Angler’s Record Fish May Be a Foul

Mac Weakley saw the largemouth bass break the surface of Lake Dixon and knew he might have a world beater at the end of his line.

But as he reeled it in, he saw he had a problem. The monster bass -- one he and his buddies had set out to catch Monday morning -- was hooked not in the mouth but snagged below the dorsal fin. And that immediately endangered its status as a trophy fish.

Weakley pulled the bass toward the boat in a struggle that took so long he could barely land it, so weak were his arms. Quickly, the fishermen grabbed the bass, pulled out the hook and weighed the fish on their hand-held scale. The verdict: 25 pounds 1 ounce, exceeding the old mark -- one that had held up since 1932 -- by almost 3 pounds.

Weakley and his partners released the bass back into the lake as a small crowd looked on from shore and the nearby dock. Now the question that must be answered is whether the fish will stand up as a world record even though it was “foul hooked.”

And there is speculation that this fish, its belly bloated with roe, is the same one that has been caught in the lake two times previously -- before it ate itself to world-record status.

“If you look at the photos,” said Tony Smock, the superintendent of lakes and open spaces for the city of Escondido, where Dixon is located, “it looks like the same bass only its belly keeps getting bigger and bigger.”

And there is another reason to believe it’s the same fish that was caught in 2001 and 2003: The bass has a distinctive black mark under its chin.

“You can’t miss it,” said Ranger Jim Dayberry. “It’s like Marilyn Monroe.”

Lake Dixon, about 25 miles north of San Diego, is renowned for its trophy bass. The reason for a wealth of big fish is that it’s stocked with 1- and 2-pound trout, which make for tasty and filling feeds for the much larger bass.

By Tuesday, word of the big haul had spread, to a point where Weakley was being interviewed lakeside by a crew from ESPN, among others.

The story of Weakley and the fish is also the story of Mike Winn and Jed Dickerson, the two others who were in the small fishing boat Monday morning. Like Weakley, both are accomplished fishermen with trophy bass to their credit.

“These guys have been buddies for well over a decade,” Smock said. “I’ve seen these guys out there since they were young teenagers. They are excellent fishermen.”

The big bass was first spotted Sunday near its nest, where it was laying eggs. The three bought a campsite at the lake, which guaranteed them an early place in the license line the next day. On Monday, they immediately set out to where they had seen the nest.

The water, normally clear, had clouded up overnight because of rain. As the three cast their lines, Weakley said he felt something hit at his white rattlesnake jig. When he pulled to set his hook, it was obvious a very large fish was straining at the other end of the 15-pound test line.

The crowd that gathered may help Weakley land his record. Smock said the fishermen saw the bass was improperly hooked as soon as it surfaced near the boat. And it was clearly an accident -- something that could weigh in Weakley’s favor -- because so many people saw it happen.

When the fish was finally landed, a less than scrupulous fisherman could have quickly pulled a fast one.

“He showed a great deal of integrity,” Smock said. “He could have unhooked it from the body and reset it in the mouth. He could have claimed it was lip hooked all the time.”

What will happen now is a matter of conjecture.

Will Weakley’s bass be deemed a world record by the Florida-based International Game Fish Assn.? A ruling isn’t expected for a month or so.

By that time, Smock said, the record could be broken anyway.

“With that fish still out there in the lake, who knows how long the record will stand,” he said.