My 56 1/2 inch fish should have never been landed but the Muskie God was smiling on me. I was fishing alone in my 14 footer with a 15 horse engine. I had a 20 inch ring Bass net. I was using an old 7 foot Ugly Stick and a Mitchell 300 with 10 pound Trilene XL. A #3 Sampo snap and swivel and a 1 ounce brass Red Eye Spoon. I was Pike fishing against a couple of friends of mine. 

     I had fished for a couple of hours then went in to eat at the camp gound on Brevoort Lake in Michigans Upper off US 2. Ate and got back in the boat and went about 100 feet or so and started to cast to the edge of a Reed Line that was in a couple of feet of cyrstal clear water. I saw these 2 fair sized what I thought were Pike cruising though the Reeds. Very Green fish so Pike was what I thought. They looked like about a 30 incher and the back one look to be about 3 feet.

     I tossed a #13 Rapala into the reeds in front of the larger one and twitched it back to the boat abour 6 or 7 times. No reaction from the fish so I decided to put on a Red Eye. Just as I finished changing the lures the smaller fish swam into an opening in the reeds so I tossed the spoon in front of it. The fish swam toward the bait and nipped at it and stopped. I came back on the rod and it just bent in half with no movement so I figured the spoon had sunk into the root of the reeds (Toughest weeds to pull lose) For a ferw seconds I figured I would have to go over there and pull my lure free from the reeds.

     I'm putting all the pressure on the line that I can amd all of a sudden the fish started to move and the line moved with it. I thought to myself God what a strong Pike as I had forgot that a fish in super clear water on sand is much bigger then it looks. It went about 20 feet and then turned toward the boat about 15 more feet and it swam into darker water and I started to yell out loud oh my God its over four feet long. My screaming brought everyonr from the camp gounds to the dock.

     There am with the biggest Muskie I had ever seen on ten pound and an open face reel. After a few minutes I picked up the net and knew it was way to small but it was all I had. I think it was 13 passes past the net when I decided it was time to try to land it. So as she swam near the boat I opened the bail on the 300 and sat it down in the back of the boat. i put the net flat against the boat and when she swam up I put her head into it and lifted. Of course the first thing to happen was the handle broke off. There she was a net around her Gills and me leaning over and grabing the edges of the net and lifting her into the boat sideways. I hurt myself in the groin area and had to have and operation on it.

     I got back to the dock and put her in the trunk of my brand new 1975 Cordoba we put a couple of bags of ice on her and I went looking for a certified scale. It took almost and hour to find one and when I opened the trunk to get the fish there was a few quarts of roe in among the ice cubes as she was just starting to spawn even though it was the 7th of June. She still weighed over 52 pounds without the eggs.
Now my biggest question of this fight was how the heck big was the other one as it was at least 6 inches longer.

I do not recommend anyone to go fish for big Muskie with 10 pound test on an open face outfit.