Finding And Catching Stream Catfish

Some anglers perceive the river sections they fish as isolated entities, encapsulated between shorelines on both sides, with the upper and lower ends bounded by limits on their willingness to travel. But to envision smaller streams as spots for channel catfish, you have to consider such streams as part of a larger, open-drainage network. Bigger rivers are pipelines fed by smaller tributaries, with tributaries born of even smaller tributaries, which originate in the joining of the smallest rivulets at the uppermost reaches of the capillary-like system of watercourses. Getting personal with potential waters also can take a fair amount of legwork and a sense of exploration, to discover an overlooked hotspot you might come to call your own.

The connectedness of streams and rivers and the channel catfishes’ remarkable ability to move long distances are what make some streams, often far separated from a larger river, good spots in which to find catfish. In-Fisherman Editor In Chief Doug Stange has written about his spring-through-summer catfish exploits in small Iowa streams, with some prime spots far up a watershed, 100 miles or more from a river the size most anglers would call good catfish water. One of his most productive streams was just 8 to 10 feet across and no deeper than 3 feet.

Small rivers and streams can support self-sustaining populations of channel catfish, if the right habitat exists for the fish’s year-round needs—food, cover, suitable flows, good water quality, and overwintering sites. Other streams provide a seasonal home to catfish from spring into summer. Catfish in some populations migrate long distances from larger rivers to smaller tributaries to reach ideal spawning habitat, which is often more available in tributaries than in larger rivers. Some catfish continue to hole up in smaller waters to feed until water levels drop too low in mid- to late summer, or until dropping water temperatures in fall send them downstream to more comfortable environments.

Stream Catfish Science

Greg Gelwicks, Interior Rivers and Streams Research Biologist for the Iowa Department of Natural Resources, has studied channel catfish in small rivers and streams extensively. He evaluated smaller flowing waters as habitats for several gamefish including channel catfish, which involved pinpointing movements using radiotelemetry. His findings on two small rivers in northeastern Iowa, the Turkey and the Wapsipinicon, reveal that habitat plays a key role in the seasonal use of these systems by channel catfish.

Turkey River: The Turkey River study focused on the lower reach of this system, between its confluence with the Mississippi and a dam 40 miles upstream. All of the catfish tagged in the Turkey moved 28 to 35 miles to the Mississippi each fall from September to November, where they stayed throughout the winter. Catfish returned to the smaller river each spring to spawn and remained in positions near their initial tagging locations throughout summer.

Spring movement into the Turkey coincided with warming periods. “Catfish returned…when water temperatures warmed from about the mid-40ºF to the 60ºF range,” Gelwicks says. “One year it warmed up early and catfish began moving up the Turkey in March. Then a cold snap hit and they moved back out to the Mississippi. In early to mid-April there was a sharp warming trend into the mid-50°F range, and catfish went up the Turkey again and stayed there.”

The Turkey River is an example of a stream in which catfishing can be good from spring through summer, but residence year-round is limited by the lack of overwintering habitat. “All depths recorded in the Turkey River study were less than 6 feet. A few deeper pools were found in the lowermost areas of the study reach, but the primary wintering location was the Mississippi River,” Gelwicks says.

Wapsipinicon River: Gelwicks also tracked catfish in the Wapsipinicon within a 15-mile stretch bounded by lowhead dams. These findings show that whether or not a stream section sustains channel catfish year-round—especially those isolated from a larger river—depends on the availability of wintering habitat. “In the Wapsi, all catfish overwintered in a single hole about 20 feet in depth. It’s an old sandpit that provides the only suitable wintering habitat in that stretch. In spring, catfish left that hole and spread throughout the 15-mile stretch,” he says. Gelwicks describes a good hole as being at least 10 feet deep, with enough current to keep the water oxygenated.

Gelwicks says that many small streams throughout Iowa hold substantial numbers of good-sized catfish in summer, an observation he based on electrofishing surveys. Many of these wadeable tributaries have maximum depths in pools of just a few feet. “Some streams, especially in the southern Iowa Drift Plain, contain a high density of catfish,” he says. “Where we see high densities, they’re typically slow-growing and run a bit smaller, likely because of competition.”

Gelwicks notes that, without barriers to fish passage, channel catfish in spring move up into smaller streams, where anglers can tangle with numbers of them through midsummer. “Typically by the end of July, flows decline, water levels start dropping, and the largest catfish vacate these areas,” he says. “These streams continue as good nursery areas for young-of-the-year catfish, because of good forage and lack of predators. We’ve sampled young-of-the-year flatheads in these streams, too, indicating that some adult flatheads use upper reaches of streams, as well.”

In Missouri, adult channel catfish have been found to inhabit smaller tributaries into early fall, suggesting that these environments provide suitable habitat throughout the growing season. While at the University of Missouri, Dr. Jason Vokoun sampled catfish with hoopnets in northeastern Missouri’s Grand River—a tributary of the Missouri River—as well as in two smaller tributaries of the Grand, Big Creek, and Yellow Creek rivers, with Yellow Creek about 15 feet wide and Big Creek about 30.

Adult channel catfish dispersed throughout the mainstem Grand and its tributaries in June. Samples showed adult catfish remaining in tributaries into October, after which they moved downstream again to overwinter in the mainstem Grand, primarily in scour holes that form around bridge support structures.