It was one of those calm nights where the world seemed to stop while everyone one slept. There were no sounds, just the moonlight and the dew. Then the alarm screamed.  I rolled out of bed and hit the button...whose idea was it to get up at 4:30 am? I grabbed my clothes and walked into the hallway. As I passed Nate's door I heard his alarm go off as well. I stopped by the living room quickly to wake Ezra, then I headed to the kitchen. Breakfast was a quiet affair over sugared cereal, while we contemplated what we had to pack.

  By 5 am the car was rolling out of the driveway, with a quick stop at the corner store for drinks, we were on our way. Today's destination was Riverdale Mills in Northbridge. I've been wanting to fish here for some time, but due to one thing or another I hadn't. When we arrived the sun was just peaking from behind the far banks. Through the breaking light we could see small fish hitting the surface and a few larger things moving just beneath. We unpacked our gear and began setting up our swim. First on my list was to set up the "spod rod". To be honest though, what I use is not a true spod. It is a cup developed by Wacker Bait and Tackle to act like a hybrid spod and catapault. Attaching the cup to the end of my line I fill it with Dat Food boilies and my particle mix, which included maize, maple peas, chick peas and sweet corn. I have found it better to feed small amounts over time as opposed to one large chum in the begining. I think that too many people feed way to much right away and it can cut down on the amount of fish they will get into as the carp will continually eat the free offerings while ignoring the hook...or just taking longer to find it among the rest.

  Over the next 10 minutes our swim was busy with setting up rods, rod pods, the net and mat. I chose to start the day with a double boilie on one rod and a particle mix on the other. We had brought a few varieties with us to choose from. I went with  sweet corn/scopex boilies Ezra and I had made the day before. We made them in two colors, a bright orange and a dull yellow. Together they look very tasty in the water. They aren't though, Ezra and I tested em and while they aren't bad, they aren't good either. The color scheme has been a theme for me this year. For one reason or another i have had huge success this year using a darker colored boilie topped with a brighter color. In this case orange on the bottom, white/yellow on top. The particles I chose were a nice looking maple pea/maize combo. Our particles this year have produced best when sweetened lightly but otherwise unflavored. To round out our arsenal we brought a few flavors of DAT Food such as Hemp and scopex, as well as our still water, fast breaking ground bait. With ingrediants like cornmeal and grits it has a great white color and  a beakdown of just about 30 seconds.

Being an early riser, Ezra was ready to get into some serious fishing.

  The morning was a busy one with plenty of fish activity. Both Ezra and I landed a good amount of fish ranging from 1-8 pounds. It was hard fishing through some of the smaller fish that were in the area. This section of the Blackstone has always been a great spawning area for carp. The fish we caught were a good indication of that, seeing that many of them were smaller and younger fish.

  After a few hours and countless small fish we decided to have lunch then move below the dam. As we unpacked our gear I took the chance to do some recording for the upcoming September video.

  We were excited to fish this section of the river.  As the water flowed over the dam it created two great sections. The first directly below the dam was a deep pool with some moderately flowing water which then shallowed out, flowed through some rocks and again deepened and slowed creating the second pool.

  What I have found and love about the Blackstone is that it creates these great deep sections that may only house a few carp, but many times some of those carp grow to great sizes. It is sometimes tougher fishing, but finding these kind of pools and trying to tempt out the large fish can be a very rewarding experience. Some of my best looking 20 pound fish have come from random deep pools such as this. Many anglers deprive themselves of great fishing by feeling they have to target big waters to get big fish. It simple isn't true and the Blackstone River is  good proof of that.

  We spent the rest of the afternoon fishing these two pools with great results, and while we didn't manage any huge fish we did get a few nice carp.  In fact Nate landed the largest carp of the day from this section.