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Good quality bait... I can knock together a quality bait for very little money using a blender and basic ingredients. Catch a shedload of fish as well. The idea that a good catching boilie needs to cost much is incorrect and irritates me to be honest. The carp are not fussy and eat most things, so stop trying to second guess them and give 'em a bit of what they like. It's not that hard - and there is very little proof about many components sold as carp attractors/stimulators etc... other than someone has sat by a lake and caught a few on it. I done that with a can of sweetcorn, it is still not a great bait imho. Or they have stuck carp in a tank and gone, ooo look, it likes that. Fieldtesting - wot a joke. Like fieldtesting a pig on a farm. If only ppl knew Good quality carp food - well, no idea what that costs. Often people confuse bait with food. I don't. This statement is the sort of thing bait companies punch out (no offence mate) : Kelp powder - pure dried seaweed, rich in vitamins and minerals and trace elements that carp require for optimum digestion. I mean really? As it would never ever be able to eat seaweed normally what a strange and random claim to make... Anyway, just start rolling simple bait and see how you get on, then you can see if your 'wonder' ingredients add anything later on. I doubt they will as location is 90% of it and the other 9% is called luck.

No secrets there, was on the news as had such low water levels back in 2003. Nothing hiding I am afraid, high 20's, maybe scraping 30's biggest possible. http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/dec/01/drought-risk-high-england-2012

Dont use it - it has absolutely no place in pleasure fishing whatsoever.

Or get on your bike and go and get the hooks that you know work better... Sorry, couldn't resist it

Mr 9 months experience

Well what do you suggest then? Unless you start forging your own hooks then your a bit stuck aren't you. You could order online or through a catalogue if you can get someone to pay on their card for you. Or get your local shop to order you some in. It is the hooks, the drennan barbel hooks are much better than the raptors as you have now found out for yourself so either get off your backside or lose fish. I am sure you will survive a cycle ride through a nature reserve in the middle of the day.

Most of the differences you can see and feel in your own hands so I wont insult your intelligence I hope! The fact braid is much softer means that the carp cannot always feel it in the same way as mono so thats why the ghost was suggested for you. You could use stiff mono to a 360 type rig? Have a look through the rigs on the forum and i am sure you will figure the rest out. You could also use fluorocarbon (but I hate it )...

Thanks pal, you make a fair point, have not tried it yet. Either that or I am spending another 2 hours attempting to tie a Trigger Rig

once you have tied it you will have the end of the line coming off the knot and running in the direction away from the eye of the hook. so you can either tie a loop in it or stick on a D ring and pop it back into the eye and use a lighter to blob it off. Its a very good knot and very easy to tie.

Only knot I ever use: For eyed hooks make sure you go through the eye first from underneath. Spade End Whip 1. Double end of line along shank. Loop free end around line and hook. 2. Perform six turns with free end and pass through doubled loop. 3. Lubricate and pull tight, trim. Be careful of the hook point when pulling tight!!! http://www.garysmithfishing.com/shoreinfop8.htm

I dont think i said anything about people panicking but I know what you mean. I am pretty sure the perch would have a great time eating maggots however. They attack luncheon meat (my first choice) and drive you bonkers so I have given up on that. yes I have tried prebaiting areas and found numerous clear spots round the edge - too many and chucked pellets on them to return and find them sometimes gone, sometimes not and no pattern to it that I can see as of yet. They only really switch on after 8.30pm as its getting dark and I have not invested enough time to establish any kind of route. Trouble is, if you bait an area they seem to naff off and feed elsewhere, it seems to put them off - its very frustrating and a bit odd. You would think being a small place it would be easy to work out but as it runs round a long bushy island in the middle, you cant see very far at one time. Also there are not many carp and they dont need that much food, not being that big anyway, so kilos of bait would just go mouldy on the bottom as there is nothing else to eat it I dont think. I will nail them in the end, it will probably take an overnight session which i haven't done yet as there are a few characters that come around with airguns shooting things, I am sure you get the drift I can tell you, its harder than it looks and after about 7pm the carp completely vanish, no bubbles, no signs of feeding - they must be in the margins somewhere but they could be anywhere really as it is all the same. I will keep prebaiting the same few spots as I have been and try red corn and stalking at first light which I have not yet done either. I need some worms for that I think. I will let you know how it goes. One carp is a small one but he is jet black on top with deeply imbedded scales that you can see are just edged with gold when it turns, has a two inch band of bright golden scales right down each side down to the lateral line and under that he is jet black again. Never seen a carp like it, looks like another species, so pretty!

