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chiguy723

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Posts posted by chiguy723

    Warm Up In New Jersey

    in Pictures, Stories & Video

    Posted

    Good day in North Jersey for me today on the long pole. Worked a 8.5 meter longpole using 16 elastic and 8 lb hooklength. Business end was a size 10 eagle claw baitholder and a 1 gram float. Bait was sweetcorn flavored with Wacker Tutti Frutti. Ground bait was bread crumb and chicken feed, with other ingredients to spike the mix. The groundbait was flavored with the same Wacker flavor.

    A beautiful day that topped out in the low 60's, the sky was clear, and the smell of impending spring hung in the air as I pulled up to the bankside at a very late 11 am. I planned a short session for about three hours, which netted me four fish.

    First fish came in was, ironically enough, a rainbow trout. Obviously, some were left over from the fall stocking. I didn't take a pic because I thought no one would be interested.

    I kept "balling in" more groundbait as I unhooked the fish. I had to use a disgorger is the rainbow took the hook in pretty deep. I thought for sure I had killed it as it lay on it's side for a bit before tearing off back to the deep. I'm not into killing something if I am not going to eat it.

    The first carp came in the way that the smaller carp seem to when on the pole, a quick pull and then it took off like a jet--straight into the bushes and it was pulling like a boston terrier on speed. This is one of the worst things to happen on the long pole because there are times when you can't turn a fish and without fail, will hang you up on an underground root leaving you there with elastic pulled out of the tip and the hook stuck somewhere four feet underwater and 40 feet away. When you do manage to pry it out then the one gram float shaped like a dart comes hurtling back at you.

    The fish headed straight for the bushes and then under and then stopped. I put the pole in the pole rest and sat there wondering how the hell I was gonna free my rig. But then. . . the line began moving again and by luck the fish was still on. I wasted no time and began unshipping pole sections as the fish began swimming towards me. A few minutes and this guy came to the net.

    post-2456-0-30825800-1300404318.jpg

    Paul Wells used to say feed little and feed often. And every few minutes I kept cupping in groundbait or slingshotting in sweetcorn with people stopping every few minutes looking at what looked to be a guy fishing with a 30 foot antenna. When fishing with one of these you'll always get the questions: What is that? Why's your pole so long? It always turns into this dissertation about Europe and match fishing and the precise control of presentations, blahblahblah. During one of my lectures to one of these folks, someone says to me, "your bobber dissapeared." In which I curtly replied, "Lesson over, gotta fish now." This one was a little more merciful and shot off toward the center of the lake with me holding on with white knuckles hoping not to repeat the last experience with the previous fish. You begin to find little lessons which unfold with each fish. If you pull on the fish, chances are the carp will freak out and pull back. It's best to take your time, keep your line low or underneath the water's surface. Let the elastic do all the work. In truth, if there are no big underwater obstructions, you simply have to follow the fish until it tires out. Doing so, will make sure you land more fish, like this one.

    post-2456-0-22174600-1300404331.jpg

    And then, the swim went dead. I could not buy a bite. And, I didn't feed a second spot, which meant I had a 2 foot by 2 foot space of ground bait and sweet corn that was feeding NOTHING, or the fish had filled up and moved on. Who knows. At least with another spot, perhaps 15 feet in from your first sport, or off to the left or right, you get a chance to pick up on some other fish that who are grazing happily on some freebies. However, I did not have the forethought to do this and had to come up with another angle. And didn't want to spend time building a second spot.

    What I did have was half of a ham sandwich. On white bread. If I couldn't change up on spots, I would change up on baits. I dismantled the sandwich and started using the white bread as bait. First bait in resulted in a missed bite. The second bite connected, and I was treated to my third carp of the day. This third was the largest. I expect maybe under ten but still such fun.

    post-2456-0-11792200-1300404339.jpg

    All in all a good day.

    See you guys on the bank. I'm the guy with the 30 foot antenna.

    Hi there fellow carpers! from Chicago

    in Carp Locally & Fishing Reports

    Posted

    Just wanted to say 'HI!" and thank you for the tons of info the site offers through your hard work.

    I check the pages before any fishing trip, just in case I missed anything that might help me in getting 'Carpzilla' :D

    :)

    I fished for pretty much anything since I was 6 and ever since I came here from Romania, turned to carp 100%, with 'catch and release' as my new motto.

    I try to use the match pole lately, rather than the classic ledgering setup, just because Terry from Chicago (CHIBIGTEE) drove me nuts one day with his technique and his Garbolino pole (some day....)

