So, you want to catch a big flathead catfish. This is a laudable goal. These animals usually weigh more than 50 pounds. World-record-class fish top 120. While in the same family as the channel and blue catfish, these shovel-headed giants are very different in their habits and physical characteristics, placing them in the genus PylodictysTo which no other fish is related. Knowing how they differ from their relatives helps you properly fish for them, increasing your success rate.
Lesson 1: Think Like a Hunter
The first concept to understand is that Flatheads are bushwhackers. During the day, they hide around or in submerged logs, wood piles, fallen trees, rocks, and riverbank cavities, and wait to attack passing prey. Flatheads are not built for long chases like their streamlined cousins, preferring to avoid concealment and swallow unsuspecting prey. Flatheads roam very little, and when they do, they do so at night or when rain creates murky, high-water conditions, never venturing far from their preferred home quarters.
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Channel cats and blues sometimes perform similar tasks, but not as often as their larger brown cousins. Simply knowing these things can immediately improve your odds for flathead-catching success – focus your daytime fishing efforts on dense, shady near-shore cover such as blowdowns and drift piles, and continue fishing near such cover at night. It is not easy to remove fat flecks from these spots, but it can be done if you fish with heavy line on stiff tackle. Cast the bait under the float or on a tight line and remain alert.
Lesson 2: Learn about lonely people
Jumbo Flatheads are tasty animals. Unlike Blues and Channel cats, which often gather in loose schools, Flatheads are aggressive toward others of their own kind. As a result, a prime piece of flathead real estate rarely harbors more than one heavyweight adult, so you will probably find it futile to continue fishing the same spot of cover after catching a good fish.
Grab one here; Go there. This is another key to success.
Lesson 3: Don’t drop the dead
Many fishermen are under the impression that large flatheads will eat almost anything.
Flatheads are often scavengers and not finicky about their food. But this mainly applies to smaller individuals. Juvenile fish up to a few pounds will attack stink bait, chicken turds, worms, crawfish and other common catfish baits without hesitation.
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However, if you’re looking for heavyweight flatheads, these baits rarely work. Large individuals rarely eat invertebrates or ruminants for dinner. The meat-and-potatoes meal for a giant flathead is another fish – a live fish – so you should use that to lure them. Good choices include live sunfish, suckers, bullheads, carp, goldfish and chubs.
Lesson 4: Keep it clean
Flatheads can taste and smell certain compounds in the water in extremely small quantities. This can be good as it helps them focus on your bait. But be sure to avoid touching things like gasoline, sunscreen, tobacco, and insect repellent, which will put them off even the most dangerous baits.
Lesson 5: Feed the Bear
Today’s fishermen have learned that channel cats and blue cats feed actively throughout the winter, even when lakes and rivers are covered with ice. Not so big flatheads. When water temperatures drop below 45 degrees these fish go into a hibernation-like state, lying dormant on river and lake bottoms until the spring warms up again.
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However, to compensate for the lean ration period of winter, flatties prepare for hibernation in the spring to ease their waking hunger pangs and then gain weight like bears in the fall. Fish during these seasons for greater chances of hookups.
