Muskie Fishing
Indiana biologists stocked lakes with muskie because of their suitable habitat and public access.Some of these waters haveinterconnected lakes, so lakes joining these stocked waters may also contain muskies.
Tiger muskies are found in a few of these same lakes. Areas that the DFW previously stocked with tiger muskies (a cross between a muskie and a northern pike) are now stocked only with muskies since recent studies show that they fare as well as the hybrids.
Fishing Techniques
Jim Bagnoli, active Hoosier Muskie Hunter member and muskie fishing guru, suggests using a six to seven foot medium-heavy rod with a bait casting reel holding 30 pound monofilament line or 36 pound dacron line. If you prefer spin-casting reels, he recommends a heavy-duty reel with 20 pound mono line. Because muskie have very sharp teeth, a 9 to 12 inch steel wire leader should be used ahead of the lure.
Effective lures include large bucktail spinners and oversize crankbaits, plugs and spoons. These can be cast or trolled behind a boat over weedbeds and structure. If you are casting, always run your lure in a figure-eight motion at the end of your retrieve. Muskie often follow a lure and the change in lure directions seems to trigger a strike.
Muskie start feeding in the spring when the water reaches 50 degrees. In the late spring and early summer, muskie will often linger in the shallows after spawning. As the summer progresses, the fish will often drop into deeper, cooler water and trolling large plugs becomes one of the more consistent ways to catch muskie. The fish prefer a water temperature between 60 and 70 degrees.
“I almost always find the fish over weeds or near structure,” said Bagnoli. “But at Brookville Lake, I found the fish suspended at 30 feet in 60 feet of water near the dam.”
As summer progresses into fall, muskie move into the shallows again. This is a prime time for using the lure that is almost synonymous with muskellunge fishing - the jerk bait. Special ‘pool cue’ type rods are needed to cast these huge lures. The jerk bait looks like a chunk of broom handle about 10 inches long. It has no built-in action and is designed to be jerked back to the boat in an erratic floating-diving motion.
These lures are retrieved at or near the surface, and when a muskie strikes this lure, the results are heart-stopping. Muskie can coil and strike a victim at over 30 miles per hour.
Muskie Lures
Anglers who target monster muskie in Indiana waters use enormous lures compared to most inland freshwater gear. Muskie lures up to 12 inches in length are designed to resemble medium-sized fish and even small ducks. Once a muskie takes a lure, the lure may not survive the scrape. The saw-toothed, strong-jawed muskie tends to destroy lures when it strikes.
Muskie Indentification
Anglers unfamiliar with muskie often confuse them with northern pike. To tell the difference, count the sensory pores on the bottom of each side of the lower jaw and then determine how much of the cheek area is covered by scales. Muskie have six or more sensory pores on each side and scales cover only the top half of both cheeks. Northern pike usually have five sensory pores and cheeks are fully scaled. Muskie have up to three distinct color patterns, including green to silver ‘clear’ sides, dark spots or dark vertical bars. Northern pike are typically green with light-colored small oval shaped markings.
Northern Pike are usually dark with light bean-shaped spots.
Muskie are usually light with dark spots or bars.
Muski Reulations
Muskie fishing regulations are designed to protect young muskie so they can grow to large sizes and give more anglers the chance of having their rod ripped from their hands by this massive saw-toothed fish. Indiana’s current 36-inch minimum length limit and one-fish-per-day bag limit prevents overharvest. Many muskie anglers practice catch and release, even with fish over three-feet-long.
