Carp Tournament Series

[Scott M]

My wife was telling me what a big fan of fishing Tom Felton is. He's the guy that plays Draco Malfoy on Harry Potter. Felton has plans to go to school in the U.K. for fisheries management. Apparently, being a European, he's a huge carp fishing fan. He loves to come to the U.S. to fish and he started an international carp fishing series that has morphed into a set of regional tournaments. They had 5 tournament locations in the U.S. this past year.

I know a few of you are big carp anglers. Perhaps you would be interested in hosting a tournament in Minnesota. Try googling carp tournament series and use the contact us link to host a tournament.

Maybe you can take on Felton, carpmanjake. Beat him out and you can play Malfoy...you've already got the hair, right? j/k

[carpmanjake]

haha. i wish. i havent even caught a carp over 25lbs. im still pretty much a newbie

and i suck at acting anyway

[Muddog]

The key to catching big Carp is, fish where there are big Carp!

Some weekend you should wonder down to LeSueur Co, and we'll see if we can get a 25lb Volney Carp on your line.

[RiverWrat]

I didn't know Volney had a healthy carp population. Looks like a really nice little lake. How are the other lakes in the region? many carp in the cannon lakes chain? gormon, sabre, tetonka, sakatah etc..?

In recent years there has been carp tournaments in the united states and some have pots of large sums of money. Mostly put on by the carp anglers group and american carp society, many from the UK have even traveled to take part. Theres over 12,000 lakes in this state...no reason why a few can't be devoted to carp/buffalo angling.

[Muddog]

Quote:

I didn't know Volney had a healthy carp population. Looks like a really nice little lake. How are the other lakes in the region? many carp in the cannon lakes chain? gormon, sabre, tetonka, sakatah etc..?

They are all good Carp Lakes. Volney is a stand out of all the lakes mentioned above.

Quote:

FYI, I stopped by the DNR booth at the State Fair yesterday. While I was there, I got a free Lake Survey of Lake V....y for fun. The AVERAGE carp caught in their gill nets was OVER 12 LBS!!!

WoW.

More than double their normal net range.

They also caught 2 pike in the net, one 28 and one 32.

This was from a 2008 survey.

Other stuff:

283 acres.

water clarity 12.5 ft.

1.83 walleye per net caught ranging from 16-22 inches.

Abundant black crappie with most from 6.5 - 9 inches.

Abundant perch from 5-10 inches.

Moderate drum 8-11 inches.

Carp caught (keep in mind it was during the spawn) ranged from 27-37 inches average wt 12.07 lbs.

Flathead were stocked in 1991, only 9 have been caught in gill nets since then. 3 in the 2004 survey. They're encouraging anglers to report flathead catches to the DNR.

Have a nice weekend.

That is from the South Central forum

[MinnesnowtaWild]

Used to have Carp contests every year in Long Lake, MN just west of the cities. The lake is packed with large Carp. Plenty of 20-30 Lb Carp in there.

[analyzer]

I introduced myself and my nephew to carp fishing on Volney 2 weeks ago. We used Muddog's technique, or as much of it as I know, thank you, and got snapped off twice, and missed 3 other bites. My nephew had a blast as our canoe was pulled around, and line was peeled off his reel. Unfortunately we were using 8 lb mono, and it didn't quite do the trick.

I returned to Volney with my older brother yesterday, it was his first crack at carp as well. This time we came with better ammo, i.e. 20lb test.

He lost the first one, after it spooled 40 yds of line off and spit the hook, but successfully caught a 31 in and 32 1/2 inch piggy. The second one had tremendous girth all the way through the fish to the tail. His scale isn't necessarily accurate but indicated it was approx 19lbs!!! What a blast.

We had good action in the morning on off the North West corner in 9 ft of water, but only had one bite after 11 am. We moved to the east end of the lake from 1230-230 and while there was plenty of surface action, did not have another bite.

I'm very new to carp fishing so I don't really know if I should be trying shallower or deeper water, perhaps you (muddog) could give me a pointer. I sure appreciate you putting us on a wonderful experience. Both Carp are still swimming in the lake.

BTW, we met the sheriff at launch cleaning the swim booey's (spl?).. he mentioned that a commercial firm comes in and seins the lake for carp. That is sad imo, do you know how often they do that?

[Muddog]

You are more then welcome.

Quote:

BTW, we met the sheriff at launch cleaning the swim booey's (spl?).. he mentioned that a commercial firm comes in and seins the lake for carp. That is sad imo, do you know how often they do that?

The commercial fisherman were on Volney at the full moon of August. From what I understand they are more interested in Buffalo then Carp. They do keep some Carp but only the biggest ones. Volney is a deep lake so it is not easy for the people to sein it. I went out to Volney and watched them pull the net in in August and the net take was small.

This link will take you to some pics of when they netted the lake. http://www.fishingminnesota.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/1942766/3

The netting was on the north shore where there are no cabins.

Quote:

I'm very new to carp fishing so I don't really know if I should be trying shallower or deeper water, perhaps you (muddog) could give me a pointer. I sure appreciate you putting us on a wonderful experience. Both Carp are still swimming in the lake.

If you ask me, it looks like you did every thing right. Fish tend to feed more actively during certain times of the day. So if your timing is right you catch fish.

My main tips would be. 1 fish where you see fish activity. 2 fish near deeper water. 3 try not to fight the fish over the baited area (let the fish run, pull the anchor and fight the fish away from the bait). 4 Use a marker so you can get back to the spot where the bait is.

When I fight Carp over the bait I will only catch 1 or 2 fish. When I fight the fish and release the fish away from the spot I will some times catch 5-10 fish! I once read that Carp releace some kind of pheromone (or something like that) when stressed that warns and spooks other fish in the area. So fighting and releacing the fish away from the area is a good idea. I have had times when returning to the area, we catch a fish or a double within 3min of returning to the spot.

One more. 5 don't place you boat between the fish and the bait.

[Muddog]

This will link you to Lake Volney stuff from yesterday and this morning.

http://www.fishingminnesota.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/2009757/Volney_carp#Post2009757

[analyzer]

Thank you Muddog, you have been very helpful. Do the carp bite all fall, or do they slow down when the water temp dips? It's funny, we thought the carp we caught lost their scales do to bumping, from breeding or that they were just real old. I can see from these threads, that they were actually mirrors. Its fun to learn new stuff.

[Muddog]

When it comes to fishing carp in lakes I have the beat luck in July and August. This year is differant in that the long stable weather came in late August and September this year. The main thing I see is that Carp feed more in warm water then cold water so your chance of catching more fish in a day is better in warm water. I also find that the corn bite picks up after the spawn. Along with that I tend to fish for other fish in cool water.

Always have some corn along so if you see carp moving around you can go after them. It is the best way to learn.