Have Confidence in Yourself

by Ron Wong

Experience builds confidence.

The boat is loaded, tackle has been prepped, lunch is packed with plenty of bait on hand; are we ready to go catch some catfish. The planned fishing trip is to a body of water where you have little experience. Can we catch some fish? We all think we can, but unless you have confidence in your equipment, partner and your knowledge, chances could be diminished.

As Bill Dance says, “Confidence is the best lure or bait in your tackle box. Believing you can do it, really does make good things happen.”

We are creatures of habit, if something works, we continually go back to using it. This holds true to having a successful catfishing trip no matter where you go.

I recently spent some time with brothers Michael Haney and Rodney Crimm, both professional catfishermen. We were on Lake Jordan and the Alabama River out of Wetumpka, Alabama this past spring.

Michael said, “Having my brother as my partner gives me confidence that we will always have a chance to win tournaments because we work so well together. There are times we disagree, but it isn’t about losing confidence and that is important to be successful.”

Lake Jordan has a good population of channel, blue and flathead catfish with early summer the best time to catch good numbers of fish. The Alabama River has some excellent catfishing due to many deep holes and moving water with excellent river access. The Alabama state record flathead catfish was caught out of the Alabama River near Prattville. The beast weighed 80 pounds.

Although they had never fished Lake Jordan Haney and Crimm had confidence that they could catch catfish there.

As Michael said, “Confidence is important in what you are using as it provides insight to do well. It gives you a chance to understand what to do especially when you go to a new place.”

While we were idling around a large cove on Lake Jordan, Haney had his eyes glued to the 12-inch Lowrance graph. He was looking for fish, the right kind of fish and he began explaining the different images on the screen.

“It takes homework to get comfortable in distinguishing what the various images represent,” explained Haney. “It takes some good study time to give you confidence in the equipment you use. At the same time, it provides you with a high level of trust.”

To be successful on the water, you must have confidence in your equipment. To gain that trust your equipment must always perform the task it was designed to do. The Lowrance and Hummingbird graphs must have sharp images to identify various objects in the water 100% of the time.

Michael and Rodney use B’n’M Silver Cat and Elite catfish rods. They use them because of the quality of workmanship in the rod and the outstanding customer service of the company.

Their G3 Sportsman 200 is powered by a 200 horsepower Yamaha engine. That engine must start every time you turn on the ignition, especially if you are river fishing with current for catfish.

Knowing that all their equipment will perform at the highest level all the time gives them confidence each time they hit the water. From there, it is up to the anglers to make the right decisions with a clear mind to catch some fish.

It was about 20 years ago that Michael had fished the Alabama River and had a good day catching flatheads, channel and blue catfish. Fast forward to May 2019, Michael and Rodney fished the river for the first time since then.

During the day, they had success catching fish in deep holes that had some cover in it. At night, fishing ledges, they caught some nice catfish with a flathead that weighed 20 pounds. They said they lost a huge flathead that would probably be more than 60 pounds as they saw the fish several times before the line broke.

On a following day on Lake Jordan, some nice blue channel catfish were caught that were located with their sonar. They explained that during late spring and early summer, after the spawn, catfish will moving to ledges leading to deeper water and become relatively easy to catch using cut shad or live bream.

Because of their experience both fishermen had the confidence they could catch fish on both bodies of water in the Wetumpka/Prattville area although they had not been on the river in 20 years and never on Lake Jordan. Given the success they had, they said fishing on this part of the Alabama River should be on any catfisherman’s bucket list.

Having confidence in your own ability negates myths such as—fish bite the least when the wind is out of the east. If you believe this myth, or other similar ones, then you have no confidence in catching fish. Confidence is a positive mental attitude. Anglers that remain positive no matter what the current circumstances are likely to be successful at catching fish.

Bill Dance says it best, “Have confidence in yourself.” So, put some confidence into your catfishing, it won’t let you down!