Carp in the Dark

After my first day of work today, I was kind of tired and a little annoyed with nobody responding to anything I sent them.  I had told Bobby I might want to fish Sunday, and ended up heading out for a session in the evening.  It was definitely good for me to get out and do something.  This was definitely the best day of fishing I've had this year.

We went to the main pond, where we found two other teenagers out fishing.  Bobby set up catfish rods, and I caught two quick bass on poppers.  After this, I switched quickly to the crayfish fly that has been killing it recently, but with only two more fish.  Bobby began fishing with a Zoom fluke, and began absolutely demolishing fish.  Every other cast he caught one.  He caught so many fish that the other guys there had to ask him what he was using.  Eventually, with all the racket going on, I decided to walk across the road to the carp pond.  Best decision of the day.

I went over, and immediately saw tailing carp.  I got three shots at one fish sitting on the bank, but it seems he didn't see my fly.  I continued walking, taking more shots at carp when I heard Bobby yell my name.  I tried to pull my fly in, but found a 9 inch bass took it.  When I finally got over to the main pond, a 14 pound catfish was sitting next to the bank.  While not the biggest I've seen, it's been a long time since someone caught a catfish out of this pond.


After the photo session was done (all photos taken with my DSLR.  I think just shooting through a camera instead of a phone just makes you think about your shot, making all your pictures better.) and the beast was released, I sprinted back to the carp pond.  It was getting dark fast.  I took more shots to tailing fish than I'd ever had before.  Almost all these fish were right on the bank, and looking down for food so much they didn't notice me sneak up on them.  I got at least a dozen casts at feeding carp with less than a foot of fly line out of my rod tip.


Eventually, it was time for me to take my sunglasses off.  It was so dark I could barely see the bottom of the pond right in front of the bank.  It was about 9:30 at night.  For reference, I took the sunset photo on this entry about 15 minutes before this.  As I was walking, I saw a swirl, and a dark shadow that looked just like a small carp.  I flipped a cast over, and he turned away.  After two more, I lobbed a desperation cast over his head and dragged it in front of him, then let the fly drop.

How anybody ever knows when a carp takes the fly is beyond me.  The first two I caught, I just knew.  I felt nothing, saw nothing, heard nothing to make me think the carp had my fly.  But somewhere, I just knew.  That's what happened here, too.  Without even thinking the carp had my fly, I set and went tight.  Fish on!

This carp was fairly lame.  On the 8 weight, he gave up quickly.  Only about 3 pounds.  But as dark as it was, I'll call it a success for sure.  With any carp, if you get them in quick enough, they aren't happy in shallow water.  My carp always seem to roll and thrash the closer to the bank they get.  It's inconvenient, but none of mine have broken a line or come off the hook yet.  I got my 3rd common on the fly.  The photo to the left was edited with a quick exposure change so you can actually see.  It was pretty dark. 

Since the person who lets us fish here wants us to thin down the carp population, I gave my fish to Bobby.  He's got a pond in his neighborhood with few fish in it, and wants to begin stocking it with interesting species to make a good all around pond to fish all summer.  Judging from the immense flats in the pond, It'll make good carp habitat.  After we filled a 5 gallon bucket, Bobby transported the fish and released him into his pond.  I was able to lighten my mood with fishing, as usual.  I'll never grow tired of being outside and getting to catch fish.  An incredible day.