The first catfish came to the scales just before midnight in Bass Pro Shops Big Cat Quest on the Apalachicola River near Blountstown, FL on Saturday July 16, 2016.
Those first fish were weighed in at Neal Landing by Eddie Huey, Bremen GA and Kevin Breedlove, Opelika, AL. They had 3 fish weighing 70.50 pounds that include a big fish of 25 pounds. The weigh-in continued throughout the night until the contest ended at noon on Sunday.
When the scales closed it was Lonnie Fountain of Jasper, GA and Jonathon Long of Talking Rock, GA claiming the first place honors. The GA team had a 5 fish limit that weighed 186.40 pounds.
“I usually drift fish,” said Fountain. “This river is so shallow though it is hard to drift. It might be 20 feet deep one minute and 2 feet the next. We were just looking for deep holes to anchor up on and fish. Most of our fish came from 10 to 20 feet of water.”
“We caught about 9 fish for the tournament,” added Fountain. “We used skipjack for bait on a regular Carolina rig. We moved around. We would stop at a place and catch a fish then move on somewhere else and catch another one.”
Second Place went to the Florida team of Catfish Ronnie and Ed Turk. Their five fish weighed 154.45 pounds.
“The fish were coming out of deep holes and feeding shallow,” reported Catfish Ronnie. “It was less than 30 minutes that we had our first fish in the boat. We did not want to travel on this low river at night so we motored up river about 5 miles and set up on a section of the river that I usually catch a lot of good fish on. We caught 2 more fish there. The rest of the night we just kept fishing, pretty much everywhere. We got lucky and added a 35 and a 38 to finish out our total.”
“The most interesting thing to me was how many fish were released after the tournament,” added Catfish Ronnie. “Down here in Florida they don’t always release them. Big cats are often looked at as a nuisance fish because they eat the bream. I was glad to see them released.”
“It started out pretty bad for us. We headed for our honey hole and when we got there someone else was already on it. So, we went down river one bend and caught fish. God has his hand on us,” chuckled Turk.
“We caught our first fish by 6:30 pm, before it ever got dark,” continued Turk. “Then we caught fish all night, probably about an hour apart. By 2:00 in the morning we had 4 fish and at 2:30 we caught our big fish that weighed 38 pounds.”
“Everything we caught were blue cats. We caught em’ on cut skipjack on a Carolina rig in anywhere from 12 to 24 feet deep. I give all the credit to my fishing partner, Catfish Ronnie,” concluded Turk. “He put us on the fish.”
Third place honors went to the hometown team of Bill Steward and Jamie Lee with 126.55 pounds.
“We were pleasantly surprised with the tournament,” said Kristy H. Terry, Executive Director of the Calhoun County Chamber of Commerce. “We had a lot of local participation and we had one of our local anglers place high in the event. We were very pleased to have all these great fishermen come and fish our river.”
“There were some good fish caught,” continued Terry. “They were fun to watch. I think they were fun to catch. There is a lot to be said by those numbers of fish that were caught.”
The decision to bring the BCQ back next year has already been made. “Everyone can mark their calendar,” concluded Terry. “We will be hosting the tournament back here on the Apalachicola River next year, in the last weekend in July.”
If you have any questions about BCQ contact Ken Freeman at 731-234-1888. Follow the BCQ Website and the BCQ Facebook Page for more information, updates, results and photos from the tournament.
For information on visiting the area you can browse the Calhoun County Chamber of Commerce Website.