Your true stories, big pike gabbing hooked fish...

[Weed Shark]

Never happens to me...never see it either. Here's two stories where I was in the other boat. My dad had a monster grab a northern on his stringer, eventually it let go when the wind swung the boat bow over the fish. Shortly after he hooked a monster and lost it.

A friend battled one hanging on his walleye. It went on a long run and came back before it let go, and just sunk like a submarine next to the boat. Alone in the boat, he never tried for the camcorder, in its case.

Same friend hand-grabbed a pike in the teens that was hanging on his dad's walleye.

I've seen big pike choked with large fish in their mouth.

I'm sure you have a better story...

[Dave B]

I had 12' fishing boat and had a friend out on Bald Eagle. We were just off the bar on the end of Cigar Island walleye fishing and his line was wrapped around the end of his line. As he tried to untaggle it his leech just dangled in the water. Out of the corner of my eye I see a 40-50" musky jump completely out of the water at the front of the boat. He jumped back so fast I thought we were both going swimming as the musky was inches from his face.

Also, on Vermilion one day back in high school we were fishing shallow bay in summertime. Every few minutes I would see a wake from a big something just below the surface. I casted and casted and casted until finally it hit. It was my 1st fish ever on a new bait caster and the drag wasnt set right. I had the right rod, right line, but couldnt stop the fish from running into thick lily pads and jumping and shaking the hook. It was a huge northern (pre-musky stocking). I pushed down on the spool so hard that I cut both of my thumbs as the line ripped off the reel.

[slipperybob]

When I was a kid and shore fishing was really slow, I'd decided to play my hand in the water making wave back and forth like a fish silting out a nest. Next thing I knew there were these two huge eyes staring at me, a head as big as my own. I can see the voracious look in the predatory fish...I flinched and it attacked, gunning for my hand. There was a big boil of water splashing and cried like the little boy I was...Next thing I say was the wake of a tail fin as the monster dissappeared into the water.

(large mought bass stories are way more funny)

[Hammer Handle]

I speared a 6 pound northern that had a 2 pound northern in his belly. Well, not all in his belly. The tail of the other northern was barely in his mouth. The head was digested and the rest was slowly going in as it digested. The tail must have been outside of his mouth for several days.

As a kid, I was "playing" with a sunfish at the end of my line. As I was holding the sunfish ABOVE the water (was bobbing it up and down), a northern jumped out of the water right by the boat and tore it off my line.

I also saw a large-mouthed bass nab an adult red-winged blackbird on a reed above the water. Splash! Bird was gone.

[Tim_Anderson]

Had a pretty cool thing happen once up in Quetico Provincial Park in Ontario. I was on a wilderness canoe trip with a buddy, and he was reeling in a smallmouth that was roughly 1.5 pounds, when a low forty inch pike t-boned it. The pike just wouldn't let go, so it pulled out drag and Gary would reel it in. We didn't have a landing net along, so tried to hand grab it, and then it finally let go. Have had this same thing happen numerous times while reeling in sunfish and crappies in the Brainerd area, but usually with pike more in the 10-15# range. Always fun though!

[Tippman]

We usually have a pike trying to get walleyes off the stringer nearly every year in the boundary waters, and they are usually pretty large. For some reason we've never been able to catch them on our spinning equipment.

Last year on Red Lake in Ontario my boat alone had over a dozen northerns grab walleyes on the way into the boat. We were very successfull at catching them as we had our muskie equipment with. Those big pike really liked the big lures. We caught most of them that had grabbed onto our walleyes, never quite got one with the walleye still in it with the net though.

[crazyice]

A few years back on Minnetonka, I was fishing from one of the many fishing piers. I was just fishing for pannies with a float, having a blast with all the fish I was catching. I had on obviously another sunfish by the way they flutter when they fight, he was heading for some reeds so I hurried the reel in a little bit more when all of a sudden I basically hit a brick wall with the line, couldn't budge it! I figured he had wrapped up in the weeds, but then all of a sudden it came loose and there wasn't anymore fight there, just figured it got off. Well I reel it in and there is only half of a bluegill left! Either a pike or musky grabbed it and got the other half.

