Mid-river holes are holding bigger catfish, though it takes sorting through a solid bite of smaller ones to connect with a trophy, which this time of year is a fun problem to have. DEO Photo by Brad Durick

By Brad Durick

The past week has been a little up and down on the Red River on the big channel catfish bite, but overall the fishing has been outstanding. You still have to sort through a lot of little fish to get to the big ones, but the big cats seem to be getting bigger and nicer each day.

The best bites have been in mid river holes and it seems that faster water is better most of the time. Sit on the spot for 15-to-20 minutes for the first bite and use your best judgement in order to not over sit.  Over a few hours you can put together a very nice basket of fish for the day. 

As always this season, dead sucker has been my go-to again, but frogs in the morning are really producing. I have not even heard of anyone using goldeye.

The forecast says we have at least two weeks left of good catfishing before things take that final cool off.

Brad Durick is a Dakota Edge Outdoors contributing writer and a licensed ND fishing guide specializing in trophy channel catfish on the Red River in and around the Grand Forks area.