A fisherman in England landed a 133-pound wels catfish at a catch-and-release pay lake in Wisbech, Cambridgeshire, that apparently would qualify as a British record, and by a lot.
The catch by Tomas Marcinkevicius “would obliterate” the official record of 62 pounds caught from Withy Pool in 1997, according to AnglingTimes.
But Marcinkevicius, who is an avid fisherman of catfish, isn’t interested, telling AnglingTimes, “It’d be nice, but I already know of larger UK cats that’ve been caught. I’m just happy with the fish.”
Those bigger wels catfish that he talks about having been caught previously simply didn’t qualify for record status when caught because the British Record Fish Committee suspended record-taking for the species over 20 years ago.
The BRFC stopped recording record weights for wels catfish in October 2000 because of its concern with it being an imported fish. But in November 2023, the committee readmitted the catfish to its record list after the threat of importing large catfish has diminished since the self-sustaining population is growing to big sizes.
Record or not, it is an impressive catch, especially considering the best time to fish for the species is during the warmer months.
But Marcinkevicius has been on a roll in these colder months.
He told USA Today/For The Win Outdoors that on Dec. 9-10 he caught a 115-pounder, a 97.5-pounder and six others over 70 pounds, along with a few in the 50- and 60-pound range. He said he caught over 30 fish, and lost count.
Then about a week later, at Willowcroft Fisheries, he hooked into what he thought was a 50- to 60-pounder.
“On the way close to the bank, he hadn’t realized I had hooked him, then he turned around and ran to the other side of the lake,” he told USA Today/For The Win Outdoors.
When he saw the tail slap the surface and his head come out of the water, he started shaking and the adrenaline started pumping.
“I knew it was a big fish,” he said.
After 30 minutes, he landed the wels catfish and slipped it into a weighing sling to capture its weight of 133-plus pounds before releasing the fish.
“It’s my biggest fish so far that I’ve caught in my life,” he said. “I’m really pleased.”
The fishing concession asked him to name the fish. He named it Tom Cat.
Incidentally, the world record for a wels catfish is 297 pounds, 9 ounces caught by Attila Zsedely in the river Po in Italy on March 11, 2010, according to the International Game Fish Association, the keeper of world records.