It’s all about the fun with Scott and Julie Lovelace. They are shown here hammin’ it up at Winter Blues in 2017.
Time on the water is time well spent
by Ron Presley
When these two anglers met, only one was a catfish chaser. That all changed as one man’s passion became a passion for two. No more concerts, plays, and traveling for fun. Now they travel and catfish for fun.
Scott and Julie Lovelace make their home in the small west Tennessee town of Humboldt. Scott has been an Emergency Medical Technician for nearly 30 years and Julie just recently completed her Bachelor of Science in Nursing.
Even though they are 3 1/3 hours away from the closest launch in Rogersville, AL and 5 hours from their favorite launch at Ditto Landing in Huntsville, they consider their home waters to be Wheeler Lake.
Scott’s passion for fishing began as a toddler. He would wander off to the family lake whenever his parents or grandparents were not watching.
“It was my grandmother, who first introduced me to fishing,” recalled Scott. “She would take me out to dig worms in the pig lot or we would knock down “tobby” (catawba) worms for bait.”
“I cherish every memory of me and Nanny on the pond bank,” continued Scott. “We would only catch channel catfish, bream and crappie, but my love and passion for chasing monster blues grew from my childhood experiences on the farm.”
Julies experience was different. She did not grow up fishing but got the fishing fever later from Scott.
“I grew up not really getting to fish,” said Julie. “But I always loved the water and being on it. My grandfather and my great uncle routinely fished for crappie on Kentucky Lake at Harmons Creek. Every summer I would go with my grandparents and spend time at the lake. He never wanted to take me out though, because he said I made too much noise.”
“When Scott and I got together we enjoyed trips to the same area my grandfather fished, Harmon’s Creek,” explained Julie. “We fished for bream, crappie, and channel catfish. I enjoy learning new things and learning to fish was one of them. Scott was a great teacher.”
A trip on the Mississippi River with James “Big Cat” Patterson sealed the deal for the willing couple. After that experience, they were becoming serious catfish anglers. Now they mostly fish the Tennessee River chain in north Alabama (Wilson and Wheeler), the Cumberland River out of Clarksville, and occasionally the Mississippi River.
“We now fish all over,” Julie said. “My favorite place to fish is Wheeler and Wilson. Our first tournament was the Mississippi River Monsters tournament out of Memphis. Scott caught his personal best 42-pound blue cat. He was hooked and I knew that this would be our new favorite hobby.”
As a team Scott and Julie were influenced greatly by that first tournament in Memphis. They discovered a whole world of new friends with common interests. To begin with they had no idea who the guys parked next to them on tournament morning were.
“It was Jackie and Jonathan Cooksey,” revealed Julie. “We had no idea at the time who we were talking to. They may not realize how something so small like that, showed us how nice the catfishing community can be. They were very nice and even came up to us after the tournament. They have always been willing to answer questions since that day and always ask how we have been doing.”
It was that tournament experience and various members of the catfish community that made tournament catfishing something they wanted to do.
“We learned a lot that first tournament,” continued Julie. “We thought we had a giant when we brought in that 42-pound catfish to weigh-in. We were able to meet Bill Dance for the first time at this event. He was one of Scott’s idols from childhood. In fact, everyone was so nice and friendly at this first tournament, it really did help to get us hooked!”
Julie was also influenced by the large number of women anglers in the catfish community. She had followed Melinda Folsom on Facebook and through tournament results. She looked at her as “the women in catfishing.”
“We meet Melinda and her husband Bryan after the JKV on Wheeler in January of 2017,” recalled Julie. “I was so nervous to talk to her but we have since become great friends with Melinda and Bryan. They are such good people and are willing to help anyone with almost anything. They truly have become some of our best friends and I look forward to seeing them at events.
“My personal best 39-pound blue cat came when we were fishing a trifecta tournament,” recalled Julie. “We were fishing out of Ditto Landing in Huntsville, AL. We hadn’t caught much that day and we had decided to move further downstream to see if our luck would change.”
“We came to a spot that Scott said just looked ‘fishy,’” continued Julie. “We threw all of our lines out and I sat in the hot seat. Within 15 minutes I had a fish on. It was the rod that we had cast into the shallow water of this area.”
“This experience taught us to go with our gut,” explained Julie. “We had never fished this part of the river and there was nothing special about it, just a gut feeling. It also taught us not to be afraid to leave an area. Just because you have caught fish in a certain area in the past doesn’t mean they will be there each time. Fish move and so should we.”
As their new hobby developed it instilled a strong sense of responsibly as it relates to taking care of the catfish they catch. Scott and Julie both practice and strongly encourage others to catch-photo-release (CPR) as part of their conservation strategy.
“We advocate for the protection of the larger trophy/breeding size catfish,” offered Scott. “It is more than CPR; we must protect the species by providing adequate livewells and oxygen systems to prepare them for a live release.”
Lovelace Catfishing recently obtained a new 2020 Excel Boats StormCat which they expect to last them for the remainder of their fishing careers. They both stated that they plan to continue catfishing until they could do it no longer.
“Lovelace Catfishing is about having fun,” Julie said. “Meeting new people and learning new things are a plus. We are willing to let anyone jump on the boat with us or we will get on anyone else’s boat to go fishing. We also like to help out where we can, whether it be for a good cause or at a tournament. Winning is nice, but just being around our friends and having a good time is what we are about.”
“I would love to retire today and catfish full-time,” offered Julie. “But unfortunately, it takes money to do what we do. What I love about tournament fishing is meeting new people, competing against some of the best in the field, and making friendships that will hopefully last a lifetime. We have been blessed to meet some of the nicest most sincere people you will ever meet since starting on our catfishing journey. We say that as long as we have a good time it doesn’t matter if we win or not because having fun is what is important.”
“My passion for fishing comes from the ability to get away from it all,” continued Julie. “Catfishing is a few hours of peace and getting away from everything else. My favorite part of fishing is to get to spend time with my husband. With our jobs, we rarely get to see each other during the week, so fishing together is really the only way we get to spend time together.”
“Our passion is fishing local tournament trails,” concluded Scott. “The trails we fish are sort of monthly family reunions. We love competing against everyone, including our friends. We are just as excited when someone else wins a tournament or catches a new personal best as when we do it ourselves.”
