Livescoping below Sketchy DAM

All right, guys. Check it out. Behind me right there. You can see right there. And how do I turn this? Right there. There's a dam. Obviously, a big dam. We've all heard the stories of, man, they were working on that dam down there and they saw catfish the size of Volkswagens. They had eyes like paper plates. I've heard that story everywhere I've traveled. Doesn't matter if you're on Gunnersville, Tennessee River, up north, whatever it is, there is a catfish the size of a Volkswagen with eyes like paper plates. And the scuba divers that were working on the dam saw them. I've heard that all over the country. And I've heard it all my life. And the first place I ever heard it was from that dam right there. I think it was that dam or that dam whenever they were digging out that side. Supposedly, there's catfish the size of Volkswagen. So, we're going to go up there. We're going to check it out. Today we've got live scope on trolling over the rocks. You know, it's kind of sketchy. We're going to go up there. We're going to check it out. See if we can't see a Volkswagen on scope and maybe hook it. You know, I've got some I've got Sunline line, but I'm not sure I can reel in a Volkswagen. But if I could see a catfish the size of a Volkswagen, be pretty happy. So, we've got a number thing right there. I sure a Volkswagen's probably, I don't know, 15 foot long. So, we're going to see if we see a catfish 15 foot long on the live scope today. So, let's make our way up there. All right, we made it up here. There it is. This is a dugout trench. And there's actually a little line of shs right down there about the buoy line. Made it over there. It's pretty sketchy out there, especially in the middle section. There's like a channel over there and a channel over here, but in the middle section, it's actually kind of sketchy. So, now we're up here into where there's a Volkswagen size catfish up there. And you know, I would believe it more if they said it was like 70 lb, you know, or 60 lb stripe or something, but nope. They said the size of a Volkswagen with eyes like a paper plate, which if you know about catfish, they have super small eyes. Even if they're like big, they have really, really small eyes. So, the fact that it had eyes like paper plates makes it where I guess it's got to be bigger than a Volkswagen probably. But this be one of the main baits I throw. This is a ball head jig. And there's two trains of thought whenever the water's cold. Right now, the water's 51°. When the water's cold, some people go to a chunk style trailer and then some people go to like a twisty tail style trailer. And I've seen both. And this right here is actually a Crush City Hedgehog that I've trimmed up and cut down. I slide up on there. And you know, I go back and forth on this. I've went to the twisty style trailers and I've went to the chunk style trailers. And basically, if I'm fishing for a lot of largemouth, I'll go to the chunk style trailer almost always. And it seems like for spots, the little twisty tail does really, really good. And these are some of the best kicking legs on the back of any bait that I've I've really used. So, we're going to uh trim down a hedgehog and hopefully catch us a big old spot of bass on it because there's some really nice spots in this river and I'm going to just kind of pitch a jig to this bank right here and then we're going to look out in the middle at the same time and see if we cannot find a swimming Volkswagen. I mean, leave me a comment down below. Have y'all heard that story where you live about below the dams the scuba diver saw those giant catfish? And if you have heard it, leave me a comment. Let me know you've heard it. And if you've heard a different story, let me know what you've heard down below because I might be the next Jeremy Wade chasing around catfish the size of Volkswagen or what or whatever it is. But I would prefer to catch a bass. And if I do catch a catfish, I want it to be an absolute giant. So, we going to see what we can do down through this bluff bank. You you can see in front of me this bluff bank right here. It does not look natural. I mean, because it's really not. You know, most bluffs are like channel swing banks in a river that, you know, naturally the current hits it the hardest. So, it erodess all kind of the dirt until it gets to the rock. So, that however wide the river is, it just expands over time until it gets to the rock. And that's kind of what makes a bluff bank. But this right here, I don't know exactly what year, but I've heard the stories about it. When they dug this side of the dam, the other side was already here whenever they impounded the lake, but they dug this side out and then made this powerhouse and then made a couple more things that are, you know, kind of break walls for the lake above this. They dropped the lake above this like 30 ft to dig this. And then obviously they used dynamite or you can see I guess they dug like drill down into the rocks and then I guess put dynamite down into the rocks. I'm not I'm not really sure how they how they do that. But you can see there's like striations on the on the rock up there