Pike!

[BassFishing123]

Does anyone else have the problem of Northern Pike biting off your lure when not using leaders.

[Lipripper]

That's a real problem when fishing in Pike infested waters so if your not useing a leader use cheep baits 

[coldfront]

Does anyone else have the problem of Northern Pike biting off your lure when not using leaders.

only had that problem one time...caught lots of pike without leaders...

[Mike Cork]

We have a lot of chain pickerel here ( southern version ) and it is just a hazard we have. Ours don't get over a couple pounds and they don't often take a bait deep enough to cut it with there teeth, it does happen. Another thing that helps us is that we use 17 to 20 pound mono or much stronger braid.

[Baron49]

The curse of the "toothy critters" plagues a lot of people across the USA.  Here on Lake Ontario and the St. Lawrence River we have Muskies, Northern Pike, and Pickerel and all grow big and mean enough to attack just about any lure you care to throw.  They bite though heavy mono and braid like it is not even there.  About the only way to work around it is to use a steel leader.  There are the newer, thinner titanium leaders out, but they seem to be very expensive to me. 

Several of my Musky fishing friends have been using 80 to 100 lb test fluorocarbon leaders when fishing the over sized musky baits with a great deal of success.  However for bass fishing these lines kill the action on most lures.  Have tried using 20 and 30 lb fluoro leaders, but still had pike and pickerel bite right through them.

Bottom line for most of us locally is to grin and bear it as part of the cost of fishing. If fishing in an around a lot of toothy critters use less expensive plastic baits like worms and creatures and keep the expensive titanium weights in the box and use brass weights instead.

[tim4081]

We have the same issue in Michigan.  Alot of pike, a few muskies etc and yes they can cost you a lure every now and then.  But they are also alot of fun to catch particularly the 30 plus inchers.  My son lost his favorite LC jerkbait to one last year but he also landed one on a 4" senko that maxed out our 15lb scale.  Guess it goes both ways.

[bassinagain]

My 13 year old son has lost a bunch of his favourite lures to pike on his ultra light. The worst was when he was looking down in the water while I was tyin a tiny ultra light spinner onto his line. I dropped it after I tied it on and left it hanging over the side of the canoe about 3 inches out of the water. A little hammer handle sized pike came charging up out the water right in front of him, clipped the lure off the end of his line and almost made him jump out the other side of the canoe. I almost died laughing but he was really PO'd because he had just bought the lure at basspro the day before and hadn't even had a chance to cast it yet. I told him it was part of the cost of fishing but bought him one to replace it the next time I was at basspro.