Ivan

3 St Clair tigers: Sent from my iPhone using Lake Ontario United mobile app

Funny...last year at this time, I posted a pic of a nice 45.5" tiger we released from my boat last year at Lake St Clair. Somebody questioned the fact that it was a naturally produced fish vs a stocked fish at the time. Now there's this question about this one even being a tiger. I do understand the question though. There are guys that often confuse barred up pures for tigers. I've seen it quite a bit with Chautauqua fish. I am not one of those guys. First, I am going to keep this discussion and photos to LSC only because muskies can look different based on the body of water they came from. For example, a Great Lakes strain muskie can look different from the St Lawrence than a Great Lakes strain looks from LSC. All of the muskies in LSC are natural. There are no muskies stocked in the lake. They are indeed Great Lakes strain pures in LSC. Occasionally, pike and muskie spawning in LSC overlap and a pike cross breeds with a Great Lakes strain muskie to produce a tiger muskie. That's what has happened in these tigers I'm pointing out from LSC. You don't know me, and I don't know you, so I'm not sure what personal muskie experience you have or LSC muskie experience. Just a little background on me to lend credibility to what I'm saying...I know these fish pretty well. Not including all my other muskie fishing experience, I have fished LSC for a week every year for the last 15 years. Over that time we have released easily over 1000 LSC muskies from my boat. Over all that time, and all those fish, 2 of them have been tigers...a very small percentage. There do seem to be more nice tigers showing up every year though. We usually have 4 or 5 boats in our group and it seems somebody gets a nice tiger during our trip the last several years. I'll post pics of 3 nice LSC tigers and 3 nice LSC pures here in a minute. All the fish are from our last few trips to LSC. Two of the tigers were caught/released from friends' boats. The other fish were released from my boat. I think the photos should speak for themselves, and hopefully you can see the differences for yourself and help in future identification.

Seems weird to have two dead right next to each other like that. Sucks seeing floaters. Old man, the fishing regulations book is available online. I thought they did a nice job highlighting muskies, too. http://www.eregulations.com/newyork/fishing/pageflip/ Sent from my iPhone using Lake Ontario United mobile app

Yeah man. There's no question... that's a tiger. If you are serious, let me know, and I can explain the difference for you. Sent from my iPhone using Lake Ontario United mobile app

No. The fish was released without being weighed. However, from my experience, a thick/heavy 46 could be about 30lbs. I know I've released some pre-spawn pures between 45 and 47 inches that we weighed at over 30lbs.

I know how you guys like tigers. A friend got another good one when we were up at LSC a couple weeks ago. 46"er. Heres a pic. Solid fish. Sent from my iPhone using Lake Ontario United mobile app

Posting pictures is super easy if they are on your phone and you use the app. Sent from my iPhone using Lake Ontario United mobile app

Awesome! Beautiful, big fish. Congratulations! You earned it. Sent from my iPhone using Lake Ontario United mobile app

Nice tigers. What's the length on that biggest one just out of curiosity? How long ago was the length limit increased? Sent from my iPhone using Lake Ontario United mobile app

.

Great work Dan! That's a fantastic day jerkin lumber. Sent from my iPhone using Lake Ontario United mobile app

Not sure about those specs. Our dry weight (boat only) is approx 2200lbs. Verado is about 700lbs. Kicker 150lbs, plus a couple guys, gear, and 78 gallons of fuel puts you around 4000lbs. Specs may have changed some depending on what year it is. I know the new ones are bigger than our 07. I'd guess about 30mph or so.

That's a good night. Nice work and nice fish. Sent from my iPhone using Lake Ontario United mobile app

Here's a few pics of ours. I would also agree that a 140 sounds underpowered. Ours does a little over 50 with the 250. Sent from my iPhone using Lake Ontario United mobile app

We have a 2007 Lund Baron 2150 Grand Sport (that's the outboard model) with a 250 Mercury Verado and a Honda kicker. Bought it new in 07. We love it, and it's aging very well, especially for how much we use it. It has handled any water. Lake St Clair, Lake Erie, Lake Ontario, Georgian Bay, St Lawrence River and our smaller local lakes.

Thanks Gill. I didn't find that one when I searched before. Maybe it is the same type thing that's going on with the bass. It's certainly the closest explanation out there right now. I just wonder why the whole muskies is black in my two cases instead of just black blotches or spots like on the bass.

Thanks for the post Evan. That fish does have similarities to the one Ed's holding, just not black. Was that a spring fish? I assumed the wounds were from spawning.

I Googled that topic a bit yesterday. Found a couple different things. Small Black spots/specs that were like some parasite and other bigger black patches that nobody seemed to have a great answer for. Saw a few people saying it had something to do with protein and was a sign of a healthy population. I don't think either of those apply to what's going on with these muskies though.

FishinNY's dark tiger got me thinking about 2 very strange fish I've seen this year. My first muskie this year came from an OH lake in April. When the fish's back first broke the muddy water, I wasn't even sure what I had. It turned out to be a nice 46"er, however, its head and back were completely black. It had very dark olive green sides, black fins, and yellow eyes. Spring, muddy water, Ohio fish are always pale and bleached out looking. I've handled lots of muskies, but never even seen a pic of one that looks like this. Fast forward to June and my buddy Ed tells me his wife got a black muskie from Chautauqua. She wouldn't even touch it...called it the devil muskie. I couldn't believe it, but it was the same thing as the one I got. Both fish were released to be caught again. Both fish seemed healthy and normal except for their color. Has anyone ever seen any muskies like these two? It seems to be some type of skin pigment abnormality, like the opposite of an albino or something. It just seems so strange that I've never seen anything like it until this year, then two show up. I'd really be interested to know what caused this coloration in these two fish. Sent from my iPhone using Lake Ontario United mobile app

Cool looking tiger. Congrats. I'd guess the coloration is due the the water also. I've seen similar looking tiger pics from dark water WI lakes.

Just curious...not saying what you did was wrong. Why would you calibrate it to GPS speed? It's a paddle wheel. Paddle wheel and GPS speed are never the same. GPS speed typically reads slower than paddle wheel speed does. Am I right? I would think you would want your surface Fishawk paddle wheel to read speed over water, not speed over ground like your GPS. Found this somewhere online and it's explained better than I probably could have done myself. GPS provides speed-over-ground, which is not necessarily the same as speed-over-water. When you're on a non-flowing body-of-water, such as most lakes, the speed-over-water is approximately equal to the speed-over-land. However, if you ride on a flowing river, your speed-over-water will be different than your speed-over-land, as the water is moving relative to the ground beneath it. How much of an issue this is depends on how fast the water is flowing, and your sensitivity to it.

You should be fine. I'd be surprised if it mattered much where you put it. I mounted mine between my main and kicker motors and it works great. Sent from my iPhone using Lake Ontario United mobile app