Update 7/13: This heatwave is pretty bad and most of river stretches on the Au Sable and Manistee will be over 70 degrees today and tomorrow. It’s a good time to do a little bass fishing. We will need some clouds and some cooler nights to regain water temps. The upper reaches of both rivers rebound quickly, but high skies and 90+ degrees is too much even for these spring-fed reaches.
I have to lead off this report with some not unexpected bad news: We received a brief but heavy rain today. The most impacted stretches are the mainstream and the North Branch. The South Branch has held steady at 260ish CFS. This isn’t a flood or anything like that, just a momentary inconvenience. It should drop pretty quickly. It’s unfortunate. The river fished well yesterday.
Now I love night fishing and I’ll be doing some mousing here soon enough, but I REALLY love not wearing waders, getting in the water or a riverboat or whatever, grabbing some fun rods (fiberglass, four-weights, etc), some wet skunks, some dry skunks, some terrestrials, some beads, some small streamers, and just hitting the water. July is awesome when it’s awesome. Matt and I took a short float right in the middle of the sun yesterday. We caught fish on everything but the handful of damselfly dry flies I’d tied over the winter (dangit!). We started with a tiny streamer, switched to dry and dropper (which was VERY effective), then fished one of Potter’s secret ants (I hope he’ll tie them for the shop!), a purple trude, a hippy stomper, wet skunk, and then back to the streamer, and finally, after countless trout and dozens and dozens of chases, short strikes, and misses, we called it an afternoon. Matt even wore a floppy hat.
In July, the variety is breathtaking. Lance did some night fishing because his clients had never done any night fishing and hadn’t even seen fireflies and they loved it. A couple big trout didn’t hurt either. My boys and I went and caught some very nice smallmouth on the fly. Some folks are still chasing and finding hex. Dave reported the first flight of tricos by the lodge dock and they are going on the North Branch as well — however the North Branch will likely be too warm, especially in the upper reaches, over the next week. Please check water temps or ask for our advice in the fly shop.
If you go out there you’ll want deer flies, tricos, #18 BWOs, Olive Patriots, Regular Patriots, Patriot Skunks, Yarn Skunks, Tricos, small tungsten beadheads, Isonychias, a few small streamers, and, if you’re staying late, a variety of night flies. Even with this past heat wave (and this upcoming heat wave), there is enough cold water and enough variety to really enjoy the river. The hotter it gets, the early (or later) you go. Fish a creek. Pop for bass at dawn. The choices are endless. I think it’s hard to be bored in July.
Oh, and this…
Teams of two, $50 per two-person team, room for 20 teams, very special prizes, the mailbox challenge, briskets, maybe some live music, hi-jinks, and usually a fair amount of good-natured scandal. 8 pm – 2 am. Sign up: [email protected]. If you know, you know.
