The best Pike bite wounds I have ever seen were on a 38 1/2" Pike I caught fly fishing in the park in town. It had bite marks starting back by the dorsal fin and going uo all the way to just behind the head. It was the end of July so this was not a spwaning territory fight, this was a really big one thought the 38 1/2"er looked like lunch. It had grabbed the Pike near the tail and treid working it's way up to the head to turn it. I regret to this day only taking pictures of the nicer looking side. Like on the Cutthroat picture, the bottom jaw made holes and slices. The top jaw however, with all those little teeth in tightly packed bunches, ripped chunks of skin off every place it had gripped it trying to work it's way to the head. I really wanted to catch the one that thought a 38 plus Pike was edible. It's hard to see the holes and slices in this photo but that's a slice right below the dorsal fin and there are holes all around the area near my right hand. Unfortunately I picked this photo to make a copy from because it was the one hardest to see all the wounds in. I should look through my extra photo stash and see if I have a version you can see the damage better in. I know there are none of the bad side.Northerns are hard on trout too. I've caught quite a few that escaped the jaws of a pike. I've also caught trout (and pike) with the same wounds that have healed. This one was active/feeding and seemed healthy when I released it.
OK I gotcha now, all I could see was the round looking spot. Here we get salmon who are scared by drift / gill nets, Orcas, seals and God knows what, Out in Hewitt lake the Pike eat one another so I imagine there are plenty of scared pike there.
That big Pike I got before the free Willy one, was coming into a spot in the evening to feed. The only thing we ever caught in there before she showed up was small Pike. I'd bet dollars to donuts that's what she was targeting in there. By the way, I'm still kind of annoyed by the Free Willy incident. I should upload a photo I have so I can post it of a Pike I got last summer. I had the biggest Pike I have ever had on. And I have had some really big Pike. It was taking line like I had snagged a Canadian submarine. I fought it for a seriously long time and all of a sudden it was gone, but there was still something there. When I got it in, here was this poor little Pike all of 16 or 17 inches long. It had been chewed up like ...... I'll have to post the photo. It was a seriously hurtin unit though.
Careful unhooking those, you don't want to end up a zombie!
