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Use crunchy baits to catch more carp | Adam Penning

Sound travels fast in water. Feeding crunchy baits can draw wary carp into the swim.

@Credit: Paul Garner

by James Furness |

Published on4th October 2025 at 1.00pm

It was the height of summer 1985 and I lay on my stomach, sprawled along a fallen oak stretching across the pond. Keeping still, I was able to get the carp to come right up to my fingertips and, one by one, I dropped Chum Mixers on to the surface of the water.

Each morsel was greedily slurped down by the carp that lived under the shelter of that tree. I lay there and watched them, enthralled.

Then I noticed something that, to me back then, was quite incredible. I could hear the ‘crunch-crunch’ as they devoured the biscuits. I didn't learn until later that carp have a formidable array of crushing teeth in their throats, and the sound of those mixers being crunched up has never left me.

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Acoustic attraction

I’ve written many times before about how tricky autumn has become on highly pressured waters. A huge volume of loosefeed, applied with highly effective, almost ruthless, tactical precision, goes in at the very time when nature is laying on her own pre-winter banquet.

All this happens during a phase when the carp feel like they have simply had enough of being chased. So, not surprisingly, things can get very tricky indeed.

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Sound and vibrations matter

One area that is never exploited in terms of triggering the carp into a feeding response is the role of acoustics. My good friend Ivan Carson has researched this topic extensively over the years and is actually in the final stages of preparing a product that will target this very overlooked area of carp attraction. It’s a very exciting prospect indeed, and I will share more with you in a future article.

Sound travels extremely well through water, and there is no question that fish of all species utilise both frequency and vibration for survival and for feeding.

It is known that various aquatic organisms make movements that emit sound or vibration, enabling predators to locate them. Predator anglers have been using lures with built-in vibrating elements since the beginning of time.

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Feed noisy naturals

Beyond this, in terms of carp fishing, I don’t doubt that the sounds of carp feeding will be extremely stimulating and attractive to other carp nearby. Of course, the nature of what the carp are feeding on will, to a great extent, determine how much sound or vibration travels through the water, but it seems logical to assume that the crunchiest of baits will also be the ‘loudest’.

For many decades my favourite autumn bait combination has been the ultimate triumvirate of casters, hemp and tiger nuts. It works extremely well and has caught me many good fish. There are many reasons why this mix is so effective, but perhaps I had overlooked what in essence may be the most magical part of all – the acoustics.

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A crunchy chorus

I can’t imagine anything bait-related that would be noisier for a carp to eat. The casters will pop and crackle, much like the popping candy we had as kids, while the hemp shells combine with the hard and ultimately crunchy nuts to make something that we, as humans, would find hard to hear a conversation over while chewing!

These aquatic acoustics will travel for a considerable distance, telling other carp that there is a feast going on and that they’re missing out.

For so long I have considered the attraction elements of the mix and thought about the oil, the sugars, the natural angle and so on. But perhaps I’ve been missing the point. Maybe the biggest part of the approach is that once carp start eating it, the signal that something really good is going on is broadcast all over the lake!

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