Winter Carp Fishing

Winter Carp Fishing

January 7, 2023

I decided to kick off the year by doing something a bit different to my lure fishing and trotting. I’ve done a bit of river carping this year, but not really fished for them much at all and I really fancied it!

It was an epic little trip that saw me land a few stunning cold water carp! I was using a very small amount of bait but made sure it was highly attractive.

Small mesh bags

1\. Get some Krill & Squid Groundbait

2\. 2mm Krill pellets

3\. Mix them together

4\. Add Krill Bait Booster

Only a small amount is needed

5\. Mix and put small amount into mesh bags

6\. Hookbait is an Oozing Pellet

High attract Oozing Pellets doing the business. I always like to ‘break the seal’ on boilies and these type of pellets. I just think that removing some of ‘the skin’ helps to release some of the flavours. It’s something I’ve done as long as I can remember.

Breaking the seal

7\. Tip this off with fake corn

8\. Hook on a mesh bag

The rig was simple and strong. I used a coated braid hooklink, D-Rig with a bait screw, size 8 hook on a lead clip set up. This was cast over to the far margin. It took a few casts to get it right but I got there in the end.

Casting to the far margin

After about an hour or do the rod was away. After a decent fight I had a stunning winter common in the net!

In you come!

A cracking winter common

It all went a bit quiet after that fish. Until now I had only been using one rod so I decided to stick another rod out down the edge.

I fished corn on the 2nd rod

I find corn to be an excellent bait in winter. I think the carp find it really easy to digest in cold conditions, much like maggots. Feed like boilies and large pellets will fill them up way to quick at this time of year so F1 corn is a great option!

Corn, a classic winter bait

A stack of corn on the hair

Stepping up to 2 rods

So the corn rod was flick down the edge to my right, but it was the far margin rod that was off again shortly after! This time it was a mirror, not a huge fish but so. I’ve to be getting bites at this time of year!

A chunky little mirror

What followed was a bit crazy. The rod was placed back in the far margin and was away again within 5 minutes. This time a beautifully marked mirror.

Dark mirror within 5 minutes

I decided to bring in the corn rod. It wasn’t doing anything and after a quiet couple of hours the far margin rod had really kicked into life!

Back down to a single rod

Unbelievably, the rod was away again far only 10 minutes but unfortunately this time it dropped off. Shame, felt like a better fish too! After that crazy hour things sudden stopped.

Suddenly very quiet

I think this shows how short these feeding spells can be in winter. No sooner had it gone crazy, when it all just came to an end. Not even a line bite.

After a few hours more I called it a day. I felt like I’d managed to put together a decent video and hopefully demonstrate an effective way of catching carp in winter. Watch the full video below. Thanks for checking it out!