I saw something scary today......

.......while pulling cranks on KY Lake. One of my clients, a 11 year old girl, hooked a decent fish and had it coming to the boat. It didn't surface like a crappie so we assumed it was a white bass or something similar. When I got it in the net, I realized it was a silver carp about 16 inches long. So far nothing scary but when I went to get the hook out of it, the hook was inside its mouth just like it had hit the crankbait to feed on it!! Asian carp are supposed to be filter feeders and not competing with game fish. This fish for all intents and purposes looked like it had hit the bait and had the entire rear hook buried inside its mouth. We were fighting high winds and boat control was tough. I took the fish loose, ripped its gills out and tossed it back it. Instantly I want to kick my own butt for not taking some pictures before I unhooked it.

I hope this was all a coincidence and this fish was not actively feeding on minnows and baitfish like the crappie. If it was, we are facing a whole another can of worms with these invasive Asian carp.

Hopefully the crank got to close to its personal space and it was merely defending itself. Reaction strike. If it starts happening on the regular then you know they are feeding.

I caught a Silver below the Barkley Dam while casting a BIG spoon and he was hooked in the mouth. I think the line was across his mouth when I was jerking and reeling. Two others that day were snagged in the back or dorsal.

Them critters need to go away

Sounds like a reaction strike to me. Similar to why shad hit jigs during their spring spawning run up the rivers. They don't eat period during this spawning cycle, but they strike anyway.

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Originally Posted by mrdux

.......while pulling cranks on KY Lake. One of my clients, a 11 year old girl, hooked a decent fish and had it coming to the boat. It didn't surface like a crappie so we assumed it was a white bass or something similar. When I got it in the net, I realized it was a silver carp about 16 inches long. So far nothing scary but when I went to get the hook out of it, the hook was inside its mouth just like it had hit the crankbait to feed on it!! Asian carp are supposed to be filter feeders and not competing with game fish. This fish for all intents and purposes looked like it had hit the bait and had the entire rear hook buried inside its mouth. We were fighting high winds and boat control was tough. I took the fish loose, ripped its gills out and tossed it back it. Instantly I want to kick my own butt for not taking some pictures before I unhooked it.

I hope this was all a coincidence and this fish was not actively feeding on minnows and baitfish like the crappie. If it was, we are facing a whole another can of worms with these invasive Asian carp.

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We have caught a couple in the mouth before while Sauger fishing on the river, the way they were hooked made us think it was trying to eat our baits , but they were thick where we was fishing and it could have inhaled by accident......


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Me and my son were striper fishing below Barkley a few years ago, we caught 8 of em on large minnows, none of em were foul hooked, all in the mouth.

I just locked down through Kentucky Lock this morning and there had to be 300 in the chamber with us. The wound up all over our tug.


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they say they eat really well, never tried them and probably never will.I've had to many of those stinking things in my boat at Tunica.

I have been seeing bigheads of 12 to 15 inches just slowly cruising under the surface of the water. Touched it with a pole it was so close to the boat....also had a loon come up inside my rig tips...he hauled butt out of there real quick!!