A couple more days on new water

I got out for two more days of Carp fishing. I left home committed to trying new water no matter how many fish I was catching. (Or not catching) The first day I saw a shoal of sunbathers that had several fish well over 20#. Not a ONE of them had his nose down like he was the least bit hungry. Actually, I'm not sure they were even sunbathing. It was more like napping or comatose. I know those fish are bad targets but I had to cast to them since I had been stalking for an hour and hadn't seen a single tailing fish. I would love to say I cast so carefully and perfectly that I was able to selectively worked my way through the shoal and got three of them over 20# to take my fly. Well, I made a few casts, woke up a couple fish, they woke up all their shaolmates, and that was that. I walked for another 90 minutes and only saw three cruisers and that was my fun for the morning.

I headed up the river to try some more new water. Yikes, there were a lot of weeds where I stopped. I was seeing a few tailing fish but was cleaning my fly off on virtually every cast. Even my "totally excellent" casts were for naught because when I stripped the fly I was almost always pulling salad along with it.





I was able to get some hookups after lunch and that always makes me happy. One of the fish I had clearly turned to the fly. I set the hook and was pleased with myself. When I got him in he was hooked on the outside of the ridge on his pretty Carp lips. The outside is so close to the inside that I think I should be able to count this one. Its not like I hooked him on a fin or something. Plus, he turned to the fly. I know Carp tournament guidelines allow something like one inch from the mouth to still count the fish as a capture. You can see the Carp Woollie just on the outside of the lip in the underwater picture.


Another one was way up in the teens and took me a good ways into the backing. That's always fun.

The next day, once again, I made myself go to water I had never fished. There was one spot I have been eyeing for 5 years and I finally stopped there. Last year I came upon a spot like this where there are just way too many Carp. There were so many fish that the water gets cloudy and you can't see them until they begin a "Carp Exodus". The sky was overcast, so along with cloudy water, spotting tailing fish was almost impossible unless a tail came out of the water. Even then it was difficult to tell which way the fish was moving as soon as the tail went under. Most of the time I was blind casting to fish I knew were there but could not pinpoint exactly. I would spook one when the fly landed on it and it would take off. In a situation like this where there are too many Carp, when the first fish bolts everyone near it does also. It is as if the first fish says, "Hey let's get out of here, something just landed on me." Everyone nearby takes off and tells the other fish they pass, "Hey get out of here, someone says there's things falling on him." And in a matter of seconds the water boils with a Carp Exodus. I tried to get a picture of a good example but never did. Another time.

While I did get some fish to hand (I'm only counting the ones that had the fly inside their mouths.) it was not as satisfying as other days when I can sight fish. The fish I caught were ones where I could see the tail and the direction they were pointing but I had to wait to feel the strike rather than see it.
St. Croix Legend Elite 8 weight


A good two days all in all because I saw new water and did get some fish.

Spider Dodging All Day

Fish On!


I tried some new water again. This day was characterized by lots and lots of "bleeping" spiders. I have seen this particular spider before but never in the massive quantities I saw today. At one point I saw 9 seperate webs, each with its own webmaster. I didn't even have to turn my head to take in all nine webs. The webs were thick and strong. Each web seemed to have at least one strand that was as thick as a piece of string. I tried walking through one to get to a different spot and before it broke it noticeably pulled a branch. It gave me the creeps that there were so many of them. I started to worry one would jump on me for a free ride and along the way it would bite me, poison me, or turn me into fishing troll.

Maybe life as a fishing troll wouldn't be all bad... I could fish every day and wherever I went people would get out of the way and let me have the water to myself. No, people would yell at me and throw rocks at me, they would tell me to stay away.

Little kids would say, "What is that daddy?"

Daddy would say, "It's a nasty fishing troll."

"What does it do daddy?"

"It just fishes all day and doesn't do much of anything else. Don't look at it; it's so ugly."

No, I don't think I want to be a fishing troll. I still want to kiss my wife so I'm glad I came home as me. At one point I saw something crawling on the brim of my hat. It was one of the dang troll makers so I brushed it off and it landed on a large rock.

I saw some cruising fish, a fair number of napping fish, and not many tailers. I got fish to hand and it helped keep my mind off of being carried away and poisoned.

I had one on that I am sure was over 20 pounds. I was able to play him for awhile but he went charging off into some rocks and seperated himself and the fly from me and everything else.

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Four Sentries