Anybody here good at identifying fish?

[Craig3410]

I've got these fish in my pond:



I know they're catfish, but what type of catfish?

(Don't worry; I don't eat them; I hate fish anyway :))

[AngryAmish]

1. It looks like a catfish

[Craig3410]

2. I know that...

but whenever I try looking up "catfish" on wikipedia and their pictures look nothing like that.



That one's all skinny and such; mine are fat.

[AngryAmish]

3. It may be a catfish of some sort

[Sugar Smack]

5. LOL!

Took the words right out of my mouth. ;-)

[gizmo1979]

4. A well fed catfish?

Looks kind of mean.So a mean fat catfish.

[Droopy]

6. It looks like a shovel head catfish to me

They can be found in abundance in the river that runs along side my house. They can get very large in the wild, but their growth will probably be limited in your pond.

[AngryAmish]

7. Are they a type of catfish?

[Droopy]

9. Heh

Yes. In Ohio, where I live, we have several types of catfish. There's the blue catfish, the channel catfish, the bullhead catdish, the shovel head catfish, and the rare spoon bill catfish.

[AngryAmish]

10. Are those also catfish?

[trof]

11. aka "hardheads"?

That's what we call them on the gulf.
Not very good to eat. Tastes "muddy".

[trof]

12. here's pic:

(That's not me.)
;-)

[Droopy]

13. That doesn't look like a shovel head to me

I think what you have there in the picture may not be found in Ohio. A shovel head has a wide, flat head with a wide mouth. Incidentally they aren't very good eating, either. The channel cat fries up the best if you are fishing for a meal.

[realisticphish]

8. keep in mind

when you're looking at pictures, catfish aren't that big vertically, but VERY wide-bodied. You'd need an overhead view of the fish to see it in a picture

[oneighty]

14. Google

Black bullhead.

Common in creeks and ponds

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