Man catches massive 81-pound catfish by ramming hand down its throat in Mississippi
Ask anyone who relishes the sport of fishing — there’s no adrenaline rush quite like hand grabbing a fish, especially when it comes to wrestling a near-record fish on your first experience.
The guide service Southern Boyz Grabbing brought in an 81.2-pound female flathead catfish by hand on July 19 at Arkabutla Lake in Mississippi, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Vicksburg District announced in a news release.
Fishermen Dalton Scott, Josh Bennett and Jacob Bennett were aiding a client with her first try at hand grabbing when Scott discovered the 54.5-inch long, 36.5-inch girth catfish inside the weighted wooden box used to snag fish.
“The catfish instantly hammered my hand as soon as I reached into the box,” Scott said of the catfish. “Her mouth went all the way up to my elbow, and she began to thrash around.”
After the client brought the fish to the surface, the group decided it would be best to swim the catfish to shore instead of attempting to haul it onto the boat. The fish, which was just shy of the Mississippi state record, was kept overnight in an aerated tank before she was weighed on a certified scale the next day.
The Arkabutla Lake Field Office was notified of the find and was brought into the office. Park rangers then supervised the fishermen’s release of the catfish into the lake. The group expressed its hopes of catching the fish again after a significant weight gain to break the current state record.
Hand grabbing for catfish is only legal in some states, mainly in the Southeast, according to the Mississippi Wildlife, Fisheries, & Parks. The sport, which is also called “noodling” or “hand grabbling,” isn’t for the faint-hearted or weak swimmers and can be dangerous.
In 2013, a 20-year-old man, who was hand grabbing in southwestern Oklahoma, was bitten by a cottonmouth snake while trying to catch a fish, Fox 4 KC reported. The snake locked its jaws around the man’s finger and he was taken to a hospital after pulling the snake off. The man survived thanks to 14 vials of anti-venom.
This story was originally published August 6, 2020 at 9:48 AM with the headline "Man catches massive 81-pound catfish by ramming hand down its throat in Mississippi."