Newbie Alert

[Paul Arden]

Brilliant! I’ve watched gourami eating bright green leaves. They also eat algae. Fortunately they’ll also eat a dry fly that looks like a termite at the same time. I’ve seen a few grass like imitations but I didn’t know anyone who has caught on them! Fantastic!!

And yep carp anglers in the UK are a different breed. 48hrs is nothing. I knew a chap who would fish 6 days straight. Drive home. Make some boilies. Head back and repeat all summer One time he was so tired driving back on the A12 he fell asleep, woke up half way up the embankment, swerved back onto the road and carried on. He explains he was wide awake after that.

Cheers, Paul

[FishNoGeek]

They also eat algae.

The urban bayous here are infested with schools of mullet, probably the same species that inhabits the salt marshes on the coast. With full respect for their euryhaline abilities, they're annoying AF in the bayous if you're targeting carp. They're constantly on the move, usually near the surface, and they're incredibly skittish. Every motion above and below the water causes them to spook, which in turn spooks every other fish near them.

That said, some of them get fairly large - well over 20 inches - and they jump and pull hard if you do manage to hook one. They generally don't take flies or bait, but the bigger ones will occasionally tail in the shallows where they seem to be focused on eating moss or algae. Naturally, we started trying to tie flies to imitate algae, which turns out to be quite difficult. They have small mouths, so a #10 is about is big as you can go even for the bigger fish. The fly has to get down to the bottom quickly and stay there, despite some moderate current. It's critical that you're able to see it once it's down there, so when you're at the vise you find yourself guessing about which shade of green will both look natural enough but also be visible. And you have to fish it dead, with some slack - you can't keep a tight line to it - but you also have to be ready to trout strike if you think a tailer has picked your algae patch to munch. It's actually quite stressful fishing.

I've never cracked the code myself. I had two other local buddies who were also actively working on this, but they've since moved away. If somebody has figured out how to catch them consistently, I'd love to hear about it. This is a target-rich environment, to say the least.

Actually, there is a way to catch them consistently: occasionally the juvenile fish will school up and gulp at the surface. It's quite something to see - hundreds of little rubbery mouths sucking air, or maybe eating something we can't see. We've seen it both in freshwater and in the salt. Whenever they're doing that, you can toss a small dry fly in the #14 range into the middle of them - really anything that floats will work - and eventually one will take it. Once they do, it's a pretty impressive ride - their first runs are strong for their size (14 inches, give or take?), and they're very acrobatic. Also, those schools will usually stay formed even when you take a few fish out of them, so you can repeat this tiny miracle until they go away.

For me it's a novelty, but it's spectacular for beginners. They don't need to stalk carefully or cast particularly well, and they don't even always need to strike quickly. It's forgiving and repeatable compared to anything in the carp or saltwater world. But me, I want one of those big ones - I'm sure they'd give bonefish a run for their money in terms of fight, particularly since you're fighting them in current - and they jump!

And yep carp anglers in the UK are a different breed.

There's a thing in the eastern US called "paylaking". Have you heard of this? I haven't done it myself, but my understanding is that it's an American descendent of UK carp fishing that got started in the Carolinas but now exists all over Appalachia. It takes places on private lakes which have been stocked with enormous carp, and the tournaments can be extremely competitive - prize money in the thousands (USD) surely with wagering on the side. The lake gets sliced up into segments ("pegs", I think they're called), and which area you get to fish is determined by a drawing. Gear seems to be similar to eurocarping setups with rod racks and bite alarms, and the real magic lies with the baits, both the composition and delivery technique.

Like I said above, it's not my thing - too many people and too little casting involved - but I'll admit that the idea of figuring out how to "bait your swim" with just the right boilie recipe and feeding style / cadence to create a feeding frenzy that pulls every carp in the pond into your area, effectively shutting down everybody else....well, I can see the appeal.

[Paul Arden]

I suspect what makes mullet difficult is how they feed. There are times when they are hoovering. Watching fish feed this way in my aquarium, this is not feeding by sight, but by feel with their mouths. They are not swimming around catching prey but scraping stuff off the bottom.

It’s not just mullet but also some whitefish species that do this and I’ve certainly wasted some of my life trying to be successful on these! What is interesting is that when some fish species do this (carp, barbel etc) they will also eat flies.

I was surprised to learn from my mate who drove up the embankment, that drug dealers would travel from tent to tent offering supplies. Ecstasy, cocaine, acid, hash, you name it. It gave me a different insight into this world

Cheers, Paul

[whinging pom]

The classification for rod record carp caught is all over the place in the UK , quite a few bigger than record fish are caught and not submitted for the record as people can’t be bothered with the hassle and sometimes threats.

One of the things that throws it is that it has to have been grown in the uk. ( not bred in the uk., you following?!!) many stocked carp lakes buy in fish from countries like Israel at around let’s say 10-15lb then they grow on, so the problems is how much extra growth in the UK is required to make it uk grown and how can you be sure that was stocked at 12lb and not another batch of bigger fish.
So then the threats start about record fish. One guy took his 15 year old to a fishery with special permission.. (yep age restriction?!!) the kid caught the biggest fish, had it weighed and photographed in the water.. kid couldn’t lift it. Then his dad refused to register it as he feared for the kids safety.
My local fishery with Benson and Hedges, lost Hedges and a lot more good stock . The first thought is always blame the otters.
Then in the angling press a new record fish appeared in a rival fishery with all the marks of Hedges, they reckon it was netted out and transported.

Honestly the rest of the world the mafia do protection, gambling and drugs, here they do rubbish disposal and ice cream vans… carp fishing is only a matter of time.
“Luca Brasi sleeps with the Fishies… in carp lake number two”

[FishNoGeek]

[/quote]

I was surprised to learn from my mate who drove up the embankment, that drug dealers would travel from tent to tent offering supplies. Ecstasy, cocaine, acid, hash, you name it. It gave me a different insight into this world

From my brief forays into coarse fishing in the upper Midwest and Appalachia, I'd half-expect to find that some of the carping tents double as meth labs....

“Luca Brasi sleeps with the Fishies… in carp lake number two”

Maybe they'll find Jimmy Hoffa's bones down there, too!