My first introduction to the world inside the ‘bubble’ - that strange, interesting and exciting world beneath the surface of the water – was when I hunted as a very young boy, for Sticklebacks and minnows in a gin-clear stream in Scotland. I caught them in a tiny net on the end of a small bamboo pole.

Later, when I was 5-years old, I caught my first perch – about 0.5kg – in the same tiny hand net whilst exploring the Great Ouse River in Bedford, England. I placed some small broken worms inside the net, and lay on my chest on the wet riverbank for hours, holding onto the bamboo pole, and staring into the clear waters…waiting, for hours, unmoving. Until that gigantic perch swam inside and I scooped it up out of the water, twisting and thrashing on the grass. I was thrilled! I’d never seen such a huge monster fish in my life! I was also amazed at the beauty of the fish – all proud, with its vibrant stripes and erect dorsal fin.

I kept asking my father (who at that time never fished) to buy me a fishing rod for my birthday or Christmas…. then one day he did! My father was in the army and we lived at that time in Germany, near Munster. My first true fishing day was with some of my father’s friends at a local canal. I had a cheap solid fibre-glass rod, a cheap reel and heavy line plus big float – the sort of rod & reel all-in-one package that comes in a plastic bag. It was a bitterly cold day, and I sat on a little foldout chair all day in the rain, watching the float. I only had one bite, but it turned out to be a 2lb roach! My father’s friends couldn’t believe it, because they’d never caught a roach so big in their lives! It was an exciting day, but the one memory that stands out of that particular day, was the discovery of a carp dead in the margins of the canal. It was about 10kg, and to me – a little snotty-nosed kid – it was awesome… it was like a whale, and I couldn’t comprehend how such a colossal-sized fish could have once lived in such a small canal.

My father was eventually posted back to England. My fishing ‘fever’ also rubbed onto my father, so we often fished together during future years – although he preferred to fish for tench.

Then, one quiet afternoon on a Sunday, I decided to follow a stream outside of my house…just to see where it led me. I was only about 7-years old at the time. The stream eventually entered a river beside a series of six large gravel pit lakes. I was so excited…I felt like a great explorer finding a new country! I needed to explore and fish those massive stretches of water (even though today, many years later, those same lakes seem very small to me!).

I began fishing for just anything that came along – mainly gudgeon, roach and perch.

But then one day the float shot under the surface, and I struck into an elephant! The water exploded and the 7ft split cane rod doubled over as if it were made of rubber. I’d hooked a big carp The fight didn’t last long, and soon it snapped the line, because I didn’t have an idea how to play fish properly.

That same year, I also lost another carp. It was deep winter and the lakes were frozen, but one tiny corner of the ice had melted. So I cast a float, with a small piece of bread flake, into the hole in the ice. It was not long before the float bobbed under…a carp had sucked in the bread! Again, my inexperience lost me that fish and as the line snapped and I fell back onto my backside on the frosty snow, I let out a loud shout. I’d seen the carp clearly and it was a common of about 7-8lb. To me it was a monster, and I sat in on the icy mud, crying like a baby…. I still remember that awful feeling inside my guts to this very day. I still get that same feeling inside – like someone slowly squeezing my stomach – whenever I lose a big fish…although maybe I don’t cry so loudly!

I began fishing seriously for bigger fish – tench, crucians, and of course carp. Eventually a 2kg mirror sucked in my bread bait one day and I did land this one. I ran all the way home to fetch my father to come to the lake and photograph it! The next carp was a 6lb+ mirror, then a 12lb+ mirror.

I became more and more ‘hooked’. I also became more and more proficient, spending hours watching and talking with the ‘old-fishermen’ who often sat beside the lakes.

One memorable day in 1970 is lodged clearly in my vault of treasured memories…It was blowing a gale, but this was not going to keep me away from the lake. When I arrived I couldn’t see another angler fishing the lake. The wind howled through my curly hair, and huge rolling waves crashed against the beach. Staring at the scene both scared and excited me at the same time.

I decided to wade out through the reeds and fish from a tiny island in a shallow bay. About 100-meters out was a tiny island that normally just peeped above the surface; but on this day the water level was high and it was submerged beneath a foot of water. I saw a carp crashing out on the windward edges of this submerged island.

At that time most of my carping was done freeline, and only having two 14ft long glass-fibre rods, and no large leads, the island was impossible to reach…but I had an idea. I moulded a knob of cheddar cheese onto the small size 14-hook, and then wrapped bread & cheese paste around it, until the bait became a large ball the size of a big Jaffa orange. I placed the rod in the rod rests, opened the reel bail-arm, and then waded around the outer shallow edges of the lake until I was on the other side about 200 meters away. I placed the ball of freeline paste in the shallow margins, and then walked back round the lake to the rods. The big ball of bait was then reeled in until I felt it dragging up the sloping shelf of the submerge island, and then left it at a position on the shelf in about 1-metere deep water… just where I had spotted the carp crash out earlier.

The wind got up stronger and it started to rain. The wind blew the rods off the rests, so I eventually just lay them down on the mud. I tried to put up my umbrella, but the wind almost blew it inside out and bent the metal pole. I decided to push the umbrella very tight to the ground like a mushroom, and then crawled underneath. I had to hold onto the umbrella pole to prevent it from being blown away. I was cold and hungry, and, like so often happens when young children are tired and lay on the ground with the wind howling around them…. I eventually fell asleep!

I was awoken by a scraping sound in the wind. I peeped from underneath the umbrella and was alarmed to see one of the rods gone! I crawled out and when I stood up I could see the rod underneath the water and the ‘scraping’ sound was my reel dragging over the gravel!  I ran into the water and picked up the rod, but couldn’t lift it up properly and it jerked in my hands and shook back parallel to the water as line literally steamed off the spool. I was only using thin 4lb b.s. nylon at the time.

I also generally prefer large boilies of 28mm, 30mm or often use double 24mm or treble 20mm boilie hookbaits.

I do not change to a different boilie in winter, as I believe that a good bait will work all year round at all temperatures.

For stalking, when I can actually see the carp, and can choose to cast to the largest specimen, then I prefer to use natural baits such as crayfish or large lobworms, prawns, mussels, etc.

Leon: Which part of the world do you think is capable of producing the very biggest carp? Do you have any idea (and evidence) about how big a carp can grow in perfect conditions?

Tony: My thoughts about where in the world the largest ever carp will come from, has changed over recent years. I now think that it is possible to produce a carp in almost any country of the world, as long as all factors we know, plus a few that we don’t, are all present in that water. The most important of all is that any particular carp has the very best of growth genetics, and when combined with river/canal or lake with a fabulous wealth of natural food, lack of pollution and is not over-populated with fish, then it will eventually grow to maximum possible weight.

I think countries such as USA, Canada or Australia would have produced many record-breaking carp already, but the original carp introduced to those countries had only mediocre maximum growth genes. However, carp have now had over 100-years of adaptation to an amazing variety of climates and differing waters. It has taken the carp longer to reach their top potential possible weights, and only very, very few do reach the top – but those carp tend to live much longer at those top weights. Ultra-fast growing carp with modern growth genes introduced to some European waters can reach amazing sizes in very little time, but that speed-growth also translates into fish dying very young. This means that an 80lb carp with enhanced-growth genes that has grown fast in a French lake, may die much sooner than a carp that has reached 80lb living in a vast and wild Canadian lake.