Summertime Post Spawn Catfishing
June 28, 2024
Kingston
4 photos



Trip Summary
Trip Summary
During Spawn, large catfish will not eat and are instead busy spawning and fighting in 2-10 ft of water. Although catfish do not all spawn at the same time, the 6 week window associated with spawn is a difficult time to catch large fish.
On Watts Bar Lake, large females started being caught during the second week of June, with larger males 2 weeks thereafter. From now until mid August is a great time to target post spawn big catfish in the deeper sections of the river/lake as they are skinny and hungry!
That being said, June has been one of the driest on record, which has caused no flow of water from the various creeks that feed Watts Bar. In addition, TVA is not releasing much water through the Tennessee River systems dams. Low/No Flow means the catfish are not on the move actively feeding and are instead "anchored" to the bottom of the deeper sections of the lake/river. As such, you have to put the bait on their nose rather than letting them run into you. Fortunately, I have found some good water to do just that. See attached pictures here and in customer reviews of large yet skinny catfish from some of the June fishing charter trips.