A new Arkansas record was set for a cutthroat trout last weekend on the North Fork River. Mike Bowers of Abilene, Kansas, caught a fish weighing 10.02 pounds with a 26-inch length and a 19-inch girth.
Bowers was with a group fishing adjacent to Gene’s Trout Fishing Resort. He was using a Bass Pro Shop ultralight spinning rod with a four-pound ultralight green line, a No. 14 bait holder hook and salmon egg. The fish first appeared to be a brown trout, but once Bowers examined it, he realized it was a cutthroat trout.
Bowers knew the previous state record was 9.1 pounds, so he immediately brought the fish to the dock at Gene’s. The fish was weighed, and the scale rested at 10.25 pounds. Bowers put it in the hospital box for recovery, but the fish eventually died. The Arkansas Game and Fish Commission was contacted, and Bowers and Gene’s owner Scott Sillence met with Wildlife Officer Corporal Doug Small and Chief Fish Biologist Christy Graham at the Mountain Home office. The trout was officially weighed on a certified digital scale at 10.02 pounds, and Graham declared the new state record.
The original cutthroat trout will be mounted for Bowers with two replicas being produced. One replica will be on display at Game and Fish’s corporate office in Little Rock, and the other replica will be displayed at Gene’s next to a five-pound state record brook trout.
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