THE ITALIAN
WHIP FLOAT
The pencil whip
float has been around for a long time, however it is so
underestimated in its use. This float was re-introduced to me when
fishing in the World Championships in Italy 1992. It was so devastating
in its application when catching fish at speed, so much so that I have
been collecting a large range of sizes of this smart float .
As I was watching in ore at the Italian team
practising this great little float, I couldn't perceive how affective
this float was, until I tried it myself. I was amased to see the
Italian team anglers catching at the rate of six to seven fish a minute.
I also had a helping hand from an extremely
good angler, a local man who had fished internationals for Italy, Mr
Emilo Hugio. He showed me how to set the float and work it in the swim,
so I could catch upto six fish in a minute, cosisting of small roach,
bleak and sunfish.
This float and its application of the method
is perhaps the quickest way I know of catching fish at speed.
With results back home of many 30lb + bags of bleak from the
River Wye and double figure bags of gudgeon from the Warwick Avon as
testimonials.
The float is a tapered flat top balsa
construction with a small wire base and a nylon tip bristle, the secret
is the way the float is shotted and fished in the swim.
Having been given a few rigs by my friends in
the International field, I have ripped them apart and analysed the
theory behind the set-up and how they work, they are so simple
and yet so affective in the way they are shotted, in fact the shotting
pattern are almost tangle free.
The float is shotted down to its nylon
bristle, with a bulk or olivette only six inches away from the hook.
Between the bulk/olivette to the hook are twenty number twelve split
shots aand a loop to loop hooklength attachment.
The reason and the theory for so many split
shots become apparent when you use the method, the line below the
olivette is always weighted and lays the line straight when flipping
the weight of the float back into the swim when a bite is missed.
As the float settle's in the water and a bite
is detected, the float is struck upwards a few inches and you can feel
the fish on the line, if however you do not feel the fish on the line,
the float is simply flipped back or settles back in the swim without
the bait or the rig coming out of the water, allowing more time in the
water to attract a fish.
A technique that needs to be practised, but
yet a difinite winner on the day. Other tips for speed fishing includes
hooking the maggot point first, so the maggot is crawling up the hook
and line, also by pulling the maggot above the spade, it stops it from
falling down into the bend of the hook.
Catching upto fifty fish on the same maggot
is the aim, the less time wasted on re-baiting and recasting the more
efficient one becomes, which accounts for more fish in the net.
THE ITALIAN
WHIP FLOAT
