Carping Basics - Surface Fishing

by Steve Lightfoot

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North American Carp Angler

Fishing for carp on the surface is about as knee tremblingly awesome and frustrating as it gets. Carp are experts at sucking in and blowing out a suspicious bait and it happens in a fraction of a second. Yet when you can do it, nothing beats the sheer suspense of seeing that big old pair of lips suck down your bait and belting off with you clinging on for dear life, with the reel clutch screaming like mad.

Carp will happily feed on the surface for ages, as long as you keep the food going in. Popular baits for surface fishing include dog biscuits, floating pellets, bread and pop-up boilies. Any of these will do the job - the trick is in attaching them to your hook. Bread crust is obviously easiest, but has casting limitations. Pellets and dog biscuits can be attached

A. Directly on the hook. To soften up the biscuits dunk them in water for a minute or two, then put them into a sealed plastic bag for half an hour. By then they should be just soft enough to put on a hook, but still firm enough to cast. Different biscuits and pellets can absorb water at different rates, so you may have to experiment. At the poly bag stage you can also add flavours to the bag if you want your bait to stand out a bit more.
B. Hair - rigged. Also works well, and its best to use lighter wire hooks and a short hair.
C. With Superglue. Cut a shallow groove in the pellet/biscuit and superglue it to the hook shank. This can work best on harder pellets.

Get them feeding

Don't rush things. Once you get them feeding by throwing or slingshotting floating baits in take your time before casting. This achieves 2 main objectives
1. They get more confident about the bait.
2. As they get more confident more fish will fed until they're competing with eachother. This is the best situation you can have since they will stop being so picky, throw caution to the wind and grab the nearest piece of food regardlessly( which can often include your float if you're using one. ) This is also a good tactic to use if you're using a zig rig, especialy if you use slow-sinking pellets

Casting out

Once they're feeding, cast out your bait. However dropping a bait directly onto feeding fish isn't a good idea. Instead cast beyond the feeding area and draw the bait back slowly until you're happy with the position. Then just leave it - it can sometimes take an age to get a bite. While your bait is out there keep the food going in in small amounts to keep them going - its amazing sometimes how quickly they can leave if the food dries up. If you do get a bite try and get the fish away from the feeding area. You can keep a schoal of carp feeding for hours on the top as long as the food keeps going in and they're not spooked away.

SET-UPS

These needn't be complicated.

Freelining
If the fish are close in, why make things complicated? Just add bait to hook and throw it in However you're limited to casting range on this sometimes.

Using a Controller Float

Using a float has two advantages.
1. It adds weight to the set-up allowing further casting distances to be acheived.
2. If you lose site of your hookbait you've still got some indication as to where it roughly is and also some degree of bite indication.

These are the floats I use ( I've used a quarter to give some scale )

The line runs through the loop/swivel at the top, and the weights hold them down in the water.

Bubble floats are also popular, since they can be semi-filled with water to add casting weight. The mainline runs through the middle of these floats.
If you're stuck there without a float, or of a Luddite mind , a twig or any good-sized bouyant material attached to the mainline using rubber bands will do the job nicely as well

My Controller Float rig
Attaching the float is a simple task, using two rubber beads and a float stop, like this

I use a leader attached by swivel to the mainline of at least 3 feet length using 10lb Drennan Double strength. Any good strength, low diameter mono will do as long as it floats well. Some people will dispense with a leader and just use a lighter mainline though. I also use a boomarm ( see zig rig post ) using 2-3" of heat shrink tubing just to prevent tangles, although that's optional.