iStockphoto / Kelly Dalling
During the Mobile Big Game Fishing Club’s recent 2025 Billfish Limited fishing tournament, one angler caught a new state record escolar, aka ‘white tuna,’ but had to move mountains to get it to the boat.
In big game fishing, the large reels will have a ‘drag clicker.’ It is a mechanism that alerts the angler when fishing line is being pulled off the reel, as happens when a fish strikes the lure/bait and gets hooked up.
For those that spend enough time offshore fishing, the clicker can become a major source of irritation. Often as the boat is rocking back and forth from rolling waves the clicker is clicking, and clicking, and clicking. So most big game fishing reels have the ability to turn the clicker off.
Alabama Angler Catches Record 161.6-Pound Escolar
The concern with turning the clicker off is you have to be watching the reel like a hawk. That isn’t always an issue because most fishermen are, in fact, watching the reels nonstop waiting for a strike. But if there is a lull in the action and people get complacent, it can throw a wrench in things.
Such was the case when angler Taylor Guidry hooked up with a large escolar while fishing off Mobile, Alabama. He told Outdoor Life in an interview they estimate the fish stripped off 2,000 feet of fishing line before he realized they were hooked up, and it was already 800 feet deep.
With that much fishing line stripped off and the fish down so deep they hadn’t the slightest idea what was on the line. Their target species for the Mobile Big Game Fishing Club’sBillfish Limited tournament were swordfish and tuna.
Escolar, often called ‘white tuna,’ is actually a mackerel and not a tuna. Despite that it is one of the most mislabeled fish species in the world, with restaurants samples finding over 50% of restaurants labeled escolar as “white tuna” or “albacore” and not escolar.
Getting the fish to the boat
Once he realized they were hooked up, they crew locked in and a 2+ hour battle ensued. Taylor told Outdoor Life “I got the fish headed up toward the boat, but it stopped at the water thermocline about 300 feet down,. It was a stalemate. I’d get it up 50 or 75 feet more, then the fish would muscle down to 300 feet again and just stay there.”
Once they got it boatside, the crew got two gaffs into the fish.
The previous/existing Alabama state fishing record for escolar is 102 pounds, 10 ounces. That fish was caught by a Florida angler from Orlando on 9/11/2023.
Once the crew got their massive fish back to the scales for the tournament, they realized they had caught something special.
It tipped the scales at 161.6 pounds. And now they will begin the process of certifying it as a new Alabama state fishing record for the escolar species.
For context, the IGFA fishing world record for the species was caught by angler Emil Terry on September 28, 2011 on Grand Cayman. Another September fishing record! There must be something about this deep water species that likes the warmer months in the Gulf and Caribbean.
Chances are, if you eat sushi you have eaten escolar. It is a delicious species. But Taylor told Outdoor Life instead of eating it they donated the specimen to researchers for study.