Old Hickory Sunday

[Jim]

Got out for a few hours on Sunday afternoon to the steam plant. Beautiful day for the start of December. Fishing was slow, but steady. Water temp was about 59 outside Flipper's and 66 in the steam plant canal. The shad are not in the canal in any numbers yet, but there are some skipjack to catch. Nothing like when it gets colder, but probably caught 20 or 30 for fun.

The best fish of the day was a nice catfish. It measured just under 30 inches and I guess about 10 to 12 lbs. A good fight on 6lb test.



I kept a few fish for dinner, the bass was gill hooked and bleeding so I didn't release it. I released a bunch more catfish and stripers about the same size. I seemed to catch a fish every 15 or 20 minutes, until right before dark when I got a bunch in quick succession.



We had half of these for dinner tonight and they were excellent. The flathead catfish was especially tasty.

No sauger or walleye. I did have a skipjack out for big stripers for the last hour or so, but nothing touched it.

Lots of people out crappie fishing and I heard some were doing well.

Jim

[Travis C.]

Nice catch.

I tried a few weeks ago at night but not much luck. I like to think there wasn't many fish in there then but it's probably more likely the fact I had no real clue to what's going on as it was my first trip to GSP in many many years.

[Alphahawk]

Nice catch Jim! Those Flatheads are one of the tastiest fish in the lake......to me anyway. I'm sure you had all you wanted catching that on 6# test line.


Regards

[MNfisher]

Nice catches! I have never tried eating a flathead. I am not a real big fan of channels, are they much better?

[Alphahawk]

Originally Posted by MNfisher

Nice catches! I have never tried eating a flathead. I am not a real big fan of channels, are they much better?

Far better than a channel. At least I think so. Its all good but the meat from around the head is outstanding....and so is the belly meat.


Regards

[Jim]

Thanks for the comments. It was nice to get out a catch a few fish.

Originally Posted by MNfisher

Nice catches! I have never tried eating a flathead. I am not a real big fan of channels, are they much better?

The flatheads have a sweet white meat. I commented to my wife that it tastes like lobster when eating it tonight. A lot better than channel or blue catfish and I eat a lot of those

The big problem with flathead is catching any number with any consistency. I just catch them occasionally. It is probably easier to catch big ones than eater-sized ones for me, but a lot of that is they love the same big baits I use for stripers.

I can't complain about the beautiful weather, but it will take some real cold to turn the steam plant fishing on.

Jim

[StriperFan]

Those bottom two have been eluding me like the devil on my last couple of trips, nice to see some in pictures anyway. As far as the flathead for dinner goes, that is fine eating, and different than the other cats. Here's a couple of pics from our last trip from last week. These guys were lucky because we let them swim. We also caught a LMB about the same as in your pic that we let swim. And a 16" sauger that wasn't quite as lucky.

[txnative]

The reason the bottom photo doesn't show the angler is because I have recently gone into the witness protection program.


Chris

[Travis C.]

Originally Posted by txnative

The reason the bottom photo doesn't show the angler is because I have recently gone into the witness protection program.


Chris

I thought the fish was just hovering there. Everything else just blended in with the trees.

[StriperFan]

And there you go, blowing your cover. I tried.

[CreekWalker]

Great report thanks for sharing. We were in that area on Saturday as well - didn't fish the canal but rather found a TON of bait working their way down the river channel. There was probably a half dozen boats hovering where the canal narrows so we didn't bother. Caught a few largemouth working the baitfish nothing big but we did get into a pod of spotted bass and my buddies pulled a double which is always fun!