I posted along the side of the flooded road the first day and did pretty well. All told I took a dozen fish, shooting only at the bigger carp and letting the small ones swim and ignoring the ever present cruising gar.
Not much bigger than a hammer handle, the gar would be available to me all summer so I didn't waste my time on them.
For three days I returned to the roadside shooting gallery taking quite a few fish in the proscess.
As I mentioned earlier, the carp come into the shallows and spawn as well as feed. That means that there'll be a big female followed or even surronded by smaller males pursuing their amorous intent.
What that means to the bowfisherman is opportunities for multiple fish on the shame shot.
In the past I've skewered as many as 4 fish with one shot... they were very small fish! I almost pulled off 5 at once on one occasion but the arrow just didn't have the steam to fully penetrate the last fish and it slipped off as I reeled in the line.
I was able to shoot three doubles while working that road.
Each day passed with the water a little higher than the day before.
You'll find that when carp are in fields like this they will often find "trails" through brush and shallower water. Once you find a travel lane like that, it's a good idea to stay close by.
By watching nearby weed tops you can be alerted to moving carp as well and position ahead of them as a direction of travel is established.
The days down there were sweet and cool early, but warm and humid as the sun rose higher above the now distant river.
The constant splashing of thousands of carp was puntuated now and again by the trilling a Red Winged Blackbirds doing their own thing with the local bug populations.
Here and there a Great Blue Heron flapped lazilly along transporting my back to the time of the Thompson brothers and their quest for that great bird.
In the distance bright white Cattle Egrets stood in the shallow blue waters waiting patiently like the fishermen they are.
While I would have loved to have waded out and stalked the thashing carp I made do with what I had... flood waters are pretty nasty in reality carrying all forms of waste material and garbage.
By the end of the third day my roadside shooting had slowed. I was thinking seriously about changing locations on the last day. When a saw something out in the deeper water that made me fall into Cattle Egret mode.
A couple of wide shallow wakes moved slowly in my direction as if some large object in no particular hurry was moving just below the surface.
As they moved closer I could see a large whirlpool like hole open in the water and as they moved even closer the white rim of a baseball sized mouth became apparent.
From experience I knew that they were Bighead carp and they certainly were bigger than the common carp usually found in these waters.
Finally I could make out the tapered bodies of the two fish angled down into the dark water and I made ready for the shot.
Fish may seem stupid but as you get close to them you must be aware of not making any sudden movements.
That may seem like a duck soup shot can suddenly turn into a hasy and often noisey, departure of the target. It's good training for bigger stuff!
The bow was pointed and I had tension on the string. I was glad to have ahold of the familiar handle and even happier to have the 67# at my beck and call... large fish are difficult to penetrate when you hit them in there solid parts. Which is something you should try to do to prevent twist off and rip outs.
A head or gill plate shot makes for a more controlled situation.
I slowly drew the bow to anchor and settled there a moment before letting the heavy fish arrow slip.
The white shaft arced out the ten yards and connected, then disappeared in a whirl of foam and froth as the line peeled merrily from my reel.
It took some doing to land the powerful fish. At first I just held tight and let him fight agains the heavy line and a reel drag that was cinched down good and tight.
Finally I drug him through the roadside brush and the safety of dry ground.
Topic: Floodwater carp and other encounters (Read 4868 times)
