Muskies are known among anglers as the “fish of 10,000 casts.” For Darren Peters, a member of the St. Joe Bass Club, the odds were a little better, considering the fact he landed a 41-inch trophy while on a recent bass fishing trip at Pony Express Lake.

Peters had gone to the lake June 22 in high hopes of a big largemouth stretching his line. While casting a Texas-rigged Zoom Baby Brush Hog from his boat, he set the hook on a lunker, only this monster was larger than any bass and had attitude to spare.

Armed with only his bass rod spooled with 12-pound test line, the battle was on. Luckily for Peters, the fish was hooked perfectly, preventing it’s sharp teeth from cutting through the small-diameter line. After what seemed like an eternity, Peters was able to outlast the big muskie and wrangle it into the boat.

“This is the first muskie I have caught,” Peters said. “I’ve had several hit different soft plastics while bass fishing at the lake, but their teeth usually cut the line on the hookset.”

After measuring the fish, Peters snapped a quick photo of it with his cell phone. “It is amazing the power these fish have,” Peters said. “I released the fish so that someone else might enjoy catching it another day.”

Muskie, like their close cousins the pike, are most known for their impressive mouth full of teeth and their aggressive attitude. These fish can grow to immense proportions and obviously hold a spot at the top of any lake’s food chain. This is just one of the reasons these fish were stocked at Pony Express Lake years ago.

Pony Express is one of few lakes in Northwest Missouri where you can catch these unique fish. These large predators are not native to Missouri and were originally stocked here for not only the fishing opportunity but to help manage the large number of crappie and shad in the lake.

According to Jerry Wiechman, Missouri Department of Conservation (MDC) fisheries biologist, muskie don’t reproduce well in most of Missouri’s lakes and have to be stocked to maintain populations. This is an expensive endeavor, and the stocking of these predators at Pony Express stopped around five years ago because of the lake’s lack of deep, cool, oxygenated water.

Biologist discovered the smaller muskie thrived because of the abundant forage, but upon reaching maturity they began having trouble dealing with the stress of the hot summer periods. As muskie are slightly more expensive to stock, MDC realized they would be better off concentrating their stocking efforts in other lakes where the muskie populations were healthier because of better conditions.

Muskie are natives of the cool deep waters of Canada and north and east of the Mississippi River in the United States. Although muskie can live over 20 years in northern waters, they rarely live longer than 12 years in Missouri, according to the conservation department. The current world record muskie tipped the scales at more than 69 pounds.

As Missouri lies further south, the muskies here enjoy a longer growing season than their northern counterparts, although the heat tends to take its toll during their later years. The state record muskie in Missouri measured 49.5 inches long, weighed just over 41 pounds, and was 14 years old.

Heavy tackle and steel leaders are a must to prevent these fish from cutting through the fishing line with their razor-sharp teeth. A large, heavy-duty landing net is also a must, along with some gloves and good long set of needle-nosed pliers to retrieve your lure.

Most people prefer to cast extremely large lures from long distances into likely muskie haunts. Muskie and pike are well known for their nerve-rattling trait of following or tailing behind your lure right up to the boat. Many of these fish will actually strike the lure if left in the water and moved in a figure 8 pattern. Anglers who have experienced this thrill will attest to the heart-stopping adrenaline rush when they continue their charge and destroy your lure.

In Missouri, anglers catch most muskie from late September through November and March through mid-June. The MDC discourages targeting muskies during the summer because even if catch-and-release is practiced, they often die due to the high water temperatures. Any muskie caught in Pony must be longer than 36 inches to keep and only one muskie can be kept.

Outdoors correspondent Jeff Leonard can be reached at outdoors@npgco.com