(Huntingdon Daily News, Tuesday, March 8, 1994)

PFBC Recognizes Tim Grace's Salmon

  The Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission has moved to formally recognize the landlocked Atlantic salmon in its Angler Awards program. In the process, the Commission has established a 10.89-pound fish caught in Raystown Lake, Huntingdon County, as the first state record in the new Atlantic salmon category.

  The lunker salmon was landed Dec. 22, 1993 by Timothy A. Grace,  of Huntingdon. The fish which hit a daredevil spoon, measured 31 inches long with a girth of 15 3/4 inches.    

  Although there was no category for a state record Atlantic salmon at the time, Grace filed a formal application with the Fish and Boat Commission nonetheless. It turned out to be a wise decision; unbeknownst to Grace, the Commission was already weighing the possibility of adding the species to its Angler Recognition Program.

  Mr. Grace's application was timely in that we were already talking about recognizing the Atlantic salmon. Nobody was sure if enough were being caught to merit a new award slot. Then here comes this big fish - we went from debating whether to establish an Atlantic salmon category to discussing how and when to do it," said Dan Tredinnick, Angler Award Coordinator.

  According to Tredinnick, certifying Grace's catch took longer than usual. "This was an odd situation in that rather than starting from scratch, we opted to acknowledge an already documented catch. By doing so, we wanted to set a high standard that ensured the continued quality of our record program.

  "In other words, we didn't feel it was appropriate to open up a new category and possibly end up honoring a sub-par fish just because it was the first one that came along. We knew right away Mr. Grace's fish was a quality fish, but we weren't sure if it was actually the biggest Atlantic salmon we knew about", he said.

  So, the Commission reviewed its files to see if any fish had been submitted for an Atlantic salmon record and if they were indeed bigger than the Raystown catch. There was no documentation for a bigger member of the species landed in Pennsylvania. "That's not to say bigger fish haven't been taken here, It's possible that someone might have caught a bigger one but not documented it since no record category existed." acknowledged Tredinnick. "we'll review older catches, but they must meet the same strict measuring criteria to which all record applications adhere."