As the end of the open water season keeps approaching, I took an opportunity to get out two days in a row. The second of those days I got out with Bigdaver in his boat and we were looking for some big apex predators.
The rain and mist that was forecast arrived a couple of hours ahead of schedule and it was raining before we launched. Low cloud was hovering at around 50 or so feet off the deck. We spent the first part of the day rinsing assorted lures and, despite marking tons of suspended bait clouds, never found any takers.
We decided to relocate and try our luck elsewhere on the outer bay. We headed over to the area where I had been on the 10th and dropped our lines in. We barely got the lines set and the pike showed up hungry. In a couple of hours we managed to boat 9 and a few spit the hooks as well. We were running four lines off planer boards with body baits. The biggest takers were a 39.5 " / 11.9 lb and a 35.5 " / 9.6 lb. The larger one taken by Dave and the second by me. Also shown below is one around 30 inches with a particularly nasty set of rather fresh-looking bite marks on its body.
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We tried until almost complete darkness to catch whatever it was that made the marks on the pike, but alas, it was not to be on that day. Notwithstanding the lack of musky, it was a successful outing all the same, with some lunker pike to ease our quiet morning. Many thanks to Bigdaver for the hospitality onboard your boat. It would have been a much less enjoyable day without the cover of the Bimini top onboard my tinny.
The rain and mist that was forecast arrived a couple of hours ahead of schedule and it was raining before we launched. Low cloud was hovering at around 50 or so feet off the deck. We spent the first part of the day rinsing assorted lures and, despite marking tons of suspended bait clouds, never found any takers.
We decided to relocate and try our luck elsewhere on the outer bay. We headed over to the area where I had been on the 10th and dropped our lines in. We barely got the lines set and the pike showed up hungry. In a couple of hours we managed to boat 9 and a few spit the hooks as well. We were running four lines off planer boards with body baits. The biggest takers were a 39.5 " / 11.9 lb and a 35.5 " / 9.6 lb. The larger one taken by Dave and the second by me. Also shown below is one around 30 inches with a particularly nasty set of rather fresh-looking bite marks on its body.
View attachment 67984View attachment 67985View attachment 67986
We tried until almost complete darkness to catch whatever it was that made the marks on the pike, but alas, it was not to be on that day. Notwithstanding the lack of musky, it was a successful outing all the same, with some lunker pike to ease our quiet morning. Many thanks to Bigdaver for the hospitality onboard your boat. It would have been a much less enjoyable day without the cover of the Bimini top onboard my tinny.
