Kentucky Afield | Catfish Noodling; Musky Fishing; Pond Fishing and Management | Season 39 | Episode

This week on Kentucky Afield, we're jumping in the water and grabbing catfish by hand.

Next, the Clatos family loves to fish for musky, so we█re headed out to Cave Run Lake.

Then we're pond fishing with a fisheries biologist and learning a thing or two about farm pond management.

It's all next on Kentucky Afield.

Hello and welcome to Kentucky Afield.

I'm your host, Chad Miles.

Join us as we journey the commonwealth in search of outdoor adventure.

One of the most unique or exciting ways to catch a fish is by noodling or hand grabbing.

It comes in on June the first.

And now let's take a look at one of my first times out catching a fish by hand.

We're down here on the banks of Kentucky Lake.

this is the place that I've done a lot of fishing, but the type of fishing we're doing today is brand new to me.

We're going to be jumping in the water and hopefully grabbing some big flathead catfish by hand.

Some people call it a hogging, and then some people call it tickling, and then some call it hand fishing.

But it it's all the same thing.

So I believe I believe he's sticking his foot in there and locating that hole, and he's kind of positioned himself and getting ready, getting a good good lungful of air and diving down and literally going all the way to his feet and then running his hand up in that hole.

I'm sure that people that you've told you'd like to go out noodle or hand grab catfish, they're probably like, Oh, my God, aren't you scared?

Oh, it's it's a defining characteristic.

I mean, you tell people you catfish noodle and it's one of the things they always remember about you and they always ask and yeah, I mean, that's that's one of the appeals of it.

He's been down there awhile.

Oh, there he is.

There he is.

He's got it.

Little guy.

What do you got there?

Just a little channel cat.

And you can see where they get skinned up under those rocks and things.

Oh, yeah.

That's way to get started.

You just gonna turn him loose?

Yeah turn him loose and find his way right on back down.

Maybe we can find something bigger.

I've been noodling catfish, I guess, sixteen years.

As a matter of fact, my very first assignment as an outdoor writer was to go down to Mississippi and and try to noodle a catfish and write a story about it.

Those guys were pretty intense, pretty serious about it, but I learned how to do it.

I caught a nice flat head, and I was like, Man, this is cool.

I like big catfish.

I always have.

I've always been intrigued by them.

And, you know, I grew up catching snakes and frogs and lizards and like a lot of country kids do.

And I just like being outside doing that sort of thing.

So we've been doing it about 15 years now and kind of a crew of family and buddies.

And we just we have a great time we go every summer.

Oh, yeah.

I feel him.

I feel the pad get ready.

There he is!

Kentucky actually has a season.

It opens June 1st.

It really gets going when the water temperature hits about 80 degrees.

That's when the flat heads kind of start moving up into the holes and and stays good for a few weeks there.

And honestly, by about the middle of July, we're, we're skinned up and worn out and ready to hang it up for the year.

Anyway, check his gills and make sure nothing is bleeding and it's not.

The fish is in good shape.

He's in good shape.

He got a little skin up there on the rock.

That's kinda part of it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Well, you can see on their back a lot of healed stuff.

Yeah.

And even his dorsal fin, he's he's wallowed that down, you know, where he's gotten up under there and dug, you know.

I tell you what flathead catfish are so cool.

Look at that mouth.

look at that big old mouth and these little bitty eyes.

They are prehistoric looking fish.

He'll find his way right back up.

Find his way right back in here.

But I guarantee you can catch him in there tomorrow.

So I want you to catch one about three times that size.

Your wife actually enjoys doing this.

She does.

My wife and my son, Anse.

We're an outdoors family.

We hunt and fish for anything that's in season.

Year round, So we we've been going out and doing this for a long time.

I wouldn't have it any other way.

So Anse is getting up here.

This is a really shallow spot, which is absolutely perfect for a first timer or a young fella like this.

Oh, yeah, he's in there.

All right, you got to get down in the water.

Belly down there you go.

Remember, get your face in the water to see my arms there in the hole.

He's been going out here with us since two years old.

You know, we've been putting him in the boat and then taking him along.

