Sunday Morning Fishing Session at Ford Lake

Today's fishing session got off to a slow start with some rain rolling through shortly after I put the lines in the water. Then the wind gusts started. Then the white caps and 2 feet rolling waves started hitting the shoreline.  Luckily, the carp didn't seem to mind.

We ended with 9 fish landed and a couple of others lost at the shoreline. The biggest fish was 19 pounds, which is good size for Ford Lake. The smallest was about 3 pounds (maybe even less I didn't weigh him). Here are the pictures:

19 pounds

15 pounds

12 pounds

10 pounds

12 pounds

8 pounds

13 pounds

This fish goes down in history as the smallest carp I've ever caught.
I didn't weigh it, but it couldn't be more than 3 - 4  pounds max.

Today I did quite a bit of testing throughout the session, but my biggest test was to stop the trend of hook pulls I was experiencing last weekend. At one point last Saturday I had 7 hook pulls in a row.

To make the testing as objective as possible I only changed one variable at a time. I started by loosening the front drag. I didn't change hook length or hair length. Loosening the front drag helped a lot.

Secondly, I eased up when fighting the fish. I simply picked up the rod, cranked it a couple of times and tightened the front drag keeping the rod tip upwards. Then I started the retrieve. That also seemed to work well. I lost 3 fish on a line of weeds about 30 feet from shore and another one that beached himself faster than we were able to get the net under him, but I only had one hook pull today. I feel much better about my fishing technique today.

I also tested using a longer hook length on a rod or two later on. I caught one fish on a 5 1/2" hook length, but all the bites and runs were coming on the 3 1/2" and 4" hook lengths today.