FUN ON THE FLOAT!
It’s the float no big-fish river angler should leave home without
Martin Bowler reveals why there’s nothing better than catching big fish on the float now!
I’M often asked what’s my favourite float. On running water, without question, it’s the Drennan Crystal Loafer, the big-fish indicator of choice for most of the specimen fraternity.
I’ve lost count of the times the bulbous fluorescent tip has dragged under to signal a bite to remember.
Depending on size, its versatility extends to suspending a livebait for perch or supporting a delicate pinch of bread flake for roach.
I recall when the float’s creator, Peter Drennan, steered a Loafer downstream in fast, shallow, boily water with a bunch of maggots in tow. The barbel shoal holding up behind a sunken pile of bricks a few yards downstream couldn’t resist a moving bait, so while a static feeder failed to bring a bite, every trot down with the float brought a response.
Then there was the time when I scoffed at the late, great Terry Lampard for his agricultural shotting pattern and a float close to the size you would use for pike. I thought I was being clever, using a stick float on the Stour, but for an hour nothing materialised.
Lamps suggested a loafer so finally, somewhat begrudgingly, I put one on.
First trot down and it buried, because now I was offering a stable hookbait behaving in a natural way. Heavy shotting patterns achieve this, and provided the Loafer is cocked down correctly it offers no more resistance than any other pattern. Since that day the Loafer has been my ‘go-to’ chub float.
Two more wonderful memories have recently been added to a growing list. The first was when the legendary Hampshire Avon drew me to her banks. Months of high levels and murky water were over, and the river had donned her early-summer mantle.
The new season had seen anglers return with their Loafers to long trot for chub, and I walked the banks with the same float attached to my line. This, though, was the only thing I had in common with them because my rod was a 1¾lb test curve Drennan model and the mainline 12lb Syncro XT.
A 5SSG loafer was cocked by bulk shot three-quarters of the way down, followed by a dropper shot and a 12ins hooklength ending in a size 2 Kamasan B175 heavy trout hook.
What on earth was I after with that little lot? Carefully I threaded a dyed red shrimp preserved in salt down the hook shank so the point exited at its throat.
I straightened the bait so it looked as natural as possible, then flicked it out into the pool at my feet. The Loafer searched the swim for a monster, but this time there were none.
I suspected some legwork might change things, so I moved downstream. On the umpteenth cast I pushed the Loafer up to 8ft, knowing that 10ft of water lay downstream, and line peeled off the reel as the float followed the boulder-strewn course of the near bank. The turbulence caused by the first rock pushed the shrimp upwards, and a pair of snapping jaws smashed the shell in two.
The Loafer signalled the take to me and I swept the rod sideways as it registered a series of heavy thumps. Adrenaline coursed through my veins as I realised I had found what I’d been looking for – an Atlantic salmon from the Hampshire Avon, and a super-rare creature in a year of a very sparse run.
I prayed for the hook to hold while the fish embarked on a series of demented runs but eventually, to my huge relief, it was safely in the net.
I doubted that the Loafer could give me a more memorable bite all year, but that didn’t stop me trying a couple of days later...
The mighty Wye offers the chance of a salmon, but barbel were my target on this trip. In front of the swim was a bed of ranunculus, with a gravel bottom just behind it. Here I used a bait dropper to lay down a bed of Sticky Ellipse pellets and draw the barbel out of cover.
My centrepin reel loaded with 8lb Series 7 line was matched to a 1¼lb test curve rod. The Loafer, of course, was my float of choice, again bulk-shotted at threequarters depth. A BB served as the dropper, as I would be holding back hard and didn’t want the bait fluttering off the bottom.
A banded pellet and size 10 Super Specialist Barbel hook completed the tackle.
Casting ‘Thames style’, I dropped the float at the head of the ranunculus and watched it wobble off downstream, pulling line from the reel.
The tip didn’t so much pop as simply drag under to an aggressive barbel bite, and this was repeated a dozen or more times under the late afternoon sun.
None of those barbel were big, but what fun they were to catch – another species to the Loafer, and I’m already wondering if grayling, perch and roach are going to add to the list this year.
If you’re heading to the river, don’t leave home without one!