Y'all, I got the chance to get out yesterday and I took advantage of it. I didn't get to go last weekend so the itch was getting pretty bad. Well, I was out there at zero dark thirty as usual. Got a bucket full of bait with my brand new Fitec 11970. (No Cast Nets we injured in the making of this post). Headed out with a strip of orange on the horizon and a dead flat calm on the water.

Scanned a couple spots on the South end. Didn't see anything that really made me wanna stop and fish so I headed to the East side. Stopped on the creek channel outside the Power Plant. Starting to see a few fish in deeper water but still not enough to make you wanna throw on 'em.

Headed a little shallower and bingo, there they were. Dropped the trolling motor as it was still dead flat calm. Started dragging baits through a pretty deep stack of marks on the sonar. Action was slow for the amount of fish I was marking. Pulled that drift for about 2 1/2 hours and managed only 4 fish, all small. Good eaters/box fish but based on the sonar, I should have done better. I pulled up about 11:00 and decided to take one more swing at them. I just thought this was still where I wanted to be and if they turned on, I would be seeing a lot more action. Boy was I right!

So I reset at the bottom of the drift I had just run. Same starting place. I was still marking loads of fish on the bottom and you could see some of them mixing with clouds of bait which to me says they are actively feeding. So I start the drift again and about 20 minutes in, all H-E-Double Hockey Sticks breaks loose!

I get an average box fish kinda pull down on #1, I get up to see what he feels like and before I can get to it, #4 goes down pretty hard, drag coming off. I start fighting that fish and #3 goes down. I am thinking I got a rotten sidewinder down there tangling all my lines up but that's not the case. I get #4 in and start on #3 and just then #2 and #5 start to pull. 5 of my 6 rods are all going down at the same time. Never seen that happen before! It was like somebody flipped a switch and they all started chewin at the same time! It was awesome! I'm standing there on the rear deck talking to the dog tellin her I can't believe what's goin on here!

Well in the end I boated all 5 fish. The biggest was about 20 pounds, maybe high teens; then a 15 or so, a 10 and a couple box fish. Wow! I was amazed. They all hit aggressively. Not like earlier in the morning when they were just pecking at the baits. So I got one line left in the water, I got fish all over the deck and I am thinking if I don't get this cleaned up, the dog is gonna get a hook in her snout!

So, I get the mess picked up, all the fish go back in the water. Fresh bait on all the rods and get everything reset and I sit down to have a bottle of water and boom! #6, the only rod that didn't get bit in the frenzy goes down hard. I pick it up and can tell right away this is a better fish. We had a pretty good tussle. When she got to the boat, she started playing that yoyo game. I would get her up to the surface and she would see the landing net and dive. We did that 5 or 6 times. She was not interested in coming aboard! Finally I was able to get the net underneath her and get her in the boat. When I started lifting her into the boat, that's when I knew she was a pretty good fish.

I'm guessing she was around 40 pounds. As I went to weigh her I realized the batteries were dead in my scale. Take a look at the picture and let me know what you guys think on the weight.



In the first 45 minutes of the second pass over the same area I boated 7 fish. The total weight of those fish was around 120 pounds. With the fish I got on the first pass, total for the day was 11 fish and about 135 pounds. Now for the controversy...

I posted the day I had on the Lavon Lake Fishing Facebook Page. I like a lot of the guys and gals on that page and it seems to be a place where the we buck the trend of Facebook and we all pretty much get along okay. One of the comments asked about the number of rods I was using saying they thought you could only use 2 rods in Texas. Another comment pulled up a screen shot saying as much. I looked at it a little closer because I did not want to put bad information out there where people might use it and end up getting in trouble. I think the issue of the 2 rod limit in from 2 places. One is "community lakes" Which the law defines as within a municipality and less than 75 acres or part of a state park. The law also states that when Bass fishing you are limited to 2 rods. I have always gone with the 100 hook rule. See below... I am quite comfortable that there is no 2 rod limit when catfishing in Texas. I replied to the comments on my FB post with this attachment.



I welcome all comments about the rod limits as I want to make sure everyone understands I was not "cheating"... There has been enough of that going around lately.

Enough diarrhea of the keyboard for now...

God Bless & Tight Lines Y'all.

