Big Fish: A pair of Texas anglers may have noodled up a record catfish

Everything’s bigger in Texas, especially the catfish.

>> Read more trending

A couple of Texas fishermen used a hands-on method to pull in what may turn out to be an all-time record flathead catfish.

Justin White and Drew Moore were noodling at Lake Tawakoni, known as “The Catfish Capital of Texas,” which attracts anglers from all over the country hoping to land trophy catch, the Houston Chronicle reported.

Noodling is a hard-core method of fishing. Anglers thrust a hand into holes on the side of the muddy bank and wiggle their fingers. Catfish like to hide in those places and are attracted to the wiggling fingers, which they chomp down on.

The fisherman holds on to the fish’s mouth for dear life and muscles the it out the water, according to Field and Stream. That’s not an easy thing to do. Especially when the fish weighs a whopping 98.7 pounds on a certified scale. It took both of them to get the angry female into the boat.

Ordinary fishermen usually stand on the bottom and noodle in holes a few feet down. Not these guys. They’re serious noodlers.

Field and Stream said they used underwater breathing equipment to scout out a promising new fishing hole, 14 feet under the surface. They had pulled a couple of 30-pounders out of it, but the day they caught the big one, they tried a new tactic and swam through a small rectangular opening in the concrete abutment of a nearby bridge.

“We swam into the hole side-by-side,” White told the Chronicle. “You have to swim into the hole five or six feet before you see the fish.” They thought going in that they were giong to catch a big one, but they had no idea what they had gotten into.

A tremendous catfish that was almost as long as they are tall started ramming them. The fight went on for a while before the two men managed to subdue the fish by squeezing it between their bodies. They both managed to get a hand in her mouth, White said. That was not the end of the battle. They had to swim out of the hole and up another 14 feet holding a giant, thrashing fish.

“Anybody can grab one of these fish, but not everyone can hang onto them,” White told Field and Stream.

Back in the boat, they didn’t know what they had. They weighed it twice on a hand-held scale and it came in at more than 100 pounds both times. After a round of high fives, they decided they’d better get this one weighed on the certifield scale at Duck Cove Marina. It came in at 98.7, which is certainly one of the biggest catfish ever noodled and may be the biggest ever to be weighed on a certified scale.

After they announced their catch on Facebook with pictures and their fish story, they got a congratulatory message from a guy who knew exactly what they’d been through.

In 2021, Levi Bennett of Oklahoma noodled a 5-foot, 106-pound catfish, according to Field and Stream. But he released it before he weighed it on a certifield scale.

He wrote: “These boys got an absolute giant. Hard work paid off. Congratulations to them.”

The men said they released the fish “to fight another day.” White said they had ofted joked that if they caught a 100-pounder they’d retire.

“Luckily, this didn’t beat it,” he said to Field and Stream. They’ll be back on the water as soon as possible.