any advice on trot lining this time of year, water depth, temp, bait, stucture ie: mud, rock.....

thanks in advance

Find some brush, trees in about 10-12'. Run the line bout 8' down. Bait with Bull Liver, if you have a slaughter house near. Have them call you when they slaughter a bull and buy the whole liver. Its tougher and will stay on hooks better. Or, just plain beef liver. Also, catch some perch, cut them up and bait with.
This should get you going on some Channelcats. If blues are in lake also, bait with fresh cut shad.
Good-Luck

Find some good cover, get you some big live bait and catch some big yellas.

AS said above , big ol bluegills and some good cover in about 6-12 ft along a ol drop off !

It all depends on where you are planning to fish, whether it is a lake or river. If it is a lake, then i would set as they are suggesting above, though any line that i set out that is gonna be left over night will be baited with live bait. If it is a river, then i would set it in waist to knee deep water in areas either in a bend in the river or directly after a set of rapids, as in the downstream side or where ever you can find a feeder creak that flows into the river. Most of these areas will be filled with baitfish that the cats will be coming for. At this time of the year, my experience has been that they are coming into shallows to feed. A few weeks back, the creek that i fish was having its bluegill spawn and if you can find where these areas are, usually in slow moving water with a sandy bottom, you can clean up in the water just a small distance away. As with the line being set in a lake, use live bait. On this, you will catch anything from small eater size to trophies. A catfish is a very ambitious fish, in that it will eat anything it thinks is small enough to fit into its mouth. Therefore, just because you think a bait is a bit big, does not mean that it will not be hit and hit hard. How you hook the bait is also important. If it is in slow moving or still water, it is ok to hook the fish right behind the dorsal fin. But if the water is flowing, then i would suggest hooking the bait through a spot in their eye socket. If you do it right, you can put them on a hook this way and not even damage the eyeball of the fish, just be careful to go through the socket, not right above, or you will put the hook through the brain and have dead bait. By hooking through the eye socket in moving water, you are reducing the possibility that the bait will pull off the hook or rip the hook out fighting the line, hook and current. Hope some of this is helpful!!!

Great stuff guys, thanks for the help!!!! Gonna be fishing a lake , lake ivie next weekend with the family

Get with Mbavo here. He has those big Channels dialed in on Ivie.
I been hitting Thomas; and out of the "loop" on the water down there.
Once again; good-luck and let us know how you did.

How is thomas now days?

Thomas has been low. Fish are still in there. Been doing well on the North-Shore, along the dam at night. Shad. Floated under a cork into the wind.