Stole a Big Pickerel's Lunch

[dsr02364]

Was out yesterday afternoon on a NC PA lake that is stocked with trout in the spring. Had a slow afternoon only catching a small pickerel and a decent bass.
About 4 PM, a tip up right near where I was jigging went off like a shot. Knowing I don't have much line on it, I ran over and it was spooled but the fish was still on.
After a few good runs, got the big pickerel up and on on the ice and saw that it was barely hooked in the upper lip, but protruding from its gut was a pretty wide tail.
Wanting to see what it was, I gave it a tug and a 10-12" brown trout popped out. I felt a little bad afterwards for stealing it's lunch, but it didn't take much pulling to get it to come out.
I still can't believe that it would grab my decent sized shiner when it had a big meal already inside.

[Doeslayer]

Nice!

[PaCarpboy]

Regurgitated trout are a real delicacy...

[dsr02364]

Thought about keeping the trout but its head was pretty far down and was starting to get digested a bit....

[digger953]

have had that happen a few times only they had them in there gut whole

[Spider1]

it's crazy when they do that. I've caught a couple pic's that already had a meal in their mouth at the time and a buddy of mine caught a big pic with the remains of another pic in it's mouth. That pic woulda been about 15" but there was only about half of it left. Ever get your finger caught in a pickerels gills, they are like razors. They actually use them to grind fish down that are too big to swallow, like a pencil sharpener. Greedy fish, they'll eat a tiny jig with a waxy on it when they got a big meal still going down. Maybe the just get tired of fish and want a nice tasty bug instead!!

[kmu70]

Just this year i caught a 25" pic. it had an approx. 10" bass in it, tons of digested fish and still after more .lol
ive seen bass, bluegills, pickerel, trout in their bellies at times they are pigs

[RuttNutt]

My buddy caught a big pickerel on a tip-up years ago and when he got it up on the ice he discovered it wasn’t hooked- it had swallowed a 12” rainbow that had taken the bait! 

[Drillin-n-Chillin]

Females fattening up for the spawn. We get the biggest picks in lake ice.

[Sheimbach490]

caught one in the summer once and as it was trying to throw the hook a whole frog came out of its mouth