The Winter "Bunch Up"

This good size mirror was landed today in one of the author's
favorite winter "bunch up" spots.  Carp will bunch up in tight
schools in the wintertime.

Here's a big secret about winter carp fishing.  Carp tend to bunch up in large groups in the wintertime in certain places. If you find these bunched up fish and the spots where they do this, you will catch them, even on the coldest of winter days. During the warm months you might find carp in various places along a pond or river.  Yet, in the winter, they will leave their warm weather spots and get together in large groups.  Just to give you an example of how this works, I was checking out a location last week.  It was a sunny day and I could see into the shallow, clear water in this venue.  I moved to this one location and spotted a mass of 60-75 carp just slowly moving around in a tight knit oval that was about the size of a kitchen table.  I suspect every carp in this body of water was in this one tight spot.  I went back later to this location with my fishing stuff and landed three mirrors.  Now, you'd think I would have killed them, but when you hook a fish in these tight bunches, it tends to spook the school. The big challenge for winter carp fishermen here in RI is to find these winter spots that hold big numbers of fish.  It's time consuming challenge, but when you find these spots, you've got some very potent and productive winter locations to fish.