UK Coarse
Float · Technique journey
A buoyant, thick-topped river float for heavier water than a stick will hold. Chub, barbel on a trot, and a crease with some pace — after 16 June.
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An Avon carries more shot than a stick and sits more stably in pace or a downstream wind. You still trot, mend, and hold back; you just do it with a float that does not drown every time the crease pulls.
It is a 16 June method on rivers in England and Wales. Use it when the stick is a passenger, not as a stillwater waggler.
Open-season rivers with pace. Chub under a tree. A heavier barbel trot. Downstream wind.
Stillwaters. A gentle crease that a stick will hold — the Avon looks crude there. The close season.
From the graph
Bait
Maggots
The universal bait. If you could only have one thing in the bag for a mixed UK stillwater or canal, maggots would still be the answer.
Bait
Bread
Flake
Bait
Worms
Dendrobaenas, lobs and redworms. Perch, bream, tench and a bonus eel. The bait that still works when fashion has moved on.
Bait
Hemp
Cooked hempseed. A holding bait for roach, a bed for barbel, and the reason tares still exist.
A starting point, not a shopping list you have to finish. Match the water in front of you.
12–13ft float rod, 3000 reel, 3–5lb line, a float you can actually see, fine hooklength.
On the peg
Maggots, hemp, or a bit of bread and meat for chub, on the line the float will travel.
Top-and-bottom rubbers, enough shot to sit it, a bulk if you must, a dropper near the hook.
A heavier crease, under the far bush, the run off a weir where it is safe and allowed.
Trotting, held to lift, or tripping the bottom for chub and barbel.
Pick an Avon that holds. Five trots for depth. Then stay on that line.
Pace, colour after rain, a bit of wind. Low gin-clear glides still want a stick and hemp.
Open season. Read the pace, pick a float that holds, feed the run, and trot it. Mend. Hold in front of the bush. Strike downstream and up.
Starting routine
0–10 min
Get a bait in the water on the line you intend to fish. Do not search the whole venue in ten minutes.
10–30 min
Maggots, hemp, or a bit of bread and meat for chub, on the line the float will travel.
30–60 min
If nothing, change one thing — depth, bait or spot — not three. Read the troubleshooting on this page.
A hold-under, a sail-away, a melt. Chub are not shy on an Avon.
Downstream and up, in contact.
Net anything with size or spines. Wet hands, unhook, return. A photograph is optional; the fish in the water is not.
An Avon on a stillwater. A stick in water that wants an Avon. River in May.
Still drowning: heavier Avon, or this is a feeder peg. Skating: you are holding too hard.
Beginner setup
A 6–8g Avon, maggot, a crease with some pace after 16 June.
More advanced
Change depth, bait or feed before you change peg.
No linked on-the-bank problems for this method yet.
Catches
Nobody has shared a catch using this technique yet. When someone does, it will show up here — we do not invent anglers or photos.