Most Utah anglers go through life longing to feel the weight of an 8-pound trout on their line and, eventually, in their hands. Brody Abshire of Roy appears to be a big trout magnet. It happened again Dec. 20 during Brody's first ice fishing trip of the season.
Brody spotted some friends already on the thin ice at Causey. Being the ever-prepared angler that he is, Brody left his rods in the car and only carried his Vexilar fish finder down the dam and onto the ice. Sure enough, fish showed up on the finder. Quickly asking his friend Tyler to borrow a rod Brody was in the game.
"After about 2 minutes I looked down to see a fish coming up to my jig on the flasher. He hit hard and I set the hook with great force. I knew it was a bigger fish after the hook set, but after it made its first run of over 50 yards of line and begin to head shake violently, I knew the fish had shoulders," Brody wrote me.
The fight was on and 15 minutes later they got the first look at the fish. Seeing a fish through clear ice always make it seem larger than it is - imagine what these guys thought when the 28-inch brown showed up under their feet.
Several attempts were made to get the fish through the hole in the ice, all the while wondering if the 6-pound test line would hold up to the big brown and the sharp ice. A finger in the eye socket and another in the mouth and the fish hit the air.
Final stats: 28-inches, 8-pounds, 13-ounces with a 15 1/2-inch girth.
Brody's other big trout include an 8-pound rainbow he landed at Pineview Reservoir last spring and a 32-inch brown he caught, also at Pineview, in 1999.
Want to see big fish caught? Go with Brody.