    Thanks again. :)

    try Lincoln Park Zoo around springtime. You'll give your match pole a work out.

    al

    :P

    winter carp fishing

    in Beginning Carping

    Posted

    so i lost my job.... damn this economy, i dont want to wait till summer comes around an im working again i want to use my free time to fish. i have never attempted to fish for carp in the winter. what flavors, baits, rigs, ext. any info, advice, links are very much welcomed. I WANT TO GET FISHING!!!! im willing to spend lots of time trying an getting one will be even sweeter then in the summer.

    thanks zach.

    Sorry bout the job. I

    've had some success with spicy baits, including cinnamon in one method mix ( i use 1 tsp per pound.), also have used crushed red pepper flakes(they all have different strengths, so play around.) in another.

    Fish light. Try lighter leaders and smaller, strong hooks.

    Don't know much about the water you are fishing, but this may be a good start.

    Backyard Flounder

    in Other Species Stories

    Posted

    On the east coast we use a carolina rig with strips of squid or cut bait(usually mullet) and drag on the bottom. It's usually an egg sinker, a colored bead or two, a swivel and your hooklength. We then drag this along the bottom and the hookups are fairly good.

    Mano a Carpo on the Chicago River

    in Pictures, Stories & Video

    Posted · Edited by chiguy723

    Why not to be frugal with your tackle.

    In this fantastic sport we call Carp-fishing, which I’ve been obsessively engaged in for the past year it’s safe to say mishaps and slips seem to happen to me on a monthly basis. Whether falling into the Chicago River, wrestling rod tips caught in tree tops, or enduring angry silences from a wife who doesn’t understand the fermenting of tiger nuts for MONTHS, my behavior, to an outside eye, can seem downright loony. And perhaps it is.

    In the search for my Chicago 30-pound, I usually fish the Chicago River after work for two or three hours. It’s not a wide river, and the depths aren’t terrifically deep and if you hit google earth, you can find a good amount of places to fish north to Evanston and South to Chinatown. Needless to say, I have not caught the 30-pound, although reports abound that they exist. An old-timer once told me he’d caught 40 pounder on the ubiquitous Wheaties- Strawberry Jello-Sugar mix, as he sucked down his 4th Forty oz. Miller High Life one summer afternoon last year. I have yet to see a 30 pounder caught. As for the Forty, I’m sure it was some whopper of a tale which grows on the re-telling.

    Last night, I was testing out a feeder rod that I had bought online. I was using a small open end feeder with a 10 lb hook link and 15 lb mainline on an older Daiwa silverspin 4000 that I hadn’t used in about a season or two. I hadn’t re-strung the reel because I was pretty lazy. I was also experimenting with a bunch of yeast and cinnamon thrown into my method mix along with Strawberry Jello. I had read somewhere that cinnamon was fantastic in winter(alkaloids or somesuch). I also read that paylakers tend to use a bread pack in the winter(probably the yeast, I thought.) Hookbait was sweetcorn with more strawberry Jello and sweetened even more with nutrasweet. So, in the spirit of experimentation I set off to one of my favorite spots where I knew the carp hung out in winter.

    After baiting up two spots, it took about forty minutes to find me. It was caught in the margin on a hair-rigged method feeder on my second pole. Little guy he was, and I threw him in the keepsack in order to compare fish at the end of my session. I would get two more in the next hour, each fish progressively bigger. Meanwhile, the second spot where I had put the feeder rod twitched little. Either I was fishing it wrong, or the carp were not in that spot. The feeder rod is what I wanted to test, by hell or high water, I would have carp on the end of the line before the session was over.

    I brought in the rod, inspected the hook, the feeder, the rod in general, and surmised that what my set up looked exactly like the one I saw on an online forum. I rebaited and threw the rod, this time into the margins, praying to the fish gods for a bite on the feeder rod. Hoping that a whopping 30 pounder would bite and run and stretch the thin-tipped feeder rod to its limits. The line was tight, the rod set parallel to the river, and the drag set loose as was outlined in the online forum. And I waited.

    Meanwhile, the other pole had a run and as I picked up to flip the baitrunner switch and flicked back an ancient hand-me-down 10’ surf rod. It’s soft tip would tell me that I had one on. The parabolic curve of the rod and the scream of braid line peeling of your reel is what carp fishing is about to me. It felt big. I go through mental notes in my mind: keep constant pressure, tighten drag enough so reel tires fish out, and don’t DONT pump the rod. As the fish lunged another time, I kept the pressure on. He tired out and I tightened the drag again. The fish stopped and I PUMPED the rod.

