Too Deep. I juststarted fishing a new river(The Tres Palacios) and generally it is anywhere between 10-15 feet. However I found some holes that are 20 feet. My question is if I can find a hole that is 25, 30 35 etc..feet deep will these deeper pockets generally produce bigger cats. I know their's a lot of channel cat fishermen on here that do real good shallow, but I'm looking for some monsters!

Please someone correct me if I'm wrong but in rivers you can also focus on tree laydowns too, as well as deep holes. I anchor upstream and cast as close as I can.

fish cover, fish cover, fish cover.

Well i have fished the brazos river with throw lines and we was never more then 25 feet from the bank in 4 to 10 feet of water. Most of the catfish was caught at night. What i am saying if i was fishing in the day then i would look for deep holes in the rivers or creeks but at night i would fish closer to the bank. And for monsters fish with live bait like Perch.

Is that water running?
If so remember it for the summer. A running river does not get a thermocline as bad as a lake will.
Also, try those holes out next winter. It seems that ALL catfish that I catch in Dec-Feb will be in 30'-45' That may just be the lakes that I fish, but that is the pattern I noticed.

I will agree with hoggwild, COVER is what I look for. But a steep bank, or a good channel is a type of "cover" to me

Thanks for all the replies...I try to always fish close to log jams, submerged trees, and bends in river but my question still is....Will a monster blue or yella prefer a patch of water that is 35 feet deep that has adequate cover as opposed to one that is 20 or 15 with the same cover.

Fish Hauler...It's interesting that you mention the thermocline. The river does in fact have running water but this is not due to dams or springs but the flowing of the tide. The river is about 7 miles from the mouth of Palcios bay so the water is brackish. This past summer we had a number of fish die on our lines. I thought it might be too much salt in the water because of the drought. I know now from this board that this was most likely caused by the Thermocline. Great info and responses

Thanks,

Andy

Sorry not trying to be a pest but any other thoughts.....

i do not know ANYTHING about brackish water catfish. I am out of my element now.
But if strickly fresh water, I would remember that deep spot for the winter, especially if there are good blues there.
You can use it as well in summer, well not the deepest part but look for flats around the channel that are under 20' deep. The thermocline on the lakes I fish can be as shallow as 10' but I have seen that only a few times. Shallowest I found it last year was 16' and that was in late summer. Yr before that it was 17', When this happens I look for water with structure (steep channel, rocks, boulders, fallen trees, standing timber, or SHADE) that is around this max depth. If thermocline is 17' I will fish in water that is no shallower than 12' during summer days. I will only fish THAT shallow if there is shade and structure. At night I will fish where ever the bait is going. If that is for flatheads, I will look for either where the perch, bass, or white bass are hanging out. Or I will got to my channel cat areas and fish the "outskirts" with live bullheads. This is pretty productive since I do alot of my channel cat fishing in heavy timber.
If that is blue cat water, cut bait (personal pref.) and I would drift thru the water that is the right depth.