Stones for thought

[Maddison_Twatter]

I read an interesting article in the anglers mail today.
Basically one of the columnists said when hes goes ledger fishing he hardly ever uses actual leads but instead takes a pack of snap link swivels and super glue, he uses the glu to stick the swivel to a stone.
He then gets to choose the weight, shape and colour of the stone according to his preferences/river/lake bed. He also goes on to say the swivel normally breaks off under 3lbs of force which makes it great if the stone gets snagged as the force of the fight will just pull it free.
any thoughts ?

[fishypaul]

mmmm .. interesting stuff

[geejayy]

i most definately wouldnt trust it for beach casting

[Maddison_Twatter]

Its more a method for still waters and small rivers nt sea

[BoldBear]

They sell Stone leger weights in my local tackleshop. they are supposed to be great for using in clear shallow water for Barbel who shy away from normal leger weights; especially if they stand out or glint in the sun.

This season I’m intending to use them to try to catch a particularly shy Barbel of around 11 to 13lbs who seems to have paired up with a double figure carp in a local stream where night fishing is not allowed.

Last season I tried to catch the Barbel but it seemed to be very suspicious of my weight and my line coming off the bottom especially as the stream is very clear and fairly shallow and the Barbel and the Carp were feeding right under the rod tip at my feet.

Each time they entered the swim they would hoover up any loosefeed but totally ignore my baited hook and seemed to shy away at my small weight and/or my line above my leger weight.

I am going to try a stone leger weight together with 18” to 24” of soft artificial weed on the line above the lead and lower the bait slowly onto the river-bed then lower my rod-tip and sit and wait for them to arrive.

The weight I’m going to try is just a stone with a swivel glued into a hole drilled into its side; bought from my local tackleshop.

The soft artificial weed is also sold in my local tackle shop, for the Carp men, and consists of soft green filaments based around a soft hollow centre and kept from collapsing with a couple of sliding float rubbers up the line.

Has anyone else tried these Stone weights and/or the soft plastic weed filaments?.

[firemantim30]

Pallatrax wrote an article for my website which may be worth a read if your thinking of trying the 'Stonze'from the tackle shop. Personally I have used stones off the river bed attached by a link swivel hooked under an elastic band wound around the stone. Holds really well and comes of when it gets snagged up. The advantage this has given me, particularly when fishing meat with the hook burried, is that you can cast into extremely snaggy areas without fear of actually getting snagged. I don't claim to be the inventor, I pinched the ideas from a book by barbel guru Steve Stayner!

[Baz T]

I watched a TV fishing programme, and John Bailey was fishing a river for barbel, and he had prepared some stone weights with swivels attached by using araldite and they seemed to work very well. I was thinking of trying similar in weedy or snaggy areas, rigged so that the weight comes off easy - and also I was thinking of trying it out on a zig rig, so that the weight comes off after fish is hooked which will make it easier to play the fish etc as the weight is sometimes quite a distance from the hook. Its cheaper to lose a stone and swivel than fork out for loads of lead weights. I keep old spark plugs and nuts n bolts for my lad to use when rock fishing too. Then again I may just be an old skinflint.