River fishin' for rough fish my whole life but no buffalo?

[rough_rider]

I fish almost exclusively on rivers for carp and catfish, still-fishing with livebait often. Why is it that I am unable to hook up with buffalo and quillback, two species that one would imagine are easily caught with that setup given the amount of time I put in river fishing. Any tips? I assume common carp, drum, suckers get to the bait before the less common buffalo do but is there anything else proficient buffalo-hunters can share with me?

[Dutch55406]

There is a "roughfish" site on the net that has all the info your looking for, just do a google search I'm sure you'll find it....

[Stick500]

they are certainly tricky to catch but I've caught 'em and seen many others caught when they're stacked up at a dam

oddly enough they'll bite on mister twister jigs (1/4 to 1/2 ounce IIRC)

you may snag a few too, but that doesn't count

supposed to be good eatin' but I never tried one- very beefy, stocky fish that put up a great fight

I've heard of people catching them on worms, corn, doughbaits, etc. too but I never have

[Stick500]

the book about roughfishing called "Fishing for Buffalo" is a great book with tons of info on all sorts of roughfish, but is surprisingly weak when it comes to talking about how to catch the fish in the title!

the book was written by a couple of MN anglers so a lot of the info is real handy for us up here

[bobbymalone]

i suppose you use a lot of crawlers?

Quillback are tough. I've caught two on tiny jig heads with twisty tails. I think they might be easier to pick up with a fly rod. They like small stuff. I think they are around more than what you might think, just not easy to catch. I've snagged probably a dozen of them while casting cranks for gamefish.

I hooked into a monsterous buffalo once with crawler. Lost him right at the edge of shore. Not sure if it was a big/small mouth. I just don't think I've found a spot where they exist in a great density.