Quebec fisherman reels in 244-pound, record-breaking Atlantic halibut — for science

It took two and a half hours for a Quebec ice fisherman to wrangle a 244-pound halibut found in the Saguenay Fjord on Saturday.

It turned out to be the largest Atlantic halibut ever recorded in the area.

“It’s really quite a difficult fish to fish,” said Marc-André Galbrand, the president of the basin committee, Comité de bassin de la Baie des Ha! Ha! (CBBH).

“You got to be really patient and you have to head on to physio after because your arms are just killing you.”

At two metres long, the halibut is bigger than most of the fishermen, said Galbrand. This fish, caught by Alain Hamel in the L’Anse-Saint-Jean sector of the fjord, between Chicoutimi and Tadoussac, surpassed the record set last year, when the team caught a halibut weighing in at 194 pounds. 

Working with the local Fjord Museum, the ice fishing was part of a scientific project aiming to gain more information about the species, says Galbrand. 

Currently, fishing Atlantic halibut is illegal in the Saguenay Fjord, but fishermen part of the project catch, tag and bring the fish into the museum where they will be weighed and cut. The bones in the head are analyzed and can even indicate the species’ migration patterns, he says. 

The bonus for those taking part in the project is feasting on the meat. Out of this week’s catch, Galbrand suspects there will be a remaining 170 pounds of “very delicious fish.” 

Jérôme Rousseau also made a catch of a large Atlantic halibut off the coast of Sainte-Rose-du-Nord on the Saguenay River this season. For him, it represents a kind of trophy after four years of participating in the scientific fishing program and over 1,200 hours of fishing.

The halibut was brought to the Fjord Museum on Monday morning, where its head and stomach were removed for analysis.

The fisherman recovered the body of the fish, which he plans to enjoy with his fishing partners.

“It’s a huge team effort,” he said. “We’re starting to look at recipes.”

Galbrand considers the activity an “extreme fishing sport.” 

“You really have to know what you’re doing. And you got to be careful too because of how they have quite impressive teeth that are really sharp,” he said. 

An added challenge for the fishermen is the depth of the water, says Galbrand. Teams can fish anywhere between 120 to 180 metres deep.

“So if you catch a halibut at the 500 feet, you got to bring it up slowly,” he said.

The halibuts are very strong and have “a lot of gas,” Galbrand said, describing a sort of tug of war with the fish until “you tire him out.”

Mere hours after the record-breaking catch Saturday, the scientific fishing of Atlantic Halibut was suspended in the fjord, as to not surpass its quota. 

Of the 35 halibut authorized under the scientific fishing permit, 27 have been caught so far. For the remaining eight, the CBBH is considering authorizing a small number of fishers chosen by lottery, “much like what you see in restricted zones for salmon or moose,” said Galbrand.