Y'all, I know it's been talked about on here before, but at the risk of beating a dead horse, here goes...

June is typically our worst month for blue cat fishing here in North Texas. This is because the blues are getting on the nest and when they are makin babies, they don't eat much. Now, that said they don't have a calendar. They do what they do based on the amount of daylight when the sun is up longer and most importantly, they do what they do based on water temperature. It is generally accepted that Flatheads spawn between 66 and 75 degrees and Blues and Channels at 70 to 84 degrees. We know that they spawn in a range of temperatures and time because they do not all do it at the same time. There is no alarm that goes off for all of them to go on the nest.

That last part is the good news. It means we can still have good days fishing for the whiskered beasts through the spawning period. We all know the "trophy season" is winter. The big fish are concentrated in deep water in the reservoirs here in North Texas and by most standards are "easier" to catch. As our good friend El Gato Azul says, this time of year, we are usually relegated to numbers of eaters rather than 30, 40, 50 pounders and up. BUT! There are no absolutes in Catfishing! Those big beasts can still be caught. The statistical odds are lower, true. But they are still out there and they still gotta eat.

So what is a catfisherman to do? We fish, that's what we do. We keep fishing. We might change tactics, we might down size our terminal tackle and target those smaller fish. We might target the shallow water fish, but speaking for myself, I will still fish for the big girls when I can. I will scan the lake, and I will fish the biomass. I WILL NOT give up! I will not say, I'm probably not going to catch anything so I'll just skip the last half of May, all of June and the first part of July. Not no way, not no how!

As for this year, I think things are starting and should finish early. I have seen water temperatures above 80 degrees this week. I think the spawn may be as much as 2 or 3 weeks early this year. All of the above notwithstanding, I'm gonna fish. I'm gonna catfish. I'm gonna fish during the day and I'm gonna fish at night. I'm gonna fish in the rain and in the sun, I'm gonna fish when it's windy and when it's calm. I'm gonna fish, period.

Richard Gene is right. Go fishin when ya can, cuz it's goooooood fer ya. And you can't catch 'em from the couch! Just go. God Bless and Tight Lines y'all...

Sound words from My HERO!

Fishing - catching - or just floating around a little sometimes... YES - it is good for me and needed on a regular basis!

Too many other things in this world of ours today that make us wonder what to do next...

Tight lines ya'll - stay safe.

Ken

Starting about this time every year we stop catching big fish, for the most part on our boat, but we still catch a ton of blues up to 10 lbs during the spawn. I call June the pleasure drifting month because the weather is nice and the catfishing is easy. Why is it easy? My trips consist of me throwing my deep net a few times on structure and bait is super easy without having to search. Then we head out under the sandbass which are very predictable in June and crack a beer and catch fish. The Bluecat bite is usually steady from sun up until the sandbass are done with their morning session. Bathingsuits + Beer + Bluecats = pleasure drifting

Chris, there is something about being barefoot on the deck and taking in the warm (or hot) summer breezes. Love it brother.

Good read!

Thank you Tim for hittin me between the eyes with that! Just a few days ago, I was pondering the whole trophy catfishing question when it comes to this time of year and I had pretty much relegated myself to simply passing on the whisker fishin this summer and planning my attack for September. I would've gone out a few times, sure. But I was really planning on putting it on the back burner until fall. Then I read this and I was dumbfounded by my own mind games. Not even trying to go after these fish would be like going to my favorite steakhouse and just saying, "no, I'll just have the salad"! What the heck was I thinking!!

New goal for this summer....figure out the flathead bite and find some kind of pattern for the summer bluecat bite.Those big fish don't get big by not eating for three months! They just have a hidey hole somewhere that I haven't figured out.

So, Catfish Tim, El Gato, and the voiceless fishermen and women who exist in quiet anonymity here....we need your input!! I know you guys have some knowledge about these big flatties that we all read about but seldom get to experience for ourselves. I have very little experience with them but plan on learning. I think they would fill the gap for the summer because, if I'm right, I believe they are an apex predator that mostly hunt at night.....which is perfect for the summer heat!

Hope everyone is filling their freezers right now with the shallow water bite being on fire. Get you some of the best tasting fillets right now so those biguns can keep swimmin and making dreams come true!

I agree about the spawn as it does mess up the bite but, with one exception here fellows! When we get the big rains with plenty run off that works its way into our creeks, rivers and lakes. You work your way back into the areas where the fresh rain is running into the area and you will find feeding cats.

