Float vs ledger for carp

[Phone]

Androo,

 

Sounds like you are coming over to the why worry(?) "they are only fish" side of the equation. I've made a bad assumption (again). In the thread "Hemp Pellets" I pasted a URL that, while quite old, is one of my favorites that answer the question - if you are going to throw someting in the water why not make it something useful. My response was with that in mind. AND for carp.

 

I like and use sweetcorn - nothing wrong with that. Equally I know the conquences and benefits for the carp - nothing wrong with that either.

 

I don't chum (use groundbait) so my offerings are of little importance.

 

I still have the mental picture of that backhoe taking two meters of "introduced crap" off the bottom of a carp pond.

 

Either your fish are pressured and require good stewardship or not. You tell me.

 

Phone

[Nicepix]

I don't go fishing to offer the fish a balanced, healthy diet. I have no responsibility morally or otherwise to do so. I put ground bait in to attract fish without over feeding them. The idea is for them to take a hook bait, not look and feel better after a visit to my swim. Taste, that's what matters, not protein.

[Anderoo]

You can of course have too much of a good thing: http://www.johnbakerbaits.com/articles/hpellets.php

 

Coarse fish have a totally different mode of digestion, as well as having different nutritional requirements to other species. When we throw our high-oil pellet freebies into the rivers and lakes we are often doing so without knowledge of what other bait is being introduced to the venue. Unlike a fish farm, we have no control over the quantities of food the fish are eating! It may surprise some anglers to know, that just one small handful of halibut pellets can provide a 10lb barbel or carp with most of its nutritional requirements for a week! If more than this amount of free offerings is introduced, it can seriously affect the metabolism of fish. It’s a bit like eating a curry every evening, it would soon make us fat, as well as seriously upsetting our stomachs too!

 

When I feed with layers pellet they make up a proportion of what I'm feeding. Other items in the mix are more nutritious/higher oil/higher protien/higher flavour/slower to break down, other items less so. If I thought I could achieve the same effect just using layers pellet, that's all I would use, as they're really cheap and easy to use! Others have shown in some circumstances they're effective just used on their own.

 

In many ways I do think 'they're just fish'. I don't feel any obligation to nurture or feed them; they're wild creatures (or at least they should be). But I also know that as wild creatures they have certain very strong instincts and behavioural traits that keep them alive, and sometimes keep them from getting caught. I like to fish places where the fish do not need to eat any bait. I'm not supplementing their diet with essential vitamins or protein or anything else; I'm trying to create an artificial feeding response in order to catch them. If it works, then it works.

[Nicepix]

You can of course have too much of a good thing: http://www.johnbakerbaits.com/articles/hpellets.php

 

 

 

When I feed with layers pellet they make up a proportion of what I'm feeding. Other items in the mix are more nutritious/higher oil/higher protien/higher flavour/slower to break down, other items less so. If I thought I could achieve the same effect just using layers pellet, that's all I would use, as they're really cheap and easy to use! Others have shown in some circumstances they're effective just used on their own.

 

In many ways I do think 'they're just fish'. I don't feel any obligation to nurture or feed them; they're wild creatures (or at least they should be). But I also know that as wild creatures they have certain very strong instincts and behavioural traits that keep them alive, and sometimes keep them from getting caught. I like to fish places where the fish do not need to eat any bait. I'm not supplementing their diet with essential vitamins or protein or anything else; I'm trying to create an artificial feeding response in order to catch them. If it works, then it works.

 

That sums it up for me too. The lake I've been fishing is over 3 mile long and a quarter of a mile wide in places. At any one time there might be a maximum of twenty anglers on it, thankfully none within 400 yds of where the shoal of carp are that I'm targetting. The carp get by without me. But every now and then they get a little treat. The choice of grubing about in weeds, doing work for little return, or hoovering up groundbait that might not be as wholesome as a caddis grub or roach fry, but it is more easily harvested. That's how nature works; balancing dietary input against expenditure of effort.

[Anderoo]

On many waters, fish only get caught when there's a gap in natural food availability, and so they have no option but to turn to the less preferred anglers' bait - regardless of how high quality it is. The same thing happens on a more permanent basis at highly stocked artificial venues; there's pretty much nothing else to eat.

 

The former example, though, is a good illustration that in many cases, at natural venues no bait is any competition for the fishes' natural food, whether it's 5% protein or 80% protein.

 

Ever wonder why all those big chub get caught in freezing winter conditions when so few get caught in the times of plenty in summer...?

