Hi.
As we have received so many emails relating to Carp feeding habits etc we thought it might be easier if we posted a response for everyone to read. It may even relate to other species. We have been researching fish behaviour for around 20 years using a mass of electronic aids, from underwater cameras to proximity sensors in order for us to evaluate just why fish will take a particulat bait one day and not the next. The results have been surprising and to understand the data you will need to look at fish completely differently. There isn't space here to go into detail so to simplify matters imagine the fish as purely a brain and a body. In order for the fish to function the brain monitors the blood continually to rectify any vitamin or dietary needs. If you can picture the outside of the fish covered in thousands of microscopic receptors in a variety of shapes, squares, triangles, circles etc etc. Each shape relates to a particular vitamin, amino acid or whatever. If the brain spots a particular deficiency it opens the corresponding shape. So, say all the square receptors are switched on ..... off goes the fish until a particular food source triggers the corresponding receptors, it hones in on the chemical signal and feeds. On another day the fish would show no interest at all in circles, perhaps a different shape relating to a particular deficiency is the order of the day. Sometimes the brain detects no requirements at all so the fish do not feed. Hence you can have a bait that works brilliantly one day but the next gets no response at all. This isn't a conscious decision by the fish, it is purely chemical. Fish after all don't have decisions to make, they don't live in a world complicated by distractions. They have no concept of TV, drink,work, bills or anything else that we humans have in our lives. They exist to eat and breed and thats all their body is designed to do. To a large extent even taste and texture is not relevant as long as the right shape is activated.
Theres also no point in using a bait that contains all the dietary needs of the fish as the chemical signal that is disolved in the water contains too many shapes all jumbled up to effectively trigger the feeding response. The knack is to know what a particular species is liable to need at a given moment in time based on local knowledge, food supply, water conditions, time of day, ph and bacterial levels etc. Not as impossible as you may think as many good fishermen have developed a kind of instinct as to what will or not work on a given day without realising why, and what location is liable to hold fish based purely on experience. Carp are not true predators, although they may occasionally take crickets, young fish ect, they are primarily underwater cattle that graze so their responses are fairly uniform. Whilst all the above does apply to predators such as Bass etc these fish have a whole range of other triggers such as movement etc so a true predator can often be induced to feed by being teased, much the same as a cat and a peice of string,the striking instinct takes over.
Anyway, I've probably bored you lot enough so I'll refrain from going into more detail but if any of you want to know more about our research data just let us know.
All the best.

i read Buck Perry's book on fishin bout 35 or so yrs ago. he discovered that predator fish(game fish) could be enticed to "strike " out of a predatorial response. get the rite depth an you should catch some of these fish, get the rite speed an you'll catch the most. he also coined an defined "structure" as applied to fishin situations. i still catalog what ever knowledge i obtain, to catch game fish, within these parameters. i can see that carp fishin can be just as intricate...find the rite depth an you should catch some, find the rite 'trigger" an you'll catch the most....an maybe the biggest. 'preciate the info!

Carp are bottom feeders. TROLL ALERT!!!

Fishdoc

My knowledge of predators is a lot less than yours but as you rightly say, they can be enticed to strike whether they are actively hunting or not. I spent some time in Canada trying to catch big Muskies and would have given up if it weren't for an old local guy who showed me just how important the whole speed and movement issue was, especially when the fish were not actively feeding.On one of our last trips we were taken out by a relative to catch Stripers and was lucky enough to get a couple, one of which was trophy size. More luck than judgement I guess but I found that whilst everyone else was casting into the shoals on sonar I went around 75yds wide of the pack where there seemed to be the odd larger fish. I don't know about Stripers particularly but it is common amongst predators of most species to hang around on the edge of activity rather than in get involved in the chaos of a feeding pack.

Take care.

That same theory goes for schooling fish. If you are catching the small ones on top water, try a spoon or little george to catch larger ones below the little schooling fish.

ru

True .... I think it's easy to get trapped into tossing a bait in amongst the shoal where a bite is pretty much certain rather than look for the bigger fish ....... mind you, some days have been so deperate anything is welcome !
Take care.