A Leland man holds the new state record for the graysby grouper.
Wyatt Rabon’s 3-pound, 8-ounce catch on May 16 about 45 miles offshore of Southport was recently certified by the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of marine Fisheries as the state’s largest on record.
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Rabon, his father, and friends were fishing aboard their personal vessel using live pinfish for bait when he reeled in the grouper on 100-pound test with a Shimano Trevalla rod and Shimano Torso 30 reel.
“The crew nearly filleted the fish once they got home before realizing they might have a potential record,” according to a division release.
Rabon’s fish was weighed in at the Intracoastal Angler in Wilmington. It measured a little more than 17 inches long from the tip of the nose to the stretched end of the tail and had girth of 13 inches.
The previous state record for graysby grouper was a 3-pound, 0.8-ounce fish landed in 2022.
The fish unofficially ties the currently certified International Game Fish Association All Tackle World Record graysby grouper landed in 2023 off Georgetown, South Carolina.
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Distinctive physical characteristics of graysby grouper include a rounded caudal, or tail, fin, uniform red dots over a tan or beige body, and nine dorsal spines. They are a small species of shallow water grouper that start life as female, then transition to male around 4 years of age, or 9-10 inches in length, after their first spawning season.
