It has taken me a couple days to wrap my head around everything that has happened over the past few days. Ever since I was a young man, I have dreamed of winning the Annual Fishing Derby that is held in Reedville every spring.
The Reedville Fishing Derby is the the longest running fishing tournament held in Virginia, in fact, 2014 was the 31st time that the tournament was held. In its heyday, the tournament was limited to 500 boats, and I understand that the sponsor, Smith Point Sea Rescue had a waiting list for boats to enter. Back then, the Chesapeake Bay was FULL of BIG Bluefish and this tournament was focused strictly on that species. Unfortunately, in the late 80's the large Bluefish that we had been used to catching, did not migrate up into the bay, and as a result, this tournament added Striped Bass and Croaker prizes to their list. This was an event that everyone looked forward to all year, and during the weekend that this tournament was held, the small town of Reedville swelled to the point that there were traffic jams on Main Street. Recently, this tournament has taken on different characteristics in that it is now strictly a Striped Bass tournament, and held in May rather than June. In addition, the number of boats that participate has shrunken significantly, this year there were fewer than 50 boats participating. I'm hopeful the Smith Point Sea Rescue can breathe new life into this tournament and bring it back to its former glory.
My Father, Capt. Fred Biddlecomb has fished in this tournament every year with the exception of 2013and 2014. During his long history of fishing this tournament, one thing has remained constant every year for my Dad, and that is that our family friend Jerry Moreland, his family and friends have fished with him. Unfortunately, we lost Jerry several years ago, but his sons and grandsons have kept the tradition of fishing this tournament alive. This year, Michael and Jerry Moreland Jr., their sons, Cody and Hunter, and two other friends, David Sisk and Scott Arbogast, fished the tournament with me on my new boat, Three Sons and started a new family tradition.
On Friday morning, we headed out early, ran for about 1.5 hours and found some good looking bait and a few nice looking marks which I was pretty sure were Rockfish.
My Mate Joe Lucas and I got our spread out as fast as we could, with the exception of a couple planer board malfunctions, we had a good looking spread. Within 30 minutes we landed a 42" bass which was good enough for the second place youth award for Hunter.
Unfortunately, the rest of the day was spent straining water looking for a follow up fish, but no such luck.
Saturday morning, I ran to another location based on some fishing reports that I got Friday evening. On my way there, I ran into some of the best looking marks that I have seen in the past 12 months, and with the exception of one other boat, I had it all to myself. Again, Joe & I got our spread out, without the planer board issues that we had on Friday. In short order, we had 3 bites and managed to land one fish.
Within an hour, I made another pass through the same area and we hooked up again. This time, Cody was up for battle. This was a LARGE fish based on the fight that it put up, however, it came unhooked before we could get the net under it. I made another pass through the area when all the sudden, one of the rods went down in a BIG way! David grabbed the rod & the battle was on. After nearly 20 minutes of give and take, I finally got my hands on the leader and brought the fish up to the surface. When that fish came into view, I could tell that we had an exceptional fish on our hands. Joe got the net under the fish, and it took both of us to get her into the boat.
Once in the boat we attempted to measure the fish, but it was longer than my measuring tape, so we estimated the length to be around 49". With that fish in the box we covered some different water and managed to get 2 more bites and land one more fish.
Knowing that we had a contender for the tournament, we packed up at 1:30 and headed to Reedville where we were to weigh in.
When we got to the dock, we sent the fish up to the weigh station where the officials recorded the official length and weight which turned out to be 50.5" and 49.25 lbs.,a full 4 pounds ahead of the next largest fish. Needless to say, we were all more than happy with the results!
*(view more pictures from this trip and like our facebook page here:
www.facebook.com/southertideguideservice )
As of 6:00 Sat evening, there were no other fish weighed in that were larger than ours, and it was official! I had finally won the Reedville Fishing Derby with the largest Striped Bass that has ever been weighed during the 31 year history of that tournament! Needless to say, I have been on cloud 9 ever since.
I really appreciate all of the calls, emails and texts that I have received over the past couple days offering me congratulations. They mean more than any of you will ever know.
As I mentioned, this whole tradition started with my dad and Jerry Moreland MANY moons ago. Jerry is gone now, but I know that he was with us that day, and my father Captain Fred Biddlecomb has been nothing but supportive of my new endeavor. I would like to dedicate this tournament win to them.
