Figured I'd go directly to the fountain of knowledge here...or indirectly since I believe you also talk with some of the best commercial cat-fishermen in the South LOL.

Pic for street credibility...



It turns out that waaaayy back in the 80's when people told us we definitely never caught a flathead out of the western basin of Lake Erie, they were wrong. It also turns out that there is evidence of a spawning population in the Thames River at Lake St Clair. Now, I want to catch one and document it (for ADHD reasons LOL).

I catch loads of channel cat, big ones too, but I am wondering if there is a better way to target flathead specifically? Different habitats? Different bait? Issue here is that use of live sunfish and many other species is illegal, so I am a bit stumped. I'd take an incidental, but I'd rather do this right if possible.

And I ain't ashamed to say I'm not the expert on some things...help?

Bronze colored gold fish, bluegill, rice slicks are good baits. Woody cover and patience.

Live bait is best for flathead. Surely you can figure out some way to make it work.

If ya can't use any live bait, you can try fresh cut bait. Might not hook up with a hog but the smaller ones will go for it.

You a catch a them year round obviously .if you have low population the best time to try for them is during the spawn in your area . The spawn in my area April and may.As you stated you cannot use sun fish.Tabbies will eat any live fish even small catfish.You can use cut bait also .Slow moving deeper water is better here.Also get your bait on the bottom.

I've caught many flathead on fresh cut bait. normally when live bait is running low and cut bait goes at least twice as far.

Thanks all! I'll try to figure out how to source decent sized, legal live bait. There just isn't the availability or choice here like there is in the states, people don't want to think much beyond whatever sized emerald shiners are running at the moment, so that's all the commercial dealers sell. I'm sure up north of me you can easily buy white suckers for pike/musky but it just doesn't seem to be a thing here.
I'm able to catch my own bait, so I'll review what species are legal and go from there. Otherwise, it's probably going to be cut carp.

Bullheads in the 4-7" range are the best flathead bait you can get IMO. Hook them up through the roof of the mouth, just behind the sandpaper teeth to keep them on the hook and very lively. I look for slack water out of the current in the deepest water I can find that has trees and such in the hole for cover too ideally.

Flatties are apex ambush predators. Look at where their eyes are, top of the head. They strike from below. Live bait drifted into woody, snaggy cover or the routes from there to shallow flats, they'll venture out onto these flats at night to prowl. Look for the pile up log jams downstream of bends or up on the flats just off the main channel. These are ideal places for baitfish to be swept right in to them. If no wood look for rock, especially if it's ledge rock with overhangs and crevices for them to hole up or spawn in.

Live bait is best, rigged up to give them enough leash to be active but not so much to bury up in cover. Skipjacks are about as good as it gets but bullheads are almost as good. Large gizzard or hickory shad are good but not as tough on a hook. Live bream or large shiners will do in a pinch. If live isn't possible, choose a good oily bait like skipjack or shad.

X2 on on bullheads. you want a bait that stays alive. 4-6 inches are big enough. that stay alive thing is why goldfish and green eared sunfish are also great baits. I have caught them on crappie also but they dont stay active very long. Neither do shad.

… live mudcat with the fins clipped on limb lines in the river

… as said they like to hang in and around logjams and rocks

… good luck to you

… they sell big goldfish around here and they work too

Add patience to your arsenal. They aren't schoolers like blues or channels. Depending on available cover and food a hole might hold just one or twenty. You don't always get a quick bite so give it time to work. You might only get a few bites a night but the bites you do get may be a real hoss.

In your area they will definitely migrate to the deepest holes for winter so look to target those routes if you know the local timetable for that.

Thanks again. The Thames River by me is slow moving (relative to the Detroit river anyhow), muddy and loaded with trees. I think I'll take a run up there next possible opportunity with some live suckers.

Bullheads if you can get them otherwise big bluegill, small channels . Set the holes in the small ditches and on the big creeks set the current breaks of those wing walls especially if there’s a tree fell or debri

Don't be afraid to go deep. Flatties are the bottom dweller of the three. Blues will school and suspend on structure flatties won't.

Big bluegill might occasionally bite night crawlers fished on fairly large hooks, like say 5/0, and you sure couldn’t help it if a flathead swallowed the bluegill before you could reel him in. Just sayin.

Large balls of nightcrawler (6 or more) with lots of ends loose to wiggle around on a big hook can work if you are on location. Learned this from a guy in Clinton IN. He fished the Wabash river hard.

I tried it below a dam here in Iowa when I ran out of live bluegills (they were getting beat in the current) and it worked almost instantly.

Bullheads in the 10" range in the summer months.
I start backing off on size as fall approaches and the days get shorter and the weather starts cooling off.

Carp the same size of you can find them.

Bullheads are my first choice
They won't drown when the current is swift

Not afraid of nice sized blue gills and gold fish in lakes

Crappie make great flatty bait if it's legal in your state.

In the area I'll be fishing, the bullheads would strip your hook bare in about 5 seconds flat LOL. I'm trying to confirm the legality of live bullheads for bait now, because I can easily access unlimited supplies of those with a small detour over to the Lake Erie side of the county.

The list of allowable live bait seems to be limited to a couple species of shiners, suckers, chubs and sticklebacks (no sticklebacks down here).

Our version of your state's DNRs made a big revamp to our bait regs in 2017 and I didn't really stay up to date on them because I was mainly fishing for channel cats and carp using prepared baits and bass, crappie and bluegill using artificials.