Ladies and gentleman…. We got him

I wanna give a HUGE thanks to everyone who gave me tips and advice yesterday! I don't post on reddit very often at all and my post yesterday absolutely exploded! And everyone was very kind and helpful.

I went out early this morning to the river at like 4 AM with one goal in mind, catch a damn catfish, I was out all morning with little action, I think I had 2 or 3 bites but nothing committed.

It was around 7 am when I was finally getting ready to call it a day and come back home. It was while I was cleaning up and taking things to my car. ( This is also why my rod is always the last thing I take to the car lol) I got all my stuff picked up and in the car and decided to stand by my rod for "just 10 more minutes" when my rod absolutely folded in half.

I did panic a little lmao! But I grabbed the rod out of it's hold and set the hook as if I had a shark on the other end of my line haha. I then proceeded to fight for my life! I've never fought a fish as strong as this guy, it lasted a good 2 or 3 minutes. I think this is because the fish swam out of the eddie I was in into the river current. But it was so exhilarating! I finally got him in close and I've never caught, let alone handled a catfish so I was a little nervous I was gonna get spined, but I managed to get him on the stringer and now me and my oldest daughter have lunch! (Catfish recipes wanted btw)

I took all the advice I got yesterday to heart and decided I was going to go with frozen shrimps on a classic Carolina rig. 20# main line to a 30# mono leader.

The fish was just under 6 pounds and about 25sh inches. I'm so excited and now I think I'm obsessed! This has been by far the most exciting experience I've had while fishing. So again I thank everyone for taking the time out of your day to help me out! This one's on you guys:)

And again drop you catfish recipes!