My First Cut Carp.

 For a few years now I have wanted to spend some time learning about my local canals with the hope of catching some quality fish of a range of different species, I have done very well on a number of rivers and still waters over the last decade and the "bloggers challenge" now upon us has given me extra impetus to challenge myself further.

 This morning I was on the cut with my stalking rod and after a few hours of recon a section over the last couple of weeks was identified to hold a good head of Carp and after half hour or so I had found what I was looking for, half a dozen Common's were suspended just under the surface and within 5 minutes my floating crust had been snaffled by a beautifully coloured carp, after a brief scrap I had landed my first ever canal Carp and hopefully the first of many.

7lb 1oz, happy days, the start of something good I hope.

 I hoped that once I had landed that carp the others would stick around but this didn't happen as the swim was totally devoid of fish, I spent a while after that walking the cut with my Polaroids hoping to spot any fish and I saw something I never expected as a shoal of 3 Crucian Carp sat just on the near side shelf grubbing around the weed, I stood and watched in amazement as I didn't expect that here, I was so taken aback that it took me a while to get a bait down to them, the slight disturbance of the float entering the water though made them very spooky and slowly but surely they headed into the deeper water off the shelf never to be seen again, but that served as a notice to what could be caught from here, I will be back and hope to see them again