Home Forums Fishing Freshwater Need Advice from Experienced Cat Fishermen

So, moved into a community with 6 or 7 stocked lakes and ponds. Bass fishing is mediocre but everyone raves about how big the cat fish are. I've never deliberately fished for cat fish, but have caught a few over the years on bass baits. Once I caught a nice eater on night crawlers when I was actually hook and bobber fishing for bigger blue gill.

These are channel cats and blues.

What's a good setup? hook and bobber? Bottom fishing? People here keep touting hot dog for bait.

The bottoms are pretty flat. Depth around 20 feet at the middle with steep sloping rocky gravel sides. Murky water with a ton of small bluegill near the banks.

I've seen some dead cats that look to be in the 10 pound range.

Chicken livers on a big treble hook. Rooster livers are best as they are tougher but are hard to find..

Off the bottom, or under a bobber?

I like it off the bottom with a light weight. Cats are real sensitive to any "extra" pressure when biting. Liver is heavy enough to let you cast well. Just enough weight to allow you to tighten the line against the weight and not the bait. Let them pick it up and move with it before trying to set the hook. Used to fish over rip rap rock on a roadside. Used a float there but the normal ones have too much pressure when pulled on. Used a turkey quill float, which has almost zero resistance. Just a small split shot to hold the float up is all that is needed. Finally, you will be bugged to death with bream/bluegill. They like livers too! Have fun and let us know what you catch. Cats are pulling machines when hooked and a ball to fight. And great to eat when you get them in. You really need my 92 year old mother for that though and that is a different story!

Couple summers ago, I fought a 33" blue from my kayak while fishing a black plastic craw for bass. It was a fight!

Dan......follow this link and do some research. Some very good advice on several different forums.

https://www.catfish1.com/

I love catching catfish. They pull like a mule and they taste good - what's not to like? I fish for them along deep rocky banks with a wood slip bobber 5-6 ft. deep in the spring and fall. They don't seem to have any trouble yanking the float under. Other than not being frequently hung on the rocks, I like using a float because if it's just quivering or moving in short rapid jerks it's a small sunfish of some sort and you can move it before the little fish eat all your bait. I like to bait with cheap frozen raw shrimp. Easy to keep in the freezer, take what you want out of the bag and put it in some sort of plastic carton - when you return home put what's left back in the freezer for the next trip. The channels and blues won't care if it's "spoiled". Some around here report good results baiting with pieces of fresh chicken breast. If you have a contact at a grocery you might be able to get some that are expired or not so pretty real cheap or even free.

Cats are not always on the bottom. A few years ago a friend caught two big blues on the same trip while bass fishing. The blues were chasing shad like bass would and he caught them on a topwater lure. It's also popular here to fish for them with jugs or noodles - it's easier to google it than try to explain it. Noodle lines are usually about 6-8 ft. long and fished in deeper coves in open water.

Like Dan Chamberlain above, I started targeting them when I found out the lake that I was new to was loaded with channel cats of prime eating size primarily because of all the bedrock overhangs and holes on the deep banks (spawning and hiding habitat) that I like to bass fish with plastics. Seemed that in the spring I would catch a cat or two on those banks while bass fishing. I asked around and that's when I found out about the plentiful catfish.

The best suggestion I can offer is to use circle hooks. When you learn how to use them you will hook just as many fish as with J-hooks, they stay hooked, best of all they are usually hooked in the corner of the mouth so easy to unhook with less damage to the fish so any you release will be have a better chance of survival. I've also caught a few bass of sublegal length on the shrimp and they're usually lip hooked.

I Carolina rig a dip worm loaded with Sonny's blood flavor dip bait. Fish it shallow in spring near feeding banks and deeper on structure in summer.

I've caught some fair to middlin' sized ones.



I used Gizzard shad, cut into 4 big chunks. Gear was Penn 320s and Ugly StickTiger 7-ft medium action rods (6 of them), 40# Mono, with an 80 lbs leader. I would use anywhere from 8 ounce to 16 ounce sinkers, depending how the current was and how well I wanted my rods to keep spread.

Bait




Setup at night




Daytime, with a hit. The rod would just slowly go down until the drag started pulling. The slower the pull, the bigger the fish, it seemed. Just let the 8/0 circle hook do its job.

immature, there are a lot less swallowed hooks with the circle hooks, too. I used to de-barb mine, you could get the hook out, fish weighed, and back in the river lickety-split.

Nice blue! Weight??

Thank you, that one went in the 60s.

That's the upper end of what is commonly caught in the James, I've only pulled in a couple that weighed more.

There have been several pulled in that weighed 100+, but I've never done it, and I've pretty much given up that game.

I've heard the James has some decent big cats in there. We fish the Ohio, mainly. The big river is currently being destroyed by commercial pukes, who sell to pay lakes locally. They average $6 a lb., which means every slob that has a boat big enough to net is raping the waters. We're about to get those regulations changed here soon.

Once again....NICE blue!!

Thanks again.

They've allowed a few to electrofish the James, and you know, that is not selective. They're hammering the big ones pretty hard.

I just got out of it, sold my boat and gear and said da heck with it.

Damn.....sorry to hear that, but know what ya mean.

Any "cold water" tactics for November and December?

This was in river current, so it may not work in lakes, I don't know your situation.

I'd find structure, and try to place my bait just a few feet upstream, a couple in front, a couple to the right, and a couple to the left. If something didn't happen within 30 to 45 minutes, I went somewhere else. Structure could be bridge pilings, boat docks, or a pile of trees on the bottom. Anything to break the current. Check out the bottom picture I posted for an idea.

