Lake Minnetonka is only 20 miles southwest of Minneapolis, Minnesota. Not surprisingly, the well-known 14,500-acre lake gets plenty of boat traffic and lots of summer fishing pressure from Midwest anglers.
On June 22, Greta Weix and her friend Christie Inman were after muskies on Minnetonka with noted guide Tanner Talbot. Greta’s goal was to catch a big musky, and she hooked the fish of a lifetime about midday. She cast a soft plastic lure with a St. Croix rod when the fish struck.
“Once the musky hit I knew I had a big fish,” Greta tells Wired2fish. “I could barely reel her in. I put all my strength into trying to turn the reel, but it felt like I was reeling in concrete. She jumped close to the boat, which was crazy to see.”
Weix said all she could think about was not falling into the lake when she battled the fish. She didn’t expect to hook a fish so large, and she was so excited she thought everyone on the water could hear her screams of joy.
Greta said the fish fight didn’t last too long, as they boated the musky quickly to weigh and measure it before releasing it unharmed. The musky measured 53.25 inches long, so big that Greta will have a replica mount made of the fish.
The anglers quickly captured a few photos of the giant musky and released it almost immediately. While a dedicated and experienced angler, Greta is new to musky fishing, having completed only a few trips.
“She was just the third musky I have ever caught,” says the Hennepin County agriculture worker.
While the anglers didn’t weigh Greta’s fish, a 53-inch musky is in the 50-pound class range, according to experts with Minnesota-based In-Fisherman. Their reference chart shows a 53-inch musky typically weighing between 48 and 55 pounds. Some anglers have reported 53-inch muskies weighing more than 50 pounds, with a 53-inch, 51-pound, 2-ounce musky caught in Wisconsin.
The pair of woman anglers were far from being done catching big fish that day on Minnetonka.
“We also caught a 35-inch pike, and a couple of 40-inch muskies,” says Greta. “My 53-inch fish was only the third musky I’ve ever landed, and is my biggest fish ever.”
