Trout Opener

Manistee River Fishing Report April 29, 2015 – Its Trout season!! It officially opened on our local streams last weekend. The river is running at 2,000 CFS and the water temp is at 49 degrees. I’ve been doing a lot of guiding on the Manistee tail water below Tippy Dam. There is still a good stain to the water, and with the amount of bait fish like Salmon Fry and stock rainbows, the big brown trout have been very active. Fly fishing and spin casting have both produced large browns. Any kind of bait fish streamer have been working the best. In white or yellow. Shad wraps and floating rapala’s in rainbow or natural shad varieties have been the ticket. Right now is the best time to come to catch a trophy trout of a lifetime!! There are still a few steelhead around, and I anticipate more showing up in the next few weeks. I’ve been targeting them mostly early in the morning with a variety of nymphs like buggers, stone flies, and caddis. Along with various colors of egg flies.

Last night we weren’t the only ones trout fishing, we spotted a good sized bobcat fishing on the shore! We saw eagles, raccoons and BOBCATS! The river was gorgeous – beautiful sunset, not a soul on the river but us – truly the reason we love fishing Northern Lower Michigan!

I have some open dates in May, give me a call and lets get after them.

For current river conditions, check out waterdata.usgs.gov
– Chris