# Big cats in the Ohio River- HELP!



## gofish91 (Mar 31, 2012)

Me and my buddy went down to the Ohio River a few weekends ago near Racine for a couple of days. We were catching the cats on chicken liver. We were having pretty good luck with the 5 to 8 pounders, but we didn't have luck getting anything bigger than that. We're planning to go back here in a few weeks in late spring. Hoping to catch a few that are bigger. My question is, should we be using live bait for bigger fish or what? I know flatheads prefer it, but we just decided to go with the chicken livers last time. Probably not the best idea for the real big ones. Anyway, we're hoping to get a few :B , take a couple photos and release. Any help would be greatly appreciated!


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## Montyg (Mar 24, 2012)

Try using gold fish for the flats and
Get you a cast net and catch some
Shad or small suckers and use them 


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## gofish91 (Mar 31, 2012)

I'll definitely give them a shot. I actually have a couple cast nets too, but I had one of those brain farts when I was leaving the house..


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## Montyg (Mar 24, 2012)

Lol we all get those from time to time 


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## JimmyMac (Feb 18, 2011)

On the Ohio its hard to beat fresh cut skipjack herring, but can be a hard bait to gather. Fresh cut Shad is a close second, they are fairly easy to get with a cast net too. Live bluegill, creek chubs, small carp, goldfish will work great also. 

Personally I prefer nice fresh cut bait over live until the water warms up just a bit more, when it does a good lively bait is ideal for flathead. Blues and Channel I prefer a fresh cut bait year round. 

Chicken liver is a good bait for smaller channels, but will rarely ever land you anything of size. Big mature cats are much harder to fool, finding out what their main food supply is in the water your fishing is a great way to know what to use.

Just my 2 cents, I'm sure others will chime in.


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## Doboy (Oct 13, 2008)

JimmyMac said:


> On the Ohio its hard to beat fresh cut skipjack herring, but can be a hard bait to gather. Fresh cut Shad is a close second, they are fairly easy to get with a cast net too. Live bluegill, creek chubs, small carp, goldfish will work great also.
> 
> Personally I prefer nice fresh cut bait over live until the water warms up just a bit more, when it does a good lively bait is ideal for flathead. Blues and Channel I prefer a fresh cut bait year round.
> 
> ...


Hello Jim/gofish91,

Jim,,, Your $.02 is pretty-much RIGHT-ON!!!

We, Bob & I, went down to the river last eve, to see if we could catch 3or4(species) of mrtwisters-jbo's FAMOUS "10". lol

I started to cast jig & twisters, NOTHING, not even a tap. Then I walked up the feeder creek and seen a fallen tree or two so I went to a stick bobber and large fatheads to see if there were any crappies or smallies hitt'n. I caught ONE SMALLIE about 12".

WELL now, after everything else failed, it's time to fish the bottom with cut-bait. RED'S BAIT in N. Lima fixed me up with some HUGE fatheads, (many 3") so I cut them in half and the catch'n was on!
Every cast, wait 5-10Min, and our lines started to come in & head down river!
Now if we didn't stop to throw some more jigs, we could'a filled a garbage- can with CATS. We caught mostly +- 18" channel cats,,, & 2 nice 5# blues.
I wish I knew someone who eats c-cats,,, they were just the right size & sure were healthy looking!
Those cats were picking up both of my cut-baits, swimming in and going down river to pick up BOB'S BAIT! It happened twice! That 5# blue ended up with 3 hooks in his mouth! 
Now, if someone was down there and was seriously fishing for cats, they could'a put a 'HURT'N' on 'em!!! 

BTW,,, THANKS TO THE 'Nice-To-Talk-To' "locals" that showed up.
They were fishing straight across the creek from us.
The 2 kids were casting 1/8oz jigs tipped with 4" purple twisters. they ended up with 4 sauger & 2 smallies. Very SLOW crank,,, "When The Street-lights Come On"!!!


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## gofish91 (Mar 31, 2012)

Great advice guys. Thanks all!


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