Baby catfish for Giant bass

[mikeb]

I was stationed at schofield from 86-90 and fished Wilson alot...I once met a man on the lake who I observed catch several Largemouth Bass all 5 to 7 pounds each...He waved me over and told me he was fishing with baby catfish 3-4 inches long that he raised in a old bath-tub......he gave me a few and I caught a 6 pounder and lost several bigger ones.....This ocurred down near the island( near the dam) ...there was a sharp drop on the south side of the island and he would catch a bass on every throw.

Has anyone else used these for bait?

[roadwarriorsvt]

I haven't used small catfish as bait, but I guess they'd work, that is if my wife would let me use them. She thinks the baby catfish are sooooo cute!

[Stan Wright]

Back in the '70s those "baby catfish" were used by lots of guys. They were puntat (sp).... Chinese Catfish. Great bait.

The guys would catch them in the streams and also raise them in tanks.
You probably are speaking of Bob Kincade, he used them a lot.

There are stories of giant catfish in the Rio Grand River around the Big Bend area of Texas. My brother use to do canoe trips there. If you wanted to catch the really big catfish... you had to use the small 5 to 6 pound catfish as bait. (everything is bigger in Texas)

[Pegasus]

I would use baby hammerheads if it would help me catch a 7 pound largemouth !

[BASSTRACKER]

bob actually gave my dad and i a 4-5lb bass that spit up a puntat while we took it home in our bucket........ ahhhhhh the days of non catch and release. i still refer to kemoo island as kinkaid island quite often, it was his favorite spot.

[Crash]

1st thing that came to mind when I read this, like Stan said, was puntat. They were a great bait back in the day. Does anyone still use them?

[mikeb]

What ever happened to Mr. Kincaid?

[skunked]

I used to read Mr. Kincaid's article every month in HFN when I was young. He was pretty much my idol, even though I had never met him. I once wrote a letter to him asking for advice about fishing the lake. He could have just ignored it, but instead he sent me back a hand-written 6 page letter! I still have it, some 20 years later. What a nice thing to do for a complete stranger.
I don't know the whole story about his death. Maybe Stan can help, but I think he had a stroke or heart attack in his boat while fishing the lake. He died doing what he loved to do.

[tkpeltier]

Back home in PA a lot of people use baby catfish for smallmouth bass in rivers like the Juniata and Sesquehanna. They're the best bait you can use when it comes to live bait but hard to come by. I got a lot of bumps and bruises as a kid stumbling around rocks in the river trying to net baby cats.