About
Welcome to www.learntocatchcatfish.com
I started this website to do what I had originally intended with one of my other catfish fishing websites that I started a while back as this will be much easier to maintain and keep current.
My name is Chad Ferguson, and I am a professional catfish angler from Saginaw Texas. Folks call me Chad, some folks call me “redneck” (it’s a term of endearment in these parts) and there are some others that call me “mulehead”. Thes rest that are out there, well I probably cannot repeat what they might call me!
I have lived in the North Texas area my entire life and have been fishing for catfish on the lakes of North Texas, Central Texas and East Texas since I was a small child. I grew up fishing for catfish from a very young age with rod and reel, trotlines and yo-yo’s on Possum Kingdom Lake and Eagle Mountain Lake. I have done a lot of white bass fishing, hybrid striped bass fishing, striper fishing and gar fishing. I even did some bass fishing along the way before I “saw the light” and realized that fishing for catfish was my true passion. I consider Eagle Mountain Lake, Lake Lewisville, Lake Worth and the Brazos River to be my “home lakes” but have spent a considerable amount of time fishing on lakes all over Texas, Oklahoma, and even some other parts of the country as well. I also love to chase saltwater fish, especially Tarpon.
I have been a professional fishing guide in North Texas for going on 10 years now and have guided catfish fishing trips on a number of North Texas area lakes including Eagle Mountain Lake, Lake Worth, Lake Ray Roberts, Cedar Creek Lake, Lake Lewisville, The Brazos River, Lake Grapevine and Lake Texoma.
I fish on the pro staff of Pure Fishing (Berkley, Abu Garcia, Shakespeare), Daiichi Hooks, Costa Del Mar Sunglasses, Xpress Boats, West Boats, Fitec Cast Nets, Bee Ready Fishing Rod Holders, Digger Anchors, Rod Wrap, Minnn Kota Trolling Motors, and there may be a couple of others that I am probably forgetting!
I have been featured in numerous newspapers, magazines, and fishing TV shows throughout my carreer as a professional catfish angler. Some of these publications include, The Dallas Morning News, The Fort Worth Star Telegram, Field and Stream Magazine, In-Fisherman Magazine, In-Fisherman Catfish Insider Magazine, The Tarrant County Times Record, Texas Fish and Game Magazine and Texas Parks and Wildlife Magazine. I have also done numerous radio interviews that you can probably find on the internet as well as regular fishing reports on the Texas Fishing and Outdoor Show. I have done numerous television appearances with Barry Stokes on the Toyota Trucks Southwest Outdoors Report, several TV Shows with the Texas Divas on the Men’s Channel, and also the Lady on The Lake Fishing TV on Comcast Cable. 
For more information on my guide service you can go to any of the following websites www.txcatfishguide.com www.lewisvillefishingguide.com www.catfishfishingguide.com
In addition to being a professional catfish fishing guide I started a website in 2002 called The Texas Catfishing Resource (or what most people call Whisker Kitty from the websites address at www.whiskerkitty.com). I started www.whiskerkitty.com with the intention of it being a resource for Texas catfish anglers to learn and exchange information. The site still exists today but it is mostly archived information, all of the new catfish fishing information will be added to this site that you are currently looking at for now on.
When I started www.whiskerkitty.com I was pretty inexperienced at building websites (that was my first one) and I didn’t realize the mistakes I was making during the design and maintenance and how they would effect me in the long run when I wanted to update and add information. Over the past few years I had basically put www.whiskerkitty.com on the back burner and have not been updating it or adding any new catfish fishing information to it. I have been playing around with some different options for the last few months trying to decide what I could do to revive the project and begin to again spread and share all the information that I have on fishing for catfish. I also wanted to make sure that it was not just a website for Texas catfish anglers but rather for ALL catfish anglers in the United States. This is because the information that myself and others on this site will be sharing with you is information that will be valid just about anywhere that you want to fish for catfish in the United States. So this is the birth of www.learntocatchcatfish.com
What you are seeing from this website now is just the beginning and I am working on getting everything functional and user friendly. It will take time, so bear with me, but I do plan on adding content to www.learntocatchcatfish.com on a regular basis. If you have suggestions for the website, information you would like to see added, or want to ask a question please feel free to contact us by email at learntocatchcatfish@gmail.com
For now I will be doing most of the posting here until I get everything up and running and functioning 100% like I want it. I do have a bunch of guys that are professional catfish anglers (catfish fishing guides) and some amazing catfish tournament fisherman that are ultimately going to jump in and help with writing articles and adding information to www.learntocatchcatfish.com I also have a bunch of “oldtimers” as well that have been catfishing for longer than I have been alive that have expressed an interest in jumping in to help share what they have learned about fishing for catfish and catfishing.
