04-13-2014, 03:50 AM
So, I'm fishing the Spanish Fork river by the baseball parks, since it's close and when you only have an hour to fish, a 45 minute drive is out of the question. I was fishing one of the pools and something flashed at my gulp minnow and bites off the back half of it. ![[Image: confused.gif]](http://www.bigfishtackle.com/images/gforum/confused.gif)
I put on a new minnow and cast to the same spot and reel/jig it back. Same thing happens. It bites off a little less of this one, but it still bites right through it. I figure it's one of the larger browns because their teeth can be pretty nasty and gulp minnows aren't known for their durability.
Rig up another one and cast it out. This time I give it slack as soon as I see the flash and just let it sit for a couple of seconds. When I set the hook, I could tell there was something on, but it wasn't big. I reeled it in and I get it out of the water just long enough to see the culprit... A 10"-ish northern pike. [shocked] It completely swallowed the minnow, jighead and all. It cut the line when it thrashed as I lifted it out of the water.
I got a very good look at it and it definitely wasn't a trout, walleye, or anything else like that. I've seen white bass this far upstream, but that's usually later in the year. I've seen carp as high as just shy of canyon view park. I've seen one other pike caught out of a utah-lake feeding river, but that was only about 100 feet from the lake.
Here's the big question. I've never caught a pike before. Does this count towards my bucket list even thought I didn't land it? [
]
Matt
[signature]
I put on a new minnow and cast to the same spot and reel/jig it back. Same thing happens. It bites off a little less of this one, but it still bites right through it. I figure it's one of the larger browns because their teeth can be pretty nasty and gulp minnows aren't known for their durability.
Rig up another one and cast it out. This time I give it slack as soon as I see the flash and just let it sit for a couple of seconds. When I set the hook, I could tell there was something on, but it wasn't big. I reeled it in and I get it out of the water just long enough to see the culprit... A 10"-ish northern pike. [shocked] It completely swallowed the minnow, jighead and all. It cut the line when it thrashed as I lifted it out of the water.
I got a very good look at it and it definitely wasn't a trout, walleye, or anything else like that. I've seen white bass this far upstream, but that's usually later in the year. I've seen carp as high as just shy of canyon view park. I've seen one other pike caught out of a utah-lake feeding river, but that was only about 100 feet from the lake.
Here's the big question. I've never caught a pike before. Does this count towards my bucket list even thought I didn't land it? [
]Matt
[signature]