Slovenia Carp 2016 - part 2.

Hi all! 

I just wanted to post a couple of pics from the Slovenian trip I made. The lake was Smartinsko - a lake I can recommend. This was my second time there, and probably not the last. It's a lake, not a hole in the ground. :) The carp are from the little ones up to 30kg+.

If you are interested, just contact David Primozic for fishing carp in Slovenia! (http://www.fishing-guide.si/carp-fishing/)

A hard fighting common carp. A real beast on the end of the line!!!

David Primozics nice mirror carp!

All carp on this trip were caught with CC Moore bait. My common in the picture was caught with Odyssey XXX + Acid pear -pop up. I can't recall what bait David used for this fish, but it was CC Moore :) And finally a landscape photo from Smartinsko...

This is just one bay, not the whole lake :) The carp started to spawn in this bay while we were fishing.

PB Carp From Slovenia

Hi all!

I had planned my trip to Slovenia for quite a long time. I had the privilege to fish with a really good carper, David Primozic (a prostaffer for Prologic and a team angler for CC Moore), so I was really optimistic about our fishing. David also does guiding on Slovenian lakes, and he rents tackle for carp anglers. So if you are headed to Slovenia, just contact him! (http://www.fishing-guide.si/carp-fishing/)

The fishing started off quite slowly in the first day, as the spot was not prebaited. Luckily, the fishing took off the next day. I managed to catch my PB carp of 19,1 kg. The bait used was CC Moore Odyssey XXX 18mm  + Acid Pear pop-up 14mm. We also caught a really nice brace of good carp on the trip. There was one thing that started to affect our fishing in a bad way - spawning. Just on the second night the carp started their annual sploshing-in-the-reeds, so it had immediate effect as the fishing went slower the next day.

Smartinsko lake common carp of 19,1 kg. (photo: David Primozic)

Another angle of my PB carp!

CC Moore power! This pop-up + Odyssey XXX brought me most of my bites! (photo: David Primozic)

Up Close And Personal

There are a lot of good guys making videos of true carp fishing. For instance, you can go and watch the work of Alliance Peche, short movies by Frank Pizon or the Vienna boys' production Metropolis Carp. Of course there are a lot of great videos made, but these few are mentioned just as examples. (Also worth checking out is a Finnish video made by team Siloneula).

For my part, I think that I want to keep my dearest moments and experiences to myself. Sharing something that you truly love is actually really personal. Also the work made by the people mentioned above is probably enough, as I really don't believe my version of "true carp fishing" would be better (or anywhere close :)) The feelings you have, the moments you live - they are something I find pretty hard to share. I remember a Ernest Hemingway quote "Somebody just back of you while you are fishing is as bad as someone looking over your shoulder while you write a letter to your girl." (Still don't know if Hemingway really said this. Internet quotes can be dodgy :))  Some things are just too personal to be shared. A part of my fishing is a piece of the essence of who I am. That part I am not ready to share.

You can be sure that I will write trip reports also in the future. It is nice to share some things from my trips, but you can be also sure that a lot of the stories will never be told. And I will never tell you the story how my backlead got stuck between rocks and I consequently ended up losing a fish. That would have been my first carp of 2015. Instead of a picture of that carp, may I present you a video full of carp runs... where no backleads get stuck!

Slovenian Expedition Part I: The First Carp

Dear readers,

My previous seasons didn't start as I had planned. Way too much blanking in rainy weather and changing temperatures. Last autumn I chatted with a Prologic team member David Primozic, and he invited me to Slovenia. It was hard to resist, as I had already planned to go fishing abroad. So we discussed further and decided that we will fish lake Smartinsko. To make things easier, we discussed that I travel by plane and take only the essentials with me. No hassle with rods, bivvies, or driving through Europe. Just a direct flight from Helsinki to Ljubljana. And David had the small task of bringing a LOT of stuff to the lake.

I am NOT sponsored by Finnair, but it would be nice. This is the easier way instead of driving...

Somewhere above Poland, Austria or Slovenia... 

Seeing green forests and snow-topped mountains at the same time was something new for me. Already in the plane I knew I was going to love this country and its nature. After a nice flight David picked me up from the airport. An hours drive to the lake and we were ready to start fishing. It was already quite late when we arrived, so we  got the rods out and started our waiting game. The only bad thing was that we woke up the next morning, and that means we didn't get any runs during the first night. I wasn't nervous at all, because I knew our spot wasn't fished for a longer time, and it always takes some time to get the fish feeding on your spot.

