Josh Rouse holds up a catfish he caught while night fishing at Shawnee State Fishing Lake. Photo by Brendan Handy.
On May 30, 2011, my friend Brendan and I decided to go night fishing at Shawnee State Fishing Lake just north of Topeka.
When we arrived at the lake, we found that it was quite a bit windier than we'd anticipated. We had purchased a few things at Walmart, including Canadian nightcrawlers, dough bait for catfish and shad. Normally, when I catfish at the lake, I prefer to use chicken liver, but they had run out. I had also purchased a glow-in-the-dark bobber and a few big flashlights, which cost only $3.75.
I brought my two big catfish poles and decided to let Handy use one of them. On mine, I put the glow-in-the-dark bobber, a weight, a hook with a worm on it, another weight and then a hook with a shad. On my other pole, a Johnson spinning reel, I simply put a bobber, an anchor and a worm. I find the bobber usually helps a lot in night fishing situations, but with the way the waves were going, it would really only help if a big fish was on.
I really liked having the glow-in-the-dark bobber, but it did have its drawbacks. The area we were fishing was extremely rocky and in the event of a line snagging (which it did twice) the bobber was likely to pop off underwater. The first time I was able to drive around the lake and get it, but the second time it disappeared into the darkness.
When we arrived at the lake, we found that it was quite a bit windier than we'd anticipated. We had purchased a few things at Walmart, including Canadian nightcrawlers, dough bait for catfish and shad. Normally, when I catfish at the lake, I prefer to use chicken liver, but they had run out. I had also purchased a glow-in-the-dark bobber and a few big flashlights, which cost only $3.75.
I brought my two big catfish poles and decided to let Handy use one of them. On mine, I put the glow-in-the-dark bobber, a weight, a hook with a worm on it, another weight and then a hook with a shad. On my other pole, a Johnson spinning reel, I simply put a bobber, an anchor and a worm. I find the bobber usually helps a lot in night fishing situations, but with the way the waves were going, it would really only help if a big fish was on.
I really liked having the glow-in-the-dark bobber, but it did have its drawbacks. The area we were fishing was extremely rocky and in the event of a line snagging (which it did twice) the bobber was likely to pop off underwater. The first time I was able to drive around the lake and get it, but the second time it disappeared into the darkness.
Luckily, the first time I lost the bobber was right after I caught a catfish. I was walking around the area when all of a sudden I noticed my glowing red bobber was nowhere to be found. I quickly grabbed up my pole and gave it a hard yank, then began reeling. I felt the fish on the other end fishing and I knew instantly it was a catfish. As I reeled, all of a sudden it began to feel like something HUGE was on the other end of the line, about how I'd imagine a 40-pound catfish would feel. In the heat of the moment, I allowed myself to believe it could be such a monster, but then I realized that as I was reeling it wasn't fighting, just staying in the same spot, and I knew the fish must have been stuck behind a rock. I walked around the area to get a better angle and continued reeling. I was scared I would break the line and lose the fish, although my 20-pound test held strong. After what seemed like an hour of reeling, I finally saw a red light coming toward the surface and realized I had loosened the fish from the rock.
It wasn't a huge catfish but it was a decent one for that lake, probably between two and three pounds. Most catfish from the state lake weigh in at a pretty similar weight, with the occassional four or five pounder thrown in. In the midst of the battle, I had knocked over my chair and the pole that was sitting in it. During the fight I thought I had noticed my other bobber go under briefly, though I figured whatever was on it had probably gotten loose by now. Nevertheless, years of fishing experience told me that there was always a chance. I yanked back and begin reeling in, only to find in disbelief that a small bass had biten the hook. While I was messing with my fish, I failed to notice my bobber had fallen off the line and was heading toward the opposite bank.
When I finally got back and got my line situated to do some more fishing (about 1 a.m.), I figured my luck had floated away similar to my bobber. I found out I was right, sitting for another hour without a significant bite before getting snagged yet again on a rock. This time, the line snapped as I tried to shake it loose and my bobber took off into the darkness.
In the end, the wind and waves overcame us, but we did learn that a succesful night fishing trip requires either a bright glow-in-the-dark bobber or a big flashlight and a calm surface. It becomes much more difficult to read a bobber when the waves are moving it all about the place. You can also use your finger on the line to tell if a fish is on, which we ended up doing in several cases, but it's more fun to see a bright red, battery-operated bobber plunge into the dark depths of a lake as a fish takes hold of your worm.
It wasn't a huge catfish but it was a decent one for that lake, probably between two and three pounds. Most catfish from the state lake weigh in at a pretty similar weight, with the occassional four or five pounder thrown in. In the midst of the battle, I had knocked over my chair and the pole that was sitting in it. During the fight I thought I had noticed my other bobber go under briefly, though I figured whatever was on it had probably gotten loose by now. Nevertheless, years of fishing experience told me that there was always a chance. I yanked back and begin reeling in, only to find in disbelief that a small bass had biten the hook. While I was messing with my fish, I failed to notice my bobber had fallen off the line and was heading toward the opposite bank.
When I finally got back and got my line situated to do some more fishing (about 1 a.m.), I figured my luck had floated away similar to my bobber. I found out I was right, sitting for another hour without a significant bite before getting snagged yet again on a rock. This time, the line snapped as I tried to shake it loose and my bobber took off into the darkness.
In the end, the wind and waves overcame us, but we did learn that a succesful night fishing trip requires either a bright glow-in-the-dark bobber or a big flashlight and a calm surface. It becomes much more difficult to read a bobber when the waves are moving it all about the place. You can also use your finger on the line to tell if a fish is on, which we ended up doing in several cases, but it's more fun to see a bright red, battery-operated bobber plunge into the dark depths of a lake as a fish takes hold of your worm.
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