Dude with the pliers needed to give somebody else a try lol lot of dicking around. The other guy was holding the mouth open wide and everything and he still couldn't get the hook out quickly. I've spent less time unhooking fish that got gut hooked
Great catch and release... did I miss something, length (53") and girth? I see the 50# title... girth at 25-26" maybe? I'd guess 45#. Throwing guesses around is for bass fisherman. Most trophy musky people I know, brutally honest, don't do that. The video and fish and experience wouldn't be any less spectacular without the title guesswork. Thanks for sharing!
When I was a kid before the internet, everything I read said musky and pike are smart and easily spooked. One hint of something off and forget about them hitting your bait. You have to be stealthy to catch them. Fast forward 30 years to RU-vid and there is video after video like this of people doing figure 8s with their lure, 6 feet of line, right next to the boat trying to get a monster like this to strike at the surface in clear view of the danger it's in. 😂
I once caught a 127", 102lb Muskie using a 50lb Muskie for bait. Pulled her in on 5lb test, I did!!! I took many pictures, but sadly dropped my phone into the river. It was probably your little 50lb minnow I snatched up for bait. So who's the better man now, Muskie Samurai? Ha...Ha!
Awesome catch, and *great* job of handling 'er. Couldn't quite make out the length, but it looked like 52". A real fatty, for sure! Doing it solo is a challenge, but I've handled some real nice ones. I mash down the barbs of hooks, have a pen net, all the tools, and a 5ft musky live well to unhook, hold, and revive fish for pics. For solo pics, I've rigged up a 3ft long stick with RAM mounts to attach the stick to the boat about 8ft from the rear and the camera to the stick, and use Canon digital cameras that have a 30 second delay 10 burst shots self-timer option. That way it's possible to unhook, measure, and take a pic with the fish being out of the water for less than 30 seconds at a time. Often when a fish is hooked in the gill area, it's possible to pass the rear hook back through the gills, cut it off at the split ring outside of the gill, and then unhook the front hook(s) easily. BTW, what the background tune? Really dig it.
Besides the angling skills was very much impressed with the catch and release quick teamwork and pic. I grew up watching ppl hug and kiss the thing forever than wonder why they can’t res it so someone else can have an experience.
You'll see they almost went in the drink at the 2:02 mark. The hooks were mangled into several gill arches, very deep. We tried the long pliers first, but there was no way to back them out.
I think the guy that caught the fish had a follow and then it went over to the other guy's lure where he tried to get it to bite, and then it went back for the first guy's lure.
Don't have to be a lefty tree-hugger, to know it makes zero sense to kill something you're not going to eat. Wish I knew as a kid what I do now, it's pretty simple. Use big enough gear\line so it's a short(er) fight. Minimize time out of water. Be prepared to take vid\pictures before hand. Good lord was I sloppy when I was young.
I don't understand why you seldom see Muskie fishermen in Minnesota, Ontario, the Dakota's, etc., actually WEIGH their catches using scales -- it's always putting the Muskie on a measuring board. Can someone explain to me why this is the norm, especially considering how big a difference the GIRTH of a Bass can affect its actual scale weight? I just never understood the reasoning behind measuring the fish instead of weighing. Before you say, "It's too difficult to attach a scale's clip to a Muskie's lip or gill plate and attempt to lift him to weigh", I've seen scales that attach to your net, so you're eliminating the problem I mentioned.
I got a pretty insane Muskie story. It was a couple summers ago, we went to Lake Chautauqua, New York for my 10 yo’s birthday. The lake was known for Muskie, walleye, perch, bass, trout, just about everything. My brother put it on a perch spreader (we live in Ohio along Lake Erie, so we had a lot of perch spreaders and were experienced perch fishermen). He said that he got bites, and then thought he got snagged. He tried pulling his hook out, and when he did he said he saw walleye dorsal fins on the surface (it was pretty far from the boat, so he was the only one who noticed it since he was focused on catching his fish) then he said he saw the fins disappear underneath the water. Then he pulled up “The Fish of 1,000 Casts” on a 4 lb rod and line to the boat. We grabbed the net, but he didn’t fit in it since we had a walleye net (because we lived on said Lake Erie so we had a net meant for walleye since Lake Erie is famous for it’s walleye fishing. We were trying to figure out how to board the thing when we saw him jump away. Our dog, whose grandpa was a hunting champion, jumped in after the fish. Our guess is that his hunting instincts in his blood from his grandfather got to his mind and he jumped in after it. My brother didn’t really care that it got away. He was proud of himself, and my parents both agreed we should count it as a catch. I was jealous, because my brother had the big spotlight in what is my thing. But over the next few months my jealousy became pride. I was proud to say “my brother caught a Muskie on a light action rod!” This is my theory that I shared with my family: My brother mentioned that he had bites, like a perch. Then the walleye he said he saw at the surface are the perch, then the Muskie went after the walleye and it got away. But t when he pulled the Muskie to the boat the perch spreader was wrapped around its neck, so obviously a Muskie didn’t try eating a tiny dried-up shiner. That is my theory. Thanks for reading the longest comment on RU-vid!
