Real nice cat you got there Sandiland- how much did he weigh do ya know?

Right i was thinking maybe those other cat fish where possibly bullheads being in a pond& all.( dont know really)

When my son was about 6 he caught a bullhead looking fish with tiny little legs one nite in the niagara river-( didnt have a lite or did we keep it)dont know what it was- i guess someone could have even throwen in some tropical or pet fish into the river even.

It was upstream of love canal( first superfund toxic clean upsight in the nation ?-) tho i have seen some mutated fish come out of the generalarea before- nothing with legs.

is it radioactive?

That superfund site? nope - dioxin& various other chemical soup mixs- they make or have made a whole lota things in that whole area...

Wy has quite a few radioactive containmentponds in the one area-( also petro chemical sludge ponds etc) from mining the uranium etc there in Wy( some ppl kiddinly say the fish glow)- never fished there myself.

If Nuclear reactor power ever becomes popular theres a whole lot of uranium etcin Wy still to be had.

I would say mine was at 17-18lbs and my buddies might have been around 20lbs. I used to weigh them but that was the first yr I started to catch these critters. After awhile I stopped using the scale. I would just measure length and look at girth..... w/in 1lbs all the time. So I figured why stress the fish out by hangin them out of the water vertically. I did this several times and heard the vertibrae pop like an accordian........ measure B4 and after and the fish is now 1" longer. Can't be too healthy for the fish...... they might swim away but probabley die in the next few days. I want these beasts to swim away as healthy as possible..... So's I can hook'em again and again and again.
I'm looking at making a bag so the fish is supported for weighing...... also to keep the slime coat healthy and the mud off. Europeans use them for carp, but I'm not willing to pay that much. I make people 'cringe' when they see me coming down the bank to fishand its not always the smell of my bait[8D]. I use a gaff w/a 3' shaft, reach down the line and pop the hook out w/fish still in water. Its nice to use barbless hooks, alot easier on the fish. People think I'm gonna gaff'em to bring them up the bank. LOL

They look like real nice size fish& pretty heavy thanks- didnt relize the other was bigger.( so far i havent got anything even close )Sounds like yall take a lot of care in things -, your tackle& fish handling etc & have a real good time doing it - good for yall.

where in wy are you?

childers that would be a brown bullhead catfish you caught out here they call them speckeled cats. just curious what it weighed? thats probably the biggest brown bullhead ive seen. and the world record for them is just over 5 lbs.

I live outsideof & southwest of the city ofcasper( going tward the town of alcova)- that is central Wy.

No town or incoperated area where i live.

thats kinda like the area I live in here in AZ. closest town is 20 miles away.