Kayak Carpin'

The weather report looked perfect for Saturday morning: very little wind.  No wind kicking up until 10AM, according to the forecast.  As usual, this was inaccurate, and wind is the biggest barrier to me when I am fly fishing for carp in the mud flats on my kayak.  Wind does two things that really hurt my style of carp fishing.  1) It puts chop on the water, which makes spotting fish very difficult and 2) wind pushes the kayak around a lot when you don't want it to, both of which leads to lots of spooked fish and missed opportunities.  Carp fly fishing is very visual.  It's sight fishing for actively feeding fish.  My typical routine is to slowly paddle along the flat watching for mud clouds, bubbles, and/or obvious tailing fish.  Finding tailing fish is a lot less common for me, so being able to spot a strong bubble line to locate fish is vital.  Once I get in range of a fish, it's a drag-and-drop presentation as close to the fishes face as possible, without spooking it.  If the fish sees the fly and wants it, the eat usually happens as soon as the fly hits the bottom.

I arrived to perfect conditions early in the morning.  Glassy, smooth water with no wind and plenty of carp feeding.

The fish were being uncooperative early on, and the one eat I managed to get, I missed on the hookset somehow.  That's a rarity in carp fishing, in my experience.  It wasn't long until the wind started kicking up, slightly after 8AM instead of 10AM, as predicted.  I took a chance and left the mud flat for the start of the main lake which was a little more sheltered from the wind.  It's deeper water, though, with more blowdowns and snags.  I spotted a feeder's bubble line in about 4.5' of water in a sheltered bend and got into position.  The fly was drug near the bubble line and I let it drop.  About the time the fly touched down, the indicator ticked, and it was game on.

This lake produces a lot of 30" and bigger fish for me, and this one barely reached the 30" mark, but gave me a whale of a sleigh ride.  It drug me well down into the main lake and keeping it from the cover along shore was not easy.  Typically, when you get a good carp up to the surface, you have won the battle.

I got this fish quickly onto the kayak, unhooked, snapped a quick picture, and got her back in the water for a quick revival and release.

After releasing this fish, the wind really kicked up and made the game all but impossible.  I cruised past one spot one last time where I had found some feeders earlier in the morning, but spotting bubble lines was not possible.

Although the weather and the fish did not cooperate as well as I'd hoped, it was still a good morning to be out.  The humidity was not as bad as it had been in recent weeks and the overcast skies kept the temperatures down in a more cozy range while I was on the water.  I'm not sure how many more carp outings I'll get this season, but if this was the final one, there are worse ways to end things.