[cold one sd]

I have had large northerns grab smaller walleyes while I was reeling them in on Oahe. This usually happens a couple of times every year and I have never been able to net one, but I know people that have done it. You are reeling in a 15" walleye and all of a sudden your drag is screaming.

[BobT]

Couple years ago on one of our Canadian fishing trips a friend and I were busy releasing 18" - 24" walleyes when my partner gets a decent fish on. After what seemed like an eternity he managed to get the fish close enough that I caught a glimpse of it and if it was an inch long it was 4'! Eventually he got it to the boat again and this time we got a much better look. It was a huge Tiger and at that moment it let go of the 15" walleye that he had actually hooked. Too bad we had to keep a walleye that was so badly chewed up but it was worth it.

Bob

[Scott K]

My daughter was reeling in a sunny, and a big snapper turtle grabbed it, and she got it up to the boat, it wouldnt let it go, I had to break her line.

[Duffman]

I've seen it happen a few times from grabbing a sunny to a small bass. One of the most memorable involved some bobber fishing up on the Basswood river up in the BW. We were sitting in our chairs on a large slab of granite that sloped into the river. We had been catching some small walleyes and tossing them back, all from our chairs, didn't even have to stand up. Well my friend has one hooked but it fell off the hook when he was swinging it up to be released. It flopped down the rock until it was about a foot from the water and then it stopped flopping. My buddy was miffed that he had to actually get out of his chair and help the fish the rest of the way. As he was reaching down to grab it, a decent pike shot out of the water and clamped down on the little walleye on shore! It did a quick flop and found itself and it's prize back in the water.

My buddy let out quite the little girly scream, and jumped so high that he scared the bejeezus out of me. Fishing was over for the night, somebody had to go back to camp to change his shorts.

[buddha]

My brother had a pike grab a smallie last summer on a lake by Lutsen. He was reeling in a smallie and the pike hit it on the top of the water and held on till the side of the boat. Not the biggest pike but somewhere between 5 and 10. Got a good laugh and a story out of it.

[MikeYager - Suzuki]

St Croix. Reeling in 13" sauger a large pike grabbed it in the middle and didnt let go until we netted it. Then it went nuts. Sauger didnt survive. Last year I hooked and landed large muskie that grabbed my 8-10" smallie right in front of me. 8lb line and #6 octopus hook. That was exciting.

[LanceJ]

I was fishing for some sunfish with my 5yo nephew off a pier last summer and he had on a tiny one and reeled it up to the edge of the pier and a northern came out of the weeds and chomped it off his line...got the boy pretty excited! That's the only time its happened to/near me.

[picksbigwagon]

I was fishing on a river north of the metro, when I caught a 10" smallie, as I was bringing it in, I was wading at the time, a northern side swiped it and came along for the ride. I took the northern off, and it stayed below me while I took the small mouth off. Well, I wasn't going to hand feed the northern and it wasn't interested in moving so I underhand pitched the smallie about 25 feet across the stream, and that northern took off in a flash when that smallie hit the water

[sdstatekid]

That happens a lot up around Voyaguers. We got 3 in the 8-12# range in one day last summer. We were fishing a rock pile and we were catching smallies left and right. One out of every two or three was a probably around a pound or less and every one we hooked like this would end up getting attacked on the way to the boat. A few years ago up there we were pulling planers and we thought one of em was dragging a little but we thought we would let be for a couple more minutes. All the sudden the drag is screeming and the planer board went under for about 5-10 seconds. Got the fish in without a problem but we couldn't believe a five pound northern would pull a planer board under and sure enough there was tooth marks on its side. Don't know if it was a northern or a musky that hit the little guy, but whatever it was was huge.