[Phone]

Nicepix,

 

You say, "Taste, that's what matters, not protein."

 

According to the fish (carp) they are one in the same. That's the delima you presented. Fishmeal ALWAYS tastes best.

 

Don't get me wrong, I think "HNV" is hooey. I object to bloated "outsized" carp. But given the option fish (carp) will home in and stay on the highest protein available. Fish protein first (it matches the natural diet).

 

I don't believe there is any single event that is a "good example" of carp behaviour. Otherwise we would have the perfect carp bait at hand.

 

Androo,

 

Maybe we have the advantage (although I doubt it) in that - in the name of "angling science" thousands and thousands of postmortem examinations the atopsys (sp) show carp to be on average 70% predatory. Bugs are the primary source of chitin - a non-essential dietary requirement.

 

Phone

[Nicepix]

Nicepix,

 

You say, "Taste, that's what matters, not protein."

 

According to the fish (carp) they are one in the same. That's the delima you presented. Fishmeal ALWAYS tastes best.

 

Maybe we have the advantage (although I doubt it) in that - in the name of "angling science" thousands and thousands of postmortem examinations the atopsys (sp) show carp to be on average 70% predatory. Bugs are the primary source of chitin - a non-essential dietary requirement.

 

Phone

 

Phooey! If that was the case, then there would be no market for fruit flavoured boilies or maize or nuts.................

 

Most fish are predominanately predatory;- insects mainly, but at this time of year many insect eaters will harvest the fry as they emerge from weedbeds. That doesn't stop carp taking a boilie if it is tasty and available.

[Phone]

Nicepix,

 

You HAVE to be absoulty correct. I conceed. Otherwise there wouldn't be 70,000 carp bait and additive combinations. You're not reading the science I'm sending your way are you? That's OK, the fish aren't either.

 

I will say after spending nearly 6 million dollars and digesting volumes of data I'm pretty convinced I know what I am talking about. I consider myself an expert. Still, I'm the first to admit there is no perfect carp bait. It would be worth MILLIONS in the UK alone wouldn't it? That's why "examples" are meaningless.

 

You do know carp convert "sweet" (as alcohols usually from cereal grains and legumes) to protein in the liver before utilization don't you? No other fish (common carp), save sharks, hava such a large and unique liver.

 

I will say, at the risk of 'issing you off further, much of what you're accomplishing is probably with "attractants" and not food sources. Keep up the good work. Few, if any anglers know the big question - WHY? Certainly I don't. Simply to many variable every time we go fishing.

 

Phone

[Nicepix]

Phone, We'll agree to differ. I get the science and if all things were equal then carp and any other species would choose the best food possible and all species other than man appears to be able to know what is required.

 

What you are not factoring in is the psychology. Any fish that lives on natural food works hard for its living. Put an inferior, but more readily accessible food source in front of it and you can throw all the chemistry out of the window. If you made a living panning for gold and someone came to you and told you that a truck load of nickle coins had gone into the river a short distance away what would you do? Continue panning for a small amount of precious metal or hike up there and fill your saddle bags with money? That's why 16% protein chicken pellets get hoovered up by wild carp.

[Nicepix]

Just out of interest I tried my new bag of layers pellets this evening. At 6 Euro for 10Kg I am very impressed.

I was fishing in the margins with two grains of sweetcorn on a size 10, 2 AA shot 6" from the hook and watching the line for bites.

I put in about 5 or 6 handfuls of pellet right into the edge and within 10 minutes I had 4 or 5 decent carp heads down over the spot. I was putting in a handful every 10 minutes or so.

Dropped the bait into the mix with a slack line and waited (not long) for it to tighten.

Ended the evening with 7 carp up to mid double

Rod was a split cane Avon style that I bought in a junk shop for £5.00 and refurbished so even more fun

 

I've just been up to the farm pond for a couple of hours. I need to be getting some zander baits in the freezer and this little pond is stuffed full of tiny roach and carp along with some decent specimens. I'd used chicken pellets wet the other day when carp fishing for the big girls, like a method mix as they call it these days. It certainly attracts the small fry, so today I tried the pellets themselves on a small band attached to a 16 spade end hook and 1.5 lb leader. Absolutely bagged up. It was like Tommy Pickering in his bleak snatching heyday The fish love them and at 3 Euros 50 cents for 5 kilo or just over 6 Euros for 10 kilo they are cheaper than breadcrumbs.

 

So, the moral of the story is, when fishing for pech or zander this autumn, have a pole and some chicken pellets handy