The great slider debate/survey

[martin56]

How many of us suffer from SLIDER PHOBIA ??
Using a sliding float is undoubtably a great method (& indeed the only one to floatfish a deep peg say 13 foot +) but how many of us would take the easy option of feeder/ledger fishing it.?? because like me find it a toil of a pleasure.
I'm a maybe guilty of being a bit lazy & given my age (55) having never used a slider in my life & may have wasted some opportunities by not trying it.
Are you ready to bear your all on the forum ??
Martin.

(the smilie's not using a slider)

[geejayy]

love fishing slidey floats, rocky deep salt water or deep marks for pike

[martin56]

I'm in the minority so far then.
Not having a go @ the method though - i may be open to being born again.
Willing to try anything & maybe need to get my lazy arse into gear !!

[pingu]

use it most of the time piking now, rarely use alarms

dave

[BoldBear]

Theres nothing wrong with using a slider and many anglers do fine using one; but for me it doesn’t give me the same control and bite indications that I get from using a long rod and a fixed bodied waggler.

I’m not a great fan of sliding floats as in deep water I like to watch my float as the hook starts to sink and count the shot down by looking at my float tip; this often gives me a bonus fish which has taken the bait half way down.

About 15 years ago I bought myself a 17ft/20ft Annex float rod especially for fishing matches in these deeper swims and it has won and placed me in quite a few matches over the years. With the longer 20ft length I can comfortably fish a 15ft to 17ft deep swim without having to use a slider; as long as I don't have any overhead tree branches to get in the way.

Pike fishing is another story; and I often use a sliding Pike float when I am piking.

[barbelblanker]

This is a timely thread as I am about to give a VERY deep (24foot) estate lake a go for roach.
I'm considering slider, pole and feeder.
From my point of view I like to use what works and also what makes fishing enjoyable. There are times when the method would out score for tench in summer. There's just something about watching a float.... Same for legering. Personally I only watch a swing tip if there's no other method OR other methods are just plain daft. So it makes sense to watch your rod tip when bunging a lead out into a swollen river Severn when fishing a stick float in the same swim would just be daft (though not always). I guess it's like a lot of things to do with our sport. If you catch half the fish but enjoy it ten times as much, well it's your day. BoldBear makes a good point that slider floats offer less control and i would agree , less presentation. If you think about it, you need a bulk of lead to get the float to go through the eyes. You can only realistically put shot in on the last ten feet. In 30 foot of water you effectively miss out 20 feet of water till that bulk kicks in. Unless you want to wait an hour for the lead to settle on a light set up.

[barbelblanker]

Did I just give my age away and type swingtip ? Doh!!

[martin56]

Ya' mean ya've still got ya' target board as well !!!!

[barbelblanker]

:) You know what....I might have....I'm going to check. I was tempted to get a swingtip out on the end of one of my quiver rods as I still reckon they might be better for finickey roach.

One tip after the weekend and the slider attempt. use powergum, 4LB nylon just isn't man enough to stop the float....

[preadtorcrazy]

forget power gum use pole elastic its alot cheaper