Great post and report! I will defer to more experienced anglers on the weight, but 40 lbs. seems about right to me.

100 hooks is the law
Not number of rods

City ponds have different laws

Wow, what a great day!!

As to number of rods….. imagine the craziness if you had 8 rods out as I know some catters do.

I am reflecting on your ‘second drift attempt’ post and realizing patience is so key to our sport. How easy to have upped and headed to another drift, and I know that’s exactly what I would have done. I would have missed out.

Great that the bite has heated up. It’s going to get better and better.

Nice work my friend!

I would say a safe 40, as I have seen the size of your hands! LOL

I think you are right about the 100 hook law. Only small ponds/specific areas have the 2 rod limit.

Keep on keeping on!

Ken

Great Read! Looks 40 - 45lbs bud

Tim,

I brought up that two rod limit issue a month or two ago, ran across that on the TPWD website and it left me concerned as you are I am sure. That 2 rod limit doesn't apply to us with where we fish or what we fish for, so rest easy man. I wish I remembered what thread that was on here, but I don't but it's all been beat back and forth and bottom line is we are not doing anything wrong. All that got me curious when I was figuring out the rod rack boom I plan to built, buying the material ahead of time, since seems like everything I want or need is out of inventory and you guys know.

Anyway we are good to use multiple (more than 2) rods and do so legally.

Now what I am curious to know is on direction of the first and second drifts, was one pulled one way and the other right opposite? Did you start the second drift from where the first one ended, and basically drift the opposite direction, basically back over the same area more or less, just going the opposite direction? I hope i am making sense with this question lol.

Reason I ask is I swear fish will be facing for the most part all one direction and it's into the direction of like the current flow, or how the wind will blow, they seem to me to just sit waiting, looking right into the direction from which bait is coming, for whatever reason.

That being said that second drift, if you basically started it but drifted it the opposite direction, I would say they were all looking and expecting the bait more that way. Just curious if this how you ran the two drifts, and if so I would figure that might very well be why the different results.

I know you get out on the lakes current flow if any, us humans cannot figure out the direction of flow or how it so ever slowly may swirl around, least for the most part. I would bet money the fish know exactly, you drift or pull, reel in or just however, your bait, be it live,cut or artificial pulled toward the direction the fish are looking, much better results, I think this goes for all fish species. We just need to figure out which way they have their nose looking. Least my thoughts about it...

Edit: Heck I didn't say anything about that freak'n fish you tacked up on here. Two things stand out in this pic, first being how big that dorsal fin that is sticking up!!! Look at the size of that thing lol, it's huge. The second thing I see, Tim is not holding it out away from him Toward the camera to make the picture look bigger... Tim's fish here is already big, I bet it's big enough so you couldn't hold it out toward the camera away from you to take that view either lol. That is one big nice looking cat right there. Look at that freaking size of dorsal fin on it lol.

I am with everybody else on the size, it's 40 plus and once it feeds the next few months, the extra length it looks to have, I bet it's going to quickly be in the 50 plus pound class. Only because Tim released it and allowing that to take place. Who knew lol... Really nice fish Tim, I am all green to my gills with envy also, you certainly have a talent at not only finding your bait and getting those on board, even if it cost you a net every so often, just trying to make a not so fun thing; a little easier to laugh at now as time moves on; but you persevered through the day and have quite the nice day to show for it, least if you ask me. You go dude!

Awesome post.

Rowdy, I tend to go where the wind goes. I ran that drift twice from the same direction. When I went back yesterday, I pulled through the same area from the opposite direction. I did so because the wind had come around to the North...There is zero current flow in Lavon right now. The lake is 6.05 feet low as of this morning. Bait has been pretty easy to find lately and I was seeing big clouds out in open water yesterday too.

Man have that bait quantity in your lake really makes for everything to build from. TPWD has our bait quantity listed really low in the lake. Finding big clouds of bait is really neat.

As for your drift directions, I just wondered if by chance you went each direction. Obviously there was something else that tripped their trigger on that second pass.

Another great post Tim! Absolutely right on the rods. I'm pretty sure you could legally fish with twenty rods although, if you had been, you would've had a serious problem! Keep up the good work brother!

Facebook, it ain’t that hard to say congrats and looked like a blast.