where it looks like it was drilled or something happened to make this into such a pretty place right here. And I'm going to tell you when the current's running this a really good place to catch some fish. But it's a difficult place to fish whenever it's running. But it's always there's always some fish that live in here. And then right now underneath the boat's like 10 ft. And then I think about at that tree right there, it's going to pretty much drop off into a even deeper. So we're going to see if we can't catch them up here. But I'm more concerned with looking on my scope right there and seeing seeing if we find anything that's just absurd absurdly big. But you never know. And I've caught a lot of bass right down through here. Also, you see I'm pitching that ball head jig 73 medium heavy rod. This is actually a LSE custom pro, the new gen one. I I like this reel a lot. When I first got it, to be completely transparent, when I first got this reel right here, I wasn't I wasn't a huge fan of it. You know, I I really wasn't. And then after I put more time in with it and kind of started using it for the intended purpose, you know, I really started to like this this reel more and more and more and it became kind of a reel that I've cranked with a lot and then a reel that I've thrown around some of the smaller baits with. So, it casts really really good. It kind of casts similar to a to a bait finesse reel, which for the first few techniques that I tried to use on this reel, I didn't really like that a ton cuz a a bait finess reel cast differently than a regular bait casting reel. So, I didn't when I first used this reel, took me I I didn't love it. And then now that I've used it for kind of talked to some of the other guys about how they use these reels and kind of got a better game plan, I've actually started to really really enjoy fishing with this reel cuz it cast so well. I've got 14lb line on here right now. 14lb Sunline shooter. Little ball head jig. I showed y'all that a second ago. So you can see on the scope screen right now we're we're about to that tree and it just dropped off to really really deep. And then you can see right there, big school of fish. I'm not sure if any of those are the size of a Volkswagen. I'm pretty sure they're not. If you put them all together, they probably fit in the trunk of a Volkswagen. But we got a school of fish out there. And then right here, we've got a little moochie moochie. If anybody does not know about a mooch minnow, they haven't been bass fishing a ton in the past few years and they haven't been following tournaments cuz this sucker catches them. And right now we don't have any current. We've got kind of actually forgetting bites right now. We have kind of a we have kind of bad conditions for this exact place that we're fishing. But I just downsized. Put a little mooch minnow on. Let's see if we can't get one of these suckers a bite. I got them all chasing me right now. I didn't hit them super super good that cast. And that's a good thing. It's a bad thing. Obviously, you want to hit them as good as possible. But whenever the fish are falling and not biting, now I know I got one more cast that's at least high percentage because I didn't move the entire school on that time. So now I hit them really, really good. Let's see if we can't trick one of them into biting. They're all jumping around. Very, very confident. Those are stripid bass. Very confident of that. I just got deja vu. Real crazy. And I've never scoped up here, but I just got crazy dja vu. Okay, no partakers. They're not partaking in my party right now. So, school of them right there. Unfortunately, I got my PFD on. So, hopefully, you know, you have to wear your PFD if you come past those buoys back there. Hopefully, it doesn't get in the way of the camera, but I am wearing a personal flotation device. You want to be safe. That dam comes on. It's rushing water, which I'm in my Icon VLX20. I would have no problem if the water did come on. I fished up here many, many times with the water on, but got to be safe. Got to follow the laws. There's one right there, boy. Let's see if we can get him to bite. Come on. Come on. He's running. He just now sees my bait. He's turning up on it. Chasing it. Get it, son. Get that thing. Just a little bitty mooch minnow. Just a little snack. Come on, guys. When you get done with your meal and there's a French fry still laying there, are you going to leave it laying there? No, you're not going to. You're going to eat it. That's why these fish should bite this little bitty bait. Little bass French fry is what it is. All right. what prompted this video. And there may be a lot of background noise because of all the water coming in right now, which is not much at all, but it does make a little bit of noise. Me and a buddy were talking and he actually brought up that story and I said, "Dude, I've heard that story my entire life and now that I've traveled around to fish, I've heard that story all over the country." So, finally had a day where I said, "You know what? I'll come out here and just see if there's a Volkswagen swimming around. Man, there's some big ones. There are some big