8/20: Flathead Catfish, The one that DIDN'T get away!

Here's two fishing reports from my last two days of fishing. The first trip I spent bass fishing with Shawn at a local lake where we had been on a 20+" bass streak for well over 5 trips. We changed things up a bit and still managed to break 20" on a single fish....it wasn't a largemouth though. The second trip I spent with Russ flathead fishing  the following night. We each found a few nice buffalo feeding on floating scum mats before dark. As the sun fell over the tree tops the action really picked up........

8/19: 

Tuesday night Shawn Skidmore and I decided to head out and see if we could find a few 20" bass after dark. For the past few weeks I had been thinking about hitting the deep end of the lake in search of night-time bass. I specifically wanted to target a couple of shallow flats and rip rap points near 40+ feet of water. In theory these spots seemed like solid choices since the bass had less room to feed than they did at our other spots. If the bass were feeding at night near the deeper water they would have no choice but to be roaming the only shallow water available. That was my thought anyway. Shawn seemed to like the idea of fishing new water so that's exactly what we did.

Shawn and I met up at 7pm and hit the water. I knew the water very well so I began the trip by pointing out a few main lake points and drop offs that we could fish at night. After about 30 minutes of paddling and talking about where we could fish Shawn was ready to wet a line. We began on a shallow flat near 35 feet of water. The flat itself was 6-12 feet deep and expanded 2-3 acres. The banks were lined with rip rap and the back of the creek arm was covered in thick vegetation. If we were going to find a big fish, this was definitely the spot to do so, or so I thought. Shawn and I worked the banks and the drop off with creature baits but struggled to find fish. In the next hour and a half I picked up 2 small bass and Shawn missed a couple small ones. At this point we decided to start working our way back to the boat ramp and fish some of the main lake points that I had pointed out earlier. As we rounded the rip rap point we started working the steep bank that was riddled with fallen trees. I was in the lead and Shawn was working 10 yards behind me. I made a long pitch up under a tree and hopped my bait twice when I felt a solid thump! I reeled down on the slack and set the hook but nothing was there. I reeled in my bait to find that the greedy fish had made off with one of my claws. I looked back at Shawn and told him that it must had been a bluegill. I reached down into my bag, grabbed another bait, and began threading it onto my hook when I heard Shawn pull in a nice bass. His bass went a little over 17", which scored him 10 points for his Kayak Wars team. He began taking pictures of his bass on the hawg trough and I went back to working the banks. On my very next cast I hoped my bait once and felt another solid thump. I reeled down and set the hook, this time I connected! Halfway through my swing I felt weight, and a lot of it. The fish didn't move a whole lot at first but I could feel it swimming back and forth. I looked up to Shawn and told him that I thought I had a big catfish. I continued to work myself over top of the catfish and then it proceeded to pull me around for a couple of minutes. Eventually I pulled the catfish within reach and slipped my hands into its mouth. The flathead went 30" and 14.5lbs....quite the battle for a bass rod.

We continued working down the bank and picked up another half dozen bass before the bite went dead. We fished the next hour and a half and only managed 1 or 2 small bass. The main lake points failed to produce any fish. At 11pm Shawn and I had made our way back to the boat ramp and we began discussing our options. Shawn wanted to fish until midnight at the very minimum so we had a decision to make; (1) continue fishing down the banks near the boat ramp for an hour or more ,OR (2) head back to the rock point and fish where we had caught all of our fish just at dark? After a little debate we started paddling toward the rock point. I picked up a small bass behind Shawn within the first five minutes. Nearly 30 minutes later Shawn picks up another small bass. The fish seemed to be spread out and the average size was 13-14", so at 12:30am we decided to call it quits.



8/20

Friday I woke up around 9:30am and started swapping out my bass gear for my catfish gear. Not only did my rods and reels need to be swapped but so did my tackle boxes and nets. I also needed to grab a couple aerators, troll buckets, spot light, anchor, cutting board, filet knife, head lamp, etc. After an hour of running in and out of the garage I had everything loaded up and was ready to go. At 10:30am Russ sent me a text stating that he had gotten enough bait for the both of us. After a brief conversation we decided to wait until 2pm to meet up and hit the water.

At 2pm we met at our take out location and loaded all of his gear onto my trailer. From there we drove upstream a few miles and started unloading gear. We both took our time carrying gear 40 yards down to the water. While I was on the bank I decided to retie all of my rods just in case I had a bad spot in my line. Russ got on the water and immediately began paddling upstream to one of his buffalo honey holes. He quickly caught a small buffalo that went just shy of 24". Once I was ready to hit the water I paddled across the river and worked a log jam on the front side of a bridge pylon. The buffalo were everywhere I looked, sucking scum in every spot that it collected. I spent the better part of an hour working a floating jig head with a piece of bread around the scum but failed to get my first buffalo. This type of fishing was becoming very frustrating.

At one point Russ and I were paddling side by side when all of a sudden we spotted a school of buffalo sucking on scum that had accumulated on a root wad. Russ told me to go over and get them, however I insisted that he showed me how to catch these frustrating fish. It was a challenge that he was willing to accept. Like a ninja Russ stealthily paddled over to the root wad and dropped his floating jig head tipped with nightcrawler into the scum where the buffalo were feeding. The first drop was a miss, but the second drop landed perfectly just mere inches from a buffalo's open mouth. He set the hook and the water exploded as the buffalo that he had hooked pulled drag and spooked the other dozen buffalo in the area. Soon enough Russ had landed the 24" buffalo, which was good enough for 10 points for our kayak war team.

