Added on Thursday, November 12, 2009  Fish Post

Pleasure Island Surf Fishing Challenge

A light chill in the air marked one of the first cool weekends of fall as 273 anglers descended on the southern beaches of New Hanover County October 16-18 for the 2009 Fisherman’s Post Pleasure Island Surf Fishing Challenge, chasing prize money in divisions for seven species of surf dwelling bottom feeders. The autumn weather turned the bite in the breakers on, and nearly every category in the event saw catches improve from the previous years’ events.

Weighing in a monster 11.40 lb. chopper, Kure Beach’s William Letendre blew away the competition in the bluefish category and walked away from the event $1,080 richer. Fishing the event with his wife Kris, the anglers fished the Fort Fisher beach Friday night and Saturday, landing some small bluefish and flounder before the bite turned on late Saturday afternoon as the tide rose.

“At high tide we did pretty good on the blues,” Letendre explained. “I caught a few nice ones before that big fish hit.”

Letendre had made a long cast with a chunk of cut mullet when the Hatteras-sized blue attacked the bait about an hour before sunset on Saturday.

“He hit it hard and just took off with it,” Letendre continued. “I didn’t know what it was at first. He never came out of the water. I thought it might be a drum.”

After the hard strike, the fish came into the breakers relatively easily, but refused to surrender the vital final yards that Letendre needed to put his prize on the beach.

“Once he came in close to the shore, he started to get some fight to him,” he said. “The current was ripping and the tide was flowing down the beach and he went with it.”

Finally, around 15 minutes after the fish bit, the angler was able to put it on the beach.

“When I got him close, I could see what it was,” said Letendre. “I told my wife, ‘Look here, it’s a big blue,’ and I washed him in with a wave.”

With the big blue on the beach, Letendre got excited, and at the urgings of his wife he drove the fish to the south end weigh station on the beach at Fort Fisher.

“It was unreal. I was shaking. That’s the biggest bluefish I’ve ever caught,” he explained. “As soon as I got him in, my wife said, ‘Go weigh him in! He’s losing weight!’ so I did.”

Letendre’s chopper ended up besting the second place blue by over 7.5 lbs., handily topping the category.

Jarett Kiser weighed in the 3.7 lb. second place bluefish to take home $540. A 3 lb. fish earned Allen Mungo third and $270.

In the flounder competition, Barry Fowler, from High Point, NC, captured a 3.4 lb. flatfish along with the $1,080 first place bounty.

Just like Letendre, Fowler was fishing the drive-on beach at Fort Fisher with family when his thousand-dollar fish struck.

“I actually caught 21 flounder all weekend,” Fowler said, “fishing out on the south end near the first ramp.”

His most valuable flounder fell for a live finger mullet around 10:30 on Saturday morning.

“He didn’t bite hard at all,” Fowler explained, “just a normal flounder bite. I gave him a little time to eat and set the hook.”

The fish bit at something of an inopportune time for Fowler, though, and he was unable to reel it in after setting the hook.

“I was actually talking to my mom on the cell phone when he bit,” Fowler continued, “and I couldn’t wind on him, so I just backed up and brought him in to the beach.”

Also like the bluefish winner, Fowler elected to take his fish to the scales just after beaching it.

“I figured I’d go ahead and take him in,” he said. “I really didn’t figure a 3 pounder would win it since we’ve caught bigger ones here before, but I guess that just happened to be the flounder.”

Close on Fowler’s heels, Phil Dickinson weighed in a 3.3 lb. flounder to finish second and earn $540. Tyler Johnson’s 2.6 lb. flatty earned him the $270 third place check.

Reynolds O’Briant, of Winston-Salem, NC, weighed in a 1.6 lb. speckled trout to top that category and win $1080.

“I was fishing the very north end of Carolina Beach right at the inlet,” O’Briant reported.

Casting a chunk of cut mullet, O’Briant only had to wait five minutes after the tournament began to hook his valuable speck.

“It was at 12:05 Saturday,” the trout winner explained. “He bit pretty strong. It was on a real light-action rod with a circle hook.”

Reeling his prize in, O’Briant had no clue he was fighting anything special.

“I thought it was just a bluefish,” he said.

