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Posts: 2024
| People shrink when they get old. Do fish??? Ha! As far as size goes, sharks can tell who is the bigger shark, so I assume musky can as well. There will be pecking orders. Every animal species has one. Just look at the line at McD's for proof. |
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| does anyone know if anyone has ever caught a bluegill on lake of the woods? |
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Posts: 171
Location: indiana | i have caught bluegill on lotw and one was just shy of sixty inches. no pics on bumpboard though. i have heard bluegill on eagle are larger. |
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Posts: 349
| Guest - 3/20/2013 1:48 AM does anyone know if anyone has ever caught a bluegill on lake of the woods? After 5 pages of reading, finally a post that makes it all worth while! haha thanks for the laugh |
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Posts: 580
| Ryan Marlowe - 3/19/2013 7:58 PM
Brad you are exactly right, lotw has numbers and your shot at a fifty may or may not be just as good as Eagle. But there for sure is a longer LEGITAMITE fish caught at eagle lake.
I don't intend to contribute a peeing match over whether either Eagle or LOTW have the bigger muskies, but I just don't know how anyone can claim to have such certain knowledge either way.
Both lakes have huge muskies. Eagle is big water, but at ~65,000 acres its really just a drop in the bucket of million acre LOTW. I don't care how many years anyone has been fishing LOTW, it's just impossible for anyone to really "know it" or claim to know, for fact, how the maximum attainable sizes compare, e.g., I'm pretty sure Whitefish Bay (which by itself is well more than 1/2 the size of Eagle) holds some awfully, awfully big muskies and it doesn't get pressured much...so who knows what's lurking there. Then factor all of Sabaskong, all of the NW Angle, all of big basins north of Sunset Channel....that's a heck of a lot of water to claim to have factual knowledge of.
I've been to LOTW ~20 times and have been to Eagle just once, albeit with a guy who happens know Eagle really well. I will say that the average size fish that I saw on Eagle was probably bigger than the average I've seen on LOTW...but at the same time, we've had days on LOTW where we've moved very considerable numbers of 50"+ fish, sometimes in the span of just a few hours.
Both are tremendous fisheries and both have world class potential. |
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Posts: 32886
Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin | The biggest muskie in LOTW is the one that's longest from it's nose tip to it's tail tip, and measures exactly that way on a bump board, too. Argue that. |
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| Do you pinch the tail to measure or not? I say YES. |
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Posts: 32886
Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin | Pinch whatever you want. |
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Posts: 87
Location: Red Wing, Minnesota | I love this site. I feel it is one of the best of it's kind.
However, after reviewing this thread I'm fairly certain that If I was ever lucky enough to boat a 60" fish, I would not post it up here. |
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Posts: 32886
Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin | I would. |
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Location: Sawyer County, WI | If the MDMWRKP establishes a program for certifying bump boards and the bump board in question was certified within the past 90 days, there would be no argument to your statement. 
sworrall - 3/21/2013 12:39 AM
The biggest muskie in LOTW is the one that's longest from it's nose tip to it's tail tip, and measures exactly that way on a bump board, too. Argue that.
Edited by dfkiii 3/25/2013 10:16 AM
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Posts: 349
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sworrall - 3/21/2013 12:39 AM The biggest muskie in LOTW is the one that's longest from it's nose tip to it's tail tip, and measures exactly that way on a bump board, too. Argue that. Steve, I hate to be "that guy" here, but you did challenge for an argument... I realize this thread has primarily been about length, but when talking about fish size a term like "biggest" most commonly refers to weight (i.e. MDMWRP), so here is my argument: The "longest" muskie in LOTW isn't necessarily going to be the "biggest" muskie in LOTW. |
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Posts: 32886
Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin | Or, it could be.
These days, in the spirit of CPR, it's length. Used to be weight when we thumped 'em. Not so much any more. |
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Posts: 1291
Location: Hayward, Wisconsin | Personally, I would be happy with the longest and/or heaviest muskie in LOTW. Although it has NEVER produced a bona fide/certified 60-pound muskie, one never knows what evil lurks out there! |
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Posts: 13688
Location: minocqua, wi. | would you be confident with a fluorocarbon leader catching that fish Larry? |
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| i caught one muskie under 40 inches fishing lake of the woods last year between the last week of june and the last week of october with an average size of probably 43 inches. that one fish under 40 inches was caught at the end of june along with the other smaller fish caught by others in the same boat. after june i was only in the boat for 2 muskies under 40 inches. one in july and one near the end of october. only one 50 for myself and i only saw about 2 or 3 behind my bait and one behind a Pike that i could say were 50 but there were LOTS of huge muskies caught on lake of the woods last year. i'd say the average size on lake of the woods is more than long enough. again we are talking a couple inches here. come on. imgine if bill sandy, doug j, and everyone vacationed on the minnesota side, whitefish bay, or other areas practically untouched. more, larger fish would be caught imo. |
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Posts: 1291
Location: Hayward, Wisconsin | NO!! |
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| My dad caught a 54 1/2 muskie - thing is it, it was a male.
I understand that males do not grow as big as the females - this muskie was exceptional.
