Jackson Lake Record Striper

Scott Hayes holds the current Lake Jackson striped bass record with a 27-lb. fish he caught in June 1985. A few weeks earlier, Scott’s dad, Guy, caught a big striper in the same stretch of Lake Jackson that weighed 24 pounds.

“They were both caught at the headwaters of Lake Jackson at the Alcovy River Shoals,” said Dean Hayes, Scott’s brother. “This is the same place that is now Factory Shoals County Park and Picnic Area. This was before Newton County put the park there. We would access the area via goat trail that started just north of the FFA Camp off of Hwy 36.

“Pop caught his on a 6-inch blue broken-back Rebel. Scott caught his on a 10-inch Cordell Red Fin. Both fish were weighed within a couple of hours of being caught at the old Chapman Store Meat Market at the corner of Hwy 81 and Hwy 212.

“We were living in Conyers at the time. The mounts were originally done by Fin and Fur taxidermy. When Mom and Dad moved to their house on the Tussahaw Creek section of Lake Jackson in 1998, the mounts got stored in their old boathouse. The mounts were in horrible shape when I took them to Ricky Smith at Newborn Taxidermy for restoration in 2008. Ricky and Kyle did a wonderful job on them, and they have been hanging on the wall at our hunting lodge in Madison County since 2008.”