Bamboo winders

[Kirpan]

Yes, the top of the blue float is quill and cotton wool, and the address is W . RAMSBOTTOM , 10 North John Street, LIVERPOOL, I would love to have seen what the rest of the tackle

[Vole]

Just checked North John St. on google maps, There's a blind wall, very governmental-looking, between nos.6 and 14. Rather sad.
It's just round the corner from the Cavern club, which even I have heard of!

[edit] - Little things like the square section rings always set me off pondering - they were probably cut from drawn tube, but for what purpose? - I'd bet they weren't manufactured primarily as float rings. The whippings look very homespun, so I think they were an after-purchase (more likely after-plucking for supper) addition, though the folded-back strip of quill "skin" to hold the ring is absolutely right for the time.

[Kirpan]

I just measured the rings and they are 5.8mm dia , 0.87mm thick and one is 1mm wide and the other 0.9 mm, I certaintly wouldn't want to cut them off a tube

[Nobby]

I've heard back from Jeff Della Mura, sorry it took so long, I had to convert the image to a JPEG,....

He thinks the float might be 18th century! Congratulations!

10 North John Street is one of 5 ventilation stations for the Queensway Birkenhead Tunnel opened in 1933, so any tackle shop there would have to pre-date the Station. The station is now a Grade 2 listed building.


But he also traded nearby:





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[Kirpan]

What the blue one ? !!

[Nobby]

Sorry, no the floats on the bamboo winders you first showed.

[Kirpan]

Still , WOW !!

[Vole]

Absolutely: wow!
This shows us how carefully our forbears were thinking about their fishing; for these floats were probably designed long before reels of any sort were available, yet they are of complex design.

Why?

Well, to put forward an idea: if you browse through the discussions of modern pole-anglers, as soon as they start talking about whips, the debate enlarges to not only consider how the float behaves in the water, but, since it has to be cast (or at least swung) out, in the air.
Carbon, glass, cane or wire stems? Bodies: high or low? Double rubber or bottom-only attachment?
The same - or similar - questions must have been aired when these wooden-based quills were made, for it's certainly simpler to just use a quill with a dab of paint on the tip, so we're left wondering exactly what the ancients were striving for.

Of course, other ideas are available and probably better, but I'm still only on the first (instant) coffee of the day...

The real joy of it is this: the only way to gain an insight (short of stumbling across letters between anglers and tackle-dealers of the day) is to knock up some copies, break out the four-metre whip, and see why these tasty artefacts work better than a quill fresh from the bird - an excuse to go fishing!
And if the weather's too nasty, to natter about it on forums!

[Nobby]

I must admit I was very struck by the similarities between these floats and Sixties 'stick floats' with a heavier wood lower half and a buoyant upper. Might these old ones have been designed to trot a section of flowing water as long as the pole would allow?
Jeff has sent me an image of some very similar floats even down to the whipped quill caps.


They certainly seem to have been trying to concentrate the buoyancy in the upper area of the float body without creating a float that is actually heavy...it sort of suggests quick bites up in the water....roach fishing??

I can hear old Jack talking about the angler hauled before the Beak for being abroad in the early hours and released immediately the moment His Honour heard the man was a roach fisher....

[Paul D]

I can hear old Jack talking about the angler hauled before the Beak for being abroad in the early hours and released immediately the moment His Honour heard the man was a roach fisher....

Cor!! I remember that Nobby, think the exact words he used when asked why he was out at that hour was: "Sir, I am a roach fisher" Brilliant, well done Nobby