LOREAUVILLE – A bass hooked, boated and released very much alive by an avid all-around outdoorsman made a lasting impression on two impressionable young boys recently at Lake Fausse Pointe.

There’s a big reason Layn Davis, 9, and Bowen Davis, 4, were excited early in the afternoon Feb. 23. Dusty Davis’ two sons watched him catch a 7.2-pound bass in the Texaco Field.

“They’ll never forget that one,” Davis said later, then amended that statement. “They might forget about it when they catch one on their own.”

That 7-pounder was far from his personal best on the lake but it and other catches that day came at the right time on a father-son(s) trip. Every time he’s “in” from offshore, where he works as an electrician for Cox Operating LLC, he takes the boys fishing, running jug lines, “turtle fishing,” hunting, etc. His wife, Candi Davis, joins them on many of the trips.

The Jeanerette fisherman, a Lydia native, grew up doing all those things with his father, Milton Davis of Lydia, just like the boys are doing with him. Layn also has started fishing Southcentral Fishing Association “slot” redfish tournaments with Dusty, Milton and Jonathan Rush of New Iberia.

The Davises turn to freshwater in the late winter and early spring, mainly on Lake Fausse Pointe. The elder Davis has been a sac-a-lait master there for many years while his son targets sac-a-lait and bass after launching from Marsh Field Boat Landing.

That’s what he did that memorable Thursday morning. After checking a few of his favorite spots, he wound up in the Texaco Field, an area that often gives up numbers and quality bass each spring when the water gets right.

He fished along the canal, each side, but found five bass only on a 50-yard stretch. They bit on the plastic lizard he had tied to his baitcasting rod and reel.

Just after lunch he set the hook on a bass that he later joked nearly cracked his rib on the hookset.

“It felt like a freight train when it hit (and started moving). When it hit I had Bowen’s pole in my hand, too. I casted his,” he said. Then turned his attention to the matter at hand.

“With the kids in the boat all hell broke loose. She jumped out of the water a couple of times. Oh, they were pumped up,” Davis said about the heavy, powerful bass.

The ensuing fight between angler and “hawg” from dirt shallow to the 14-foot long Alweld boat lasted approximately three times as long as it takes to read this sentence. He reached over the side of the boat, lipped her and lifted her into the boat.

“The boys were screaming,” he said.

He gripped the bass in his hand, proudly, but was concerned immediately by what he saw. The fish had “choked” the bogus lizard and hook. It was bleeding. Davis cut the line just above the hook rather than yanking it out and causing further damage.

Then he went to work reviving the bass to perhaps thrill another angler another day. With a fish that size, he said, there’s no choice but to catch-and-release, particularly during the spawn,

“It took about 25 minutes to get her to swim off. I played with her in the water, slapped her in the butt. She took off and swam all the way across the water in the bayou and swam back in a circle. I trolled over, reached down to grab her” and that was enough to get the bass moving, good to go.

His PB on the lake was 8 pounds, 4 ounces, caught about seven years ago. With two other 7-pound class bass to his credit, this was the biggest in three years, he said, and perhaps the most unforgettable considering the company he kept that day.

“We love that — being in the boat. We’re enjoying it,” he said.

Davis’ big bass was the second “hawg:” within a week at the lake. Mike O’Brien of New Iberia caught a 7.13-pounder Feb. 19 in the 17th annual Louisiana Bass Cats Invitational.