Spokane Man Boats Washington-Record Pike

The infiltration of northern pike into the Idaho Panhandle isn’t stopping at the state line.

On Saturday, Fred Ruetsch of Spokane was fishing in Long Lake when he caught the largest northern pike recorded in Washington.

The fish weighed 32 pounds, 3 ounces and measured nearly 44 inches long, said Ray Duff, Washington Fish and Wildlife Department regional manager.

The pike was a female full of eggs.

“It’s hard to say whether the pike came down from the Lake Coeur d’Alene drainage as an adult or whether we’re now seeing the large adult progeny of fish that have been getting into the Spokane River system for years,” Duff said.

Ruetsch caught the pike while bass fishing with a spinnerbait. Coincidentally, he was accompanied by Bill DeMaris, who caught the current state record of 18 pounds, 6 ounces in 1980.

Ruetsch’s pike has not yet been officially declared the state record.

Washington fisheries managers have not yet had to deal with the predatory non-native pike. But now that illegally introduced pike appear to be seriously threatening the trophy trout, crappie and bass fisheries of Hayden Lake, North Idaho fisheries managers plan a counterassault.

Recently, 43 of 65 people attending a public meeting backed a Fish and Game Department proposal to lift the five-fish daily pike limit at Hayden Lake.

“This is the best way we have of keeping the pike population in some sort of control,” said Ned Horner, Panhandle regional fisheries manager. “It’s also a way of telling the people who are carrying out these illegal introductions that they can’t always have their way.”