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Muskies DL style

by , Posted to on 08/21/2009 10:30 AM | "Quote" | "Quick Reply" |

Joined: 03/03/2009
Location: nd
 Now how awsome would it be to have muskies in DL! The weed beds are prime time on this lake to support their type of behavior! Ya i know we have tigers, but i mean an abundance for them that a guy could actually target. I dont think it would damage the walleyes so just hear me out before you get all up in my crap. muskies are very low percentage fish, that target relatively larger meals. meaning theyre not going to do a fraction of the damage that the walleyes themself, the pike, and the bass already do to eachother since there wont be THAT many of them, and they eat a few large fish in contrast with the others that will eat maaaaany smaller fish. who knows they might even control the cormorant population! haha. (which ive seen not near as many of them compared to the last few years, anybody else?) Theyre so fun to fish for! just explosive and incredible fighters. even you bobber heads cant say having a 50" monster on your 6 lb line wouldnt be the highlight of your fishing career!  Hey just an interesting topic, never have seen anyone bring it up so i thought i would do just that. i now i might get burned at the stake for it around here because walleyes are sacred, pike are the devil, and everybody who starts a thread ends up getting burned by someone anyways. so lets see it, whos gonna throw the first stone! haha
Re: Muskies DL style
by on 08/21/2009 10:36 AM | Reply #1 | "Quote" | "Quick Reply" |

Joined: 08/16/2004
Location: ND
My only response is this.......  if you are using 6 lb line on bobbers you must like frequent visits to Scheels!!!

YES, I am that foolish!

Re: Muskies DL style
by on 08/21/2009 10:48 AM | Reply #2 | "Quote" | "Quick Reply" |

Joined: 02/13/2006
Location: ND
Muskies in Devils Lake is a great idea.  Why not?  Devils Lake would be perfect for musky.
Re: Muskies DL style
by on 08/21/2009 10:48 AM | Reply #3 | "Quote" | "Quick Reply" |

Joined: 02/13/2006
Location: ND
Why would you use 6 lb line on bobbers? 
Re: Muskies DL style
by on 08/21/2009 11:31 AM | Reply #4 | "Quote" | "Quick Reply" |

Joined: 02/03/2004
Location: ND
I concur wholeheartedly, G&F, get on this one!
Re: Muskies DL style
by on 08/21/2009 11:33 AM | Reply #5 | "Quote" | "Quick Reply" |

Joined: 03/03/2009
Location: nd
haha ok ok so the 6 lb line thing was just taking a jab at bobber guys. the only rule in my boat is no live bait. 
Re: Muskies DL style
by on 08/21/2009 11:53 AM | Reply #6 | "Quote" | "Quick Reply" |

Joined: 12/16/2001
Location: MN
Theyre so fun to fish for!
Fishing for muskies sucksCatching muskies is fun. 

Muskie fishing is PAIN.  Pure monotany with little reward.  Muskie fishing is torture, insanity in its truest definition.  Doing the same action over and over and over and over again, while getting the same results, but expecting something different to happen.  Which reminds me...I'm going this weekend. 

Planting skis in a lake is like planting trees.  You have to wait for 12-15 years to see it come to fruition, except you have to plant every year.   There's a food source in DL, certainly.  Notably there is a solid population of suckers of various varieties which are preferred over spiny fish like white bass, walleye, and perch in the muskie diet, but also those alternatives. 

Not a bad idea though.  There's probably a few lakes in ND that could support fishable populations of skis.  I often though Ashtabula would be a good spot to put them, a long reservoir with river and creek channels and tons of forage in suckers, bullheads and juvenile white bass. 

Good topic.
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Re: Muskies DL style
by on 08/21/2009 5:26 PM | Reply #7 | "Quote" | "Quick Reply" |

Joined: 01/12/2008
Location: ND
I see the G&F is once again stocking pure strain muskie in New Johns. Good deal and way to go. Now we just need a 50inch minimum law.

More muskies in any lake in ND would be fine by me. 
 
I really think they need to stop stocking the hybrids and go to pure strain simply because no one fishes specifically for hybrids. Pures would be a completely different story.

It would also be nice to see New Johns specifically managed for muskie. One muskie lake in the whole state full of walleye and pike waters can't hurt nothing. New Johns obviously has some serious potential.
Re: Muskies DL style
by on 08/21/2009 6:56 PM | Reply #8 | "Quote" | "Quick Reply" |

Joined: 08/21/2007
Location: ND
most recent stocking in east bay and creel bay was in 2002. approx. 50,000 tiger musky fingerling in creel, and 30,000 in east bay. I wonder how long it takes them to grow to say 3' in DL?
"A true friend is one who overlooks your failures and tolerates your sucesses"
Re: Muskies DL style
by on 08/21/2009 8:33 PM | Reply #9 | "Quote" | "Quick Reply" |

Joined: 01/12/2008
Location: ND
Seven years of growth? I'll bet there ain't a hybrid in there under three feet.
Re: Muskies DL style
by on 08/21/2009 8:55 PM | Reply #10 | "Quote" | "Quick Reply" |

Joined: 08/21/2007
Location: ND
I wish I could get into the archives of the G&F stocking reports, I know they stocked pure strain in DL in the 80's, but I don't believe it was in any large quantity.
"A true friend is one who overlooks your failures and tolerates your sucesses"
Re: Muskies DL style
by on 08/22/2009 08:34 AM | Reply #11 | "Quote" | "Quick Reply" |

Joined: 11/03/2002
Location: ND
I want muskies in the Tailrace real bad.  As I've said before; my lord, all the forage.  Striped bass would be cool too. 

