Aknib
Well-known member
I’m not talking about types of floats here, nor shotting patterns, I’m talking about…
Numbers!
I’m just embarking on what will no doubt be yet another journey taking several months and I’m assembling a collection of handmade river floats similar to the stillwater collections that I made three or four years ago, it’s always been the intention to add a river collection but you know how it is with time, motivation and all that.
Anyway it got me thinking, during the planning stage, of what I actually want to end up with and I reckon sixty or so floats will about cover my needs.
Now, given that half of that figure will be replicated in a black tipped variant I’m covering all of my river needs with thirty or so floats.
So why, during my many years before, did I feel the need to have two or even three times that many river floats?
Sticks, shouldered sticks, both Avon variants, lignum sticks, wire stemmed sticks, shallow water sticks (got to say they are excellent DH) double up for the black tipped equivalents and the list is just as endless as the stillwater patterns but the thing that stands out most in my mind is the incremental variety in size.
Do we really need 2 x no.4, 3 x no.4, 4 x no4 and so on?
At the cutting edge of match fishing where a fish might make the difference between a brown envelope or being an also ran then I’m inclined to think yes but on the more general pleasure fishing stage, where overthinking often leads to under enjoyment, I’m thinking no.
I’m not cutting any corners and if I genuinely believed that I needed two hundred river floats then I would set out to make them but I honestly don’t.
So what’s your take on it, do you really need so many sizes of each pattern of float?
Are you of the opinion that anything less is turning out under equipped or maybe you think you can adapt your approach to compensate?
Numbers!
I’m just embarking on what will no doubt be yet another journey taking several months and I’m assembling a collection of handmade river floats similar to the stillwater collections that I made three or four years ago, it’s always been the intention to add a river collection but you know how it is with time, motivation and all that.
Anyway it got me thinking, during the planning stage, of what I actually want to end up with and I reckon sixty or so floats will about cover my needs.
Now, given that half of that figure will be replicated in a black tipped variant I’m covering all of my river needs with thirty or so floats.
So why, during my many years before, did I feel the need to have two or even three times that many river floats?
Sticks, shouldered sticks, both Avon variants, lignum sticks, wire stemmed sticks, shallow water sticks (got to say they are excellent DH) double up for the black tipped equivalents and the list is just as endless as the stillwater patterns but the thing that stands out most in my mind is the incremental variety in size.
Do we really need 2 x no.4, 3 x no.4, 4 x no4 and so on?
At the cutting edge of match fishing where a fish might make the difference between a brown envelope or being an also ran then I’m inclined to think yes but on the more general pleasure fishing stage, where overthinking often leads to under enjoyment, I’m thinking no.
I’m not cutting any corners and if I genuinely believed that I needed two hundred river floats then I would set out to make them but I honestly don’t.
So what’s your take on it, do you really need so many sizes of each pattern of float?
Are you of the opinion that anything less is turning out under equipped or maybe you think you can adapt your approach to compensate?