Once the trout hit the sand, the angler immediately hopped in his truck and headed for the north end weigh station at Carolina Beach Pier.

“I was at the pier by 12:15,” he said.

In the event’s optional live weigh-in red drum TWT, Hampstead angler Brad Taydus landed a 7.6 lb., 26.75” red drum to top the competition and earn $1,383.73. Taydus, fishing with friends, had a slow start to the tournament, but everything changed around 8:00 Saturday evening.

“We were fishing a little hole around 3/4 of the way down the north end,” he said. “We’d caught small blues but nothing else and were getting kind of disappointed, kind of down, but that turned around real quick.”

Casting a double bottom rig with a small piece of cut mullet on it, Taydus thought he’d had another bluefish strike.

“I saw the rod go, and I kind of thought it was a little blue,” he explained. “Once I had the rod, he pulled and shook his head a little, then started running a good bit and I knew what it was.”

The fish came in fairly easily, but started battling when Taydus worked it close to the beach.

“He came in pretty easy, but he started fighting right at the edge,” he continued. “He swam up and down the beach a little bit and then a wave washed him in.”

Seeing a large slot red on the beach, Taydus got a bit worked up.

“My buddy Steven had to calm me down,” he said. “I was getting ready to go ballistic, but he came over and shushed me because we didn’t want everyone to know we had a drum.”

After running the red to Carolina Beach Pier to weigh in, the anglers returned to their spot, and Taydus’s fishing partner, Steven Roberson, caught the second place, 7.0 lb. red drum shortly thereafter, earning $830.25.

A 6.9 lb. red earned third place and $553.50 for Scott Davis.

In the black drum competition, Ronald Campell, of Castle Hayne, won with an exclamation point, weighing a 9.8 lb. drum to take home $540.

Fishing the rock cove at Fort Fisher, Campbell hooked his big fish around 8:30 Sunday morning on a piece of cut shrimp.

“He didn’t bite that hard until I pulled back on him,” Campbell said. “Then he started running sideways and I thought it was a shark.”

When he was finally able to see the big black drum, he knew getting the fish up on the rocks would be a challenge.

“That fish was so big I had to use the waves to get him up on the rocks,” he explained.

A 3.5 lb. black drum earned Kevin Treadway the second place honors and $270, and Patrick Harrington rounded out the top three with a 1.9 lb. fish worth $108.

A trio of 1.4 lb. whiting topped that leader board. Dallas Elliot weighed his first, at 4:50 Saturday morning, and the tie was broken on time.

Elliot hooked his fish at 4:00 Saturday morning on a piece of shrimp while fishing with friends on the drive-on beach at Fort Fisher.

“I felt pretty good about that fish because he was one ounce off of a citation,” Elliot said.

Alvin Lacewell weighed in the second 1.4 lb. whiting at 3:50 Saturday afternoon to earn $270, and Blake Adams hauled the third 1.4 to the scales at 11:34 Sunday morning, pocketing $108.

Pompano were the final division in the tournament, and a 0.8 lb. pomp earned Cerro Gordo, NC’s Justin Rockwell the $540 first place check. Rockwell’s pomp fell for a shrimp bait in the surf off of Atlantic Towers, between Carolina and Kure Beaches.

Cole Fawler beached a 0.4 lb. pomp to take home second place and $270, and Marshall Francis weighed in another 0.4 lb. fish a bit later to finish third for $108.

The event also featured Junior, Lady, and Senior Angler prizes awarded to fisher-folk landing the heaviest of the six qualifying species.

Banks Osborne topped the Juniors, landing a 2.8 lb. bluefish worth $75.

A 2.8 lb. flounder secured the Top Lady Angler honors and another $75 for Teresa Barefoot.

Mirion Fowler’s 2.6 lb. flounder earned the final $75 prize in the Senior Angler competition.

“We had more anglers fish this year than ever before,” said Tournament Director Eddie Hardgrove. “The Carolina Beach area continues to be a great location for surf fishing and our tournament, and thanks to the early commitment and support from this year’s sponsors, as well as the help from the Town of Carolina Beach, we were able to raise nearly $2000 for the Cape Fear Volunteer Center and the Little Buddy program.”