Musky 101

Meet West Virginia's Barracuda! May 4, 2011 Reporter: Patrick McMurtry Videographer: Brad Rice

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EYEWITNESS ONLINE WEBCAST VIDEO

Spring is here and that means the musky are as active as they'll be all year. We are out on North Bend Lake looking for some of these massive fish. It's part of an ongoing study that's giving the West Virginia Division of Natural Resources a lot of good information.

Scott Morrison, a biologist with the division, explains how the study works. "We just picked up another large male in this area. We haven't picked him up before in the years we've been doing this study. We put two tags in, a tag we put in the muscle and we can read it with a reader."

That lets the DNR figure out where this fish is at different times of the year. That's great information for anyone trying to catch these elusive musky. Did I mention, massive?

"Females can get over 50 inches long, males, the biggest I've seen are like 42 to 44 inches. On Middle Island Creek, we estimated one fish we tagged when it was three years old and about 15 years later we got it again, so we estimated that fish to be 18 years old." says Morrison.

These fish are not only big and long lived, they're also travelers. In fact, Scott says some of these fish will really cruise in their lifetimes.

"In the study we're doing now, we found fish use the entire 7 miles and 300 acres of this body of water. In Middle Island Creek, and the Elk River, we've taken them 60 miles from where they were originally taken, so they move quite a bit." says Morrison.

You want to talk move...try getting one on your lure..you'll see how fast they move, and how strong these beautiful musky are!

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