Shot, patterns and locking??

[Comfortably_Numb]

I realise shotting patterns get asked a lot of the time ... but having read this brilliant thread here http://www.fishingmagic.com/forums/coarse-fishing/20777-shot-locked-waggler-float.html and in particular quoted post below ..... Does anyone else shot their wagglers this way, think this way?? .... The original post quoted below was from 2006 and many who contributed to the thread no longer seem to be members

Well, I'm going to go against all the rest of you (Ron excepted) and state that the conventional waggler/locking shot is an abomination 90 percent of the time.

I'll start by explaining when it does work. This is when you are attempting to catch fish which are feeding up in the water. How often that is depends on what sort of fish you are after; for me, it's only when I am specifically trying to catch roach or rudd from lakes in summer - and only then when I know they are not feeding on the bottom - or when fishing the far bank of a canal.

In any other situation I'll be fishing for tench, bream, carp, crucians or roach, and expecting them to be feeding on or very close to the bottom. Now I cannot see the logic of chucking out a rig which means the bait takes up to thirty seconds to reach the bottom, just on the off chance that a stunted roach might grab the bait on the way down.

OK, you can put a bulk shot three feet or so from the hook to speed things up, but then the old argument about a concentrated weight for casting starts to look a bit shaky. Using a heavier float so the locking shot is at least 75 percent of the total is one way round the problem; I prefer to fix a peacock quill straught to the line with a wide tight fitting float band and put almost all the shot a couple of feet or so from the hook, with just a single tell tale below. The weight of the float is tiny by comparison, so the bulk of the weight is still concentrated for casting.

Once you start fishing this way other advantages start to leap out and grab you. You can use a smaller float for a start. The whole set-up is much more stable and resists drift far better. You can cast close up to weedbeds, trees, lilies or whatever and the shot will land first, taking the bait straight down; the float will tend to slide across the surface before cocking directly above the shot rather than pull the bait away from where you want it to go.

Finally, should the fish begin to feed higher in the water you can slide the bulk shot up under the float and achieve the same effect as with locking shot.

Sometimes I think anglers must want to complicate things.

 

[tigger]

The drennan floats have interchangable weights on their self cockers so allow you to decide how much weight you want down the line. I often use their loaded floats attatched via a float adaptor and locked into position via float/leger stops. This makes sliding the float up and down the line trouble free and still gives weight at the float for casting.

 

[peter crabtree]

Fred Blake...

Didn't he excel at fishing with bread flake?

 

[robtherake]

Fred Blake...

Didn't he excel at fishing with bread flake?

Very good! Mr. Spooner would be well pleased with that one.

---------- Post added at 21:34 ---------- Previous post was at 21:19 ----------

I use these little devices rather a lot. It saves messing around with locking shot or rubber gadgetry and they simply don't move. The lighter one adds negligible weight and the heavy one is used with floats so substantial that its weight barely matters. It finally ended my fruitless search for a make of shot that's grippy enough to lock a float, yet easy enough to close with finger pressure. None have passed the test: they can't match lead shot in any respect. Out of all the ones I've tried I rate the rugby ball-shaped Anchor shot the best. The increase in surface area over round shot definitely gives better grip on the line and they can be pinched on without having to risk your tooth enamel.
Float connector 9159, Fishing tackle for fishing

Float connector Cralusso - flat, Fishing tackle for fishing

The lighter adaptor would work with the method Fred describes, adding negligible weight to a light float. Incidentally, I used the exact method many years ago to catch perch which wouldn't stray far from some semi-submerged trees. It was right at the beginning of my angling career and came about because none of us knew anything about shotting a float properly and had never heard of - let alone seen - a waggler, little perch bobs being the order of the day, with shot bulked at three-quarters depth. I'm surprised, though, that I've been overlooking such a stunningly simple technique. Must've unlearnt it along with the other million or so things that've been forgotten.

 

[Keith M]

The waggler fished as we know it was around before the seventies and certainly wasn't invented by Smith and Giles who didn't win the '71 Severn National (Leicester did!). It seems more likely an Ashurst (Benny and Kevin) development, similar methods were in wide use on the fenland rivers in the 60s.

The great advantage of the locking shot method is that when fished right it should rarely tangle (1/2 inch gap between the shot helps) and it also casts and fishes better. Simplicity is the key. Loaded floats don't ride the water the same on moving water. Most of this comes from the immense amount of practice that has gone into waggler fishing in the last 40 years. If there was better way we'd all use it.

Peter Stone was alluding to a method that was (and still is) effective on the Thames from Oxford up where it isn't too wide ie within casting and feeding distance where skilful use of a waggler is used to present the bait tight against the far bank bushes for chub. The feeder hadn't taken over then so very accurate casting was required with very little shot down the line. Walker had no experience of this style. The waggler evolving on wider waters like the Trent and Severn was initially more for roach and dace but later for chub and barbel as well.

The float attachments described to me seem to impede casting and are prone to tangles. I've had the privilege of watching the finest waggler anglers (Palmer, Perry, Dean, Ashurst, Marks, Lane, Giles et al) and they all used the simple locking method; with today's Anchor double cut there is no problem damaging the line and you can always lock it onto very fine pole rubber.

I agree with what Mark Wintle wrote above, read it, it makes a lot of sense.

Locking bulk shot at the base of a waggler is used for a very good reason and it has been proved over the years by hundreds and thousands of our best all round float anglers.

Yes for fishing fairly 'close in', or if you are trying to beat a strong surface drift, a bulk shot which is lower down in the sub-flow can be excellent but if you are casting more than a couple of rod lengths out or further and need to fish right up tight against features (lilies, far banks etc) and you need very accurate casts and you also want to minimise tangles then in my book the bulk shot around the base of the float is definately the way to go.
I often use semi-loaded 'Onion' wagglers which reduces the number of bulk shot that I need to add around the base and also makes the float fly truer and straighter through the air, without the typical waggle that gave the waggler its name.

Yes I know that hard shot can damage your line if you pinch it on too tightly but as long as you don't pinch them on too tightly (or you pinch them over pole float rubbers) this is fairly rare.
I may have been lucky but I can't remember a single time that I have lost a fish because of bulk shot cutting into my line and I have been fishing the waggler regularly for approaching 50 years. (famous last words LOL.)

Keith.

 

[rubio]

I occasionally use the Cralusso attachments for heavy floats when casting further out, but tend to stick with locking shot as I did when I first started all those years ago. Line damage is minimal imo if you are using the right size float in the first place. Trying to power a light waggler thro wind or just too far out is the moment shot start slipping and the temptation is often to squeeze shot a little harder. Typically I lock my locking shot with stotz either side which I trust to slide if put on properly in the first instance. The heavier shot are put on so that they deliberately slip. I change depth and shotting frequently in a single session, usually when trying to keep in touch with roach, so I want some flexibility.
Incidentally i bought some rugby ball Anchor shot some time ago and found them to be amongst the worst I've ever used. Bad batch maybe, or yet another example of different strokes........