A prominent Southern California bass angler established a new record at San Diego’s Lake Poway recently with the catch of a 14.8-pound largemouth bass.
Jed Dickerson explained to Western Outdoor News that he had been playing poker in a casino when he quit before sunup to check out the dawn bite.
“I told the players that I was taking off because I was going fishing,” Dickerson recalled. “They just laughed, probably thinking ‘What a sicko.’ Anyway, I went home, changed and headed to Lake Poway.”
Largemouth bass are in their spawning phase, with pregnant females guarding nests while at times visible to sight-casting anglers.
The previous record at Lake Poway, 14.1 pounds, was established in late March 2024. (Any bass topping 10 pounds is considered a trophy-size fish.)
Dickerson recalled the moments before his record catch to Western Outdoor News: “When I first saw her, the belly was massive but I couldn’t tell how big she was. She was real cautious and spooky, so I circled the boat around and from deep water I could see she was back on the nest, and I knew it was probably the lake record.”
The nest was in a weedy area and Dickerson was casting a jig before switching to a lighter swimbait. It required several casts from different angles before the bass finally committed and became hooked.
“I set the hook and immediately she came to the surface,” Dickerson said. “I fought her to the boat as fast as I could and got her in the net, and I knew she was big but also knew she wasn’t long enough to be 17 or 18 pounds. Now I was just hoping she would be the new lake record, and I put her on my scale and knew she was over 14.”
Dickerson telephoned the concession booth and rangers ultimately arrived to officially measure and weigh the bass before it was released. “They weighed and measured her, and she went 14-pound, 8 ounces, and she was amazingly 26 inches long by 26 inches fat,” Dickerson said.
According to the International Game Fish Assn., the world record for largemouth bass stands at 22 pounds, 4 ounces, for a fish caught at Montgomery Lake, Ga., in 1932.