Nothing excites Matt Hayes more than snatching an hour or two with a simple floating rig to catch carp cruising on the surface...

I love this time of year because it delivers some of the most exhilarating fishing you can experience. Surface fishing for carp is simply brilliant. When the sun shines and the carp are coaxed to the top of the water I reach for a floater rod, a bag of dog biscuits and hit the waterside for a few hours of rodbending fun.

Surface fishing is one of the few forms of coarse angling where you can see a fish take your hookbait - it's so exciting to see a carpy mouth engulf your bait with a gurgling swirl. I have to say, though, I'm surprised how few people bother to surface-fish in summer. Time and again I hear anglers marvelling at the carpshaped 'submarines' drifting on the surface in front of them - but then they do nothing to catch them

Despite the fish encouraging a floating bait to be cast , the majority of anglers' baits still languish on the bottom of the lake, as far away from the cruising carp as possible! I ask you, if you were fishing for any other species and saw them in the water in front of you, would you try to present a bait straight at them? Of course you would. So, in this month's feature I want to encourage you to gear up for a spot of floater fishing. The water is warm, the time is right, the fish are feeding. Don't miss the boat.

SHORT OF TIME? GO FLOATER FISHING

Summer floater fishing is worth trying if all you can do is snatch an afternoon or a few hours in the evening. The latter half of the day, when the water is at its warmest and the fish have been coaxed to the top by the sun, is often the best period for catching off the top.

When I'm up to my eyes in work and I've only got a few hours to fish then floater fishing is often the first thing I think about. Many is the time I've grabbed essential bits of kit, hurled them into my truck and shot down to my mate Ed Brown's fishery at Furnace Mill, near Kidderminster. This day-ticket complex is open to anyone to fish and every summer I manage to snatch a few evenings down there and quickly knock out a few carp on floaters. This isn't a unique water. Like lots of public waters it offers cheap evening tickets (£4.50 for four hours; call 01299 266777 or 07860 570080 for details) so you can even floater fish at the best time of the day for less money. Bargain!

SURFACE FISHING - GET MOBILE

One of the things that attracts me to floater fishing is its simplicity. Compared to most styles of carping you don't need much tackle. In fact, the less you carry and the more mobile you are, the better. This allows you to keep on the move and catch fish from different swims. With so little gear to weigh me down I can comfortably wander round a lake searching for groups of fish on the surface. Like small river chubbing, where you go roving to find pods of fish, you surface fish for carp in the same way. Simply walk around the water looking for signs of surface-feeding carp. Sometimes fish are obvious, you can see them swirling at floating bugs or you can see large, dark shapes ghosting through the water. At other times, especially if the water has a ripple that reduces visibility, you must spot subtle signs of life. Small creases in the ripples, called flat spots, indicate the movement of a fish just below the surface. Sometimes you'll need to spot the tip of a fin, or a fraction of a fish's back peek above the waterline. Either way, the carp in most lakes will be up for a floater on most days in summer.

IT ISN'T COMPLICATED

I suspect some anglers are discouraged from trying floater fishing due to a false perception that it's a specialist tactic and the preserve of long-stay carp anglers. While I know some anglers tie up convoluted rigs dripping in bells and whistles, my rig is a doddle to construct. The 16-step sequence (below) shows how just a few bits are slotted together to form a rig that will perform very well. I reckon you'll buy the bits of kit you need for about £15. When you've tied this rig - and believe me anyone can. The inline controller float, a Total Fishing Gear Surface Missile, lies on the water with the hooklink laid behind it. When a fish takes my cutdown floating boilie hookbait it pricks itself on the hook and pulls against the controller. With the float weighing 40g and the water around the float adding to the resistance, fish often hook themselves. On most waters you don't need to strike at a bite because the fish hooks itself, but sometimes fish eject the hookbait and you have to be on your mettle to strike the bite. Some days at Furnace Mill I sit on my hands and wait for the fish to hook themselves. But on days when they're feeding cautiously, I have to strike at every bite.

