In almost 30 years of fishing for and writing about catfish, I’ve only seen a handful of truly unique things,” said In-Fisherman Editor In Chief Doug Stange. We were discussing advancements in catfish angling, particularly those that go beyond traditional tactics and their refinements. From Stange’s viewpoint, in that handful the methods covered in this article stand out.

We were introduced to Marlin Ormseth through ice-fishing pioneer and longtime In-Fisherman friend Dave Genz. Genz, a friend of Ormseth’s, fished with him for catfish and recognized his methods as unique. A former bait-and-tackle-store owner from Sioux Falls, South Dakota, Ormseth is an accomplished multispecies angler for walleye, pike, perch, and other species. Now living in Bonneau, South Carolina—Santee-Cooper Country—he’s mostly on the water after big blue cats.

Ormseth likely gets his share of doubletakes on Santee as he’s pulling planer-board setups for catfish—boards are just something you don’t see fishermen using down there that often—or if ever, for catfish anywhere. Planer boards are in-line devices used to guide trolled lines and baits off to the sides of the boat, rather than being pulled directly behind in the boat’s path. Another variation on Ormseth’s theme—fishing on the surface—is likely to turn even more heads.

Many fishing developments occur when anglers adapt tactics from one species to another, often across geographic regions. “Ideas like Ormseth’s usually come from great multispecies anglers,” Stange says, “and multispecies angling is what In-Fisherman is all about.”

Since the mid-1990s, catfish have been regularly covered in In-Fisherman, in Catfish In-Sider, and in the annual Catfish In-Sider Guide, the last two being the first catfish-only magazines. “Until we started covering catfish regularly about two decades ago, catfishing was done by a large group that fished pretty much exclusively for catfish,” he says. “There have been good ideas, mostly refinements of conventional methods. Today, more multispecies anglers are getting into catfishing and adapting their tactics to catfishing situations. They bring a multifaceted perspective, so they’re better able to develop new presentation wrinkles to consistently catch more fish.”

Take Ormseth’s catfish methods, largely adapted from those he uses for walleyes. “There are many similarities between walleye fishing and catfishing, although there are obvious differences, too,” Stange says. “But the fundamental mechanics of delivering baits are very much the same. Planer boards seem like a natural fit for catfish. It just took a guy who’s part of the larger angling world to make it work.”

Ormseth’s Spread

Ormseth didn’t start fishing for catfish right away after moving south. At first, stripers were his favorite species on Santee, until their numbers dropped and fishing for them got tough. He turned to catfish as the next challenge. He’s now guiding on Santee as a licensed captain. On an average good trip, he catches about 100 pounds of blues—330 pounds, his best day. His biggest fish is 63 pounds.

Drifting is a popular way to catch catfish on Santee and across North America. Many anglers drift-fish with the wind in pontoon boats. Some anchor and fish stationary baits. Ormseth tried these methods, but his experiences with walleye fishing told him there might be a more effective way to present baits, one with more boat control.

He’s often fishing in water as shallow as 3 feet, sometimes pulling baits on the surface when conditions are right. Before getting to that nifty setup, it helps to understand the reasoning behind his planer-board strategy overall. “Being quiet, stealthy, is what makes this system work,” he says. “One night while I was pulling baits shallow, I ran into a big alligator. It shook the whole boat before bolting away.”

Thinking like a walleye angler after catfish, Ormseth knows that to be stealthy in shallow water, he can use boards to quietly present baits off to the side so as not to spook shallow catfish. And with some lines set off to the sides and some set behind, a lot of territory is covered. Good boat control helps running boards, so he combines the use of a trolling motor and driftsocks to achieve that control.

“I typically fish with four rods, two planer board rods, and two in a narrower path behind the boat,” he says. “I use 8-foot Berkley Glowstik medium-heavy casting rods and Okuma 30 DX linecounter reels. They’re tough reels and they cast well to save time getting baits to catfish faster.

“On the two outside rods, I use Church Tackle TX-12 Mini Planer boards—the smaller boards work well and have less water resistance. I let out about 100 feet of line before clipping on the board, followed by another 110 to 130 feet of line before engaging the reel and setting it in a rod holder.” One board rod is set on the port side, the other starboard.

On each of the inside rods, he uses a Herbie release float, an invention he devised for fishing walleyes on Lake Erie. The Herbie’s equipped with a salmon release for holding the line. “I let out about 100 feet of line before attaching the Herbie, followed by 100 more feet on one rod and 150 more on the other, so baits are set back different distances,” he says. “These also go into rod holders. I set drags on light for all the reels because of the impact of hard hits on near-zero stretch braid. To start my setup, I move downwind with the trolling motor until all the lines are set with boards and Herbies.”

Ormseth’s reels are spooled with 80-pound-test monofilament backing, followed by 80-pound Stren Super Braid. Then to the 80-pound braid, he loop-to-loop connects about 80 feet of 60-pound Super Braid, and on the end of that he ties a loop for attaching to the loop on his leader.

Leader line is 40-pound Berkley Big Game mono. One end he connects to the braided mainline. He slides a float on the leader, pegging it in place, and attaches a swivel to the terminal end with a loop knot, followed by a final section of mono leader about 10 to 12 inches long sporting an 8/0 Gamakatsu Circle Hook. Having the swivel close to the hook and below the float eliminates line twist resulting from the bait swirling as it’s trolled.

