A Florida angler’s catch of a massive permit could shatter a world record that has stood for 21 years.
Kathryn Vallilee, while fly fishing recently off Key West, landed a 21-pound permit on 6-pound tippet. If her line-class record application is approved she she will have broken the existing record – set in 1999 – by more than 11 pounds.
“The fight for me was so tense because I knew this fish was the one,” Vallilee, who was fishing with Capt. Brandon Cyr, told For The Win Outdoors. “And I think my focus on fighting it was what makes that memory so vivid. When Brandon got the fish in the net, I just felt a wave of relief wash over me.”
The International Game Fish Assn. announced Vallilee’s March 22 catch this month via Twitter and the angler, who already holds the line-class record for 4-pound tippet, expects her record to be approved in the coming weeks.
RELATED: Watch: Quarantined angler lands fish from balcony – 50 feet up
Permit, a favorite among south Florida fly anglers, are tough fighters that travel in schools over sandy flats.
Vallilee, with Cyr as guide, has been trying for the 6-pound tippet record since early 2020. On March 22, she fell just short with a morning catch weighing 9.5 pounds (the record stands at 9 pounds, 12 ounces). But later in the day she and Cyr saw three much larger permit moving like shadows over the white sand.
“Even at a distance these fish seemed to be larger than the ones we had hooked previously,” said Vallilee, who was casting a Skok’s Strong Arm Merkin fly. “Hooking that fish is a bit of a blur to me, but I remember stripping a few times basically just to keep the slack out of the line before coming tight to one of the fish.”
The permit remained with the school briefly before darting into a nearby channel. “And this made us pretty nervous,” Vallilee explained, “because you never know what is on the bottom for the fish to wrap the line around and break off.”
Vallilee, who owns a Key West fly-fishing shop with her husband, said the process of weighing, photographing and releasing the permit was accomplished in less than a minute.
“It’s so gratifying after an experience like that to see the fish shoot off like a bullet and think, ‘Maybe I’ll see you again someday,’ ” she said.
–Images showing Kathryn Vallilee and Capt. Brandon Cyr are courtesy of Amber Rose