I don't think I've ever seen "live bait" as one of the lure descritions on the Muskies Inc. page for Chapter 47. But you look at ch.49 (WLMC) at the fish caught on live bait is like 48%. Is there a reason no one here uses live? I've thought about trying it (with a quick-strike, of course). If you have 2 people in the boat, why not set one sucker in front, and one in back on bobbers while casting lures? I've read about guys having follows, then when the fish turns away, it sees the sucker and takes that instead. Sounds like you could up your chances at a few more fish.
You see it down there so often because there are at least seven guides on Webster that regularly use suckers to put fish in the boat for clients. Other people see the guides using suckers all the time and they start using suckers too and all of a sudden there are a ton of fish being caught on suckers. The local tackle shop also carries a good supply of large suckers so they're available to everyone.
I'm sure some people will chime in and share their opinion on suckers. I'll keep mine to myself this time around…
I have been looking at the same thing and actually I have a guide date scheduled with a Webster guide named Mike Hulbert. My main goal for this trip is to understand how to utilize and rig live suckers. Mike actually designed a quick strike rig and sounds pretty knowledgeable. I will be out on 11/11 and I will try and post a report and what I learned. There are some videos on you tube that are somewhat OK but the biggest problem I have seen is actually getting the suckers.
In the Detroit/Toledo area I have not been able to find anyone that regularly stocks large suckers. I know the guy at Cabelas that orders the bait and he says that with one weeks notice he can get me large suckers. Cabelas gets a lot of their bait from Knutsons in Brooklyn, MI. I have talked to Knutsons and they only have 8" suckers right now. They get larger suckers in December for the spearers 👿 . It's important to be very careful where you get these suckers/minnows because of VHS and any potential issue. The other place that stocks them is Ye Olde Tackle Box which is in IN very close to Webster. The other option is trying to catch them yourself.
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Got my first muskie on a quick-set rig, what a blast to watch that sucker get nervous and about come out of his skin. On the other side of the coin it dosen't always work. Two of us were out on Webster with each one of having a sucker out. Casting I brought in a mid 40's fish, wouldn't go on the figure eight. She went under the boat to the sucker, made him go nuts and she just kept swimming away. Bad thing on a real windy day, even with alot of weight, they can go water skiing. Steve
"edalz" said:
The other option is trying to catch them yourself.
That is ONLY an option if you are catching and using the suckers in the same water. If you transport suckers from one water to another you could be spreading fish disease. Also… if you use a sucker in a lake that you have purchased you MUST kill and dispose of that sucker and all bait.
I hate suckers, even more than muskies they hate humans and want to make our lives miserable, what they lack in teeth they make up for with their weed entangling capabilities and their douche-like attutudes. Suckers in the boat can be considered a live swimming banana in terms of how much bad luck they can incur on a single trip. Once I fished with the king of all suckers, his name was Retardo Montalban and he was known to charge muskies and scare them away. For what I pay for suckers I would rather buy a new bait.
Kevin
Michelle and I have caught a few on Suckers. We even went overboard for a while with a 100 gallon tank and were buying them from a trout farm in Muskegon. They really are not that productive and can be a major pain in the astric getting tangled and such. If you do use them make sure you do (NOT) let a Musky swallow one. Use a quick setting approach no matter what type of hooks you use. Large single barbless hooks cause the least damage but do not hook as well as trebles. The single hook has been demonized by many in Wisconsin as a fish killer but sadly its the fools who feed suckers to the Pike and Muskies that are the problems. The truth? Any hook is a quick strike rig and any hook is a swallow rig. Muskies can swallow any amount of treble hooks nearly as easy as they can one single hook. I plan on making a video of a single hook quick strike rig someday just to prove that its not the hook that kills but the guy using it. (OF course I will strike the fish as soon as it takes the bait)
The link that Will has provided is the honest truth about the ingestion of hooks by Muskies. It also applies to any other fish that is allowed to swallow a hook. I would be correct to say that there have been 100 times more Brook trout killed by swallowed hooks then any esox type of fish. But using that same small j hook you can set as soon as the brookie takes the worm. Sure you miss a few but this method preserves sub legal fish. The days of cutting the line and leaving the hooks behind has to stop. No fish can digest steel.
