Fellas and Ladies I needed some vacation bad, and finally took some last week. My boys and I went to some family land and had a bunch of fun. Shot bows, shot rifles, checked game cameras etc.

We also caught some big old channel cats and I felt like a beginner trying to clean them. I've filleted tons of fish, but just felt like I was doing it wrong. These were about 9-13 pounds, not the biggest in the world, but big for me.

The first one I filleted like I would anyother fish and it just didn't work well. The rib bones were too much for my electric knife. Plus, the guts were just in the way. I gutted the rest like you would a deer, and then filleted them. This worked all right, but it seems there should be a better way.

This is the first one, and you can see how copious the amount of "innards" were.



Just figure you folks might know of a better way. Here's some the little blog post I did with more pictures and a little write up if you are so inclined.http://wp.me/p3bCKM-p2

They're fat. I hope you had a sharp fillet knife to slice off a thin wide swath of silver from the skin side of the fillet after you had it off.

Skin 'em and cut them into steaks. Wild catfish are a lot better when cooked with the bone in.

had the same dilemma not long ago. figured out to fillet them like i do a nice pike. fugg those bones,start behind the ribcage and fillet all the way to the tail.

tired of the 29 trick moves it takes so i only keep ones big enough to have a decent amount of meat to make it worthwhile to dick with them.

if anyone has a way they do it that works well let me know. i am used to walleyes and bluegills and crappies where you do it the normal way.

Ones that size we skin, fillet, and then cut the fillets into nuggets about the size of your thumb.

this:



then this:

Sent Curdog4570 a link to this thread, I think catch catfish and argue with Isaac is about all he does these days...

Skin then filet is all I've ever done.. skinning is 4 cuts and strip maybe 3-4 times sometimes 2-3... and its done,

Is that the reason that they are both too busy to get on here and talk to the rest of us? miles

AMEN!!!!

First off, that's the important part right there. Them boys will remember this for the rest of their lives - and that memory won't be about dad being less than smooth skinning cat fish.

On big ones like that, I cut down behind the head and then thru the skin only down the top center, from the head cut to as far back as you want to fillet. Do not cut thru the skin at the tail, you'll eventually flip the fillet over skin side down and separate meat from skin.
Then fillet down the spine and over the ribs just like a big scaled fish. Cut as far down on the belly as you want to save.
Do that from head to tail, then flip over as mentioned above.

For eating, I like the 2-3 pounders and fillet them with an electric knife. Cut down behind the head and then shave the spine back to the tail, flip and skin.

Did I mention that those are some big cats???? Bet the boys got a charge out of hooking those dozers.

Hope so, I really enjoy it when they're around and talk "down to my level"..

I have fileted a lot of fish including cats, bass, perch, crappie, trout, & salt water fish. I use the electric knife on all including cats. Getting the cats cold seems to help the skinning process some. I try & cut the skin off cats, but unlike most other fish doesn't work well even using skinning pliers. I have seen the skinning device pictured, but had no idea they worked. Will have to try & locate one on line.

I use a good non electric knife. Start at the spine and fillet "around" the rib cage. Leave the very edge at the tail and you can flip the fillet over and fillet the skin off.

Do it this way and you will never see the guts. It's a lot easier and less messy. You can always cut the large fillets in chunks.

I've used them on bass, crappie, cats, even alligator gar.

Tuffer the fish, harder the grip needed, but they work.

I wish mine had a cast frame so I could really grip the livin crap out of it, but I haven't broke it yet....

this

Lakes full of shad like L. Livingston have fat blues and channels where we trim a couple inch wide 1/16-1/8 inch thick layer of fat off the skin side of the fillet. The blues are hard to eat if that isn't done as were those big really fat blues off the lake at LaGrange years ago. The fat can lay on the side under the silver after its skinned and you cant see it or hardly eat it at times, especially on blues.

We never worried about doing that off clean lakes like Buchanan or Rayburn and cut in steaks through the spine made some great eating.

The high fin blues on Rayburn can be unreal delicious.

Almost all big yellow cats need extensive fat trimming.

Im not very experienced with filleting any kind of catfish. My first big gafftop I cut along the spine behind the head, as usual and started extending down the side and towards the tail. I did cut around the ribs so wouldn't have to mess with the abdominal contents. Flipped the fillet and separated the skin from the meat. Flip fish repeat. I treat it like any other fish, except the ribs seem to go further back and more sloping angle.

