>>558335Well, a large part of it has to do with the lake I'm fishing on being one of the best catfish producing lakes in TX (for channel cats at least). I'm using a slip sinker rig with 20lb test, 3/4 - 1 oz sinker, and #4 or #6 treble hooks baited with punch bait (stink bait). The bait I'm using is CJ's Catfish Punch Bait, I've used Shad, Minnow, and Monster "flavors" and all of them have done very well. I've tried several different kinds of stink bait as well as worms, shrimp, chicken hearts & livers, cheese, hot dogs, frozen shad, cut bait, etc and the CJ's bait consistently outperforms everything else I try when it comes to channel cats.
As a general rule, if I'm not having any luck in 15 - 20 mins then I move to another area. You're a bit limited in that respect when you're fishing from shore but I've found that "going to where the fish are" is a much better tactic than "waiting for the fish to come to you". If available, look up fishing reports for the bodies of water that you're going to be fishing on as well as the water temperature (since water temperature plays a big role in the behavior & location of fish in the lake).
