Thomas Turner
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Go into a modern tackle emporium and you actually have to determinedly hunt out the float section amongst batteries of carp rods, the village of erected bivvies and the food mountain of boilies. When you do find floats, if you do, there will be a pallid stock of mass produced plastic efforts, gradually gathering dust. It’s that bad, it’s such a far cry from the tackle shops of my youth (and probably yours) when hand made floats of quill and reed and cork took centre stage. But then, between 1950 and 1980, coarse fishing was float fishing…before the ubiquitous and skill disarming bolt rig blundered clumsily onto the scene. Today, I know superficially successful anglers who barely own a float, outside a controller or two, and have based all their success on reeling in victims self hooked whilst they have been asleep, on their phones or comatose in their vans. It’s dire. It’s sad. It’s not fishing.
Float fishing heaven
If you are sixty or over, it’s probable that floats are in your blood and there’s not much I’ll have to tell you, though of course, as a guide these past thirty years, practise might have made me better than some…not perfect I hope you’ll notice I did not add! You’ll possibly remember the days when a painted crow quill could be bought for four old pence, the price of a bun or an ice lolly. My go-to float between 1958 and 1964, when I lost it on a Norfolk tench, was a quill/cork bodied contraption that I worshipped and cost nearly half a crown (I’m not even going to insult you by changing that into “new” money). I’ve had my happiest times, nearly, waiting for it to vanish beneath the ripples and reflections of my childhood.
Who doesn’t love the float?
FLOAT HEROES
All my heroes growing up were float anglers, even **** Walker though we associate him with early carp techniques. A French technician over in Lancashire, working in one of the mills, taught me the use of fresh matchsticks for canal roach, knowledge I employed sixty years on with great success during my last seasons on the Wensum. Brian showed me how to lay on for roach on the Dane, that sumptuous little river, winding through rural Cheshire. I’d cycle miles out of my way to watch Benny Ashurst when news got out he was fishing a canal on my patch (the legend was that he could feed so brilliantly he could actually coax the roach out of the water to feed on the tow path…but I never witnessed that!).
As a teenager, I fished with Ivan Marks when he came down to practise on the river Wensum and caught more big roach than was polite or I had previously believed possible. He was a better stick float angler than either Jimmy Sapey or Jimmy Hendry, both veteran Norfolk men who I hero worshipped, but not by much. The very first trot I saw Jimmy H make resulted in a roach of 2.11. He was that good. But back then, everyone float fished, even the one time record carp fell to Albert Buckley fishing a float on a reservoir. The whole concept of the quivertip, for example, was completely foreign in the 1970s. Until the Persuader came along, a Marks/Marlowe affair I believe, John Wilson and I actually made our own quiver tips from adapted glass Avon blanks. They were rubbish and we went back to the float.
Float action
FLOAT APPEAL
Many of us will have grown up in The Float Age, when the top anglers fished the float on the Trent, the Thames, the Avon, the Witham and everywhere else there were fish. Now it is The Bolt Rig Age BUT very many of us don’t fully go along with the change. At the very least, 50% of my guiding clients want to catch fish on the float and that percentage is arguably greater than I have allowed. Barbel, chub, grayling, tench, roach, carp, it really doesn’t matter what the quarry, very many of us want the visual thrill of the float and the challenge that goes with fishing it. Bolt rigs demand technique and no skill: float fishing requires both and that is want many of us want.
Float action
Even if a float does not go under, it is a glorious thing to watch on a serene day by the water. A blank bolt rig day is day of life lost. A blank float day is a day of different pleasures. Yes, you can buy machine made plastic but why do that when there are float masters at work. Andy Field, Ian Lewis, Paul Cook and many more make floats that you never tire of, that become family. Yes, they cost more but, in truth, how many floats do you lose in a season? I’m out every day and thus far in 2022, I’ve seen two go AWOL. I can stomach that loss for the pleasure these little masterpieces bring.
Who doesn’t love the float?
FLOAT TACKLE
Rods and Reels…pin or not to pin? On rivers and close in on stills, most of the time I personally go pin. It’s not affectation. I truly believe that control is enhanced both working a float and when playing a fish. It’s not by much but fine lines are often present in any sport..ask Nadal and Federer. It’s your choice but if you have a pin or if you are thinking of buying a pin then I think perseverance with it will bring pleasure and eventually better results. I’m not a purist though and I’ll confess my limitations..I use a line guard these days and I can’t really Wallis cast. Shock horror but there it is..
Who doesn’t love the float?
Rods…well I’m clearly going to head up the new Thomas Turner Classic+ duo. Both the 13’ and 14’ are unbelievably joyful to work with. I say “unbelievably” because when I met John Wilson in his Norwich shop fifty years ago, we thought a 12 foot glass rod we made then would be as good as you’d ever get. And now these creations, rods that sing to your fishing soul. I won’t labour the point but Santa is coming…
Thomas Turner Classic+ 13ft float
Bliss – TT Classic+ 13ft float rod
Next, we’ll look at trotting rivers, something I’m good at…but with serious limitations.
