I never deliberately went out to catch catfish. I've caught quite a few on bass lures, but wasn't particularly attracted to chasing them. Recently, we moved to a subdivision/small town in Saint Charles, Mo. They have six managed lakes, one of decent size and I like to launch my kayak and chase bass. This summer I've caught a significant number in the 15 to 19 inch range with one going a hair under 21 inches. It remains loads of fun, but one night...
I hooked a monster. When it bit on a bass lure, I knew instinctively it was a catfish. It was a great one. I actually called my wife within a couple minutes of hooking it to tell her I was in a real fight with a monster fish. I was using a spinning rod with 10 pound test and didn't want to horse it around so I played with it for several minutes.
I never could make any headway. Every time it felt like it was giving up, it nearly pulled me out of the yak! People were watching from the shore because it was dragging me in circles and figure eights, mostly within 30 yards of the bank.
I knew the line was going to break eventually. I use smallish snap swivels to change baits often and since I'm not fishing monsters, they've always worked well for me.
Well, eventually, the line broke and I never even got to see what it was. But when it broke, I checked my phone and saw I'd been fighting that fish for at least 34 minutes from the kayak and had never even gotten a glimpse of the thing!
So, since there are some large cats in that lake, I started bank fishing them. In the last two weeks on bluegill cut bait, I've taken one flathead of approximately 8 pounds (I don't weigh them, but I measure every fish,) and three channel cats all in the same class of 36 to 40 inches. One smaller channel of about 26 inches.
I only kept one because it swallowed the hook and I wasn't sure it would survive that.
These fish are fighters! I'm liking it.
Next I'm going to do some kayak drifting and dragging cut bait and see where that leads.
Any advice?
