72lb and 48lb Flathead in Pond

Just thought I'd share this, because I just ran across the old newspaper clipping.

This is me with my grandpa with "our" spotted cat. Caught it in a 2 1/2 acre pond, it had a whole lot of fat. My brother "helped" him catch a 48 lb one a few years before this one.

He caught them on a Clorox jug, about 6 feet of those saltwater steel leaders, a 2" maybe 2 1/2" tall treble hook, a huge bluegill, and a large bobber halfway down the leader.

That was about 1989.

Awesome picture!!! Cherish those memories. I have a picture of me and my brother with a 6 lb channel cat we caught out of a creek on family property. We were very small, the fish is hanging from a broom stick you can see in the picture, what you cant tell is my grandfather was holding the broom stick out for the picture, I sure wish he was in the pic too!

Awesome Picture man!!!

Nice fish!!

Pond wasn't always just 2.5 acres or we're these fish put in there after being big? Just asking because in a 2.5 acre pond that fish should have been able to eat everything in there in a year or two. Not knocking y'all or the fish.

We have the whole thing on a VHS tape!


I need to get it transferred to DVD.

Good question: Here's the deal......my grandfather and his brother put 5 flats into the pond a number of years earlier. I don't know exactly how many years. I know that 3 of them were caught before they were "too" big, as in 25lbs or less. The 4th one was caught at 48lbs in 1987. The 5th one was this one in 1989. # 4 and 5 were caught on a jug, set with a bluegill with the large flats in mind. I think that was done so that my brother and I would have this story to tell, that's how my grandfather was.


One of the main reasons for putting the flats to begin with was to control the yellow bullheads. He always said there were lots and lots of "mudcats" in the pond, so he and his brother caught the flats in the bayou nearby and put them in the pond.

My grandfather kept the pond stocked, and stocked well. He'd raise fingerling channel cats by the hundreds in floating 4'x4'x4' pvc coated wire cages, using a dipnet to scoop up some to fry or to release them into the pond. Our pond always had lots of fish, he'd feed the catfish, and he'd let anyone bring their kids to come fishing. There were/are 3 water oaks along the pond, and I remember a truck being parked under each one on Saturdays with dad's bringing their kids to catch catfish. Paw paw would let them keep 15-30 catfish each, depending on the person I guess. He wouldn't let them keep bass though, those were for me and my dad. Many of kids caught their first fish here.

The fishing was great, there were a lot of nice bass caught and mounted by family members. Nothing huge at the time, that was before the big "Florida Bass" surge, but I've taken several 8s myself.

My Paw Paw has been gone for 18 years now, and the pond has since gone downhill, due to a leak in the levee because of a tree root. The water level is much lower now, and all of the tires and stumps that catfish used to spawn in are dry. Catfish numbers now are next to nothing, but the bass and bream are doing well. I'm in the process of repairing the levee to return it to its former glory.

Awesome man, sounds like he knew what he was doing. I wonder how many bullhead that sucker ate in his life...

That's the only flat I've ever "caught". It's on my bucket list, I want to catch one bad. I just need to find the time to go after them with a serious effort. Time's hard to come by for me these days, if I could put time on a credit card, I'd be one broke son of a gun, but I'd sure be having fun!

Cool pic I bet that was an exciting day

Love too hook into a stud like that!

Awesome post. Thanks for sharing.

Great story and pic. Great fish.

You have a very great grandpa.

Anyone ever heard of using a bobber with a jug? I was young, but I remember him talkin about it. He had been using a single leader that was 2-3 feet long, but couldn't get the fish. So....he doubled the length of the leader to add a bobber half way to keep the gill at the same depth but have slack.

He said that the bobber (large round one) was big enough that the bluegill could pull it under, but wouldn't keep it under, so it pretty much kept it suspended at 2 feet or so.

The reason he used it is so that when the spot grabbed it, it wouldn't feel the Clorox jug, itd just be easy pulling, so the fish fully committed and eventually the slack ran out, and the party started.

Just wondering if anyone has done this or heard of it before. May not have even been what made it work that day. Maybe the spot was just hungry lol

Great story. People would be amazed at atcually how many fish
a small pond can hold if it's managed properly.