Swingtip - a disappearing method?

[Pangolin]

As a returnee to angling, after nearly twenty years away, I've noticed that nobody seems to mention using swingtips any more. Is this because of bite-alarms, or better quivertips, or do a lot of people still use swingtips?

[Peter Waller]

Strange that you should ask that! I actually dug out a swing-tip last summer. Very effective and very enjoyable technique, perhaps due for a revival? But I think, with the advent of the quiver, its use has become rather more specialised.

[fenboy]

I grew up in the Fens and in the 60s when I was a kid the rivers and drains were lined every weekend by match anglers, nearly all of whom were swingtipping for bream. Naturally, that had an influence on me and I learnt to leger rather sooner than I would have done otherwise, I guess.

Swingtipping was, and is, a great method for bream. It gives the bream a chance to take the bait and swim off with it before feeling resistance. You can ignore the initial twitches and only strike when it literally swings away. Lovely memories.

Remember, though, that bream dominated match fishing in the 60s in the sluggush venues in East Anglia because there had been a nationwide roach disease. Also, matches were very much individual affairs rather than team events, so it was win-or-bust and pounds and ounces were what counted. Team fishing didn't take off until the rules for the National Championships were changed so that it wasn't total team weight that counted, but points for each team member's placing in his section. This meant a big penalty for anglers who blanked, so "team orders" meant ensuring you didn't end up with a dry net. It was better to weigh in a few grammes of bleak than risk catching nothing by going for broke on bream.

Today, of course, even on the Fens, match anglers tend to target smaller fish.

I daresay swingtipping would be a great pleasure method, though. I don't fish the Fens for bream any more, but when I used to do a lot, I would bait up heavily the evening before, then turn up at first light. Best bait was a big lump of bread flake on a size 10, 8 or even 6! But if you wanted to catch after about 9am you would have to scale down.

The disadvantage of the swingtip is that it is ineffective on flowing water and in very windy weather. On those occasions the quivertip always wins.

Hope that helps any young anglers who haven't got a clue what a swingtip is.

[malevans]

I use my swing tip, not frequently because i don't do that type of fishing very often, just a few times a year, but if i am targeting tench then thats what i use because.........i like it.

[Peter Waller]

Interesting reply that Fenboy. I used to fish the Witham area back in the sixties. Always remember the interest it caused when I ledgered, Broads style, on the Fossdyke. It was, and is the way we fish for bream on the Broadland rivers. I never did find out what they thought of my two hook rigs. Not only ledgering but I was also using the new, as it was then, ABU 505! No mockery, some top match anglers sat and watched, and I caught some nice bream! Apparently nice bream weren't normally caught on that length that was reserved for junior matches! Never put much thought to it but I look back nowadays and wonder if perhaps it all started there! Doubt it though. As a matter of interest what do you call flowing water? I say that because I have often used it on slow flowing Broads and adjoining rivers. Slow being 1 m.p.h. perhaps.

[Dick Dastardly]

Can not understand why the swing tip lost its popularity.I have always prefered it for still water bream (pleasure and match anyway)I have often fished matchs where bream have been the target species and at the end listened to people moaning about how finiky the bites were on the quiver,all mine on the swing tip being unmissable.Windy conditions?no problem ,in fact less of a problem than a quiver in these conditions,as long as you use a target board correctly.

[fenboy]

Well, Peter, I'm sure you must have caused some amusement on the Witham in the 60s with Broads-style legering tactics. Did you use a 2oz grip lead? Obviously you were very sophisticated, though... a swingtip instead of a bell attached to a clothes peg was pretty revolutionary for you East Norfolk lot

Incidentally, I hate to mention this, but can you remember which team won the All-England when it was fished on the Broads in 1960?

If I recall, wasn't the Witham the birthplace of the swingtip. I believe it was invented by Freddie Foster, a miner from Swinton? But its greatest exponent had to be Ivan Marks. Did a greater match angler ever live? I watched him win the Great Ouse Championship in 1973 (held on the Relief Channel) and I don't think any angler has impressed me more, ebfore or since. He won so many BIG matches against 1,000 or more other anglers. Incredible achievement, whether you're a match angler or not. And I'm not.

By the way, swingtipping carried on in a sort of tiem-warp way in the Fens for many years. Its greatest exponent was Syd Meads of Wisbech, who used to clean up in the Irish festivals, where bream were the quarry. I believe he died a few years back.

Slow-moving rivers were fine for swingtipping, of course, Peter. You just added a bit of lead wire to the tip. But on the Fen drains, when they opened the sluices, the run-off was much greater - sometimes incredible - and swingtipping was impossible.

[Del_R]

I use a swing tip on an old split cane rod. A lad came up to me the other week and said he'd never seen one before - wasn't sure if he meant a rod made of wood or the swing tip! Nevertheless, the swing tip still suffices for me (until the day I bite the bullet and buy one of these new fangled quiver tip rods...).

 

Del

[Peter Waller]

I never really got into match fishing, never had the drive. I belonged to the Lincoln club, enjoyed the camaradarie but match fishing never really suited my temperament. Actually it was half ounce coffin or quarter ounce Capta leads, I did scale down a bit, even went from a size 6 to a size 10!!

 

I did fish the Waveney Championship once, did reasonably well. I remember the All-England being held on the Broads. It gave the locals a great deal of amusement as we watched visiting anglers using their ultra fine float techniques, totally unsuited to the Broadland rivers. Ten pound lines, two ounce leads, twin boom paternosters and size 6 hooks were more our style, complete with walnut sized lumps of bread paste mixed with treacle! Sounds quite heathen now, but it worked!

100 pound catches were the norm in those far off days.

[fenboy]

Peter, you are ignoring my question. It was King's Lynn AA who won the 1960 Broad National.

Back in the 60s, King's Lynn AA and Great Yarmouth AA were huge rivals - to the extent that they got their kids to fight it out between themselves. One year (probably 1968?) I was picked for the KLAA junior that met GYAA at Holkham Lake. I think we lost, but I recall that a certain N. Fickling either won the individual honours or came very close. It was a long time ago.

Are there still fish in Holkham Lake? I last fished it in 1971 and caught a few decent perch, before teh perch disease took hold. Haven't wetted a line there since.

Incidentally, do people still fish Wolterton Lake - the fabled "Marsh Lake" of the 70s which was probably the best tench water in teh country at the time?

I wonder how many other Norfolk lakes have been forgotten?