Winding down. Maybe.

Northwest Georgia received a significant amount of rain this weekend, around 2 inches by some counts.

Multi-day rain events around here often bring the carp up into the shallows.  No news there, of course. That happens in a lot of places, and not just with carp.  The prevailing theory seems to be that the rain washes a few more food items into the buffet as it scours the shoreline and drains into the lake.

Rivulets draining from far up the shoreline and into the lake.

I'll buy that, if for no other reason than after heavy rains I often see carp in places where they usually aren't found, nosed up tight to the water's edge and in serious feeding mode.

Like yesterday. The carp were on a flat that, for whatever reason, is typically not on their scheduled daily rounds. I have, for example, searched this flat thoroughly over the past couple of weeks, seeing no carp. Not one. Then yesterday, following the deluge, they were there.

And I caught them. Not all of them but enough to count the day as an unexpected late-fall bonanza.

As I landed these fish, I realized that there is a good chance that these were my last carp of 2012 and felt, weirdly, a twinge of sadness. If you're not careful you can get sentimental about that sort of thing, as if a December carp is somehow more significant than, say, a February carp.

Still, I took a few extra seconds to admire these fish. They may or may not be my final carp of 2012, but I couldn't overcome the urge to savor them just a bit.