Carp are not bonefish, and the anglers who fish for them hardest will tell you so without any prompting. But the skills carp demand — getting into position without blowing up the flat, reading which fish in a pod is actually feeding, dropping a fly into a dinner-plate-sized spot, and seeing an eat that barely registers — are the same ones that pay off on bonefish, permit, redfish, and any trout that’s been fished over too many times. And the best part is, carp will teach you all of it in a pond ten minutes from home, in July, for free.

July is when this works best. Warm, shallow water pushes carp onto sun-heated flats, bays, and mud shorelines right when trout fishing slows down or ought to be rested in the heat. Carp tolerate low oxygen and high temperatures that send everything else into the depths, so in midsummer they own the skinny water — and skinny water is where you can see them. The catch is that summer heat also moves them around during the day. Early morning and the last few hours of light are prime, both for cooler, more oxygenated water and for the low sun angle that lights up tails and mud. When the sun gets high and the flat bakes, the fish slide toward shaded edges, wind-churned margins, and any inflow carrying cooler, oxygenated water. Fish the shade and the moving water in the heat of the day, and the open flats early and late.