The Twisted Cat Outdoors Fishing Tournament returns to southeast Missouri for its second year on Saturday, July 5.
Trish Erzfeld, the tourism director for Perry County Heritage Tourism, is thrilled about the event’s return to Perryville, but hopes the weather will be more favorable this year when it rained so much that the tournament had to be postponed until the following month. The original date for last year’s fishing tournament had to be postponed from its initial weekend of July 6 to Aug. 10 due to high river levels and floating debris caused by heavy rainstorms that swept through the region. Despite this necessary change, the event remained successful and set two records for the nationwide tournament.
“We’re really excited about this,” said Erzfeld. “We’re partnering with our Cruise-In, which will be that day as well. So, we’ll not only have the car show, the great food and the company of that event, but we’re also bringing in many teams to do some catfishing in the Mississippi that day. And that was down from what we anticipated because of last year’s high water, when we had 37 teams from 12 states.”
The Twisted Cat Outdoors Fishing Tournament is among the leading catfishing tournament trails in the United States. Established in 2009, it has evolved into a nationally recognized series, hosting events on the Mississippi, Missouri, and Ohio rivers, along with some of the nation’s top lakes. The tournament aims to be both family-friendly and highly competitive, drawing anglers of all skill levels — from beginners to seasoned professionals. Its mission is to create memorable experiences for participants, with a strong emphasis on sportsmanship, conservation, and community engagement.
“These teams are very competitive and they have their whole season lined out, so we did lose some teams due to other commitments that they had for other tournaments, but we’re looking at more than 50 teams this year,” Erzfeld said. “The teams that came here last year fell in love with Perryville. They fell in love with the downtown, the folks that they met, and the fishing was really good, too. Erzfeld went over the tournament schedule.
“We’ll have what they call a captain’s meeting on Friday the fourth at The Warehouse downtown,” she explained. “The teams will be congregating down there, signing in, getting registered, and getting any last-minute details for the tournament. They look forward to the captain’s meeting, where they get to see their other competition that’s coming in. A lot of them are friends, and they really love the whole atmosphere of downtown.”
At this point, Erzfeld mentioned that the city’s annual fireworks show will take place on Thursday, July 3, this year. “Because a lot of the teams are family-oriented, we’re hoping that they bring their families in when they come in to pre-fish,” she said. “Many of them do that. They don’t just come into town and go fishing the next day. They like to test the water, see where the fish are, and have their own game plan for where they want to put in. Most of the teams will put in either at Wittenberg or Chester. Some of them may go farther north and put in. They can also go down to Cape Girardeau and put in. They like to check out everything.”
Things kick off bright and early on Saturday morning, when the teams start gathering in the city square at 5 a.m.
“I think the teams get up around 2 or 3 o’clock, and they’re in line,” Erzfeld said. “At 5 o’clock [the tournament staff] starts checking the live wells to make sure that they’re empty and that all the team members are accounted for. Then they fish until three and have until 5 p.m. to get back in line for the weigh-in, or they’ll be disqualified.
“When the teams come rolling through, people can put their chairs — please bring chairs — on the courthouse lawn and on the sidewalks to watch the teams arrive. We’ll also have our live well so that we can throw out some of the first catches. Both kids and adults enjoy seeing the big fish up close.”
Also returning to this year’s tournament is Alex Nagy of SeaArk Boats, the event’s corporate sponsor.
“What’s kind of unique about Twisted Cat is the last four years we really pushed and changed how we do our championships and how to get invited and involved,” he said. “So, we have 13 tournaments throughout the year, and we take every angler’s top four, and their best top four finishes get them in. It’s become harder each year to get invited because there’s so much competition. With that, you get a lot more people traveling across the country. You know, we’ve got anglers in Oklahoma, Texas, Iowa, Kentucky, Alabama — from all over — that are chasing the points trying to get in. This’ll be stop seven, so we’re a little halfway for the trail. Points are coming together and adding up. Who’s getting in the top 50 halfway through the season is getting interesting.
“The fishing [around Perryville] is really good. In early July, the numbers can be more in number than in size because of spawning. The goal with Twisted Cat is to make it more fun. We don’t want it to be just a catfish tournament. We want it to be an event. There are some people from Oklahoma who are going to spend two days here this weekend. They just want to put in, do some scanning, not really worry about fishing, just get their boat out there for two days, kind of mark some stuff, and maybe see some different things that they want to fish up or down river. That way, when they come back closer to the tournament, they have places to go, quickly check, and see if they can mark fish or catch fish there. This year is going to be a really fun event.”
