Brown Trout From Hartwell Tailrace Set Lake Russell Record

Tim Harris ought to go fishing more often! On his single trip to the Lake Hartwell trailrace last summer, he caught a trout bigger than anyone else has caught from Lake Russell.

On Fourth of July, 1993, then 14-year-old Tim Harris, of Hartwell, went fishing in the tailrace below the Lake Hartwell dam, which is in the extreme upper end of Lake Russell. Tim told GON he was fishing with an ultra-light rod and reel, spooled with 6-lb. test line. He was using corn for bait and the corn was dangling below a float about 30 feet off the bank.

Tim said he jerked on the line and the bobber disappeared, and then it popped back to the surface. As soon as it did, it shot back underwater when a big fish hit.

“At first everyone thought it was a carp,” said Tim.

On July 4, 1993, on his one and only fishing trip to the Hartwell tailrace , 14-year-old Tim Harris, of Hartwell, caught this 10-lb., 8-oz. brown trout on 6-lb. test line.

The teenager fought the trout for about 10 minutes, and the light line held up through several long runs that threatened to strip the line from his reel.

To compound problems, they didn’t have a net to land the king-sized trout. Finally, the played-out fish was eased into the shallows, and Tim’s mother’s boyfriend scooped it up and held it, using a shirt over his hands to keep the fish from slipping away.

The fish was weighed on certified grocery store scales about an hour later. The brown trout weighed 10-lbs., 8-ozs. to set the Lake Russell lake-record for brown trout.