Having been an angler (mostly fly) for almost my entire life, I've seen things like this fairly often.<p>Fish are very attracted to surface animals in the water due to their relative inability to escape once in the water. Ducks make easy prey and watering birds in the shallows are only moderately more difficult. Probably one of the most voracious shallow-water predators is the Northern Pike, which I've seen catch birds, mice and other animals many times while fishing in Canada. At my Dad's house in northern California, we see Bass suck under small ducklings many times a year.<p>Unlike the Catfish, Bass, Pike and other shallow water predators have specific behavior for lying in wait. They will stop in the water, use the pectoral fins to hold stable and then curl their tail to one side. This allows them to rapidly straighten their bodies and blast forward in one swift stroke to seize prey. Note in the video that the catfish do not employ this - they make a snapping/sucking motion with their jaws to draw the prey in.<p>One of the largest Bass I ever caught was hooked using a fly I tied, made to look like a Robin. I had seen a 14+ lb. Largemouth attempting to eat robins that were landing on lily pads. I tied the fly over about 1 week and caught it on a gorgeous Sunday morning just after the sun came over the trees :)
This reminds me a bit of one of my favorite episodes of this "X minus 1" old-time radio show.<p><a href="http://www.podcasts.com/x_minus_one/episode/student_body_07311956" rel="nofollow">http://www.podcasts.com/x_minus_one/episode/student_body_073...</a>
Does that make them catfish hunters...?<p><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catfish_Hunter" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catfish_Hunter</a>