The Pleasure Angle – Floatfishing the Upper Layers

Mark Hodson

An angler since he can remember, Mark Hodson almost literally lives, eats and breathes fishing. A match angler in his youth, fishing for the junior Starlets, he turned to the dark side and joined the ‘floppy hat’ brigade in his college years. He worked in the tackle trade for ten years, on a part time or full time basis at Chaplains, one of Birmingham’s busiest tackle shops and managed the specialist department there for two years.

He now fishes just for fun, although the ‘floppy specialist hat’ still dominates his angling, his writing concentrates on getting the maximum enjoyment from your angling and trying something different from the norm.

The Forgotten Arts – The Art of Floatfishing the Upper Layers

Hot and still, ideal for the floating line waggler and those unhittable bites

Whether a stickfloat or waggler is employed, whether pole or running line, whether on running water or still, it requires forethought, discipline and some knowledge of that other fast disappearing angling art, that of ‘building’ a swim through thoughtful and planned feeding.

Some may think that the splashing waggler style of fishing used on commercial carp waters may count as fishing on the drop, but to those purists like myself this is as close to fishing on the drop as chalk is to cheese.

No, here we are in the realms of watching your float slowly cock as it runs through the swim, with your bait falling slowly beneath, amongst the free offerings that have been carefully fed to coincide with the fall of your hook bait, just waiting for the next plump dace, roach or greedy chub to suck in that bait, the first signal of which you have is the failure of your float to settle as it should.

Like all the Forgotten Arts, the skills used in the catching of such fish in the upper layers are a requisite skill for those wishing to call themselves a ‘true angler’. Time spent perfecting such skills is time well spent, for the knowledge of how fish react to falling baits, and how they intercept them, and feed in the upper layers is knowledge that can be taken into every branch of the sport, fish of all species will take a falling bait, as there is nothing more natural.

Waggler fishing

Whether on moving or stillwater the same rules apply to floats and shotting when it comes to catching on the drop with a waggler. A float with a long insert can be shotted up to its shoulder with the locking shot leaving the insert to register with only a few dust shot spread out over the depth you wish to fish. Meaning that if a fish intercepts the bait prior to those dust shot registering the float will not settle past the shoulder on the float, giving a clear indication that a fish has taken the bait on the drop.

Wagglers with long inserts are a must

The trick is knowing how long it takes for those dust shot to register without a fish taking the bait.

To do this you cast your baited tackle to an area where you’re confident a bite will not occur. You do this half a dozen times counting how long it takes for the float to settle as those telltale dust shot register. Those who don’t like counting can always sing a song (not too loudly of course) noting at which point to float settles. When you then cast in your swim you know exactly how long it takes for your float to cock and how it should behave if the bait is left untouched. Anything different from the time you have noted, or the floats behaviour differs in any way should be treated as a bite.

Stickfloat fishing

Shot your stick using the traditional shirt button style with shot spaced out at equal intervals, decreasing in size as you get nearer the hook. Again before fishing in earnest learn the natural behaviour of your float in the water as it cocks.

Being fixed top and bottom style a stick float should settle gradually, tilting into a near vertical position on an axis as each shot registers. Again count how long this takes and treat anything out of the ordinary as an indication of a bite. Cane or Lignum sticks which have more buoyancy in the base are perfect for this method. You will quickly realise how many potential bites went unnoticed before you started using the method. Even if you do not intend fishing on the drop, ie, you are fishing hard on the bottom or even overdepth, five minutes learning how your tackle should behave as it travels through a swim is five minutes that will put a lot of extra fish in your net.

A question of depth

As a general rule of thumb start a couple inches off full depth and as the session progresses you may have to shallow up to follow the fish as they come higher in the water to intercept the regular feed that you will be putting into the swim. Remember the shallower you fish the quicker your float will cock, so adjust your counting (or singing) accordingly after checking the new behaviour pattern of your rig at its shallower depth.

Rudd, ideal for tempting on the drop

If you arrive at a swim to find fish active in the surface layer topping all over the place then obviously you may wish to start at half depth and adjust accordingly. It is vital to search for the fish as it never ceases to astound me how many fish will only take a bait fished at a certain depth. For example, chub will often ignore a bait six inches outside the zone in which the feed is falling through the water.

