Catfish Wrastling!

by Jessica Black
(New Braunfels, TX)

My Mema in East Texas was worried about the fish in her pond dying because it was drying up due to the drought. She said that if we come we can keep all the fish we catch. Since she hand feeds them daily, the fish didn't care too much for any bait we were using.

So I decided it was time to lay down the pole, kick off my flip flops, and wade into the water. It wasn't too long after that my husband, our 8 and 12 year old daughters, and some friends of the family were in the water too.

It was very muddy and only knee deep at it's deepest point. We all started feeling around and next thing you know, the catfish were like torpedo's swimming around and into us.

At first, I think all of us were more scared of them then they were of us. But, that soon changed after the first fish was caught.

We were all yelling and running through the water and mud jumping on top of fish and grabbing them with our bare hands. There were so many we had to throw them up high on the bank and get the people that didn't want to get in the water to put them in buckets. It looked like we were mud wrestling catfish.

By the time we finished, we had caught 70 catfish, 2 bass and 1 perch. We filleted all the fish and divided them up.

Everyone had such a fun time. My kids said it was the best weekend ever! I'm sure that we all will remember and talk about it for a while. My Mema was happy that if the fish had to die at least they are going to a good cause. Ours will be eaten at my oldest daughters' fishing teams' fish fry next month.


Catfish Noodling

Noodled These Three Catfish The Other Day

by Jerrod Lutz
(Lexington, OK)

Caught the little one first. As I was walking back I seen this slab, so I went in and pulled the middle sized one out. Then I went back in there and pulled the big one out.