What tried to grab my luncheon meat?

[The Flying Tench]

I had an interesting but unsuccessful evening today. I decided, with the recent increase in temperatures, that many of the fish would be in the margins. I went round a local lake putting some mini pellets under a few bushes and trees, obviously close to the bank. Then I came back in the evening with big lumps of luncheon meat on my hook, and fully expected the tip to swing round almost straight away. I tried about 5 swims, and not a touch. i then decided that maybe it wasn't a big bait lake, and I put on a small piece of meat on a 12 hook in a snaggy swim. 10 mins, nothing, so I decided to call it a day. I hadn't had a bite, though in the last few minutes there were maybe some very slight movements on the quiver, though I put them down to the wind.

 

So, as it was getting dark. I wound in for the last time, but as I pulled the bait from the water the head of a fish appeared chasing the bait. And, I lie not, I HEARD IT'S MOUTH CLANG SHUT as it missed the bait! The annoying this is, I wasn't expecting it and it was a bit dark and I couldn't see what it was. I suupose a pike is the obvious answer, but something from my unconscious mind told me it wasn't, and to put the bait back in the water. Almost immediately there was a bite, and I had on what must have been a big carp. I wasn't ready for it, I hadn't checked the clutch setting and let it take too much line, and it snagged me. But it was like a steam-roller. Even if I'd been more prepared I'm not sure I could have stopped it. I left the bale-arm off and ran back to the car in the semi-dark, and got some waders and went in after it - but the water was too deep, and I had to pull for a break.

 

So, i suppose the simple answer is that the two events ( the fish chasing the luncheon meat and the carp) were separate and unconnected. The first was maybe no more than a jack. The second was a carp. But it was a coincidence that, after a biteless evening, they happened within seconds of each other.

 

You might say that a carp looks quite different from a pike! True, but in the dark it could have been a few inches of a big carp's mouth that broke the water, or a pike, and I simply couldn't see well enough to say. But then, surely, I wouldn't hear a carp's mouth clang shut?!

 

Out of interest, I know that carp will occasionally take spinners, but has anyone known them take a moving bait such as meat?

[rooney888]

ive had carp grab meat when ive lifted my rig out the water when pole fishing, usually i start to lift pole up and about half way something would take it.

And ive also caught a carp when reeling in my feeder fishing meat, once i was fishing about 50yds out and a fish grabbed it at about 10yds out.

And a pool near me sometimes when surface fishing, when im reeling in to rebait a carp will come up and grab it while the bait while it's skimming across the water.

 

So not an unusual accurance, and the noise you heard may be the noise of a carp trying to get the meat. Sometimes i see carp taking bait off the top they make a popping type noise when they come up and take them.

[Guest Brumagem Phil]

TOO EASY!!!!

 

Robocarp!

[Unimexsol]

Carp is my guess, if you got a glimpse and subconciously don't think that it was a pike then it probably wasn't. Could it have been a large chub maybe?

[Vagabond]

carp taking bait off the top ....make a popping type noise when they come up and take them.

 

Dick Walker used to call such fish "Cloopers" - describes the sound perfectly.

[DavyR]

Don't suppose there are any catfish in your lake?