Little Angler, Big Pike
Sam Cook, Duluth Times - 08/15/2010

It isn’t often that a 47-inch kid catches a 45 1/2-inch fish, but it happened Monday on Kabetogama Lake. Six-year-old Josh Atz of White Bear Township north of St. Paul caught a 45 1/2-inch northern pike that afternoon while staying with his family at Moosehorn Resort. Josh was fishing with his mom and dad for northern pike, using a pink Lindy rig and a leech, said his dad, Tim Atz. Josh was using 8-pound-test line. "The fish hit and came totally out of the water," Tim Atz said. "I was up front, facing the other way. All I heard was, 'Zzzzzzzzzzz ....'" He thought the sound of the drag meant Josh was snagged, but he quickly learned Josh had a big fish on. "He dove on him twice," Tim said. "He fought it for 20 or 25 minutes." Josh has done a lot of fishing already at age 6, and he fought the fish until it was 10 feet from the boat and became tangled in weeds. Tim Atz took over then, and got the fish up to and into the boat. "When we got the fish in the boat, it started buckin’ all over," Tim said. "Josh ran to the front." Who could blame him? The Atzes kept the fish and intend to mount it, Tim said. They didn’t weigh it because they couldn’t find a scale big enough to weigh it. According to length-weight ratios for northern pike, a fish of that length is likely to weigh about 27 pounds. Christy Mitchell, who owns Moosehorn Resort with her husband, Jerry, said the pike is the biggest fish of the summer at the resort and the largest in the four years the Mitchells have owned the resort.