Share
Lincoln County neighbors join hunter youth movement
Next-door neighbors Paul Thompson and Grady Norton , who live on the Lincoln County side of Lake Norman, have defied age in hunting.
Thompson, 83, owner of Coffey & Thompson, a Charlotte art and framing gallery, traveled to Mongolia and took both Altai and Gobi ibex. Charlottean Doc Thurston III, son of a longtime Thompson friend, also went on the trip. Thurston bagged an Altai ibex, his first.
"Mongolia is beautiful, but in a desolate way," said Thompson, who has visited dozens of countries as an outdoorsman. "The areas where we hunted are very primitive."
Norton, 80, founder of Catawba Cricket Hatchery, a Charlotte bait company, bagged a 9-point buck on the first day of N.C.'s archery deer season.
Hunting in Union County, he felled the deer from a distance of 40 yards with a shot from a crossbow.
"My dad is amazing," said Ronnie Norton. "He climbed to a tree stand 15 feet high to hunt that day." Tom Higgins
Cornelius angler catches 60-pound red drum
Joe McGroarty of Cornelius boated a whopper of a red drum recently while fishing just outside Murrells Inlet, S.C. The fish, weighed on a Boga-Grip device, scaled 60 pounds. The big red was released.
"I was using only 12-pound test line," said McGroarty, 74, who retired to Cornelius from Chicago seven years ago. "So I had to baby the fish. It took me about 30 minutes to get it to the boat."
McGroarty was fishing with his wife Paula and friend Lou Cetello aboard the Fishful Thinking with skipper/guide J Baisch. The three anglers also caught flounder and speckled trout. The largest red drum on record in South Carolina is a 75-pounder caught at Murrells Inlet in 1965 by A.J. Taylor of Conway. T.H.
NOTE
Anglers Bruce Davis of Charlotte and Dennis Jenkins of Denver, N.C., caught and released five red drum 55-60 inches long and estimated at 40-60 pounds in the lower Neuse River near Oriental last month. With guides Ken Midyette and Reggie Barnes, the pair also caught eight keeper flounder (14 inches and more) and four keeper puppy drum the next day. Jack Horan
CATCHES OF THE WEEK
A 27-pound Lake Norman blue catfish by Garrett Compton, 9, son of Cliff and Ursula Compton of Denver, N.C.
A 48-inch red drum at Ocracoke Inlet by Wayne Tucker of Matthews while fishing with guide Norm Miller on the Rascal. Webster McCain of Waxhaw boated a 47-incher and Frank Carter of Indian Trail a 44-incher.
A 41-inch red drum in the Portsmouth Island surf by Christian Hilton of Landis. He and Tony Hilton caught and released multiple limits of smaller reds, along with blues and flounder.
A 5-gallon bucketful of large whiting in the surf near Buxton by Larry Hart of Rock Hill.
Up to 20 smallmouth bass boated and released on four successive days while trolling at Fontana Lake by local angler Billy Jack Milsap.
Calendar
FISHING
Oct. 22: 6th annual Charlotte CCA Oyster Roast & Pig Pickin', 6-9 p.m. at The Olde Mecklenburg Brewery, 215 Southside Drive; $20 per person. Sponsored by the Charlotte chapter of the N.C. Coastal Conservation Association. Information: www.ccanc.org.