[DinkADunk]

A couple of years ago I was at a resort on Pelican Lake in Orr. One evening sitting on a fishing pier at the end of a little point I caught a blue gill and was reeling it in (the young kids around thought is was great). When it got to the deck, a northern pike around 20" or so jumped in the air, grabed the bluegill (riped off the hook) and landed onshore with the bluegill in its mouth. A couple of moves with its tail and it found the lake again. I busted up laughing and the kids all started screeming.

[Scott M]

I was reeling in a dink smallmouth bass on Seagull lake off the Gunflint Trail, when a moderate (8-10 lb) northern T-boned it. He wouldn't let go. Even at the dock he wouldn't let go. I had my wife grab the camera and we took some cool pictures. Poor smallie was all torn up, so we ended up filleting him.

I remember my grandpa losing a hawg northern that had latched onto a hammerhandle. It was one of the few thigns I remember about fishing with him (He passed away when I was in 4th grade).

Other than that, I have seen it happen a few times, but it's usually a dink northern that does it....I guess I will have to go somewhere where the pike grow large.

[nthomps66]

Last summer I was watching my 3 yr old reel in a little bass himself when the pole was almost ripped from his hands. I helped him out and got a nice picture... My son was mad that the mean old northern stole his bass.

[crazyice]

That's a pretty cool picture, I am sure your son will have a wonderful memory of that incident! Hopefully the fun of having something like that happen infront of his face will have HIM hooked on fishing for the rest of his life.

[Jlineandsinker]

This is a little bit of a twist to your stories,but about 10 year back my son was fishing from the dock,up by Cross Lake,caught a fish he couldn't remove the hook from,came walking up the dock to get me,when a pelican took the fish and pole right from the dock. Was a strange sight watching the pelican flying dragging his pole. Saw the pole go down fifty yard away.

[jparrucci]

A few years ago up on Vermilion, I was cruising the rocky shoreline casting for smallies. It was a calm day and I was doing well, slowly trolling with the bow mount around a bay. About 5-10 ft from shore was a rock with an acorn sitting on it. There was a large tree nearby overhanging it, but the branches didn't quiet reach to the rock. It was in the fall, and up in the tree I can see a squirrel gradually working his was down the branch as it bends, and then scurrying back up as it bends. It was pretty good entertainment watching the squirrel run up and down the branch, trying to work up enough nerves to finally make it all the way to the rock. The squirrel finally got all the way to the rock and nabbed the acorn. So, there on the rock in the water sat the squirrel.

I could see him sitting there trying to decide how exactly he was going to get back to shore. The branch was only a foot or two over the water and he decided to make a jump for it. Just as he is leaving his feet, about a 36-40 inch Northern comes out of the water and smacks the squirrel mid flight.

I sat there in awww trying to figure out what just happened. I was really close to the rock at this point; the splash from the Northern leaving the water almost got me wet. As I am sitting there analyzing what I had just seen, the Northern appears out of the water and drops another acorn on the rock, and disappeared back into the water.

[Deitz Dittrich]

ok.. I got 4 stories...

First was my shortly after I graduated High school.. My family and I took our pontoon boat(which was wrapped around a tree like a taco in a tornado shortly after this trip) and floated the Missippi for 2 weeks... We put in just north of MPLS and then just floated south for 2 week.. we would anchor and sleep on the boat at night, pull anchor and float the next day. Onenight as we were getting ready for bed in a backwater down by Iowa a squirl fell out of a tree in a backwater area, tried to swim to an island... never made it.. I have no clue what got it.. but missed it about 3 times and the 4th time it never made it back up for air...

Next my dad and I were fishing on Tonka.. I had a pike(3lbs ish) on very near the bridge at Grays bay... About half way to the boat a larger pike (15 lbs ish) hammer it it eventually ripped the smaller pike off and I didnt lade either of them.

I was fishing Lake Bemidji in college on opener.. And had a walleye on(typical 14" fish) and just before I grabbed it, a muskie inhaled it... probably one of the biggest ski I have ever seen and my hand was no further from it than 3"....

