ADTV Match Masterclass - Sweetcorn

For this time of year when the colour starts to drop out of the water and the fish are relying on sight, there is nothing that is going to catch their eye better than a bright yellow grain of corn.

Another advantage of feeding sweetcorn in comparison to pellets, is that sweetcorn have very little food content and are easy for the fish to digest so it is much harder to overfeed the fish. However, they still have enough weight to them to make a nice fish attracting plop when hitting the water to draw any inquisitive fish in the area and will sink quickly enough to keep fish towards the deck where it is much easier to catch them! 

For fishing the pole with sweetcorn during the winter months, no matter what area of the peg you fish, you need to make sure that your rigs allow your to make the most of how visual sweetcorn is to the fish even in coloured water. Therefore, I tend to always use carbon stemmed pole floats with a spread bulk that covers anything from 1/3 to 1/2 of my rig so I can constantly lay my rig in and watch for any bites as most of the time, the fish will take the bait as they see the sweetcorn fluttering past them. 

The rest of your rig, is dependent on the size of fish you are targeting. However a good starting point is the orange Matrix Slik, with an 0.16mm mainline to a 0.12mm hooklength. Hookwise, as you can bury the hook in the sweetcorn, I tend to use a slightly larger hook of a size 14-16 so I can maximise the hooking potential of the rig on the strike. 

For fishing rod and line, during the colder months as sweetcorn is such a visual bait, fishing it as a stand alone bait with no feed on the straight lead is best. For fishing the bomb with sweetcorn, I prefer a short soft rod such as the Matrix Aquos Ultra C 10ft which I have paired with a Matrix Aquous 4000 Reel loaded with 6lb mono fishing line.

The business end of the rig, features my favourtie micro lead clip with a small 10-15g fishing lead. I have made the rig semi fixed to ensure a better hookhold on the take by using a small hooklength swivel. An added bonus of this swivel is I can quickly change hooklengths when needed. Lastly, the hooklength is 10 inches of 0.20mm rig line down to a size 14 eyed hook with a hair rigged bait band. 

As metioned earlier in how I set up my rigs, I find the best way to fish with sweetcorn is to constantly lay your rig in, so the fish can watch the bait falling through the water and I try to replicate my feeding to maximise this. Therefore, I find it best when fishing sweetcorn at this time of year to feed little and often and will normally start my session feeding around 10 grains of sweetcorn via a toss pot. I will then fish for 5 minutes, re-laying my rig every 30 seconds before repeating the process.

On slightly warmer days when the fish are quite active, I will not be afraid to pick up a catapult to increase the noise factor and attractiveness but again, I will only feed around 10 grains of corn at a time. 

Although sweetcorn is insanely attractive to fish straight out of the tin, there is a way to make sweetcorn even more irresitable to the fish and that is to blend the corn into a slop. This slop when fed contains a range of different particles sizes, with some sinking straight to the bottom, whereas some will linger in the water column creating a cloud with zero feed content to draw fish into the swim from far and wide. 

This tactic, I find can be unbeatble when fishing in shallow water upto 3ft, so is great when fishing down the margins or towards islands. Again, I find it best to feed it little and often through a toss pot and will normally add a couple grains of sweetcorn to the slop, so there is some bait replicating my hookbait in the swim. 

The way you hook sweetcorn, can also play a massive part in your success using the bait, and for the pole there are two ways that I prefer which each have their day. The first is through the top of the grain, so the hook goes through two points of the skin, which helps keep the corn on the hook. I tend to use this method when I am getting plenty of bites so I am not wasting time shipping in and out. The second is through the end, which offers no resistance and is great when you need to make sure you strike throuh the corn on the bite. 

When fishing the rod, the number 1 method for me is hair-rigging either one or two grains of sweetcorn and to do this I will prefer to use a pellet band over a quick stop. All you need is a gated baiting needle, so you can stretch the bait band, so you can pull it through the corn and when you release the tension it will expand holding the sweetcorn in place. 

When fishing the pole, I find it best to build a swim, but when fishing the straight lead and feeding no bait, covering the full range of your swim will help you get more bites. When setting up, I will be watching the surface of the water for any signs or likely looking areas and will use this as my starting point.

If I do not see anything, then I will work my swim like a clock face starting at 10 o clock and moving in small increments all the way to 2 o clock. In each spot, I will normally wait 5-8 minutes, and looking for even the smallest indications on the tip which will give me any indication on where the fish are sitting in the peg. If you start getting a few indicatons, give the same spot another go as when you find them you can normally expect a few bites as they will shoal tightly at this time of year. 

One of the main stand outs of sweetcorn is its bright visual yellow colour and although you do not normally need more than a single tin of sweetcorn, as with all baits there are days when a different colour will trigger a feeding response quicker. This is where flavoured corn can be a real advantage! 

This can be used solely as a change of hookbait, or for feeding as well, with the flavoured corn also giving off a stronger feeding signal in the water. I really like the Dynamite Orange Scopex Flavoured Corn that is available ready to go, but I have also played with flavouring small batches with different bait liquids and glugs to try and give me another edge. 

With the weather incredibly mild for the time of year, it has been a perfect opportunity to show the effectiveness of sweetcorn on multiple methods, and after catching some early skimmers and carp on the long pole, feeding little and often via a cad pot with 10 grains of corn, I cannot wait to give the margins a go. By feeding the corn slop, it is not long till the fish move in and the bites are fast and furious as the only edible morsel in the corn slop is my hookbait.

I even get to have a go with the straight lead and soon find a few fish sitting to my right in the open water, before I round my session off with the biggest carp of the session of double scopex corn. Hopefully, this article has shown you how effective and versatile this bait is during the cooler months, and next time you go fishing this winter rather than reaching for a bag of pellets, try swapping it for a can of the humble sweetcorn!