There’s no record of blue catfish in the Nanticoke River until about 2010, more than 30 years after the Deep South river monsters first arrived in the Chesapeake Bay watershed.
Today, fishermen can hardly sink a line into the bay tributary on the Eastern Shore without snagging a big blue cat, typically fighting hard.
Plenty didlast weekend, when a few dozen turned out for the fourth annual Nanticoke River Invasive Fishing Derby. The no-fee tournament targets blue catfish, bottom-feeders that have stormed into Eastern Shore waters, multiplying prolifically and eating just about anything they can get their whiskered lips around.
As a 1:30 p.m. weigh-in approached Saturday, boats docked at a landing in Sharptown, about 10 miles from the river’s Delaware headwaters. Fishermen disembarked, lugging coolers and dangling blue cats from stringers.
“The goal is to make long-term predators of these fish,” said Noah Bressman, the Salisbury University scientistwho organizes the Nanticoke tournament.
Bressman, 31, got his start studying amphibious fish such as the Northern snakehead, which can hoof short distances over land. He tattooed his passions on his body: A neon blue, skeletal fish on his left forearm renders some of his own biochemical artwork; on the right, a school of amphibious mummichogs dart toward his wrist while a snakehead, baring reptilian teeth, gives chase.
Bressman’s interest in invasive species eventually led to Chesapeake blue cats. When he first cut one open, a 47-pounder from the Nanticoke, he found a whole wood duck in its stomach.
The discovery was exhilarating — it drew headlines, and Bressman plans to get a tattoo of the scene soon — but not encouraging.
Virginia wildlife officials released blue catfish, often sought for their taste and size, in some of its bay tributaries in 1974 in a…
