The Snowbee XS floater is one of, if not the, best selling floating lines in the UK. XS floaters are supple and have very little coil memory, so they handle well and lie straight on the water. WF models shoot very freely thanks to their fine running line. All models offer good presentation thanks to a relatively fine tip. Overall, they’re excellent fly-lines.

So, with a little encouragement from FF&FT, along comes the new XS Buzzer line. The differences are slight – same handling, same suppleness, same free-shooting character. Replace a few feet of coating on the front taper with a denser coating and you have a line designed to sink inches, to put Buzzers and small Nymphs where they should be, just sub-surface

Technically, the Buzzer XS is a sink tip. To me, that means a slight casting challenge. Sink-tips have a tendency to ‘kick’ due to the change in coating density, only the taper of the Buzzer XS changes so the kick is negligible.

Buzzer fishing from the bank is possibly the cream of stillwater fishing. Cast across the wind, let the line drift and wait for the curve in the line to look wrong, takes are just a pause, then lift into a fat over-wintered trout (mine are always fat and over-wintered, even the ones stocked yesterday). Joking aside, Buzzers take feeding fish. And the Buzzer XS takes flies down just a few inches and slows their progress – drifting flies slower and deeper catches more fish.

Oh, and, the Buzzer XS lends itself to river fishing too, as a subtle anti-skate line it works perfectly on smoother stretches where water speed tends to push a wet fly to the surface.