    The line went slack.

    A list of expletives left my mouth. A couple crossing the bridge twenty feet away stopped to look at the strange man with a rod in his hand cursing out what appeared to be, nothing. They quickly moved on in the hopes the foul-mouthed crazy man with the fishing pole would not follow them.

    At the end of the line the method feeder was still there. The hook link was still there; however, the hook itself had straightened to a place where the barb would no longer find purchase in the carp’s lip. In case, you were wondering, it was an eagle claw lazer hook. I cursed myself for being too d*mn frugal on my trip to Dick’s sporting goods. I should have went for the gamakatsu’s.

    However, my own Frugality would strike again this particular evening. As began putting away the 10 footer, the feeder rod began to twitch. The idea, I believe is to not miss bites because the tip is so thin. However, what the online forums failed to mention was when carp fishing with these rods, do you fish the bite or the run. So I opted for the run. I snuck up on my set up and loosened the drag a couple clicks in case I didn’t dial it in so there was little tension. And I stared. For a while.

    I could see the tip twitch, so something was obviously messing with the hook bait or the swim feeder. It seemed like forever. Strike on the run, I kept thinking to myself. After what seemed an eon, the run came. I reached for the rod and pulled back.

    I did not tighten the drag. What would happen in the split second afterwards was horrible. The spool began to spin and a good amount of line came off. The problem with monofilament, as you all know, is that is has physical memory. When it comes off the spool, especially if its been sitting for a season, especially if you’re using something cheap like Shakespeare Omniflex, curls and bends. It also causes bird’s nests not unlike a baitcaster would. Which is what happened in this split second between striking with the rod and screaming “Oh CR*P!”

    I checked the line and the fish was still there. I tried keeping an arc in the rod as I frantically worked on the monofilament bird’s nest, pulling here or unraveling there. And of course, under panic and in the half dark, the bird’s nest did not untangle. It, in fact, got worse.

    Also in a panic, I thought it a good idea to cut the line above the tangle and go mano a carpo with the fish. Okay, so maybe not the smartest move. It might have been smarter to just let the fish go. Under the influence of panic and stupidity, I did not go this route.

    I instead, began wrapping the mono around my left hand and using my right hand to take in or let out the line. I’m not unaccustomed to handfishing. I used to hand fish off a dock as a kid but that was for sun fish and not CARP.

    I must say to those of you wanting to try carp fishing by hand, please use gloves. My left hand was the spool and my right hand was the drag. Instead of a 1:5 ratio, the ration is now 1:1. And it sucks. Bad. When the fish lunged I’d let the fish peel off the line from my left hand, using my fingertips of the right hand to pinch down on the line, thinking this might slow down the fish. It did succeed in giving me rope burn on my fingertips when the fish went for a run. So wear gloves, if this is something stupid you would like to try.

    I spent what felt like forever chasing the d*mn fish along 20 yards along the river bank up and down, the mono filament peeling off my left hand as my right was bringing in or letting out line. After you calm down a little bit, and you forget about your left hand turning bright red because you’re wrapping the mono around your palm and fingers a little too tightly, you get to feeling that this might not be too bad a way to fish as you feel EVERYTHING on the end of the line from a head shake to a turn. I don’t think I’d want to do this five or six times during a session, however.

    A couple times I created another birds nest but quickly undid them. And finally, I brought the fish on the bank. And it was a beaut. It was the second largest of the evening, allowing to call it a good evening after all. Pictures to follow.

    Four fish caught, one fish lost. Three caught on an old surf rod. One by hand. And none on the feeder rod. None over 30.

    Lessons learned: Don’t skimp on hooks. Don’t skimp on line. Or at least change your line every season.

    For those of you who do fish feeder rods, what brand line and what at test do you use yours?

    Tight lines folks. Happy New years. :D

    post-2456-1200064738.jpg

    Trial By Water

    in Pictures, Stories & Video

    Posted · Edited by chiguy723

    Trial By Water

    A Rookie’s tale.

    Since being bitten by the Carping bug last fall, I have made it out to the Chicago River, near where I live, as much as possible.

