"What was your first carp...?"

[Snape]

Great Story MS. Boyhood dreams!

[Frankelson]

I wrote a couple of articles in the 1970s for Coarse Fisherman magazine and called them "Average Angler", poking some mild fun at the experts and their "one shot two thirds of the distance from the last shot".
The then editor, David Hall, said this was fine but average anglers only caught average fish.
So I told him I'd catch a double figure carp (having never even seen a carp at that time).
Down at my local lake I changed my usual 16s hook for a ten, and, used my Bennet's of Sheffield electric blue match rod and Mitchell 300 (which I stil use today), with a bomb and the usual washing up liquid bottle top. I changed my usual single maggot for a lump of bread flake.
... er... something like ten trips out fishing like that I had my first bite - a roach of around a pound.
A few trips later I caught my 11lb Carp - frightened me to death, I'd never hooked anything so powerful in my life.
To give him his due, David printed the article I then wrote - complete with a grainy Polaroid photograph.

[Gammarus]

I cannot remember my actual first carp, but I know it would have come from Long lake, Chichester Angling club. I was a member in early 60's and learnt much of my fishing there (by trial and error), spent years with float and maggot wanting to catch an elusive carp, and failing dismally.
Eventually it must have happened, probably with a bit of crust, or possibly when a friend (who lived on a farm) read that you could catch fish on stewed wheat (barking mad I thought). I'll not forget that day, we chucked a load in, followed by a leger and some wheat for bait. Then started proper float fishing with another rod. Suddenly his leger rod went end over and into the lake!!
I then started using wheat (particles, before sweetcorn became known as "the bait") and catching loads of carp. It is still my favouritecarp bait, and cracking for roach.
One season I caught an 8lb carp on crust from long lake, this won the junior prize for biggest carp of the season - shows how things have changed. Was some years before I ever managed a double, late teens perhaps, but that was from Broadwater lake, Godalming. A terrible anticlimax - you needed to see the fish to understand why

[John Davis]

July 1977 from the Trent and Mersey canal at swalkestone, it was a massive 1lb 12oz common caught on two yellow maggots fished right underneath the rod top. The rod, my first rod was a weighty split cane, 3 piece thing that my old dad brought for me off a chap he worked with some 12 months before when I first started out fishing. I was only just 14 years old then and I felt on top of the world and had a grin like a cheshire cat for at least a month. Happy days.

[Mark]

I have tried but sadly I can’t remember. :brickwall:

[Snape]

I have tried but sadly I can’t remember. :brickwall:

Same. I'm guessing it was about 5lb and would have come from one of a few places near Portsmouth around 1981. Not sure otherwise. :think:

[CraigM]

The tiddlers of my youth & pre-24 year break from angling I can't honestly remember. My fishing diary tells me that I caught several up to @ 6oz from a pond at Newdigate - nr Dorking I think.

Fast forward to my local - Swelling Hill - pond & my first fishing outing after that gap.

Summer 2007 & finally a break in the rain meant that my 10 year old daughter & I could put all those newly purchased lead free leads & barbless hooks into action.

Same Daiwa float rod that I'd caught my very first fish [2oz perch] on back in 1974.

Worm fished on the bottom beneath a 1970s bought quill.

Second cast & 15 minutes in. Sky darkening & rain about to return.

Suddenly the quill was sliding across the surface & going under - heading for the lily pads 5 yards away!

3 minutes later & as much by luck as through skill [& thank goodness for soft, through action glass rods!] the common was in the new [knot free, fish friendly] net.

It was by far the biggest specimen I'd ever caught. My previous, teenaged self's PBs had been a barbel & a tench - both of 4lbs. This bottomed out my Salter scales [7lb version]. I'd like to have been able to say that it was my first double, but later catches persuade me that @ 8 & a half lbs is more accurate, & I had the first double to look forward to 2 years later from the same swim.

Daughter Lissy was as ecstatic as when she caught her own first carp [3lbs 2oz & a nice picture in Anglers Mail] using my old rod some 2 months later.

5 minutes after the fish had been returned the heavens re-opened. We packed up & dashed for home. Angling was back on the agenda & I've been firmly re-hooked ever since.

[Luke]

I'd been along with my dad and elder brother a couple of times before, just to see what all the fuss was about, and I'd watched them both land some impressive specimens. Impressive to my eight year old eyes anyway. Up until that point I'd resisted having a go myself, I was quite content just watching, but I couldn't resist any longer...

I persuaded my dad to lend me a six foot bright green rod that he'd apparently made himself and I promised him that I'd fish all day until I got one. All day is a long time when you're eight. We started at dawn and other than a few missed bites I had nothing at all for the next 17 hours. As the last of the light trickled away and it was time to head home I gave it one more try. A piece of flake, flavoured with some strawberry-smelling powder I'd found in the the bottom of the tackle box, freelined just under the tip of the rod. Sitting in the dark now with my dad beside me, he'd packed away all his own gear and everything else around us. All that remained was my rod and the net.

Just as I got the orders to wind in I felt a tweak on the line held in my left hand. This was followed by a slow and steady pull. Not quite sure what to do next I just lifted the rod up and watched as the reel handle spun backwards at an unbelievable pace and the carp shot off into the middle of the lake.

"Turn the anti-reverse on" I heard from over my shoulder.

"What?"

I had no idea what he was talking about so just held up the rod and handed it to him. He took it from me and as he went to grab the reel the still-spinning handle came right round and slammed into his wrist with a bone-crunching thud. "Argh $&*! that one will come up nicely tomorrow". At the shock of being stopped so suddenly the fish then decided to rush straight back towards us and I just looked on as my dad started winding like fury to keep up. Once some kind of control had been established he handed the rod back to me. To be perfectly honest, the rest of what happened is all a bit hazy. All I can remember is that it was truly enormous, six and a half pounds in fact, and I've been an angler ever since.

The bruise on my dad's wrist lasted almost as long as the smile on my face.

[Caractacus Potts]

Growing up in Worcestershire in the late 70's there weren't that many waters that held carp, and most of us boys fishing was on the Severn or the Teme.
However, in the summer of 1980 we fished Leigh Sinton pond, a small irrigation reservoir that held a few, although to us they were unobtainable and we were fishing for the roach.

I remember dropping my swimfeeder (empty of maggots) and three maggot hookbait under the rod tip in a couple of feet of muddy water while I dealt with a tangle around the bail arm. You've guessed it, as I lifted the rod to swing the feeder to hand to re-fill it there was a delightfully unexpected resistance and a plucky little common of 8 oz was hooked ! A red letter day for me.


I'm still a big fan of margin fishing !

[The Sweetcorn Kid]

Lovely tales guys,..........keep em coming. :hat: