anyone have any methods / patterns that pick these guys up with any regularity?
I had an odd experience this weekend, where there were numerous moderate size cats appararently surface feeding in one of the heavily weeded waterways here in the houston vicinity.
I threw some of about everything at them (leaches, couple nymphs, couple wets, some foam bugs) and didn’t get so much as a look.
there was a light hatch coming up most of the morning…perhaps i should carry some parachute adams with me from now on…‘just in case’…didn’t have the trout box with me, so couldn’t ‘match the hatch’ too well.
A fellow fly fisher up in Orlando says he has caught them on a Crappie Candy and being similar to the Clouser, not surprising.
I have no experience with cats on the fly other than saltwater that I caught on a Dan Blanton Tropical Punch that is a crustacean imitation but also a Clouser type of fly.
Hard to beat a Wooly Bugger for channel catfish. I have caught them on other streamer type flies also, but channel cats like the Bugger just like trout, bass, and almost everything else that swims.
Larry Compton
I have a really nice 5 wt rod that goes freshwater fishing with me as a backup rod.
One day I was fishing this small pond in Alabama and I was fishing with a small purple foam fly. A little slurp and all of a sudden I had a fish on that was taking me into the backing, now being a salt water guy I would have never thought I would need much backing on a fresh water rig. But I am sure glad the guys on this board convienced me to put it on. Any way after a long and I admit tiring workout I bring to hand an 8 lb catfish (acording to the scale I had in the vest) I am sure glad they are hardy fish, it was like catching a small shark on my salt water stuff. Man was it fun. It also taught me a valuable lesson, catfish will hit anything. I have caught a bunch of cats on flies. Some on the wooly bugger and some on top water flies. Usually for me it is dark colors.
While they are not normal for me to catch I do catch enough of them to know that with light tackle they will give you a run for your money. I think Marlin might have something there with the rattle. I do remember catching one on a red worm while bass fishing a long time ago.
Have a great day
Harold
[This message has been edited by Harold Hattaway (edited 02 August 2005).]
BTW: a 32" cat doesn’t give you great bragging rights up here, even on a fly rod.
It also includes the fly I used, but we have much success with woolies with yellow maribou and hackle and a purple crystal chenille body. I always add bead chain eyes to my woolies for the Red.
I cant target catfish specifically, but I can catch them fairly regularly in a specific situation. I fish alot at night around docks that have lights, which attract baitfish. I almost regularly will catch at least 1 catfish everytime I go out to fish the docks, mainly on clousers. Seems that catfish are just as predatory as bass and other gamefish, and if you catch them in certain situations its easy to catch them. Then again, I have also found cats which are almost impossible to catch. I have often dangled flies in front of cats in clear water, and been rejected.
Now if you cast here I guarantee you’ll get a cat:
[This message has been edited by ccabal (edited 03 August 2005).]
BTW… has anyone ever fished for cats using a fly at a catfish farm? I’ve seen some catfish farms out in the country where you can pay to fish, and I have always kinda wondered if those pellet-eating cats would even consider taking in a fly?!?
I don’t target catfish but do catch quite a few in ponds here in southern Iowa on bead heads like pheasant tails. This summer I stumbled onto using a beadhead pink squirrel and the cats really seem to like it. I experminted a little and came up with something a little better. Use a 10 or 12 hook and tie on bead chain eyes then tie a pheasant tail only with a pink antron thorax. Tie the tail fibers off in front of the beads and leave a short collar of the butt ends. I fish it under a float on about a 7 foot leader with 4lb tippet. Most of the takes come as it is falling and so far has taken bluegills, crappies, bass, catfish, and a grass carp. Lots of fun!
We have them in the stock ponds at the deer lease. I’ve had them hit just about anything I’ve thrown in front of them from hoppers to wooly buggers. I was using a small clouser last time I was down there, saw a good size cat surface 10 ft in front of me. I promptly roll-cast right on top of him and started stripping. He lazily came up, took a look, sucked it down and swam away. I was so shocked I didn’t set the hook right away. He got about 15 ft before he realized something was up and took off like a shot. It was a small pond, but almost got me into my backing. I fought him for a while and got him right up to the shore - then he broke my tippet.
From sight, I would estimate him about 24" and fat. Good times on a 6 wt rod.
This weekend while guiding a canoe trip on the Minnesota River we saw about a million small frogs scooting up the muddy banks into the grass. I would have given anything for a fly rod and frog pattern. Hopefully I’ll get my chance this weekend. My guess is that there are some darned nice cats just waiting along the edge for those babies. JGW
Here is a strategy that works wonders on the right water: Fish nymph patterns deep in the fast water below low-head dams and along tidal rivers during low tide! Standard patterns such as the Early Brown Stone and American Pheasant Tail in sizes 8 through 12 rolled along the bottom will lure lots of whisker fish. Keep your stick high and hold on!
Not to toot my own horn too loudly, but you can read more about this “angle” in chapters 5 and 8 of my new book . . .
Philadelphia on the Fly: Tales of an Urban Angler
. . . just published by Frank Amato Publications and available starting in September.
To date I’ve caught maybe two dozen channel cats on fly tackle. The first fish I ever caught on a fly rod was a 6-lb. channel cat in a farm pond; it grabbed a #10 olive wooly worm (with red tail).
Since then most of my catfish luck has happened at a 200-acre lake when I was throwing a #10 flashback Hare’s Ear nymph trying to catch panfish.
About a month ago, I caught six very nice channels out of a farm pond using a black wooly bugger, size 8 I think. (8 or 10)
I’m not sure but what fly rodding for catfish might be more profitable if you let the sun get higher in the sky before you start fishing, and then retrieve your fly at a shallower depth. The eyesight of catfish isn’t said to be very good, so maybe they detect a fly easier when they happen to be swimming just below it (where your fly would be silhouetted against the light background of the sky). But that’s only speculation on my part.
We have done well catching catfish in the late evening and at night with DARK #10 woolybuggers, in Wa. state and New Mexico. We generally started out targeting bass of some sort and switched to the cats as they were so co-operative.
…lee s.
find a hole in your favorite catfish river and drop a clouser or wooly bugger on them. Likely the top 2 cat flies here. Just … not any clouser or WB though (although - they will eventually work).
Stephen … no fair on that one - you were skimmin them in the flooded shallows … (jkjkjk).
Cats are targeted up here on the Red R - as stephen noted - 32 inch channel cats are … too common to be noted. The river in this are has regs in place to ensure a viable and successful catfish fishery - danged it - it worked …
some have even successfully used shrimp patterns - even spey’d for them …
they are not all that hard to catch on a fly, easier than a big bull bluegill. I have noticed in the past that when my father-in-law was feeding his channel cats in his stock tank that they were selective and only took the pellets. Little bluegills were in there feeding with them and the cats ignored those morsels as well as any other presented food or patterns.
So maybe bringing along those Adams is not just a good idea but a necessary idea.
Darryl; a fish on the fly is a fish on the fly! True I was skimming the shallows for carp, but I think for the big 32" cat I cast out to one side of the wing dam or the other (if I recall correctly, it was in the hole on the upstream side of the long riprap wing dam in the outflow for the floodway).
Haven’t seen you out lately. When you hitting the area again?
I don’t think I’ve ever actually “flyfished for channel cats” but have caught quite a few [and walleye and brown trout, too] while fishing a #8 weighted black woolly bugger for smallies in a river an hour or so west of here over the last several years. I hooked most of them in low light conditions, but I fished mostly during that period - and caught smallies and walleyes and browns at that time too. So I guess this proves very little. I do know that until the first run was over I generally didn’t know if I had a brown or channel. Of course, as soon as the channel started rolling over and over there was no question. [The walleye were like hooking a bath towel compared to the other fish!]
I’m not sure how you’d go about targeting the channels in that river. Seems as the black woolly bugger catches 'em all.
. Take a look at Elmer’s 27 inch catfish (top left photo) caught on the Clouser Minnow (6th photo left to right from top).
(jkjkjk).