Just FYI the water is WAY up right now, like 3x average flows for this time of year and 2.5 feet above what it was less than 3 weeks ago. Some of the upper river launches are all but unusable, and stretches of the river are way out of its banks. Its coming down now, and maybe the water temperatures are rising too, but it was like 62 degrees last weekend.
The result was pretty much a total bust for the fishing report last weekend- I wasn't able to go, which I still missed badly but apparently I didn't miss any fish!
The river may be more cold-front proof (I'm not sure I personally believe that though), but high and cold water is definitely a bad combination.
I definitely do not want to discourage any trip to the UP any time for any reason, but a numbers trip for musky might not be as likely right now. There are no rules of course though- no doubt the fish could be totally jumpin in the boat!
We did 7 fish in over 40 hours of fishing last week covering the waters above dollarville to mud lake, which was at 5-6 ft in places, had 4 follows there but of smaller fish. Getting to mud lake was a lot of work with the 40 tiller which did a great job handling turns in the river. Fish were non existent in that stretch. The dam area was a bit better but still smaller fish. Had horrible Deet proof biting flies from below the dam to 9-11 miles south, made a wrong turn, or failed to turn on the way back and ended up a different arm about 1/4 mile before i looked down to navigate on the gps. Carry a gps on that stretch- water is high enough to where you can get into stretches that appear to be the river (and not an ATT Iphone either :-). There are large areas of grass that are thick enough to lure even Will Shultz into casting there as well….There was a point I swear I could hear a voice telling me to cast into it, but then I would recover from the heavy deet vapor on my neck-er-chief and reflect on that post previously….
Had a very very nice fish smash a buck tail boat-side and wake Kim from a nap on the river-mouth stretch, probably 5-7 miles up river. Couldn't keep it on for the net but ho well. That was a 12 hour day of 0-2. The 22 in smallie on Muskie gear was a nice catch though.
It was definitely tough fishing on the water in 5 days with 7 fish during showery precip on the head and heels of a cold front. Did catch a tagged Tiger though, a first for me. Water was fast, dirty and 62. Not a numbers trip for us, current and wind kept the ipilot busy but the secenery was worth the trip.
It was just like fishing Austin at times and Austin type lures brought the majority of the fish.
I like the lower stretch for structure. We stayed at the river-mouth campground so it was convenient for fishing. But there could be fish anywhere on that river. We did a fair amount of exploring and found some historical restoration projects along the lake shore on our rain day which was worthwhile.
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Here is a Jim T.H. special type photo for y'all.
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"tundrawalker00" said:
But if you were going, where would you launch?
Depends on what you're after- if it is strictly for numbers, it is probably "easiest" to get on fish above the Dollarville dam. This gets quite pressured though, so standard tactics under standard conditions often will get just follows, at best. And the bigger, deeper Lower river- below the falls- is probably the least for numbers of any stretch. All the many miles in between the dam and the falls are pretty similar for numbers.
Going down from Newberry at McPhees Landing (the flooded ramp in Bill's picture) gets you into the extremely sinuous marsh stretch of the Middle river. Very cool trip and interesting habitat. Launching at Slater's north of Hulbert – the mouth of the East Branch – gets you quicker access to the most remote section of river. It's straight and wide, lots of hardwoods, and slightly muddy here- the only stretch like that. Once you get down around of Joy's Island, the water usually gets back to clear-tannic and it's all spruce-cedar to the mouth.
Honestly, I don't have a favorite stretch nor do I think the fishing is markedly different between any of them. In short, it's all awesome to me. You can have great numbers in the Lower, and you can go without seeing a fish above Dollarville depending on the day- and everything in between, everywhere in between.
Like Duke said it can really depend on the day. I fished there for a week last year and put in a couple times at each the dollarville launch, and fished from the dam up but not to mud lake, and from the mouth launch up a couple miles up. My buddy was a bit of a wimp with his boat and refused to go too far if he thought he might hit a stick, and we did not get a chance to fish the middle river [smilie=bangtard.gif] But as far as fish, I had a couple swings and misses in the upper river, both decent fish but not a ton of action for what I expected/hoped in that stretch, and I had 7 hits with 5 hookups on the lower on the first night there… sadly Im a moron and none hit the net. Then saw nothing the rest of the week! So again, its hit or miss, it can be great anywhere, and the scenery can be pretty awesome. I hope to get up and fish all the way to the lower falls someday soon, and fish the confluence with the east branch too.
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