This is the story of the day I caught my 40 inch Northern Pike back in 2014.

There’s good days and bad days in fishing.. But it’s always what you make of it and today…well I think you can read and find out how it went.

Today, normally dad and I fish for walleye, but it’s a very sunny day and for us sunny days are never good walleye fishing. We started out at preachers point, were dad bagged a 23 inch walleye. We tried to scare up some more but moved on to the grasslands (an area in sucker gut) where I grabbed a 24.5 inch walleye. We trolled around more had our lunch before going into Betty’s hole around 1145, grandpas favorite spot for pike. We started casting for pike, me using a rattler that I’ve used prior for pike and dad a mepps spinner. Dad caught a 19 inch pike and I decided to switch to the same. After a couple casts I decided I didn’t like the action it gave to my pole so I switched a Johnson minnow that’s copper colored, and is a lure I’ve used in the past to catch some nice sized pike. My first cast I catch a nice 19 inch pike. We troll around some more and fast forward an hour after we’ve precision casted our lures all over the bay, dad catches another 19 inch pike. We get to the edge of one bay and I notice a bunch of minnows swimming by.

“Bunch of minnows swimming by dad.”

I cast to the point of the bay and dad says, “yep they’re here”

I’m reeling in and feel a hit on my line and see a shimmer where my line is, I go to set the hook but it fails. I feel another hit on my line as I see a second shimmer and this time I set the hook.

“Uh dad….get the net”

“Fish?”

“Oh yeah.” I’m reeling in the fish and we see a giant log floating to us.

“Oh. My. God.” Dad says as the log is actually a pike and dives towards the bottom of the lake. I’m reeling in as much line as I can as the fish goes under the boat causing me to run around the boat to keep it from breaking my rod. Dad’s switching places with me to balance the boat as the pike is trying to stay deep and peeling off line like crazy. Dad puts down the net we have and moves to the back to our storage compartment with the dip net “I need a bigger net” he says while I’m fighting this thing. Finally after 15 minutes of fighting this monster dad is able to land him with the dip net. I get the glove on and in my flustered state I grab the fish by the mouth and the teeth actually go through the glove. Dad takes over and lays him out on the ruler. ITS BIGGER THAN THE RULER!! I grab the scale with the measuring tape and measure him out….40inches.

Let me repeat… 40…inches

That is the biggest pike I have ever caught on this lake and the biggest dad has ever SEEN. This pike stretched our gear to the limits, 10 pound test and the pike was easily 15 pounds.

It was superb teamwork on dad’s end while I battled this monster. We’ve never had to use the dip net until today, Valerie thank you and your husband for getting those nets way back when. They finally came into use today!

Normally fists are bumped at the end of a battle like this… Today was hugs.