This is part 5 in my series on stick float fishing. I've dug out an original Bruce & Walker John Dean Stick Float rod that I've owned since 1981 coupled with a Mitchell Match and John Dean stick float to fish the Dorset Stour for roach.
John Dean came to prominence in the mid 70s, mainly on the river Trent where he enjoyed huge success on the float in matches, winning Amnglers' Mail Matchman of the Year award in 1979/80 with a record points total. He was in the winning Nott's Fed. team of 1980 that dominated the 1980 Div. 1 National with a record points total, and John was rated so highly at that time it was predicted that he'd win his section more or less regardless of the peg he drew which he duly did with 12lbs of roach. The JD rods (stick float and waggler) and floats came out in about 1981 which was the year John fished for England in the World Championships at Luddington on the Warwickshire Avon.
John was a perfectionist when it came to all aspects of his fishing, keen to get the rod, floats and even a stickler for his split shot being perfect.
I've never got close to his level of success in big matches but it's no coincidence that my biggest wins (up to 200 pegs) were mostly using this rod and at least a couple using those superb floats. Furthermore, I had a great deal of success catching specimen roach using this rod and using it in preparation for this video resulted in roach of 1-14 and 1-9 (on the video).
If you want to make your own stick floats that emulate the JD ones you could do worse than copy what John did and make some with plastic stems from children's paint brush handles.
When the Trent became feeder dominated in the early 80s John packed up match fishing and turned to trout fishing with great success though he still coarse fishes. He contributed to Jim Baxter's 'The Rising Antenna' book on waggler fishing and if, as promised, Jim's book on the stick float comes out next year then I look forward to a contribution from John.
My two latest books, 'Big Roach 2' and 'Ivan Marks and the Likely Lads' are available from calmproductions.com
Негізгі бет Stick Float Fishing Part 5 - John Dean, His Influence, rods and floats
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