REEDSVILLE, W.Va. — An April trip to a flood control lake in Preston County was supposed to be for small to medium sized panfish. Reedsville resident Matt Born soon found out he was not equipped for what was about to happen.
Fishing from a kayak, Born had spooled up four-pound test line for this trip and was using small, homemade spinners. He was targeting larger bluegill and caught a few as he moved toward a series of lily pads. One long cast later, things changed.
“As soon as it hit the water, I made about three to five cranks and that thing just drilled it. He was just laying there waiting in those lily pads. He plowed that thing full force,” said Born in an interview for West Virginia Outdoors.
Born immediately knew he likely had a chain pickerel because he had caught them before. Slowly he played the fish but was still unaware of exactly what he was dealing with.
“I knew it was a decent sized fish, but I didn’t know how big. The closer I got, the more it started steering the kayak. I brought him up and he looked like a torpedo in the water. I thought, ‘Uh-oh I’m in trouble because I don’t have a net and this is four-pound test,'” he laughed.
He also was fishing with no leader. Although at least for the moment the line was not in the fish’s mouth where those razor sharp teeth could have sliced the tight line at any moment.
“I thought I might be losing this lure, but we’re going to try it,” he said.
Time after time Born got the fish to the side of the kayak and just as he reached to clamp the fish by its gill plates, she blew up and took off. More drag would be peeled and the fight would start all over again. Born said he wasn’t sure how many times that happened, but finally the fish started to tire out. After about 10 minutes he had it. Although a toothy critter, Born said he was willing to do what had to be done to land the giant.
“Sacrifices would have had to be made. I’d have lipped that fish. Bleeding is temporary a state record is forever,” he laughed.
Well, as he was about to find out that isn’t necessarily the case. Born was familiar with the state record for a chain pickerel, especially the length because he held it for a fish he caught in 2019 at Upper Decker’s Lake in Preston County. He knew for sure this one was longer and started making phone calls to get it to a DNR biologist for officials measurements.
Turned out he was correct. The big fish streched the tape to 27.95 inches. That beat his old record of 27.87 inches. The certified weight however fell short. Born’s fish weighed 5.65 pounds which missed the record weight of 6.19 still held by Steven Demma for a fish caught in 2001 at Tuckahoe Lake.
“She was already spawned out, if I had caught her before the spawn she would have probably beat that too, but that’s okay,” he said.