MURPHY’S LAW

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When it comes to muskie fishing there is one law known to all muskie anglers....."If it can go wrong it will go wrong!" The failure to address the smallest of details could result in the loss of a fish. Perhaps that fish is one that you had been in pursuit of for years, the fish of a lifetime. Professional fishing guides are not immune to Murphy's Law. Let me share some of my personal experiences with you.

One of the first times that Murphy's Law caught up with me was on Lake of the Woods in Canada. I was fishing with my friend, the late Duke Verkuilen. Duke and I had many memorable fishing trips together and over the years we developed the type of friendship that can only come from spending lots of time chasing muskies together. When Duke passed away several years ago I lost a true friend and so did the sport of muskie fishing. Duke was a man who placed great faith in the peak fishing times and lunar phases. This was one of those rare occasions when all of the factors came together at the same time. It was a new moon phase. We had a major feeding period. As an added bonus a storm front was moving in. We were fishing a reef structure that we knew was a feeding structure for a very large fish. Some friends had seen the fish and estimated its length to be in excess of 55 inches! We fished the area for 45 minutes with no action. Evidently the fish was not hungry or was not home. As we were leaving the area I made one last cast with a Giant Jackpot lure. I gave the rod two pulls and the lake surface exploded! Half of the giant fish's body was out of the water, its head thrashing wildly from side to side. My arms were stretched out and the rod was about to be ripped from my hands! In that moment of panic I realized that the reel was locked up and was not giving any line. There was so much pressure on the reel that my frantic efforts to disengage the reel were to no avail and the line snapped with a sound like a rifle shot!

This fish was without a doubt my "fish of a lifetime. Because I was unable to respond to and correct a "tackle malfunction" (one that I had experienced previously and chose to ignore) I lost a great fish. In the past the reel had "frozen up" while playing smaller fish and I had no difficulty landing the fish. Had I repaired or replaced the reel this story might have been about landing a record fish.

On another occasion I was fishing with well- known Eagle River muskie guide Harvey Brown. Harvey was known for the large muskies he produced. Harvey took me to one of those lakes that was known to have large muskies in it. Harvey was throwing his favorite lure, a black Suick and I was throwing a break-away Mud Puppy. We were fishing a sand bar with cabbage weeds that continued out from a submerged point that eventually dropped off into 35 feet of water. We had several follows that dropped away as they got close to the boat. We were about to call it a day when a very large fish followed Harvey's Suick to the boat and created a large swirl as it missed the lure and headed back down to the weed bed. I tossed my Mud Puppy to the same general area that the muskie headed. I had only made a couple of turns on the reel handle when a large wake appeared behind my lure and followed it all the way back to the boat. As I went into my figure eight the fish inhaled the Mud Puppy! I set the hook hard and the body of the Mud Puppy came flying off just as it is designed to do. Line peeled off of my reel as the heavy fish headed for deep water. After a short but powerful run I was able to bring the fish to the side of the boat. "She's 35 pounds", Harvey said as we got our firs good look at the fish. The fish made another desperate run and I turned it and had it heading toward the net when it slowly sank out of sight and was gone. No thrashing head. No tail walking. It simply swam away. The seven-strand leader that I was using had broken where the snap is attached with a crimped sleeve. Since that time I use only piano wire leaders with a haywire twist.

These were two occasions where terminal tackle failures caused me to lose large fish but what if it was more than just losing a large fish? What if these failures had happened during a tournament where a lot of money was at stake? Last year during Paul's ProAm tournament in Eagle River a good friend of mine who is also an excellent muskie angler lost a mid 40 inch fish because his line broke. After the tournament he was telling me about it and he said what really puzzled him was the fact that the line did not break at the knot which is the usual site of a line failure. Instead, his line had broken 10-12 feet up from the knot. He'd cut off the line and tied a new knot prior to fishing the tournament. That sort of killed any frayed line theory. The only possible cause for the line breaking appeared to be the fact that it was his habit to hook his lure to the bottom line guide on the rod when he switched rods. He felt that the sharp hook had possibly nicked the line and caused it to break.

If I had to pick the number one reason that big fish are lost or more correctly not hooked, would be dull hooks. I know a lot of muskie people who will disagree with me when I say that you don't set the hooks on big muskies...they hook themselves. Muskies have tremendous jaw strength and razor sharp teeth. When a muskie clamps down on a lure and you set the hook all you are doing is moving the fish. Either the hooks are already set or by Cody keeping pressure on the line the fish is hooked in the split second when it opens it's mouth to throw the lure. In either case the hooks must be sharp. The best hook sharpener I have found is the type that has two round chainsaw files fastened together. With this type of sharpener the hooks should be sharpened to a cutting edge, not to a needle point.

Another piece of equipment that should be carefully inspected before each outing is the landing net. Check the netting to be certain that there are no broken strands. A very small opening in the netting can allow a very large fish to escape. Also check the rim of the net and the yoke for any breaks or fractures in the metal or composite material.

I have only covered a few of the things that can go wrong when muskie fishing. There are many of Murphy's Laws that pertain to fishing but the only one that I have no solution to is "You should have been here yesterday" Good Luck and Have Fun.

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