Chasing Bait

Like any seasoned cat guy, I've developed some pretty strong opinions about which baits work best for each type of catfish at any given period during the warm weather months.  I've also worked pretty hard to figure out how to get my hands on that bait, how to keep the cost down, and how to keep it on hand at my home so that I can fish at a moment's notice.  Catching and keeping bait has actually been a fun part of my development as a catfish man.  The following is much of what I've learned.


Surprisingly, channel cats actually get quite active very early in the year.  Their pre-spawn feed starts right after ice out and lasts into June.  During this time period, the channel fishing can be phenomenal.  I had a buddy who I met on the river and ran into from time to time out there.  As we got to know each other a little bit, we started picking each other's brains about bait and tactics.  One night when we were loading our boats at the launch he started talking to me about dip bait.  I had tried a few different store bought prepared baits, but never had any luck with them.  He swore by a dip bait called Sonny's Super Sticky Channel Cat Bait.  He was real reluctant to tell me the name of his secret bait and he looked all around like he was selling me a dime bag before he pulled the jar out of a storage bin in his boat.  

I don't think that I tried it right away, but I eventually picked some up.  He was right.  Channel cats love this stuff.  I can recall one early spring Saturday afternoon when I was fishing in that basin just up from the bridge.  I had two rods out with Sonny's on both.  I literally coudn't keep both rods in the water.  I've never experienced anything like it.  I do have a few disclaimers.  First of all, flatheads won't touch the stuff.  When they get active, I lose all interest in the channels, so the dip bait goes away.  Another thing that might be obvious is that this stuff stinks.  It's pretty hard to keep it off of your hands and out of your boat.  That's another reason that I put it away by early June.  I'm tired of the mess.  I have found that buying it in the bigger buckets rather than the smaller peanut butter jar looking containers makes it much easier to manage.  You can order the bigger buckets of Sonny's through Catfish Connection.  I add just a little water, stir it up good,  and then use a hard plastic kitchen mixing spoon to push a dip worm around in the bucket until it's completely covered.  Dipping the loaded worm quickly in the water before casting is supposed to help hold everything together.  If all you want to catch is channel cats, I don't think that you can beat this stuff.   I  mainly use it in the spring, but it is money all summer long.


A couple years ago, my dad took me on a channel catfish charter on the lower Grand.  The captain's name was Dan Lipski and his charter is called River Kat Professional Guide Services.  He introduced us to cut creek chubs.  He told us that he had caught them earlier that day and put them immediately on ice.  Dan would cut the chubs in half and put both halves on a 5/0 Eagle Claw 084 hook.  He really put us into some fish.  I think that our biggest was a 12-pounder.  After seeing how well this bait worked, I made it my mission to find a good place near my house where I could catch them.  I finally found a nice little park with a creek that is loaded with them.  My kids and I have a lot of fun going there a couple of times a week to stock up our supply.  We attract a lot of attention from people in the park.  I've had more than one person try to convince me that I was catching trout.  The males do get quite big and colorful. 

I am lucky enough to have a little creek in my backyard.  A small waterfall with a little pool sits just beyond our back fence.  It's a perfect place to keep bait alive and healthy.  I had this great idea last year to build a minnow cage out of 2 x 2's and hardware cloth.  I pictured this perfectly symmetrical cage with a door on top.  It was going to work like a dream.  When I was done, the thing looked like a blind guy with one arm built it.  It was all lopsided and the door wouldn't close tight unless I put a big brick on top of it.  The cage was ugly, but it worked.    I dropped it in the pool, anchored it with some big rocks and filled it with bait.  That very night we got a big rain and it disappeared down stream.  I never saw it again.  My next idea was to drill holes in a couple of 5-gallon buckets, anchor them with rocks, and tie them to a tree.  This worked for me all of last year.  The whole time I was messing around with these ideas, my dad was telling me to just use one of those torpedo bait buckets.  I went to that at the very end of the year and it worked better than anything else.  It required no maintenance and I didn't have to wade into the creek to get my minnows.  Always listen to your dad.  

