Carps are not always active. When they feel tired of feeding for too long, they usually stop to rest in cozy and safe places. How to find such spots and what lures are effective against non-feeding carp.
If the carp are not active, they mostly stop to rest in places, in which they feel safe and can easily digest the food they have eaten. After locating such a place, it pays off to go fishing there, because contrary to appearances, even non-foraging carps like to eat something for dessert from time to time.
Carp anglers know from their own experience when and where the carp begin to feed, and therefore, the easiest way to catch them. Once you've found your favorite carp feeding ground, fishing is pretty easy. In summer and autumn, carp look for food almost every day in exactly the same places and at the same time.
In large dam lakes, these fish usually forage throughout the night, while in rivers also during the day, and especially early in the morning. In post-excavation lakes, carps are also eager to eat at dawn, as well as in the evening.
Much depends on the fishing pressure. I know a few post-excavation lakes quite well, in which fishing has been very intensive for many years, which led to the situation, that catching a carp in some popular spot, it is only possible in the middle of the night.
A few months ago, two anglers who did not know the fishery at all came to one of these lakes. They began to fish in place, which has long been avoided by all local anglers because no one has ever managed to catch a carp there. The locals even laughed quietly at the visitors, however, it did not take too long, because the "newcomers" caught a few large carp on the first day, on the other hand, the local throwers didn't even have a single bite at that time. The guests were catching a few boilies in a place like this, in which there was not a single fish at night, while during the day the carp probably came there to rest. All anglers are looking for carp feeding sites, while hardly anyone is looking for places, where the fish rest. First of all, that's why, that most anglers don't know where to look for them, and besides, they are careful, that since the carp do not eat any food in such places, therefore they cannot be caught with a fishing rod.
However, I do, that everyone, who will take a closer look at their fishery, and then a little bit of head work, he will start selecting places quite quickly and precisely, where carp are standing between meals. These fish take the rod quite well even during the afternoon siesta, which is best evidenced by the already mentioned results of two visiting anglers.
In between meals
Carps look for crayfish in small dam lakes, clams and other food in the shallows only at night. During the day, the flocks of fish stand at a considerable distance from the shore, usually at greater depths (for example, in an old river bed). Carps behave almost the same in large dam lakes. In these reservoirs, having many more natural food sources at your disposal, they don't have to swim for too long, to satisfy your hunger. Mostly they stand at a depth of four, five meters and they are also looking for food. For the day they disappear somewhere beyond the horizon and only then calm down, when they are already very far from the shore and at a depth of at least seven meters.
After determining where the carp spend the day, we can successfully provoke them to quite good bites. The more fish, the easier it is to stimulate their behavior. And it is in large water bodies that carp live in larger groups. It is in such waters that I caught most of my carp, mostly big (from 20 into 30), protein balls floating above the bottom. And without any incentive!
I make the bait more attractive by adding a little more flavor to the dough or by dipping ready-made protein balls in aromatic oil.
Right under his breath
If the water is clear, I almost always fish with bright boilies, and thus I also provoke the carp with optical stimuli.
It is very important to give the bait as close to resting carps as possible, because only in this way can fish arouse interest or induce in them the reflex of food competition. I check the bait every hour, and the set is each time a little closer than before.
Sometimes a completely different technique of provoking the fish also pays off, for example by baiting with fine groundbait (particular). It is very often possible to trigger a real chain reaction: one fish tries, the other one starts to do the same, and before a minute has elapsed, all the carp present in the fishery are feeding.
But what not to say, it is quite a risky method. Except that, that there is a lot to gain, you can also lose everything. And even if you manage to provoke the carp to feed, it takes a very short time anyway. The fish have not yet managed to digest, or have not started to digest, the food they have eaten.
I like to use protein balls to provoke carp.
This lure is better eaten, when served with fine groundbait. In the resting places of the fish, however, the protein ball itself should float about two centimeters above the bottom.
Single fish
In small post-excavation lakes, carps search for food in small groups. Some fish live alone and mostly stick to one part of the tank. Carps quite often change their resting places in small water bodies. Apart from that, Usually, few fish are kept in one place, and sometimes only one single carp.
When it gets warmer at the beginning of spring, carps eagerly swim in the coastal shallows in clear weather and bask in the sun. In summer, they hide in the shade of water lily leaves, branches of coastal trees hanging over the water or descending to greater depths, where the water is cooler and richer in oxygen.
In autumn, fish like to swim to the shore again. It is enough though, to make it a little darker (clouds) and a stronger wind blew, and the carps go down to the depth right away 2-4 m. In winter, carp rarely leave their refuges. Occasionally they go in search of food. That is why it is so important to know the wintering sites of these fish. In small waters, catching carps in their resting places is not so easy, as it might seem. It is true that finding such places does not take too long, however, given the fact, that there are a few, and sometimes with only one fish in the fishery, provoking them (her) feeding with traditional carp lures is not that easy.
First, we have to put the bait under the nose of a fish standing above the bottom. That it would be possible at all, the water in the fishery must be very clean, and the carp resting place should be close to the shore, so, so that they can be observed.
A worm with air
If the protein ball is ineffective, we should try a few times for the flesh of the bread slowly falling in the water. Even carp, which are completely motionless, can often be tempted by this lure. However, the surest bait for lazy carp is the red worm. It may sound strange, but I am convinced, that many modern carp hunters have never in their life tried to fish their favorite fish with this particular bait.
And yet you can inject any flavor into the red worm. If we additionally inject a little air into the worm, then the twisting bait will float above the bottom, and this temptation is unlikely to be resisted by any carp. Fishing in carp resting places has a great advantage – Carps are hardly suspicious there, even in fisheries with very high fishing pressure. In these places, the fish are not used to the presence of food, and thus they are also not afraid of treacherous lures.
The situation is different in the carp feeding places – experienced fish often ignore even the most attractive lures. So a conclusion can be drawn: carp do not associate a possible threat with the bait, but with space, in which they regularly consume food. So sometimes it pays to look for carp resting, away from "attractive" fisheries, skillfully give a provocative bait and hook a fish that does not know anything…
