Rock Island Muskies

[Tubakka]

Been able to sneak a way for a couple days to hit my super secret spot, and the profits have been worth the gas. I was out solo Tuesday and got a fat 42" that weighed nearly 25 pounds with 2 other hookups, and then today I took out a good friend promising him his first musky. Shaw nuff, I delivered...he got a 40" and had another smaller fish follow up. Check out the pics at my website [because I didn't know how to post them on here anymore...]




Also, Keyes Outdoors, from Wisconsin, came down a couple weeks ago and filmed a musky show with Dwayne Hickey, a musky guide on Stone's Throw Adventures. While we didn't get any big fish, due to weather only allowing one day of taping, and the few fish over 40" hooked escaping capture, a total of 14 muskies were hooked and 6 boated within a days time on the Collins river, on a very remote inaccessible portion. If you want to fish there, ya gotta hire Dwayne, haha, but man it's worth it. Check out the two part episodes as they come available on their website , or on Fox Sports. We are beginning to develop quite a musky fishery, and some attention to it, around here. It will improve, but only if we push to get better regulations, and stocking in our waters, especially in the waters surrounding Rock Island. On that note, Dwayne hickey is helping to start a local musky club chapter at Rock Island. Interested people should contact me at [email protected]. We're an almost entirely catch and release club, save a state record of a truly trophy fish over 50", and yearly dues will be like $25, but alot of that will go towards privately funding stocking and other projects to make the musky fishery in out state that much better.

 

[trealtree]

Nice fish!

 

[Beekeeper]

Good Fish!

 

[Chris Tripp]

Hey man, we need to do a show together, pm me if interested.

 

[gil1]

Tubbs,
Since your website's inception, my computer locks up almost every time I go on it. Normally, I'd say my computer is screwed, but it only happens when I try to get to your site. I have to manually shut the computer down and restart. All I could see was your ugly mug, and the fish was under the screen. From now on, please put the fish over your face so I can see it and not you. :D only teasing

 

[easy45]

cool

 

[bob]

Nice job whoring out a once secluded and fragile resource but that's what you do isn't it? YOU DA man!... I guess next your going to tell us all that the musky pop can't be hurt either. Preach on brother.

Folks if you want to catch a musky just go round up some hog sucker and or stoneroller minnows and take them to the Collins, Rocky, Upper Caney fork and fish slack water or deep pools. If you can't catch one I'll be amazed. It's stupid easy. And remember they really are tasty grilled with some lemon and butter despite their ugly appearance. Ask Tubby he like em too.

 

[Chris Tripp]

Nice job whoring out a once secluded and fragile resource but that's what you do isn't it? YOU DA man!... I guess next your going to tell us all that the musky pop can't be hurt either. Preach on brother.

Folks if you want to catch a musky just go round up some hog sucker and or stoneroller minnows and take them to the Collins, Rocky, Upper Caney fork and fish slack water or deep pools. If you can't catch one I'll be amazed. It's stupid easy. And remember they really are tasty grilled with some lemon and butter despite their ugly appearance. Ask Tubby he like em too.

Talk about a pathetic post, why on Earth would you personally attack someone who is within their legal right to do something.

 

[trealtree]

Nice job whoring out a once secluded and fragile resource but that's what you do isn't it? YOU DA man!... I guess next your going to tell us all that the musky pop can't be hurt either. Preach on brother.

Folks if you want to catch a musky just go round up some hog sucker and or stoneroller minnows and take them to the Collins, Rocky, Upper Caney fork and fish slack water or deep pools. If you can't catch one I'll be amazed. It's stupid easy. And remember they really are tasty grilled with some lemon and butter despite their ugly appearance. Ask Tubby he like em too.

Talk about a pathetic post, why on Earth would you personally attack someone who is within their legal right to do something.

It's the only reason he came to this site. IMO

 

[stillinscrubs]

Tubs,

Did somebody link some serious malware to your website?