And if it's a catfish.

It might bite his hand but it's not going to hurt him.

He'll be OK.

He just came up, bit Anse's hand Did he bite your hand?

Yeah, you OK?

Michelle and I have always hunted and fished together, and we just decided when he was born, we're just going to take him with us.

And, you know, when he gets big enough to decide he doesn't want to go that's fine.

But he sure likes it.

He loves it.

Good job.

So what that feel like, buddy?

What's it feel like doing that?

I think it's pretty fun.

Did you feel the fish bite your hand?

yeah.

He bit you one time.

I know.

Did it scare you a little bit?

No?

you're not scared of anything, are you?

we release 99% of the catfish we catch doing this, and we almost always have.

And, hey, we we like to catch big catfish, too, so we have an interest in not killing them, you know, it's a misconception that noodlers are going out there and cleaning everything they catch.

They're sport Fishermen, just like everybody else.

A lot of people sink boxes for, for catfish noodling or drums just like sinking structure for crappie.

But it's, you know, it's for a single catfish.

First time I've ever tried this.

So we're here at this box and I got my feet right in the opening where I'm going to go down and stick my arm in there and try to feel around, see if there's anything in there.

what's the biggest thing you have to really watch out for.

Everybody asks about the beaver snakes and turtles.

Every time I take somebody new, that's the first thing they ask when you see turtles everywhere, you see some snakes on the bank and stuff.

But so far as a turtle backing up in the holes.

I mean, these holes that we're checking, they're they're well underwater.

They're under rocks and things.

You feel anything?

No didn't feel anything.

sweep that stick around in there, a turtle has to breathe.

And it's not a place that a turtle is going to back up into.

Do I use the hook end?

Yeah the hook end.

and so the thing that we stress, like, we always go in groups.

We never have somebody dive alone.

And I mean, the the biggest real danger is obviously drowning.

There's always a chance that you're going to get stuck underwater.

I don't feel anything.

Nobody home.

So we always have somebody right there next to us when we dive, most of the holes that we check you can you can stand up.

But there are a few that are over your head.

And those you need to you need to be particularly careful so a lot of what we check, honestly, are holes that we found in the banks under rocks.

It's taken us 15 years of looking and we look continuously every summer.

We've kind of built a circuit of areas that we check.

Some days this one will have a fish in it and that one won't, and vice versa.

But it's, it's, it's still fishing.

Getting ready to check another hole this is completely different than the last one.

It's not actually a manmade box.

It's up under the bank.

It's got some concrete in and around it.

So we'll go see what they've got.

They said this hole has been known to hold some pretty good size fish.

She already got one?

She gets real quiet.

I'll tell you what this is.

This is something that you probably wouldn't want to do by yourself for safety concerns, but it also takes some teamwork sometimes to manipulate these fish in the best way to get them out.

That's what we're seeing right here.

But if you come to the left, I got to push him back in.

Yeah.

Is he a mean little sucker momma?

He is baby, he's biting the front of my hand.

Oh, I lost one on camera.

That's a pretty good channel cat.

He was biting biting biting, His little mouth wasn't big enough for my whole hand.

Nobody home?

Nothing I feel, but I. I heard something.

Did one of you guys?

I had a stick right here it may have been raking or something.

You wanna try this one or?

Yeah, I'll double check it.

The other day, there was a fish that kind of layed over to the right, which was kind of hard to find.

This is hard to get a feel for what you're feeling for with the.

Fish?

When you go in, take that stick and turn it to the right.

OK, you hit the stick?

It's a flat head, so we'll try to locate where he's at with the stick.

Then I got to manipulate.

Yeah.

Yeah, you kind of have to manipulate him a little bit.

And you might he probably bite that stick and you might be able to just kind of pull him, and as you do, swing him out and I would have your left hand in there ready to get him.

But you'll you'll know it if he gets on that stick.

But yeah, go in there and go straight.

Right.

Straight right.

Yeah.

Oh, I heard it thump.

Yeah.

OK, we heard all that.

He's got the stick.

Oh.

Did he take it away from you?