While I like keeping creek chubs on hand for those nights when I get to break away at the last minute, they haven't turned out to be my favorite bait.  Alive, they are active on the hook.  The problem is that they are part of that minnow group that gets their heads squished by channels.  When I'm fishing live bait, I'd rather use something that the channels won't touch.  As a cut bait, they seem to work fine in my stretch of the river.  I think that cut sucker out fishes them, though.  So, chubs are good in a pinch, but there is better stuff out there.

Most of the summer, I have found that you can't beat a nice medium sized bluegill for flatheads.  They are strong, they move like crazy on the hook, and the flatheads love them.  We have plenty of little parks with ponds in our area.  All of these places are good for quickly catching a night's worth of gills.  I catch an occasional gill in the river and these go immediately into the livewell for that night's fishing.  The same with rock bass.  They too are strong and struggle a lot on the hook.  I've caught a lot of flatties with live and cut rock bass.  It makes sense, since there are so many of them in the river and they tend to hang around in the same snags that hold the flatheads.

While I'm talking about live bait, I'll add bullheads.  They are supposed to be an excellent bait for flatties.  A lot of guys will say that they are the best.  I found a place near my house where I can catch them.  I usually do this after dark the night before I go to the river.   They are a lively bait, but they don't have my full confidence yet.  I've fished with them a half dozen times and have only caught one flattie with them.  I will say that when I was using a bullhead, the strike was viscious.  The flattie pounded him with an anger that actually made the rod jump in the holder.  Overall, I'll give them a B.  Around here, the efforts to catch them are a little more involved and the little buggers are difficult to handle.  I haven't been poked by their spines yet, but I've heard that it's pretty painful.  I'd take a bluegill or rock bass over a bullhead any day. 

While all of these baits can be great, my far and away favorite bait is a big piece of cut sucker.  I start most of my trips on the river stocking up on them.  It's usually not hard to do.  They are everywhere.  I seem to have my best luck in the flats between the launch and the bridge.  Two spinning rods leaning on the back bench of the boat with crawlers on a simple split shot and hook rig is all you need.  You can usually catch the necessary 5 fish in short order.  My dad discovered that you can up your catch rate by tying on a crappie rig.  On this rig, the sinker is on the bottom with two hooks snelled above off of the main line.  This rig increases the amount of bait being offered and it puts it right up off the bottom where they can easily find it. 

I keep the suckers alive until just before I'm ready to set up in my first spot.  I pull them out of the livewell, give them a good tap on the head with a small club, and start cutting.  I've found that if you don't give them that tap, they're much more likely to flip blood all over the place when you make your first cut.  I start by cutting the tail off and then I simply move up the fish, giving me 3 or 4 big round sections.  Next I remove the guts, cut off the fins, and remove the scales.  This leaves a nice big clean piece of bait.  It all goes into a tupperware container and into the cooler until I'm ready to use it.  I almost always fish one rod with cut sucker.  I generally load it onto a sharpened 7/0 or 10/0 Mustad 92671, making sure to put the hook point through the skin and leaving it exposed.  I've probably caught several hundred pounds of flatties with this bait alone.  If I know that I won't get a chance to catch more suckers before my next flattie trip, I may freeze some right in the tupperware container.  (My wife loves finding this in the freezer.)  This will catch fish, but obviously, fresh is better.

All of the baits above can be excellent for catfish.  My suggestion is that you try them all and always bring out a combination.  You'll start to get a feel for what works best and when.  Like me, you'll probably have one or two favorites.  It is good to get to that point because confidence in your bait is very important.  Sitting in your boat on a dark river is much more exciting if you fully believe that the fish want what your offering.  There's a big difference between thinking that maybe you'll catch a fish and knowing that it's just a matter of time.  I've developed a confidence in my bait and tactics that makes me believe that I am going to catch fish every time that I go out.  The only thing that I have to wonder about is if it's going to be a new personal record.