Telling big fish stories

Dave Mussman estimates he’s hauled in more than 50 Mackinaw from Lake Tahoe since the new year began.

“Macks are a dime a dozen,” he says.

Just not the 20-pound variety — though there’s plenty out there.

Trolling in the Tavern Hole area at a depth of 225 feet on Sunday, the Tahoe City fisherman landed one of those hogs.

Bulging belly and all, it weighed in at exactly 20 pounds and measured 37 inches. He’d rather not tell what he had on the end of his line.

Mussman, who was fishing with his buddy, also named Dave, released the mack after taking measurements and snapping a photo.

“Catch and release is the way to do it,” Mussman says, adding that he’s also released several brown trout in the 5-pound range this year. “I let them all go so they can get back out there and multiply.”

A 20-year Tahoe resident and a native of Madison, Wis., Mussman says he’s caught more than his share of mackinaw — also called lake trout — in his homeland. But none that weighed 20 pounds.

His largest mackinaw came a handful of years ago in the annual Jake’s on the Lake charity fishing derby. That one weighed 21 pounds, 3 ounces.