Yes, about the only way i hold them. Small pike I grip around the back, and slide thumb and finger just against the top of the gills.

Musky and pike are similar in appearance only. I would gladly hand land a 42" pike, and would not think of hand landing a 36" musky. the head shakes are ferocious. We carry hand held bolt cutters, and to reduce stress on the fish, most hooks are immediately cut. I prefer no hooks on a fish in a net because the stories abound of people with a treble in them, and the fish.

Another reason for the net is to make sure you land the fish at all. We use 100 lb test, and rods that can cast 16 oz lures easily. drags screwed down to their max... Musky fight so hard (every one is different, but generally), that multiple tail walks and crazy head shakes mean that you actually stick about 30% of the fish that actually eat the bait. And to every 1 that eats, you get many follows from inactive fish.

Every second that fish is on the line is another second for it to figure out how to shake the hook, so to the boat and in the net is key.

I was a few seconds slow on the net (on film...lol) and my buddy lost one that ate a lure at the side of the boat. A fury of head shakes and poof, it was gone.

When you cast ALL DAY, or in our case last weekend, for THREE DAYS straight you want the odds stacked in your favor as much as possible.

Another reason is that a musky will fight till it kills its self through lactic acid build up, so correct (fast) handling is key.


For such a powerful fish, they are very fragile and vulnerable to high water temps, and lactic acid buildup.

Some people like to say catfish fight harder. Catfish are like a deep cycle battery, lots of slow, long term power when fighting.

Musky are like taking the same battery and dropping a crow bar across the terminals. lol.



A swimmer a month or so ago was practicing for a triathlon, and a musky attacked him. lol. They are a bit different fish. Totally fearless and you dont bring your lure too close to the boat when you "figure 8", or it will attach the trolling motor.

https://windsorstar.com/news/local-n...thy-fish-story

didn't know this, figured they were completely similar but just bigger, sound wise to use a net then lol

as you say pike are usually quite calm as soon as you get them to shore so you can just scoop them out with the gill lid

Or maybe I am just a massive pussy, that could also be it lol

Hoping we get some cold weather here. Excited to ice fish

quick teaser vid brahs.

A follow up vid to the the teaser brahs.

^^ fuaaark that's awesome brah

fuaaaaaaaark

Really nice video and great fish there Trapperbrah.

Thanks man!

Heres another on how I debone pike. Delicious fish, if you can remove the Y bones.

thanks! On rc.

I cant wait for next year!

Been ice fishing for dem dere perch each weekend. Got some decent hauls, but nothing super amazing. It's been either lots of little ones or a few big ones. Finally think I found the spot to go to, but by next weekend they may move again lol

Nice! I've never ice fished but think it would be a blast! Meanwhile, I'm fishing tomorrow and the highs will be in the mid 60's. LOL! Texas coast! Hoping to get a decent bite before the front hits.

Haven't gotten out much since fall. Fishing an ice tourny this weekend and looking forward to it. Planning a muskie trip to leech lake next summer. It's an awesome lake and pulled 2 51"+ fish out of ther last time.

Booked a Salmon trip in Alaska next summer. Looking forward to it.

Will come back and finish watching Trapper brah's videos. Grinding all day with lures that large has to be exhausting! I only watched a few minutes of the second video, but do you not loosen the drag and allow the fish to run some line out when you hook one while figure 8'ing beside the boat? More questions to come......

Jealous of those temps lol. Ice fishing is a blast, although it can get real cold if the wind is bad. Something really cool about bringing everything you need on a sled, and dragging it onto a lake and being able to really go anywhere you want (as long as the ice is safe there)

Ended up being foggy as Fak today! Took my time getting out on the water knowing the fog would be an issue. Wandered around in the fog for a few hours waiting on my Bros to meet me at the launch. Picked them up a little before 1 and took off to one of my favorite areas. By then the fog had lifted considerably. It took another hour or so to find the fish but then boated about 13 fish with 8 keepers. All redfish. The biggest 2 were around 26". Head back to the launch just before dark to find our vehicles had been broken in to.

Mirin dem redfish. Tasty buggers

What's up, haven't gone out fishing in a year and I miss it sometimes.
Usually fish solo but I'm at a point where I'd like to fish with others on a boat.
I get bad sea sickness, I popped dramamine like tic tacs on my last trip and still got sick af. It took me 6 hours to get used to the motion and by then were wer heading back lol.

A huge snow storm front was coming in yesterday and the solunar tables were excellent, so I took the day off and went laker fishing.

No giants, but three on the ice, one good one lost at the hole, and messed up on about a dozen. Two of them are going into the brine tonight, and on the smoker friday morning. Biggest was about 8 lbs, maybe just shy of 9.

Nice haul Trapper! Solunar table looked good here yesterday as well. The bad weather supposed to hit here tonight. Texas really dropped the ball last year when a big freeze hit around this time so errone tripping pretty hard over this one. Shouldn't be a big deal.

Smoked lake trout is amazing. Mirin hard

Went out on the ice today, got 19 perch. Could've easily limited out but didn't want to be cleaning fish all day. Was gonna stop at 15 but was a school under me so I kept fishing and got 4 additional ones from that school

Son!!! Hard to leave when they are biting! Is CPR (Catch, Photo, Release) not an option while ice fishing? An old coworker of mine reached out to me some time back telling me about an ice fishing excursion he and his son had taken. Said it was so cold, his son landed a fish and by the time they took a pic it was frozen!

You can if you get the fish back in quickly. Unfortunately, these perch are caught from deep water (like 50+ feet down) and die when you bring them up. Their swim bladders actually protrude from their mouths. I had one big perch get off at the hole but he still floated up

Sounds a lot like red snapper. Except you can puncture the bladder and most will be able to swim back down. Damn I'm ready to hit the water again! Thinking about taking off Friday for another round!

Jealous, I would love to catch red snapper! I think you should take the day off and fish

Sone night time Georgian Bay walleye action.

Some solid fish caught that night.

Mirin walleye

Ice fishing season probably done now. Got tons of perch but wish it had lasted longer

So do you only ice fish?