Angler Ben Erb knows bowfin—he’s spent the last few years learning their ways near the headwaters of the Mississippi River in Bemidji, Minnesota. So when Erb set a state bowfin record last summer, he knew it wouldn’t stand for long. He immediately got right back to work, chasing his own record.
“After I caught the first one, which was 31 inches, I knew I had seen bigger fish than that, and so this year, I was like I want to do it again,” said Erb.
This July, Erb succeeded in knocking his first record from the board, catching a 31.5-inch/80-centimeter bowfin in the exact spot he’d caught his first record-setting fish nearly a year before.
The record-breaking catch
Erb set out on a solo kayak fishing mission on July 3, paddling to a backwater area on the Mississippi River filled with cattails and bulrushes. After catching a bowfin right off the bat, he spotted a giant one swimming right next to his kayak.
“I knew right away that it was probably bigger than the record I got last year,” Erb said. “What I like most about kayak fishing for bowfin is they think that your kayak is a piece of habitat or a log they can hide under. It’s very common when you’re sitting there waiting for a bite, they’ll swim right up to your kayak.”
As the bowfin cruised by, Erb got his bait—frozen creek chub he’d caught a few days before—right out in front of the fish. Erb says it stopped and put its nose right up to the chub for a couple of seconds before grabbing it.
“When I set the hook, it just kind of went crazy and got wrapped up in some of the bulrushes that it was hanging by,” Erb said. “So it was a pretty short fight because after that, I was basically able to paddle over to it and get it in the net.”
Erb measured the fish and confirmed it was a half inch longer than the one he caught last summer. In Minnesota, a witness must be present to observe a catch-and-release record, so Erb called up a friend to meet him at the boat launch. There, they measured the fish again, took photos, released it and then headed to their local Mexican restaurant for celebratory margaritas.
‘Going to bat’ for bowfin
While his discovery of Minnesota’s vacant bowfin record in 2025 inspired Erb, it wasn’t the start of his interest in the species. Erb, a lifelong fisherman and a fisheries science graduate student, has long had a love for catching fish often overlooked by others.
“I will go to bat for the merits of bowfin as a sports species any day,” Erb said. “They hit a bait super hard, they fight like crazy, they jump, you can sight fish them—anything you could love in a predatory sport fish, the bowfin checks all the boxes.”
Erb argues bowfin are just as fun to catch as the bass and walleye other Minnesota anglers are chasing. Plus, he says, they’re readily accessible in Minnesota and much of the United States.
“Bowfin are a riot to catch, but like nobody ever targets them. It’s kind of this untapped resource that’s right in our backyard,” Erb said.
Advice for the next record-breaker
For anglers looking to give bowfin a try, Erb recommends finding a sandy spot with vegetation and gently flowing current. Near home, he’s had luck with cattails, bullrushes and wild rice. Further south in Missouri, Illinois and Indiana, he’s found them near wood and over mud.
Because of the bowfin’s love for vegetation, Erb uses a medium heavy fiberglass rod and 65-pound braided line. He also exclusively kayak fishes for bowfin because it allows him to get back into vegetation he couldn’t access in a larger boat.
“They’re going to get into the vegetation at some point, they’re going to wrap you up, and it’s just nice having that heavy gear to manhandle them a little bit,” Erb said.
Erb gravitates toward creek chub or a piece of cut bait, but he says bowfin can also be caught with artificial bait or on a fly rod for an extra challenge.
He has a few more weeks of the season to break his own record once more, but Erb says he wouldn’t be heartbroken if someone else unseats him. In fact, he’d be thrilled to see more people giving bowfin the attention he believes they deserve.
“If anybody lives near bowfin or has interest in catching them, I just say give it a shot,” Erb said. “They don’t have to be your favorite game fish in the world, but you’re doing yourself a disservice if you completely write them off.”