Finding decent size suckers is and will be a problem in Michigan as they are not stocked by bait shops until spearing season starts. By then who needs em eh? There are some fish farms that have them but then you need a tank and such to keep them alive. We found it to be quite a hassle as they get sick from tank disease and such. It is a blast to watch a Musky take a sucker at boatside,reel down on it and set the hook. Now a days we just catch perch or Bluegill and toss one over the side if things are slow. Muskies love perch [smilie=brows.gif]
So if you use live bait just set that hook as soon as the fish has the bait and you should be fine. A single barbless hook is the easiest to remove and does the least amount of damage to the Pike or Musky. You will miss a lot of them though and that is why most guys use a couple trebles on a wire leader. They call them lift off rigs, quick strike rigs, slider rigs etc. etc. etc. all just hooks on a wire leader. Mike and Michelle
Kingfisher:
So you're saying that no matter what, always set the hook as soon as humanly possible? I'm not calling you wrong, but it goes against what the latest issue of Musky Hunter mag. says. I forget the guys name who wrote it, but he says he waits till the musky has stopped moving to start eating its meal before he sets the hook. And he states how much he despises the single hooks because of the fatality rate. So he's not out for killing. Personally, my first thought would be to set the hook once the sucker is in the fish's mouth. That's what we do with artificial, right? It doesn't make sense to say you're always looking out for the good of the musky, yet you wait 2,3,6,10 min. before setting the hook. Who knows how far down the throat that sucker is by that time?
I for one would like to try suckers. I feel it's worth a shot, and if it catches me a fish…. Great. If some of you out there who have more experience than I do tell me it's a bad idea, I won't do it. But a new approach to musky fishing sounds intriguing.
Set the hook immediately no matter what. A swimming fish can still be swallowing a sucker… I can't believe MHM would publish an article that talks about the old school technique of waiting for the fish to stop.
If this is only about trying a new technique try jigs, vertical jigs or learn how to troll for deep fall fish. If you are going to be taking some kids out or someone that isn't able to cast for a few hours then dragging meat might be a good bet.
There was a guy on another forum saying that he uses single hook rigs and waits TEN MINUTES before setting the hook! I couldn't believe what I was reading, needless to say there was quite the backlash to this guy but he insisted that his way had the same mortality as any other. I thought they were called Quick Strike rigs for a reason?
Well Jim,… Here is my experience.
When I first got onto muskie fishing,and not knowing very much,we
would bring suckers 75% of the time. Nothing huge,just 6-9 inchers that
we bought from Geletts on Gun lake. Thornapple was our lake,and single
hook was our method. When a bobber went down, we would count to 10
real up the slack until we felt the weight of the fish and then BANG set
the hook. No rhyme or reason, thats just what we did. We caught lots
of pike and a few muskie without any problems what so ever. Most of
the time they were hooked right in the corner of the mouth. And then
one day it happened,…… gut shot. The bobber never went down,it just
kept moving slowly sideways. Finally I said: "that sucker cant be doing that" and reeled up the slack "just to check". Well, I felt some weight and
I set the hook. I ended up with a 36"(If I remember) muskie. It had
swollowed the hook and I was forced to cut the leader. I felt sick. Literally
sick to my stomach. I thought to myself,…what if that was a big fish and
I was the one to have ended her. Not cool!!
Since then(years ago) I have only used live bait a couple times, mostly so my daughters can fish. I havent had any luck, but if I do get a strike
Ill set the hook ASAP. Then you got to add in the extra cost and pain in the butt for finding good suckers.
Once in a great while Ill use live bait, Its just not at the top of my list
anymore, and although we ALL KILL FISH, some means are not really the fisherpersons fault. When useing live bait, my opinion is: the responsibility will be mostly on your shoulders. Are YOU going to
be O.K. with a possible worst case scenario? I know its just a fish,
and lately Ive been hating these filthy animals, but… they are the
reason we are all here.
Take this long asz reply for what its worth. Peace -kid
"Will Schultz" said:
I can't believe MHM would publish an article that talks about the old school technique of waiting for the fish to stop.
