Improve your spodding

1. Get the correct tekkers! The only sure-fire way to increase both accuracy and distance is to learn the correct technique for spodding. Get yourself a tutorial with a casting coach; see it as an investment!

2. Pinpoint accuracy is essential. Use distance sticks to accurately record the number or wraps to your spot. Doing this with your marker, spod and fishing rods will ensure that you end up actually fishing over your bait!

3. Pick a far-bank marker. Once you’ve found a spot to bait, make sure you line it up with a prominent feature on the skyline. Remember though, it HAS to be visible at night! (HINT: the tallest trees, pylons, streetlights or church spires tend to work, and they often already have decent spots lined up with them!)

4. Night time? No problem. Once you have the wraps and skyline marker sorted, you’ll be able to bait up at night. Do it. Most will stay tucked up in bed, but if you’re willing to bait up at unsociable hours, especially on busy waters, you’ll reap the rewards.

5. Two is twice as good! Using two marker rods (if you can stretch to it) will give you more idea of the true size of your spot. Having those visual aids out on the spot will allow you to evenly bait the spot, rather than burying one rig in bait, leaving the other as an unintentional single!

6. No spod rod? No problem. Tie a large loop in the end of the line on one of your fishing rods. You can then use this rod to spod, then simply loop the spod off and loop your leader on and you’ll be on the money. (HINT: only use the smallest Spombs or spods for this).

7. Mixology is an art! Perfecting your spod mix takes thought. The likes of Steve Cliff know that having an attractive mix isn’t enough – it needs to work with you, not against you. His contains a balance of hemp and pellets that allows the mix to slide out easily and disperse evenly. Too much pellet and the mix becomes stodgy and clumps up.

8. Spod over zigs. Summer or winter, fish can be found in the upper layers. To stimulate them into snatching at your zig hook baits, you need to get some cloudy spod mix into the water. There are loads of ready-made sloppy mixes out there, so give them a go over your zigs.

9. Braid up. Really, you should be using braided reel line on your spodding setup. It can be cast much further than mono, and its zero-stretch means that your spod or Spomb lands bang on the money, every time. Berkley have just released their brand new CB2000 braid. It’s not only model-thin, meaning new PB casting distances are guaranteed, it’s tough too. Read our full review here.

10. Keep topping up! You won’t believe how quickly a group of carp can clear out a baited spot. If you get signs of action, or you see fish showing over your spot, but get no bites, top up! Caught a fish? Top up!