http://www.LouisianaSportsman.com April 2015 | Louisiana Sportsman 95
also channel catfish, to the stringer tied to his kayak. Every
time he strung a fish up, the tattoos on his arms flashed.
He had a half-sleeve tattoo on his left arm that depicted a
farmyard that included cows, chickens, pigs — the whole
menagerie. The inside of his right forearm had a pig sectioned
into the various cuts of pork.
“The next one will be a crawfish with an Acadian flag,” he
announced after catching me checking out his ink.
Note the common thread in his body art: Everything is edible.
The cork on his line seldom stopped bobbing. Often bluegills,
even the biggest ones, would just give the cork a nudge. Catfish
invariable snatched underwater.
One second it was there, the next millisecond it was gone.
As the morning wore on, catfish seemed to make up a larger
share of his catch.
“I don’t like dealing with catfish,” he said. “They are slimier
than regular fish, and they have prickers.”
But he kept every one.
“I collarbone (de-headed, gutted and skinned with the back-
bone left in the fish) my catfish to cook them, but I fry bream
whole,” he said. “I fry the bream until the fins are hard; they
crunch like potato chips.”
I mentioned that I like to fillet my bream.
“You fillet bream?” he asked incredulously. “They are best
eaten on the bone.”
He didn’t leave much room for debate.
By mid-morning he was ready to head for the kitchen (to fry
his catch, not to work). He paused during the paddle back to
the landing.
“I like that I can come out here with my kayak and compete
with my buddies who have big boats and laugh at me,” Latiolais
said. “People are really com-
petitive. They want to catch
everything and beat everyone
else to a spot across the lake.
“This is relaxing. It’s right
here. It’s close. There are no
other boats. There is no pres-
sure.” ■Get some recipes
Flip to this month’s Seafood Bible column for a
couple of recipes by Executive Chef Dustie Latiolais.Jerald Horst is a retired
Louisiana State University
professor of fisheries. He
is an active writer, book
author and outdoorsman.