More Champlain Carpin'

Tim with his first carp ever! Great job on that Tim!

Tim hit me up for my Learn to Champlain Carp special on Friday. It was a great day for it too. Lots of carp around mudding, circulating, doing all the things that carp do. Combine that with a light wind and great sunlight it is a sight fishing carp dream come true. Within the first hour of being on the water Tim had a carp on but it dug into the weeds hard and broke him off on a fast run. Big fish and light tippet can do that.  Something similar happened a couple of hours later and the fish came unbuttoned so we got the fly back. Barry Reynold's new fly pattern is really kicking some carp butt on Champlain. I think he is waiting until his new book comes out to showcase it so it really isn't my place to debut it online. I will be happy to show it to you and help you get a fish on one if you book a trip though!

That's a lot of fish and fun for Tim!

 It got down to the last half an hour of the trip and Tim got a great cast into a pod of carp. One of the fish jumped on it and he had his third fish of the day on! It took off into the emergent weeds and I told him what to do and the leader came out unscathed. The fish went on a short run but was really a bulldog fighter. It took about 25 minutes to land that fish. It really put Tim and the tackle to the test- but he was up to it and so was the Hydros and 3X Mirage (the best fluoro out there- thank you Orvis!). 

The fish came it at 15 pounds and was a great fish for Tim. He could not get the grin off his face and I can't blame him. 

I snuck out with Kevin yesterday to get in some carp and gar time. I managed a 10 lb carp on the new Barry fly (love that thing!- thanks again for sharing!). A pretty typical Champlain fish that was mudding. They have been mudding like crazy this year. Wind direction has been a great indicator of where to find them.

I just love carp!

The gar were around but the combination of wind and half-assed sun made it tough to find them. Mostly they ended up too close to the boat and spooked. Keep your fingers crossed for better weather tomorrow- two guys heading out on the lake!