Ormseth makes his own breakaway weights and attaches one to the loop on the braid above the leader, using a cross-lock snap. Ormseth: “I cut a 3- to 4-inch section of shoestring, insert #4 buckshot, and seal the ends. Fifteen shot make about an ounce. I use up to 25 shot for deeper fishing. If the weight snags, I pull until the snap opens, losing the weight, but I usually save the rig. If the hook snags, the rig often breaks nearer the hook, so I can salvage the rest of the rig. I use a section of broom handle, wrap the line around it 8 or 10 times, and pull hard until it breaks. When the rig’s trolled, the weight should drag over bottom with the float keeping the bait up about a foot or so.” He baits hooks with 1- to 2-inch skin-on chunks of mullet, shad, or shiners, with mullet his favorite.

Mechanics and Location

Ormseth uses a 70-pound-thrust Minn Kota AutoPilot trolling motor for pulling rigs. “This motor is the heart of my system,” he says. “I set it and forget it. I also use drift bags to help control my speed. If the wind’s calm, I don’t use any; but if it’s windy, I use up to four drift bags to get the speed right. I like 0.6 to 0.8 mph in warmer water and 0.3 to 0.5 mph during the colder seasons. Once you get the speed right, just sit back and have a cup of coffee.

“I always pull with the AutoPilot against the bags to get the propelling motion that the planer boards need to move them outward. In heavy wind, the boards don’t go out quite as far. I often troll with the wind, unless it’s light, then I troll into the wind. No wind is perfect for this system for following breaklines and structure. The key is getting the boards out at the right speed,” he says.

Although Ormseth fishes during the day on occasion, he mostly fishes at night, especially in summer because it gets uncomfortably hot during the day. “To see the boards and Herbies at night, I attach an inexpensive chemical glowstick. I drill holes at the top of the boards and Herbies and insert the glowsticks, then attach a 1-ounce weight to the bottom side of the Herbies so the glowstick stands upright. I can see every move the lights make with snags or bites. When a big blue pulls it down, it only takes a second for the light to disappear. Grab that rod and hold on, and you’re in heaven at Santee-Cooper.”

Working his board spread primarily on Lake Moultrie, the depths and locations he fishes differ by season. He focuses on edges of structural elements, particularly creek channel edges and where creek channels end on flats, and dropoffs associated with the Cooper River channel. He also works over interiors of flats.

Ormseth keeps a log of each trip, recording the numbers and sizes of fish caught, plus water temperature and depths. During spring and fall, he often finds blues on shallow flats. “I’ve seen a few nice, warmer days in mid- to late February when blues moved into about 10 feet of water,” he says. “Then as the water continues to warm, they tend to move even shallower, and I’m typically fishing in 3 to 4 feet of water at that time. The shallow pattern tends to start once the water temperature reaches about 52ºF.

“From spring into summer, once the water temperature reaches the low 80ºF range, blues move progressively deeper. In summer, I start by fishing the mid-20-foot depth range to find fish, moving deeper if I need to, following structural contours. In fall when water temperatures cool, blues start to move shallower, with 52ºF typically signaling their movement to shallow flats. After spending a period shallow, they go to deeper water as water cools into winter, eventually to 40 or 50 feet.”

Surface Surprise

“When I started fishing for catfish on Santee, I trolled the basic board setup,” Ormseth says. “When I was trolling I saw that blues were actually hitting the planer boards that cut across the surface, so I devised a surface presentation to catch blues on top.” He caught his biggest blue on this surface rig in early December.

The blue cats hitting his boards were most likely keying on shad or other baitfish, with the boards mimicking a baitfish skirting the surface plane. “For surface-fishing to be effective, baitfish have to be suspending,” he says. “There are several baitfish species in Santee—like herring, mullet, and shad. The best conditions for surface-fishing are when the water’s flat calm.”

Ormseth works surface rigs behind boards and Herbies when blues are shallower in spring and fall. He only surface-fishes at night, mostly over areas 10 feet deep or less. Among his favorite spots are where shallow channels dump into big flats, often where blues chase schools of bait. Trolling covers a lot of territory, he says, giving you the ability to fish big areas to find the blue cats.

Surface-fishing’s done using the same board and Herbie setups, except he typically fishes three rods—two board rods off each side and one rod with a Herbie float. He only runs about 1 to 2 feet of line between a board (or Herbie float) and a surface rig, compared to 100 feet with his bottom-rig setup. After clipping on the board or float, he lets out about 250 feet of line, engages the reels, and sets them in rod holders.

His surface hardware is nothing like we’ve seen before. To a barrel swivel attached to a heavy cross-lock snap, Ormseth crimps on a length of 100-pound mono followed by a bead and then a buzzbait blade, then more beads, a crimping sleeve for a spacer, a bead, a second buzzbait blade, and a couple more beads. Then he slides on a 9- or 10-inch pole float, another crimping sleeve and bead, a third buzzbait blade, and a couple more beads. Finally, a crimping sleeve attaches the line at the cross-lock snap.

To the end of the noisemaker, Ormseth ties a squid teaser with a single #1 treble hook on a 2- to 3-foot long section of 40-pound Big Game monofilament, with a barrel swivel at the end for connecting to the cross-lock snap on the rig. He likes to use mullet cutbait. For hooks: “I tried circle hooks but missed about 25 percent of fish that hit. Trebles do a much better job on the surface, and circles do better on bottom rigs,” he says. He trolls surface rigs faster than bottom rigs, about 1 mph, to get the blades churning. Result: “Strikes are explosive.”

Ormseth’s tactics are unique to the catfishing world. They should be effective on other reservoirs, promising to change the way many catmen fish—at least for those, like Ormseth, who come along and try it.

Contact: Captain Marlin Ormseth, 843/825-4713, santeecoopercatfishhunter.com.