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What a Record

Reg Whitehouse

I have been fishing for many years and like most anglers I started fishing for small fish in my local waters, Slowly I worked my way up to fishing for bigger fish and then developed an interest in predators so I started fishing for eels, pike and zander with some success and managed to land several big fish

Living in Birmingham I had met Colin Bunn many times and had chatted to him about fishing, When he told me he was running Cat-fishing tours to the river Segre on the river Ebro system in Spain I decided to give it a go, My first trip went better than I could have dreamed of. I caught some quality Cats weighing in at 67lb, 113lb and a cracking fish of 120lb I was hooked on fishing the Ebro area so I booked my next trip with Catmaster straight away

After being picked up from the airport at Barcelona, We set off for Mequinenza .During the drive myself and my son Nick used the time to get to know the anglers who where on the trip with us as we had never met them before. They were Paul Richardson who is disabled and fishes from a wheelchair he is a right character who had everyone in stitches with his dry sense of humour, Also on the trip was Steve Dunnett and his partner Jan who are also great people and are very easy to get on with so the holiday was off to a good start

When we arrived at the river we were a bit concerned as it was raging through and chocolate brown in colour, Our guide Colin assured us that the cats liked those sort of conditions and it was normal for late March, After we settled into the apartments we went for a couple of beers and a nice meal, Then next morning was off to the to the swim to set up the gear for the week

The method we used was the tried and tested buoy rig where a large buoy is either tied to the far bank or an Island, or it can be dropped into the river on the end of a rope and a heavy weight, The line from the rod is then tied to the buoy by a short piece of light mono to form a weak link which breaks when the cat hits the bait, A live bait is then suspended below a large pike style bung set normally at a depth between 3 ft and 6ft.

Buoy rigs set up, note the white buoys on the far bank against the reeds.

First to catch was my son Nick and after a short fight his first ever Catfish was on the bank a modest fish of 31 pounds but Nick was well happy. The next piece of action was Paul's rod flipping back as a cat hit the bait the rod was struck but to no avail the cat had dropped the bait, The bait was rowed back out into place by John Deakin who is Colin's new guide for this season he was helping us out for a few hours, John had only been back on the bank for a few minutes before the same rod got hit again this time it was fish on, Paul guided his wheelchair into the fighting position and began to give the fish some stick Paul began to realise it was no small cat when someone had to hold on to his wheelchair to stop it being pulled over, Paul expertly played the fish into John's hands and it was into the sling ready to be weighed, The scales went round to 168lb Paul was delighted as we all were

Steve was next into the action with a creditable Cat of 93 lb we all started to realise that we could be in for a good week little did we know how good it would be, Wednesday dawned and it was my turn for some action and what a fish it was, As I was playing the fish we saw a glimpse of it and it was whitish yellow in colour Albino someone shouted unfortunately it was not a full albino but a lovely part albino that weighed 157lb and a P.B. for me what more could a man ask. The action was thick and fast now and my son Nick was into a good fish it was surging all over the place and nearly pulling Nick's arms off, it was safely banked and weighed 160lbs needless to say Nick was over the moon and I was very happy for him.

Paul was next up with another good fish that weighed 126lb this one fought better than his bigger fish as it was hooked at over 150 yards range and took some getting back through the strong current, Steve was unlucky again as he had another fish under 100lb I had another good fish of 110lb. Things went a bit quiet for a while with smallish fish for Nick, Paul, and Steve. Then my rod got hit again and I was into yet another really big fish after a great fight a fantastic fish of 171lb was on the mat ready for photographing this was surely a fish of a lifetime and I was thinking things just don't get any better.

By now it was Friday and we where thinking time was running out for anymore big fish how wrong can you be. Nick chipped in with a fish of 142lb and Steve got his reward at last with a fish of 138lb we were all glad his patience had been rewarded.

I was in again after the strike I could feel little resistance so for the first few minutes I thought it was a small fish but then the fish got into the main current and the line began to tighten up more and more until I was struggling to hold on to the rod. It was making strong lunges and even with the clutch fully locked down and a 7 lb test curve rod bent to the limit it was still taking line. I could make no impression at all on this fish 15 minutes turned into 30 minutes and the fish was still a long way from the bank .My arms and back were now giving me some serious pain but no way was I going to give up on this fish. After about 40 minutes of hard graft the fish was about 10 yards from the bank it was then that it rolled on the surface everyone just gasped when we saw the size of it. I just could not believe that it looked even bigger than the 171lb fish I had caught earlier. Colin said that this was a very big fish which put extra pressure on me not to slip up. The fish brought its massive tail clear out of the water and slapped it back down causing an enormous splash on the surface. This was to be its final act of defiance, I guided it to Colin and he put his hands in its mouth and pulled it safely into the sling.

It took 4 of us to carry the fish and the sling to the mat we hooked up the scales and the weigh bar, Colin and me tried to lift the fish we got it up long enough for Nick to say that the scales where going to 192 pounds then we had to let the fish back down again as it was so heavy Colin wanted us to double check the weight and to photograph and video the scales as it may be a record so this time we put the weigh bar on our shoulders and stood up together sure enough Colin confirmed the scales had settled at 192 pounds and that meant it weighed in at over 13 and a half stones. Colin said that this fish beat the previous best fish of 191 lb Caught by fellow Brummie Glen Patterson last year and it was a record fish for Catmaster Tours and possibly a record for Spain. We measured the fish at 92 inches long (7ft 8ins) or 2m 34cm.

We returned the fish to the water for a while for it to recover from the fight I also needed time myself to recover as it was hard to take in what I had done. We got the fish onto the bank again and took lots of photographs and video of it and then returned it to the river and watched it swim off strongly. This really was a fish of a lifetime and after some words of congratulation from Colin and the others we cracked open more than a few beers and a couple of bottles of Spanish plonk and sampled one of Jan's fantastic bank-side Bar-B-Q,s

Saturday was a big anti climax especially as early in the afternoon all our lines got wiped out by a large tree that had been carried down by the now rising flood water. Steve had to go out in the boat and release all the lines from the tree and he only just managed to get back to the bank due to the now raging current. So we decided to call it a day and go back to the apartments to get cleaned up we had a nice Chinese meal and some more beers in the nearby town what a great end to a great holiday

Catmaster can be contacted on 0121 451 1861