they are seriously everywhere...very easy to spot (black cloud moving through the water)...question do Bass/Walleye/Catfish feed on these things?? I spotted a really nice largemouth combing the shore after something, so I hooked a dead carp minnow on a jig head and put it right in front of his nose...and he wanted none of it...maybe he was feeding on these fry? I didn't have my arsenal of spinner baits since I was specifically targeting panfish, but i wonder if a black spinner bait worked slow could imitate that, and gotten him to strike?
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It is hard to get a fish who is feeding on tiny things to hit a big lure. If the bass are feeding on fry that are an inch long, a spinnerbait would be far too obtrusive to imitate a small fish. A small black in-line spinner might get noticed, as would a small 1"- 2" black curly tail grub on a small jighead.
You may try one of the tiny crankbaits on the market like the Strike King mini cranks, the Yo Zuri Snap Bean and the Norman Lures Tiny N and Deep Tiny N.
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I don't know what they WERE feeding on, but yes, they do eat those catfish fry, spines not withstanding.
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[cool][#0000ff]I'm guessing those were bullhead (mud cat) fry rather than channel cats. Typical of how they act after first emerging from the nest. Sometimes there is a protective male underneath them and they will smack a lure dropped into the ball of babies.[/#0000ff]
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[#0000ff]Bullheads are eaten by all predators in the lake from the fry stage until they are too large to swallow. They are very good food and both walleyes and big cats love them. Used to catch a lot of big walleyes by fishing big black marabou jigs at the outflow of the Jordan River after the walleyes were through spawning. They ganged up in there to slurp up the small bullheads and white bass being pulled down into the river by the current. And any that we filleted had bullheads in their innards.[/#0000ff]
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You might try the [url "http://www.amazon.com/Gitzit-Fish-Lures-Baby-Dusty/dp/B003OBUIBI"]Gitzit [/url]baby blue eyes. They have a jig head, and softbody - come in several colors, but look just like catfish fry. Here's another [url "http://www.gobstock.com/_037069833706-Gitzit-Fish-Lures-Baby-Blue-Eyes-Chartreuse"]supplier[/url].
I've seen clouds of them black bitties swarming around Cutler along the Valley View.
I'd suppose you can't net them for bait, since even Bullheads are a game species.
But I wonder if one is likely to find carp minnows in the same area?