Mirror carp on a 3/4 weight fly rod

After being "skunked" at Clove Lake Park on Staten Island,

I decided to take my act to  Loeb Lake in Central Park, the next day.

 Armed with an ultra light fly rod, I began looking for carp.

Central Park has an abundance of turtles, as do most urban lakes and ponds.

So you must try to keep nuisance fish away.  Today there were scores of 

turtles looking for handouts from the tourists that want to see the turtles

that gather here,

It was almost dusk when I got a take.  There was no power run like most

carp make. I thought I was stuck on some debris in the lake.  Slowly,

I was able to budge the line a little, not much but enough to let me know

that I was not hung up on something. I thought it was a big snapping turtle

I had to pump my rod and retrieve line. This was a slow process because

there was a tremendous weight on the fly line. After several minutes of this,

I was able to put line back on the fly reel. My rod was bent completely in half,

I was making progress. Finally I saw the carp's mouth. I had an onlooker take

my net and I steered the carp into the net.  My first mirror carp in a couple

of years,