Gelb's giant muskie fulfills lifelong dream

Two weeks after he caught the biggest muskie kept in Wisconsin in at least 17 years, Tom Gelb's phone hasn't stopped ringing.

The 53-inch fish had a 28½-inch girth but an empty stomach and only about 2 pounds of eggs inside, according to taxidermist Ron Lax of Conover. It weighed 51 pounds, 2 ounces on a certified scale at the U.S. Post Office in Conover, 10 ounces less than it weighed at Eagle Sports Center in Eagle River, and 4 ounces less than at Lax Taxidermy.

If Gelb's catch would have had a normal amount of eggs for a mature female and a full stomach, it easily could have approached 60 pounds.

Musky Hunter editor Steve Heiting said while the last certified 50-pounder in Wisconsin was caught in 1989 in Sawyer County, it has been 31 years since Vilas County produced such a fish.

Last April — before the season opened — a muskie reportedly 56 inches long with a better than 30-inch girth was caught, photographed and released in the lower Fox River at Green Bay. Many believe it easily would have topped 50 pounds.

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