No, this is not a recipe I am recommending for dinner tomorrow night. It’s a bait for catfish that some say is so effective that it should be outlawed in fairness to the fish.
Catfish, as all fishermen are aware, have a keen sense of smell. They use the barbels on their chins to pick up any scents that might lead them to food. The word on the catfish streets is that this blend of Strawberry Jello & Chicken Gizzards will draw big cats like a thumb tack to a magnet.
For years, chicken livers have been the gold standard of catfish baits, but livers have a nasty habit of coming off the hooks, often during the original cast, plus catfish can frequently peck around the hook to get at the livers. But gizzards are another matter. If you put a chicken gizzard on a hook, it stays there.
Now for the Strawberry Jello. The secret ingredient. My source says to, first, empty a package of chicken gizzards in a Zip Loc bag, then dump a package of ordinary Strawberry Jello in the bag, shake it well and let the ingredients blend.
When the bait hits the water, it sets up an immediate chum line and draws in the catfish.
Catfish bite throughout the winter, just not as aggressively as they do in warmer months, so if you want to try this amazing bait now, wait till late afternoon and toss a bait out at your favorite catfish lake. Or try the bait next spring when it warms a bit. In the meantime, pick up a pack or two of Jello and hit the Food Lion meat Department when you need a pack of gizzards.
It really works, or so they say.
