Coming into the 2014 season we were riding high off several new techniques we learned, several notable fish, new gear and lures, and even a bit of tournament success. To help prepare for the season, I came up with an idea to try to direct our enthusiasm and pre-season purchases by having Steve and I put together our own individual “New Year’s Musky Resolutions.” We identified goals for the upcoming season based upon accomplishments and milestones that would ultimately encourage and push our musky angling abilities.
Resolutions:
My personal resolutions stemmed from my background as a casting-oriented musky angler from northwest Wisconsin. Though I’ve fished musky for years now, my personal best was a 47"er, the only tiger I ever caught was a sub-30”er, and I only ever accidentally caught one small sub-30" musky trolling a topwater (Whopper Plopper). Full disclosure — with over 11 years of fishing musky, I’ve sadly never hooked a musky on the figure-8’d. I've also never capitalized on sucker fishing. With all that weighing on me, here were my 2014 Musky Resolutions:
- Personal Best Musky: Catch a musky longer than my long-standing largest musky (47”+).
- Tiger Musky: Catch a Tiger Musky (40”+)
- Sucker Musky: Catch a musky while soaking quickset rigged suckers (40”+)
- Figure-8 Musky: Catch a musky on the Figure-8 (At least 36”, but the bigger the better)
- Trolling Musky: Catch a musky while trolling (40”+)
Hailing from the Twin Cities and Alexandria, Minn., my fishing partner Steve came up as a bass-oriented multi-species angler. As of 2013, I pushed him to shed all other fish distractions and chase the big girls, now he identifies as a musky angler who occasionally fishes for other things. Several quality muskies and countless dollars in gear later, Steve’s resolution list stemmed not from the downfalls of a slow learning curve and excuses, but from only having spent one full season really chasing muskies. Steve’s 2014 Resolutions:
- Soft Plastics Musky: Catch a musky on a soft plastic lure (40”+)
- Tiger Musky:Catch a Tiger Musky (40”+)
- Sucker Musky: Catch a musky while soaking quickset rigged suckers (40”+)
- Topwater Musky: Catch a musky on a topwater lure (40”+)
- Catch a Wisconsin Musky (36”+)
Story of the Year:
Overall I’d say this year was a tough one with patches of awesomeness. We definitely put our time in and worked for every fish we caught. I caught less fish this year, while Steve caught more. Overall the size of fish we caught and encountered increased, too.
The Good
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| Mike's first musky, a 46" spotted beauty -Guided by Casey on Leech Lake |
Leech Lake: On two trips up we caught three great fish (50.5, 46, and 45) and marked several other quality fish, too.
Costa Del Mar’s Sunrise Lens: This season Steve and I both wore new Consta shades with the sunrise lens. They were a musky fishermen’s dream. It’s a bit light on the brightest of days, but for most ideal musky fishing conditions it's a must-have.
Medussas: After going the entire 2013 season without catching a fish on soft plastics, Steve found his stride with Chaos Tackle’s Medussa. He boated multiple fish with their lures. He liked the mini’s for Tigers and had a tough trip on Lake Vermillion saved by a 44”er on a Monster Medussa.
I caught my new personal best, a pretty 50.5”er during this year’s Frank Schneider Tournament, which earned me a $100 Tournament award bonus to add to the awesomeness.
Tigers: Steve spent a good part of the summer and early fall honing his craft of targeting metro tiger muskies with suckers and soft plastics (mostly Medussas) on Gervais and Lake Johanna. For those of you who have not taken a stab at tiger muskies, I highly recommend it! Once we dialed in the tiger musky pattern (steep sloped main lake points and particular edges of flats), we could target and catch fish with a pretty good success rate. This held true for most of July to October — even in less than ideal weather patterns. When the bite was on, it wasn't uncommon for us to have a multiple 35”- 42” tiger day with some fatty pike mixed in.
Somewhere in Between
I didn't catch as many fish with my confidence lure, the Red October Baits 7.5” Ninja tubes, this year. However I did catch my 50.5” (personal best), had two very large follows on Leech, and lost a lower 40”er at the boat during the Wisconsin Musky Opener.
Follows: Man did we have a lot of follows! There were several days where we wouldn’t catch anything, but we’d have a dozen follows, and there were plenty of quality mid and upper 40” fish in that mix. Steve converted a decent sized pike, and his 49”er on the figure-8. I had two decent fish that went a couple of laps on the 8, but didn’t get them to bite.
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| Steve's topwater musky caught during the George Wahl Tourney (About an inch shy of the 40" mark) |
Minn Kota Terrova: I don’t want to look too deep into this, but while this motor allowed me way better control and freedom over my old cable steer trolling motor, my brand new Terrova seemed to have trouble keeping the
“Spot Lock” and “Co-Pilot” features running true. I’m not too concerned, this should be covered under warranty and corrected for the upcoming season.
The Bad
Wisconsin: We both got skunked. Didn’t see many fish, lost every one we had on, and didn’t come across anything of great size (nothing larger than a lower 40”er).
I lost the biggest fish of the season and my fishing career (estimated 53+). The flashbacks still plague me...
Trolling: We didn’t do enough of it. I tried it out on Waconia in a deluge during the Metro Musky Tournament only to find myself on the wrong side of the lake facing five-foot crashing waves that put my trolling efforts to a quick halt. We also gave it a try mid-day on Leech during the Frank Schneider tournament, but I wouldn’t say that we gave it our all, and had no success.
In the end, here's how our resolutions played out:
Casey’s Resolutions
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Achieved?
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Steve’s Resolutions
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Achieved?
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Personal Best Musky
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Yes
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Soft Plastics Musky
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Yes
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Tiger Musky (40”+)
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Yes
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Tiger Musky (40”+)
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Yes
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Sucker Musky (40”+)
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Yes
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Sucker Musky (40”+)
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Yes
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Figure-8 Musky (36”+)
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No, but almost!
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Wisconsin Musky (40”+)
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No
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Trolling Musky (40”+)
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No
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Topwater Musky (40”+)
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No, but almost!
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Stay tuned for our 2015 Resolutions.
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