Photo by Ron Sinfelt

Most Sooner State catfishing is done in reservoirs these days.

Oklahoma is blessed with hundreds of thousands of surface-acres of water in dozens of large reservoirs, most of which have abundant populations of channel, blue, and flathead catfish.

But all of these are stream fish by nature. They've adapted well to reservoir environments, but they originally made their home mostly in moving streams. (Why do you think they call 'em "channel cats," anyway?)

Some of my fondest childhood memories are of camping on the banks of creeks and running trotlines under the light of a Coleman lantern. I remember watching eagerly as we pulled ourselves along the line, re-baiting hooks and watching for the telltale movement imparted to the set by a catfish thrashing on a dropper somewhere just ahead.

Catching catfish in streams is a family tradition for many Oklahoma families -- a tradition that predates the construction of most of those big dams and reservoirs. And while the big lakes have inundated many miles of streams, especially in Eastern Oklahoma, hundreds of miles of creeks and rivers whose catfishing can be downright excellent still thread the Sooner landscape.

It doesn't matter whether you fish the clear, rocky streams of the Eastern Oklahoma highlands or the turbid streams of the prairies: Catfish swim just about every flowing stream, and even haunt holes in some intermittent flows. Not one county east of Interstate 35, which roughly bisects the state, is without numerous streams in which catfish of one or more species can be caught.

To begin, let's talk about the larger rivers; there, all three species of larger catfish can be found.

First, of course, is the Arkansas River, which, entering the state north of Ponca City, is dammed in two places to form Kaw and Keystone lakes and gathers the waters of the Salt Fork, Chikaskia and Cimarron rivers before it reaches Tulsa. Below Tulsa, the Arkansas flows free for many miles, augmented along the way by the inflow from dozens of creeks, before swelling in size just above Muskogee, where it's joined by two other major rivers, the Verdigris and Neosho (Grand). Dammed again to form Webbers Falls and Robert S. Kerr reservoirs, it absorbs the Illinois and Canadian rivers. Downstream from Kerr Dam are more navigation pools -- long, narrow reservoirs with lots of moving water.

Catching catfish in streams can be quite different from fishing in reservoirs. Current is the key to finding fish and catching them. Black bass, striped bass, walleyes, catfish -- it doesn't matter: Understanding how the fish relate to current can make your time on the water much more worthwhile.

I believe that fish, like most creatures, are pretty adaptable. They don't always behave the same way in every environment, and they learn to respond to change both rapid and gradual.

Ask anyone who has raised channel cats in a small pond and provisioned the fish either with timer-actuated automatic feeders or by hand. Just prior to the devices' going off and scattering pellets of food over the water, fish will gather under the feeders in anticipation. And I've known people who beat on a metal pole in the water or on the planks of a wooden dock to signal that it's feeding time just before they'd toss out the food. In a short time, fish learn to respond to those signals; even before the first pellet of food hits the water's surface they may start to thrash on the surface of the water as soon as the banging begins.