Tournament Report – Pleasure Island Surf Fishing Challenge
With 36 hours of nonstop angling competition, falling temperatures, and rising winds, the 470 anglers participating in the 2015 Pleasure Island Surf Fishing Challenge proved themselves a hearty lot, and over 30 walked away from the event with a share of the more than $22,000 in prize money given away following Sunday’s awards ceremony.
Competing across six categories of the area’s most popular surf species along with an optional Red Drum Calcutta, those who earned checks in the tournament, held October 16-18 along the shores of Carolina Beach, Kure Beach, and Fort Fisher, were rewarded for their heartiness.
Lexington, NC’s Jerry Weisner earned the tournament’s biggest prize, a check for $3,262.50, for topping the Red Drum Calcutta with a 7.5 lb. fish that he hooked on the final morning of the event. After a strong cold front blew through the evening before, Weisner was among many anglers to land slot-sized red drum in the blustery conditions Sunday morning, but his topped the rest of the pack by over half a pound.
The winners of the 2015 Pleasure Island Surf Fishing Challenge pose with trophies, plaques, and checks totaling over $22,000. The event attracted 470 anglers to Carolina Beach, Kure Beach, and Fort Fisher over the weekend of Oct. 16-18.
After waking up Sunday morning, Weisner nearly elected not to fish due to the howling wind, but changed his mind and baited two rods with cut finger mullet, casting them into the surf on the drive-on beach at the north end of the island.
He quickly noticed one line headed into the wind and set the hook. After a 15- minute battle in the wind and strong current, he landed the fish and woke his son Cory. The anglers measured the red and realized it wasn’t over the state’s maximum 27” size to keep a drum, and Weisner headed for the weigh station to register his catch.
Unie Pendergrass, from Wilmington, caught the event’s heaviest flounder, a 5.4 lb. fish that earned the local $1861.20 and the tournament’s Top Lady Angler honors. Pendergrass fished with her husband just north of Fort Fisher and got her first bite at 9:00 on the opening morning of the tournament.
At first, however she wasn’t sure that a fish had grabbed her bait, a live finger mullet.
“I felt something but it didn’t move at all when I reeled and I thought I was hung up,” Pendergrass said. “I walked to the side and felt it move and started reeling and walking up the beach.”
Unie continued reeling and eventually slid the big flatfish ashore.
After weighing it in, she continued fishing at the same spot, but the big flounder was her only bite of the event.
A 3.1 lb. bluefish secured the top spot in that category and $1,861.20 for James Lee Adkins, of Fayetteville, NC. Adkins fished the tournament with his brother-in-law, and the pair found a deep slough on the drive-on beach at Fort Fisher that they liked.
Adkins’ big bluefish bit a chunk of mullet around 9:00 Saturday morning, and he weighed it in quickly.
“I hadn’t heard of anybody catching any bluefish bigger than 10” so I decided to go weigh it in,” he explained.
Steve Churchill, of Holly Springs, NC, managed to top the tournament’s trout division with a 2.0 lb. fish to also pocket $1,861.20. Fishing near the motel he was staying in around the Carolina/Kure Beach line, Churchill kept lines in the water for virtually the entire event.
“Some older guys were fishing there when we checked in and doing pretty well,” he explained, “so we decided to try it out there.”
It proved to be a good decision around 4:00 Saturday afternoon, when the finger mullet/squid combo Churchill was casting caught the attention of his valuable trout.
Winning the pompano category with an exclamation point was Carolina Beach local Dennis Watts, Jr., whose 3.3 lb. fish was more than quadruple the weight of his nearest competition and earned him $930.60.
Watts fished a section of the north end of the beach he knew well and where he had found previous success.
“There’s a hole about midway down the north end that I’ve fished for years,” he explained, “but that’s the biggest pompano I’ve ever caught.”
The fish fell for a whole shrimp fished in the breakers, and Watts was treated to a show as it began leaping from the waves while he battled it to the beach.
Salisbury, NC’s Tonya Adams landed one of only two black drum scaled in the event, both 2.3 lbs. She beat her competition to the scales by four hours to break the tie on time and earn her own $930.60 check.
Fishing the drive-on beach at Fort Fisher, her money winning drum struck a piece of shrimp around 11:30 Saturday morning, and she got it to the scales at 2:20 that afternoon.
Kevin Treadway, of Maco, NC, earned first place on the sea mullet leaderboard with one of four 1.4 lb. fish weighed over the course of the tournament to take home another $930.60 bounty.
Treadway fished with friends near the rope that marks the end of beach driving at Fort Fisher, and he landed his money-winning mullet less than an hour after the tournament began.
A sand flea fooled the big sea mullet, and Treadway hustled it to the scales, beating the next 1.4 lb. fish by less than an hour. The lucky angler also landed the Red Drum Calcutta’s third place fish almost exactly 24 hours after weighing in his mullet.
For more information on the Pleasure Island Surf Fishing Challenge and a full leaderboard, visit www.fishermanspost.com.