A good knife works wonders, I have a 7" W�sthof filleting knife my wife got me a couple of years ago for father's day.

we clean lots of catfish.last trip i had 45lb of fillets. i have a skinning board with a 3in spike sticking straight up on one end. i take a fish and a hammer ,lay the fishes head on top of the spike and pound it straight down on the spike with the fish flat on its belly. take a knife and cut straight down behind both gills just thru the skin.then cut a v from the back of the fin on his back and cut it where it joins the cuts behins the giles. with the fish held tight on the board and the board screwed to a table you can easily skin both sides with a good set of skinning pliers(walmart sells them for 5.00 ). once skinned they are very easy to fillet.lay the fish on its side,start forward above the ribcage ,trim to the back of it then finish the cut flat to the tail. skinning board save lots of time and its much easier your hands with slick catfish. i don't like a electric knife for any tpye of fish with a heavy ribcage.last trip i cleaned 2 99quart cooler full of catfish in about an hour by myself using this method. 45lbs of fillets is alot of good eating.

Just like we do it, nail their heads to a railroad tie.

Link to my knife, work equally well on flounder, redfish and whiting. I haven't had the chance to clean specks yet. I haven't sharpened it in 2 years of regular use (just fish though)

Fillet knife

Who makes the skinning device? Tried a search without results & zooming on the photo. Thanks.

Nail that bad boy to a tree and get after him with skinners then filet the meat off the sides. Note, there is much good meat on the bigger ones ahead of the filets.. Catfish stew comes to mind

Got to where we caught blues at the lake here for fun and turned em loose. Water is so damn hot not much good eating comes out of that lake anymore IMHO.

Yellows have to be around 40 plus pounds in the river to trim much fat. But I would imagine lake ones might have more fat.

I love the cheek meat the best out of ones big enough to mess with.

Rost, I hope you some day get to try yellow cat out of the Neches River north and east of you.

I always likeed to hang them off of a tree limb using stout wire and a hook. I made the hook from a tarp strap hook with a point sharpened on it. miles

Once the fish are weighing as much as the ones you caught, I knock 'em in the head, turn 'em belly up, and cut the belly out in one piece. With an electric filet knife, you can start just behind the double belly fin and just around the edge of the ribs, up to the breastbone, then around the ribs back to the starting place.

You will have one big piece of meat with a separation in the middle. You "filet" each half, then "filet the silver skin off.

Then I either skin and steak the rest, or filet from the ribcage back in the conventional manner depending on the size.

The big rib bones are way to hard on electric knives, so even with smaller cats I filet from the big upper fin aft.

Cats up to 3 lbs or so are very easily skinned by making a few relief cuts in the skin first. Hold the head in L/H and use the Walmart skinning pliers in R/H. Then you can break the back just behind the big upper fin. Takes less than a minute per fish.

Like Pat said, they cook pretty good with the bone in.

They cook good with the bone in. But its even better when a sloppy person filets em and leaves us the bones... with a decent amount but not to much meat on em. They fry up good and eat better.

I use the same nail to skin frogs too.

i just frogs in 2 with a hatchet. then take a good pair of pliers and skin him like you were pulling his pants down. grab him between the legs and jerk them down to his feet. chop of the feet.

i just cut frogs in 2 with a hatchet. then take a good pair of pliers and skin him like you were pulling his pants down. grab him between the legs and jerk them down to his feet. chop of the feet.

my spike board is actually made of a rectangle of aluminum 1/4in thick ,its about 16in x 24in i drilled a 2in hole in it at one end. then i welded a spike to a flat piece of steel about 4in square. then i bolted the sqaure on the underside of the sheet of aluminum with the spike sticking up thru the hole. i figuer this way i can take the spike off to sharpin or replace it. i built it to last a life time. clamped down on a good heavy table it ain't moving.

Barbarians!!

I wish I could mentally picture that or see a video, Cur.

Have y'all gotten rain and are your quail coming back?

My wife got me the same knife for my birthday or father's day a couple of years ago too. Nothing like it. I've been filleting fish for almost sixty years and never had a knife like that. Handle it very carefully, right out of the box. Fish come apart very easily for that knife.

Can't forget those catfish cheeks....they're up on top of their head. rub your thumb on top and you'll feel two soft spots and that's their cheeks. Just get a sharp knife and go around the outside of that covered hole and you'll have some fine meat a little bigger than nice size scallops.

I know ya don't need the stroke Andy but you're gettin it anyway. Its good to see a man doing right by his kids. Best to ya'll.

Enjoyed the blog.

Thanks for all the help gents!

Fillet them from the rib cage back and leave the skin on. Layer them with a salt, pepper, brown sugar mixture sprinkled on the meat for a day or so in the fridge. Then cook em in the smoker or the upper rack on the gas grill. The skin keeps them together a lot better, you don't have to eat it. You'll like the results I bet. 1 to 3lb's are better, but I eat a lot of bigger ones in the spring skinless and fried. Marty

Thanks Marty