Ready, set…fish: Fish-o-Rama returns Friday, Saturday

Published 4:45 am Friday, April 27, 2018

The weather should clear in time for the return this weekend of the annual Hanceville Senior and Kids’ Fish-o-Rama, giving locals a weekend’s worth of shoreline angling at the city’s fully-stocked Veterans Park pond.

This year’s event kicks off at 7 a.m. Friday with the Senior Fish-o-Rama, which the city hosts in conjunction with the Cullman County Commission on Aging. Then at 7 a.m. Saturday, the kids’ version of the event begins, with the city handing out free hot dogs and refreshments both days.

Begun by Mayor Kenneth Nail back when he was serving on the Hanceville City Council, the Fish-o-Rama is closing in on two decades.

“Counting back, I’d say it’s been going about 17 or 18 years,” said Nail. “It began back when Fraternal Order of Police was putting on an annual fishing event, and the game wardens were assisting with it, and we’d bounce around every year from Sportsman Lake to St. Bernard and back again. So we decided it’d be a good idea to just have our own event out here at the park.”

The pond at Veterans Park has been around far longer than the event itself; in fact, said Nail, it used to supply crop irrigation lines for farming in the vicinity. But this week, it’s been pre-stocked with 600 pounds of catfish and closed for fishing until the Senior Fish-o-Rama begins to ensure a plentiful catch on both Friday and Saturday.

Participation in the Fish-o-Rama is free, and kids who catch the biggest fish on Saturday will get trophies for their trouble. Lures go in the water beginning at 7 a.m. each day, with the event wrapping around 11 a.m.