A Tennessee angler who could not find a friend to fish with last Saturday night reeled in one of the largest blue catfish ever caught in the state.
David Anderson’s catch of a 103-pound blue catfish, on a tributary to Nickajack Lake, places him among a small number of anglers around the country who have landed catfish topping 100 pounds.
The catch was only nine pounds shy of the Tennessee record, a 112-pound blue catfish caught on the Cumberland River in June 1998.
The Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency, which announced Anderson’s catch on Wednesday, stated that he used a nightcrawler as bait and caught the behemoth from the bank of Suck Creek after an hourlong fight on 12-pound monofilament.
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Anderson kept the catfish alive until a friend arrived with a scale early Sunday, then released it back into the creek.
Apparently, he didn’t mind fishing alone or missing out on the state record. He told the TWRA: “Fishing is more than catching for me. It’s my church. It’s my go-to place. It’s my getaway, where I gather my thoughts.”
As he walked the creek’s bank his thoughts were on the estimated 60-pound catfish that he lost when his line broke over Memorial Day weekend.
He hooked the 103-pound catfish just before midnight Saturday. His rod had been lodged securely in the rocks. “It didn’t bump or tug, but literally was jerked out,” Anderson said. “I grabbed it, leaned back and let the drag out.”
Some of his friends watched and joked with him via Facebook Live. “Just pull the fish in,” one of them said.
Anderson said he felt a huge sense of relief when, after reeling the fish close to the bank, it rolled so smoothly into his net.
However, the net broke as he tried hauling the fish into shallow water. “I was not going to let this fish get away after the fight, and I gathered both net and fish and took them to the bank,” he said.
He secured the fish with a rope, thinking it could beat the state record, and waited for a friend to arrive with the scale. “At this point, I just wanted to let it go,” he said. “You just don’t see them this big and I was concerned.”
The catfish was set free within minutes after it was weighed.
Mike Jolly, a TWRA fisheries biologist, estimated the fish to be at least 25 years old.
For the sake of comparison, the International Gamefish Assn. lists as the all-tackle world record a 143-pound blue catfish caught on Kerr Lake in Virginia in 2011.