Hardhead Catfish

I consider this fish to be the biggest pest in the ocean. If a fisherman is using natural bait and fishing where hardhead catfish swim, it is impossible to keep them from biting. They will bite when nothing else will. In fact, it seems that when nothing else is biting, these fish take advantage of the situation. Most saltwater fish bite best when the water is clearest-- not these fish. They will bite when the water is at it's dingiest.

The first spines of the dorsal and pectoral fins are sharp and coated with slimy venom. If one gets finned even slightly by a hardhead catfish, it can hurt for a long time. A deep puncture can hurt for hours and lead to infection if not properly cared for.

When I first moved to Gulf Shores, Alabama hardhead catfish were the first fish that I caught. I was accustomed to freshwater catfish which are very easy to handle. Freshwater catfish fins don't sting that much when one does get nicked. I quickly learned that hardheads are not a fish to remove from a hook while one's mind is on something else. They twist, turn, and flip out of water as much as they do in the water.

My worst experience with them happened when I was fishing alone, fairly soon after I moved to Gulf Shores. I pulled a hardhead over the sand and reeled him up to take him off the hook. He flipped just the right way and one of his venomous fins hit the space between my thumb and index finger. I had been stuck before, but this one was different. It was in deep. I tugged as hard as I could and it came out - problem was that it hit me at the bottom of my chest. I should have went straight to the emergency room, but at the time I wasn't very educated regarding how nasty seawater and catfish venom can be. I was sick for about a day. The moral to that story is that these fish can hurt you.

If you are an inexperienced saltwater fishermen and you catch a hardhead, if the fish appears to be hooked firmly you should probably cut the line and re-hook. It is very difficult to remove a hook from a solidly hooked hardhead without getting stuck.

Fishermen aren't the only ones who should worry about these fish. Swimmers sometimes step on dead ones, occasionally driving the spines deep into their feet. It is very common to see dead catfish on the beach and in the surf, especially in the summer when the beaches are the most crowded.

I personally have never known anybody who has eaten these fish, but they are considered edible. Custom and habit are probably the real reasons most fishermen don't consider these fish good eating. In earlier times, the seas were teeming with "better" fish than hardheads. Older people who grew up near the coast remember a time when they could catch more fish than their family needed anytime they wanted. A fisherman with a boat full of flounder or speckled trout is not going to want to mess with an ugly catfish that is much harder to clean.

A hardhead weighing a pound would be a big fish. The world record is 3 pounds, 5 ounces.

A cousin to the hardhead is the gafftopsailfish, commonly called sailcat. These grow much larger than the hardhead. They also have poisonous fins, but I find them much easier to handle.

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