    My first experience was last September when I was targeting channel-cats with a piece of crawler on a carolina rig. Out of nowhere, a carp struck hard and took off to places unknown, peeling off line at a frantic pace. On a 6’6” Berkeley Equalizer, it’s like trying to hold on to a freight train with dental floss. I was hooked, so to speak. The carp weighed in at 11 pounds and change.

    I can only explain my brief time carp fishing like a drug addiction. Always looking for a bigger high, a better trip—a bigger fish. No longer content with taking proverbial bong hits out of an apple, I then opted for the 12 foot pole and bait feeder reel. I then broke twenty pounds three times on this river. I now want that thirty-pounder, or that forty-pounder. I think fifties are unheard of in Illinois. Needless to say, much to the chagrin of my better half, I spend a good amount of time on the Chicago River looking for Thirty or Forty.

    This brings me to last night and the title of this post.

    I had hit the river at seven in the evening. It’s still winter here in Chicago and a light snow began to fall. Colder gusts of wind began to whip down the banks and causing steam to rise up and off the River. It’s a pretty site. I try to fish where no one else does, usually steep banks near steep drop offs in to the River. It had already gone dark and I was using flashlight and the force to negotiate my way down one of these steep grades of ice and man made concrete rip-rap. Not too smart I will add, but then again, no guts no glory.

    I made it down the steep pitch and started throwing in chum balls ( this nights mix: bread crumbs, dog food, oatmeal, and sautéed and pureed green pepper.) One pole was set up with a bolt and hair-rig, sweet-corn hookbait, and tossed to the margins. The other pole was set up with a method feeder with sweet-corn hookbait and tossed to the other side of the river under some promising branches.

    After an hour wait, the margin pole starts twitching and then stops. Too impatient, I give it a quick hookset and come up with—nothing. Except a goby. I rebait and throw back into the margin. The goby, too. Even though it’s an invasive species, so is our beloved carp. Can’t play favorites.

    Pole Two now goes off, this time a full fledged run. I hop to it, flip the switch on the bait feeder and give it a jerk. The fight is on. And after a couple cycles of reeling in and running out. I get it up on the bank with my jerry-rigged net, a flimsy wood dowel as an extension. I unhook the fish and weigh it in the net and it comes in at 12 and change ( I use a deLiar scale which doesn’t give out ounces, hence the “and change”.) A picture is snapped and as I am placing the net and fish into the water, the Margin pole goes off. Bam, I’m off like a shot to the margin pole and doing the familiar bank dance: that series of jerks, leaning backwards, and pitching forwards that we call “playing a fish,” yet any onlooker would think was Insanity. This one felt bigger, much bigger. Perhaps my twenty, perhaps my Thirty ? I stumbled in the dark over the steep, icy rock bank a couple times keeping up with it. And as I brought it in and shined my pen light on it, it was definitely not the thirty, perhaps a twenty plus though, I thought.

    I set down the pole and grabbed my net to get under the fish. It barely fit in and as I was half-dragging, half-lifting the fish out of the water, the thing flops out. Second nature told me to pitch forward and get the net back under the fish. Nature and Gravity would further tell me that if you pitch forward enough on loose gravel, you surely will lose your footing pitching yourself further forward resulting in a Fall. Into a very icy, somewhat polluted Chicago River. The first thing that went through my mind when falling into near-freezing murk is: Ohmigod, Ohmigod, I hope I am not drowning. The second was: I wonder if that fish is still on?

    At this point, the sane person would call it an evening, pack it up, and proceed home for a hot shower.

    Net in hand I make it back up to the bank to find the rod, which had made its way a couple feet down the bank. I suppose the fish took a final run after seeing a hulking mass coming at it into the water at a high velocity. Miraculously, the fish was still on and with frost bitten fingers netted (this time a little more gingerly) the fish. It weighed in at seventeen and change. Not bad, but not the Twenty or Thirty I had thought. I pull out the camera out of my jacket to find, it has become water-logged along with my phone and my cigs. Finally, at this point, I came to the conclusion that I may have caught two but lost a pretty good camera and a pretty good phone and a pack of instant nerve-calmer.

    It was time to go home.

    And shower.

    Epilogue:

    Things a rookie learned from last night:

    1. Smooth equals fast. Patience equals fast. When netting a fish, especially if your net is not the largest, take your time getting the fish in. If it’s been played well and well hooked, I don’t think it’s going very far.

    2. Bring a buddy if possible. For Safety reasons. And it’s always easier to take having your buddy laugh at you than your wife.

    3. Keep your valuables in your car, your tackle box, or a zip-loc bag.

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