My first pike

Not a bad first!

After a frustrating visit on New years day Toby and i returned to Cudmore fisheries predator lake Tara.
We both started out on float rigged dead bait (Lamprey section/half Herring) and after a quiet couple of hours we started to get pickups only to be disappointed on the strike, as we are both fairly new to Pike fishing neither of us knew exactly when to strike?

After speaking to the current Catfish record holder on the avoca lake, he suggested we should try a live bait (which his other half kindly supplied). I kid you not 2 Min's after Toby's first cast with a small but feisty Perch, the big bodied float on his line started going walkabouts, the float dipped a couple of times, and Toby grabbed the rod and tried to set the hook. Gutted, no fish, no rig either but a nice clean cut on the line told us a Pike had got a large mouth full of mainline as well as the perch!

We each had a couple more takes as the afternoon wore on, but I decided to change to a really simple Catfish rig of slightly popped up worm on a straight running ledger.
I cast to an over hanging tree to my right, from which Toby had promised me all day would produce a fish.
Oh boy he wasn't wrong, my alarm give a couple of beeps then screamed off. As I struck to set the hook all i could think was please for god's sake don't do what you did last week, when after a cracking take, I hit into the biggest fish I have ever felt, only to be snapped off immediately. This time everything was right and I started to play the biggest fish I have ever had on my line. The fight was brief but exciting and after a couple of frantic minutes Toby netted my first ever pike. The large single hook loaded with worms had lodged beautifully in the scissors of the fish, so after quickly being unhooked and weighed the 12lb esox was safely returned no worse for wear.

Thats her at the top and im the one beaming ear to ear!