When is the best time to fish for catfish—night or day? For some top catfish anglers around the country it’s a slam-dunk answer: Nighttime is prime time—that is, unless you’re fishing for blue cats during winter. Or, you’re fishing for flatheads in rivers during the Prespawn Period, or late summer into fall. Or, you’re chasing channel cats during the Spawn Period in reservoirs. Some anglers fish exclusively during the day year-round. Maybe we’d better explore this night-versus-day thing a little further.

There’s no doubt that catfish are often more active at night. For instance, research with radio-tagged flathead catfish conducted by Iowa Department of Natural Resources fishery biologist, Greg Gelwicks (see “Flathead Tracking” in this guide), shows the fish were often stationary during the day but mobile after dark. “If we only checked them during the day, we started to wonder if some of them were dead because they were always in the same spot, day after day,” he says. “But if we checked them at night, they might be a half mile or a mile away from their daytime spots.” Gelwicks’ observations are solidified in tracking studies by other researchers elsewhere, too.

Channel and blue catfish feed opportunistically and aren’t as dramatically nocturnal as flatheads. That eat-when-food-is-available behavior of channels and blues allows daytime anglers to compensate for reduced activity levels during daylight hours. Research at Pony Express Lake in Missouri conducted by Steve Eder and William McDannold, for example, showed that while radio-tagged channels and blues were more active at night, anglers who fished in habitat frequented by catfish during daytime hours enjoyed catch rates equal to, and sometimes better than, anglers who fished at night. The implication is that catfishing success is not only affected by how and where you fish, but also when you wet a line.

Figuring Flatheads
Jack Love, Great Bend, Kansas, leader of Megacat Crew (megacatcrew.com): “If you’re after flatheads during the day, you’re fishing in totally different spots than at night. During the daytime, you’re going to fish right down in the middle of the biggest logjams, or in the best habitat that’s available in that stretch of river. Drop your bait right in front of that flathead, almost bump his nose. He’ll either take it because it’s an easy snack, or attack it because it’s annoying him.

“At night, you want to fish the feeding areas adjacent to where the flatheads spend their days. They’re lazy. They don’t move any farther than necessary to find food. Get baits around the fringes of the big logjams, or along cutbanks upstream or downstream from the logjam. The drop-offs below sandbars near daytime habitat are good, too. It’s sort of a trade-off—during the day you pretty much know where the fish are but have to get them to bite. At night, they’re active and feeding so it’s easy to get them to bite, but they’re roaming around so they’re harder to find.”

Love fishes day or night, depending on the calendar. “Flatheads spend the winter in wintering holes, and really don’t get active until water temperatures rise into the 50°F range,” he says. “In April, we fish during the day around the edges of those holes, or on shallows near the holes.

“I’ve had more success early in the year with dead shad or dead frogs than with livebait. There’s a lot of winterkilled forage drifting in the rivers at that time of year, and flatheads take advantage of it. On warm, sunny afternoons the fish move out of those deep holes into areas of warmer water and pick up any food they can find easily. Once we get into May, we switch over to fishing almost exclusively at night until flatheads start to move back toward the wintering holes in late September. A lot of guys think flatheads shut off after midnight, but I’ve caught some of my biggest ones at 2 a.m. The best time is probably just after sunset. The time from 10 p.m. till midnight is good, too. The one time I’ve never had much luck is the hour or so before dawn.”

Scott Wiseman, Ohio River cat chaser from Indianapolis, Indiana, (scottwiseman.org): “I think flatheads move from deep to shallow at night in search of food, so when I fish after dark I set up to cover the three primary depths that catfish might be using,” he says. “On the Ohio River there are holes 70 to 80 feet deep, but I never catch fish from those deepest areas. I’ve hooked into most fish adjacent to those holes, in 20 to 30 feet of water, and I’ve also had good success in water as shallow as 4 feet. So I look on outside bends for the deep holes with cover—logs, rocks, and debris—on bottom, then anchor my boat midway between the core of the hole and shallow water. I set three poles out of the back of the boat, with one bait in 20 to 30 feet of water, one at middepth at around 10 or 15 feet, and the third in 5 to 10 feet. The best fishing has been from just before dusk to about a half hour after it, but the bite’s good till midnight. I often fish all night, but generally don’t catch a lot after midnight.”

In-Fisherman editors have had good success fishing for flatheads during the day when the fish are in prespawn mode. The key is to target them in thick logjams. The best woodpiles are often along riverbends, although those in mid-river or single large trees with giant, sunken rootwads hold fish, too. And often flatheads are even more willing to smash a cutbait sent into the thick cover than a livebait. Don’t spend too much time at one location. Probe various locations in the logjam, and if you don’t get a bite, move on to the next spot. Some anglers continue to use this pattern through summer, even though nighttime is a good option once the spawn ceases and midsummer arrives.

