Shorebound Angler Lands 50-Plus-Pound Striped Bass, Breaks a 42-Year-Old River Record

Georgia angler Travis Harrell made a protracted, 150-foot solid throughout the swift present boils and whitewater of the Flint River. It was March 19, Harrell was fishing from shore, and water was pouring out of the tailrace beneath the hydroelectric dam that types Lake Chehaw.

Harrell’s 2-ounce pink bucktail jig, adorned with an 8-inch lengthy Got-Cha white plastic grub, landed on the far aspect of tailrace present circulation. Then he began one other lure retrieve.

“That solid was identical to 1,000,000 others I’ve made, however then I felt successful and the load of the fish,” Travis tells Outside Life. “I knew it was a giant one, and I yelled ‘Fish On!  Fish On!’ so different anglers close by knew I’d attached and so they’d concentrate on their traces within the water.”

Harrell had already been casting for 2 hours that morning when the fish struck at 9 a.m.

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“The striper saved going and going, and there wasn’t a lot I might do,” says the 42-year-old from Albany. “I had a heavy Lew’s rod and a Daiwa bait-casting reel spooled with 17-pound monofilament. However the farther that fish went downstream in present, the extra anxious I obtained that I’d lose it.”

There have been huge boils and loads of sharp rocks round. Harrell finally noticed the fish’s big tail on the floor, and he thought if he didn’t tighten his drag and switch it, he’d absolutely lose the bass.

“I actually leaned on the fish, and I used to be getting worn out,” he explains. “However she lastly turned again, and I gained line on her.”

Harrell says he fought the massive striper for 20 minutes in complete. One other fisherman, Doug Willbey, confirmed as much as assist him with a giant touchdown web.

“My arms have been hurting, and my arms have been cramping from the combat close to the top,” Harrell says. “However we went down some stairs subsequent to the wall, and Doug scooped her in his web.”

Harrell was afraid the online would break. He helped Willbey, who nonetheless had the linesider within the web, climb again up the concrete steps to the highest of the wall.

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“We began whooping and hollering after we obtained take a look at the fish,” says Harrell. “I referred to as my dad to inform him, however he was sleeping as a result of he’s retired. My mother needed to wake him up, after which he got here proper over to see my fish.”

On a scale they’d on the dam, the fish weighed 50 kilos, greater than any striper they’d seen caught from the Flint River.

“I actually didn’t need to kill the fish, however we needed to take it to the DNR workplace in Albany to have it formally weighed and measured,” Harrell saus.

The fish formally weighed 52.2 kilos, with a 47.5-inch size and a 35-inch girth. This shatters the outdated Flint River striper file, a 48.5-pounder caught in 1983.

Travis says he has fished “the wall” all his life, studying the nuances of striper fishing from his dad, who additionally has fished there all through his lifetime. The spot is a 15-foot-high concrete wall that borders about 50 yards of river pouring out of the dam.

“I’ve discovered the whole lot about fishing for stripers within the tailrace from my dad. He all the time advised me that if I needed to catch a giant striped bass from there I had to make use of huge lures and put in quite a lot of time casting throughout tailrace currents.”

A good-knit group of native anglers fish the wall usually via the 12 months, says Harrell. They catch panfish, catfish, bass, and hybrid stripers. The spring is when huge spawning-run striped bass will push up the Flint River, however they’re halted by the dam, the place anglers have a shot to hook one with out the necessity for a ship.

“All my household has caught 30-pound stripers from The Wall,” says Harell. “My finest one till now was a 22-pounder. It takes effort to attach with a giant striper there. That’s why in spring I take trip time to fish The Wall.

“I believe catching a giant striper within the Flint is like looking for a giant ol’ buck,” Harrell continues. “You gotta put within the effort and time.”