Pere Marquette-Michigan

[mario66pens]

Headed up to the Pere Marquette and the river Manistee in early march, I'm meeting a buddy of mine who never has steelhead fished before. I will be taking my 10ft 7wt, because I'm assuming it's a swinging game, but I'm not entirely sure.

Will I need to buy a sinking or intermediate line? (was thinking about it anyways for lake largemouth)

Patterns for swinging?

General advice on the area?

Thanks

 

[The_Sasquatch]

PatrickC knows that river well, I believe.

 

[Acristickid]

Wellston Mi is very nearby to both waters- couple fly/fishing/bait stores, couple restaurants, motels, nuthin fancy. The Manistee is huge and you really need a boat to fish it. That said you can fish the outflow at Tippy dam. The river is large there but can be waded and a good place for swinging. (that’s the only placed I fished it) You could call Schmidt Outfitters and ask specific fly patterns etc…

The Pere Marquette is probably Lil J sized and is good for wading. I found it to have good public access and have pleasant wooded surroundings. That whole area is fairly flat with some low rolling hills here and there. It is quite rural and as soon as your turn off the main roads the roads are dirt. The soil is very sandy (no wonder the Hex is so prolific there) and porous which allows water to seep into the river rather than runoff directly into the river. The river bottoms alternate between sandy and gravel spots. The cover is mostly cutbanks, snags and some deeper darker spots in the gravel and sand. The deeper water seems brackish to me. Definitely a different type of stream make up than PA.

I fished for steel there in Nov for the first time so that is my recollection of the area. Good luck.

 

[markp]

I fish the PM about 5 times a year and the type of fishing you will encounter really depends on where you are fishing on the stream. The most popular section is going to be the fly only area, it is also the best place to wade. The size of the stream there would be fairly similar to the J as said earlier and can reasonably well fished with floating line, unless very high. If you are attempting to fish the lower sections of stream you will probably have a very hard time wade fishing. Because of the stream bottom there are times in the lower river, below Wahalla Rd, that you will find yourself sinking into the soft substrate.

As far as fly selection goes the standard Erie fare works fairly well but I would carry a decent selection of Large Gaudy streamers, because if it is high that is by far the most productive. There are two main access areas for the fly only section and they are both on 72nd street right by Baldwin. There are two tackle shops there Baldwin Bait and Tackle and an Pere Marquette Outfitters both of which will have some flies, however I would say that Baldwin had the better selection when I stopped in. Baldwin bait and tackle also has a website with a forum you may want to join.