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Posted

I had a day on the grand river a few weeks that is worth writing about. It all started when my cousin who doesnt fish too often called me in february and asked if i could take him out fishing this spring and immediately i thought of the amazing channel catfish on the grand river that i love to chase every april and may. So we set up a random saturday in April as typically it starts to heat up near the end of april and hope for some good weather as the weekend approached.

 

As we had a pretty cold march i wasnt sure when the first day of fishing out of my boat would be but i was remaining hopeful that the grand river would open up and those kitty cats would start to feed!

 

i finally received news that the grand had opened a week or so before my scheduled trip with my cousin and his friend so i started to get the boat all rigged up and ready to go. I have to say i absolutely love that transition period when i am putting the sled away and start to get the boat all rigged up as i know what amazing adventures are up ahead.

 

so i hit the river the tuesday before the weekend and had a decent day with i think 10 or 11 channel cats landed but the water was still very cold and only a few spots were holding fish.

 

saturday arrived my two guests for the day were very excited to get out there, neither had ever caught a channel cat before let alone a fish over 10 pounds. Little did they know this day was going to spoil the hell out of both of them! haha

 

We arrived at fishmasters in dunnville for sunrise and immediately set out to our first spot. the anticipation was high for that first catfish but of course the first spot was slow. we set up and waited.....and waited... for about 1.5 hours when i was just about to move to the next spot and boom the first rod buckles. turns out to be an awesome fish at just over 15 pounds.

 

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fish fought like a champ and my buddy was happy. success! haha

 

as i mentioned the fishing was slow so we decided to move to another spot even though we just banged one and i am glad we decided to move. as we pulled into the next spot the river was alive, fish swirling everywhere as my boat was spooking fish all over the place. fish jumping, frogs croaking, birds chirping it was awesome.

 

we get all the rods set up and again the wait begins. within 5 minutes we had the first fish in the boat and over the next few hours we put on a clinic.

 

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after a handful of fish the boys let me reel one in! happend to be a tanker just over 18 pounds

 

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next was a beauty double header just as the boys sparked a couple cigars

 

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report continued

 

Posted

the hot bite continued as we landed fish after fish.

 

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and then we hooked into something that fought a little different. i saw it headshake above the water and said no way i think its a pike!! haha well wouldnt you know

 

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released the pike as another rod buckled

 

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and another...

 

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as the evening progressed the bite slowed in our spot so we moved again and found some more active fish. a couple fatties too!

 

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landed a bunch more fish in the 5-10 pound range that didnt even get the net moving haha. boat side releases for anything under 15 pounds all of a sudden.

 

after a full day of pounding some catfish we decided to call it quits. an amazing 46 catfish landed in one day. over a dozen over 15 pounds to boot. what a day.

 

thanks for reading. enjoy the pics

Posted

You set the bar pretty high with that day Andy... great report. I'll be posting my recap of 5 cat trips shortly. The record for most cats in a day remains yours... just... for now!

 

Pete

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