ARLINGTON — This hulking humpie has one horrendous hump.
The pink salmon that Adam Stewart recently pulled out of the lower Stillaguamish River is so huge it’s landed him in the record books.
At 15.4 pounds, it’s already been declared by the state Department of Fish and Wildlife the biggest pink salmon ever caught in the state.
And it’s bigger than any pink on record, ever, anywhere, according to the International Game Fish Association, a Florida-based organization that serves as the conferring authority for worldwide fishing records.
The previous state record pink also was caught in Snohomish County. A 14.86-pounder was caught in the Skykomish River in Monroe by Alexander Minerich on Sept. 30, 2001, according to Becky Reynolds, world-record coordinator for the fish association.
Stewart’s catch is so big that he thought he hooked an entirely different fish.
“I thought it was a coho for sure,” Stewart said.
Pinks are also called “humpies” due to the distinctive hump they get on their backs when close to spawning. They’re generally about 3 to 5 pounds. Cohos, also called silvers, average 6 to 12 pounds, and are known for their fighting ability. Pinks usually put up only a light struggle, then give up.
Stewart was fishing for silvers when he and a friend went to the river on Oct. 11. He was using a “clown corkie,” a plastic float ball that attracts the fish and lifts the hook off the bottom of the river, on 10-pound test line.
When he first hooked his record fish, it swam away from him, taking line out from his reel along with it — what anglers call “running.”
“Most of the pinks, they don’t run very far,” Stewart said.
This fish ran all the way across the river, about 50 or 60 feet, he said.
The height of its hump served like a ship’s rudder, with the river’s current pushing the beast farther across.
When the fish reached the other side, “he sat there probably five minutes and I couldn’t even pull any line,” Stewart said.
This is where patience paid off.
Stewart was the more patient one.
Believing the fish may have gotten hung up among rocks or logs, he waited.
A minute passed. Two more. Some more after that.
Suddenly, the fish started speeding downstream.
Stewart pulled and reeled. The fish stayed hooked.
The whole battle took about 15 minutes.
“I didn’t even know what it was until I got it into about six inches of water,” he said. “I saw about a foot of hump sticking up out of the water.”
Well versed in fishing records, Stewart knew this fish was close to the biggest, he said.
He pulled out a digital scale that he carries and weighed the fish at 15.7 pounds. He then wasted no time in getting the fish to the Haggen grocery store in Arlington, which is certified by the state to confirm weights of fish and game. He got there in half an hour, tops.
They made a record.
A fish biologist, Don Rothaus, drove out to take photos and measurements.
The fish was 31 inches long, with a girth of 24.75 inches.
Stewart still has to go through a formal application process with the International Game Fish Association for the world record. The process takes about 60 days for the record to become official, Reynolds said.
Stewart, who works as a metal-and-glass cutter at Ryerson MicroJet in Marysville, said the world record for pinks is broken every few years, but usually just by a couple of tenths of a pound.
This time, he’s breaking the record by about half a pound, he pointed out.
“Hopefully I’ll have it for a couple of years,” he said.
Stewart usually releases his catch.
Sometimes he’ll eat the pinks if it’s early in the season and their flesh is firmer. This time of year, before spawning, the fish’s meat starts to break down.
And who really eats a world record fish?
“I’m getting it mounted,” he said.
Reporter Bill Sheets: 425-339-3439 or sheets@heraldnet.com.
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