Some view the common carp as a trash fish but for all you fly guys out there, nothing more can be tougher to fool than a big carp on the river.  When the dog days of summer are upon us and the coldwater trout should no longer be fished for since they're trying to survive in the low warming creeks, hit your local ponds, rivers or lakes and try some site fishing for carp.

I can promise you one thing, it WON'T be as easy as you may think. I do my carp fly fishing mainly on the Juniata river here in central PA and it's some of the toughest fly fishing I've done, they're picky and spooky.  Wade slow and have a good pair of polarized sunglasses. I usually try to find some deeper grassy pools just downstream from some shallow water.  Sometimes if your lucky you'll catch them "tailing" in the shallows which is when they're doing most of their feeding and you'll see their tails splashing and causing a ruckus out of the water rooting on the bottom for food.

Carp have a wide range of food sources from nymphs to crayfish to vegetation and mullberries floating down the river.  My go to fly has been a big size 6-8 beadhead stonefly heavily wrapped in lead wire so it goes straight to the bottom.  When sight fishing just watch where the carp are heading and try and get your fly 3 or 4 feet in front of them with a lot of finese so as not to disturb the water and spook the fish so it's laying on the bottom and try and give it a little movement and be ready to set the hook quickly because as soon as they pick it up they could spit it back out. 

Your going to want some pretty sturdy equipment because once you get into the 30+ inch fish they will take you for a ride.  I've had many fish take me well into my backing several times in a fight.  With my biggest to date being a 34 1/2 incher with a fight lasting nearly 45 minutes and a few battle wounds on my hands from trying to palm the reel when she was making some fast runs it some of the most exciting and rewarding fishing i've done with a fly rod thus far.

bait favorites:big stonefly nymphs, crayfish patterns (with weighted eyes to drag them on the bottom), big beadhead wooly buggers

rod:  I prefer a 6-8 weight

line/leader: although it's not necessary a sink tip fly line could be helpful and i usually go with a sturdy 10lb test mono leader