The Characteristics and Senses of Carp
Carp are among the fastest-growing fish in freshwater, able to reach double-digit weights in a matter of months.
Carp are built like piscine linebackers, thick-bodied and with powerful tails that allow them to accelerate to speeds that top 10 miles per hour. This might not sound all that fast, but that’s equivalent to trout, and in a moving current, can make for quite the force on the other end of a fly line. They can grow as long as four feet, and reach nearly 100 pounds.
The largest carp ever caught by an angler was hooked on Lac de Curton (Rainbow Lake) near Bordeaux, France, and weighed 94 pounds. Rainbow Lake is world-renowned as a carp destination for conventional-tackle anglers, who will set up their “bivvies” (bivouacs) to camp, chum, cast and hopefully hook a large fish.
Carp are among the fastest-growing fish in freshwater, able to reach double-digit weights in a matter of months–again, depending on food source and environment. But a distinctive, mature fish can achieve celebrity status in parts of Europe. I’m not kidding. In 2009, for example, the carp angling world literally mourned the death (apparently as a result of ingesting uncooked, toxic “Tiger Nuts” bait) of Benson, a 25-year-old female common carp that had been caught 63 times and had an estimated worth of 20,000 British pounds. (Google “Benson and fish” and you’ll see; I couldn’t make this stuff up if I tried.)
Carp are typically golden, bronze, olive green and/or brown in color, depending on the food they eat and the environment in which they live. They have thick, armorlike scales along their sides and backs; long, serrated and spiny dorsal fins; broad tails; and sweeping pectoral and anal fins on their softer, lighter bellies. The scales and fins of carp often exhibit bright red and black hues.
Perhaps the trademark feature of a common carp is its round, hoselike mouth–hence the nickname Ol’ Rubberlips–that tilts downward to allow the fish to vacuum food off the bottoms of lakes or rivers. Note that the downward slope of a carp’s mouth is thought to be the product of domestication; wilder carp, which are more prone to chase different food types and feed less on the bottom, have less of a drop.
Common carp, unlike the goldfish in the bowl, also have barbels–whiskerlike organs that extend from either side of their snouts. These sensory organs contain taste buds, allowing the fish to swim in murky water and taste their way along, sorting out preferred food from other stuff along the way. There are also taste buds on the carp’s anal and pectoral fins. The insides of carp mouths also have special cells that can distinguish one taste from another–perhaps even lock into memory “good tastes” from bad ones, such as the metal of a fishhook. Many serious carp anglers, conventional or fly, will tell you that it’s difficult enough to hook a carp in the first place, but it’s especially hard to catch any carp a second time. One of the leading theories about why that is holds that carp have such refined senses of taste and smell that they’ll burn the bad experience of being caught into instinct, associating the smells and tastes of that syrup-soaked bait, and hook–or the sight and taste of a fly–as they do so.
I don’t know for certain that carp can “memorize” danger scents, tastes, or smells, but I do know that they are tremendously difficult to fool more than once. Among fish, carp might best represent the old adage, “Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me.”
Kevin Morlock–who owns Indigo Guide Service in Michigan, and along with guide Steve Martinez has recently turned anglers onto the remarkable, carp-based, flats-fishing experience to be had off Beaver Island in Lake Michigan–recently told me that he had tagged 300 carp in the past few years, and has recaught only six of those fish.
Carp also have a keen sense of smell. Scientific studies have shown that carp can actually distinguish the amino acids in certain food sources, such as crustaceans, worms, vegetation and so forth. Along with their superior sense of taste, a carp’s ability to smell different foods also helps the fish live and eat in dirty waters.
Just because carp don’t need to see in order to eat doesn’t mean that they have compromised vision. In fact, carp have keen vision when compared to other fish, and if you’ve seen how they react to motions and shadows in clear water (carp also love clear water), you’ll know just how well they can see. Scientists believe that carp have the ability to sense different colors as well.
Lastly, carp have a seemingly uncanny sense of hearing. While some of that ability is attributed to the fact that carp have large lateral lines that sense vibrations in the water, it’s worth noting that carp also have “ears.” They can detect sound frequencies from 60 to 6,000 Hz. Their ears are comprised of otoliths, which are tiny sacs connected to a small bone. Another elaborate series of bones and sinewy matter called the Weberian apparatus connects the ears with the fish’s swim bladder. The net result serves as an amplifier of sorts, allowing carp to hear things many other fish wouldn’t notice.
Getting Chummy
Much of traditional carp fishing with bait and tackle revolves around chumming, specifically because carp depend so highly on their senses of smell and taste. Serious tournament anglers all have their favorite “glugs” and syrups, and mixing up chum recipes and delivering them by “spod” catapult (or even remote-controlled boat) is an art form. Most fly anglers would not dunk their Woolly Buggers in worm juice. I’m not suggesting you step over that line when you’re carp fishing, but if ever there were a species and situation where a little chum or scent wouldn’t seem quite so disreputable–you’re “slumming” when you carp fish anyway–this is it.
This chapter is excerpted from The Orvis Guide to Fly Fishing for Carp: Tips and Tricks for the Determined Angler (2013).
Also, check out KD’s new book: A Fishable Feast: Fly Fishing and Eating Your Way Around the World–out this year and published by Rizzoli in New York. (order at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Books-A-Million.) If you want a personalized copy with an inscription from me for yourself or a gift recipient–e.g. “to Susie, the greatest fly angler ever to grace the rivers of the Americas”–sure, I’m game. Just visit kirkdeeter.com to order and tell me what you want me to write.
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