So anyway, back to my story. Around the time that I started www.whiskerkitty.com I also started making an old family catfish bait for my own personal use. Through word of mouth from my fishing guide clients and friends I started getting a lot of phones calls and emails with people wanting to purchase my catfish bait for their own catfish fishing. I was making it and giving it away for a long time, finally one day someone mentioned selling it and it all kind of went downhill from there. The catfish fishing bait exploded and it started selling like hotcakes and the rest was history, the whole thing was way bigger than I ever intended it to be. The bait is called Redneck’s Catfish Bait Soap. It is a homemade Lye Soap Catfish Bait used for jug fishing, juglines, trotlines, limb lines, bank lines and rod and reel fishing. The bait is made from the same recipe that my family used over 65 years ago and I still make every single batch of it myself here in Saginaw Texas with my family and a few family friends that help now and then. It is a true “homemade” catfish bait that is still made with the exact recipe and ingredients that were in the catfish soap bait when the recipe was invented over 65 years ago. The website for the bait is www.catfishbaitsoap.com it is yet another website that has not been updated in a good while but I am working on it, one of these days I will get it all updated and functioning correctly and get all the latest and greatest information on the website. There are a bunch of “copy cat” baits floating around out there so if your looking for my catfish bait soap make sure that you look for Redneck’s Catfish Bait Soap. Currently the best way to get the catfish bait soap is to call Olsens Pro Am Fishing Shop at 817-625-0831 they can take your order over the phone and ship it to you.
During the time that I was just getting started with selling the catfish bait soap for jug fishing and trotlines I was also doing a ton of jug fishing with juglines and fishing with trotlines, limb lines and bank lines. I was really doing a TON of jug fishing though and I was spending a lot of time tinkering around with different fishing jugs (juglines). I had several designs I was working with and testing all centered around trying to compact the design beyond a standard bleach bottle fishing jug or coke bottle fishing jug (and while we are on that subject everything in Texas is a Coke, that means Dr Pepper, Mountain Dew, 7-UP, they are all called Cokes). I was frustrated with going out to set 25-30 juglines for jug fishing and my boat being spilled over with bleach bottles. After testing juglines, doing a lot of jug fishing, rebuilding and doing more jug fishing and going through a very long process I finally came up with what I believed to be the ultimate jugline for jug fishing catfish. I made some of these fishing jugs for myself and fished with them for months, and also gave a bunch of the fishing jugs away. Just like the craziness that went on with people beating down my door trying to get the catfish bait soap I started getting phone calls and emails from people wanting fishing jugs for their own jug fishing, so it was at that point that Redneck’s Juglines were born. I started selling the “original” juglines for jug fishing and sold these for about a year before I started selling the “flagging juglines” for jug fishing. I was young and inexperienced in the world of business back then and failed to patent my designs and what soon followed was a slough of copy cat fishing jugs and knock offs with minor variations from my original jug fishing (juglines) design.
A few year back between running guided catfish fishing trips, making bait and making juglines and the birth of my second child my world kind of got “rocked” and things went into a bit of a tail spin with trying to keep up with everything and it all caught up with me. I had to take the last couple of years and work on regrouping and reorganizing and getting things back where they were managable both in my personal and professional life. I have finally reached that point so things are starting to get full bore again.
As of this writing (2/15/2010) we will be shipping Redneck’s Catfish Bait Soap as soon as the weather warms up ( we cannot make bait when it is cold) so you can call Olsen’s (number was listed above) and order from them, If you are interested in purchasing juglines for jug fishing contact me by email and I will do my best to get you some fishing jugs, I am still working on getting everything together so we can start shipping again but it may take a little while.
I have some other catfish fishing inventions that I have perfected as well that would revolutionize some of their areas of fishing for catfish but have had to put a hold on them until I feel like I am equipped to manage them and have the capabilities to get patents before releasing them to the public.
