Matt

From my experience fishing all kinds of places....you can't force a swim and sometimes you can't force a fish to feed aggressively in a location that is out of their comfort zone. Carp are creatures of habit. I find it is best to use their habitual behavior to your advantage, versus trying to change their behavior to suit your preferred fishing approach. Seeing carp in an area is a lot different than seeing carp actually EAT in an area. Have you seen them FEED in the margins? Are you sure the freebies in the margin aren't being consumed by something else? Carp tend to have feeding zones, safety zones, and transit zones. Are the margins on this body of water just a transit zone? If you actually seen them feeding in the margins (tail up, nose down posture or feeding clouds), , then the problem is your rig/approach. Carp are increasingly shy in shallow water. How subtle is your rig? If the rig is stands out or the fish bump into your line a lot...they will be spooked. There's a lot of factors to work out.

Looks like a great event with some stellar teams! Good luck to all.

Sure, CAG could be better. But, that takes a lot of time, money and hard work. The organization may not have grown drastically in membership, size and scope, but its cumulative impact over the years is quite evident in the increasingly mainstream acceptance of carp as a resource and sportfish to be respected. CAG will always be where it all started for carping in the USA. As the sport becomes more and more financially relevant, CAG has an opportunity to mature into the next phase of its existence. As business interests in the carping world continue to grow the US market, I think CAG has the opportunity to change courses from a social organization funded by members and run by volunteers only, to an advocacy/education organization funded by like-minded business and members and run by staff. But, that's a long ways away. Even the CAG haters have CAG to thank for their existence (PMSL).

To be transparent, I've owned some nash luggage and a nash umbrella, and its served me well I don't know the circumstances of your rod breaking, but if it broke after minimal use, that's weak.

St. Croix and GLoomis have incredible rod replacement and customer service. Unfortunately, Nash doesn't really care about the US market. You learned an expensive lesson to not purchase Nash products.

Good luck and have fun!

sick pike!

Wow. Awesome results! TN really is a serious carp destination, lots of great fish from that state over the years!

Do something in the central part of the state....Lake Marburg was a good location for the "all-state" events. Been a few things there in the past. Louis and I used to put on a few fish-ins in Philly...but that was always a challenge with parking, road closures, and worst of all, rowing events. Where ever an event gets planned, make sure to contact fish and game commission regional office and if its in a state park, inform the park rangers there. Those guys just like to know what's going on, and will often come by and learn a bit about carp fishing. A decent lake with good bank access is always a good option for an event.. Hasn't really been anything going on in PA since 2008 or so....

Grits in the PVA mesh has been in my regular rotation since 2007 after that first Baldwinsville event. Such a simple and cheap bait.

I've been an a very avid user of PVA for a long time (I almost exclusively use mesh tubing from resistance), and there are a lot of options for mixes you can use. My three favorites are: shredded maize (I put cooked field corn in a fodo processor), grits and flavoring; shredded maize, oats and flavoring; shredded maize, bread crumb and flavoring. The key to making these mixes work in pva is making sure they are not too wet. Also, many flavorings will retard the melting of PVA. Oils (which I use when cooking corn), will also slow the melting process. You can manipulate your bait mixture so it packs tightly and stays tight to your hooklength, or you can use a loose mixture that will spread and waft around your hookbait. I personally like PVA because you have a lot of freedom in the bait mixtures you can use, whereas with packbait, it always has to be something wet that will pack effectively. with PVA, especially the mesh sticks, you can make presentations both LARGE and tiny. I also really love the pva presentation once the mesh stick is threaded onto your hooklength. One of the major advantages of PVA over packbait is preparation. Many of my fishing sessions are short and I like to travel light. I can prepare a ziplock bag of my mix easily, and if I don't use it all, it can be refridgerated and stay fresh. Also, depending on how wet your mix is, you can prepare numerous rigs/sticks and be ready to clip on a fresh rig and recast in seconds. This is especially important when fishing a tournament or when you have limited time to take advantage of a hot bite. With all that PVA praise said, I've definitely had fishing sessions where the fish wanted that big dinner plate set, and the packbait far outperformed pva, even when the baits were relatively similar.

Is a tiger nut still "just a pick-up" if used solo without any packbait? I think tiger nuts work well on lakes/rivers where the carp typically feed on zebra mussels, snails, and other "crunchy" forage. They have worked well for me on the Finger Lakes, St. Lawrence, and certain swims locally. I like to fish either a single tiger, or a tiger and fake corn. I personally like to let my tigers ferment and get a bit funky after a double cooking process. First time I will boil them with a little peanut oil, sugar and salt, maybe some chili too. I'll boil them for about 45 minutes on a lite boil. Then, I'll just let them sit for a few days, week, or whatever. I will then boil them again for another 30-45 minutes. That second boil helps to thicken the liquid. After they cool down I just put them in a sealed container, and they will get better with age.

Be careful baiting up near crowds - people will figure out what you are doing and soon your spot will get jacked - part of the reason I prefer to bait up in the cover of darkness or fish really out of the way inconvenient places. I like to prebait my area with about 5 gallons of cooked corn about 12-24 hours in advance of a fishing session. Obviously, the more days you do this consecutively, the better your results are likely to be. We haven't held any get togethers in a number of years, but I would be willing to get together sometime in the spring on the Schuylkill somewhere.

these areas will definitely hold fish. If you can get close to the channel and deeper water, I would try baiting and fishing a variety of structure: deep water with current, shallower slack water, close to structure etc...you should be able to find the fish after you've put some time in. In my experience fishing the Delaware in Philly, you need to prebait fairly heavy to get consistent action. Another key to finding a good spot to fish in the city is to find out of the way places that won't get visited by the bucket brigade.

I won't make the September fish-in, but I am going to try and make it out to the Raritan on 10/20. Only 75 minutes or so from Philly, and I should take advantage of my NJ license that I got to chase snakeheads in South Jersey. Plus, haven't been to a fish-in in a few years.