When it comes to cat fishing for me anyway, this is one of my favorite ways to catch them. I work my way up the lake into the muddy water running in and I anchor out in the big middle of a mud flat pool and then fan cast my baits. They will be there and feeding hard and heavy.

We got about a half inch of rain on our lake last night, and that is not what it takes to get this big feeding started. The weather guys are saying we are slated for wide spread heavy rain this weekend... yea!!!! About darn time is all I can say about that.

You can bet Rowdy is ready and will be up in all that muddy nasty water fishing his butt off for those whispered critters... I zoomed in a shot this pic of the turkey Vulture yesterday also, kind of resembled me I guess as I too was out eye balling the area I am going to fish once we get some rain here.

Rowdy, I haven't seen water that dead flat calm in forever! Great pic!

It is a great change of pace and a a much more stress free way of fishing that’s for sure Tim!

Geno, I have a fair amount of experience chasing flatheads from my younger days of doing it. That is how I cut my teeth on big catfish. They run hard and are much more active pre-spawn as they search for food and leave their normal haunts. They are strictly ambush predators 90% of the time. When I say ambush I mean they don’t move more than 3 ft 23 hours out of the day. You can still catch them when they are in this state but you must place your bait in that 3 ft zone to get them to bite and often that zone is even smaller. So where are these areas they lay in? Under large rocks, under the end of the slab at the boat ramp, under the crown of a rootball on the bank, under a fallen tree, log jams, on a submerged piece of standing timber. They like shady dark places to hide. These are the areas they lay and wait for prey to come to them. Often times they won’t even move when they attack. They just suck water into their mouth and the prey fish gets sucked in. There’re is about 1 hour per day where they leave that ambush spot and go on a roam feed cycle but this only occurs ever 2-3 days per fish. The guys that I know that are really good at catching them do it during the daytime when they are laying in wait. They know where the fish orient and they are able to place baits in their face.

Now as far as big blues go, I’ve been chasing these dang fish every week my whole life. They pretty much don’t eat during the spawn. Occasionally you can catch a good one but it is very rare. When they come off their nests, which is usually sometime in July, there is about a 2 week window that they are absolutely starving and we catch them in the morning, but they pretty much go nocturnal in our hot Texas heat. We have pretty good luck catching them right at dark starting in August and it’s pretty much a night game until October.

Here are our best August fish from the last 2 yrs. If you can figure out a way to catch big fish consistently during the spawn then let me know. I will gladly pay you $500 to teach me!!

My TM is in the shop, so anchoring or drifting below G Dam is my only choice for now. Raw chicken or smaller cut bait like skipjack or bluegill will put the eaters in the live well.

Tim, if that water hadn't been that calm, I would have never shot the pic of that ol'e turkey Vulture either lol. I had to use all the zoom my phone had to shot him. It's kind of grainy but you can see his ugly mug. You guys find a place the vultures hangout or roost by the water or in a tree out over the water, good bet the cats are there too. Least over the years it has been the case for me. Ol'e yellow likes to hang around with these ol'e buzzards.

I'll throw in a little here. Different lakes have different traits. In the last month, I've caught flatties in 2-4 fow and 50 fow. Blues up to 30lbs have been in 50+ fow within the last 3 weeks where I have been fishing, as well as the eaters. The flatties in deeper water have fed in the middle of the day. The others on the other end of the lake roam in the early evening, but shut it down tight after about 11pm until again around 4-6am. I can go out and expect 3-5 take downs with flatties before 10pm. If you don't hook up with one of those take downs, it's like not going to get bit again for a while. My point.... there isn't one. Fishing is a lot of trial and error. You can't error, if you don't trial.

Great info everyone. The more I here about flatheads the more intrigued I get. They're just a mysterious anomaly to me. They seem to be the most elusive predator in fresh water. The few that I've caught have all been memorable. Each one has been such a different takedown. A slow steady pull that just about snaps the rod. If I'd had really cheap gear that might have happened on a few of them. I caught one while bass fishing one time and almost lost the rod because I wasn't expecting that kind of pull.

Thanks for the info and thanks again Tim for making us all ponder and yearn to get back out on the water! I don't know what happened to me though, I used to never even hesitate to want to get back out there. I can't say that it's because I'm getting old. I mean, there's some of you guys here that are MUCH older than I am and y'all don't seem to have that problem!

Oh, and TRH, I love the last two sentences. It's a great way to say you're not gonna catch anything if you don't get out there and fish!

June ,July and August is for flatheads and hybrids in my little part of West Texas heaven.

Is your west Texas heaven a river or lake?