Carleton youth brings home a big fish tale

By Tina Comeau

THE VANGUARD

NovaNewsNow.com

When it comes to fishing for speckled trout, eight-year-old Sara Crosby of Carleton seems to have caught the knack for blowing the competition out of the water.

The Carleton Consolidated School student was fishing with her dad and a friend on May 2 when, using a worm and a gold spinner as bait, she landed a 2.53-pound trout.

It looks to be a record for a trout caught by a youth in the province. According to the Nova Scotia Anglers Handbook of 2007, the record has been a 0.85-pound trout caught last year.

The catch has given the daughter of Jeff and Heather Crosby bragging rights in her family since her dad has never caught a trout so large. And the 17-and-three-quarter-inch-long trout also trumps the community’s records at the store in Carleton.

“When she walked in here her grin was ear to ear,” says owner Jennifer Cunningham. “She had a grocery shopping bag and the fish was coming out either side of it.”

The youngster describes catching the fish.

“I casted out and my dad casted out on top of my line and then his friend casted out on top of my dad’s line. We were all tangled and no one thought we had a fish but when we got untangled, on my line was a big fish.”

On Friday, May 4, Robert Gaudet from Natural Resources went to the family’s home to photograph and measure the fish. He was quite impressed by Sara’s catch. He chuckled saying she’ll get full credit for catching the trout, even though “her dad had to help her because her hands were getting tired.”

“We’re still showing it to people,” Sara said about the trout on Friday. “Then we’re going to eat it.”