good way to finish the inland season

[lilman]

Got up to mille lacs friday night a little after 4 pm. Plan was to move the house and get going for thr the evening fish. I get to the house, dad is gone, apparently he met memberTricky out there and was enjoying his time in Tricky's house. So we get going, move, have the house ready to go by 5. Lower down my Angel Eye, and like clock work pick up a nice eater. Throw back down, hoping to get another one real quick.

We were set up on a rock pile that comes up from 27 feet of water to 22 feet of water. Nice basketball sized rocks that were crawling with hellgrammites and crayfish, pretty cool to see.

5:30 rolls around I get a fish to come right tight to bottom. I am shaking the spoon, nothing happening, I am pulling out every trick in the book for what I thought was a walleye hugging the bottom. I finally start slapping the spoon onto the rocks and let it sit back down onto a rock. Line tightens and I set the hook into solid weight. Gain five feet, head shake, lose 4 feet, this little tug of war and headshakes went on for a while. I finally start gaining on it, dad is looking down the hole, and I was sure that it was going to be the big walleye. Then it makes a circle under the hole and we both agreed it was a pout. It was a fun fight so I wanted to keep playing it. My dad went outside and was messing around, he comes back in, "Your still fighting that thing?" He comes down to look again and sees a nice pike roaming around. Get it to the hole, we miss the first landing and now its pissed, running like a true pike. After a few more long runs, we got a second crack at it and my dad didnt miss.

Ended up going 16 pounds 13 oz and was right around 38 inches. Snapped some pictures, took down the tag information, it was actually tagged twice. If you look close you can see the tags.

The release of a gorgeous healthy looking Mille Lacs Pike that gave me a memory to last a lifetime and hopefully will provide many more memories for other people as a twenty pound trophy class pike! It gave me a nice bath on the way down.

I was using four pound test on a 28 inch Light action Midwest Rod and reel Rod with a 20 size President. The equipment handled it perfectly. The perch was fun the rest of the weekend, picked up some nice walleyes too. Good time meeting everyone there. Thanks for a good season rock!

[EBass]

Sweet! That's a nice fight and a better story.