 

[Chris Tripp]

My computer has no problems running it, but I suspect flash may be dragging some systems down a little.

 

[Tubakka]

I get mixed reviews on the website. Lots of people don't have problems...I've checked into it, and can't find anything, but I'll keep looking. An update on your flash player should do the trick.
Bob...what the hell man. I didn't post any tactics, any specific spots, and even spoke greatly about releasing any muskies that aren't complete trophies...if someone keeps a 50" for the wall, I won't say anything, I probably will too once in my life...but you can go polish a door knob for all I care. And yeah...muskies are stupid easy to catch. Let's see your pics...

 

[Tubakka]

In direct response to your ridiculous post, attention, the right kind, is what is going to save this fishery. Poaching and lots of harvest goes on there already, and has for years, yet the fishery persists and produces giants, not just for TN, but anywhere where they swim...fish up to 54" for Dwayne, the guide on my site. I don't give away spots or specific tactics...but if this becomes a destination musky fishery, as I firmly believe it can in short order, THAT kind of attention, from the northern boys, will garner support from the state for higher regs and more close watch on the illicit taking of these great fish. Rock Island and surrounding waters no doubt should have a 50" limit, and I frankly think the upper collins should be catch and release only...its too fruitful and too easy to access, with too low of limits. Lots of guys can catch them on the river...the lake is a different story, which is where I've been fishing recently.

I guess the OTHER "fragile" fishery that I blew the whistle on is that "unknown" stocking ditch known as the Caney Fork? Man...I sure ruined that one...NO ONE in the Nashville metro area knew about that place!...

 

[num1medic]

:cool:

 

[bob]

So in one breath your telling me that right now the rivers have the potential to become a musky "destination" location. And in another breath your telling me it needs the added pressure to protect it??? The only thing it needs protection from is people who can't keep their lips from flappin. You'll look back someday and realize that you just may have had a very negative impact on a place that was very special. And I'm not talking about fish numbers alone. A good fishing place is more then numbers of fish. A good fishing place is a place where you can temporarily escape the hustle and bustle and crowds of people. So yes you can ruin a �destination� and still have fish in it and you picked a good river in the caney to use as an example of just that�.

 

[Tubakka]

I'm saying that right now, that section of the lake gets virtually NO stocking, NO attention from the state in regards to the massive poaching that takes place there, and no benefit from having a fish that can be a one-stroke economic boom to an area...I watched it happen on Kinkaid Lake back home. The truth is...musky fishing will never take off in this area like it has up north. It just won't...people don't get it. They like catching them every now and again, but to seriously devote time and energy into it, it just ain't going to happen in large numbers. But...they already DO go out in canoes and shoot muskies around the springs in the summer with rifles, and keep stringers of fish below the legal limit [seen it in person on the Collins]. The state kinda turns a blind eye to it because, frankly, those are the stakeholders...the people doing that. But...if you get out of state fisherman coming down here, spending their money, and looking for a trophy musky, like I have seen guys from Saskatchewan who spend 3 weeks at a time down here in the winter, spending at least a few thousand dollars during that time...well, then we have something to invest it, like Kentucky figured out two decades ago with th eir musky fishery. So yes...attention and pressure can help this fishery greatly. The beauty is...most of the "musky" fishing pressure won't come at any other time but the winter, when nobody else is out there anyway...the summertime why would they drive 10 hours this way when they can drive 10 hours to Georgian Bay, Niagara River, St. Clair or Lac Milles? They won't...the good kind of attention is the kind from out of state by conservation minded anglers...the neck-slitting rednecks who fillet them out regardless of size are the ones who already KNOW about it. It's no secret to them. Go to the Collins sometime on a weekend and see how many canoe rafts and jon boats you see floating down there, alot of them with sublegal fish strapped to the side.