During the time that I have been running guided catfish fishing trips, manufacturing Redneck’s Catfish Bait Soap and Redneck’s Juglines and running www.whiskerkitty.com I have had the pleasure to become friends and work with some of the greatest catfish anglers in the country, and have made some great friends and fishing buddies in very unusual places along the way. It has been a wild ride but I wouldn’t change a bit of it.
So that’s a little history on me and my fishing background, at risk of this sounding like an infomercial I will move on to a little more about me.
I am married and have been for almost 14 years as of this writing. I have a beautiful wife that has been patient along the way with all my adventures into the fishing world. There is not many women who would have put up with the nonsense that I have dished out and the mistakes I have made along the way. From the phone calls at 3 in the morning from people wanting to buy catfish bait soap and juglines, to me coming home covered from head to toe in blue catfish slime or catfish punch bait day in and day out for weeks at a time, she has been there through it all. She is my rock.
I have two great kids that love to fish and manage to get in on the action whenever they can whether it be helping me catch bait for guide trips, helping me make, package or deliver catfish bait soap or going out and fishing all day they are there every step of the way and are always right in the middle of it all. They are there and we have fun doing it whatever it is. They love to fish and we get on the water and go fishing whenever we have the chance. 
If there is one thing I can get you to take away from this, it’s to teach your children to hunt and fish and appreciate the outdoors, but also teach them to RESPECT the outdoors. There are valuable lessons learned every step of the way.
I have two dogs that are thrown in the mix and there is never a dull moment with them and the kids around the house, it’s always an adventure.
I love life and try to live it to the fullest. I spent the better part of ten years working as a paramedic and in the emergency medicine field which taught me a lot of valuable lessons about life. Spending time looking people in the eye at what would be potentially the worst or best moments in their lives gives you tremendous insight into what is valuable in life and what your priorities are (or should be).
Besides fishing, and my family I stay so darn busy I don’t have a lot of time for other things.
I workout a lot boxing and kickboxing and doing MMA. I am a gym rat as much as I have time to be. I like to run as well and try to do one or the other every day, it keeps me from going insane. I am a movie buff and like to watch movies as much as I can.
I love to cook, especially with my kids whether it be cooking out on the grill, or cooking in the kitchen I like making big meals and trying new things and getting them to help with the cooking. I love to make desserts and any kind of Southern recipes or cowboy cooking recipes.
I like to to go camping and hunting as much as I can, but it seems it’s harder and harder to find time to do so any more.
I like working on projects around the house, building things and remodeling etc MOST of the time, but have some off days now and them (have to add that disclaimer in case my wife reads this).
I enjoy writing as well and doing things that are artistic, as well as photography. At one point I was going to pursue a career in journalism and photojorunalism but some how got mixed up in that crazy emergency medical services career and it just never happened. I have done some writing now and then for different magazines and newspapers but it has been a while. I think that may be part of the reason I enjoy creating and maintaining these websites and blogs.
I have a personal blog site that I started as well at www.themulehead.com that will have some fishing information posted on it as well as some recipes, my family adventures, rants and raves and who knows what else.
I hope this helps with giving you some more information about me and letting you know that I am not some web designer that claims to know a bunch about fishing for catfish and started a website.
I want www.learntocatchcatfish.com to be a website that is about YOU and the information that you want to see and hear about and I want to know YOUR comments. If you have questions about fishing for catfish, catfish fishing equipment, catfish tackle, jug fishing, catfish baits, how to catch catfish, where to catch catfish, when to catch catfish or ANYTHING at all about catfish fishing PLEASE send me an email (or you can email me from the “Ask A Question Link” and let me know what your questions are or what catfish fishing informatiom you would like to see.
Make sure that you subscribe to the RSS feed or enter your email address so you can keep up with the updates to this catfish fishing website and information and comment on my posts with your information. I want to know what you think, if information is helpful, or if you still have questions, or what it is that you do that is different, and by all means if you learn something off this website that is helpful please post a comment or shoot me an email and let me know.
Thanks,
Chad Ferguson
Make sure you check out my catfish fishing and personal websites also and again please email me at learntocatchcatfish@gmail.com if you have questions!
www.catfishbaitsoap.com
www.txcatfishguide.com
www.catfishfishingguide.com
www.jugfishing.net
www.lewisvillefishingguide.com
www.whiskerkitty.com
