Thursday, January 14, 2010
Bill Cochran's Outdoors: World record largemouth bass cheered through tear-filled eyes
Bill Cochran is a Roanoke Times outdoors columnist.
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Manabu Kuritan with world record-tying bass from Japan.
Ever since George Perry reeled in the world record 22-pound, 4-ounce largemouth bass 77 years ago, anglers have been toiling to top what is considered fishing’s greatest prize.
The International Game Fish Association, which is the record keeping agency, has called it “freshwater fishing’s Holy Grail.” BASS tagged it “the catch.” Beating it has loomed as a far bigger prize than winning a million-dollar lottery.
During the early and innocent years following Perry’s catch from Lake Montgomery in Georgia, the search centered in the Deep South, particularly Florida, home of the fast-growing, long-living Florida fish.
Then about 1980 the hunt switched to California where several deep, clear San Diego lakes, particularly Lake Castaic, began producing monster largemouths following stockings of Florida fish. Bass fishing no longer was just a pastime of the working class good old boys of the South. It became a national pastime, the center of a billion-dollar industry. Bass grew to be the most sought after game fish in the country while other species, such as brook trout and salmon, faded.
On March 12, 1991, Robert Crupi reeled in a bass from Lake Castaic just ounces shy of Perry’s catch. It weighed 22.010 pounds. You get an idea of how California has dominated trophy bass fishing when you consider that the state currently accounts for 20 of the top 25 all-time catches. Lake Castaic, alone, produced eight. Crupi caught a second one, just a pound off the one that ranks second to Perry’s.
Maybe we weren’t paying that much attention when on April 22, 2003 a 19.150-pound bass was registered from Japan that scored in the top 20.
Big bass in Japan? No way! This fish has USA stamped on it.
In Japan, the largemouth is classified as an invasive species. It is considered by many a cheap import form the United States. Bass anglers in Japan often are held in low esteem, like carp anglers in this country.
On July 2, 2009, the unthinkable happened. Manabu Kurita, a 32-year old bass wiz from Aichi, Japan, reeled in a massive, big-lipped, big-bellied largemouth from Lake Biwa, Japan’s largest natural lake (165,760 acres). He caught it on, of all things, a live sunfish bait that he dropped next to a bridge piling. Kurita said it took just 3 minutes to reel in the nearly 30-inch fish. While it wasn’t big enough to dethrone the catch of George Washington Perry, it tied it.
It was almost as if IGFA was saying “Say I Ain’t So.” It took six months to verify the catch. There were rumors to deal with, including one that Kurita may have caught the bass in a “no-fishing” zone and that he had stopped his boat to fight the fish in a “no stop” zone.
The longer it went the more the catch appeared to be illegitimate; yet, none of the ill will proved true. If Kurita had wanted to cheat, wouldn’t the obvious place been to say that he caught the fish on a such-and-such brand lure, deriving endorsement money from the manufacture?
BASS Master Magazine sent its editor to Japan to check things out. He returned with a positive report. Kurita was subjected to a polygraph test. He passed. IGFA was flooded with letters and e-mails.
“Many were incredulous that the all-tackle record could be tied from a fish in Japan,” said Jason Schratwieser, IGFA conservation director. IGFA moved slowly, fearful of a lawsuit.
Then last week, following meticulous documentation, IGFA put Kurita’s name alongside Perry’s in the world record book as an official tie. BASS carried a live video feed on bassmaster.com.
But full joy wasn’t there. Not like it would have been had the catch occurred in the United States.
We’ve had to get used to losing leadership to Japan in cars, television sets and cameras. Now, add to that, record bass. There is a tear that comes with the reality that a fish we thought was ours, a symbol of pride, independence, guts and soul and toughness -- a survivor -- is equally at home in Japan.
Japan now is the new frontier for big bass. That distinction has gone from Florida to California to across the ocean. Don’t look for the current record to last another 77 years. Kurita thinks he already has hooked and lost a bass bigger than the one that vaulted him into the world record book.
“I think in the 28-pound range,” he told BASS.
Before long, the U.S. isn’t even likely to hold onto a tie. The spotlight clearly is on Japan.
