Local owns U.S. Tarpon record

When Houma native David Prevost picked up tarpon fishing as a hobby, he jokingly made a proclamation to his wife.

“I told her, ‘Honey, I’m going to catch the record-breaking tarpon,’” Prevost said.

It took 35 years of work and hundreds of trips out to the Gulf of Mexico, but Prevost made good on his promise. He now owns the record for having caught the largest tarpon in United States waters.

The local CPA snagged his massive catch, a 246-pound, 10-ounce tarpon on Oct. 15 when fishing the Gulf of Mexico with his friend Jeff Deblieux. The fish is easily the Louisiana record for the species – outlasting the previous record fish by more than 10 pounds. Through research, Prevost has also discovered that his tarpon is also a national record, outlasting the previous best by just more than three pounds.

The local angler said that the support he’s received since catching the fish is “incredible”, touting that the entire experience has been something that he’ll never forget.

The record fish was one of eight tarpon the duo caught on that day off the shore of Grand Isle. They were fishing aboard the White Kap, which is the Prevost family boat that’s named after David’s daughter Kristen Angele Prevost. The KAP represents the daughter’s initials.

“It’s been an absolutely awesome thing,” Prevost said. “I’ve gotten hundreds of texts and calls and signs of support from friends, family and people in the fishing community. It’s been overwhelming to the point that it almost doesn’t feel like it’s fully sunk in just yet. It’s been really, really crazy. It’s something that we’ll never forget, for sure.”

The record fish was the last one caught in the day.

Prevost said he and Deblieux took the White Kap out in the morning and had been fishing all day about 8-10 miles off Grand Isle’s coast.

The longtime fishing buddies had about 15 bites in the day, which had netted seven catches to that point.

Provost said when the record fish was caught, the tarpon were active and were biting.

At around 5:15 p.m., the White Kap had a hook up.

The Houma native hooked the fish and the record fish was officially on its way into the boat, though getting it there officially proved no easy feat.

Prevost said he had no idea initially that the record tarpon was a special fish. Once hooked, the saltwater fish darted from the boat, pulling the line’s slack as much as it could, swimming as far from the boat as it could.

“We didn’t know it at the time that it was going to be really big,” he said. “It didn’t feel any different at first. It ran out quite a ways from the boat.”

Then it jumped, leaving the water and showing itself to the anglers on the boat.

At that point, Prevost had a clue that the fish was pretty big – but he still didn’t think it was anywhere near record-size.

Then it jumped again.

And again.

And again.

Four times total, the tarpon left the water and fought for its freedom. The struggle was on and the battle between fisherman and fish was at its peak.

“The fish was strong,” Prevost said. “It definitely had its share of fight.”

While Prevost battled the record tarpon, Deblieux was on the other end of the White Kap, fighting a different tarpon with all of his might. That one, too, was pretty nice sized, according to Prevost, but it never ended up in the boat.

“His tarpon ended up breaking off,” Prevost said. “So then it was just me and my fish going at it.”

After a lengthy struggle, Prevost got the fish near the White Kap. By that time, it had become well-known that the fish on the hook was huge.

Prevost said he and Deblieux did a measurement of the fish’s girth, which came back at 46 inches – a mark that indicated to the anglers that this tarpon was easily in the neighborhood of 200-pounds.

Once that determination was made, Prevost made the decision to bring the fish aboard the boat to bring ashore for an official weigh-in.

At that time, it became obvious that the tarpon was massive.

“It took everything Jeff and I had to get it into the boat because of its huge mass,” Prevost said. “It wasn’t easy to move the fish around.”

Once onshore, the fish was taken to Sand Dollar Marina. When it was placed onto the scale, the digital weighing instrument said back 246.6, which equates to 246-pounds, 10-ounces.

Prevost knew immediately that he was the new holder of the Louisiana record for tarpon.

“I called my wife and I called my daughter, and I was just so happy,” Prevost said. “They told me that they could hardly hear me because I was so excited and so filled with excitement. I knew the fish was big, but I didn’t expect to see 246 when I looked at that scale.”

Then it got better.

After doing independent research on the tarpon record books, Prevost discovered that his record was actually for the entire United States.

The largest American-caught tarpon he could find on record was 243-pounds, which makes his the biggest weighed fish in the country’s history. The world record for the fish exceed 246-pounds, 10-ounces, but were caught in South America and Africa.

Prevost said to own a national record is something that is humbling and that gives him goosebumps.

But after all, he did say he was going to get to this point all along – even if just in a joke to his wife.

“She asked me, ‘What are you going to do now?’” Prevost said with a laugh. “I don’t know how to answer that. I guess I’m going to have to catch a bigger one now, right? This one took 35 years to get. I just hope I’m blessed to be able to fish for another 35 years.”•

Tarpon