A lot of anglers ask me how I manage to catch decent weights of carp in the winter, when most people think they will not feed. The answer, I tell them, is to put your faith in Sonubaits' Super Scent sweetcorn - and to fish a little finer than you maybe thought possible!

Many anglers get suckered by the idea that because it is carp, they need to beef their gear up - or fish on the bottom. Both notions can be wrong. Carp don't fight that hard in the winter because, to put it simply, the muscles that give them 'turbo power' in summer stop working when the water turns colder. This means you can afford to scale down on elastics, main lines and hook-lengths, without fears you might get smashed off by a carp.

My winter approach centres on 0.11mm Preston Powerline as my main line, and I will fish with a 0.10mm Preston Precision hook-length, especially for my F1 fishing.  Where F1s are concerned, I will ease back on the elastic, to a 9H Preston Hollo, although I will use an 11H for a fishery with carp running to 5lb-plus. The size of hook is also of prime importance and I believe that smaller is better. I work on the premise that If you miss a bite when using a small hook, that fish will take the bait again, but if it is a bigger hook there is a chance of bumping the fish and spooking it. In winter I will use a size 22 most of the time. I like a hook with a nickel finish and a semi-round shape. It is light and it falls down through the water very slowly.

I believe that fish watch everything, baitwise, as it falls through the water, and a lot of the time I fish at half-depth. Even in the winter, when there is frost on the bank and only a limited number of hours of daylight, a lot of the fish are well off bottom up in the water. The trick is to just keep laying the rig in and let it fall. You fool big carp with that approach, just using a corn skin, with the kernel squeezed out, on a fine line and a size 22 hook.

Floats are obviously a prime consideration, and when conditions allow, I use as light and slim a float as he can get away with. And the Preston PB12, which was primarily designed for shy-biting roach, is among my favourites. It has a delicate, slim body and a fine bristle, and I like my bristles, especially in the winter, to be fine. The PB12 is a tremendous float for laying in when fishing at half-depth, tight over to the far bank. I also like the Preston Chianti for this time of year. Again, it is a light, slim float with a finish cane bristle which offers very little resistance to a fish which is sucking in the hook-bait.
The key to success, once the tackle is sorted out properly, is working out the depth at which fish are feeding.

You have to be methodical about it. If I go across with the rig set at full depth and I will keep shallowing up until I find the fish. I have had experiences where I have had no bites at full depth, not even liners, yet by shallowing up I have eventually found the carp and caught them. Give these tips a try and you will definitely catch more fish!