Mark Taylor

Mark Taylor's Outdoors column and notebook appears regularly in The Roanoke Times.

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BURNT CHIMNEY -- Don Horn and Benny Webster couldn't help but laugh hysterically Friday morning as they watched an angler in a nearby boat try to handle the massive catfish he'd hooked.

Sunday they were still laughing about what they had witnessed in a quiet section of the Blackwater River arm of Smith Mountain Lake.

"I only wish I'd had a video camera," Horn said, shaking his head.

Horn's brother, Jerry Horn, the man they were laughing at, didn't mind the ribbing.

He was about to collect his memento -- a $1,500 check for winning the catfish category in the Optimist Club of Cave Spring's 41st annual fishing tournament, a total that included a $500 bonus for setting a tournament record.

Horn's catch was the largest in a tournament that produced a number of stellar catches and which saw a full leaderboard in all but the muskie category, which, as usual, drew no entries.

Other top catches included a 29.12-pound winning striper for Bill Hayes of Roanoke, a 7.1-pound largemouth for Ben Mullins of Roanoke, a 4.68-pound smallmouth bass for Gary Boothe of Roanoke and a 1.7-pound crappie for Clarence Sisson of Salem.

Jerry Horn's tournament got off to a good start early Friday when he boated a flathead catfish he estimated would weigh between 17 and 20 pounds.

Based on recent trends, that wouldn't be enough to make the top four in the category, but there was a chance so he was happy to put the catfish on a stringer while he continued to fish.

About 9:20 a.m., a fish hit one of his live shad baits.

"I could tell it was a good one," he said. "It was pulling my boat all over the place."

Horn, a 59-year-old retiree who lives in Roanoke, had seven or eight lines out.

"That thing must have gotten tangled up in four or five of them," he said, laughing.

When Horn got the fish close to the boat, he reached for his net. The fish took off again, the other tangled rods shaking and rattling.

Hence the laughter from his brother and Webster, who were anchored not far away.

After a battle lasting about 20 minutes, Horn was finally able to net the fish, which narrowly topped Ricky Cowden's 35.12-pound catch last year.

With the three other placing catfish ranging from 28 to 30 pounds, the four winning catfish totaled more than 123 pounds.

Boothe didn't have that kind of audience when he caught his winning smallmouth.

In fact, the 37-year-old prefers to take a stealthy approach as he walks the lake's banks to fish at night.

"I wear camo and keep a low profile," he said. "No one's ever said anything to me."

As Boothe walked the shoreline about midnight Saturday, he had a feeling something good was about to happen.

"The bait fish activity was tremendous," he said. "When I start hearing a lot of activity, that's when I put on a Thunderstick."

When Boothe heard a large fish crashing bait near a dock, he made several casts with his chrome-and-black plug before hooking up with his winner.

The win was bittersweet for Boothe, who said he dedicated the catch to his late friend Barry Phillipe, who drowned at the lake last August.

"He was my best friend and the best fishing partner I ever had," Boothe said of Phillipe, who fished previous Optimists tournaments with him.

The lucky lure was Phillipe's.

"It was the last lure he used," he said. "I'm going to have the fish mounted with the lure in its mouth."

A silver-and-black Thunderstick also was the key lure for largemouth bass winner Ben Mullins, who was cruising along the banks about 2:30 Saturday morning when he saw a big fish boiling near the surface.

"I threw up in there two or three times before she struck it," said Mullins, who admitted things got a bit hectic when he tried to get the fish in the boat. "Trying to get her in the net ... there were some tense moments."

Both the striper and crappie winners admitted their catches were bonuses.

"We was bass fishing," said Hayes. "We stopped by a tree and I just threw a swimbait over there and he just took off with it."

Hayes, a 47-year-old brick mason who lives in Roanoke, said he was fortunate the fish headed toward open water and not toward the trees.

After netting the big striper he faced another challenge.

"He wouldn't fit in my livewell," said Hayes, whose lure was a Berkley Hollow Body swim bait.

With the fish's tail sticking out of the livewell, he raced to Foxport Marina to weigh the fish. After the weigh-in, he released the fish, which swam off briskly.

Sisson was fishing for catfish and stripers when he hooked his winning crappie.

"I caught it by mistake," he readily admitted.

Sisson was fishing with small live alewives when the fish hit. With saltwater-sized tackle, Sisson quickly figured out he wasn't hooked into a monster.

"It wasn't much of a fight," said Sisson, who didn't have much confidence that the fish would keep its leading spot through the weekend. "I thought maybe it would place, but I didn't think it would win.

"I'm shocked it held up."

The tournament drew about 500 entrants, according to club president Carol Landrum. After prize payouts, proceeds are used to fund youth-related programs in the Roanoke Valley.