Had plans to head out for my local Carp program with a buddy today. As I was hooking my boat up and loading up at around 9am, I get the message that he's sick and wasn't able to power through to get up and go. So, I hit up my second choice, @clarkman to take his place in the boat.
We met up at the local launch and headed out to a sneaky weedy bank I sometimes like to hit. A few fish were present, but nothing that made me want to stick around very long, so we headed to my favorite flat way up river.
Almost immediately upon arrival, we spot a happy fish. @clarkman took his shot, and to everyone's surprise, didn't f it up. Fish turned, hoovered, and found a bent piece of steel pulling on its lip. After a long, hard battle, we netted this beast we estimated in the upper teen range, pushin 20.
After that, the fish got pretty sparse. As sparse as I've ever seen on this flat actually. Shots were few and far between and when they did present themselves, we took our previous successes for granted and did not apply our A-game. The results reflected such.
Toward the end of this section of flat, I spotted a very comfy fish tailing next to a weed bed where I proceeded to land on said weed bed, which should have blew him out when I pulled the fly out. He kept doin his thing, so I cast again. This time getting the fly on the other side of the fish, which caused me to line him. So much so that he rolled over on his side as I pulled my fly back. Game over! Or so I thought. He swam leisurely about 20ft and went back to chompin away at the sand.
I made one more cast and got my fly about 5' from his side. He turned swam over, dipped, and got a new lip piercing. I thought the fish was bigger than he ended up being, but I'll take it.
Shortly after that, @clarkman hooked yet another, but lost it at the boat. Womp womp.
We poked around the flat a bit more to no avail, so decided to pick up and move to a new location. As we were headed to a "tried and true," I had this thought that "well, the super famous, out here every day guiding for carp guy is out in one of these spots and it's probably that one," so decided to detour into a location I hadn't yet actually fished for carp. Once we got there, we were immediately met with LOTS of fish blowing up all around us. As we got further back into the area, we had carp everywhere, yet none tailing and feeding, and none that were particularly comfortable.
These fish spooked at everything. And I mean everything. On the way up river, I had not seen said famous guide in any of the usual spots. After having spent about 30mins in this new location, we concluded this is where he was hiding earlier in the day. These fish had absolutely been pressured, and hard. It made sense why he'd fish back here... It was probably the most carp I'd seen in one location in as long as I can remember. So, note taken. Beat him there next time.
And that's our report for today. 2 fish to hand, one new spot, and Clarkman scouted a new boat he's going to go back and claim.
We met up at the local launch and headed out to a sneaky weedy bank I sometimes like to hit. A few fish were present, but nothing that made me want to stick around very long, so we headed to my favorite flat way up river.
Almost immediately upon arrival, we spot a happy fish. @clarkman took his shot, and to everyone's surprise, didn't f it up. Fish turned, hoovered, and found a bent piece of steel pulling on its lip. After a long, hard battle, we netted this beast we estimated in the upper teen range, pushin 20.
After that, the fish got pretty sparse. As sparse as I've ever seen on this flat actually. Shots were few and far between and when they did present themselves, we took our previous successes for granted and did not apply our A-game. The results reflected such.
Toward the end of this section of flat, I spotted a very comfy fish tailing next to a weed bed where I proceeded to land on said weed bed, which should have blew him out when I pulled the fly out. He kept doin his thing, so I cast again. This time getting the fly on the other side of the fish, which caused me to line him. So much so that he rolled over on his side as I pulled my fly back. Game over! Or so I thought. He swam leisurely about 20ft and went back to chompin away at the sand.
I made one more cast and got my fly about 5' from his side. He turned swam over, dipped, and got a new lip piercing. I thought the fish was bigger than he ended up being, but I'll take it.
Shortly after that, @clarkman hooked yet another, but lost it at the boat. Womp womp.
We poked around the flat a bit more to no avail, so decided to pick up and move to a new location. As we were headed to a "tried and true," I had this thought that "well, the super famous, out here every day guiding for carp guy is out in one of these spots and it's probably that one," so decided to detour into a location I hadn't yet actually fished for carp. Once we got there, we were immediately met with LOTS of fish blowing up all around us. As we got further back into the area, we had carp everywhere, yet none tailing and feeding, and none that were particularly comfortable.
These fish spooked at everything. And I mean everything. On the way up river, I had not seen said famous guide in any of the usual spots. After having spent about 30mins in this new location, we concluded this is where he was hiding earlier in the day. These fish had absolutely been pressured, and hard. It made sense why he'd fish back here... It was probably the most carp I'd seen in one location in as long as I can remember. So, note taken. Beat him there next time.
And that's our report for today. 2 fish to hand, one new spot, and Clarkman scouted a new boat he's going to go back and claim.
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