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This is from an "OLD" catfisherman.

5K views 31 replies 12 participants last post by  Crashdoyle 
#1 ·
I used to do two kinds of fishing, catfishing, and Flyfishing for trout, bream, and bass.
Flyfishing went by the wayside when my thumbs went south, so that left drowning worms for bream, and catfishing.
Now, I'm so decrepit that it's dangerous for me to go fishing by myself.

So, me and my better half are planning on going catfishing in two or three weeks at High Falls lake.
Since momma isn't up on spinning reels, I'm gonna get her a nice casting rod (I have two large spin-casting reels) and we'll use spin-cast for its simplicity.
The bait will be chicken livers which should get us some small channel cats and bullheads.
I rig the liver in surgitube and circle hooks.
To rig it, tie a knot in the end of the tube and snip off about two inches of the tube to make a bag. Turn the bag inside out, stuff in a piece of liver, and work the hook through the open end until it's closed, dip it in the liver blood, cast it out, and sit back to a cold drink, good conversation, and enjoy your day.
 
#2 ·
Heres an idea from another decrepid old man that works on our channel cats here in Pennsylvania on the Delaware River.

Pick up a small package of chicken breast fillets, cut em into 1 1/2 inch squares and go fishing. Stays on the hook better, and plain catches catfish.:tango_face_smile:
 
#4 ·
Welcome to GBO.
I've seen some videos of soaking chicken breast in jello and catching big cats.
I'm gonna stick with my livers on this first trip, but on a later one, I'll try plain breasts and some strawberry flavored ones.
 
#3 ·
Welcome to the forums Old Man!

Bugeye I saw your heads up in the PBS forum - good thing as I don't always check down here!

There must be 10,000 different ways to catch a catfish - everyone has a favorite. The wife and I used to live near to a good catfish river and fished it a lot. Our favorite method was a leech on a circle hook. Tried several other baits, but always seemed to do best there with a plain old leech. Tried them with and without scent squirted on them and couldn't really tell any difference.

Sure miss those pan fried fillets! Closest place for catfish now is probably 75 miles away. But we "suffer" with walleye, pike, perch, and bluegill. :)
 
#5 ·
Your cats were used to eating leaches, and the bait they are used to is usually best.

Catfish in Georgia grow up eating chicken liver. :)
That's why it's my favorite. :tango_face_smile:
 
#6 ·
Why fish will bite on certain things has always been a mystery to me.

I mean I can understand why a trout would hit a dry fly on the surface that mimics, say a mayfly, and they would hit a wet fly that resembles a nymph, buy why do walleyes for example hit a crawler trolled on a harness way out from the shore of a lake? I've never seen a crawler swimming along when I'm out in my boat, and certainly not swimming at anywhere near the speed we troll them!

And how about colors? Anyone ever see a real minnow that was firetiger, or red and white, or chartreuse??

And then we have tackle companies telling us we need this year's new color, or new shape, or new action lures because the fish have wised up to the lures we used last year and we won't be able to fool them with our old lures! Are we supposed to believe the fish all get together at the end of the year and compare notes on what to bite and what not to bite???
 
#7 ·
Interesting thing I heard about the Berkley power bait here in Oregon is the hatcheries were using Berkley fish food. Certain colors work better on certain lakes. I got tired of goo and started using worms and eggs or shiners etc. and started catching larger fish. The rivers and streams are color of lure, usually everyone's catching them on the one I don't have.
 
#8 ·
Being an avid small game hunter I always saved the hearts from squirrel, rabbits and pheasants for my Iowa River catfishing! I kept the gizzards out of the pheasants as well! I prefer to fish with the line loose and no sinker if possible. If I have to have a sinker then it has to be a slip sinker. I have also have had good luck when mixing deer blood, BJ's catfish bait and flour into a doe ball. I have caught lots of eating size catfish on night crawlers but these Iowa rivers are full of carp and they get in the way!

Channel cat caught out of a river are one of my favorite. Channel cat from a pond need a couple of weeks of swimming around in a cattle tank before they are fit to eat. Since I have no cattle nor cattle tanks these days the pond catfish get tossed back.
 
#9 ·
Well today being my birthday (76) my wife sent me a text and said choose what I wanted.
She put a $1,000 cap on it. :tango_face_surprise
She's feeling guilty about her Greece trip without me I think.
But I think a couple of hundred oughta do it.
One ugly stick casting rod (for her) and some new line, hooks, swivels, etc should be plenty.