ones over there. And they are deep. And I do not have that heavy of a head on. Let's see. All right. We're about to We're falling down to them. No interest so far. I think I missed them just a touch, unfortunately. All right, we'll see if we can get them this time. They're in about 20 or 25. Actually, they're all the way down to 40 or some fish. I got one chasing it. Oh, that was a big one, dude. That was the Volkswagen. That was the Volkswagen. Oh my god, that was a giant. What was it? That's what I want to know. What kind of fish was it? We got to get us one. We have to get a fish up here. Me personally, I have a hard time telling the size of fish. Whenever my screen is deeper than about I'd say 35. That's where I really have a hard time telling the size. I can tell which one's bigger than the other ones. Oh, do I got a Volkswagen? I do not. What do I got? A baby stripe. Look at that. So, I might be I'm up here fishing where the wives tail says the biggest fish in the world is the world record catfish by 1,000 lbs. And I caught the babyest stripe I've ever caught. Ever. There's some big ones deeper. Those were really shallow and I didn't think those were big ones anyways. Oh, they all followed it out. Tons of them followed it out. I got more babies on me. Oh, he nipped it. I can't believe how good that sucker ate that bait. Come on, get it, you little sucker. That one bit at it. Didn't get it though. There's a lot of fish up here. I mean, a whole lot. Surprising amount of fish up here. So, if y'all ever watched any of my other YouTube videos, you know, typically I film more not using Liv Scope, you know, because when I'm home off the road, I'm not on tour anymore. I typically enjoy fishing without live scope more. So, when I'm home, I typically fish without live scope a lot for my videos, but how else are you going to know what's here without getting it to bite? Cuz I can't always guarantee I'm going to get the biggest fish in this ditch to bite. And if I don't, I still need to know he's here. Look back. I'm behind him. He's going down. Looks like some really, really nice ones around. Some really nice ones. Let's go check this other side. What are all those? What are those? Something small. Very small and schooled up. Let's see. I'm amongst them. Let's see. Oh, it's pulling. I might have a Volkswagen right here, boys. I might have it. I figured it was a catfish. He was fighting like a catfish. Look at him little fell. I think that's a bluecat. And I don't know for sure, but I think bluecats are invasive. So, I don't know if whenever they were digging the dams, there was even any blue cats in here. There may have been. I'm not 100% sure, but I have been told they are invasive. Let's get us a Let's get the slime off of here. You ever just leave the catfish slime on your bait? Sometimes I leave it on there thinking maybe it make them bite. You know, Taco, he's got all the crazy stuff that makes bass bite. Blueberries and ground up stuff. Japanese secrets to make the fish bite. I'm from the dirty river in Alabama. So, best thing we got is a little catfish slime to make them bite. Let's see what we got. We're down here. We're amongst them again. I'm sure these are all catfish. And there is a pile of them. And they do enjoy the mucci. I've caught a bunch of catfish on this thing. Let's see. They're coming up to it. So they ease up to it and they kick away real fast. That's almost always catfish. I say almost always. Stripe do the same thing, but stripe will come up to it and then kick away and make a circle. Catfish typically don't make the circle. Come on, get it, you big sucker. There's a big one right there. Oo, he swerved me. He swerved me. I mean, straight swerve me. Let's see what we can get down there. It is crazy how many fish are right here. I stopped talking cuz I had one. Lord have mercy. I mean, some straight up scoos of them, son. I've seen catfish scored up like this many, many times. I have never made two casts to them, though, until today. First time. Man, they kind of they kind of choosy. A little bit choosy to be honest with you. H. Uh-oh. What do we got there? Golly, that sucker is like three foot long. Almost maybe four foot long. That sucker's big. See it? Get it. Nip it. Nip it. Nip it. Nip it. Just get it. Just get it. Oh, I rushed him. I got anxious. Oh my god. Oh my god. I got anxious. I saw it and I said, "Nip it, dude. Get it. Get it. Get it." And then he freaking bit it. But I just rushed the bite. There's another big. Come on. Oh, he swerved me. I got straight swerve. One's coming up off the bottom. What is it? Oh my god. I should have I should have been ready to show my live scope screen so y'all could see exactly what is happening right here. It's unbelievable. They're all over me. Oh, I guess I should have took the catfish slime off. It didn't seem to do the deal this time. Gosh dog. Dude, the fish here are unbelievable. There are so many. Come on. Let's get them to chasing, then let's get them to nipping. Come on. Just a little nippy. Oh my goodness. There are some big giant ones swimming around. Come on, get it. Come on, get it. Yeah, I think I got about 150 following me. Look at