Around Iredell Sports

2008 Feb-14

Fishermen have trouble finding top catches

Finding enough legal-sized fish wasn’t a problem for the two highest-finishing immediate Mooresville anglers participating in the professional pool during the American Bass Anglers Weekend Series tournament tour stop held on Lake Norman.

Finding them big enough to contend for top honors and the guaranteed $5,000 grand prize, though, was.

As it turned out, both top-20 finishers Wayne Hauser and Alfred Keisling, each from Mooresville, were among the limited number of the participating pro boaters in the field catching a full limit of five Lake Norman bass, but neither came close to challenging for top overall bragging rights in the one-day competition specifically designed for the working class weekend-warrior type fisher folk.

Of the two, it was Hauser who experienced the better effort. He hooked his line onto his total of five fish that tipped the official weigh-in scales at tournament headquarters Midway Marina at the 9.86-pound level that was good enough on its own for outright sixth-place in the field of 63 anglers classified for the event as the pros.

As for Keisling, he, too, boated a full limit of five bass that combined weighed in at 8.80 pounds. His total was worth sole possession of 16th place in the field as a result.

Lexington’s James Blankenship was the one reeling in the majority of the goods from the tournament, the first of several scheduled within the Division V of North Carolina’s American Bass Anglers Weekend Series. Blankenship hauled his limit to the scales that pitched them at the 13.09-pound mark to crown him as the boater’s champion. The full bag was also worth the guaranteed top cash payoff of $5,000 as well.

Also from Mooresville competing in the boater class included Wes Paulin and David Lynch.

In addition to the pro boaters comprising the field, another batch of competitors engaged in a separate contest among the amateur-level entries labeled as co-anglers. Within that bunch, only one fisherman with direct Mooresville ties linked in with a top-10 effort.

Mooresville’s Kerry Murphy landed a co-angler allowed limit of three bass that weighed in at 6.06 pounds for the day. The total was worth a sixth-place finish for the local entry.

In the co-angler category, Hiddenite’s Charles Culley latched onto to a limit of three bass that combined weighed in at 8.13 pounds that made him that division’s top angler.

Other Mooresville-based co-anglers catching fish included Allen Snyder, Richard Outlaw and John Kirby

In addition to the division competitions, both the pro boaters and amateur co-anglers engaged in a big fish contest for the day.

In the boater class, a lunker weighing in at 4.31 pounds made Winston-Salem’s Robert Morrison Jr. the winner, while in the co-angler division, runner-up James Metcalf of Cameron nearly netted a sweep of honors with a single catch weighing in at 5.11 pounds.

For the tournament overall, a total of 120 participants comprised the field. Between them, they hauled nearly 300 fish to the weigh-in scales, with all but one of them returned to the lake alive and in good condition for a nearly-perfect, 99 percent catch-and-release result.

The fish combined to weigh down the official scales at 509.52 pounds. Anglers netted an average weight per fish of 1.73 pounds and caught a standard of 4.25 pounds of Lake Norman bass apiece. The average number of fish per contestant was two bass.

Midway Marina filled the role of tournament weigh-in site, while all anglers in the field gathered at the Charles Mack Citizens Center in downtown Mooresville for complete tournament registration details. The Mooresville Convention and Visitors Bureau served as the event’s official host.

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