Tournament angler catches record-sized bass in New York

Pennsylvania bass fisherman Jim Brittenbaugh dragged his 21-foot Stratos bass boat five hours from his home to Cayuga Lake in west-central New York earlier this week. He had gone there on July 11 to practice fishing for a two-day team bass tournament that began on July 12. Little did he know that while fishing with his buddy, he would catch a largemouth bass that will likely set the New York state record.

“I launched my boat and tried a few spots not far from the boat ramp,” said the 38-year-old fisherman Outdoor living“I was waiting for my good friend [and top fisherman] Dave Ruark, who I was supposed to meet at the lake around 11:00 a.m. so we could fish together.”

Fishing alone, Brittenbaugh tried a few spots where he had caught bass in previous years. He was simply checking spots to find the best places to fish in the tournament. He caught and released a 4-pound bass and lost another good fish. After meeting Ruark at a boat ramp at 11 a.m., the two anglers ran 10 miles to a creek mouth that Brittenbaugh wanted to check out but had never fished before.

“I knew that Greg Hackney had won a Cayuga Lake tournament in 2014 at the mouth of that creek,” Brittenbaugh explained. “We got to the area and started scouting it in 20 feet of water. With my forward-facing sonar, we headed to shore and started fishing along a deep hornwort edge in about 8 feet of water.”

As Brittenbaugh moved the boat closer to the mouth of the creek around noon, he spotted a submerged point and caught a 7-pound bass.

“About five casts later with a Junebug color Senko wacky-rigged worm, I got the lure over the point, and right up to the boat I felt a nudge and set the hook,” he says. “It was so close to the boat that I was ready to bring the lure up for another cast before the bite came.”

Brittenbaugh says the bass dove deep and tried to burrow into the grass. But he kept the pressure on the fish as his 7-foot spinning rod folded in half. He was worried his 2/0 TroKar hook, 20-pound braid and 12-pound test fluorocarbon leader wouldn’t hold the powerful fish.

“I kept the rod pressure on and walked the rod around the bow of my boat and the trolling motor,” he says. “Then he made a run out of the boat, right on the surface and we could see his back. At the end of the run he rolled over on his side and walked his tail to the surface, just 15 feet away from us.

“When I saw how big it was, my heart stopped. I thought, Oh my God, I don’t know if I can get it in.”

But he kept the pressure on the fish, brought it close and Ruark scooped it up into the net.

“We were stunned,” Brittenbaugh said. “We had never seen anything that big. My best bass before was a 7-pounder from a farm pond. We knew it was at least 10 pounds.”

They put the bass in their live pit for five minutes and then grabbed their phones to current bass record for New York StateThe fish weighed 11 pounds, 4 ounces and was caught by John Higbie in 1987 in Buckhorn Lake in Otsego County.

They weighed Brittenbaugh’s bass on two different scales they had in the boat. Both scales showed it weighed over 12 pounds. Thinking they had a record bass, they called the New York Department of Environmental Conservation and arranged to meet some of their staff at a boat ramp to check the fish.

Three DEC workers met them an hour later at the Union Springs boat ramp. Emily Zollweg-Horan, an aquatic biologist for the DEC, was in charge, Brittenbaugh says. They excitedly weighed and measured Brittenbaugh’s enormous largemouth.

“It officially weighed 12.35 pounds and was 25 inches long,” Brittenbaugh said. “It’s not officially the state record yet because the scales they used have to be checked for accuracy and the paperwork for the record has to go through channels at the DEC.”

DEC also took scale samples from the bass to date it. They said the bass was done spawning, so it probably weighed more when it was full of roe.

After DEC’s work, Brittenbaugh and fishing buddy Lenny Speed ​​put the big bass back in the livewell of Brittenbaugh’s boat and raced back to the creek mouth where it was caught. They released it there, and Brittenbaugh says he can only hope to catch the fish again during the tournament.

Read more: The biggest bass ever caught

“I’m still in shock about that bass,” Brittenbaugh says. “What a thrill. I want a taxidermist to make a replica of that fish. It’s the bass of a lifetime — no, the bass of 100 lifetimes.”