that. Can you see that? Can you see those? Those are all following my bait. Oh man, I'm not prepared. I really didn't know what I was going to see. cuz I have never scoped here. You know, I don't fish here much to begin with. Definitely never scoped. They are some fish here. Good gosh. Maybe they're all just nbound spots. I've got the new best spotted bass lake in the world right here. I've got 300 nlb spots around the boat. Get it, son. Get it. Just a little little inhale. Maybe I need to work it a little faster. Been working it pretty slow and they've been just tailing it. God, that one's giant. That one right there is giant. Oh, big son. I'm going to shorten my screen up. I'm looking a little deep right now. I mean, big giant. I'm going to throw a jerk bed over. See what they do. So, this is my other bait I've got out and ready Maverick Maverick 110. You see the top of the fish are up there in about eight and this bait gets down to about six pretty easily. Oh, yeah. That's perfect. I'm going to come right over them. Uhoh. Golly, they're all over it, but they swerving me. Get some. Man, these suckers are smart. I might have never scoped here, but I got the feeling somebody has fish for these suckers right here, man. No reaction to it. I hit him pretty fair. I mean, I missed him by like 3 feet probably, but I hit him pretty fair. Oh, he sees it that time. Oh, I paused it when I shouldn't have paused it. It's one thing about them stripes is when you get them coming the right at the right time, you can pause it and they'll just eat it. And when you don't when they're not committed and you pause it, they're gone. Now, I'm I assume a lot of those are stripes. I'm not 100% sure. Look at that big sucker. Oh my goodness. Oh, I had one. I got another one. Oh. Oh, he came off. Gosh. Like a four or five lb stripe. Get it, son. He was not as big as a Volkswagen, but he was a good one. Let's see. I knew they were going to bite it. They were just acting differently. Here they come. Come on. Oh, dude. They're biting it. Do I got hooks on this thing? Oh my goodness. I'm actually kind of surprised that I could throw this bait behind a minnow. Oh, what do I got? I got a bass. I got a bass. Oh, spotted bass. Nice little spotted bass. You can tell too, you know, a lot of these lakes around me have spotted bass in them. A lot of spotted bass in them. Like that's probably the number one bass around me, you know, as far as just volume of fish. Now, they don't win many tournaments, but you can tell on the lakes where they live on rock, they get that color to them where they're like really dark almost almost like a brownish green. When they live on them rocks, that's how they get. And in other lakes where they live on clay, they'll get just pretty tiger striped kind of white looking. But that was cool. Uh-oh. What do I got here? Get it, big sucker. That sucker was all over it. I should have been ready to record my screen. Honestly, if you want me to tell you the truth, I thought I was going to troll down through here, look out in the middle, and see a bunch of big giant catfish the size of Volkswagens. Now, that's a joke. I thought I was going to throw down the middle and not see anything to be honest with you. And then I was just going to have to, you know, pitch a jig to the banks and just that was it. Get it, you big sucker. You see how now, right now over there at that dam, it's 45 ft. Right here, we're in 10. Come on. Come on. Come on. Let's get one of these big giants. Oh, he swerved me. He swerved me. That was so surprising that that was a bass. Cuz I mean, I just had like four bites and I saw one was a stripe. I thought they all were stripes depending on how they're rushing up to it. And I threw it over that one. just came up deliberately and got it, which it ate it like a bass. I just didn't think it was going to be because of the history that I had for the past I guess it was about a minute and a half. All right, let's see. See if we can draw some up. I missed them. I missed them. Guys, such a fine line between when to move this bait and when not. They'll come up to it just and then not get it and you're like, do I move it more? Do I move it less? Typically, I'd say it's move it more. But so far today that has not worked. They see it. I made the one cast that wasn't over them. They're everywhere down this bar right here. And I made the one cast where there was not many. Let's see here. They're just now easing up. God, they're all coming out. I missed them a little. Gosh, dude. My completion ratio is not very good. My execution, it's not my execution. It's their execution. They're not getting my bait. Like, it's drop passes. It's not poorly thrown passes. just drop passes cuz they are not getting it. I'm so surprised by just how many fish are in this dag gum ditch. I mean, I kind of get it because when that water comes on, you see about four boats run all all up there, sit down, then just drift backwards. or sometimes they'll, you know, anchor somewhere around in here, but they'll just run up there, drift backwards, and I guess they're catching them. I'll never see them catch them, but they they around them for sure. Come on. About