Friday, September 19th was a great day for fishing with light winds, some good cloud cover and temperatures in the 80'. It was also a good day for Big Fish!
We were still on the Lake around 11AM, but about ready to head to the Marina as we already had a limit of nice Channel Catfish, one Caught and Released 30 lb. Blue Cat and then....
The one we had been waiting for hit my line! I did the hook setting and reeling, but good friend and customer DB Moreland was there with the net! We managed to land the largest Channel Catfish I'd ever seen. It looked to weigh over 10 lbs.! The Channel was caught on Danny King's Punch Bait in a timbered area near Fisherman's Point Marina in 13' of water. (The Channels have been on a good bite all month long.)
The scales at the Marina were not certified so I made the trip to the Athen's Freshwater Fishery and had the Biologist weigh and measure the fish. Well....the rest of the story is that the fish is the new Richland Chambers Lake Record Channel Catfish weighing in at 11.5 lbs. and measuring 28" in length!
Even though I get to fish well over 200 days a year and get to catch some really large fish, the excitement never gets old!
Oh yea....After we got back from the Athen's Fishery, we released the fish back into Richland Chambers to be caught again. So keep on fishing as you might just be the lucky one next trip!