Time for big Ohio blues: Catfish like these are by no means out of the question right now in Ohio

May 28, 2009 by admin

It’s time for big blue catfish on the Ohio River.
Mike Marchand has the evidence.
Mike, his brother-in-law, Ronnie Ramsey and a couple of cousins were fishing on the Ohio River near Stephensport in the Cannelton pool. Other than a couple of nibbles, the fish weren’t interested in feeding.
Suddenly, something hit his line. And Mike’s fishing line isn’t your ordinary 10-pound test stuff. He uses 65-pound test on a big Penn reel and an Ugly Stick Rod.
A week before when he was fishing in the same spot something big twice broke the heavy test line.
It was about 1:30 a.m. when Mike realized he had a fish on, and it didn’t take long to determine it was a dandy. “It took 20 to 25 minutes to land it. It might have been longer,” explained Mike. “Next, we had to get it up a 10 to 12-foot bank.”
Marchand said he didn’t have scales that would weigh the fish. “The scales I had only went to 55 pounds and it pegged it, so I took the fish home and put it in my pond until I could get another scale the next morning. When I weighed it, it went exactly 75 pounds.”
After Marchand weighed the fish, he drove it back to his hole and released it. “Who knows, maybe one of us will catch it again some day,” he said, smiling.
He caught the fish on a live bluegill. He fished the next night, but didn’t catch a fish.
Marchand says blue cats are seasonal, biting best in spring and fall. “This is about the time for them to be hitting,” he said. “They should be starting now.”
The Ohio River is known for its huge blue cats.
The Kentucky and Indiana state record blue catfish was caught in 1999 below the Cannelton dam by the late Bruce Medkiff of Owensboro. The monster weighed 104 pounds; it also was released back to the river after being officially weighed.