That sounds like one bigasscat. You should have stuck your hand in the water to see if you could noodle him in. That is a nice gill you got. Pelican is a great place, tailored to my fishing style. Too bad to hear you didn't hook into any of the beastly bucketmouths. I have caught more 16-20 inchers out of there than I can count. Hooked in to some fish that were too large for my pole to bring out of the weeds too, may have been one of them bigasscats, didn't know it had catfish though. Good to know. Nice post!