Members of PETA, please consider yourselves notified that the world population of channel catfish is lower by one.  I caught 2 but threw one back after I gave him a stern talking to about messing with my baited hook.  I apparently stumbled into a school of Jewish catfish cause they were eating my chopped chicken liver like a family of Greenbergs at the synagogue.

Our local lake is drying up at an alarming rate and this has prevented many people from bringing their boats to the lake to fish.  However, the lake can still be accessed by foot.  I was surprised that I was the only person utilizing the lake on a day that was perfect for fishing.  A bit cloudy, a mild breeze and not all that hot.  With 7%+ of the population of the USA being out of work you would have thought that more folks would have been fishing.  Is fishing no longer an activity enjoyed by retirees?  I wonder.  Well I enjoyed the time spent just sitting there feeding bait to the little scavengers.  I enjoyed eating the second one I caught.  He was 13.5″ long, which is above the 12″ minimum.  He tasted slightly like liver.

This trip was kind of a shakedown trip.  I recognized that I am lacking some of the necessary equipment for fishing in the local lake.  I need some more colorful bobbers (corks) so that I can see them better.  I need a wider range of hooks, in many different sizes.  It took a few casts before I determined that I could not catch a perch with a shark hook.  Maybe next time I will stop at the bait stand and buy some worms.  Maybe they hang on the hook better than liver.  Or even some bait shrimp.  I wish I knew where I could get some cotten seed meal.  My grandfather used to make dough bait from cotton seed meal and light bread.  My cousin and I ate more of the dought bait than the fish.  Maybe I can contact Ed, ginner of cotton and he will know of a source for cotten seed meal.

I will go again because it was a good way to spend most of a day without being at home under foot.

Chuy, the fisherman