No carp yet, so I lied in the blog title. Maybe the second part will have more fish in it... :) (Sorry about the crappy photos, they were taken with my Sony POS phone.)

A Chance to See Me!

Hi all,

Usually I spend my time in solitude. At least that's the case when it comes to fishing. Now you have the opportunity to see me and talk about carp angling. Maybe not the best way of spending a day, but still, a way of spending time.

The place is: Raision Meri & Metsä, Tasalanaukio 1, Raisio

Time: Thursday 10.10.2013 (The shop is open from 10-18)

And below you see a picture of one of my carp catches from this year (this was from a double run)

August glory, an early morning carp.

Prologic Senzora 13 Hands-On Review

Dear readers,

I just received my new bite alarm system, Prologic Senzora 13 with 4 alarms +  1 remote alarm (wireless). I can't field test it yet (because of winter), and one time field-tests are useless anyway.

What are the most important things in alarm systems (reliability, endurance) usually can't be tested on a few trips. To say anything that could be considered as a fact, I must fish at least a one full season with these alarms. Anyway, I would like to review these on my dinner table, talking about the facts that can be said about the product at this time (ease of use, settings, etc).

The Prologic Senzora 13 alarm set.

The alarm system comes in a plastic case, which is foam-padded from the inside. Opening the box you can see 4 alarms + 1 remote with an attachable belt-clip. The overall construction of the alarms seems to be good, and the carbon-effect look on these is actually nice. The alarms itself are lightweight and you can attach the 9V batteries easily within seconds. Each alarm runs on  a regular 9 V battery, which is quite nice as these batteries can be found on every retailer. Usually the 9V battery easily lasts for an entire season, so I guess I don't have to keep any spare batteries with me. The remote alarm works with 3 x AAA batteries. I use rechargeable ones, so I always have my batteries fully loaded on the remote alarm.

The volume can be set really loud on the alarms, so you won't miss a bite. There's also a silent mode for the remote.

The sensitivity setting seems to be working perfect, one adjustment beep counts for about 1 cm, and the alarms have 5 sensitivity levels. So the alarm sensitivity can be set to beep from approximately 1 cm to 5 cm of line. That's enough adjustability for me.

There's nothing fancy about the tone settings. You can select from five different pitches, and the tones are quite different. You shouldn't have any problems distinguishing alarm sounds from each other.

There is a feature in this system which cannot be found on every alarm set out there. You can test the range of you remote alarm by pressing some buttons. It's nice to test the range if your tent is quite far away or there are some obstacles between your tent and the rods.

Oh, the best part is that the set is all ready to go. No hassle with programming the alarms. I will write a more comprehensive review after the carp season 2013.

The Night Of The Living Mosquitoes

I had been prebaiting my swim for a week with DD Bait Feedermix and boilies. A few kilos of Freshwater Snail Feedermix and about 2-3 kg of boilies every other day. The boilies I choose for prebaiting were the Banana&Crustacean and Red Bull Guana. I was really looking forward to fishing the spot, as I have succeeded there almost every time.

The night of fishing came, but it was actually a night of terror, as mosquitoes were trying to take over the world. Literally, there were hundreds of them just waiting to feed on me. Taking some pain and around hundred mosquito bites, I managed to set my rods and my bivvie. So it was just a waiting game then. I managed to get some sleep, and around 4 am, I woke up to my alarm going off!

I hurried to my rods and saw the right rod going off in a good speed. But I also found out that my left rod had lost 100 m of line and it was pointing to another direction I cast it to… I took the rod on the right and landed a beautiful mirror carp. It was in really good condition after spawning, and by the looks of her, the boilies had been very tasty…

After that I started to work with my left rod. The rig was probably stuck in tens of waterlilies, so I pulled the line to cut off the lilies. One by one, I managed to get the rig closer. It took around 15 minutes, and I put very heavy strain on the Prologic XLNT Camo monofilament. Suddenly the rig was loose of the weeds, but I also realized that the fish was still on! My situation was quite tricky, as I had my landing net occupied with the previous carp… After some hectic (and not so educational) close quarters battle with the carp, I managed to get her also in my landing net. A landing net can get crowded… But to cut a story short, the lean and mean fighting machine common carp was 12,3 kg. Both of the fish were caught with a combination of DD Bait Red Bull Guana and Banana Crustacean boilie.