Pending State Record Blue Catfish Caught in Tennessee

Tennessee will have a new state fishing record after an absolute giant of a catfish was hauled from the Cumberland River over the weekend. The 118-pound, 7-ounce blue catfish was caught by Mika Burkhart in Stewart County, and though it hasn’t been officially logged into the state record books, it outweighs the current top fish by more than six pounds.

According to the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency (TWRA), Burkhart caught the massive blue cat at 12:30 p.m. on Saturday, September 24. The giant measured 54 inches in length and sported an immense girth of 41 inches. After having the trophy catch weighed and measured, Burkhart successfully released the blue cat back into the Cumberland River, the TWRA said in a Sunday morning Facebook post.

The record that Burkhart’s fish will beat, once verified and certified by state officials, was set 24 years ago. That fish was caught in 1998 by Robert E. Lewis and weighed 112 pounds. Like Burkhart’s pending…