I caught 2 CC ~4-5lbs from my pond yestereday, cleaned them and had them on ice within 45 minutes. I filleted them. Fried them tonight and they were tough. Thought I might have over or under cooked them so I tried varying the time in the grease (360 deg more or less) to no avail.
Same result. Have eaten a lot of catfish from my pond but never encountered this problem, even with larger fish than these. Should I check my pond water for anabolic steroids? Seems like the flash toward the tail was not as chewy as up next to the head.

That's a good question. My only comments on Channel Catfish are purely anecdotal. It seems to me that CC are better than most other fish at accumulating tastes and odors from their aquatic environment. This seems to be particularly true of the yellowy flesh just under the skin. Nobody in the world takes better care of their fish than I do--in regards to immediate cleaning and proper handling--and I've still found that CC sometimes smell and taste like diazonon, algae, etc. I haven't however experienced tough CC flesh. I'm more often encountering a mushy flesh.

Of course I know that sometimes CC taste awesome. I had one from Lake McConaughy in Nebraska this spring and it was very mild in flavor and nice in consistency.

Sorry that isn't a better answer.

My first reaction is that they are males recovering from spawning. When on the nest, males don't eat. They lose some weight, mostly from fat and metabolizing their own flesh. When that happens, remaining flesh becomes tough and can be stringy. Plus, catfish reaching that 4 to 5 pound plateau are beginning to get a little age on them, and that can account for texture of their flesh to be tough, also. Between the two, that's probably what you have. If you haven't been feeding them, some timely fish food will help soften that tough meat. It may take another month, but feeding will definitely help.

We ate one CC about 2 months ago that was noticeably tougher than any other CC I have eaten. I thought perhaps it was undercooked and sent it back to the grill twice, to no avail. The timing might have been right for a post-spawn fish (I just realized I don't keep eating records on my fish - the shame), but I definitely remember that particular Cat was real skinny.

BTW taste was completely normal, just tough.

Geeze, I thought they were supposed to be tough. The thing I like most about big catfish is how firm the meat is.

My wife and I both really enjoy the belly meat from a big cat, which is by far the toughest part. We joke about the belly meat being "West Virginia lobster." We skin both sides of the belly meat.

To me, the next most enjoyable parts are the "shoulders" -- the thick meat above the ribs and just behind the head. It sure bakes or grills into nice firm pieces.

Now I'm salivating. I've got to get home and set a few lines.

Ken

We need to do some Jack Sprat-style partitioning and swapping, Ken.

The belly meat is indeed the firmest, no argument at all. I stopped including belly meat with fillets last year when nobody in my family would eat it. To me, shoulder meat is OK, but I prefer the thinner meat from the tail.

The last CC we ate almost sliced itself apart after my wife cooked it. I'm glad I got to enjoy it and you didn't have to suffer through it.