‘Shocked at What We Caught.’ Florida Fisherman Pulls in a New State-Record Catfish on His Home River

Justin Hodge grew up fishing the Suwannee River along with his dad and grandpa, setting bush hooks (a.okay.a. limb lines) for gators and catfish. They’ve all the time caught decent-sized channels and blue cats there, however this previous winter, they began pondering extra concerning the Suwannee’s true potential.

“Me and my dad obtained to speaking about how the river ain’t by no means went dry,” Hodge says, “and the way there’s obtained to be some greater fish in there.”

Between Feb. 9 and 13, Hodge and his dad fished the river for 3 days and caught 10 blue cats as much as 30 kilos. Their actual focus, although, was finding and finding out the deepest holes alongside the river. Hodge, who runs an Alweld Invader, a shallow-running johnboat, didn’t have forward-facing sonar or some other fancy electronics onboard. So, they plumbed the depths the old style manner.

“We’d simply drop anchor and see the place it touched and the place it wouldn’t contact,” Hodge explains. “I imply, we’d know the place a basic gap was, however we used the anchor to actually determine the place [a hole] began … and the place the deepest spots had been.”  

With a greater map of the river in his head, Hodge was again on the Suwannee on Feb. 15. This time, he was joined by his buddy Wyatt Allen. The 2 spent the morning catching bream for bait, they usually’d landed three or 4 keeper-sized catfish by midday. Then a thunderstorm rolled in and pushed them off the water.

Again on the boat ramp, the 2 fishermen frolicked underneath a shelter and cleaned the few fish they’d caught whereas ready for the storm to cross. By 5 p.m. or so the climate had let up, they usually went proper again to the identical deep gap they’d fished that morning. Utilizing minimize bream baited on large hooks and heavy spinning rods with 100-pound braid, they caught two fish back-to-back earlier than the large blue hit.

“It wasn’t 45 minutes after we put the boat again in,” Hodge says. “And I knew as soon as I hooked him. I instructed my buddy, ‘That is both a sturgeon or a catfish. No matter it’s, it’s large.’”

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Hodge’s drag was cranked down tight, and he was frightened he may break the fish off throughout its preliminary run. However he was in a position to flip the catfish shortly, and he says the battle didn’t final lengthy as soon as the fish got here up off the underside. Allen was prepared with the touchdown internet till they noticed the massive fish.

“As soon as he rolled up prime and we noticed him, my buddy [Wyatt] simply threw the web within the backside of the boat,” Hodge says. “He grabbed a kind of plastic lipper issues, and that fish broke it as quickly as we tried to mash it on his lips. So then I simply wrapped the chief round my hand, and fortunately he was hooked nicely sufficient that I simply drug him into the boat.”

The 2 anglers saved on fishing, however Hodge was nonetheless distracted by the massive blue cat he’d caught.

“We most likely fished for an additional hour with him laying within the backside of the boat, and we had been simply taking a look at him, shocked at what we’d caught,” Hodge says. “I used to be pondering in my head, too, that I might throw a bag of corn in my truck one-handed, however I couldn’t even choose [this fish] up with one hand. 

“So I referred to as one other buddy, D.J. Rogers, and I used to be telling him, ‘Bro, you gotta deliver us a scale to the boat ramp. I feel I’ve caught the state-record catfish … I can barely maintain him as much as take an image with him.’ And he was like, ‘Effectively, I’m on the best way. Y’all meet me on the boat ramp.’”

After getting a weight of 73 kilos again on the ramp, Hodge knew he had a file on his fingers. (The previous record, set in 2015, weighed 69.5 kilos.) So he referred to as the Florida Fish and Wildlife Fee. An FWC officer finally arrived on the ramp round midnight, they usually all went to a seafood market to make use of a licensed scale, which confirmed 73.6 kilos. The fish measured 48.75 inches lengthy with a 36.75-inch girth.

Up till that time, Hodge and Allen had saved the fish within the water within the hopes of releasing it alive. However after studying that it might additionally must be inspected by a fisheries biologist, they accepted the truth that the fish would die they usually took it dwelling in Hodge’s cooler.

“Heck, I had him in a 120 quart Igloo and he had that factor full,” Hodge says. “He was simply as large and vast as that cooler, and his tail was dang close to curled up in there. He might have really been nearer to 80 kilos after I first caught him.”

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That subsequent morning, the biologist got here to confirm the species as a blue cat. He additionally estimated the fish’s age at round 55 to 60 years previous. FWC made Hodge’s file official on the finish of February, and the company lastly introduced the file on social media on Tuesday.