Was bass fishing yesterday on a lake in SE Wisconsin that has a large population of pike. Rumor has it there are some large pike and I have seen pics of 40"+ caught, but all I have ever caught were typical snot rockets. We probably landed 30 or so pike yesterday in the 14"-24" range. Everyone of them had fresh wounds. Some had wounds on one side some on both sides, all had a minimum of 2 wounds. At first I thought they were bite marks from large pike, but after boating so many fish with the same issue, I'm thinking maybe something else is going on. I'm still not discounting the pike were just plain lucky they escaped being breakfast. All the bass were healthy and fat. Any ideas?  

When you see lots of smaller pike beat up it is usually a result of spawn. I have seen 40" and over beat up as well. There are always bigger dogs in the system that play rough. I have also seen talons marks by raptors that tried to lift off with a pike in check but couldn't lift the weight. Pike are notorious for eating their own.  

Earlier this spring I saw a ton of real super tanker pike sunning in the shallows that looked like they had been through a meat grinder - all presumably the result of the spawn -

 

A-Jay

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Did it look anything like this? This was from an October outing though so that'd rule out spawning sores.

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Did it look anything like this? This was from an October outing though so that'd rule out spawning sores.

Wasn't that nasty