Mississippi isn’t known for snook, but kayak angler Matthew Mitchell set a new record for the species, shattering a previous record from 2025.

The prized sportfish are beginning to show up in Magnolia State waters. Mitchell was fishing in the Gulf somewhere near Pascagoula Bay when he hooked the snook on a Z-Man soft plastic mullet. According to the Mississippi Department of Marine Resources, snook are expanding their range into the Pascagoula Estuary, east of Biloxi Harbor, due to warming waters.

Mitchell’s snook measured 26 inches and weighed 5 pounds, 6.4 ounces. Though small for the species, his new record eclipsed the previous one—set by Vince Wray in January 2025—by a full 4 pounds, 7 ounces. The large jump in size from one record to the next shows that snook are becoming more established in waters off the coast of Mississippi.

According to the International Game Fish Association (IGFA), snook are fast-growing fish, reaching 12-14 inches in their first year and 24-26 inches by age three. Angler Roman Duenas Marquez broke the IGFA all-tackle world record for Pacific white snook last July with a 60-pound, 13-ounce fish caught on a beach in Mexico. The reigning all-tackle world record for common snook was caught in 1978. It weighed 53 pounds, 10 ounces.

Full story by Travis Hall & featuring @matthew_mitchell____ ...

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Started with a beat-up ’90s WaveRunner.

He laid down a flat EVA foam deck, then built out a center console using the original handlebars and controls. The real kicker is the retractable side pontoon stabilizers: he added electric actuators to lift them when it’s time to run fast and carve.

Y/N this is your type of DIY? Check out the full build tutorial on @joeoceanside’s profile: the man is CREATIVE. ...

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The old record was 14 pounds from 1998.

Richard Courtright Jr. was competing in a derby alongside several other anglers when he landed the record-breaking trout. “The drag was really loose so it could do whatever it wanted to” he later told CT Insider. “It felt like fighting a piece of plywood.”

Courtright’s fish was what’s known as a “helper fish” reared at the nearby Kensington Hatchery. Hatchery staff use these aggressive rainbows to encourage more timid Atlantic salmon to feed on high-protein pellets.

Story by @travishallmedia ...

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First bird down for Cooper Gallant 👊

Five years on the Elite Series and nearly a literal ton of fish hauled to the scales (1,950 lbs and change). Not his first rodeo just his first turkey. Congrats, Cooper. ...

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We’re sending you and a friend to Nashville for an exclusive Race Weekend experience in partnership with 23XI Racing, with access to 23XI’s Takeover at Chief’s, Eric Church’s famous bar, and Nashville’s Superspeedway on Sunday May 31st, for the chance to watch rising star Corey Heim take on Nashville—live.

Here’s what you’ll get:
🏁 VIP 23XI Race Weekend experience for 2 at Nashville Superspeedway race

🎫 2 tickets to the Field & Stream lounge at the 23XI Takeover at Chief’s on Broadway

🏨 3-night stay in Nashville

💵 $1,000 travel stipend

💵 $200 in F&S gear

👉 F&S 1871 Club Premium Membership

How to win:
✅ Like this post
✅ Tag a friend
✅ Enter at the link in bio

LET’S GO RACING 🤝 ...

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The Fight Continues…
Congress voted to fast track a foreign mine in the headwaters of America’s most visited Wilderness Area. But the long-running fight to protect the Boundary Waters is far from over. In the aftermath of the Senate’s vote, the Executive Director of Sportsmen for the Boundary Waters, Lukas Leaf, expects to see expedited federal permits for the mine coming down from the Trump Administration. But mine construction is years away no matter how you slice it, he says.

There will almost certainly be a flurry of lawsuits challenging the legality of using the Congressional Review Act to overturn the 20-year mining moratorium. Those suits are likely to appear before either the US District Court for the District of Columbia or the US District Court for the District of Minnesota. And there are critical state-level hurdles that Antofagasta must clear. The Minnesota Department of Natural Resources will have to approve and issue its own permits, for example, and those could be harder to come by.

Minnesota has powerful tools for protecting clean water, Pete Marshall of the Friends of the Boundary Waters Wilderness told the Minnesota Post in an April 22 article. He’s advocating for an “opt-out provision” from the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources that he says could stop mine development before it begins.

Read the full story by @travishallmedia // 🔗 in story.
Photos by @jakedahlke & @hansski43 ...

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There’s a fine line between fishing and doing absolutely nothing… and we’re experts at both.

Archival Project // @fieldandstream x @yuenglingbeer ...

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A hiker asked his peers to identify these tracks after hiking a remote stretch of West Coast Trail.

“Pocket knife is 5 inches for scale. I hiked in, ate lunch at a lookout, and on the way out saw this print facing back toward where I’d been sitting. Didn’t see it on the way in. No dogs allowed on this trail, and the nearest place they’re allowed is about 5.5 miles away with ladders in between. My guess is cougar, but the claws are throwing me off. Also looks like two different sizes—mother and cub?”

The internet acted accordingly… one camp started triaging apex predators, another landed on “probably just a big dog breaking the rules,” and then one absolute menace drops a photo of his lab and his cat, both on leashes, essentially adding “not saying it was me… but…”

Thread derailed. No ID confirmed. One hiker’s still wondering what followed him. ...

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