The artice written (Dead Zone, Oct/Nov 08) by Dave Dorazio in MHM doesn't really go there.
The article states, "There's no time for a coin flip after a musky has grabbed a sucker. The lucky angler grabs the livebait rod and begins to retrieve line until he feels the weight of the musky. Don't worry about the musky dropping the sucker- you can put quite a bit of pressure on the musky.
f the musky has hit on the sucker and moved a distance from the boat, you have to move closer to it. Don't be afraid to get right over the musky. As you near the fish, if it's heading away from you, it's time to set the hook. Reel down until the line is tight and then try to break the fod. If the musky doesn't seem to want to move, put more pressure on it. Eventually, the musky will try to swim off with its meal. When the muskie is moving away from you, it' hammer time!"
I don't fish livebait for muskies much. I've only tried it a couple times in Indiana… with NO LUCK. Of course I didn't catch a fish the other ways either those days.
That article from MHM is a bad article if it advocates letting a muskie swim with the bait until it stops. Remember this, so called quick strike rigs are just treble hooks on a wire leader. A single J hook Rig is just a single J hook on a wire leader. What you do with it is what counts. Wisconsin guys have demonized a Hook and it is stupid. I know guys who have been feeding treble hooks to Pike for as long as I can remember and those rigs are what are being called quick strike rigs today. Tip up fishing I have watched guys smoke an entire cigarette waiting to set the hook. Then they get a sub legal Pike and have to cut the wire to stick it back down the hole. Treble or single or multiples of either can be used as either quick strike or swallow rigs its that simple.
I am sure you can see my Irratation over this issue. I have fought with Wisconsin fishermen on the boards for years over this issue of which rig kills and which one doesnt. The truth is they both Kill and they both can be used safely.
Here is how Michelle and I use Live bait. We hook up a perch,Blue Gill or 8 to 12 inch sucker by removing the dorsal fin and replacing it with a 3/0 treble hook on a 60 lb wire leader. We hang the bait over the side of the boat so we can see the take. Its a riot watching a Musky chase a fish around in circles or just pound it right in front of you. As soon as the Fish takes the bait and heads away from us its clobberin time. Muskies always hit a baitfish with a coiled attack which ends up turning them around and they dive with thier prey dogboned in thier chops. Thats when we hit them Immediatly . The treble hook ends up in the top jaw or corner. Like Kid coulson says ,you have to be carefull when using live bait. Turn your head and its gone, swallowed and you have a dead Musky or pike.
Quick strike rigs(so called) were not developed to protect the fish. They were developed to insure the fish was hooked while quick setting which is why most of these rigs have multiple hooks. My bitch with the people who want to ban single hooks is this, Then you get idiots letting muskies swallow multiple hook rigs which is even worse. The bottom line is this, Its not the hook type or rig but the guy using it.
I got one for you all, Try using no hooks at all. Just tie a cotton string to the sucker and hope the Musky doesnt let go of it ha ha ha . Many times you can finesse one into the net that is not even hooked. I have read stories of walleye fisherman and perch fisherman who have done this when a Musky ate his little fish. That picture of the mamoth Pike that ate the smaller pike that was circulated last year. Great example.
Live bait fishing is fun but like any other sport there are things you need to do correctly. I used to kill a lot of little Brookies that swallowed #8 aberdeens while worm fishing. They never survived the removal or leaving the hooks in them. I had to learn that setting the hook as soon as I felt them was the ethical way to fish with live bait. I may lose some of them now but so what? They all live to bite again and the ones that are too small grow to end up in my frying pan some day. My creeks have more trout in them then ever before due to this method of quick setting of the hook. Its a no brainer.
Some guys ask me why I defend the single J hook when I dont even use them. Its simple , they are a tool and used properly can be the safest hook to use because they have only one point of entry into the fishes mouth. Barbless they are the safest hook out there. Trebles on the other hand can pin the fishes mouth shut, and multiple trebles can hook a fish in the eyes or gills from the outside while the other is in its mouth. Trebles just plain do more damage.