No, I got it right there at the mouth and we didn't even have patent on that stick.

He's on that stick.

He should have him.

oh, yeah.

What do we got?

Hahaha.

I had him there for a few minutes.

I had just got him in and got my hand under there.

Oh, man.

Well, I turned him loose obviously.

Yeah we got to see him so.

Got him up out of there.

I said wait a minute what do we got here.

If we slow that video down, you'll be able to tell that I actually did have a catfish in my hand for a second.

I got it out, and you guys told me to keep it close to my body.

Well, when I went to stand up, I was trying to show it to the camera.

Yeah, and I had it out about this far away, and it just got loose.

Oh, yeah.

We all saw it, and it's on tape.

we were going to turn it loose anyway.

But that was pretty awesome.

Yeah, that's pretty cool.

Pretty cool.

You know, a 50 pound flathead is a handful.

They can torque fingers and twist wrists.

You can't just grab them by the jaw and let their tail go in open water because they're going to beat you up pretty quick.

It's so far down that the pressure builds.

Try and hold your breath when you get down there.

It takes me a little while to I just can't stay down there long enough.

You've got to respect a fish like that.

But if you hold them the right way, if you can kind of get their head up close to your body and get their tail under control, that's another reason why we dive in pairs a lot.

If we've got a big fish, there's no shame in having a buddy grab his tail.

So he doesn't beat you to death.

Got one!

Oh, my gosh.

Oh, my Gosh.

Got one.

Look at the tag on him.

Kind of for me own benefit of knowledge.

You know, we've started tagging some of the fish, you know, with a zip tie in the dorsal fin or something just to see.

And we've had fish that we've caught three weekends in a row.

Catch them, take a picture and let them go and they go right back in there.

What do you what do you think approximately poundage of this fish?

My guess would, Anse what's this fish weigh?

Um about let me look at it.

About 11 pounds.

Hey he's bigger than that.

Between that and catching a big flathead on a live bluegill that might swallow that hook so far as that individual fish this is not hurting him as much it's one of those things that you do with knowledge and respect to the resource you've got just a couple of little bitty spots on it but all in all it's in great shape.

Big ole fat belly on it.

You really can't understand the feeling of getting in there and feeling that fish strike until you actually use your hand probe.

Exactly.

We've taken a lot of new people.

That's that's part of the fun.

Like, we like to take people just almost universally.

It's not what they expect.

Yes.

It's not as scary, I guess, as people think it's going to be.

But also people are pretty surprised at how powerful those fish are.

Oh yeah.

There you go Finally, finally got him to hit.

It's amazing to me how you kind of work in groups as a family and as teams.

It's a team sport and it's more fun with a lot of people.

Out here.

It is.

What do you think about that?

Pretty fish, huh?

I like his belly.

I know.

Aren't they pretty it looks like a little male.

I think you're probably right.

Say, I'm going to keep an eye out for some of your articles and keep up with what you're doing.

And I'm sure you and I will find some more.

For sure.

Yeah.

Yeah, I think it'd be a good time.

Well, I enjoyed it, buddy.

Lot of fun.

Yeah, a lot of fun.

Most families who fish together are very tight knit families, and that's true for the Clatos family who like pursuing the state's largest predator fish, the musky.

Today we█re out here on beautiful Cave Run Lake.

I█m with Reid and Ryan Clatos, and we are in search of musky.

You know, actually, I found out about you two, I got a phone call from a one of our fisheries biologist.

Yeah.

And he had said that, Ryan, you had caught a 53 inch musky this year, right?

Yeah, like three weeks ago.

Oh my gosh, it█s a 50.

Oh, we will die if we lose it.

Oh, you got it.

We got a 50.

So I called you.

And it just so happened I wasn't even thinking about it.

I was in deer hunting mode, but I started thinking, wait a minute, right now is a great time to catch a musky.

Maybe we need to go fishing.

So here we are and we're going to try to catch us a musky today.

You've caught a 53.

Ryan caught a monster.

And what's the biggest one you█ve caught?

About 49 and a half inch.

So you've both got almost 50 inch musky.

