Submitted photoDan Williams caught this monster bass recently at Lake Eddins in Clarke County on a "secret" lure.

Dan Williams launched his boat and began fishing in sweltering midday heat on a recent trip to Lake Eddins. Williams and his fishing buddy were going to fish during the heat of the midday sun, hoping to catch a few fish. Williams, a retired dairy farmer is an avid angler, hunter and farmer who grows delicious vegetables when he’s not catching big fish.

“Believe it or not but we’ve been catching fish right during the middle of the day in this hot weather,” Williams said. “I don’t know why they’re biting better then but they are. If you can stand the heat you can catch a good one or two also.”

While Williams was fishing for big bass on his trip, his partner was fishing for crappie and having some luck, too. Williams is also an avid crappie angler who has caught more than his fair share of monster crappie as well. He’s got a couple of huge crappie on his wall that weighed in at 3 pounds 10 ounces and 3 pounds 6 ounces!

Williams and his partner had been catching a few fish and things were really heating up after a couple hours on the water.

High noon monster bass

“Wham!” Williams’ rod bowed up as a monster bass nailed his lure and dove towards the bottom. The excited angler reared back on his rod and slammed the hook deep into the fish’s mouth.

“That fish hit a diving plug and when I set the hook I thought he’d gotten around a snag,” Williams said. “Because I couldn’t move him an inch.”

When the big fish pulled back it was all Williams could do to hold on for a few minutes until he started wearing the fish down.

“I thought it was a catfish because he dove for the bottom and was really heavy,” Williams said. “It was hot as blazes but that didn’t stop him from hitting my lure.”

The battled raged back and forth for a few minutes until the fish tired and came toward the boat. Upon seeing the boat the bass came unglued.

The fish exploded through the surface and thrashed wildly on the surface and Williams knew this was not a catfish nor any ordinary fish. This was a monster bass the likes he’d never seen before. Just imagine catching a monster bass at high noon on one of the hottest days of the year.

You would never expect it to happen. But that’s just what happened to Dan Williams.

Williams catches a lot of crappie and has plenty of fish to eat so he definitely didn’t want to eat this big boy. However, he’d never seen a bass this big and he faced a dilemma.

“We didn’t have any scales with us and I didn’t want to kill the fish,” Williams said. “I wanted to get him back in the water, so he wouldn’t die. I wanted somebody else to be able to catch him, too.”

Imagine that! Williams wanted to give another angler an opportunity to feel the thrill again and again, also. While most people would have been really concerned with finding scales to weigh the bass on, Williams was more concerned with getting the fish back in the water so that it would live to catch another day. He knew that the extremely hot weather could have an adverse effect on the bass’ chances of survival as the stress they go through in such humid conditions could have a very detrimental effect on them, also.

After they got through fishing they showed several people the photo and all were amazed at the size of the monster bass. Some said it was the largest bass they’d ever seen and that was true for Williams as well. Some people wanted to know what the state record bass weighed and some even thought that this fish might push that, too.

While we’ll never know the exact weight of that fish and just how much it might have weighed, we can be sure that Dan Williams was more concerned with the health of that bass, so much so that he released him to grow some more. Williams likes to feel the thrill again and again and there’s one thing to remember. He knows just where he caught that bass and right where he released him. And who knows, he might just catch him again one day real soon.

Call Mike Giles at 601-917-3898 or email mikegiles18@comast.net.