Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations Ever catch a grass carp?

While trying to catch some Tilapia this past weekend in my ponds, I accidently hooked a three year old grass carp on a live worm. It actually bit the worm. What a fighting fish! If you could catch those with any degree of reliability, I'd soon forget about LMB and HSB and stock grass carp. Estimated weight 10 to 15 pounds...but I had to break him off on the light tackle.

I also caught one last summer on a piece of nightcrawler. Heck, I thought I was bluegill fishing. Long, strong runs. It was about 5 pounds and was stocked at 10 to 12 inches about 9 months prior.

Catch em on broccoli or about any green veggie, or so I have heard

I have read and heard they can be caught on cherry tomatoes. Most of them I caught have been on worms! In my experieice they don't bite baited hooks very frequently until the vegetation is sparse.

I have a Bounty on my grass carp, $25.00 per head and in two years no one has collected.

Here's my story. Once the grass carp eliminated all vegetation in culture ponds, we found that they readily would feed on floating pelleted food. Once they were trained to the pellets, we took our fly rods, and tied on a wooly worm or a sponge rubber spider from which we had pulled off the rubber legs. We'd toss out the food, and then make a cast. Perhaps this sounds a little less than sporting, but let me tell you, grass carp put up an amazing fight on a fly rod!! :-)

Dave

Dave same tech here. I set off the feeder and big cats and grass carp show up. I use a cheap wlamart fly that falls about the same rate as a water soaked pellet. I catch mostly big cats, some bluegil and that is fun, but have hooked 8 or so 10-20 lb grass carp. Yet to land one but what fun on a 5 wt rod. Btw I feel they are not good to eat when larg but the smaller ones which I kill sometimes in hauling are excellent table fare. I was nervous at first about eating a "carp" but they really are good. However as said we have removed big ones from lakes and they tasted like mud.

The little ones are fabulous when smoked. Really firm, white flesh. A little like northern pike, except instead of "Y" bones they have "W" bones--and lots of 'em.

Hi Greg! Does your field season start to slow down now, or are you southern boys working year-round??

Dave

I catch carp by using cheap white bread on a weightless hook floating on top of the water. They come by and scoop it up like they would grass. Lots of fun!

Dave we finished up electro work about 2 wks ago but still lots to do. Now is the time to fix all the stuff we broke during the year. :rolleyes: I was in MO Nov 6-11. We saw lots of deer including 3 shooters. To make long story short I had him at 18 yds broadside when I drew back my arrow slide off my string. I drew back two more times but never let the arrow fly. It was fun intense expereince though.

BTW I was hunting over one clover field where I saw at least 9 roosters flyin' and cacklin'. I wanted to hunt them so bad but below the line in MO where you can pheasnt hunt. Hope you are bird hunting right now, enjoy. I got a setter pup so may have to visit one day to shot some birds. You can come down and I can put you on some big bass in exchange.

Greg -- check your e-mail.

Dave

This was in the Dec. 2004 issue of Nebraskaland magazine.

"A 64 pound grass carp taken from Wilson Creek 2X in Otoe County shattered the previous Nebraska species record of 51 pounds. Malik Solunovic of Lincoln was fishing for bass and crappie in a float tube when the carp took the Shad Rap on his 10-pound test line. Biologist said the fish, which had a 33-inch girth and was 46.5 inches long, probably was the result of a 1979 stocking of grass carp in the lake to control vegetation."

The thing that really caught my attention was that this fish was caught on a Shad Rap.

Have they found Malik Solunovic yet?!!

I believe the NC record for grass carp was caught on a Rebel Pop R.

Dave, I have had the same experience, when my feeder throws the floating feed, you can put a salmon egg fly, made for trout fishing on an 8 weight rod with floating line and cast in the middle of the food and both grass carp and channel catfish will hit it. My fly fishing friends are disgusted when I call this "matching the hatch".

Darrell Stringer