to ease back up there to the dam. See if we can't find that dagum Volkswagen. There's a bunch of fish. There's a bunch of fish. Everywhere we go, there's a bunch of fish. That's That's going to be my Dr. Seuss book. Fish everywhere. None of them are like a Volkswagen. Oh, he sees it. Oh, denied. Straight denied. Denied. There we go. Let's see. We're only dropping in about a hundred. So, can't really expect a bite because there's only about 100. But I think these prefer chicken livers or a cut bait or something. I don't really know how to catch catfish. But I know they don't deny the mooch minnow a lot of times. Caught a lot of fish on the moochie mooch. All right. Madden sees it. Madden wants it. No, he didn't. This is blowing my mind. This is unbelievable. I mean, not that they won't bite. I'm not prepared to catch them. Honestly, I didn't expect to see them. Blows my mind how many fish are in here. I'm pretty certain those are all cat daddies. I think the ones back there are stripes and the ones right here are catfish. That's how it seems to me. Man, really really strange. Wow, look at that one right there. Is that one fish? Oh my god, it is. That is such a giant fish. Whatever it is, this catch is a 27lb bass. If it is, it'll have stripes all down it. It's funny. It's crazy. Really, dude? These suckers don't want to do nothing but follow. I need a leader. Where's the leaders at up here? I don't need a follower. There's so much disturbance up there. I can't see my bait. I think that's it. Yep, that was it. I mean, I saw like 30 up there and I threw up there and they all followed it out and now there's 70 up there. I just don't even understand how there can be so many fish up here. What do I got? They're all baby stripes. which I knew those didn't look big, but there was one out in front of them that did look kind of big. I mean, there's so many. This is crazy. Every time they come up and I think they're about to get it, they just don't. They just don't. What's really weird is the places where I've usually caught them is not the places they're sitting. They are sitting elsewhere, but the big are over there. So, we about to fish right here for a minute and we about to turn right back around. There's one right underneath that foam. It's not It's not a great big Whenever I stop talking, they're like right on it. Just every time when I stop talking, they're chasing it. Just know that. This is unbelievable. There's my bait. I can see it good that time. Yeah. You know, just casually going over a 100. Just ain't nothing serious. Just casually swimming my men up by about 30. Ain't nothing serious. Ain't no big thing. Just throwing by all the fish, you know. Golly, you want to talk about stubborn son. This is crazy. We got company in the ditch now, which that's all good. I hadn't seen nothing that looks quite like a Volkswagen. I ain't seen nothing I would think's bigger than about 500 lb. I definitely don't think as big as a Volkswagen, but I've seen some 500 pounders. back to the catfish hole. Back on the catfish hole. Gosh, dude. I need a catfish expert tell me how to catch a catfish. That's unbelievable, dude. Unbelievable. Shorten my screen back up where I can tell what's going on. Throwback to The mega school. The mega scoop. Gosh. There is a pile of them. I mean, a pile of them. They seem to like the jerkbait better. I didn't hook them on it, but they bit it. And the one I did hook, it was a stripe. I just got nipped. If I ever come to this again, I'll come back more prepared. Goodness gracious. All right, let's go back to the jerk plug. They chasing it. That was one of the times where I did not need to stop it. Man, these suckers tough. Have y'all ever heard people say there's catfish the size of Volkswagen right here? >> Yeah. >> That's what I'm filming a video about that today. All right. Now, we've caught a catfish, a bass, a stripe, and a crappy. I thought that was a crappy when I saw him sitting up there and then he came over there and locked up the old Maverick. So, bada bing bada boom. All right, guys. We are making our way out of here now. See, I talked to that boat. asked them if they'd ever heard the wives tale of the catfish as big as Volkswagens down here and they said they've heard it but they don't believe it and I don't believe it either. So, you know, it is what it is. I did not expect to see a fish bigger than probably a 30 lb catfish or a 30 lb stripe. I figured that'd be about the biggest fish that's probably even in here. So, I do know that somebody caught a like a 61 catfish here not long ago, but that's still not as big as a Volkswagen. That's a lot smaller than a Volkswagen steel. But I just thought it was a cool thing to come out here and look for because you never know what if you saw it at some point. Nobody had ever seen the Loch Ness monster and that point is still today. But, you know, at least there's a tail about it. But anyways, appreciate you guys watching. Maybe need to go over there and investigate the other side of the dam. So, leave me a comment if you want to see me go over there to the other side of this dam at a later date. So, appreciate you guys watching. We'll see y'all.