Fish-Hawk.Net

A little after the fact, but since I joined yesterday, I thought I would ask.

I was out at Shirley's Bay two weeks ago and caught a catfish (about 5.5 lbs) while trolling a crankbait through shallow water (2-4 ft) in front of the mouth of bay where the rifle range is. I was heading into the shallows to look for bass/pike but figured you can't catch anything with your lure in the boat, so I just threw it out to see what happened. The fish hit almost immediately and my son reeled it in (with great excitement). I thought it was odd that it hit a crankbait, but I try not to overthink things.

I have since been told by a co-worker that catfish have spines. I did not have any problems handling it, and didn't see anything on it. I googled it, but mostly got information about some cats having spines, some not, lots of wiki entries on scientific names and species, etc. But not a good description of where the spines would be. Anyone know where the spines are located?

Tight lines

All catfish have spines in each pectoral fin and the dorsal fin. They are not always obvious but if you saw the dorsal and pectoral fins sticking out they were probably being flexed. They are actually part of the fin so it's not like you see a bony protrusion.

Bigger catfish are easier to handle the small catfish (IMO) as there is more fish to hold as you remove the hook. The small young cats have very sharp spines and man do they hurt (got a nice poke in a fleshy part of the hand between the thumb and forefinger, youch). The small cats are harder to grab and hold, and squirm more in your hands.

If you run your fingers along the inward side of the spines you can feel the striations which can sometime be useful in determining the species of catfish. Most common in the Ottawa area are Channel cats (the biggest), Brown bullhead and Yellow bullhead. Other small species exist but are more difficult to find. Looking at the color of the barbels also helps differentiate the species.

I have in my tackle box a small bottle of hand sanitizer just for those spines. Cause if you get poked it can hurt as hell for a few days, But one squirt of the hand sanitizer and rubbing it in the pain is gone.

Thank you for the responses, and the tip. I will put a little hand sanitizer in my tacklebox.

Ya, they are nasty. I won't let my kids unhook catfish cause I don't want them to get nailed and end up with a nasty infection. Good idea about the hand sanitizer.

Yup they can hurt. Best way is to grab em from under the belly, no fear of getting a poke then.

RJ