From todays paper. They had a pic in the paper, didn’t see it on-line. (Worst website out there IMO… 
)Anyway, something for you muskie nuts to read….
50-pound muskie brings angler to tears in Minnesota
By The Associated Press
Article Last Updated: 10/31/2007 09:32:34 AM CDT
Joe Kiritschenko said he cried after catching a 50-pound muskie on Lake Mille Lacs this weekend, but it wasn’t because he was 4 pounds short of the state record.
Instead, Kiritschenko regretted that his grandfather was not alive to see it. He had fished for big northerns and muskies with Peter, a St. Paul sign painter, for 20 years—until he died in 2001 at the age of 86.
“He meant everything to me,” said Kiritschenko, whose real father left the family. “I called him Papa. He would have loved to see a fish like this.”
Kiritschenko, of Woodbury, eventually weighed the fish on a state certified scale. It was 50 pounds, 55 inches long and had a 27 1/2-inch girth. The state record muskie is 54 pounds, caught in 1957 in Lake Winnibigoshish.
Only a few muskies 50 pounds or more have been caught, weighed and documented in Minnesota in the past two decades.
“It’s a rarity,” said Jerry Younk, a Minnesota Department of Natural Resources muskie researcher based in Bemidji, of Kiritschenko’s fish.
Using a formula based on length, the muskie could have been 14 to 20 years old, Younk said.
Kiritschenko is like many muskie anglers in that he believes in releasing his catches so they can grow bigger, but his 50 pounder was hooked deep and couldn’t be revived.
“It was belly up,” Kiritschenko said. “I have mixed emotions about keeping it because I know there will be a backlash from other anglers who don’t believe in keeping fish. But I didn’t have a choice.”
Kiritschenko was fishing alone around 11:30 a.m. Saturday on the northwest corner of Mille Lacs when the muskie hit. He was using a 15-inch, cream-colored lure called a Heli Dawg.
He said it didn’t take too long to bring the muskie to the boat, then net it with one hand while holding his rod with the other. “I just scooped it up and fell backwards into the boat,” he said.
Once it was in the boat, he called a fishing buddy, his mother, his sister and his wife. “I told my wife, ‘I finally got him. I got him for Papa.'”
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Information from: St. Paul Pioneer Press, http://www.twincities.com
GONE.
no, hes just giving it a hug! 
I am so jacked up, I am off all next week, and I will be doing nothing other then throwing baits all week 
I noticed on other sites it got pretty heated. 
I personally am never planning on keeping one, nor would I put anyone down for keeping one either. Its your right as a MN fishing license holder. If your any type of avid musky angler, I garrantee you have released a heck of alot more ski’s then you have kept. It sure does seem like jealousy is a major factor. I fortunately have never had one die on me (that I know of) but honestly dont know what I would do. Leave it to the birds or give it to a farmer or what. If it was that big, probably donate it to the DNR and get a replica. Congrats to everyone who is still out slingin’. The next month is what seperates the men from the boys. 
