Pssst! Hey, bud, c'mere. Wanna hear a secret? It'll cost you 19 bucks.

Here it is: There's one whole passel of catfish swimming around the Lone Star State, just waiting to be caught.

Okay, so that's about as big a secret as the details of Madonna's sex life. Still, the details of either subject are equally titillating to a true catfish man.

On the basis of sheer numbers caught annually, catfish are the undisputed kings of Texas angling fare. Whatever you are looking for in a game fish, from the simple pleasures of channel cats on a cane pole from a shaded river bank to the heart-stopping excitement of drag-wrecking flatheads on an expansive reservoir, Ol' Whiskers can accommodate you.

So, name your poison, select a spot from our favorite picks below (grouped by region), and wet a hook.

NORTH

Squaw Creek Lake enjoys a well-deserved reputation as a catfishing Mecca. A wealth of creek channels and timber provides excellent habitat for the lake's plentiful channel cats, with an occasional blue just to keep things interesting. The areas near the power plant water intake and around the upper-end islands are prime.

The lake is owned by Texas Utilities electric company. The only point of public access is Squaw Creek Park, located 4 miles north of Glen Rose on State Highway 144. An entry fee is required. The lake is open 7 days a week, except November through February, when it is closed Monday through Wednesday. The park offers overnight camping, but all boating traffic must cease at sundown.

Lake Bridgeport is a prime flathead hangout. It takes upward of 30 years to grow a 100-pound flathead, and this old reservoir has been around long enough (68 years) to grow some real monsters. Trotline catches of 40-plus pounds are common in the sloughs and creeks of the north end near Wise County Park.

Lake Ray Roberts delivers up channel cats with great efficiency, too. The deep water around the small islands near the dam, Wolf Island and the timbered creek channel north of FM 3002 are among the better areas.

The White Bluff area of Lake Whitney is such a good channel cat spot that one local game warden claims dibs on his days off.

You can't talk North Texas catfishing without mentioning mighty Lake Texoma. Blue and channel cats fall to cut bait drifted around Pecan and Soldier creeks. Consistent and substantial individual poundage requires a trip "up the river." A weekend foray to an upriver spot known as "Slick 'Em Slough" can yield 500 or more pounds of catfish protein represented by a mere 8 to 12 blue and yellow mega-cats.

WEST

Lake Fort Phantom Hill. Interesting name, no? Oddly enough, it really is situated atop a hill. We won't go into the "phantom" aspects, except to say that one could easily mistake the hulking specter of one of the lake's monster catfish for some kind of water wraith.

Despite its somewhat lackluster appearance, The Hill gives up its share of cats. The sloughs along the east side and in the southern tip are favored channel cat haunts. Local scuttlebutt says a couple of local boys routinely catch -- and release -- 70-pound flatheads. Live bream and chunks of beef liver are favored baits.

E.V. Spence Reservoir, located just up the road from San Angelo, sports some of the clearest water of any lake in the region. Channel cats hang their hats beneath the picturesque sandstone and red clay bluffs in the upper end.

Channel catting on mighty Lake Amistad is best when high winds muddy up the shallows. Scatter a little 100-proof grain over a shoreline flat or windswept point, lob in a big wad of nice, stinky blood bait suspended beneath a cork, and look out.

In winter, move deep. Real deep -- say, 80 to 100 feet where the Rio Grande channel drops off.

In commercial dough baits, you'll need something with plenty of body to prevent wash-off in the current. Otherwise, stick with cut bait, worms or shrimp. Do not neglect the San Pedro Canyon and Devil's River areas, or the first 7 or 8 upriver miles of the Rio Grande.

Like Texoma, Amistad is a border lake -- but in this instance it is with a whole 'nother country. Anywhere south or west of the line of buoys running down the lake's center is officially Mexican territory. Mexican fishing licenses are inexpensive, and provide good insurance against an uncomfortable encounter with officialdom in a land where they "don't need no stinking badges."