You have caught a 50 inch musky.

And your 13.

So how old were you guys when you started musky fishing?

About 11.

We started.

And both of you have caught multiple fish this year, and you've caught multiple fish throughout your life.

What's your favorite technique?

How do you like fish one most?

Well, I mean, we just like throwing it out there and reeling it back in because they're striking at baits, we roll them pretty fast.

Okay, So when we have a follow up we like to like make the like on the figure 8, right.

Yeah.

Like on the figure eight.

We like, we go around the corner and then we make a fast turn and loop and we go make a fast turns because they want to strike at it.

So you're kind of playing cat and mouse with that big fish a little bit?

Yeah it█s like a bait fish.

You're trying to make it run away from it.

Your sister and mom and everybody in your family musky fishes.

Oh, Mom and Hannah don't.

Bella our sister, She does.

She likes it.

Your family's got more musky than most people that I know that a fish their entire lives.

Yeah.

We got a musky on.

He took our fish.

Hopefully not.

He█s big.

That's a good fish, lets ease over.

So that is your dad?

Yeah.

Your dad's over here fishing beside us and low and behold, look, he's hooked up with a big muskie.

Took our fish.

And your sister is netting it.

There you go.

That's slimy.

Look at that fish.

What a beautiful fish.

He has a fin cut.

It's how they age those things.

Certain years they fin clip them.

Very nice.

Yeah.

I'm sorry.

Oh, don't be sorry.

That's great.

You know, that's a typical fish here.

What's that fish?

Probably 32 to 34?

He's pretty close to keeper.

What's keeper?

36, right?

Yeah.

Well, there you go.

That's.

That's beautiful.

I knew the boys were picking the wrong boat, and they decided to come with me.

Yeah, we fish pretty hard.

I haven't seen any fish, but you have seen one or two.

And low and behold, right behind us you stack one.

When you turn them back loose, you them grow a little bit.

That's what makes us a good fishery.

Oh, absolutely.

You guys are pretty lucky.

You got twin brothers.

You guys get along really, really well.

You got a fishing partner for life.

Pretty much.

Well, I'll tell you what.

I've had a lot of fun sharing the boat with you guys, hearing your stories.

And I love how you guys just really enjoy fishing together.

In September it█s your month for musky.

Next year, September, I'll be back.

Are you considering building a farm pond or have a farm pond that may need some help?

Well, the Department of Fish and Wildlife has some resources that may be able to help.

So, Jeff, I know you've been a fisheries biologist for quite a few years.

You probably feel like at this point in time you've seen every pond in the state, haven't you?

I've seen a few.

But your primary job is not pond management.

Your primary job is really to manage the public waterways.

Correct.

But if someone is having a problem with their pond and you will help them out?

We do.

That's part of our job.

We try to help provide technical guidance to the pond owners.

What's the number one problem as far as ponds?

A lot of the calls are dealing with fish population problems, you know, crowded bass undesirable fish species.

Also aquatic vegetation issues.

And like I say, fish population issues undesirable species.

It's almost like that fish knew he had a chance to be on TV.

Yes, because this is exactly the undesirable fish species you're talking about.

This is one of a couple of fish that can be very problematic in a pond like crappie, they're prolific.

They can get off really large spawns, they can overpopulate.

And unless you've got a good predator population, you know, you can end up with a pond full of these small crappie.

What other non desirable in a pond would you look for?

Most common one that we probably deal with is a green sunfish.

They're incredibly aggressive.

They can wear out a male bass on a nest, but another crappie.

I mean, it's better.

There sure are a bunch of these jokers in here, though.

I mean, look at the eyes on that dude.

How big they are.

Massive.

Yeah, that's an old fish.

Oh, really?

So eye size can, at times, yeah.

That's a pretty good indication that that's probably an older fish that's been around for a while and they're just not growing.

They're crowded.

Well Jeff, that's probably not real good.

We walked down this dock, we fished one spot and we've caught three fish and they've all been undersized, small crappie.

Now, I'm not going to make a determination just yet that the bass population's in bad shape, but we're going to have to walk across the pond and try to try to catch a few more fish and see what they look like as well.

