Brad's Bites: Getting the Drop

All of my Red River reports from last year had some mention of low water and dealing with where we could and could not go. Let's start 2022 off with a change. We have been flooding here on the Red River since mid-April. It is officially the latest start to catfishing that I have ever had. Right now, the water level is dropping fairly quickly and I am hoping to be in the water by the end of next week, but being realistic it will probably be the week of June 6, because the boat ramps need to be cleaned off from a month plus of silt being deposited on them during the high waters.

Water temperatures right now are in the high 50s which tells us there is great upstream migration of channel catfish coming from Canada. The fish are here or passing through, meaning once we get into fish, the fishing should be great and big fish should be plentiful. Some areas should be fishable from shore right now. Despite the high waters, we are now in the pre-spawn phase and catfish are hunting and hunting hard. This is the time to get just off the main current seams and use fresh baits.

Over the next couple of weeks there will be more to tell as things settle down and we get started.