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How to fish weedy carp lakes

Oz Holness reveals how to find clear spots, present effectively, and turn dense weed into a feeding hotspot...

by James Furness |

Updated on11th May 2026 at 11.46am

Of all the types of lakebed anglers face, weed is probably the most daunting of the substrates you could land on.

Hopefully, I can point you in the right direction on how to fish in and around it, as well as give you the confidence to fish a venue which could potentially be choked with it.

Silkweed

As the water warms, a lot of shallower spots start to get covered in silkweed, which will hold a lot of natural food, thus drawing in carp.

This coincides with areas that the fish want to be in and around at that time of year, so presenting on these areas is key. In my eyes, you have two options. First, you can fish a bait well above it, with a zig rig or a pop-up straight off the lead.

The other option is to fish softly on top of the weed using either a balanced bait or a slow sinking pop-up. Chod rigs work well, as they enable the hookbait to sit on top of silkweed. Alternatively, a longer hooklink with a balanced bait will settle on top of it nicely.

It isn’t essential to use a pop-up hookbait as long as you have a balanced bait which sinks slowly, and use PVA foam on the hook when casting out. Trapping two nuggets either side of the hook will ensure it sits up, then flutters down once the PVA dissolves. Everything then nestles down nicely on top of the silkweed.

As the water warms through the spring, the other types of weed will begin to grow.

YOU WILL NEED A POWERFUL CARP ROD TO PULL CARP OUT OF THE WEED.

A clear spot is a perfect place to present a rig.

Silkweed

Eel grass

This is a long, stringy type of weed, and it often flourishes near gravel. Therefore, if you find this, you know that there is gravel nearby and potentially a clear spot to fish over. It comes up in vast forests and grows rapidly.

Eelgrass causes several problems from an angling perspective. First, when you cast into it, you will often get a good drop. This is the lead going straight through it, but when you go to pull the lead it will be jammed. For this reason it’s important to feel the drop and then drag the lead to see if it is actually clean before deciding that the spot is fishable.

The other element to consider is that during the day everything grows up directly off the bottom, reaching for the sun. But when it gets dark, weed often falls down. This makes presentation a problem, as the weed can collapse over the rigs!

Don't be afraid of the weed!

Canadian pond weed

This starts to flourish towards the end of May and early in June, depending on the weather. Suddenly you will find vast beds of this and other similar types.

They can be dense and thick-stemmed, which creates issues when trying to land fish. But, they are oxygenating plants, so the fish will be in and around them and often use them as a home.

At night, the fish will venture out, so fishing a spot near weed is always the ideal scenario. Finding this golden spot takes work, though. Starting with just a lead and some braid I feel for a clean drop. Once I’ve got that, I pull gently to see if it comes back easily, indicating a clean lakebed. It may take a while, but even the weediest lakes will have a clear spot to be found somewhere.

Once I’ve found a potential area, I put the line in the clip and cast around it to see if there’s enough room for more than one rod on it.

I always carry a few types of weed rake with me. I have a lead with the coating cut, so it looks almost like a pine cone. This will pick up any silkweed or small bits of detritus on the bottom, telling me what’s out there. I also have a small castable weed rake for sorting out my line lay to the spot.

THESECARP FISHING TIPS WILL HELP YOU CATCH MORE FISH!

Lead arrangement

In really weedy situations, I would rather fish a tight linewith a lead clip and have instant indication on the take. Good bite indication, and dropping the lead on the bite, are key to helping you land fish.

On a really slack line, the fish can travel a good distance into a weedbed and you wouldn’t even know you had a take. By getting rid of the lead, the fish will come up to the surface and be a lot easier to land.

If there is a bit of low-lying weed, I would fish a longer hooklink, most likely coated braid, with either a pop-up or a balanced bait, but this time on a helicopter set-up. The helicopter is great for fishing over lakebeds that are not super-clean, because you can adjust that top bead so it all sits nicely on top of it.

Weed-friendly loosefeed

The bait that I use will vary depending on the spot that I am fishing. If I am fishing on a short-term basis, or to a spot that has low-lying weed, I would bait up with halved or flattened boilies which will flutter down and nestle on top of any weed.

If I was fishing a clean spot or looking to get a spot ‘rocking’ for the longer term, then I would be covering that area in seed. Particles and boilie crumb laced in liquid will encourage everything to come in and rip up the bottom. The spot will go from patchy to pretty clean in no time.

There will always be suitable spots – you’ve just got to take the time to locate them.

THE BEST BITE ALARMS WILL ENSURE YOU KNOW AS SOON AS A CARP IS HOOKED...

Some spots are more obvious than others

Strong tackle is a must!

In terms of terminal tackle, you need to be using the strongest gear you can. For really weedy situations I prefer to use braided mainline.

For those of you that haven’t used braid before, it takes a bit of getting used to. It is very responsive, so you have to be sat on the rods at all times because when the bite does come, all hell will break loose.

I use a strong leadcore leader, which will protect the braid from any mussels in the weed, and I have always been a fan of big hooks. I would be looking at using a minimum of a size 4 hook and, in really testing scenarios, I would even jump up to a size two.

Providing you balance out the hookbait, I really don’t think the size of the hook will prevent you getting bites. It will, however, help you land more fish – I can practically guarantee it.

HAVE A LOOK THROUGH THESE CARP FISHING LINES TO LAND MORE FISH.

You need strong tackle to get carp out of weed!

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