Why wild Chesapeake catfish should be the new salmon
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Chef Kyle Bailey snags blue catfish for his DMV restaurants. Photo: Courtesy Jay Fleming via Long Shot Hospitality
Restaurants. Stadiums. Prisons. There's a big new push to get invasive blue catfish out of the Chesapeake Bay and onto a variety of menus.
Why it matters: The Bay's blue catfish population is booming, which is bad for the native species they outcompete for food and habitat, and those they prey on — especially our dwindling juvenile crab population.
The big picture: Blue catfish get a bad rap. "When I hear 'invasive,' it's like aliens coming down. It's not sexy, it's not appetizing," says Matthew Scales, seafood marketing director for Maryland's Department of Agriculture.
- The agency is working with grocers and chefs to show consumers that blue catfish are sustainable and delicious.
Catch up quick: Blue catfish arrived in the Chesapeake Bay only a few decades ago — originally introduced in the '70s for sports fishing in Virginia — but they're already in the bay's top three invasive species.
- Blue cats can balloon to the size of small kids, over 5 feet long and 100-plus lbs, reproduce like crazy, and travel great distances without food. But when they eat — crabs, menhaden, eels — they're voracious.
By the numbers: The blue catfish commercial harvest in Maryland and the Potomac River skyrocketed from over 609,000 pounds in 2013 to 4.2 million pounds in 2023 — an increase of more than 500%. But that's hardly enough to curb the population.
What they're saying: Part of the problem is branding. "We're battling the mindset that catfish are these dirty fish, bottom feeders," Branson Williams, DNR's invasive species manager, tells Axios. That's not true, at least with blue cats.
- Unlike farmed or flathead catfish, blue catfish aren't "mud suckers." They feed on 80-odd species that dwell in the bay's midwaters — bad for the environment, good for flavor.
- Blue catfish taste milder and brighter than other varieties, closer to wild bass than farmed cat. As Scales says, "Filets can be elevated to fine dining or eaten in a crispy fish taco off a truck."
State of play: Scales travels around the U.S. promoting "wild-caught blue catfish" or "wild Chesapeake catfish" to chefs, grocery chains like Giant, festival organizers, and institutions with bulk buying power.
- His team also explores avenues to use the whole fish beyond filets, including creating "fish meal" for fertilizer and pet food.
- You may find blue catfish at the University of Maryland, Camden Yards, the Maryland Food Bank, and even prisons.
- Some D.C. chefs are big on blue cats, too. The Long Shot Hospitality team even goes fishing, catching 800 lbs. of blue catfish for their restaurants. Chef Kyle Bailey puts it in a fried waterman's platter at The Salt Line and blackened catfish Creole at Dauphine's.
Zoom in: Whole Foods launched blue catfish in over 400 stores nationwide last year, though Mid-Atlantic locations have sold fresh filets for nearly a decade.
- "It's a win-win for us," Dan Rand, the megachain's principal seafood buyer, tells Axios. "We want to support the fisherman and environment, and we're able to offer a nice quality fish at a value."
- Whole Foods keeps the cost of fresh filets under $10 per pound — sometimes $7 on sale — which is a bargain in the fresh seafood case. They're also looking into offering frozen and breaded options, and working it into prepared foods.
Reality check: "Eating our way through the blue catfish population isn't going to be the sole solution," Williams tells Axios. "But creating a viable fishery could be."
One huge hurdle there is a federal law that catfish must be inspected by the USDA — not the FDA like most other fish — and that there must be a USDA inspector on-site when processing.
- The requirement was created to help protect the domestic farm-raised catfish industry from foreign exports, but it hinders the wild market. There are far fewer USDA inspectors and facilities for Chesapeake catfish (there's only one processing facility on the Eastern Shore).
- But there's fresh motivation to change the rules.
What we're watching: Big state-led pushes to help make commercial fishing and processing of blue catfish more viable. Maryland was awarded a $4.5 million federal grant this year and the majority will go toward expanding processing.
- In Virginia, a grant program established last year allows the governor to award up to $250,000 to businesses and entities that support blue catfish processing, flash freezing, and infrastructure projects.
Editor's note: This story has been corrected to note that Matthew Scales works for Maryland's Department of Agriculture (not Department of Natural Resources).