Dontcryformejanhrdina

Thanks again Mike! There's not too many pictures of me smiling like that. I can't stress enough how fun yet serious Mike is about fishing. Even to the extent that he loses sleep planning out the day, checking the weather reports, etc...the night before. AND when he had every right to cancel the planned fishing day due to the weather he found a way to make it both safe and VERY enjoyable for us. The guy goes above and beyond.

Hey everyone, I just got back from fishing with musky mike. What a day! I cannot express what a pleasure it is to share the boat with Mike. The guy is just one of the nicest guys you can meet and made what could have turned out to be a miserable day because of the weather into a day I'll never forget. my brother and I arrived at Mike's place around 7am and the wind was blowing pretty hard. Mike offered to take us carp fishing today and musky fishing tomorrow and have us stay the night but my brother's wife would kill him if he didn't come home tonight so MIke mAde a phone call and borrowed a ranger 620 fisherman to use for the day. When we got out on the water the waves were huge and it was pretty scary at times but he got us through them safely and we started trolling after being covered in waves (poor Mike got the worst of it sitting in the back too). It didn't take long for the clicker to go off and my brother was the first one up to bat since he's never fished for musky before. After a big jump he landed a nice solid musky in the 40" range. Gorgeous fish is all I can say and a great start to the day. We kept trolling for a little while and the clicker went off again, my turn to grab the rod this time. I got a musky around 38". Smiles all around and it helped us forget about being soaked (for a while anyways). We later stopped for lunch to warm up a bit and went back out, this time trying casting. I hooked into a 44" musky on a crankbait, my new PB! I was suddenly warm and the adrenaline was pumping. My brother was absolutely soaked right through all of his clothes and was freezing so I didn't want to keep him out any longer (only around 1pm by this time) but he didn't want to stop me from fishing since he knew I didn't want to stop lol. So Mike again graciously offered to have his gf pick my brother up and take him back to his place where he can get into some dry clothes. Beginning to see a pattern here? Mike just won't let anything ruin the day and found out a way to make everyone happy. Special thanks to Mike's gf too who helped out somebody she didn't even know. Just a classy family all around. So we kept on fishing and after some more casting we decided to troll again. The sun started coming out and it was a welcome sight but that didn't last long. The wind (and rain) picked up again and we hooking into another musky (mid 30" range) and then decided to call it a day since the waves had gotten BIG again. Another VERY rough boat ride ended the fishing day. 4 musky boated including my brother's first and my personal best! I had only caught 4 musky all year before today! Mike is just an incredible guide and he is an even nicer person. I'll post pictures later. Thanks again Mike for a day I'll never forget!

It's scary times when a loved one is ill. Don't give up hope though and stay positive. My thoughts and prayers are with ya.

Haha I hope so too! Getting a 50 is one of my fishing goals this year.

I've also caught 2 rockbass (not snagged, hooks in their mouths) on musky bucktails that were biggr than they were! can't figure that one out.... But really, I would think lures in the 8-12" range would be best. It would appeal to the large fish as well as the average musky.

I caught a 20" pike on an 8" topraider. Damn near cut the pike in two with the back hooks when I set the hook lol.

I bought a fenwick elite tech muskie rod from Crappy tire (got it on sale so I figured why not) but now you guys have me worried lol. Good thing I have another rod. I haven't had a problem with it so far but I haven't used it that much either.

If it helps at all I was musky fishing for a couple of hours last evening and while I never saw a musky the pike were hitting bucktails pretty hard. I was moving them fairly fast too with this warm weather.

We've all been there before.....not usually with fish though!

It's not a real kiss if there's no tongue involved.

The Good, The Bad and the Ugly is the BEST western ever made. For a Few Dollars More and A Fistful of Dollars (which is almost a shot for shot remake of the Japanese film "Yojimbo" which is even better though if you don't mind subtitles) are great too, as is Once Upon a Time in the West. The Magnificent Seven (remake of The Seven Samurai which is another great movie) is another good one. Shane, Unforgiven and basically anything with the Duke.

Nice report. Must have been a fun day. Can't wait until next Saturday.

I agree. Pike and walleye taste very similar. I can't understand why pike isn't more popular. Maybe it's the slime. Also, pike are very easy to fillet if you know how to. I think they're easier to clean than walleye, actually. As for eating size, I'll keep pike around the 24" range, give or take. I fish for pickerel/walleye sometimes in Cambellford and the slot size there is between 13.8" and 19.7" I think, that's a pretty good size for eaters.

Wow great report! Doing something like this has only been something I've talked about, still remains a dream of mine. Congrats.

