GASSAWAY, W.Va. — A relaxing day of fishing got a tad more exciting over the Memorial Day weekend for Hurricane’s Justin Boggs and his seven year old son Carson. The two spent the day floating in their two-man kayak from the power station at Gassawy to the Dairy Queen. Along the way, Boggs said they caught 15 or 20 smallmouth and rock bass. One of those smallmouths was pretty nice.
“I caught a real nice three and a half pound smallmouth. My son really wanted to keep it, but I told him we weren’t going to keep this one but if we caught something bigger than that one we would keep it,” Boggs explained. “Growing up on the Elk River, knowing the water and knowing we were about to pull out, I never expected we’d catch one bigger than that.”
Further down stream, as storm clouds gathered and rain started to sprinkle, the two anglers worked their way closer to their takeout point. Justin hooked a smallmouth about eight to ten inches and started playing it toward the kayak. Then it happened.
“The smallmouth jumped out of the water, and all of a sudden a large musky came out of the water and t-boned it in mid air,” Boggs explained. “I got my son to start filming with his phone because I never expected I’d be able to land it and I knew nobody was going to believe this had happened.”
Outfitted with a pole which was actually rigged for trout fishing with light line and light action, Boggs played the giant musky for a half hour before ultimately the musky appeared to win.
“We got it up close to the boat and I just kind of lost my stomach when I saw the smallmouth float back to the top and my line went totally slack,” said Boggs. “I just figured it was a lost fish.”
But they had the video which Carson shot with the cell phone to prove the story. But it turned out the story wasn’t over.
“Suddenly the musky shot back out from under the kayak and bit it again and started thrashing around. It was another seven or eight minute fight,” Boggs said. “The second time thought the hook somehow slid into his mouth.”
Boggs finally had the big musky hooked and gently feathered the light rod until the fish was finally tired out. The next difficult issue the two anglers faced was getting him into the narrow confines of the kayak with no net. They had a trout net but that was going to be sorely inadequate for the job. Boggs said he reached into the water, grabbed the big fish above the tail, and flopped him over into the boat where it started thrashing again.
“Unfortunately at some point while it was thrashing around the boat, I lost my pole,” he said. “I didn’t even realize it was gone until we finally got the bank.”
The pole was at the bottom of the Elk River, but the fish was securely in his possession with a stringer through its mouth. Young Carson put down the camera and grabbed the oars and guided the kayak to a sandbar where the two of them reflected on the amazing half hour fight. They decided to keep the fish as proof of their story.
“Normally I would have thrown it back,” said Boggs, “But I made a promise to a seven year old boy and I decided to honor that promise.”
The musky turned out to be 41 inches in length.