A couple months ago, Turk “THE guide” on the St Croix River ( http://www.croixsippi.com ) sent a fella to me that was looking for a cat trip for his friend that was back from Afganistan. Last night was the night I had the pleasure of taking Curtis and David out catten.
It was David’s first time out flatheading and one that I’m thinking he might remember for a while.
This week I’m calling Evert’s Resort home as Mr. Hospitality Dean is on vacation. (Did I mention that when the cat’s away the mice will play? All walleye gear/lures in stock are 10% off. Just don’t ask me how to use it! 
)
Once underway, we went to a location that had deep water and the most flow available in the area. With my standard rigging…the 10/0 Gamakatsu hook, 4 oz no-roll sinker all tied to the Garcia 7000 with 80 pound Power Pro, we sent our bullheads down to the depth of 40 feet just behind a 30 footish hump.
Last night was challenging because of my slight errors. Curtis noticed the rod behind me “kind of” bending down towards the water. I figured we where hung up on a rock but with a quick glance toword the 7000…I noticed that I didn’t put it into free spool… 
No matter! I picked up the rod by hitting free spool and handed it to the first batter which was David.
He set the hook as per our coaching conversation prior and the fight was on! I could have loosened the drag a bit…but it looked like David was having a good time..mono on mono with the cat. In the coaching I ask customers to try to pull line out of the reel…generally they pull with the line wrapped around their had and they end up hurting their had somewhat. The line just won’t come off the reel. This is a way to gauge the size of a cat prior to seeing it. No line coming off the reel means less than 15 pounds. Some line coming off on runs means up to 25 lbs and if it just keeps pulling drag…we are talking a 25+ pound fish. So, when the line was being pulled off regularly and I notice David wasn’t making much progress, Curtis and I started a round of poker. 
David eventually pumped the flattie off the bottom and into my waiting net. A couple pictures, tape and a weight…off she went to fatten up by eating more walleyes and saugers. 
David’s first flathead came in at 39 pounds and some change.
Although I’m still learning Pool 4 (with alot of help from friends 
) I’m starting to find a few of the thousands of flathead haunts. New water…new opportunities and of course new challenges.
I have to mention that there was one boat fishing withing shouting distance from us. David’s bite came within 15 minutes of rigging. The other fisherman came over and said that he was fishing there for two hours with worms and never had a bite…he sounded a little frustrated when he asked what we were using for bait. 
He stopped into the resort tonight and we had a fairly long conversation about flat fishing…I can tell…he has the fever! 
The other little human error piece was while motoring out of this area, I glaced at my gps and notice I was a little off course. I don’t really watch too closely while it’s still light..just as I started turning what happened happen so quickly I can’t recollect it. Just saw something in the water and head a loud noise, then the motor jumped in the air. After a good inspection of the motor and watching the below deck area, I felt comfortable enough to continue fishing. At first I thought I hit a wing dam, but once the boat was out of the water today, I’m leaning towards a BIG log because I couldn’t find any damage to the skag, prop or boat. A wingie at 25 mph will leave a mark! …this is where “new challenges” come in. 
Ps Mayflies are STILL hatching!! 
