Rare catch at Toledo Bend

[longsidelandry]

[SIZE=3]Wow, I don't know if anybody else has received this email but it's pretty cool![/SIZE]
[SIZE=3][/SIZE]
[SIZE=3]DeRidder, La. - [/SIZE]

[SIZE=3]Dry Creek residents, Tommy and LeQuita Harper reeled in a rather unusual catch while fishing at Toledo Bend recently. [/SIZE]
[SIZE=3]On Saturday, April 4, the two were spending the day fishing with their seven year-old grandson, Colbi, when the boy surprised them all by finding a Butterfly Koi fish at the end of his line. [/SIZE]
[SIZE=3]“He was so excited when he saw it,” says Tommy Harper, “but none of us knew what it was.” [/SIZE]
[SIZE=3]Colbi had been fishing off of the banks at Toledo ’s Tennessee Bay near a friend of the family’s camp when he hooked a fish that gave his ten pound test line some trouble. “His pole was bending pretty bad, so that’s when I took it from him to help,” explains Tommy. “We were all surprised when we saw the fish.” [/SIZE]
[SIZE=3]Friends fishing nearby guessed the fish to be a Grass Carp. “I was pretty sure it wasn’t that, but I still didn’t have any idea of what it actually was,” says Tommy, “so we just put it in our ice chest.” [/SIZE]
[SIZE=3]The group later took the fish to a local bait and tackle shop to be measured and registered. The fish weighed in at 15.2 pounds and measured 40 inches long. After returning home with the prize, the Harpers’ son-in-law searched the internet in the hopes of discerning the fish’s species. It wasn’t long before the family not only realized that they had a koi fish, but a valuable koi fish at that. Estimates of the fish’s worth, were it still alive, range from a minimum of $7,000, to over $20,000. [/SIZE]
[SIZE=3]“I could not believe it,” says LeQuita Harper, “we were shocked.” [/SIZE]
[SIZE=3]“I wish we would have kept it alive,” adds Tommy. [/SIZE]
[SIZE=3]Now, most residents who have heard the story are just wondering how such a fish managed to find its way into Toledo Bend. While it has been a practice in the past to use goldfish as fishing bait, others are guessing that the fish must have been released by its owner into the reservoir.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=3]Vince Martin, however, has a different theory. [/SIZE]
[SIZE=3]Martin works at the local DeRidder Pets store, and he believes the animal may have been displaced by Hurricane Rita. [/SIZE]
[SIZE=3]“It is possible that someone near the lake owned a large koi pond and the hurricane caused it to overflow and moved the fish into the lake.” Martin says that he himself owned a koi pond that did just that during the 2005 storm. [/SIZE]
[SIZE=3]Judging by the fish’s size, Martin estimates that the fish was approximately ten years old. [/SIZE]
[SIZE=3]Even though the fish is no longer alive, LeQuita Harper says that the family will be keeping it with them for years to come.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=3]“As soon as we can find someone who mounts exotic fish we are having it mounted,” she says.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=3]“It’s just too beautiful not to.” [/SIZE]

[T-BAZ]

Wow, that is one cool looking fish.

[huntin fool]

W posted this before, but a cool looking gold fish

[swamp snorkler]

$7,000 TO $20,000 I'M BOUT TO GET A SHOVEL AND DIG ME A HUGE COY POND. THATS WORTH A TON MORE THAN CATFISH. That's a $460 a pound fish.

[fun w son]

i would serious think about stoping drinking beer while i'm fishing if i caught one of those....... ok maybe after two of them????? maybe!!!!

[mikedatiger]

This is my favorite part: Friends fishing nearby guessed the fish to be a Grass Carp. “I was pretty sure it wasn’t that, but I still didn’t have any idea of what it actually was,” says Tommy, “so we just put it in our ice chest.”

Hey what the heck is it - who knows, but I bet it will fry up nice. Put er in the ice chest!!!