The Monster...

[Jeff Tief]

Al,old Dale Hulsey and Frank Jones were probably cheering you on from Heaven.

[RSBreth]

That's awesome - I love the Gar/Carp/Catfish/Etc. surprise when fishing for something else. I once caught a really great Channel Cat when fishing Cowley County State fishing lake (Kansas) when using a Clouser Minnow on my 7-weight. The Cat went about 12-pounds (on the little "De-Liar" scale). I've been towed around by Gar hooked while fishing for Bass here in the Ozarks - but never landed one that way.

Cool story.

[Kayser]

Nice fish! Grasscarp are a lot of fun on the fly rod- I've caught about half a dozen while bluegill fishing with tiny jigs, but my biggest was only about 20 lbs. There is no doubt in my mind as to how hard they can fight, but I've never really been able to target them specifically. If somebody wanted to target them specifically, I've caught a fair amount of them while fishing for carp with corn. And if you can fillet out the y-bones and red meat, it tastes great- the ribs are my favorite, though.

Rob

[Greg]

Wow landing that on a 6 wt is a real accomplishment. I've done that a time or 2 with the stringer myself. I've always wondered if the fish can work themselves off the stringer eventually and survive?

[stlfisher]

Nice fish. I hooked into one at Busch Wildlife last year on an Olive Bugger...quess the fish thought it was moss or something. Had it on for a few minutes, but never did land it. Sounds like quite a fun evening.

[Greasy B]

Great Fish Al. The Brother caught a similar fish on Crooked Creek a few years back. It was eating mulberries and took a bluegill popper. The fish took so long to land we paddled to the take out in the dark.

[ozark trout fisher]

Awesome fish.

Seeing that you posted this I have to admit that I was expecting a picture of a monster smallmouth, but a 30+ pound fish on a fly rod is worth getting excited about regardless of species. I've never gotten into the carp thing, but I may yet. I can't imagine the fight. If I had hooked that thing on a 6 weight it would be gone before I knew what happened. I actually did once hook a very large grass carp on an ultra-light spinning rod, and he stripped all of the line off of my reel within a matter of just a few seconds.

Thanks for sharing.

[Al Agnew]

This an old story from 2011, more than seven years ago, but I was reading through old posts looking for a couple of posts I remember making long ago when I came across it, and thought I'd update it...that fish is still alive and swimming in the pond.  In the years before I caught it, I'd see two swirls of big fish taking off from the bank, in different parts of the pond so I knew they were two different fish, whenever I was walking the banks and the conditions were right for them to be up in the shallows.  But in the couple years before I caught that fish, I hadn't seen but one swirl at a time.  Since that day, I've never seen but one swirl at a time, so I'm pretty sure it was the only grass carp left even back then.  But I'm still seeing that fish take off now and then...it's exceedingly spooky, so I never get a good look at it.  I don't know how long grass carp live, but I stocked those three grass carp back about 1995, so it's something like 23 years old at this point.  I'm glad Tim was wrong and it survived!