I guess the conclusion to the title of the thread is a freelined worm

I know you are tryin to help mate but 9 months of carp fishin is not really enough experience to draw on and you are slightly confusing things. The fish are very clued up, i have been around long enough to know it when i see it They are also quite old, when you have been staring at the things for years you can tell. They have certainly been fished for in the past and probably had a fairly horrendous experience on the bank because it has gone into their long term memory (Carp have a short and long term memory, just like people). They are not thriving that well, there is not a huge amount of food in there, there is no weed (except as mentioned which is not a nice sort), no lilies, a few dead trees they do like to hang around and sunbathe. They are actually quite twitchy as they have little cover from herons and cormorants, meaning they rarely sit still for long unless tucked into the bank. I am actually going to go down the shop, buy some lilies and chuck them in because the carp have nowhere to sit under at the moment but that is not the point right now. The place is not rich in food in contrast with many other places I have fished and this is likely to be why the carp have not grown that large and why they must visit the margins to feed. If you try and fish with naturals you will find that the perch will be more interested than the carp, so you cannot sit on your backside ledgering a worm or maggots - as a stalking bait however, it may work. The snail shell idea is very good and I will try that too. It is, however, a very pretty place to fish and is an small, old gravel pit. The biggest fish me and a mate watched jump three consecutive times like a salmon, right out of the water. Jump, jump, jump. We got a good view, I put it around 20lb, a common. It was the sort of carp you want to catch

No I think they already have, the perch are going nuts chasing fry around. To be honest, this was meant to be a bit of light relief. The carp are not really very big, nor is the lake - which I am not embarrassed to say. It is not worth the time and effort unless you have the sort of personality that doesn't like to be outwitted by a fish. I have dangled bread on their nose today to be flatly ignored and they swim casually out the way, tried all sorts of things over the past few weeks and it is rapidly becoming one of the hardest lakes I have ever fished. I have absolutely no idea why which makes it all the more frustrating. Nobody bothers with it, clearly the fish are older than they look and have not got the room to grow that enormous, there is only 8 of them in about 2 acres, nothing else except perch, it goes to about 10 foot deep, thats all. But they just wont have it, nothing interests them at all. I can honestly say i have never seen fish, basically that small (under 20lb bar maybe 1 of them) that are so unbelievably clued up. They are also terribly terribly shy, the water is crystal clear, they know what a rod is...its harder than the flamin pit I was originally looking for a bit of light relief from. The bottom is also covered in some kind of blackish stringy blanket chod that clings to everything which is why I am on pop-ups - which from todays experiment they wont have either. They are nice and black though thats why I always say size is not the be all and end all.

I did wonder about that today, they definately feed in the margins on the millions of bullrushes so must be eating snails and similar kinda stuff. It was hot today though and they spent most of the time just cruising around as you would expect really. I will try that tho, thanks. A trip to the parents to raid the compost mound - no wonder they say anglers never grow up

I just needed some gas These carp are doing my nut. Laugh at at anything floating, wont take this, wont take that, wont take pop-ups, i am beginning to wonder if they eat at all - the place also has an abnormal number of frogs and toads Everywhere you walk they are hopping off the path. I am on the point of sticking a 2/0 in one and lobbing it out there Anyway, this is slightly off the point of the thread. Clearly I will have to try something else and I think it is the rig thats the problem. Try try try again. I am going to critically balance some red corn over some died corn next time - goes a bit against the grain using plastic corn but needs must I am afraid. yes noknot, it will be your rig next time.

You will no doubt be amused to learn I spent considerable time tying the scorpion rig - considerable time - before coming to the conclusion that there was too high a chance of foul hooking for me to contemplate using it. I went back down to the lake with my carefully tied critically balanced pop-up rig and layed it carefully on a nice gravel spot in the margins with a scattering of boilies round it - nice. I know the carp have a couple of spots in the margins they will visit so I was sure they would be along at some point. There are only 8 of them so you need a bit of patience. Well to cut a long wait short, the carp clearly did come along, took one look at my critically balanced pop-up, had a good giggle, mopped up the rest of the boilies and departed. Excuse me, I am now off to stick my head in the oven.

Had an interesting chat about this today with a certain guy who has caught a few carp in his time His ideology centred far more around counter-balancing the rig to perfection, whether using cork dust in home-mades or drilling out boilies to fit a cork centre. He felt the rig was less important than ensuring the bait would fall soft as a feather and sit slightly raised on the lakebed. As long as you had a decent rig set-up (i.e utilising a D ring on a very sharp hook) he was convinced that the real secret lay in the perfection of a critically balanced bait. He felt shop bought pop-ups are too buoyant to present properly and require too much weight to keep them weighted down, making the presentation poor and unwieldy. If you were to use them, then it was vital to ensure they fell through the water very very slowly, critically balancing with putty. His preferred rig was simply soft braid with a critically balanced popped-up bait - but then he does own a bait company

Nice one baggin the carp. Sounds like you got it right on the day and you are being a bit modest, reading between the lines... Definately tie your own rigs - I thought you had - will save you a fortune.

