Fishing Michigan's Whitewater Rivers

by Jerry Dennis

Below Boney Falls the Escanaba is a rugged and hard-driving river, funneled between short, steep cliffs, thrown into disarray by a bottom of bedrock ledges and boulders. It is water famous for brown trout, a fact you find hard to believe when you see it for the first time.

In high water, when the power dam is releasing, the river is simply awesome, throwing six-foot waves that roar away downstream and disappear around the first bend. Even in low water the current is so swift your casts get swept away, your spinner chopping the surface because it has no chance to settle in the current. It settles instead in the almost unnoticed eddy along the steep bank--settles and disappears. You retrieve it, thinking ahead to where your next cast will land, and that is when the brown trout strikes.

Michigan is not well known for its whitewater rivers. Many lifelong residents, in fact, aren't aware that the rivers of the western Upper Peninsula are some of the fastest and least-tamed in the Midwest, and that they are a holdout for wild and unsullied trout and other game fish.

Like a lot of river fishermen I always concentrated my efforts on the stretches of classic water: the waist-deep flats where trout rise to mayfly duns, the deep, elbow bends where pools drop away to darkness and it's easy to imagine the largest fish of the river grow fat and old like pampered monarchs.

I'd fished broken water with fair success, but logic always dictated that the really fast water, the water too swift to be waded, would be too swift for trout.

About 10 years ago, a fly fisherman from Oregon showed my friend Mike McCumby and me how to catch browns and rainbows from a section of rapids in the Firehole River in Wyoming. It was late September, the water was low and warm, and we'd had only fair success fishing the slow water of the river. One evening we met a man in our campground who claimed to have caught and released 45 trout that day, browns and rainbows from 12 to 18 inches long. The trout, he explained, had migrated to the fast water because of its higher oxygen content, and were feeding on mayfly and stonefly nymphs.

The next day, under his tutelage, we stood in knee-deep water at the edge of the rapids and cast weighted nymphs upstream. The line shot down with the current, and if you weren't careful it developed a quick belly that dragged the fly over the surface behind it. If you could prevent drag, which I was able to manage only about one cast in six, the line remained limp, the nymph sank beneath the surface, and you would get a strike. Every good cast to the center of the river would hook a rainbow trout, and every good cast along the slightly slower water at the edges of the river would hook a brown trout. In a few hours Mike and I released about 20 trout from 12 to 16 inches long. We brought the idea home and found, to our surprise, that it worked in Michigan as well.

Fast water attracts trout. They won't necessarily live right in it--it requires a great deal of effort, after all, to stay in position against heavy current--but they can often be found in the immediate vicinity. Broken water is heavily oxygenated, an attractive feature in summer, when many rivers warm to dangerously high levels. Oxygenated water is more attractive to insect life as well, and countless mayflies, stoneflies, caddis flies, and midges breed over the rapids, their larvae hatching out and clinging to rocks on the bottom. Trout know those insects are often dislodged and swept free, and that rapids and the water directly below them offer good grazing.

Water does not rush unobstructed through a rapids, the way it does in a culvert or a rain gutter. Rocks, ledges, and other obstructions create endless variations in the flow. Small eddies of still water can be found just over bottom, behind rocks and along the bank. All are places where a fish can hold position with almost no effort at all, then dart forward to grab at drifting insects and other food.

The challenge to an angler is to present his fly, lure, or bait in a natural way that attracts the attention of the fish. I've seldom had success with dry flies in fast, broken water, partly because it is so difficult to see them, partly because they quickly drown and are swept away. Still, a heavily dressed, highly visible dry fly can be effective at times, with trout slashing at it recklessly, as if afraid it will get away. I've had better luck with nymphs, wet flies, and streamers, all flies that represent insects and minnows that might frequently be tumbling out of control in fast water. Detecting strikes is seldom a problem: the fish strike hard, determined to get the fly before it sweeps past them.

Likewise, bait and artificial lures have to be presented in a way that captures the trout's interest. On the Montreal River, in the final miles before it dumps into Lake Superior on the Michigan/Wisconsin border, I once cast small Mepps Spinners into a large, deep pool at the foot of a formidable rapids. My spinners tended to be swept to the surface and away from the best holding water, until I cast slightly upstream and gave the line slack. After a moment I drew the line up and activated the spinner. The lure would rise up from the depths then, clearly visible in the clear water. On three casts in succession, I saw different brown trout of 16 to 18 inches chasing the spinner, slashing at it, bumping it with their noses. I hooked one of them, finally, but it vaulted from the water and threw the lure and put an end to the action.

Bait fishermen often have poor luck in fast water, primarily, I suspect, because the heavy weight they need to get their bait near bottom prevents a natural-looking drift. They do better concentrating on the deep pools immediately downstream from a rapids, where game fish congregate to feast on the forage being constantly washed down to them. Also, don't overlook the smaller, less obvious pools found in every rapids. A large rock, for instance, will always have an eddy of still water immediately behind it, where a nightcrawler or other bait might get results. Beitner Rapids, a stretch of whitewater on the Boardman River near Traverse City, for years gave up big brown trout to bait and hardware anglers fishing the little eddies and deep pools at the fringes of the rapids. A friend of mine once watched an elderly gentleman with a baitcasting outfit rig a nightcrawler on a Carlisle hook, weight it down with a one-ounce bell-sinker on a drop line, cast it into a bathtub-sized pool at the edge of the fastest chute of water in the rapids, and promptly hook and land an 11-pound brown.

