By Sara Duggan Community Outreach Coordinator, The River Center-The Loxahatchee River District
The AustinBlu Foundation and the River Center hosted the 3rd AustinBlu Foundation Land and Sea Fishing Tournament. This unique tournament offered two competitions for anglers: a harvest competition and a catch and release tournament. Over 90 anglers were registered to compete in this stacked competition. With lines in the water at 7:00 AM, anglers had until 4:00 PM to submit or weigh their catches in-order to be considered for prizes. Anglers in the catch and release tournament used the Fish On app from Reeltime Apps to submit catches to our River Center judges. The more fish they caught, the better their chances of winning. By the closing of the event, over 600 catches had been submitted for judging! Contestants in the harvest competition weighed their largest catch at our AustinBlu weigh-in station. Anglers could submit fish for 4 different categories: sheepshead, jack crevalle, snapper (any species), and checkered pufferfish. The competition was steep, but twin sisters Ella and Gracie Greaton managed to catch a 15-pound jack crevalle, which brought them into the Grand Prize position. This is the first year we have had a girl win grand prize! Fish on ladies! After the fishing, the fun kept rolling with awesome vendors like Mang Gear, a prize-packed raffle, and food trucks from local eateries Smac Shack, Little Moir’s Food Shack, and Kona Ice. We had over 225 people attend the award ceremony and festivities. Participants went home with amazing swag buckets filled with items from our generous tournament sponsors. Winners of the competition were awarded cash prizes, with a grand prize of $500! We hope to continue this tournament opportunity in the future in-order to support a great local cause, the AustinBlu Foundation. Thank you to our tournament sponsors for their support in this community event.