Advice needed- new musky angler

I have decided to try musky fishing. I have a decent amount of experience fishing walleye, panfish, and bass. I’m just trying to learn as much as I can about muskies. I plan to mainly target northern Wisconsin lakes. Any tips as far as types of structure to look for, best times of the year, and when to throw what types of baits? So far I have been focusing on weed edges and throwing a buck tail, sometimes a prop bait in the evening. I understand it’ll likely take many trips before I boat a fish. I’m just trying to better my chances. Thank you

I would say your tactic this time of year is good. The water is pretty warm and you need to use speed with your retrieve to get a reactive strike. Try to target periods of higher activity. Sunrise, sunset, cloudy days, and at night time. A rapid weather change often creates a feeding window.

Don’t be afraid to down size your presentation. You don’t have to throw giant buck tails and pounder bulldawgs all the time. Patience is a virtue, it might take a while before you boat one.

Weededges are pretty good. Look for points, inside turns, midlake humps. Open water can be good but I havnt really tried it a lot. You will find them just takes time.

Do you have all the proper fish handling gear like a proper net, bolt cutters, etc? Id start there first if you arent.
Tactics wise I think you are on the right track already. They arent much different than other fish they relate to weed edges, structure, rocks, points, etc.
As the water temps start dropping dont be afraid to burn bucktails threw the middle of reed beds. If the lakes you fish have cisco, those spawn in the Fall and you can get on a hot bite for muskies when that is going on, but that will be real close to ice up.

CaptainMusky wrote:

If the lakes you fish have cisco, those spawn in the Fall and you can get on a hot bite for muskies when that is going on, but that will be real close to ice up.

Usually occurs the first week of November around here. A big white bulldawg or medussa is a good lure choice. I am usually done muskie fishing by then because deer firearms season is open.

One difference between Muskies and other fish is they don’t relate as closely to structure and weed lines. 30 yards is nothing but two flaps of their tail. I had decent success over the years by closely fishing edges, and then every fourth or fifth cast turn around and heave it out into the middle of the lake. There are active fish that never come up shallow.

SR

If you get a chance to fish with very large sucker minnows around mid October through mid November it is my favorite way to fish them. Just try to follow the weed lines around the lake. It is challenging to find a bait shop that will have good minnows. And they are spendy but what a gas to watch a muskie chase down the minnow as it swims next to the boat. In WI, you can drag your minnow(s) under/behind the boat and cast a bait at the same time.

I spend most of my fishing time targeting muskies in western MN. When I started out, I read some old articles by a man named Mark Windells. He is known as an expert angler and baitmaker and sells the popular “Harasser” series of bucktails, and other baits. He wrote about fishing fast with small bucktails in and around weed cover, looking for active fish. Mark was guiding and fishing before many of the big advances in baits and equipment we see today, but I think his advice is still very sound. I am not just looking for a fish, I am looking for an active fish that wants to bite. If you keep fishing weeds with a fast-moving bait like a bucktail, you will get bit. As noted, be sure to have a proper net, serious hook cutter and long pliers. I have had the same purple and gold harasser tied on since July 2 and have landed 6 fish on it, probably will have it on until after turnover. Good luck on boating your first fish!

bzzsaw wrote:

If you get a chance to fish with very large sucker minnows around mid October through mid November it is my favorite way to fish them. Just try to follow the weed lines around the lake. It is challenging to find a bait shop that will have good minnows. And they are spendy but what a gas to watch a <strong class=”ido-tag-strong”>muskie chase down the minnow as it swims next to the boat. In WI, you can drag your minnow(s) under/behind the boat and cast a bait at the same time.

Has to be the most boring way I’ve ever fished. 15 bucks for ONE minnow. Throw that thing out with a bobber the size of a softball and wait. Then wait some more. Then drink a beer. Then wait longer. I finally got so sick of it I just went home after the 6 pack of beer ran out. And wasted 45 bucks on three big sucker minnows. Never again.

Dissect all of the structure on the lake, learn it without needing to look at your graph, depending on the time of year fish it in the best manner/highest percentage presentation, every trip if you find a hot fish (WPT it) go back and visit him/her about every hour on the hour, be sure to hit the same spot you laid a WPT on at least 1-3 times every future trip, develop a line of of WPTs, finally every time you go fish, fish only the spots you developed that had fish on most of the time (keep a log if you can’t remember) and go N/E/W/S from there to see what else is there that you may have missed, take a shot in the dark on secondary stuff if you see nothing on any given trip of your known spots, last resort. Wash, rinse, repeat. Baits are made to catch fisherman, not fish. Bucktail (shallow (most of the time)), rubber (always), cranks… (depends), top water is nothing but heartbreak, don’t waste an active fish on a top water, EXCEPT when the water cools in September and the fish come in to the shallows.

Four posts, wooooohoooooo!

Fish of 10 THOUSAND CASTS ! Maybe more ? Burnt myself out of Musky fishing throwing oversize baits . Good luck to you !