(Spirit Lake)– A Spirit Lake man is the winner of $5,080.00 after snagging a specially tagged walleye just hours after the conclusion of Walleye Weekend. Dennis Weerheim caught the fish Sunday night while fishing from a dock in front of his home on the east side of Big Spirit Lake…
“My wife went to bed so I said I think I’m going to go out to the dock and try fishing a little bit. Caught a couple of walleyes and then I caught this one. And while I was netting him I was looking down there and in my head lamp I could see something on the fish’s back and I thought oh my gosh, it’s a tagged walleye! So with the pole in one hand and the netted fish in my other hand I headed straight to the shore because I didn’t want him to flip or anything and lose him, so that’s what I did and then I checked him there and it definitely was a tag.”
Weerheim tells KUOO news while his timing was a little bit off, he’s still thrilled with the catch…
“Oh yeah, I had been out all weekend for the contest and everything and then yeah, I wasn’t fortunate enough to catch it during the contest to get the big bucks but this is really nice.”
Nine specially tagged walleyes are still out there, with cash prizes still to be paid out to the next two that are caught. The prizes in the extended contest are based on a percentage of registration fees for the extended contest.