Eventually I found my first buffalo of the trip, a small 22" buffalo from a school of 40 or more.

Russ, the buffalo expert went on to land 2 more buffalo over the 24" mark.

Eventually the sun began to set over the tree tops and the buffalo fishing was the least of our concern. We found a nice cut out bank with several fallen trees and set up for catfish. I tied off to a log running parallel to the current and tossed out a couple live bluegill. Russ anchored 40 yards downstream and tossed a couple baits out as well. The first bite didn't come until an hour or better after dark. Russ made quick work of the 24" flathead, it was a nice start to our evening but not quite what we were looking for. I eventually made a move downstream 60 yards and across the river from Russ. I found a nice hole, 12' deep, with 1 single tree in the core. This was the last deep water before a major riffle so I decided to give it a shot. During my paddle from spot to spot one of my bluegill had died so I cut his head off and tossed it to the outside of the fallen tree. Before I could even get my second rod out I heard the bait clicker go off. The fish pulled about 6" of line out and then dropped my bait. Five minutes later the clicker went off for the second time, once again pulling about 6" of line out. Eventually I picked the rod up and waited for a tug, and then I set the hook hoping to get the turtle, gar, or small catfish that was playing with my bait. I failed to connect but I did manage to get my bait back so I tossed it out a little further, hoping to get away from whatever had been pecking at my bait. Ten minutes later that rod began get a bite and the bait clicker began rolling slow and steady. I dropped my rod, engaged the reel, and set the hook.  Whatever it was I got it this time around, and after a brief battle I brought the flathead into the kayak. 

The flathead went 30", good enough for kayak wars so I snapped a quick picture. I sat in this spot and proceeded to get another 2 runs but failed to hook another fish. It appeared that the small fish were using this area to feed, maybe avoiding the bigger fish while they were feeding elsewhere???

Russ and I met up downstream and made our way through the next major riffle. Below the riffle we each took a side of the river and set up just upstream from where we thought the fish would be. I chose to set up on the head of a log jam, and Russ chose to fish a rip rap bank. I quickly tossed out two live bluegill, one of which was an 8.5" green sunfish and the other was a 5" green sunfish. The smaller bait was placed 10 feet off of the bank and the larger bait was placed 25 feet off of the bank. I sat around for 30 minutes without a bite. Eventually, I grabbed my phone and began scanning my news feed on facebook.....after 10 minutes I had read enough. Every now and then the big green sunfish would pull bait clicker and get my attention, but the clicker would stop and the line would slack up. At one point I leaned back in my seat and started looking for shooting starts, and thats when the rod with the large green sunfish began to click.......and click......and click. I sat up straight grabbed the rod, turned off the clicker mechanism, engaged the reel, waited for the line to tighten, and then set the hook. What I then felt was a large amount of weight. My rod was doubled and the fish wasn't taking line or letting me take line. Either this was a large fish or I was snagged, and then I felt two hard head shakes. With each head shake it felt like my line swayed 2 feet each way. My heart began to race. The fish made a quick run toward the bank and made a massive swirl 10 yards in front of me, my heart had now moved to my throat. I yelled across the river to Russ and told him I had hooked a good one. The fish then began running upstream, eventually puling the nose of my kayak off of the bank and dislodging my anchor. I was now floating with the fish, everywhere he went so did I. He eventually made his way into the line of my second rod. At this point I began to replay every lost fish in my mind. I thought about losing the fish to a bad hookset, a snag, breaking my line, breaking a rod, floating into a logjam, pretty much anything that could go wrong. After what seemed like 3 minutes the fish surfaced and at that point I knew it was big. I pulled the fish within grasp and I leaned over to grab the the flathead by the mouth when it decided it wasn't quite finished yet. It turned, threw water all over me, and then proceeded to rip drag. I knew that I couldn't let that happen again so I leaned forward and grabbed the net. On the next pass I managed to get the head of the fish in the net. At this point I still had tension on the line but the fish was 3/4 of the way out of the net. I lifted the net but it only seemed to make matters worse. I eventually used my foot to push another 1/4 of the fish into the net. At that point I felt confident in dropping my rod, grabbing the rim of the net,  and then working the rest of the fish into the net.  It was without a doubt a new personal best, the question now became; by how much? I told Russ that I had the fish in the net and that I would need some assistance. He asked how big and I replied, "Over 40 for sure, but I don't know about 50." Eventually he paddled over and we worked ourselves closer to the bank and began snapping pictures.

44"

Hawg Troughs......doing it right!!!!

We snapped a dozen or more pictures, put the fish back into the net and sat it in the water for a few minutes. We then repeated the process again. The result was the pictures you see above. As always Russ did a great job on the camera. THANKS RUSS!!!!!

The final count was 44" long and 47lbs 7oz in the net, the net weighs 1lb 5oz. so the fish went 46lbs 2oz. I dropped the fish into the water and let it, and I, recover. In less than 20 seconds it began thrashing around and was ready to swim off. (Hopefully to be caught again!) Russ and I then just sat around and talked about that fish. I kept asking him if he would have believed me if I had lost that fish? "If I told you I lost a nearly 50lber would you believe me?" I then reminded him of all of the big bass I had lost recently, some that would had shattered my personal best. "I doubt anyone believes those stories Russ" I told him. In my head I kept telling myself, If there was ever one fish this year that I didn't want to lose......this was it.

Russ and I then spent the next hour bouncing from spot to spot but the bites disappeared.  Russ had to take his daughter to kindergarten in the morning and I had work. So at 2am we called it quits.