My niece has a small pond that's about 7-10K sq ft and loaded with channel cats in a good range of sizes. Pond is probably 10-12 ft in the deep end. She feeds them regularly with floating catfish feed. When I fish it I usually get bit pretty quick a couple of times, then I blank out. I'm using prepared baits; cheese, minnow flavor, liver flavor, real chicken livers, my own cotton seed meal dough bait. These have all proven effective, but I only get about 2-3 bites. Are these fish sensing the struggle of being caught and staying away? I can't figure it out. If anybody has any ideas, I'm ready to listen.

Tell your sister not to feed them for a couple days then fish it.

+1!!

I say use a slip cork rig and don't set the rod down. As soon as they start to mess with the hook set it. I had this same problem on the stocked ponds here on fort hood. I would use a slip weight and tight line it. I would get all the bites in the world but never got hooked. The problem was that I couldn't tell when they were messing with the bait and due to the weeds, the bait was some times down in the weeds due to the weight, making it hard for them to get at it and making for light bites. I switched it up to this set up and started hooking up.

CatfishAddict is right on, i have a catfish pond and feed on a daily basis floating catfish feed, i would get 2 or 3 cats on tight line and that would be it for the day, switch to slip cork rig and now i catch as many as i kneed for the fish fry, i use homemade punch bait and cut carp, when you see the cork go down just start reeling the fish will hook it self, stop feeding a day or two like BigPoppa said, it will help. Good luck john525 and let us know how it goes for you.

Well, it was a total blank yesterday. I was laying it on the bottom with all the previously mentioned baits including raw shrimp. I was out between 8 and noon. One shrimp was eaten off, homemade dough bait not touched, and Mr. whiskers cheese and CJ's minnow stink bait never got touched. Very disappointing, because I've seen lots of cats cruising that pond and have caught cats as big as 6lbs. During my trip yesterday I saw absolutely no sign of any catfish.
The niece has been out of town and they haven't been fed for nearly a week, but here's an interesting twist. TPWD came out and confirmed, during the summer, that she had a transient alligator visit her pond a took up residence for a while. She was told, judging by the tracks and rubs on the ground it was about a six footer.Do you think a gator would clean out a pond like that? Kinda weird.

john525 try some cut carp,cut it about 1/2 inch cubes and use a 3 inch peg float about 16 inches above your hook, dont use a sinker, i cant help you on the gator since we dont have them around here, good luck

Throw out a few range cube and fish with bacon on a small circle hook.

What is the water tempature? And i would say keep an eye on the barametric pressure. As I have have learned recently (thanks minowkiller! ) the higher pressure causes the fish to have a full feeling due to their swim blatter. Lower the pressure, the more hungry they feel due to how their swim blatter reacts to the pressure. I would think that in smaller body's of water, these factors would play a larger role in if they are moving and feeding or being fat and lazy. Try to find out if there is any structure in the pod; brush or even sunk trees. Is it shaped like a bow with no features, or is there a hump down there? If there is, try to put your bait close to these areas. Also, what other fish/crustaceans are in this body of water. This will give you an idea of other forage or even competition for food. I suspect if you had a shrimp eaten off, there are perch/sun fish in there and/or crawfish. These thing can tell tell you about the aquatic ecosystem; over population of mudbugs/perch would be a logical explanation for them not hitting your bait even after not being fed for a week; they are just feeding on the easy pickings of these other food sources. When fishing the stock tanks/ponds on fort hood I've had to learn all of this the hard way. My tried and true go to is a circle hook spelled to some 20 lb mono leader (12 inches long). This is tied to a swivel and the swivel is tied to a 30lb braided main line. I use a medium action 6.5 feet or longer rod. For bait I use chicken gizzards/hearts and sliced beef liver cut in to bait sized strips/chunks all mixed together in 1 container. Use a cork thay can easily be pulled under, but can stay buoyant baited. If the top of the weeds are 36 inches under the surface of the water, I would put the cork no deeper than 28-30 inches above the hook. The weeds here are so thick here that the fish ether can get in to them, or its to difficult for them so they dont. Because of this, you have to think of the top of the weeds as the bottom of the pond. Don't use any weight, or the absolute minimum possible. This will allow you to see when a fish is nibbling. When the cork shows the bait is being investigated, Reel down on em. Or, if the cork disappears reel down on him and lift the rod tip up and he will hook him self.

i had the same problem you are having out of my buddy pond in Ga first you have to go down at feeding time dont feed the fish when fishing they get use to getting easy food and get the feeding times down. like said before if you can dont feed them for a few days. pond fish seem to me a bit different lake fish. i would catch one or 2 then have to move to the other side of the pond for some reason i was only ever able to catch a few at a time in one spot then i would have to move spots

I think the pond is only about 10 ft at the deep end and it rises gradually to the other end. When I was fishing Monday, the water level was down about 3 ft and I could see a lot of the bottom. It's a fairly clear to stained body of water. Not a lot of cover or relief on the bottom. There is vegetation in there, and I'll try a slip bobber next time. Catching fish is usually no problem if all you want is a couple fish. I could try to move to the other side, but you can cast all the way across and into the pasture. Thanks for the responses guys. I guess I'll just keep wettin' a line when I go down there and see who bites. If you have any other thoughts leave 'em on here. I'll check back on this post for further comments.

fish have good eye sight and if they can see movement from the bank they my not strike but if they are use to being feed and being feed at a regular time it makes it a lot harder at least in my experience good luck

John - I grew up in Florida fishing a 1 acre farm pond that we had at the time. The pond was loaded with trophy bass and had an excellent population of channel catfish. Live shiners in this pond were the best bait by far for both species. I am not sure why but live minnows/shiners has to be the most underrated bait for channel catfish on this forum. I have caught channel catfish on live minnows/shiners in Florida, Georgia, Mississippi and now Texas quite regularly. Try a live minnow on a small live bait hook with no weight or just 1 split shot underneath a bobber that is just large enough to stay afloat with the minnow. This allows the catfish to not face much resistance when it takes the bait and not get spooked when he starts taking the bait. I would start out fishing 3 feet deep or so and adjust the bobber 6 inches down as needed. Channel catfish in ponds move around all over the place - back in Florida the pond was about 10 feet deep and I would often see them up against the bank in a foot of water or so. Try the minnow rig and post the pictures of your catch - it will definitely work!

Thanks OleMiss. I should have thought about minnows. I usually get 2-3 cats when I'm crappie fishing with them. I appreciate the input. If I do well ya'll will definitely see some pics.

YOu can alwasy try some of Chemdawgs catfish bait that he makes. I fisked a pond this past weekend and hauled in ssome really nice cats over 18inches. The fish usually bite on worm & hot dogs, but they wouldnt hit anything this past weekend.