fishing for wild carp

[barbelboi]

Originally Posted by bank_tramp

Welcome Charlie,

Unfortunately the Stowe fish can no longer be considered true wildies since king carp have now been stocked, my dad had commons to 24lb+ from there last season

Thanks for the update - it was only one of the smaller lakes that was considered inhabited with true wildies.
Jerry

[bank_tramp]

There are a few ponds around Stowe that used to hold what we considered wildies, I believe there was one near Akeley so you may be correct, one things for sure its very hard to say a fish is a genuine wild carp these days. Crucian carp are going the same way I'm afraid.
As far as the op's original question I think most methods will catch wildies, they ain't too different from king carp in that respect

[carp_mad_man]

If the lake's ONLY got wildies, then a maggot clip rig - see the Carp Mad Man on the Carper's tip bit seem #5 -

But, if it has been fished before and there are other 'non-wild' carp, then you could get away with natural high attract pellets - Not Boiles yet though - the mixed grpup of non wild - that have been caught/fished for - and wild carp would ecourage the wild carp to 'learn' that these not so natural and possibly more user (fishermen) friendly baits - like pellets - are fine to eat. All the best with it, the CMM

[waggler]

My personal approach would be a very simple set up fishing with a few monster lobworms, your won garden lobworms would be best and with the recent rain should be easy peasy to get a good collection, if you need some help check out this guide: Fishing Worms from your Garden

Good Luck!

[nicepix]

There is a small farm pond at the back of our cottage. It was drained about 19 years ago and re-stocked according to the farmer with two bucketfulls of fish. He has no idea what fish these were and in that 19 years it has only been fished a handful of times - mostly unsuccessfully according to the farmer.

On exploring it I could see that there were carp in there. No surprise as literally every farm, village and house with grounds of any size has a pond or ponds with carp in them. So these carp were as wild as is no difference. Withing half an hour I had one on sweetcorn and three others followed in the next couple of hours. Nothing big, around 4 Kg max, but a few had the spiky dorsal fin that catches in the landing net and is supposed to signify a wild fish or so I have heard. I tried a few more times hoping for a tench or rudd, but only carp have come out so far. The other day I threw in some bread crusts and within two minutes fish were taking them. I've also had them on sheep pellets and small pieces of luncheon meat left over from a barbel session. So, we have fish that have barely if ever exposed to baits taking sweetcorn, sheep pellets, meat and bread readily.

I wouldn't get too hung up on baits. Just fish what you have to hand.