MECKLENBURG COUNTY, Va. – Talk to fishermen here and you will hear the legend of Buggs Island Lake: A Navy diver sent to recover the wreckage of a small plane encounters a fish the size of a man on the lake’s bottom. He bolts to the surface and refuses to dip a toe into the waters again.

The yarn seemed as dubious as any other fish tale — until two weeks ago. An angler hooked a 143-pound blue catfish in this reservoir along the Virginia-North Carolina border; it smashed the state record by more than 30 pounds and could be a world record.

Additional Photos

Nick Anderson, left, his father, Richard, and his stepbrother Jeramie Mullis pose with a 143-pound blue catfish that the younger Anderson caught at Buggs Island Lake in Virginia. A tourism industry has grown around the fish. Dallas Weston/Mecklenburg News-Progress via The Associated Press

It is likely not the only one lurking out there. A monster fish that can easily top 100 pounds and stretch nearly 5 feet has come of age in the region’s waterways.

It has a distended beer gut of a belly, a chin studded with whiskers tipped with taste-bud-like sensors and a grunt like a pig’s. Like a creature from a Hollywood B-movie, it has grown fat from conditions created by pollution.

BENGAL TIGER OF LOCAL RIVERS

Blue catfish have exploded in numbers and size in many local river systems, biologists say, spawning the type of giant fish more commonly found in the species’ native Mississippi River — or in the pages of Mark Twain. And no one is sure how big they’ll get here.

The rise of “blue cats” has spurred a response as strange as any fish story. Nearly everyone agrees it is a monster of sorts, but whether that is necessarily a bad thing depends on whom you talk to.

Many biologists are increasingly alarmed at the spread of the species, which they fear may be muscling out native catfish and gobbling other local fish. The predator has been described as the Bengal tiger of local rivers.

It is that size and fierceness that have made the blue cat a hit with anglers, who have flocked to southern Virginia waterways, generating tourism dollars for struggling rural areas.

“A lot of people love it. A lot of people hate it. It’s kind of like the snakehead,” said John Odenkirk, a Virginia state biologist, referring to another invasive species of fish that has captured the public’s imagination.

Buggs Island Lake, at 50,000 acres and with depths of up to 100 feet, is a good place for a monster to lurk. Nick Anderson was fishing there with his stepbrother and father June 18 when he got a hit on his line.

“I got real nervous” after seeing the lumbering gray mass, Anderson said. “It took about 50 feet of line and went straight down to the bottom.”

Over the next 45 minutes, Anderson, 29, a high school football coach from North Carolina, battled the blue cat until he was exhausted. Four times he reeled it to the surface, and four times it dived back into the lake.

Finally, he got it to the side of the boat. His father netted the fish, but the net was only big enough to cover the beast’s head, so Anderson grabbed the fish’s torso, and his brother got ahold of the tail. They wrenched it on board.

FISH WILL EAT ANYTHING

The mature fish are voracious predators, sucking up gizzard shad, white perch, freshwater mussels — even rocks — into a mouth that looks like a vacuum-cleaner attachment. The fish can live more than two decades.

Data on the blue cat’s impact on other species are incomplete, but some fear that the fish could harm already decimated populations of American shad, river herring and other species.

“The blue catfish can utilize nearly any habitat and will eat anything,” said Tom O’Connell, director of the Fisheries Service for Maryland’s Department of Natural Resources. “When you look at their size, they could reduce or eliminate some native species.”

Biologists say one thing is clear: Eradicating blue cats is virtually impossible. Anglers can’t catch enough, and the commercial market remains small. States have recommended limiting consumption because they can contain toxins such as PCBs.

A team of fisheries managers from across the region is considering suggesting that states come up with plans to control blue cats, O’Connell said.

The specifics could include stronger penalties for stocking the fish in new rivers and streams, a government subsidy for harvesting blue catfish, or attempts to increase the commercial market.

NO SCALE BIG ENOUGH

Back on shore, Anderson quickly encountered another problem: No tackle store had a scale big enough to weigh the fish, and there was no one to call for help. The Andersons decided they had only one choice — call 911.

“I said, ‘It’s no emergency, but it is, sort of,’” Richard Anderson, Nick’s father, recalled telling the operator.

Two officers from the Mecklenburg County Sheriff’s Office arrived and speedily escorted the trio to a supply store with a bigger scale. The fish was 57 inches long and 43.5 inches around.

The International Game Fish Association could certify the fish as a world record in the next few months. Despite efforts to keep the fish alive and return it to the lake, it died the next day.

Anderson’s catch is what any catfish angler dreams of — and so do a number of towns in southern Virginia. A multimillion-dollar tourism industry has grown around the blue catfish on the James River, according to a report by state wildlife officials.

Meanwhile, many think an even larger monster is lurking in a local river.

Twain wrote about seeing a “Mississippi catfish” more than 6 feet long. There are unverified reports of blue cats of up to 315 pounds being caught on the Missouri River before 1915.

“I heard the rumors of a man-size fish, but I didn’t believe it until I saw it eye to eye,” Nick Anderson said. “Who am I to say there isn’t something bigger out there?”

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