Friggin Prigan took The Thumb and I up to the Pend Orielle river for the insanely hot pike fishery they have this time of year. He was talking about the "cant keep them off the hook" problem with the medium sized pike in the sloughs. Having experienced a crazy bite the week before, we were convinced and headed out at 0500.

Arrived to find a beautiful sunny morning, great water, and a river level that dropped 5 full feet. &(*#%.

First fish was 3 hrs of casting in, hooked up with the big largie on a buzzbait worked right on the surface making a wake. Another hour later, The Thumb managed to pick off a smallie on the outside rock band of one of the slough entrances. Lastly, around hour 6 of fishing, I lucked into a stray pike. A little bugger at 3 lbs, he put up a fight a trout would be proud of, making repeated runs and thrashing around like a champ.

Im definitely headed back, but we worked HARD for this bite. Make sure water conditions are stable before heading that direction.

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