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Pike Float making

Don Corleone

Don Corleone nearly had a fit the last time he saw what they were charging for floats in the tackle shop. "£2.50 for that," he roared at the poor bloke behind the counter. "That's more than a f*'cking pint."

Balsa pencils are a versatile tool for dead-baiting on still waters of all sizes, and slow-moving drains and rivers.

Home-made versions cost a fraction of the price of shop bought floats. And they're more durable as well. The swivels don't pull out the first time you use them and the paint doesn't crack off as soon as you cast them out. With a little trial and error, you can tailor them to the waters you fish.

Balsa dowel is sold in a range of thicknesses at most model or craft shops. Avoid the really light-coloured wood, which has an almost fluffy texture, and can be crumbled with the fingernails.

If you only intend to make a few floats, use the 1cm diameter wood.

After much trial and error over the years, I generally make floats of around two approximate sizes: ~

A 5 or 6" length of this will support a small deadbait and a small Fox egg sinker fished off bottom, or a bigger bait like a joey or sardine and a couple of swanshots.

A 8 or 10" length is ideal for laying on with three or four swanshots, or a medium egg sinker resting on the bottom.

Here's how to make them step by step:

1/ Cut the balsa to length with a sharp craft knife.

2/ Sand the ends to round them off slightly.

3/ Make a hole in the base around half a cm in depth, using a nail. Carefully push it in, without splitting the wood.

4/ Glue a swivel into this with Araldite Rapid, and smear glue around the base to give it extra strength.

Tip: It's also worth putting a drop of glue on the eye of the swivel where it goes into the barrel. This seals it and prevents water seeping in, which will make the wood expand and quickly crack the varnish off.

5/ When the glue is dry, sand the float to ensure the surface is smooth.

6/ Apply two coats of yacht varnish. Allow the first to dry completely and lightly sand the float before applying the second.

7/ Apply two coats of matt base white to the tip.

8/ When this is dry, apply a coat of fluorescent blaze, red or orange.

Tip: Some people can see the red better than the orange. If making floats in quantity, it is worth giving some of them black tips, which can be seen best of all on some days.

Fishing pencils is dead easy. Shorter ones are better for suspended baits. Always attach them to the line via a snap-link swivel, so you can change floats without breaking your rig down. That way you can switch from fishing off the bottom to laying on in a few seconds, without having to waste time tackling up again.

If you expect to be ringing the changes with different baits, use three or four swan shot to cock the float. Just add or subtract shot as required, to allow for different sizes or weight of bait.

Some people add a few cms of thin silicone to home-made traces. If you pinch the weights on this, you can move them up and down the trace without damaging the wire.

Longer floats are better for laying on. If the depth is set correctly, they should keel over and lie flat on a slack line, but sit up nicely cocked when the rod is put in the rests and the line is tightened.

You'll usually find a foot or so over is all it takes. With the anchor weight rigged 18" or so from the bait, this is the most sensitive way of fishing a static bottom bait.

As soon as a fish takes it moves the lead. The float usually keels over and lies flat, in the time-honoured lift bite, before moving away.

You can lay on in moving water as long as you cast the rig upstream. Just adjust the depth to take account of the flow. The faster it's moving, the more over-depth you will need to be, although the method will not work in really heavy flows . In slower moving drains and rivers, however, the current will tighten the rig for you. As the flow drives the float against the stop knot, it should stand up.

You can also lay on with a popped-up bait, adjusting the distance between anchor weight and the bait to vary the distance it rises off the bottom.

Slimmer (ie half cm diameter...) balsa is more fragile, but it has its uses. Longer, thinner floats are useful for beating surface skim and waves on open, windswept waters. A foot-long float might look excessive, but thin balsa is extremely sensitive. It won't budge when the waves are crashing over it but it'll soon disappear when anything takes a shine to your bait.

Thicker balsa is far more buoyant. It makes useful livebaiting floats, if you insert a 6" cane stem into a three or four-inch section of it and whip an eve on the bottom. Fish them bottom-end only, but make sure you use floating braid or greased mono, to stop the bait swimming up over the top of sunk line, which is asking for a tangle or a bite-off.

Before I forget, here's a shopping list. Just about everything can be bought from either a hobby/craft shop, or Do-It-All, B&Q etc:

Balsa dowel in 1cm thickness (or half cm or 2cm for more specialised floats at the end...)

swivels - buy the cheap sea snood ones, or keep them from discarded traces

Araldite Rapid

yacht varnish (you can use matt, Cuprinol etc, but it's more costly...)

base white or matt white enamel paint

fluorescent blaze, orange or red paint

brushes and brush cleaner

And then there is Polyballs

Polyballs. They cost an arm and a leg if you buy them from a tackle shop.  Get along to your nearest craft shop and you can get several useful sizes for a few pence each. The inch-diameter make useful ball bobs for roving lives. They're also buoyant enough to support a paternostered livie.  Bore a hole through the ball with a needle and push an inch or so of biro tube through the middle. This stops the line cutting into the polystyrene and splitting it. Polystyrene has one small snag. It dissolves if you paint enamel paint onto it. Give it two or three coats of a water-based emulsion or blackboard paint first, then apply the matt white/fluorescent for the top.

 Easy or what..?