Thats a monster too.You might want to check lake or state records on that one. Never ate one,but they do fillet and eat pike,so give it a shot. It won't cost you nothing.Worst thing that can happen is you don't like it and throw it out.

YUPPERS Pickeral

FishOnTx, you were pretty close on your guess. the Pickerel family are closely related to Northern Pike. After all Pickerel basically just means "Little Pike" lol.

where did you catch it?

Nice catch and I would guess a walleye.

Nope, it's a Chain Pickerel, a native Texas fish.

I have relatives in northwestern Louisiana that eat squirrel brains and pickled pigs feet and chicken lips and boar butts.

They all throwback "jackfish" or chain pickerel. That's enough for me to say they are generally not taken home to eat.

They're plenty good to eat, but the reason most people throw them back? Very boney, and a lot of work for those little fillets. Up north people eat their bigger cousin, northern pike, quite often. But at that size it's a lot easier to fillet around all the extra "Y-Bones".

Cool Pic!