Goldberg Tips - Halloween Madness - Monster Muskies

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Halloween only comes once a year so we decided to go all in for this issue. Enjoy!

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Musk-o’-lanterns

Tell us you’re a musky angler without telling us you’re a musky angler. If you’re trick-or-treatin’ with the kids and walk up on one of these jack-o’-lanterns, there’s a chance you may have discovered a new fishin’ buddy in the neighborhood.

You may want to stop by before it’s too dark to admire the detail of this cabbage dragon by Walleye Wisdom’s Gary Speicher. 

Check out the detail on this musky head lurking under the harvest moon by Adam Constantine. Those are some serious knife skills to get the shading like that!

This musk-o’-lantern was actually brought along on a musky trip for good luck! The spirits of muskies past were in the favor of Andy Bagwell’s crew.

Last, but certainly not least, is John Anderson’s lit up full detailed musky. This thing had some serious thought given to the design since it appears to be carved all the way through! #impressive

Now who’s going to make these into stencils so we may all enjoy these at our doorstep? 🎃

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Little Things = Big Rewards

If you’re a Musky Insider PRO  member, you know that October 14th-20th were “pink days” and that’s when the big fish magic often happens.

However, mother nature threw a turnover curveball at many of us in that time frame.

Well, Orlando Zecca was still able to hit one out the park when he bagged this 54.5” Lac Seul “pink day” tank while many of the other boats on the water were signin’ the turnover blues.

 

Orlando shared the juicy deets with us, and there were a few of them that really stood out.

1. The system was in full turnover mode.

2. The fish came from an area that featured a number of bottle necks with extended sand/rock points.

3. Normally, Orlando spreads his casts out quite a bit during this time of the season. But, since he recognized it was turnover, and the muskies were behaving out of the norm, he decided to saturate the area with casts.

Congrats to Orlando on putting all the pieces together to score this giant!

Do any of those deets sound familiar? If you’re an Insider PRO member, you may recall Matt Seifert talking specifically about saturating spots during a tough bite in his recent Q&A session with us.

And, in last week’s issue we also covered targeting bottlenecks and/or channels between basins during turnover. A tip plucked straight from our Late Fall Tactics class with Steve Herbeck.

During this week’s Insider PRO Q&A, we continued the turnover and late fall conversation with Kevin Goldberg and Josh Borovsky. Between the two of them they had fished waters in western MN, NW Ontario, Ohio, and the MN metro area over the past week. Josh shared some juicy tips on how to do identify which specific bottlenecks will be the most productive on any given day based on conditions.

Not all lakes have pinch downs or bottlenecks. Kevin shared some great insights on areas to target during turnover on lakes that don’t have that feature. Josh chimed in how he scored every day out west zigging when everyone else was zagging on lakes that also lacked bottlenecks.

Kevin is one of the most well traveled and experienced musky sticks on the planet. The whole session was loaded with gold nuggets. Here’s just one . . . 

Vertical Bars vs No Bars

Over the years, Kevin picked up on a little detail that can often matter more than you think. On many of his waters, he gets to troll with a six line spread. If he has a hot color, he will oftentimes stagger his baits in the same color but every other bait in the spread has vertical bars while the others don’t.

“You’d be surprised how many times one of those patterns gets all of the bites and the other gets none.”

“I have seen the fish show a preference for one or the other in casting situations as well . . . and not just with painted baits. I have also applied the concept to my bucktails and spinnerbaits at times by drawing vertical lines on them using a sharpie.”

If you’re an Insider PRO member and missed the live version, be sure to login to the member portal and check out the recording of this goldmine of info. If you’re not an Insider PRO member yet and would like to be, make sure to get your name on our waitlist.

Be the FIRST to see Musky Insider every week by signing up for the email version of this newsletter. It's 100% free and we will never sell your email address! Click here to sign up and never miss another issue. 

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Costume of the Year

Whether you’re headed to a costume party this Halloween or headed out with kids, we got you covered with these great costumes.

First up is a fishing influencer. One of our favorite accessories of this costume is the 50 different unaffiliated brand logos. If you #hashtag all of them on your social media, maybe you’ll even get a small discount code.😂 Some other must-have accessories include the optional 70’s mustache and action camera with the fish eye lense for extra magnification.

If you get this costume, we highly recommend saying “biggin” for every piece of candy you get in your bag. 

Next up is the sharpshooter. We can’t see the back of this shirt, but we’re wondering if it says “Just hopin’ that ain’t mine floatin.’” 🤦🏼‍♂️ Some fancy shooting gloves might compliment this costume as well. This costume is guaranteed to start fights and make friends at the same time!

Last up is 007, the code name of James Bond. But, it can also be the code name for one of your buddies that never seems to catch anything. You don’t need British intelligence to see this agent is in need of a Musky Insider PRO membership!

If only there was a way to add a massive bait pile from “lure changeritis” to this costume as an accessory. 

Got any fun musky related costume ideas? Send us your costumes by responding to this email. 

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This Week's Mashup:

Mashup time!

#1 – With warm water temps holding on longer than usual, it looks like some of us might get a little extra training in. Are you ready to throw pounders for the rest of the season?

#2 – Check out this Halloween themed line-up of Chaos Tackle Medussas from out friends at Taps and Tackle.  “Last Night’s Hot Wings” may take the cake for funniest color name. 😂

#3 – Keepin’ with our spooky theme, here's a print that combines Night of the Living Dead, Jaws, and our beloved Musky. Not really diggin’ the portrayal of muskies, but it’s Halloween so we’ll let it slide. ☠️

#4 – Found this gem of Michael Myers from last Halloween on the St. Lawrence River Guide’s insta page. 👻

 

 Wanna be featured in Musky Insider? Send in your recent trophy musky photos by replying to this email. You might just see your pic in next week's newsletter. 🤙

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