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ANCHORAGE -- Steve Merson saved and saved for the trip of a lifetime to Alaska. But the way it turned out, he caught a once-in-a-lifetime fish that could have sent him home a much richer man.

The angler from Fort Atkinson, Wis., reeled in a 20-pound halibut from the bottom of Cook Inlet last Friday worth a whopping $10,000 in the Homer Jackpot Halibut Derby.

If only he'd known he had to buy a $10 ticket to win.

"He sure should have," said Paula Frisinger with the Homer Chamber of Commerce. "That's really, really sad."

Frisinger spoke with Merson for nearly an hour after he returned to the Homer harbor from a half-day trip on a Rainbow Tours boat called the Jackpot. She said he was in disbelief that he missed out on a $10,000 payout.

"I think he was feeling pretty blue because he didn't know about the derby," Frisinger said. Instead of a big check, Merson went away with just a Homer Jackpot Derby hat.

After Merson brought the flatfish up, a deckhand gaffed it and wrestled it onto the boat. And that's when they each noticed the fish had been tagged.

Merson told Frisinger that the captain of the Jackpot, Art Morris, asked him if he had purchased a derby ticket.

"What derby?" Merson asked Morris.

Morris said he takes so many clients fishing in the summer, he doesn't remember much about Merson's reaction to catching a tagged fish while they were anchored just outside Kachemak Bay. Morris said Merson was fishing on the opposite side of the boat when his deckhand gaffed the halibut.

"I don't even remember looking at (Merson's) face," Morris said by cell phone. "I never really talked to him (after he caught the halibut).

"It's all a blur."

Morris said he didn't know the fish was worth $10,000 until a reporter contacted him Monday.

Merson, who could not be reached for comment, is a hatcheries supervisor for the Department of Natural Resources in Wisconsin. The trip was planned to celebrate his 40th birthday. Some of his buddies were scheduled to join him in Alaska, but Frisinger said they had bailed at the last minute.

"He saved and saved for this trip," Frisinger said. "His friends decided not to come, but he said, 'What the heck; I'm going anyway.' "

Merson was the second person who reeled in a tagged fish without a derby ticket this year, Frisinger said. An angler caught a $1,000 fish earlier, but like Merson, went home with empty pockets.

'Awfully lucky'

At least there's some good news, Frisinger said: Five tagged halibut worth $10,000 apiece are still out there somewhere.

But where, Frisinger said, is anybody's guess. There's no telling where or when Homer's prized flatfish may turn up.

Cal Blood of the International Pacific Halibut Commission told Frisinger that two fish with Homer Jackpot tags were caught off the coast of Oregon this past spring.

One halibut was from the 2003 derby while the other was from 2006.

And at the end of May, an elderly man fishing in Cook Inlet caught a $10,000 tagged halibut from the 2007 derby. Frisinger said it was probably a good thing he caught the halibut a year too late.

"He probably would've had a heart attack," she joked.

All Merson had at the end of the day was a case of catcher's remorse, Frisinger said.

She said the dejected Wisconsin angler told her he would have laid out $10 for a ticket had he known about the derby.

In an attempt to cheer him up, Frisinger said she advised Merson to look on the bright side.

"You're awfully lucky," Frisinger told him. "You should go out again."