At the upstream side, just at the edge of deep(er) holes could be productive, also. They like to lay in those deep holes, and the active feeders will come up to the edge.

The outside bends in the river. I've pulled them out several times set up like that, but with big boat traffic on the river, sometimes you had to be ready to move.

Mainly structure in 20 to 50 feet of water is where I had my best luck.

Here is everything you need for blue catfish except bait. The no roll sinker, cigar float, circle hook rig is the key.

http://www.proanglertackle.com/CatfishRod.htm

Best bait is live or fresh shad. Second best would be live perch or gold fish. You can catch a few on chicken parts. Winter is the best time for the big fish.

For channel cats your bass rig works fine, 15 to 17 lb mono, treble hook under a slip bobber, stinky punch bait, chicken or beef liver. Chum the water with sour grain or blood off of the liver helps.

Catfish are not too hard to catch, fight well and make good eats!

BTW I use their medium heavy rods for blue cats with 6500 Garcia reels and saltwater spinning reels. 25 - 30 lb mono and 50 lb leader. Blue cats are not as sensitive to line size as channels.

Dan,

If you want to do well catfishing, the very first thing you need to do is learn how to catch “shad” - Blues will eat cut shad, but the shad only work for about 24hrs before they lose what ever it is they have, then they don’t work anywhere near as good.


Chad Ferguson has a good site with pictures, and even a e-book on how to locate and catch shad (I got it... definitely work the 5 bucks or so).
Here is a link to the catfish edge site run by Chad - http://www.catfishedge.com/shad-catfish-bait/

Rules for catfishing -

Boat gear includes rod holders, a cast net, ...
Learn to locate the shad (the fish will be on those)
Learn how to catch them —- Get a cast net and learn to throw it.
get decent rigs — for you on ponds / lakes for blues 3-4 ounce sinker, 6/0. To 8/0 circle hooks with a 3 way swivel
Learn to pattern them.
In lakes blues run edges with flats, and are in spots throughout the year... watch the north side of the lakes in the spring that warm up first.
Master the different types of fishing (sitting vs. drifting)


Water temps are very signifiant, and so is the thermocline in lakes- The spring ‘bite” is something not to be missed on lakes (when the fish come out to chase the spawning shad in the shallows and tie on the feed bag.


After you get the swing of it, you start recording your personal bests - Here is my best blue to date, and Gordy’s Gritters (good friend of mine and catfishing buddy) monster flathead from last year.


50lb is Blue cat


75 ish pound flathead

Cut bait on the bottom with a treble hook

Thanks for all your replies. Now that the ice is melting, I'm going to try some bank fishing. These lakes have cat...but they're small lakes (man made) so a good cast can get you to the deepest water they have.

Best to y'all.

Lotsa luck, big cats can be fun. So can regular sized ones on lighter gear, so hope you do good.

IF you want to take a BIG Flathead, you need a bucket full of live Sunfish or BIG Goldfish (where goldfish are legal) , as "PAPA" doesn't often take cut bait.

Fish the live bait about 6" off the bottom. - After dark is BEST.
(Our largest flattie so far was 68# and pulled like being hooked to a Jeep.)

yours, tex

Dan...a little more grist for your mill..I found for channel cats the best bait I ever used was LIVE minnows, as they are a bit more predacious than some species. Fish them on the bottom. Second best bait, for reasons known only to the catfish, was shrimp....raw.

ingwe,

Oddly enough, the channel cats will frequently hit an artificial bait. = My biggest channel to date hit a Rapala.

yours, tex

Yep! Caught them on plugs AND plastic worms fished for bass!

ingwe,

A K-12 buddy of mine was in a BASS tournament & caught a channel cat on a plug. - He was disgusted with having wasted time reeling-in a lowly catfish & tossed it back. - Later he discovered that he had likely released a NEW STATE CHANNEL CAT RECORD.
(His partner said that what Tommy said then is truly "unprintable".)

yours, tex

I've had good luck on Frogs, live shad or shiners (seined) the same freshly dead (less than 12 hours) and crawlers. with crawlers you often catch a variety of fish, especially carp where I am. I never had much luck with gizzards or livers but only tried them a handfull of times. I've always wanted to try shrimp and might do that this spring. I preferred circle hooks and egg or flat sinkers. never used floats to keep them off the bottom and didn't need to in my experience. all mine have been caught in rivers or reservoirs. biggest channel cat was 30.2 lbs biggest flathead was 28 lbs even.

That’s a monstrous channel cat!

We haven’t been doing much good around here lately, it’s been so damn cold that our water temperature has dropped making bait tough to catch and the cat bite slow slow. Spring is right around the corner and as soon as it warms up for a week or two they’ll pick back up again.

I missed the state record by 2 lbs I haven't caught one even close to that before or since. it was spring 1998 and I caught it on an ultralight rod, 8 lb test using a plain hook and 3/8 egg sinker and 3 dead fathead minnows. biggest not including that one were about 18-20 lbs and a lot in the 6-12lb range. good eaters.
I miss walking out the backdoor a few hundred yards and catching catfish all night along the river.

Some very good info on this thread. I would add one of my favorite ways is to drift in a slow river with no weight, or will add just enough weight to bounce on the bottom. Then I use the trolling motor to keep the boat in the right position. Once we find fish we will redrift the same area. Very productive.