Now someone tell us about the smart guys at the Game & Fish and how we're stupid.
svnmag



                                                                                                    
Re: Muskies DL style
by on 08/22/2009 08:49 AM | Reply #12 | "Quote" | "Quick Reply" |

Joined: 03/03/2009
Location: nd
 i know about the stocking reports. BUT.......i fish only for monster pike seeing as though theyre the top predatory fish on DL, and i use huge bulldawgs, double #10 bucktails, love the 13 jointed xrap....and so on. and i have never, in my life, caught a tiger.  and i fish a lot. if they are here in any number at all trust me i would be the guy that catches at least ONE right! but no its gotta be some dude from texas fishing off the 57 bridge with a straw hat and a bobber over the 4th of july! haha. my beef is that i would like MORE of them, ooooor just plant pure ski's and let them do their job.






Re: Muskies DL style
by on 08/22/2009 10:03 AM | Reply #13 | "Quote" | "Quick Reply" |

Joined: 12/16/2001
Location: MN
I wonder how long it takes them to grow to say 3' in DL?
They should be there right about now.  I saw a pic of a 33 caught through the ice last year.  Tigers grow fast in comparison to pure strain, that is why they are valuable as a hybrid species.  They provide a fishery several years before their pure-strain brethren. 

However, the problem with stocking only 30 or 50K per location on DL is that not a lot of them make it to adulthood, particularly with all the 3-6# pike making for a tough predator to overcome - plus walleye, white bass and others.  The 1-5% that do survive and become big enough to catch are a small miracle in their own right. With that in mind, it would be extremely tough to get a muskie population established for the same reasons.  The pike population is so dense on DL.  It could be done...but I'm starting to think it'd be really tough.
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Re: Muskies DL style
by on 08/22/2009 7:44 PM | Reply #14 | "Quote" | "Quick Reply" |

Joined: 02/17/2004
Location: ND
Muskies control a lot of acreage so they are not exactly ideal for ND.I don't have the stats but there have got to be bigger northerns than Muskie just from the widespread presence.I caught two northern today on a 1/16 jig and minnow in seconds and they were both over 10 and that was in a body of water less than 150 feet wide.One had VERY large teeth marks on his back and belly.Maybe a Mountain Lion tried to eat him.
Re: Muskies DL style
by on 08/22/2009 9:19 PM | Reply #15 | "Quote" | "Quick Reply" |

Joined: 02/03/2004
Location: ND
Muskie arent a moving, cold-water fish, they like large lakes with warm weedy areas. Neither of which are abundant in the tailrace.
svnmag Said:
I want muskies in the Tailrace real bad.  As I've said before; my lord, all the forage.  Striped bass would be cool too. 

Now someone tell us about the smart guys at the Game & Fish and how we're stupid.


Re: Muskies DL style
by on 08/22/2009 10:21 PM | Reply #16 | "Quote" | "Quick Reply" |

Joined: 03/10/2003
Location: ND
Don't get me wrong, I love chasing walleyes in Devils lake but I spend about 12 hrs per week chasing muskies and so far this year I have caught 6 with the biggest this morning at 8 am, 47 inches. Just seeing a muskie when you are out, following your bait, is about the same excitement level as boating an 8 pound eye, snapping a pic, and putting it back. ( I release all of my muskies ). Devils would be prime for muskies and it would also bring in more tourism. Look at what it does for angler tourism in Wisconsin  (OOps I said Wisconsin on this site, sorry guys) It would be fun one day to see Musky Hunter Jim Saric and Steve Heiting, fsn saturaday mornings, on Devils lake. The only down fall is that they would have to put a lot of  fish in the lake to make fishing for them worth the effort. The lakes that I fish are small enough to fish most of the good spots in one day but I can't imagine running and gunning on Devils for muskies. It would be fun though, something to think about. I urge you Hardcore DL guys to put the bobbers and cranks down for one weekend and go to the closest muskie lake and give it a shot. The best time of the year is coming up.
Re: Muskies DL style
by on 08/23/2009 08:26 AM | Reply #17 | "Quote" | "Quick Reply" |

Joined: 11/03/2002
Location: ND
Lycan,

Oh, like the St. Lawrence River of NY or the New River Gorge of WV?
svnmag



                                                                                                    
Re: Muskies DL style
by on 08/24/2009 11:05 AM | Reply #18 | "Quote" | "Quick Reply" |

Joined: 01/08/2003
Location: ND
I caught one yesterday in DL fishing the weed beds in Pelican (first one ever), it was about 29 inches and released. One yhing of note is the old girl was very slinder and the couple northerens I caught were thicker than the musky.
 

Good Luck and Good Fishin'

Eric T


Re: Muskies DL style
by on 08/24/2009 11:18 AM | Reply #19 | "Quote" | "Quick Reply" |

Joined: 11/03/2002
Location: ND
Chicago strain.  It's probably got a sibling below the Darling dam with one eye and a jacked up gillplate.  I hope you kissed it before the release.
svnmag



                                                                                                    
Re: Muskies DL style
by on 08/24/2009 11:22 AM | Reply #20 | "Quote" | "Quick Reply" |

Joined: 09/13/2005
Location: ND
Would adding muskies to D.L. be a way to reduce the pike there?   I mean by interbredding and sterilizing the pike by making hybrids.  If so then I'm all for it!  10 pike/walleye in Pelican during the spring is rediculous.
Hail the Bison!
You can always retake a class, but you can never retake a party!
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Posted On: 08/21/2009 10:30 AM
1855 Views, 31 Comments

Tags: muskies, style, beds, weed, prime, awsome, support, time, lake, tigers
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Region: North Dakota

Categories: Fishing > Pike and Muskie Fishing
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