Remember that on running water feed will fall at a trajectory governed by the speed of the flow, many fish will ignore a bait that does not follow that same trajectory. That’s why I’m so sure baits with a varying density work so well when fed in a combination, say hemp and caster, or pellet and maggot together, the differing trajectories and rates of descent provide most fish with too many norms, and when the hookbait comes along somewhat hampered or aided (which ever way you wish to view it) in its descent, the fish just accept it, not having got used to a single type of bait falling through the water in a regular predictable manner.

Bring Forth the dinner gong!

The key to catching well on the drop is controlled, disciplined feeding.

As a session progresses fish will be more and more confident coming higher in the water to try and be the first to intercept the regular free meal of falling feed, signalled by the pitter-patter of the bait hitting the surface. Ideally you want the odd fish swirling at the surface seconds after the feed has entered the water with the rest of a feeding shoal following the bait down or rising to intercept the feed. What you don’t want is a scene that somewhat replicates a piranha feeding frenzy.

Although great fun and very hectic you will usually find that after 20 minutes or so you can’t buy a bite. You’ll frown, in a fashion somewhat similar to a clown whose lapel flower has ceased to shoot water, as just five minutes previously you couldn’t put a bait in the water without a fish grabbing at it, with you connecting one time out of five.

What happens is one of two things. Firstly the feeding frenzy sends fish and bait in all directions, with each fish doing its own thing. This splits the shoal, with some ending up on the deck waiting for the odd morsel that gets through the surface layers, some will do their finest flying fish impersonation getting dizzy and disorientated. The rest will stay in midwater looking up and down, caught in comatose state of indecision.

In the catapulting of a quarter pint of bait your well organised swim with disciplined feeding fish becomes an orgy of piscatorial gay abandon; trouble is that fish are very prudish and in the blink of an eye they blush at their over exposure to those factors that could compromise their very existence, and suddenly go the other way, becoming very aware and tackle shy, leaving you to start building the swim all over again.

On the drop chub heaven

Secondly, the Piranha-like feeding frenzy rings another dinner gong, this one though ends with the red stain of blood in the water as Mr Pike, or a group of large perch or zander spot an easy meal and smash into your shoal of fish feeding in the upper layers. An eruption of spray and fleeing fish, not dissimilar to a barrage of depth charges going off is the end result, with a similar consequence for your swim, leaving it empty apart from the predator with a now sated appetite.

Shoaling fish are like sheep, creatures of habit, one will follow the other in an orderly fashion if you play the right tune, at the right tempo you’ll get a nice orderly dance. Steady regular feeding will give a nice conga, with all the fish following and feeding in an orderly fashion. Feed too heavy, or irregularly, and you’ll end up with the mosh pit of swim destruction. If they do get a little out of hand cut back on the feed, or feed a bait with a greater density, which will encourage them to follow the bait down for a while. Control is the key.

Something a little different

For those who already catch on the drop out of intent, and this discourse has just been a refresher on the basics, here are two ways to improve your on-the-drop technique.

Firstly there is the method of catching on the drop where you fish a waggler with a floating line and ignore your float. He’s gone mad I hear you scream. Well I haven’t and here’s why.

Occasionally it doesn’t go to plan and you end up with those un-hittable bites from rudd and roach that leave you either grinding your teeth or looking to the heavens uttering profanities as your terminal tackle flies over your shoulder following an over enthusiastic strike, and buries itself in the nearest bramble. The trick to catching these fish is to fish a floating line, feed, then cast, and then ignore your float no-matter what it does, instead concentrate on the last 4 feet of line on the surface, only when this starts to snake away into the depths do you strike, connecting nearly every time. Obviously this works best on dead calm days and can hamper presentation, but give it a try when you start having ‘one of those days’ and you can’t hit a bite, even if it was a mosquito feeding on your backside.

Secondly, don’t forget the lead of choice for our friends on the continent, the styl weight. Their cylindrical shape gives a slower drop through the water and when using round baits such as hemp, tares and pellets will go a long way to avoiding false bites as a fish grabs a round shot believing it to be bait.

Oh, and don’t forget the Enterprise plastic baits which, being mostly buoyant, they can enable you to create the critically balanced on-the-drop rig, mimicking the freebies exactly, which is on-the-drop perfection.

Have a go, set aside a day and spend it learning, perfecting your understanding of achieving mastery of a method that will fool the wariest of fish, as there is nothing more natural than a bait falling through the water.