If Tony Milam and Michael “Chubbs” Reaves had been fishing out of one of the landings on the North Carolina south side of Kerr Lake, the Tarheel State would have a new state-record blue catfish.
As it is, the 109-pound monster that Milam caught on March 17 has been certified as Virginia’s new state record for blue catfish because the two fishermen from South Boston, Va., began and ended their trip on the Virginia side of the lake.
Kerr Lake, a 49,500-acre impoundment on the Roanoke River system, straddles the North Carolina-Virginia border and is a favorite fishing spot of anglers from both states. Also known as Buggs Island Lake, Kerr was home to the previous Virginia state-record blue, a 92-pound fish. North Carolina’s blue catfish record is 89 pounds.
In a see-saw battle of state records between Kerr Lake and the James River, Milam’s catch replaces the 102-pound, 4-ounce blue catfish caught by Tim Wilson in the James River in 2009. Wilson’s catch broke the record established by a 92-pounder from Kerr Lake that had reigned since 2004.
“We were just going to do a little fun fishing and looking around for the catfish tournament that Saturday,” Milam said. “Heck, we didn’t even take our good tackle. The water was pretty high, and we wanted to look at a few things, plus Chubbs had a new boat and we wanted to put some time on it and see how it fished It was the second time that boat was in the water. I think it fishes pretty good.
“I saw the rod twitch when the fish picked up the bait and started moving off,” Milam said. “I picked up the rod and set the hook. It made a big swirl and when I saw its tail, I knew it was a big fish, but didn’t think it was anywhere near this big. It really didn’t take long to wear it out and get it back to the boat – about 10 minutes, maybe 15 at the most.
“We were positioned with two anchors, and the scariest time was when it ran between them,” Milam said. “I was fishing with an ‘eating-fish rig’ and had a small hook, so I couldn’t pull on it too hard. I kept steady, even pressure on it, and luckily, it swam back between the anchors and never tangled. When it rolled up beside the boat, Chubbs scooped it up in the net.”
That was when Milam and Reaves began to realize how big the fish was. Reaves had a 75-pound scale that bottomed out before they could lift the fish out of the water. A nearby friend had a scale that went to 100 pounds, and it wasn’t enough, either. That’s when Milam and Reaves decided they had to weigh the fish properly.
The called friend Lew Compton, who had a 200-gallon cattle watering tank ready and met them at the landing so they could keep the fish alive and release it after weighing it. A call to the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries got a biologist dispatched to verify the species and witness the fish’s certified weight. Milam then got a call from Bass Pro Shops to see about taking the fish for display in the aquarium in its Richmond location, and a tanker truck was dispatched from that location.
Compton transported the fish in the 200-gallon tank to Mecklenburg Farm Supply in Chase City, Va. to be weighed on certified scale – the same of scales where the 92-pound state record had been weighed.
The big fish was officially weighed at 109 pounds. It was 53 inches long and had a girth of 41 inches. It took about a week for the VDGIF to certify the catch as a state record.
Milam said the big cat hit at approximately 9:30 in the section of the lake where the Dan and Staunton Rivers run together. Milam had caught his previous personal best blue, 68 pounds, in the same spot.
“I was fishing with an old, like maybe 20 years or older, Abu Garcia Ambassador reel and a 6- foot Ugly Stick rod,” Milam said. “We really weren’t serious that morning, but were killing a few hours looking around before the tournament on Saturday. I was using 30-pound Bass Pro mono and a little ‘eating fish rig’ with a 5/0 Eagle Claw Kahle hook and a small piece of fresh shad for bait. This certainly isn’t what I was expecting to catch. The news spread really fast, and one of my buddies was putting it on FaceBook while I was still holding it in the net beside the boat.”
The fish, nicknamed “Lucille” by Milam, was picked up by the Bass Pro tanker truck at around 2:30.
“They loaded her up in a big tank with oxygen and took her to Bass Pro Headquarters in Missouri,” Milam said. “She will be in quarantine and under the care of biologists and vets for 30 days to be sure she is healthy and has no diseases she could spread to other fish. After that, they will bring her back to display in the aquarium at the Bass Pro Shops in Richmond.”
Milam’s friends said the smile on his face has been permanent since March.
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