Curiously enough, it is often the days when the carp eat most noisily that signify when they are feeding cautiously. Quiet slurpers are usually confidently feeding fish that hook themselves. However, carp that explosively snatch and swirl on the top are often the ones sucking in and spitting out the bait in a flash. You must strike at these the instant their mouth closes over the bait.

PICK THE RIGHT BAITS

Floating cat biscuits, Sugar Puffs, bread and floating pellets are great surface baits, but the good ol' dog biscuit takes some beating especially when it's been doused in some attractive flavouring. As for hookbaits, while you can use a mixer identical to the loosefeed, I don't do this. Mixer biscuits swell up and soften when they are in the water, they're easily knocked off your rig and they sit suspiciously lower in the water as they take on extra moisture. A better option is to get a buoyant pop-up boilie and butcher it with some scissors until it resembles the profile of a mixer. Once threaded on to your rig you've got a durable bait that stays on the hair for hours and which looks like a freebie.

GETTING THEM FEEDING

The length and type of the hooklink is one variable that affects your bite rate. You've got to strike a balance between getting takes, hooking fish and landing them. As a rule, the longer your hooklink the more likely fish will eat your hookbait because it's further from your controller.

Balanced against this, the shorter the hooklink the easier it is for you to strike a bite and the more likely it is the fish will pull the line tight to the controller and hook itself. I start with a six-foot long hooklink but if fish shy away from the bait and controller I may extend it up to nine feet. In contrast, if fish are feeding really confidently, a five or even four foot hooklink may selfhook the fish better.

The hooklink material and the hook you use is also important. With the rig silhouetted against the surface and the sun backlighting it, carp get a great opportunity to inspect your gear. Heavy hooks that make your bait sit suspiciously low in the water, or thick lines that sink or look like rope stretching across the water, cut your chances. Use a modern copolymer hooklink material often used by match anglers. I use my own TF Gear Starving Whippet in 8lb breaking strain, but there are other brands you can try. As for hooks, a size 10 or 12 Drennan Carbon Specimen is my favourite. It is strong enough to land a decent carp but not so heavy that it weighs down the hookbait.

USING THE WIND

The final aspect that makes a difference to your catches is how you link your feeding pattern to the prevailing breeze. Surface feeding fish are programmed to follow the wind - they know the breeze will blow grubs across the water. If you want to make use of this feeding behaviour fish with the wind coming over your shoulder so it blows away from you and across the water. This allows you to catapult out mixers and drift them across the lake, creating a 'lane' of floaters to intercept surface feeders over a wide area. Carp tend to work back along the chain of floaters, eating their way towards you.

If your rig is drifting on the breeze along with the freebies your hookbait is likely to be taken without hesitation. This means a floating mainline is best, or you can make the line float by spraying it with line floatant or pole elastic lubricant. You must also keep flicking (mending) your mainline to keep a tight line between your rod and the controller float. This helps you strike more bites and allows the float to drift more naturally.

FITTING THE JIGSAW

At Furnace Mill I wandered round the 20-peg Willow Pool looking for groups of fish on the surface. Sitting down with the wind coming from behind me, I catapulted in 10 mixers every two or three minutes. With the breeze pushing the baits across the water I soon had a chain of feed baits tripping across the pool and within 10 minutes the fish started feeding.

At the outer edge of the feed line, the carp noisily sucked at the baits, a sign they were nervous about feeding on top. But as more fish were attracted to the area and competition intensified, the carp began taking baits more cleanly. Within 35 minutes they were taking baits one after the other and a pristine 9lb common carp was first to make a mistake. Striking the instant it's mouth closed over my bait, I enjoyed a great battle on a 12ft barbel rod. Five minutes later I was in action again, with another common, and over the next four hours I bagged several more carp, each one giving me a great scrap on light gear.

This expereince summed up the pleasure I get from floater fishing. With such little tackle and effort required I caught some good fish in the few hours I had to spare. I didn't have to spend hours getting my gear ready, or sorting it out when I got home. I grabbed a bag, some bait, a rod and hit the bank. If you want to use a few hours fishing to maximum effect and enjoyment, gear up for a spot of floater fishing. It's quick, simple and enthralling and it's what makes summer great.

Our thanks to 'Improve your Coarse Fishing' magazine.