Upstate NY boy, 8, sets new state freshwater fishing record for rock bass

Jason Leusch, 8, of Webster, N.Y. caught this 14.5-inch, state record rock bass fishing off the dock at his family's cottage on Lake Ontario in Wayne County. 
The connection to Gaeta is that his mother's mothers parents (his great grandparents) are the connection to Gaeta.  His great grandfather was born in Gaeta, and the parents of his great grandmother were both born in Gaeta.) 
An 8-year-old boy from Webster, N.Y., in Monroe County is now the proud owner of the new state freshwater fishing record for rock bass.
Jason Leusch was fishing off the dock at the family’s cottage at Port Bay on Lake Ontario in Wayne County on May 24 just before 10:30 a.m. when he yelled to his parents that he hooked “a big one.”
Mom and Dad were initially slow to react, since their son had already landed about 20 rock bass that morning. He was fishing with a 5-foot, ultra-light pole using fathead minnows as bait.
“I told him at the time, we’d be down there in a second,” said Mike Leusch, his father. “When I got down there and looked at the fish, I said, ‘Holy Cow, that’s a big one, buddy.' ”
 The father, whipped out his iPhone and looked up the state record for rock bass: Eric Avogardo of Hawthorne, N.J. in 1984, who caught a 1- pound, 15-ounce rockie in the Ramapo River.
 “I then grabbed my digital scale and the fish was 2.00 pounds – right on the button,” Mike Leusch said.
 Father and son then drove to the Bay Bridge Sport shop at the south end of Sodus Bay. It again weighed 2.0 pounds on the shop’s official scale. It measured 14.5 inches.
 Leusch said he contacted the Department of Environmental Conservation and was told to freeze the fish. A few days later, the father drove to DEC’s Region 8 Office in Avon to verify the species of fish and weight.
The photo of the boy and his fish has since been posted on several Facebook pages.
 “Facebook has been blowing him up,” the father said. “People from all over the state have been writing him messages, congratulating him.”
 Leusch said his son had previously caught a monster, 6-pound, 11-ounce largemouth bass and that was mounted by a taxidermist.
 “We’re going to have this state record fish mounted as well,” he said. “It’s going to hang on the wall next to the big bass in our living room.”
 This is the second state freshwater fishing record broken this year.
Morgan Fonzi, of Gasport, broke the white bass record earlier in May while fishing on the Lower Niagara River with his 3 pound, 8-ounce fish.