The post Conjuring Up Coarse Magic – The Lost Art Of The Float – Part One appeared first on Thomas Turner Fishing Antiques.
Continue reading...
Float fishing heaven
If you are sixty or over, it’s probable that floats are in your blood and there’s not much I’ll have to tell you, though of course, as a guide these past thirty years, practise might have made me better than some…not perfect I hope you’ll notice I did not add! You’ll possibly remember the days when a painted crow quill could be bought for four old pence, the price of a bun or an ice lolly. My go-to float between 1958 and 1964, when I lost it on a Norfolk tench, was a quill/cork bodied contraption that I worshipped and cost nearly half a crown (I’m not even going to insult you by changing that into “new” money). I’ve had my happiest times, nearly, waiting for it to vanish beneath the ripples and reflections of my childhood.
Who doesn’t love the float?
FLOAT HEROES
All my heroes growing up were float anglers, even **** Walker though we associate him with early carp techniques. A French technician over in Lancashire, working in one of the mills, taught me the use of fresh matchsticks for canal roach, knowledge I employed sixty years on with great success during my last seasons on the Wensum. Brian showed me how to lay on for roach on the Dane, that sumptuous little river, winding through rural Cheshire. I’d cycle miles out of my way to watch Benny Ashurst when news got out he was fishing a canal on my patch (the legend was that he could feed so brilliantly he could actually coax the roach out of the water to feed on the tow path…but I never witnessed that!).
As a teenager, I fished with Ivan Marks when he came down to practise on the river Wensum and caught more big roach than was polite or I had previously believed possible. He was a better stick float angler than either Jimmy Sapey or Jimmy Hendry, both veteran Norfolk men who I hero worshipped, but not by much. The very first trot I saw Jimmy H make resulted in a roach of 2.11. He was that good. But back then, everyone float fished, even the one time record carp fell to Albert Buckley fishing a float on a reservoir. The whole concept of the quivertip, for example, was completely foreign in the 1970s. Until the Persuader came along, a Marks/Marlowe affair I believe, John Wilson and I actually made our own quiver tips from adapted glass Avon blanks. They were rubbish and we went back to the float.
Float action
FLOAT APPEAL
Many of us will have grown up in The Float Age, when the top anglers fished the float on the Trent, the Thames, the Avon, the Witham and everywhere else there were fish. Now it is The Bolt Rig Age BUT very many of us don’t fully go along with the change. At the very least, 50% of my guiding clients want to catch fish on the float and that percentage is arguably greater than I have allowed. Barbel, chub, grayling, tench, roach, carp, it really doesn’t matter what the quarry, very many of us want the visual thrill of the float and the challenge that goes with fishing it. Bolt rigs demand technique and no skill: float fishing requires both and that is want many of us want.
Float action
Even if a float does not go under, it is a glorious thing to watch on a serene day by the water. A blank bolt rig day is day of life lost. A blank float day is a day of different pleasures. Yes, you can buy machine made plastic but why do that when there are float masters at work. Andy Field, Ian Lewis, Paul Cook and many more make floats that you never tire of, that become family. Yes, they cost more but, in truth, how many floats do you lose in a season? I’m out every day and thus far in 2022, I’ve seen two go AWOL. I can stomach that loss for the pleasure these little masterpieces bring.
Who doesn’t love the float?
FLOAT TACKLE
Rods and Reels…pin or not to pin? On rivers and close in on stills, most of the time I personally go pin. It’s not affectation. I truly believe that control is enhanced both working a float and when playing a fish. It’s not by much but fine lines are often present in any sport..ask Nadal and Federer. It’s your choice but if you have a pin or if you are thinking of buying a pin then I think perseverance with it will bring pleasure and eventually better results. I’m not a purist though and I’ll confess my limitations..I use a line guard these days and I can’t really Wallis cast. Shock horror but there it is..
Who doesn’t love the float?
Rods…well I’m clearly going to head up the new Thomas Turner Classic+ duo. Both the 13’ and 14’ are unbelievably joyful to work with. I say “unbelievably” because when I met John Wilson in his Norwich shop fifty years ago, we thought a 12 foot glass rod we made then would be as good as you’d ever get. And now these creations, rods that sing to your fishing soul. I won’t labour the point but Santa is coming…
Thomas Turner Classic+ 13ft float
Bliss – TT Classic+ 13ft float rod
Next, we’ll look at trotting rivers, something I’m good at…but with serious limitations.
The post Conjuring Up Coarse Magic – The Lost Art Of The Float – Part One appeared first on Thomas Turner Fishing Antiques.
Continue reading...