Topics
Posts
Members
Boards
Forum Topic
July 13, 2026 at 6:05 PM in General
Sometimes in our pursuit of giant bass, the angler, the bass and its prey, all loose. Such as the loss this quality 6lb-12oz, 22.5" largemouth bass due to its own gluttony, causing it to choke to its ultimate demise. Wish I could say I caught this one, but the reality is, l did not.This was truly a unique sight to see and puts things into perspective to learn from: This bass already appeared to have a full stomach and still tried to swallow a 12"+ catfish. We all know bass are opportunistic feeders, but this illustrates the point they will try to overtake prey of sizable proportions. I always say a bass doesn't have a mirror, and truly has no idea how big or small they really are. They just know they want to eat. An 8", 10" or larger bait is nothing to a hungry predator like the bass.- Another key point is how it swallowed this catfish, headfirst. This is valuable information for the angler looking to rig larger soft plastic baits. I'm not a big fan of back stinger hooks, and this is a great point on why they are not necessary, if one is truly looking for a giant bass. Giant bass will try and eat their prey the easiest way they can swallow it: headfirst.Backstory: On June 6th, 2026, I went for an early morning quick bank fishing session and saw this bass explode on the water. It was insane.Then it disappeared. Only to surface a short time later revealing it was struggling and choking. I tried to snag it for almost 30 minutes to see if I could, extract what it was choking on and save it.Unfortunately it quickly expired before I could do anything. Upon extracting the catfish, it was noticed besides its dorsal spines pinned in the roof of the bass mouth, its whisker barbs were already down the gullet making it impossible for the bass to spit the catfish back up and avoid its ultimate fate.I hope someone finds value in my sharing of this unique experience. I know I did, and it's not a total loss to the angler.
Very cool experience to have! Validates the butch brown method of rigging for sure