Best Times Blues
Wiseman also targets blue cats on the Ohio River. “They’re more of a day bite, and winter is the easiest time to catch and find them during the daytime,” he explains. “My friends think I’m nuts to launch a boat when the air temperature is 2°F and I have to break ice to get out to the main channel; but at that time of year, if you find a current break associated with a deep hole and mark fish on your sonar, you’re on blues and there’s a good chance you’ll catch a 40- or 50-pound fish.

“Summer or winter, I fish during the day and look for scour holes below bridge pilings and those associated with submerged wing dams. The deep holes along outside bends are good spots if you can find a current break. Fifteen to 40 feet of water is the most productive depth range where I fish. Big, fresh cutbaits—skipjack, gizzard shad and mooneye—are my favorites. I use a 5- to 10-inch chunk on a 8/0 or 10/0 Gamakatsu circle hook, rigged Carolina-style.

Phil King, catfish guide and tournament angler from Corinth, Mississippi, (h2othouse.com/catfish) along with team members Tim Hanie and Lealon Harris, caught the first 100-plus-pound blue weighed in at a catfishing tournament. “I prefer to fish during the day because it lets me target specific areas—deep ledges on inside or outside bends of rivers, and humps and old creek channels in lakes,” King says. “Daytime fish seem to seek the security of deeper, darker areas of lakes or rivers. Once we identify those locations, we mark them on a GPS and then go back and catch fish off them time after time.” King notes that he’s seen research indicating that blue cats often roam extensively when feeding, in some cases up to 14 miles, making it difficult to locate them. By targeting their daytime areas, he puts his baits into higher concentrations of fish.

Channel Cat Clock
Tom Davis, Latimer, Iowa, fishes catfish tournaments in lakes and reservoirs across the Upper Midwest: “I’d just as soon fish at night because there’s less recreational boat traffic. For a tournament, I usually prefish during the day to find the depths and structure I’m looking for and mark them on GPS. I fish them long enough to prove to myself there are fish there. Then I come back the night of the tournament and fish those spots, sometimes a little shallower. The good thing about lakes is that channel cats tend to stay in an area for days at a time, with the only movement being deeper during the day and shallower at night.

“I look for spots with shallow tapering shoreline near deep water. In the lakes around here, 10 or 12 feet is deep. Shallow is 2 to 4 feet. It’s good to have the wind blowing into that shoreline. I cast right up against the shore if I’m fishing after dark. The cats can be so shallow that their backs are nearly out of the water. Most of the tournaments go all night, so we stay out and generally catch fish all night. There are a few lakes where the channel cats just plain shut off at midnight and absolutely refuse to bite till about an hour before dawn. That happens in West Lake Osceola in southern Iowa, and I can’t figure why.”

If there are no nearshore areas that meet these requirements, Davis looks to riprap or major points. “Riprapped shorelines are good all summer at night. The cats are in there looking for crawdads, so that’s what I use for bait. Riprap is especially good during the spawn, when channel cats are looking for cavities for spawning. Otherwise, a major point can be a good spot if the wind is blowing across it. I’ll fish right on top of it, or just to the downwind side.”

Jack Love: “Channel cats bite night or day. In fact, I’ve caught some of my biggest channel cats—10- to 15-pounders—during the day. I catch them on livebait, because liver and commercial baits tend to produce the 1- to 5-pound channels. I use live goldfish, small carp, small sunfish, and chubs during the day and pick up nice cats around drop-offs or along the edges of logjams. The fish are usually associated with a current break, some sort of structure, and it doesn’t really seem to matter whether it’s daylight or dark.”

Fishing in small rivers and streams is a good option if you like daytime catting. From Prespawn through summer, resident channel cats, or those that use these smaller systems as seasonal habitat, are often eager biters holding in predictable locations in good numbers. Look to logjams, undercut banks, and neckdowns as catfish magnets. Cutbait on a lightweight rig is a universal option to bring home a nice brace of eaters at the end of the day.

Tradition says catfishing can be best after dark, and research supports that cats are often more active after sunset. But anglers who know where and how to fish for flatheads, blues, and channels during the day can enjoy success rates equal to, and possibly better than, their nocturnal brethren because catfish rarely turn down a well-placed bait. The ultimate conclusion is that there is no poor time to fish. For knowledgeable anglers, it’s all good.  ■

*Dan Anderson, Bouton, Iowa, is a frequent contributor to In-Fisherman publications.