Balsa & Cork Floats

I was approached by an older gentleman whilst in Scotland a few weeks ago on a fishing trip and he saw that I was using my own handmade floats which he commented on and asked if I could replicate some old floats he had in his float box that he used for worming after trout?

I had a look at the old floats he had which were almost in tatters but remember seeing something similar recently in a book so agreed to make them for the guy, and mentally noted the rough weights he wanted

I have never made anything like these floats before so a bit of experimenting was done on a smaller scale till finally I settled on the floats shown. I was amazed at the shotting pattern to settle the floats and can now see why the guy wanted them.

The river we were fishing on when we met was my old local river which has a mixture of fast deep pools and runs to shallows and the floats do take a bit of a bashing but weight is definately the key factor on the river for the worming.

The float in the middle takes an impressive 5AAA and is only 6" in length with the same circumference as a normal avon but the added cork layer makes it more bouyant. The others are both 2AAA and 5" in length.

I have yet to send them up to him for his viewing but I have definately enjoyed experimenting with different materials on the same float body.