Precisely - put it better than I could have. I have been carp fishing over 20 years, I am not using a fancy rig for the sake of it or to impress anybody as there is not a soul in sight - just how I like it. I think if 40lb(+) carp have been caught on the Scorpion rig it will probably withstand a bit of pressure. It is also fiendishly clever. I will shorten my hooklink on the 360 rig however and try both later on today. She will be mine...oh yes...she will be mine

If you can shin up a tree with polaroids then the fish do not have to be right in the margins to be observed - I can promise you that. I did nearly fall - well I did fall out actually - yesterday; so dont get too absorbed in watching them To draw some basic comparisons all the hair rig setups are basically the same - thats why I put a pic of each of them in. The manner of presentation may vary but they all sit off the bottom in a very similar way. Now I hesitate to contradict Nick, so let me stress this is just my view The carp may not feel the lead on a running rig (granted, why i use one) but I am beginning to wonder if (sometimes) they get that far at all. Does it matter if they can feel the lead or not if they have dropped the bait long before they have attempted to give it a tug anyway. So all the emphasis placed on semi-fixed/bolt rigs/running rigs may be a bit misleading. Maybe it makes very little difference in reality bearing in mind 99% of people are on a hair rig. I am coming to the conclusion (and I may well change my mind) that slack lines/tight lines, bolt rigs/running rigs, are distracting from what is really important. That once the carp has picked up your bait it cannot eject the rig. All the rest is then just detail and personal preference as the fish is nailed. Has anyone tried the scorpion rig before as I will be giving it a go later?

Hi Andy, Your setup looks great and considering you say you have not been carp fishing long you clearly know how to put a rig together. I would use a hooklink weaker than the mainline so if you get smashed up the carp won't be towing around your hooklink, swivel and a length of line which is more likely to tangle up and cause the fish serious distress - but this is an 'old-fashioned' opinion these days I think your imagination is working fine Carp often use their pectoral fins to stir up the bottom in front of them and they suck and blow the bottom too which causes turbidity. The silt is a slightly different issue and if you can find a hard spot then I would try and concentrate on that for lots of reasons. Is the bottom all muddy or is it an old gravel pit (or similar) with bars? Is it a clay bottom with years of silt collected in the holes on the bottom? Try and have a good feel around or just ask someone and find out! If it is very very silty everywhere, you may find you need to change to a helicopter rig if the fish are up to their gills in mud and feed mainly on bloodworm or something. Try and find a hard spot, clay/gravel whatever, and it is likely you can bait up their better and present your bait better too. Lots of carp fishing is trial and error, just like all other species to be honest. Good luck!

An opinion based on a lot of experience Tony and I was hoping someone would say something along those lines. It is possible, however, to watch fish feed however and observe them without donning scuba gear. This you know very well I am sure, as you will have watched them feeding in your time, particularly when in gravel pits which are crystal clear. I did not ignore your question to be peverse, I felt a range of opinions (without bias/input from a specific scenario) would encourage people to think about the question and throw up different opinions which could then be discussed/considered by everybody. Also different carp in the same lake do not always feed in the same manner, and when targetting a specific big fish in a low stock water this is when the question comes into its own, in my personal view. I do not think it is confusing the issue - there are some very good anglers who read through this forum and they may not have bothered to contribute up to this point, precisely because the question was quite vague. Nobody mentioned the Scorpion rig for example. There are others rigs in a similar vein. But it is interesting to see the rigs most people would use and why they have found success with them. I can see the fish feeding where I tend to go fishing, I trust this answers your question. The scenarios vary from a very muddy bottom through to a hard bottom and therefore what works in one place may not be effective in another, as you rightly point out. So presuming this is a gravel pit and you have seen them pick up and drop your bait in a second many times, watched one carp push another carp off your hookbait just before they are about to take it, observed them clear the area and leave your hookbait untouched...what would you do then? If it was a silty, turbid water and you just kept getting dropped bites, bleeps and little 1 inch movements on the bobbin - but you knew the only fish in the place where carp and it was very pressured - what rig would you opt for? Nobody does the same thing so its just interesting to see peoples ideas and views, thats all.

Suggestions so far: Chod Rig 360 Rig Blowback Rig Coated Braid D Rig (pop-ups) Zander - If you have a pic of your Turf Rig that would be great. Any other suggestions?