We get a lot of calls about muddy ponds and usually it's due to fish and it's either due to a bullhead catfish, which is another undesirable or common carp.

They're just very problematic.

They keep the ponds muddy, which is very bad for large mouth largemouth bass that is a site feeder and the pond stays muddy all the time.

It's really, really good to see different age classes of bass in your pond.

This isn't exactly what you want to come out here and catch big numbers of.

But if you're seeing this size and medium size and the occasional really big bass, then you have a very healthy pond.

This is a nice quality looking fish.

Looks like it's been eating well.

It was aggressive.

It was.

And again, it's proportional.

Not a big head, skinny body.

The things that you're looking at when you're kind of looking at your fish in your pond.

A little better bass at least got the 2 pound variety.

So that's good.

In the last couple of casts we've got a four inch bass now a bass that's probably somewhere in the neighborhood of 16, 17 inches.

So it has several different year classes in it.

Hey, that's a good sign.

This is exactly what you want to see.

Saw a big fish take off, right there.

Could have been this.

Here we go.

Now, now, now we're dealing with the kind of fish that you really want to see in your pond.

We have caught all age classes of fish.

Now, this is this is a full grown it's a pretty good sized bass right here for a pond.

I mean, we're looking at a close to 5 pound fish.

Hey, it's a good way to go out and try to get a decent idea of what your population of your fish is like, is just walk around it occasionally and catch some fish and take notes of what your catching and the overall health.

Look at this fish.

Very healthy fish got a big belly.

If someone built a new pond, what do you recommend as far as fish stocking?

We recommend a large mouth bass and bluegill.

Basically, it's 400 bluegill per acre, 120 bass per acre.

You can find this information on our website.

We have a farm pond web page.

Google, Kentucky Fish and Wildlife.

Go to our main page up in the top right hand search box.

Just type in farm pond management.

There's a list of fish suppliers that sell in the state.

So that information is on that website.

I'm sure you get phone calls on aquatic vegetation as well.

That's a lot of phone calls.

We get people trying to figure out what they're dealing with and how to control it.

There's three ways of controlling aquatic plants and that's one physically, you know, removing it by hand.

The second way is biologically that your grass carp.

But you got to understand grass carp don't eat all types of aquatic vegetation.

So they got a preference list.

There's things they will eat and things they won't.

And then the third, of course, is chemically.

Again, identifying the plant is a key to getting the appropriate control method for that plant is the big thing.

And you can go on the website of the Department of Fish and Wildlife and find out who your district biologist is.

There's a site on there that you put your county and it'll tell you who your conservation officer is, who your land biologist is, and then you can find out who your fisheries biologist is no matter what county you live in, in the state of Kentucky.

Correct.

It's it's very easy to do.

And their email address is located on there?

Their phone and email addresses and just, you know, pull that email address up, take a picture on your phone and send it to that email.

I'm loving it.

Oh, my gosh.

Is that a crappie?

Oh, my goodness.

Now let's check in and see who else has been out having fun in this week's Ones That Didn't Get Away.

Here we have 16 year old Lily Faith with her very first turkey, a nice big Tom that weighed around 20 pounds.

Nice job.

Check out this beautiful striper called by Angela Wilson Gasser.

This fish was caught on Lake Cumberland.

Six year old Gunner Wittus took this nice turkey from Washington County.

This bird weighed over 23 pounds.

Nice job.

Luke Kurtsinger went fishing with his dad in a farm pond in Washington County and caught this nice largemouth bass.

Congratulations.

Dallas Walker gives this fish a thumbs up.

It's his new personal best largemouth bass.

This beautiful gobbler was taken by Jenna Dunn on the opening morning of Turkey season in Gallatin County.

47 yard shot.

Nice job.

Here at Kentucky Afield we'd like to take a moment to remember all the servicemen and women who paid the ultimate sacrifice in the protection of our great country.

And remember, hunting and fishing on private property is a privilege.

Always ask permission and thank the landowner.

Until next week.

I'm your host, Chad Miles, and I hope to see you in the woods or on the water.

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