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Posts: 171
| I wish I would not have read this post. I have been going to Sabaskong for about 12 years with only one fish over 50" to my credit. Last year, after a week of fishing and only catching a 45" for my biggest of the week, I was drowning my sorrows at Green's in Nestor Falls. While walking out the door about 1:30 am, I was approached by a shadowy figure just outside the shine of the street light. He was wearing a trenchcoat and opened it up to show me several pictures of 55" plus muskies velcroed to the coat. He told me that they all came from an area called the Northwest Angle and he knew a guy that knew a guy that had a resort over there called Baystore Camp. He claimed that the fisherman that stayed there had a hard time catching anything under 45"(eaters?) and quite often would see and/or catch fish over 55", sometimes in the 60" range.
So I called early this summer and booked a trip for this September and now you guys are saying there are no 60 inchers over there either. We already paid our deposits so we are stuck going there. Since there are no really big fish over there either, would it be smarter for us just to let the camp keep our deposits, don't waste any more money going up there, and just stay at home and watch Oprah reruns for the week?
By the way, the guy in the trenchcoat DID have his clothes on, the fish pictures were not taken on bumpboards, and I think the guy's name was Frank or Fred or something like that.................. |
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Location: MN | You should change your trip to Green Bay. There was a 64 caught over there this Spring. |
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| To Larry Ramsell
Did you do any checking on the possible 63-64" from White Fish Bay.
Caught & released maybe late 90's.
Jan 2001 Vol 26 Special issue of In fisherman.
Steve Martinson, I believe.
Just Curious |
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| Also Larry,
You wrote an article on the best musky waters in the U.S. in musky hunter not too long ago where you mentioned a 60 incher washed up dead on the shores of mille lacs after choking on a carp during the summer of 2012. Do you have any more details on this? |
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Posts: 371
Location: Dixon, IL | I know some monster muskies in LOTW! What about Chippewa Flowage? I know this lake is heavy fishing pressure and many resorts. I read about someone found bone jaw that suppose to be around 60 lbs. Other is guy caught 18 lbs catfish and something grabbed it. Found large teeth marked on catfish's belly. BIG musky grabbed 18 lbs catfish in Chippewa Flowage.
LOTW and several other lakes seem getting better and better than 10 to 20 years ago and big thanks to catch and release! |
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Posts: 1291
Location: Hayward, Wisconsin | Mike: Very hard to follow up on released fish...no way to verify unless there is a photo on a bump board, so no I didn't pursue it. Was it 63 or 64? Or less. And so it goes.
Guest: I tried to get more info on that Mille Lacs fish, but was unsuccessful. Guess the guy that found it didn't want more publicity.
ILmuskie: Always have been lots of "stories" of monster muskies in the Chip, but strangely, none of them ever get put on a scale (except the "one" that was likely loaded by Louie the Liar). Yes there have been some huge jaw bones found, but to put a weight to them is ludicurious and unrealistic. A mid 50 inch fish can have a HUGE head and the stories begin from there. Saw the catfish, but unrealistic to "guess" how big the muskie was that grabbed it...great story though!
Almost all muskie lakes have been getting better since the advent of catch and release and expansion of the muskie range...NOW is the best time in history to catch a big muskie and with 100 times more muskie anglers out there now with equipement and skills that far surpass those of "yesterday", if there were numbers of 60-inch muskies out there, they would be getting caught!! |
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| "A mid 50 inch fish can have a HUGE head and the stories begin from there."
Can a mid 50 inch fish also have a TINY head? |
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Posts: 371
Location: Dixon, IL | I think that HUGE head is old fish and tiny head is fast growing fish. Illinois and other southern state and Ohio that muskies grow fast but very rare over 40 lbs. Fast growing might have life short! Lot of shad in Illinois, Ohio and southern state. I know some shad in Wisconsin and lower Minnesota so Muskie eat shad and other like sucker, ciscoes and live little longer than in Illinois. |
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| Have any of you ever seen a young, fast growing, mid 50 inch fish with a TINY head? |
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| Thought the 18lb catfish-eating musky was just another fabricated story? If memory serves, the musky supposedly came out of the water and shook the catfish violently while in it's jaws, yet the puncture wounds on the soft underbelly of the catfish were oddly pristine. No tearing or shredding as one would expect having had such an encounter with a massive, furious musky. Seems like more folklore from an area full of it.
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| "Yes there have been some huge jaw bones found, but to put a weight to them is ludicurious and unrealistic. A mid 50 inch fish can have a HUGE head and the stories begin from there."
Putting a weight to the huge jaw bones may be ludicrous and unrealistic but determining a likely body length from them isn't. If the jawbones found on the Chippewa Flowage were indeed large enough to have come from a fish over 60 inches this should not be written off. |
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Location: Contrarian Island | I'm with Larry ... seems lots of guys see 60 inchers but none are ever caught. I might believe it from someone that has caught a few 57-58s as they might be a little bit more credible but still...something called Buck Fever... yah maybe there are a couple out there..but not in the #s it seems that are floated around out there by guys who's pb is under 55"..just think of when you 1st saw your 1st 50 incher in the water... now see a 55.... now take that up 5 full inches.. um ok... if they are really there, wouldn't they be caught..... once in a while.... just maybe...?!
Edited by BNelson 8/23/2013 2:05 PM
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