One Last Big Carp in the Home Lake?

By November I would normally not even be thinking about carp fishing in my home lake. I decided to see if that would be a mistake by searching some shoreline yesterday morning. And at the first spot I stopped, there she was! A 20 lb carp tailing in the shallows!

So I have fished this stretch of beach many many times... and never had a carp take there. This big girl ate on the first go! She proceeded to dump into the backing. I brought her back in and was about to tail her when she took off again. I got a good look at the way she was hooked and it was not looking good. I would normally have taken photos of the fight but I knew I would have to concentrate. I got her back in again after about ten minutes, tried and failed to tail her, touched her twice, grabbed the leader three times, and watched her swim off. I was a little disappointed not to get a photo of her because she was quite large, but very happy to add her to the short list of 20 lb carp I have caught. And in early November! So cool...
The rest of the day was pretty much business as usual.