How to Tell a Catfish Apart

There is more than one type of catfish. If you know what to look for it is fairly easy to tell the different types of catfish apart. There are channel cats, oppoloosa cats or yellow cats, the blue catfish, the mud cats or pollywogs.

To identify the channel cat you will be looking for a fish that is generally dark gray on his back and a dirty white underbelly. The channel cat has distinguishable marks or spots on their backs that will remind you of freckles. These are good eating fish and are found in all types of fresh water.

The oppoloosa cat or yellow cat can be recognized by there really wide head and their yellowish skin tone. When the fish is still in the water it will appear as if the fish is a ruddy brown color but when the fish is removed from the water it will start to take on a yellow hue. The mouths on these fish are wide and flat and it appears that the tails of the younger yellow cats are extremely long. It appears that these catfish grow their length and then they add body weight. So a thirty pounder and a sixty pounder will actually be about the same length.

The blue cats will be easy to recognize by the fact that they are unusually long for the width they are and they are very dark in color. The blue they call a high fin blue has a head that is narrower than the other cats and their dorsal fin is very prominently positioned than the others. Of all the catfish the high fin blue is the most aggressive and unlike the standard blue catfish these fish are a light blue in color. The mouth on the high fin blue is actually quite small for the mouth on a catfish. The high fin blue is something of a loner and does not run in schools like other catfish.

The mud cat is not very good for eating and you will know when you catch one. These fish are a ruddy brown color and on their belly where other catfish are generally white these fish will have a yellow hue to their flesh. They also have small mouths and they have eyes that appear smaller than the ones on most of the catfish. These fish appear to have a pot belly or an extended belly.