Getting to wild, fast water can be more difficult than fishing it. Many of Michigan's most notable rapids are far from roads, and are most easily reached by canoe. The problem with that, of course, is that rapids that rate Class III or IV--dangerous, with waves large enough to swamp open canoes--should not be attempted unless you've have considerable experience canoeing in whitewater. The alternative is to study topographical maps of the region, and note logging trails and footpaths that approach the river.

Extremely fast water can only be effectively (and safely) fished from shore, or the shallow, wadable fringes. Often, rocks will create natural casting platforms to give you good access to promising holding water. Other times, sheer ledges and gorges prevent easy access to the water. Keep in mind that turbulent water, even relatively shallow rapids, can be extremely dangerous. A step into knee-deep water might seem harmless, but it could sweep your legs out from under you. If you fall in fast water, always go to a sitting position, keeping your feet and legs forward to help ward off rocks. Often you can ride right through the worst of the water, then swim to shore when the current slows.

There are dozens of rivers in Michigan with stretches of extremely fast water. Many of them are trout streams, others home to smallmouth bass, walleyes, pike, and other warmwater species. In the Lower Peninsula, few of those rapids reach whitewater status, although there are isolated exceptions like the Pigeon, Ocqueoc, Boardman, Rifle, and a couple short sections of the Huron.

Most of the real whitewater in the state--and especially the whitewater inhabited by brook, brown, and rainbow trout--is found in the Upper Peninsula. Below are a few rivers I've found particularly productive or appealing.

Escanaba River

The stretch below Boney Falls is the best-known rapids on the Escanaba, and a spot once famous for large brown trout. The fishing isn't what it used to be, but good trout are still taken at this popular place. Less visited water is found upstream, in the section below Gwinn. A number of rapids are scattered through the stretch, and are punctuated with deep pools inhabited by good numbers of brown and brook trout. In June and July I've had good luck fishing the fast water with streamers and nymphs, then in the evenings switching to dry flies on the slow pools, when hatches become prolific.

Menominee River

Trout aren't the only game fish attracted to whitewater. The Piers Gorge section of the Menominee, downstream from Iron Mountain, is one of the fiercest stretches of whitewater in the Midwest, and is inhabited by smallmouth bass and walleyes. This is big water--deep and furious--and requires some special techniques to be effectively fished. Heavy lead-headed jigs worked in the deep pools below the chutes and ledges will pick up walleyes. Bass hang out in the calmer water of the eddies and the enormous pools at the edges and bottom of the rapids. Locals take the bass with Rapalas, spinners, jigs, nightcrawlers, and minnows.

Black River

This Gogebic County river is one of the most intriguing in the U.P., and hosts a good population of native trout. In spite of fishing some mouth-watering pools, I've managed to find only small brookies and browns in the long section above the series of waterfalls near the mouth at Lake Superior. The falls themselves create some memorable pools, especially below the final one before Lake Superior, where steelhead and salmon congregate in spring and fall.

Montreal River

Several miles of promising, difficult-to-reach water can be found between Saxon Falls, northwest of Ironwood, and the mouth of the river at Lake Superior. There are no access sites between the Falls and County Road 505, and the river flows through a deep gorge that is difficult (and potentially dangerous) to hike into. The only way I've found to enter is in whitewater canoes. Keep in mind, however, that the water is wild and demands good to excellent canoeing skills, especially when water levels are up in spring or after rainfall. Rainbows and brook trout are said to be present, but I've seen only browns, including some large ones. Insect hatches are sporadic, due to the fluctuating water levels, but I've noticed good numbers of large stonefly nymphs clinging to rocks on bottom.

Presque Isle River

The first time I saw the lower Presque Isle River, an 18-mile stretch of almost continuous whitewater rapids between M-28, east of Ironwood, and Lake Superior, I was too busy trying to keep upright in a canoe to think much of the fishing. When we finally entered a slower stretch at the base of the Porcupine Mountains, I looked over just in time to see the shovel-wide tail of a rainbow trout slap the surface. My first thought was that it was a steelhead, but in this section of river upstream from half-a-dozen major waterfalls that was not likely. Later I learned the Presque Isle supports a strong population of naturally reproducing rainbows, and caught good numbers of 10-16 inchers in the rapids between the waterfalls a mile or two above Lake Superior.

They were suspended in the deep lake-like pools immediately below the falls, and in the waist-deep, churning runs above and below. Good hatches on the Presque Isle result in some dry fly action, though most local anglers fish with bait and artificial lures. Excellent runs of steelhead and salmon draw attention in the short stretch of fast water below the last falls, where it is also possible to pick up large rainbows and browns in the summer.

Sturgeon River

This remote, wild river at the base of the Keweenaw has great potential for brook trout specialists. The section of rapids and falls at Sturgeon River Gorge is usually visited for its spectacular scenery, but pools and eddies within the gorge also attract occasional fishermen. The fishing varies from poor to outstanding, depending on the season and the whims of the trout. Local fishermen say they can fish the river six times and never have a strike, then on the seventh trip limit out on brook trout up to 18 inches.


Copyright ⌐ 1995 Jerry Dennis. All Rights Reserved.

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