easy to purchase i mean. sorry about that.

Back in the day, we used to toss a can of dog food with holes in it into a spot that might attract some catfish or as we refer to them up here horn pout. Wait until later that afternoon or early evening, and toss a worm on a hook on the bottom. Now we toss the dogfood like chum, and use a worm on a hook set to the bottom.

Make a nasty, stinky paste. The nastier and stinkier the better. Someone mentioned chicken livers...a pretty basic ingredient. Essential even. But the secret is cheese. It doesn't have to be stinky cheese, because it will be. Mix whatever sounds good or gross together. Put it in a jar or can, covered if you're going for the long marinade, or uncovered for a day out on the roof. Get some of those spongy baits with holes in them made specifically for this stuff and catfish, or just use chunks of sponge. Dip 'em into the goop, let them soak it up. You can also play with the consistency. Anywhere from dipping slime thin to thick pasty baitball is good.

Raw Shrimp

I either use cut bait, chicken livers, or shrimp.

Catfish are like any other fish you gotta match the hatch so to speak.You gotta give them what they are eating if you really want to be consistent.After a late frost and a fairly cold winter I caught some channel cats on nightcrawlers.I decided to see what they'd been eating and in their stomachs each one had a ball of nightcrawlers and directly behind the nightcrawlers was an equal sized ball of rollypollies.They had been eating rollypollies the week before when it was to cold for nightcrawlers to come out.Now, a prespawn male flathead will bite a treble hook if you put it in front of his face.

I have honestly had the most luck with earthworms when it comes to catfishing. Just load the hook up with as many worms as possible and the catfish see that hunk of food and cant resist. At least i think thats what happens when your fishing.

rabbitpolice, charley and others are right, I use the same but Huntandtrap09 really hit on something. Some of the largest cats taken on the Missouri rivers were taken off barges from the guys in early 1900's using mostly spoiled ham.

I mostly catfish now in in the mississippi river at a lock and damn. The current is amazing and you need something that stays on the hook. We always use a castnet and use shad or skip jack. We typically are fishing for big blue cats so we will hook the entire shad or skip jack. during times when its hard to catch baitfish we will cut them up.

chicken liver son u know that...is this jp?

you cant go wrong with a nightcrawler

worms

Me and my brothers fave is chicken livers/ hearts. The hearts hold up a little better. But the biggest catfish I've ever seen caught first hand was a 64lb channel cat caught on a 2" goldfish.

i fish for flatheads and blues mainly so i would have to say either fresh shad or lively bluegill