Last and my fave story.. I was fishing a tournament on Forest Lake..a multi species tournament... My partner and I were fishing some deeper bass fishing with a jig worm... He hooked what we thought was a 4: cookie cutter bass which we had been catching. After a short 10 second fight his rod did a double take...The fight was on for about 10 mins and we never saw the fish.. Just as I was getting the net ready the fish surfaced.. A very nice Muskie!!!! about 10" from the net it just opened its mouth and spit out about a 13"bass... dead as a door nail with the hook still in its mouth?... Still no clue how it never cut the line or let go...but its the only time I have ever seen anybody land a dead bass!

[Deitz Dittrich]

I got to thinking, a toothy also cost me quite a few $$ once... While fishing a tournament in Wi.. I had a decent bag a of bass but needed a kicker fish.. I had one sitting in a area and spent alomst an hour trying to get this fish to bite. With about 10 mins to go inthe tournament I get the fish to hit and set the hook, 1/2 way back thte boat a muskie comes out of nowhere and inhales this bass.. needless to say, my line went slack and I ended up getting 4th I think... That bass would have won it for me for sure. Darn teethy fish!

[mnmarlin]

When I was about 12 we lived on Bay Lake, by Deerwood. We were fishing crappies and doing really well, we had a bunch, some of which were 16-17", real huge black slabs. I had a bite, and started to reel in another nice crappie, and a huge northen came up and hammered it. Hit it so hard that the reel flew right off the rod! I don't know why the line didn't break, but my dad grabbed the rod and I grabbed the reel and landed the crappie. It was 13" long, and the teeth marks on it were 10" wide. I don't know how big that fish was, had nothing to judge it by, but it harrassed us all summer, stealing crappies and sunfish from us. My uncle even tried to catch it using a small sunfish on a big hook (this was over 30 years ago) but it never hit anything when we targeted it.

Lots of fun.

[The Grebe]

I was fishing the Snake River a number of years back and I was hauling in a small walleye....it came to the surface and was maybe a foot from shore, in about 6 inches of water and I was just going to lift him out and the water opened up!

All I seen was the huge head, with mouth open and gills flared....I mean, it looked like you could have put a football in this things mouth! Startled the beejeebers out of me!

The monster pike held on for a minute or so and then let go and I pulled in the little walleye...he looked like he had been put through a shredder.

There was this old farmer type standing on the river bank and he says, "Yah, ya shudda let er take it."

Yeah, like that old timer would have made the right move! He would have probably let go of the rod, fell in and drowned! A person would have had to have the reflexes of a cadaver to have not reacted to that mighty strike.

Heres another, this happened two summers ago. My one son was reeling in a crappie and we both seen that it was a crappie and all of a sudden it started pulling really hard and running and when he got it in, it wasn't a crappie anymore, but a pike!

[Standard]

I had a small pike hooked once, was reeling it in close to the surface when I see this huge flash and my drag starts screaming. Didn't hang on, so I'm not sure how big it was.

Another time on a lake up north, I was in a kayak going after some sunfish. Super clear water, and they were all kind of schooling underneath me and in my shadow. Then I remember looking down, and there's nothing around. A few seconds later this pike just comes screaming underneath the kayak. Obviously looking for breakfast.

[SnakeRiver]

Here's a picture from a dualie in the BWCA. Look at the slime!

[Scott K]

I wouldnt speak to loudly of casting out a game fish for bait!

[federline]

OK, not quite pike/freshwater, but its saltwater cousin -

Florida Keys, just finished up pulling some lane snapper out of a reef, and we were now freelining yellowtail in chum clouds. After catching a couple boxers, another guy laid into a nice on, and started hauling him up when the captain yells "REEL! REEL! REEL! GO! GO! GO! HURRY!" so he puts the afterburners on the reel crank and as this nice fat yellowtail pops outta the water, this big BARRACUDA t-bones it in the air right above the water surface, surgically removing the body directly behind the gill plates, leaving entrails dangling from the fish head on his hook. He was devastated, and very pi$$ed, he was sure he had the big yellowtail for the day.