YOU CAN NEVER STOP LEARNING ABOUT CARP

ONE of the many things I love about fishing is whether you are just making your first cast or you’ve been angling for decades, there’s still so much to learn.

Carp fishing initially boomed because of the mystery surrounding the species. We’ve come a very long way since then, but even the most seasoned carp angler still encounters locations, individual fish and behaviours that make them pull their hair out.

Take a look at the underwater films available on YouTube, including Korda’s new ‘Test Tapes’, and you’ll see how frustrating carp can be. These aren’t fish with the two-second memory that non-anglers might think – they are smart, cautious and have an individual character profile. This makes catching them all the more difficult.

At times it almost feels like the fish are deliberately challenging us. Showing over spots without picking up the rigs, swimming under the rod-tips, or quite often disappearing altogether, they make you wonder if the lake has any carp in it at all.

Most of us don’t have an underwater camera to aid our decision-making process (which is probably a good thing!), and this is what separates experienced carp anglers from the rest. No fishing situation is identical, but those of us who’ve been in the game longer can draw on previous successes and failures to plot their next move.

Do I recast? Should I put more bait in? Maybe I need to change my rig, and so on. In this month’s learning tool for carp anglers, we have a host of answers on a huge variety of questions from some of the best in the sport – including a special feature from Korda’s underwater stars. I, for one, will be putting some of their advice into practice in the coming weeks.