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"We're going to need a bigger auger"


Carl Bjorgen

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I am a panfisherman during ice season. Here's a story that just happened this morning.

I go to my favorite neighborhood lake and right to my favorite spot because I only have a couple hours and want some action even if they are small fry's.

A 1/2 hour in I am doing well catching and releasing a fish every couple of minutes or so. I am kind of spacing out when all of a sudden I look down in my hole and see something strange. Something is pushing against my transducer.

I see a snout come into view, then a large pike head, then a body. This log shaped object swims slowly past my hole. The back of this fish is so broad that its width exceeds the diameter of my hole. It takes what seems like an eternity for me to finally see the tail.

I estimate the monster to be in the 35-40 inch range.

I am shaking like Jon Voight drawing down on that Hillbilly in Deliverance. I try to calm down and eventually do a few moments later. I grab my phone to take note of the time; it is 9:30am. I put on a fresh waxie and drop 'er down.

I glance at my flasher and notice that all the fish have suddenly disappeared. Weird. I start jigging rapidly to try to pull them back in. Not more than 30 seconds later a feel a good rap on my lure. I set the hook and start pulling something in. Seconds later the line starts tearing off my spool. I think, "no effing way". But it was true.

I had tied into the monster.

After about five minutes and a series of reel it in, peel it off again, I finally got a look at this thing and quickly did the math:

16" bro panfish rod, 4 1/2" hole, 2 lbs test. This fish wasn't coming in the boat.

I continued to fight the giant pike and while doing so managed to grab my camera phone with video and capture the moment as best as I could. There was no way I could get the beast on camera, but I wanted to see if I could at least get the rod bend and the line peel, the results were disappointing but under the circumstances, it was the best I could do.

At around the 20 minute mark, he decided he had had enough. He dove for cover, found something solid, and busted my line. I sat there quaking, shocked and exhilarated at the same time. I would need a few minutes to calm down before attempting to tie on another jig. My hands finally started working again, I finally got rigged and went back to fishing for dinks in my little spot on my favorite lake...

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Carl, great story! But at somepoint with to small of a hole. You should have asked yourself, do I wear this guy out so he may not make it or just cut the line and live with the excitement he brought me for a minute? I know when it's all happening so fast and it maybe a fish of a life time, it's hard to think things out. But that he got away before he went belly up was a good thing! Thanks for sharing your excitement! cool

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Great story! Thanks for sharing. You've got a good way for telling stories.

I had this northern/muskie swim under my hole last Friday. It was in the 4 foot long range. The fish is 8' deep when I took this picture. Like you I had been panfishing and catching fish, and then the flasher went dark. I happened to look through the hole and saw it swimming through. I had another rod with 8 lbs test, so put a fathead on a hook and dropped it down. The fish would come and "sniff" the fathead, but would not bite. Was pretty cool to watch though.

Northern2_13a.jpg

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Great story! I would love to see a 20 minute battle with a pike. The fish I usually catch come up pretty fast smile

You should have asked yourself, do I wear this guy out so he may not make it ... But that he got away before he went belly up was a good thing!

I disagree with this comment, I think the fish will be just fine. Remember, it's not July with 80 degree water out there. These fish can handle a battle here and there, especially in the winter.

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Hey, that's a great story Carl!

We had something similar happen last week. I took my 6 year old daughter out for her first time ice fishing. We were catching a few decent size crappies... I stepped out of the portable to check a tip up and vex a few holes when my daughter yells out "Daddy, hurry I've got another fish. I thought it's another Crappie- "I'll be right there" I told her.

I get inside the fish house and her rod was nearly bent in half and all I hear is line zinging off the reel.

I taught her how to let him take the line and start reeling when he gets tired and stops.

Long story short, she fought this fish for 10 minutes to the bottom of the hole. We looked down and as the guys from Grumpy Old Men would say "Holy moly, she's a monster."

The head on this pike was longer than the 9 inch hole.

I'm guessing it had to be close to 3 feet long.

We tried like heck to get it up the hole but it smacked his head on the ice, spit the hook out and said "See ya"

Talk about a thrill for a 6 year old on the ice for her first time out!

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aanderud, remember he said he only had a 4 1/2" inch hole! confused Why play a fish out if you know you can't get it through the hole? It's not even catch and release, he can't take a picture so all your doing is possible hurting the fish by having it banging off the ice under there and wearing it's self out! frown

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aanderud, remember he said he only had a 4 1/2" inch hole! confused Why play a fish out if you know you can't get it through the hole? It's not even catch and release, he can't take a picture so all your doing is possible hurting the fish by having it banging off the ice under there and wearing it's self out! frown

That fight isn't going to kill the fish in cold water. If you cant fight the fish why even fish? Glad to see another online fish cop though.

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Almost exactly the same thing happened to me a few years back. My buddy and I were scouting around and both of us pulled up a few sunnies so we decided to set the house up. We start fishing and couldn't see any fish. We were sight fishing in about 8 ft of water. I look down a hole that had the vexilar transducer in it and saw this big boar staring at the transducer. I screamed like a little girl. My bud saw it and hit me telling me to shut up.

We tried to bounce sinkers (attached to line) off it head/back.

That thing would not leave. We packed up and moved to a different spot. Oh, that is a 10" hole. Any guesses as to how big it was??

DSC00555.jpg

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WOW!

Was this a muskie lake?

Steve

Grumpy, my 3 yo son and I had the same type of experience this winter. I usually set the hook for the kids and on one occasion the 12# line started screaming off my heavy trout rig. I "helped" and the end result was an 11 lb northern.

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Was this a muskie lake?

Yeah, after we both settled down, My friend and I had one of our most infamous exchanges: Me:"Geez, I wonder how that old thing would taste?" My friend with a total strait face: "Kinda like eagle."

We still laugh about that a few times a year.

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I wish fishing for crappies on White Bear Lake back in early january and hooked into a 36 inch muskie. Caught it on 4 lb test, took me about 5-10 minutes to get it through the 8 inch hole. Fortunantly, I had a gaff which I slid under the gills(not to hurt the fish) and pulled it up through the hole. I never go anywhere without the gaff for those types of situations

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I get strangely excited when big ol' carp swim by my cam. I don't know why. Just seeing something that big I guess. Only thing I don't like about seeing carp however, is usually after they appear, the rest of the fish disappear.

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Originally Posted By: thedeadsea

Was this a muskie lake?

Yeah, after we both settled down, My friend and I had one of our most infamous exchanges: Me:"Geez, I wonder how that old thing would taste?" My friend with a total strait face: "Kinda like eagle."

We still laugh about that a few times a year.

Good one! 99.9 percent of readers will think that's humor. .1 percent will feel the need to inform you that eating an Eagle is illegal and will give our sport a bad name. Joe.

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shoulda grabbed it sparky!!!

Wouldn't ya know it, that same sarcastic comment came out of my mouth directed to my buddy! AHhh, it was out of season anyway.

As to have the wherewithal to grab the camera, That darn muskie would not leave, it was there for about 5 minutes.

It was a bright day, and I think that monster saw us bring up a couple of fish and made its way over to us.

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