SO WHO HERE HAS CAUGHT A BLUE PIKE BEFORE??

[Droz]

I caught a northern out of the Hudson River around Waterford in NY.  When I pulled him out it looked like he had one of those chamelion paint jobs.  It was a beautiful fish,  the skin was bluish turquoise depending on how the sun hit it.  I had a picture but it got wiped out of my digital camera.  I thought it was kind of strange myself but after reading all these posts, it sounds normal.

[PeRcHsLaYeR]

looks like a walleye rather than a pike.

[Droz]

It was a Northern

[Grimace]

so sauger is different than blue walleye then.
saugers are blue?
i caught a bunch of saugers in Northern manitoba on a fly in trip and nobody blinked an eye.

[AirManCam]

Blue Pike, are actually blue walleyes. They are not extinct, they are rare however. They are extinct in Lake Erie though. I can find them in my home state of WI in some rivers such as the WIsconsin and menominee. They can also be found in Canada

How do you know what is and is not in Lake Erie? What about that fish they found in the ocean, wasnt it supposed to have lived like 4 million years ago? Dude, just because they are not caught, doesnt mean they arent there. Its kind of like talking about a 200 b&c whitetail, are they there? Yes! Do you see many shot? No. See the connection

[BUCKSKI]

Lots of old timers in western NY talk about the Blue Pike. Walleyes, not northerns, they talk about getting both on outings Yellows and Blues. Overharvest was the reason for their decline. Never heard of the Blue/ northerns. Yes different species adapt to their environments and mutate over many years. All adaptations to survive. Wonder why we have out tailbones?? Brings ups creation VS evolution debate..
Need to look into more, maybe BIGRED has some info he is usually pretty knowledgable in the fishery area.
By the way different regional names for the same thing kills me. Black bass, grouse, partridge all have region meanings.
Gets confusing to me.

[bigredonice]

this link might help with any confusion http://www.nativefish.org/BluePike/

[IceTroll]

Here is an interesting colored Northern that I caught last year at Ft. Peck Reservoir in Montana. And yes, it is a Northern Pike and not a Musky or any other hybrid. 100% Northern Pike.

Another Pic of the same fish with a better flash from the camera

[cold_feet]

So you are looking for a Blue Pike huh!! Well we did catch some Blue Pike in a Ontario Lake called Big Gull. These are a Northern Pike with a blue hugh and very light spots I it almost looked like a Musky but the local cabin owner did say they had some of these fish in that lake. He did not call it a Northern he called it a Blue! When we cleaned it even the meat had a diffrent appearance to it it seemed to me a little more pink than the Regular Northern Pike. Sorry I don't have pictures of the fish though. If my memory is correct we caught at least 3 of these fish during the week we were there.

The other species of blue pike Lake Erie was famous for are from the Walleye family. I can remember years ago of seeing dozens of boats sitting out on Erie with lanterns hanging over the sides. Night time was the time to slam the fish and bushel basket loads came in on a nightly basis off that lake. It wasn't uncommon for a guy to go out and get a hundred a night. Talk about fish pigs huh!
ColdFeet