Record queen triggerfish bit in 170 feet of water
Seth Costanzo of Mt. Pleasant, S.C. set the new South Carolina state record for queen triggerfish last month. The SCDNR recently certified the 9-pound, 10-ounce fish as the state’s biggest.
Costanzo was fishing about 50 miles offshore of Charleston when the record fish hit. He was fishing aboard the Somethin’ Serious with Capt. Jack Demsheck and Val Demsheck. They weren’t specifically targeting triggerfish, but they caught plenty of them that day. The record fish hit around midday.
“We were targeting grouper, but we caught 22 queen triggers. We also caught some small vermillion snapper and two small grouper,” said Costanzo, who was 18-years-old when he caught the fish.
The crew was fishing in about 170 feet of water. They were using squid and cut bait. Costanzo had caught his share of triggerfish before that day, but this was his first day he’d caught queen triggerfish. Once he pulled the fish into the boat, he said they were confident it was a new state record.
“The captain, Jack Demsheck caught one about a pound smaller the weekend before. We knew this one was a state record,” he said.
Once back in Mt. Pleasant, they took the fish to Haddrell’s Point Tackle and Supply. There, they had the fish weighed and began the paperwork to have it certified as the new state record.
Due to a technicality in the way state record fish are recorded, Costanzo’s fish is listed as a tie with a smaller queen triggerfish that was caught in 2011. That 9-pound, 7-ounce queen trigger was caught out of Georgetown by J.H. Woodberry of Lake City, S.C.
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