Dontcryformejanhrdina

Pike tastes great and are VERY easy to fillet. It's actually kind of weird that more people don't target them. I ALWAYS take home the pike I catch (unless I'm at my limit or they're too big) and I give quite a bit away too and I don't have to feel bad about it. Helps the musky out a bit and there's no shortage of pike in my area with few people targetting them let alone actually eating them. You wouldn't believe the ammount of times I hear "you eat pike?!!" from people. You'd think I was eating carp or something.

I love braid. I'm definitely not a finesse guy. I've got 50lb braid on my spinning and casting bass rods and 80lb on all my musky rods, 100lb on my musky trolling rod. I can't stand the memory of mono and I will never go back.

Wow, great report and what a massive musky! Thanks for posting. Lake of the Woods is on my bucket list for sure.

I second upping your line to at least 65# just so you don't lose your lures from casting.

I use 150# mono leaders, I don't think they care. I've even caught bass on that setup. I mean, the lures have huge hooks dangling off them, and that doesn't seem to deter the fish from striking at all.

Too bad about the rod. Gotta love the sound of the clicker going off!

Did you get them trolling or casting?

Love seeing your reports Mike. Those fish look real thick!

The good thing about bass fishing is you can catch big ones even if you don't have a boat, even on those hot sunny days when nothing else seems to be biting. That's a largemouth bass all right. Keep at it and you'll catch ones a lot bigger than that.

Funny, I recently posted in the bucket list fish thread that I wanted to catch a gar. This wasn't exactly what I had in mind.

I was out musky fishing this morning, and I drove by a dead skunk on the way there, not a good sign at all. While the lake seemed dead (huge turn around from monday when it was on fire), it was just the calm before the storm. Suddenly while using a 9" jerkbait the great beast appeared! Be prepared to be blown away everybody! The ferocity! The power!!! THE EXHILARATION!!!!! The result: Well....I guess I wasn't skunked afterall! Snagged my first gar/minnow.

Nice job guys! Hopefully the musky are still on tomorrow.

Wow, nice pair of musky! Congrats!

Seeing your username reminds me I'd like to catch a gar. I see them in many of the waters I fish, they just don't seem to like musky lures at all.

I think I missed my first 50" musky a few hours ago. It hit a jerkbait, I set the hook into her and she came up. I tried reeling hard and getting her down and swimming but she was barely moving, so heavy! I saw it's mouth was wide open the entire time. A couple big head shakes from her and she was off.

A few years ago before I really got back into fishing, the biggest bass I caught all year was in the middle of summer, 1pm on a VERY hot day (it was over 40 degrees). I was sweating just standing there up to my knees in the water. Then I had some old guy driving by stop his truck and tell me I was going to get cancer because I was standing knee deep in the moira river haha.

Whereabouts are you located? Several of the lakes around here contain those fish but catching them is another story lol. I imagine I'll catch a 50" musky or 40" pike (had a big pike on earlier this year that got off boatside when I grabbed my net that had to have been close) before I catch a 30" walleye. I live right by the bay of Quinte but I'm such a walleye newbie too that I have no idea where to even start and I've only fished it a couple of times without success. I've been putting my time in for musky/pike this year but no big ones yet. It'll happen, hopefully sooner rather than later.

Realistic bucket list fish that I'm currently working on catching are a 50" musky, 40" pike and a 30" walleye.

The last lake I fished had areas where you could literally only see 6 inches down. Gorgeous pictures, great release shot!

If you wanna get out and try for musky either in Haliburton or around Belleville I'm up for it as long as I have enough notice to get the day off work and make sure I've got no plans with the gf.

Haha your name is perfect for this topic.

Can't beat a date like that!

You'd have a hell of a time towing even with a 4x4 in loose sand. I wouldn't want to try it.

First off, there's so many great anglers on this board that I'm humbled, especially by the multi-species anglers. I'd love to be talented/experienced enough to be able to switch from catching musky to catching big bay of quinte walleye, to trolling up big lakers, or fly fishing for various species but I simply don't have the time to learn the patterns and techniques for all of those things (and for things like fly fishing because I don't have the time or any experience I don't bother spending money on gear that will just sit in my closet). My friends and family think of me as a guy who is pretty obsessed with fishing, but even I only get out fishing once-twice a week if I'm lucky. Most of that time is spent trying to learn and improve as a musky fisherman and it leaves me with little time for targetting anything else. I grew up bass fishing from shore in the summers but never got into fishing seriously until last year when I bought a boat so I'm not very experienced, I'm not expecting to be great right off the bat and I'll continue to learn and improve over time. I wonder how often everyone here gets out fishing? How long have you been doing it and how in the world did you guys get so good at several different types of fishing? lol

I always leave the winch strap on until my trailor is in enough water that if the boat slide off the trailor it would float, it just gives me peace of mind. I know a guy who's boat slid off his bunk trailor while going down a steep ramp (where I often launch) and that was enough for me to take the extra precaution, especially since I often launch by myself. His boat is a LOT bigger than mine too haha.