So here I go shopping at Amazon. :tango_face_glasses:
 
#11 ·
i've used quite a few different baits for catfish.
when i used to trotline often, i used beef blood
made from the buckets of blood you used to
could buy at the slaughterhouses. it really
doesn't work very good for rod and reel fishing
because it's fairly fragile.
the last few decades i've pretty much used shad
exclusively. you can stop by one of these larger
lakes around here and if you know when a school
will be passing by, you can fill up a cooler full in
2 or 3 casts.
if i'm fishing right away i'll use them because they're
definitely better fresh. if not i'll pack freezer bags
full and freeze them for later.
the price is right for sure.
 
#14 ·
At walmart prices, I could get 4000 33max reels.
I doubt if I could handle that many lines out.
I don't need $1000 worth of anything to go fishin, and I don't need any guns, or clothes, or anything else that I can think.
Hmmm, I'll bet she knew all that and that's why she offered so much.
She knew I wouldn't spend it. :tango_face_grin:
 
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#18 ·
Well momma kept insisting I spend a lot of money, so, I did some checking on a guided fishing trip and I ain't gonna pay $100 per hour plus tip for someone to take my fish off the hook.
So this afternoon I went to walmart and bought two Berkeley 7ft graphite casting rods (for my two spincast reels) and a bunch of hooks, lines, and sinkers. :)

I'm going to home depot in a day or two and get the wood and metal braces to build a stake-body for my little red wagon so I can haul more stuff down to the water.

So I'm happy with my birthday stuff, Jesus rose from the dead, what more could we want.
 
#20 ·
We did go to a water department lake where we didn't get a bite on strawberry hot dogs or chicken livers and rain ran us off early.
So, this coming Saturday (5-18-19) we are heading for High Falls lake.
It's supposed to be 89 degrees but we'll have a nice shady spot where I've caught a lot of fish in the past, both catfish and bluegills.
AND, THE ONLY BAIT WE'LL HAVE IS NIGHT CRAWLERS.
They'll catch anything.
 
#21 ·
Bugeye, all you need to do is catch one or two bluegills on the worms and you'll have one of the best baits ever for catfish. Cut them bluegills up into 5 or 6 pieces and you'll catch cats, and bigger ones than you would on livers. Plus, it's a lot cleaner than dealing with livers.
 
#22 ·
I am gonna take your advice, but not this trip.
If I can keep momma's interest up concerning fishing, I'm gonna teach her to cast a spinning reel.
I have two heavy duty spinners and medium heavy rods for them, and if she learns to cast one of those, we'll go for bigger fish.
High falls has some big catfish very close to where we'll be fishing, and the eating size I'm after hang on the outskirts of the deep cover above the dam.
It's a large log jam right against the base of the dam.

My wife loves catfish so I'm really hoping she gets into it. :tango_face_smile:
 
#23 ·
Well. I guess I'll give a fishing report.
My back was hurting bad enough that I didn't want to face the climb back up to my truck, so instead of high falls, we went back to the water dept lake, where I got one bite on nightcrawlers.
The rod bowed over and stayed, but even with a circle hook, it let go so I'm thinking big turtle.
I'm not going again until my back gets some rest.
So nothing exciting. :tango_face_sad:
 
#26 ·
In a couple of weeks it's supposed to be cool enough to go fishing and I'm gonna try some hotdogs soaked in that fish sauce that Asian's eat. it smells like rotten fish.:tango_face_surprise
And I'm gonna chum with some meow mix that's made with four different kinds of fish.
I'm sure that'll stink.
 
#27 ·
Really hard to find any more but cow liver is way better than chicken liver. Use cow liver and it doesn't cast off the hook and no surgical tube needed. With chicken liver I use hooks with an egg loop tied on them Hook the liver and run the egg loop around the liver. I can cast so so like that but at least far enough to get out on the water! If you need to cast to the middle of the lake, I doubt it will work! Have made up some chicken breast but haven't used any yet. Every time I get ready to I see a new formula for making it and start over. This time it includes olive oil and strawberry kool aide. No strawberry kool aid so gonna try cherry! Funny thing my son swear's by night crawler's! Unfortunately they also seem to work well for him so I have to listen to him talk about the things heck, anyone can hook on a night crawler!
 
#30 ·
een a long time since I could figure out how to get back on. In that time I put together a couple light casting rods w/Low pro reels to fish for bull heads with. When I was in Colorado I used lots of beef liver as chickn liver I could not keep on the hook. Got back here in Oregon and all I could find for liver was calf liver and it's as bad a chicken liver. stuck to chicken breast for a couple years. Then got a bright idea and went to tieing on my kooks with an egg loop and no problem with liver anymore! Egg loop works great!
 
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