Twelve months of carp fishing: Action in September

It's here! Probably the most action-packed month of the year. It's time for the big feast! No PVA utensils, preferably the big feeding ladle and pop-ups are used for the snowman at most. You can still bathe during the day and the bite indicators screech at night. Blessed be you, generous September! 

Now all the carp are really eating, the small ones as well as the really big ones. And they are eating a lot! And they are making more mistakes now. Because, as we all know, food envy switches off caution. The still high water temperatures and the resulting high metabolism turn the carp into real eating machines. In addition, natural food is already becoming scarcer due to the season, the days are getting shorter, the nights are getting cooler and the autumn winds are starting to blow. The perfect circumstances to attract carp, which are already eating their winter fat, to a feeding spot.

So you can hardly go wrong in September? That's right! Except fishing too deep! Although the wind can already be blowing hard, in most cases it is not enough to mix the entire water column. The surface water is simply still too warm for this, the stratification is therefore still too stable and it takes even colder air temperatures - especially at night - to mix the entire water column. This is why people are still fishing in the ‘middle storey’. Using the example of a quarry pond with a depth of up to 15 metres and a reservoir with a depth of up to 25 metres, it is better to concentrate on depths of six to ten metres (based on these examples). This is different for a body of water with a maximum depth of five metres. Here, wind and waves can mix the entire water column even in September - provided the water is also well exposed to the wind. In deeper waters, however, it is not until the next month, the golden month of October, that carp feed even in the deepest parts of the water. But more on that in the next column.

For now, it's time to enjoy and reduce the food stocks. Because in no other month do carp eat as much fishing food as in September. But that doesn't mean that you only get the nursery on the spot now. The big ones come just the same and are also really hungry. It's just a bit harder to hook them because virtually all the carp are eating. Sometimes it's difficult to hook a fat one. Imagine twenty 20-pounders on a feeding spot. They are simply quicker to feed and the fat one just doesn't feel so comfortable around lively half-pounders. A rod on the edge of the feeding area or slightly away from the feed can be absolutely worthwhile and should definitely be tried out. However, if there are enough big carp in the water and the half-hardy fish are not necessarily in the majority, you don't need to worry about it and can also turn a few buckets of hemp or corn over the spot. Action and thickness! September makes it possible!

So let's head for the water!
Enjoy it!
Your Alexander Kobler

PS: Regarding my predictions for the last week of August, as I described in the last column: Just like last year, the drop in temperature didn't materialise at all. On the contrary, it got really hot again! But the nights were a little cooler and I'm sure that one or two people have already benefited from this. Somehow, the weather rules I've collected over the last few years no longer fit and it seems that summer lasts longer, we wait for autumn to slowly set in, but then it comes so abruptly that you get the feeling that autumn is almost over before it's even started. Winter and summer are getting longer and longer, while spring and autumn are getting shorter and shorter.