– submitted || Drew Fulmer, 10, of Florence, captured this record big-head carp in Jonathan Creek.

Whale of a tale

Two hour battle
lands record-
breaking catfish
in Jonathan Creek

By Ann Beckett
Tribune-Courier Features Editor
sports@tribunecourier.com

MARSHALL COUNTY – Drew Fulmer, 10, from Florence, enjoys spending a couple of weeks each summer at the Lakeside Campground in Jonathon Creek visiting his grandparents. Cody Morris, 16, from Smithgrove, also visits his grandparents at the campground.

This summer’s visit was one the boys won’t soon forget. Both enjoy doing a little fishing while they’re here and last Monday night was no different. That evening the boys headed to the campground dock with their poles to do a little night fishing. Around 9:30 p.m. things got a little interesting.

Unknown to them, what they had snagged on the end of Drew’s line, the boys began a two hour struggle to pull the unknown giant onto the dock.

Drew’s grandfather, Dan Fulmer, also of Florence, went to the dock around 11:30 p.m. to check on them and saw the predicament they were in. Dan headed to his truck to get a larger net and was able to help the boys scoop the fish up and onto the dock.

What was on the end of his Okumu spinning rod and reel with a Crappie hook in its mouth was a record breaking big head carp. Paul Risner with the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife measured the fish and confirmed it to be a new state record weighing in at 64 pounds, 49 1⁄2 inches long and 30 inches around and caught on a 10 pound line, breaking the old record of 58 pounds.

Cody, whose grandparents are Paul and Sharon Hedrick of Gary, Ind., and Drew will have quite the fish tale when they get home. When asked how he felt about catching the fish, Drew said in his 10 year old wisdom, “It was very exciting.”