...besides, there aren't too many people going to deal with the mess it is to get to these areas in THIS cold of weather anyhow. These aren't the best ramps and conditions...ice on the guides...and like I said, I didn't say exactly where I was catching them...just Rock Island. That's alot of area to fish.

God forbid our sport grow...

 

[jb3]

Nice musky. I lived in Grundy County for a while with my uncle and he always said the Collins had musky in them. I was just too lazy to try it out. I was always riding around to all the farm ponds trying to catch those lazy largemouth.

 

[shorefisherman]

that second pic down line looks like it swallowed a mallord whole.....that kinda makes me want to make floating duck lure using two large extra sharp diamond tipped trebble hooks as its feet :D ....can u imagine a musky hitting a decoy...the ultimate topwater bite.....thats what musky fishin is all about...their SAVAGENESS..
hey tubbs, i think that bob charactor maybe had a bad experience with u on the caney river........he prolly saw u dunkin a 26 inch brown in a cooler and got mad :D

 

[Tubakka]

Who the hell is Bob anyway? I mean, if you're going to be that bold and make is personal, at least identify yourself. Besides, I don't keep that many trout anymore. But the few that I will take home to the grill after the 24" limit is in effect, I won't feel an ounce of guilt for. The limit change was spurred on my an "alarming" amount of harvest on a put-grow-take fishery, yet you know as wel las I do shore, we were catching as many if not more quality trout than ever, and I heard that from other like minded trout anglers. Catch and release is a great concept, and should be practiced a good portion of the time ,but this absolutist thinking applied to a stocked trout water like the Caney is beyond moot. I sometimes wonder Shore, maybe our rantings and postings on here had a small part in getting those new regs on the Caney...

 

[Fordman]

Nice job whoring out a once secluded and fragile resource but that's what you do isn't it? YOU DA man!... I guess next your going to tell us all that the musky pop can't be hurt either. Preach on brother.

Folks if you want to catch a musky just go round up some hog sucker and or stoneroller minnows and take them to the Collins, Rocky, Upper Caney fork and fish slack water or deep pools. If you can't catch one I'll be amazed. It's stupid easy. And remember they really are tasty grilled with some lemon and butter despite their ugly appearance. Ask Tubby he like em too.

Ok I gotta input something here. There is nothing wrong with the information that tubs posted. First he gave no specifics as to lure and location at all. He is promoting a fisherie that he has a guide on. Nothing different than what Rsimms does yet you dont call him out! I will give you that tubs is, at times, overbearing. Yet he is young and learning more everyday about how not to decimate a fisherie. I remember years ago a young man on here named Crow. He was loub, obnoxious, knew everything about archery, and you couldnt tell him shat. We all watched him grow up and to be very candid tubs has grown in his short time here. If his guiding endeavor grows he will grow with it. The only thing I will say to tubs is this. You need to go to Fly South and look and the 22 + browns that are still eating small flies..... just sayn.

 

[Tubakka]

Fordman, thanks for the backing man. Yeah, I don't know what this guy's problem is...probably a guide himself just jealous he doesn't have an guide on that fishery...it's a dynamite waiting to go off, in a good way.

 

[mr.big]

I hired Dewanye a couple years ago for a day,,we had a blast,,but me and another guy was on the Rocky one day crappie fishing and a BIG musky took a keeper crappie off our line at the boat,,that was just a monster fish..

 

[Headhunter]

The great Tubs.

 

[B.D.]

Since your website's inception, my computer locks up almost every time I go on it. Normally, I'd say my computer is screwed, but it only happens when I try to get to your site.

If you can get to the forum section, there are 100,000 porn spam posts and two actual posts. I found that intriguing.

bd

 

[catman529]

Awesome! Did not know there were musky out at Rock Island... I have only ever been to the state park on camping trips but would like to fish the area.

 

[mr.big]

up in the Rocky,,we was crappie fishing with 6 pound line and 1/8th ounce jigs and bass assassins .April `08