06/19/2025
A 40-Year-Old Record Has Fallen in Southern Illinois!
On March 28, 2017, Ryan Povolish and his buddy Josh Jackson set out to practice for an upcoming bass tournament. They were fishing Kinkaid Lake in Jackson County, Southern Illinois, near Ryan’s home in Carbondale. It would turn out to be a fishing trip they’d never forget on the 2,335-acre lake.
Both black and white crappies — as well as hybrids — are present in Kinkaid, with anglers frequently catching crappies over 2 pounds. In recent years, at least two 4-pound fish have come from the lake. Ryan was fishing from the back of the boat and had only made about five casts into the 6-foot-deep water when he hooked a nice fish. He initially thought it was a bass, but Josh was sure it wasn’t. Ryan’s reaction quickly changed — he realized he was holding a wall-hanger crappie.
Later, when they weighed it for the first time, it began to dawn on them what he had accomplished.
Using bass tackle and a Strike King ChatterBait, Ryan broke a record that had stood for nearly 41 years. A nearby angler provided a scale to weigh the fish, which came in at 4 pounds, 9 ounces — but this would not be ruled an official weight, as it wasn’t a certified scale.
After several unofficial weigh-ins, an IDNR District 21 fisheries biologist finally weighed the fish on a certified scale. Officially, the crappie weighed 4 pounds, 8.8 ounces. It also measured 18 1/8 inches in length with a girth of 16 1/4 inches.
Written by: Anthony Rubeo Outdoors
