by John Jefferson
The first fish I caught were two little perch that bit on small pieces of earthworms or bits of bread squeezed into little balls. We were at Grandmother Jefferson’s house on the Guadalupe River, west of Sequin. I was about eight or nine. My tackle was a bamboo pole with braided cotton line, a bottle cork-bobber, and small hook.
That was life’s second milestone. My first fight was earlier. But catching two fish – that was a turning point!
Later, I caught my first “big fish” at Uncle Josh Munro’s “camp on Beech Creek, west of Silsbee. The bobber jerked straight downward! I raised the pole and the fish resisted for maybe eight or 10 seconds. It was what East Texans called a “blue-channel catfish”, about nine inches long.
I ran all the way up the big hill to the house to show it to him.
During interviews with successful anglers, I’ve asked what the first fish was they caught. Most didn’t remember; some guessed it was a perch or catfish.
That’s a start. It doesn’t require much equipment, and almost all of Texas has plenty of fish in rivers, creeks, lakes, and ponds. Most are caught fishing from the bank.
Texas has three main catfish species: Channel cats (most prevalent), blue catfish (the largest: state record 121.5 pounds!), and flatheads, also called “yellow” or ”Opelousas” cats. Most weigh under five pounds. All three are fine eating!
Many are caught on rods and reels or poles, but some people employ trotlines, throw lines, limb lines or jug lines. Catfish eat insects, fish, crawfish, and are also taken on commercial catfish bait. If it’s the gooey kind, DON’T GET IT ON YOUR HANDS! Punch your hook in with a screwdriver and pull it out with the line. Cube type baits are easier to handle and can be stored in your freezer. I had a rank bucket of punch bait once that mysteriously disappeared. You could smell it through the garage door. Catfish loved it! Wives – not so much.
Sometimes catfish will mouth a lure. One July Fourth, we canoe-fished early morning. We were about to quit when I got a strike on a grub. I cast again and hooked it, but it didn’t feel like a bass. It began pulling us up into a long cove. Thinking it was a carp or a catfish, and knowing my line was old, I didn’t resist. It towed us about ¼ mile around a bend to the end of the cove, taking about ten minutes. Finally, it surfaced in shallow water. The yellow cat weighing about eight pounds was as exhausted as I was. Vicky stuck the net down, accidently knocking the lure out of its mouth. It lay there for several seconds, not sensing it was free. Had I realized that I would have jumped in after it. Slowly, it sank out of sight.
Holding my head in my hands, after a quiet pause, Vicky said, “We’ll stop at H.E.B. and I’ll get some fillets.”
JJ
