Back in 2007, Wade Weidenbach and his business partner, Scotty Bowman, partners in the Dirty Deeds fishing team, caught a 609-pound, 11-foot-long Mako shark.
“We were goofing off, you know, catching redfish. When he swam by he went past the boat and turned around, came back to the boat. Then I walked from the helm station and stood up on the bow and looked over and realized what he was. His eyes rolled up and looked at me, and I looked at him and I said, ‘MAKO’! We lost sight of him, found him again, and threw a chunk of bait at him – one of the redfish we had caught – and he scarfed it up. It was game on after that”, Bowman said.
According to Weidenbach, “We got the life jackets out and crossed our fingers. Mako are real bad about jumping in the boat – you’ve got to be very careful with them.”
Game on, indeed.
They gaffed the shark when he came to the surface. Four shots from a shotgun (under the surface) only succeeded in splintering the barrel of the gun, but didn’t stop the shark. After 3 1/2 hours of fighting, they headed home with a shark over half as long as their 17′ Cape Horn craft.
What do you do with a 9-foot shark once you catch it? Wade and Scotty cut it up and ate it.
Cap’n Wade now runs Down Stream Fishing Charters and does, in fact, now own a bigger boat.
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