Sahuarita Man reels in rare albino catfish in Lake Sahuarita

SAHUARITA, Ariz. (KGUN) — On the morning of June 29th, Chris "Crash" Carnes, a resident of Sahuarita, experienced the catch of a lifetime at Lake Sahuarita.

What began as a routine fishing trip turned into a remarkable encounter with one of the rarest fish in Arizona.

Carnes, a surgery technician by day, sought a change of pace from his high-stress job and the hazards of mountain biking. His wife bought him an inflatable kayak to urge him in a different direction.

“My wife thought it would be fun to change my hobby from something so dangerous,” Carnes said. “Like breaking my arm for example.”

Embracing a more relaxing pastime, Carnes took to fishing in the local lake with his kayak, capturing several impressive catches along the way.

However, nothing could have prepared him for his latest find.

“I pulled in a usual-sized catfish,” he said. “But it was unusual because it was completely white, an albino catfish.”

Albino catfish are a rare sight in the wild due to their light coloring, which makes them more visible to predators.

“A fisherman term is that when you get close to the surface, you see color,” he said. “Well this was absent-colored. It was all white.”

Carnes, known affectionately as “Crash” due to his mountain biking mishaps, didn’t seek to keep the rare catch for himself.

“Somebody said, ‘I would have kept it and put it in an observatory tank.’” he said. “Okay, well I don’t have that,” he laughed.

Instead, after enjoying the moment, Carnes released the albino catfish back into the lake, giving other fishing enthusiasts a chance to reel it in.

“Once I enjoyed taking it in, I went ahead and released it,” he said. “So it’s still in the lake if anybody else wants to try and get it.”