We have a new record white seabass guys, a real beauty!!!!
LAGUNA BEACH, Calif., April 10 (UPI) -- Battling the fish for almost an hour, two Southern California brothers hooked a world-record white sea bass off Laguna Beach.

Scott Caringella of Westminster, Calif., told the Orange County Register Saturday he was alerted to the mighty fish by "a crazy flock of birds diving into this spot."

He hooked the fish with sardine bait and immediately knew it was a big one.

His brother Craig, of Foothill Ranch, let go of his own catch and seized the throttle for the five-mile chase.

"Every time we had it, it would run," Scott Caringella said. "If my brother wasn't running the boat, there would have been no way we would have gotten it."

When the fish finally jumped, he said, "I knew right away it was a record. I pulled it back to the boat and my brother gaffed it. It was 76.4 pounds."

The previous record for white sea bass was a 74-pounder caught off San Clemente Island in 1982.

To make it official, the brothers took the bass to an International Game Fish Association weigh station.

Scott Caringella said the fish is already being mounted at a taxidermist -- after the steaks were
cut.