Carp fishermen use deer corn all the time to bait a hole--and they catch a lot of catfish that way, too.
A popular technique involves soaking the deer corn in a bucket of water for a day or two, then boiling it for 30 to 60 minutes. You can add flavors to the water after it stops boiling, but I'm not sure what is good for catfish--plain deer corn might work just as well.
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"The fishermen will groan and lament, all who cast hooks into the Nile." Isaiah 19:8a