I hope so too. I think I'll be more excited if my brother catches one since he's never fished for musky before. I caught another musky in Head lake in Haliburton yesterday. Only 33" but it still fought pretty hard, felt bigger than it was and still had tons of energy when I let her go. That was my first musky while trolling (literally hit about 5 seconds after I started trolling, in open water). I also had another one hit trolling (both on soft plastics) but spit my lure, one blew up on my bucktail at boatside but never stuck, and 2 more followed to boatside but never hit. I'm gaining more confidence in different techniques and trolling too. After going all summer without getting much of anything other than 2 hits I've caught a musky the last 3 days I've went out. Thanks everybody.

I've tried, the pictures show up in my post when i edit it but when I go to save changes it keeps saying "You are not allowed to use that image extension on this board" no matter what I try. I am so lost with this stuff.

Also, how can I get pics to show in this thread? It doesn't seem to let me insert photobucket photos. Yeah....I'm not very computer savvy.

So I had booked a charter with Stacy Ash from Protackle here in Belleville a while back but had to postpone it. Well we finally got out Thursday on Moira Lake. We launched at 8am and we were both confident this day would produce. I've only caught 2 musky so far after trying all summer so I am still looking for some pointers and experience. Well the day started off slow, I had a follow but not what I was looking for, a smallmouth bass following a sledge that was almost as big as he was. Stacy caught a couple of pike in the mid to high 20 inch range on a topwater but still no sign of a musky. Suddenly he see's a follow! As he's reeling closer to the boat, turns out to be just another smallmouth. Very nice sized but not what we were looking for. While using a bucktail I hooked into something, my first hit of the day. First it didn't feel that big, then it felt pretty heavy and I got a little excited. Well it turns out it was just a 5-6lb pike that ran into a bunch of weeds after I caught it. We were starting to get hungry so we went into town for lunch for a bit of a break. He had more confidence in the afternoon bite despite not seeing any fish in the morning. We started fishing bulldawgs which I've used very little so far. Still nothing for about 2 hours until shortly after 2pm I'm popping the bulldawg up in deeper water when it feels like I snag on a log, I set the hook just to be sure and it starts to move! I yelled "Got one!" and Stacy tells me to hit it again! So I set the hook hard into it again and the fight was on, it stayed deep until I got it to boatside then Stacy netted it. What a rush! I could tell right away it's a new personal best, measured 42". She swam off strong too, nothing better to see while fishing then that. My link My link Shortly afterwards Stacy hooks into a musky on a bulldawg but he says it's fighting weird. Well it jumps a few times and then we see the lure is actually hooked on it's gill plate with part of it in it's gills. Looked real bad when I netted her but when we got looking a little closer somehow her gills were untouched and just the gill plate was hooked. After I cut the hooks out he released her (guessed about 36") and she swam off strong. Whew. A while later after a couple of guys he knows pointed us in the direction of where they had just spent half an hour trying to get a couple of really big fish they raised to bite, Stacy caught another musky on a topwater and it's head was massive....but that was about it. This was by far the UGLIEST fish I have ever seen. It was 45" long but it's body could not have been bigger than my forearm (and I'm not a big guy), it couldn't have weighed 10lbs. It had scars on it's head, a jaw that looked like it had been broken in the past, it never even put up a fight. I called it a Pep Boys musky because it was all head and no body. It was literally shaped like an arrow. After releasing it she stayed at the surface for about a minute or so before finally swimming off slowly. I kind of wish I got a picture of it just because it was so bizarre. This was 1 really old/sick fish WAY past it's prime. He drove over to the guys afterwards and said "You can keep you're ugly musky!" Shortly before we were about to leave I got a really hard hit on a jerkbait, I set the hook HARD into the fish, had it on for about a second or two and then nothing! I looked at my leader afterwards and the 150lb flourocarbon was frayed pretty badly in a few spots. It hit the leader, not the lure! So frustrating! All in all I had a pretty awesome day, got my biggest fish so far and learned some new techniques. Now I have a new personal best to beat when I go with Musky Mike in October!

The maggots add a lot of flavour too. See, this is why I don't pick up hitchhikers, they always have a duffle bag full of rotten fish.....at least I hope it's fish.

Shore lunch! Just have to fight off the crows...

Sweet fish! The patterns on them are really nice too. Can't wait to get out there and learn a thing or two from a musky whisperer.

He didn't push himself up, he just pushed the dock down.

That's a sad fact. I remember as a kid a few veterens from the first world war visited our school, now there's not many WWII veterens left. Sorry about your loss. It doesn't matter how old a person is, it always hurts losing them. But he obviously made an impression on you so he'll always be remembered.

That tiger musky is one gorgeous, vicious looking fish! Congrats!

I've had snappers break my stringer and steal my fish before. Annoying watching a snapper sitting in front of me, eating my fish. He is pretty lucky. Would only take a split second to lose some fingers.