Last Minute Musky

By: Mark Walters

This would be the 26th year in a row that I have Second place wlnners in this year's Operation

been a part of what we call Operation Musky.

We Stay at a first rate, very friendly motel called alongsideTommyGilbertson who spearheads this the Hiawatha In Eagle River. Besides my good veryfunouting,

friends and now their children and grandchildren fromTruax, many of the guys from The Red Brush Gang and some of their friends have joined in for a weekend of laughter and musky fishing where In our very low key outing, each boat is a team and the competition is based on Inches offish caught.

To highlight the reality of my reality, I am considered a bit of a joke but a very fun one as I have never caught a measurable musky during Operation Musky and to be perfectly honest, do not care.

Saturday, August 23 High 64, low 47

Last night the majority of this group that are between the age of 13 and 76, simply had a blast together as we had a bit of a picnic at the Hiawatha and laughed a lot. Today, my partner Jeff Moll, who did 23 years atTruax, and I would be giving It our best shot. I told Jeff that the day before I had a vision that this was our year. Jeff and I would be In Jeff's Lund 'Alaskan', and we fish each day until the hours are over which today would be 8:00 p.m. I had not caught a fish in years. As in not even a bass or northern pike in this outing and was pleasantly surprised when I caught a 17-inch smallle early in the day on a blaze orange bucktall. After

■ft _______________ ... HH about 2 hours of casting and very little sleep the { night before we decided to try trolling, and I put on a red and white Creek Chub Pikie 3000. As is the

|/|0|| anc| | never st0p giving each Other verwere the annual week long retreat for people ,,, from all over the Midwest and hopefully that Dal abuse and had a blast.

never changes. Holy Moley was I ever surprised when my pole started bending and it was fish on. My musky was not large and since we never catch any, we did not know the exact rules on the size minimum. We measured it on a bump board and it was exactly 30-Inches, then released It. I sent the pic and numbers to Tommy Gilbertson who was my boss back in the day and was told that 30-inches was the size they have to be to count.

After that we fished for what would be a total of 12 hours casting and trolling and mostly just bullcrapping with each other. When we got back to the Hiawatha my fish was the only one registered and so at least for a night, I was king. In our northern pike side bet my bear hunting partner Doug Cibulka was leading with a 28-inch fish and Andrew Gilbertson was in 2nd with a 27.5.

I might add that this outing is even more fun because we have several groups of 3 generations and quite a few father and son teams. Also Gary Jensen, who is one of the old-timers has his son Brian and 13-year-old grandson Kenneth and young Kenneth was a big part of creating this year's trophies.

Sunday, August 24 High 62, low 43

The weather this weekend was chilly and I liked that. My buddy Moll made me stay up late again last night and I guess you could say that we have been doing that for well over 50 years. This morning, I was confident the big 30 would get beat and really had no cares. Fishing ends at 11:00 on Sunday and even though I was not aware of it, my stepson Joey Dushek landed a 33-inch musky at 10:30 drank them on the long ride back to the Hiawatha after I always enjoyed really sucking in this outing over the jeffMoiiand Mark Walters took 1st last 26 years, but It was really fun to win! place in this year's Operation Musky outing on the Eagle River Chain of

Sunset