My dentist used a single hook tarpon fly on his first Musky. The hook was barbless and when I unhooked it I was amazed at how easy it came out and how fast we were able to get her released unmarked.
Michigan tip up fishermen have been feeding Wisconsin quick strike rigs to Michigan Pike for 100 years. They are just a treble hook on a wire leader. You let them swallow one and its dead. They swallow a single hook and its dead. They swallow a Jackpot? a crane bait? A small bulldawg? and its dead.
Dont feel bad Kid, it happens. You were not trying to kill that fish and we can not always be perfect and on the ball. I killed hundreds of little Brookies before I learned the ethical way to fish any live bait be it spikes and waxies for Gills or Suckers and Shiners for Pike and Musky. We should always try our best to hook these fish in the mouths and get them back safely . Go barbless if you can, remove that belly hook on your three hook crankbait but most of all we need to teach the kids that its not as important to land every fish as it is to preserve the species by not killing sub legals and fish that we intended to release all along.. We need to teach them that the blame should not be put on a tool but on the man or woman who used it. Education ,education,education. We should never stop learning.
So Jim, Try a perch over the side with a single 3/0 treble where the dorsal fin used to be. Set the hook as soon as the Musky takes it. If you hook it great !!! if you miss it oh well try again. The Musky will thank you for the free perch ha ha ha . Mike
😀 Jim this issue blows up on every board in the Musky world starting about this time of year. I am sure you are a pretty smart guy and very ethical. Common sense will guide you. When I have a musky take the sucker at boatside 9 times out of ten he spins around and takes off with his prey. Thats when I hit him. If I can see the fish and he is just sitting there with it in his chops I might wait until he turns away from me to hit him. With a Bobber its different. It goes down and you have to be on it because not being able to see what that fish is doing can get you a swallowed hook. I am sure you will find a good method that works for you. I think the biggest problem I have is getting the hook to release from the sucker on hookset. That is why say try to break the rod. I tyry to just get a little sucker skin with one barb of the treble hook. Sometimes my suckers just swim right off the hook ha ha ha . With the VHS problem it would be a good Idea to try using local perch and or Blue Gills,Crappies and rock bass. Any way good luck, Mike
"Kingfisher" said:
😀 I am sure you are a pretty smart guy and very ethical. Common sense will guide you.
I don't know about the smart part… [smilie=bangtard.gif] 😀 but I try to be ethical. That's why I said that if this is a bad idea (especially for a new guy) I'm not going to do it. But thanks for the kind words, Mike!
The study they did in WI. was on circle hooks. The Minnow Bucket by me won't sell sucker anymore, cause it's too much trouble. They have to give you a receipt with the batch number on it. So we just get the biggest minnows they have. When I fish sucker, the bait clicker goes off one to three clicks, they usually slide under the boat and I hit them right away, usually getting the treble hook in the corner of there mouth. Steve
"Kingfisher" said:
Treble or single or multiples of either can be used as either quick strike or swallow rigs its that simple.
Actually Mike, the quick strike rig with a tiny hook or rubber band holding the nose of the sucker is a safer method. A single hook of any type in the sucker is asking for trouble because as the fish turns the sucker to swallow it the point of the hook will be toward the angler allowing the sucker to slide right down the throat of a fish. With a quick strike rig the hook point is always toward the head of the sucker and if the fish tries to swalow it the hook points are going to hang up in the back of the fish's mouth. Sure there's lots of damage that can be done in the back of their mouth but it's nothing compared to a gut hooked fish with a single hook.
I use Pete Maina's lift-off rigs exclusively and have never hooked a fish in the throat. I do 'wait' for the proper hook-set angle (muskie head going away from hook-set direction) to the set the hook. I would say about a third of the fish run with the sucker right away and you can set the hook immediately. A better percentage of the fish will not run. I first, try to spook them with my trolling motor. If that doesn't work, I will apply pressure on the rod to get them to run. If this doesn't work, I will take the best hook-set angle possible and hope for the best. Time-wise, I rarely will take more than a minute to accomplish this and it is normal less than 30 seconds. When I'm using really big suckers (18 inches or bigger) I am a little more patient about getting the better hook-set angle and the fish are less apt to just inhale a huge sucker.
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