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Silver Lake Report
Spokane County, WA

Details

10/01/2007
Trolling
Tiger Muskie
None
Chartreuse
Spoons
Noon
10/01/2007
5
301

First I want to say it has been a GREAT 2007 on this lake! I've caught 11 Tiger Muskie since July including a 39 and 41 inch. Also a fish that was only about 11 inches that leads me to believe the slim possibility of tigers reproducing naturally exists at Silver. What an exiting year, so many stories, but today one of the strangest things I have ever seen on the water happened. My buddy and I anchored near the "church" very windy and cold today so wanted to stay stationary as possible. About 20-30 yards away I saw something break the water and assumed it was a Muskrat. A few minutes later this "thing" was swimming about 15 yards in front of and across the boat. My friend has better vision and spotted that it was a tiger muskie. Head completely out of the water, mouth wide open and eyes seemed to be bulging. It must have swam about 20 ft. like this, then sunk under. We couldn't believe it! A few minutes later it did this again and my buddy trolled to it, I wanted to net it and see if something was wrong with it and we could help it and release it. Maybe it was chocking on something it shouldn't swallow or dying or sick some way. But when we got a foot from it right next to the boat it swam under. What was going on with the muskie??? Looked BIG!, 40 inches if not really close to it. Has anybody ever seen or heard of anything like this before? Is this something natural? Like I said my only guess could be that it was chocking. But, besides this NO hits, NO follows. Anybody know good tactics to catch them when the weather turns like this?


Comments

Mike Carey
10/1/2007 8:19:00 PM
Check the Muskie Forum - there was an earlier post about this type of muskie behavior. Must have been a really COOL thing to see!
Nik
10/1/2007 10:21:00 PM
I've seen muskie do that at Silver before too, it's a natural thing they do, not sure why they do it though. As far as muskie reproducing, as you know they are a sterile fish, so the chances of 2 muskies of a different sex somehow becoming un-sterile is a million to 1. Add to that that Silver does not possess the surface area or volume of water that muskies need to reproduce naturally, and you're odds shrink to 100 million to 1. There is simply no way they are reproducing. WDFW must have released some back stock they had this year, that's the only explanation.
muskie guy
10/1/2007 11:25:00 PM
Anthony- Sounds like you had a good year, nice job. When the weather is cooling down like it is I always fish deep water adjacent to the structure muskies were using in summer. Deeper than 15 feet always seems to produce fish. But you need to use lures that get down and stay down. I also slow back down like in spring. I posted a video on you tube called "head-up tiger" you should check it out. It will probably look similar.
I caught a 39 - 40" female tiger this year that had eggs in her. It was cool and the first time I had seen it since I started chasing muskies in 98. But they were not viable eggs, just teeny little orange colored dots. Randy Osbourne, the WDFW bio guy over here said they had electro shocked a few fish with eggs before too and he said both sexes can produce the needed items, but not in a viable state. I wish the plan to stock some true muskellunge, to produce our own egg supply for our tiger program, wouldn't have fallen victim to misinformation.
phil cogley
10/2/2007 10:31:00 AM
phil cogley
10/2/2007 10:43:00 AM
Just like muskie guy said fish deeper, slower and use BIG lures. I know Chris Donnley with wdfw he said they are still planting tigers, so the small one you caught was a plant from this year. I have caught 4 or 5 this year that were in the 10-12" range I had some that could not even take my lures, but they sure gave it a try. I have also seen the tigers doing this on silver and Hauser, i dont know why they do this, but ive never been able to catch one, so I assume they are not in a feeding mood. I too had a good year my largest being 41" as well, with a lot in the 37-40" range. I had heard of one fish caught that was 47", but Chris Donnley said 41-42" should be the max in the lake. This was mid summer when I talked to him so maybe the fish have put on an inch since then. FEAR NO FISH!
PhilSoucy
10/2/2007 2:46:00 PM
I remember a posting of that kind of Musky behavior at Silver Lake earlier this year. I'm in here every week and always check Silver, Newman, Long, Liberty and others.

Papa Tango Sierra
OneEyedTrout
10/2/2007 11:08:00 PM
Dang it MuskieGuy!! You made that posting from work! That's it, I'm logging onto the camera system and watching you all night now! Anyway, I believe the funky muskie dance has something to do with their air bladders and adjusting to thermal/barometric changes in the water.
phil cogley
10/3/2007 10:13:00 AM
Has anyone caught any walleye out of Silver? I was out there in the spring and was sure I saw one swiming on a rock flat. Later this summer while fishing I noticed some nets by the bible camp. A while later the wdfw boat came over to pull up the gill nets. The pulled up the biggest brown ive ever seen, one tinch a ton of perch and two big walleye. The guys said they only pull up big ones so they dont think the eyes are reproducing, but they thought there was a fair amount of them in the lake. I kept meaning to fish for them, but I didn't want to waste fishing time for them when there are muskies to be had. PS when you lose a big fish by the bible camp watch the cussing, they dont take kindly to it and I dont mean the fish. FEAR NO FISH!
muskie guy
10/3/2007 11:57:00 AM
Phil- I caught several walleye 2 years ago while night fishing for muskie. I called Randy Osbourne, told him about it and he went "huh?" I haven't bothered fishing for them since, wonder if you get to keep all you catch since they aren't supposed to be there. And a guy pulled that big fish out of the weeds in front of Rubies, it was a good 45" fish, unfortunately I got to checked it out while it was hanging from a tree. I lost one as big on the East side my last trip out, I thought it flew down from Curlew it was so big. Most likely only a few that big in the lake this year but there sure are a bunch of fish getting into the 40" range now huh? A couple years ago we were happy to catch a mid 30" fish, lakes getting better every year. I wonder how the egg shortage and people not releasing them will effect the next few years. I've asked 6 different people, very nicely, to release their prized muskie because it was too small. It's hard to convince them a 30 - 34" fish is "too small". I wonder how many have been pulled out. OneEye!! Ain't you supposed to be payin' attention to the ole' lady at night? Can't sneak nuthin' by.
phil cogley
10/3/2007 1:16:00 PM
musky guy, how did that night fishing for the tigers go, ive never tried it because I havent heard anyone catching them at night. I know Musky's will hit at night and pike dont, so I wonder if only half the tigers in the lake will hit at night. Ha Ha. If the game dept would just put Pike in the lake we wouldnt have to worry about the toothy fish running out. Then we could fish for them on hard water as well. Im still going to try and get out one last time I told my wife I have to run the Stabil through the tank before winter. I assume you fish mostly on the North side, because it sounds like you rent a boat from the resort. I mostly fish the other end. If you see a 18" Tracker tournyament V red and black thats me.
Captain Jim
10/5/2007 11:28:00 AM
A co-worker of mine saw a muskie doing the same thing out at Newman Lake. My guess is, they are scanning the surface for ducks, and going back under to the area they spotted them and eating them.

Captain
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Available Guide

Available Fishing Guide:
Website: Austin's Northwest Adventures

Phone: (509) 668-0298