winter fish

This time of year I like to explore and look at new pieces of local streams.  I've had this pay big dividends in the past come springtime. So tonight I was checking out an outflow pipe from a large factory. The pipe itself was small only about a foot across and only had three or four inches of water running out of it. But it was warm. You see a little patch of steam rising. The pipe itself was set back in a little notch in the bank  maybe seven feet across and ten or so feet long and a couple feet deep at its deepest. Out in front it was shallow and the rivers current hit it pretty hard. In other words I wasn't going to find a wintertime  bass hideout here. But there were some big carp milling around and I'd walked a ways thru snow to look at it, might as well try it. I flipped a 1/8 ounce jighead and a curly swim up the little notch right to the pipe. Wham! first cast and the rod bent into the cork and the six pound line was taxed to the limit as the fish tore all around the outlet before shooting out into the river. Turned out it was a dandy channel cat that had hammered my jig. Not bad for a quickie exploratory trip after work in the snow.