Outdoors: Slammin' salmon a Michigan fall frenzy
Oct. 4—BEULAH, Mich. — On March 30, some 66,373 coho salmon raised at the Michigan Department of Natural Resources hatchery here were stocked in the nearby Platte River.
The following day another 60,000 of the young fish, 5 to 6 inches in length, were stocked in the waterway. When the calendar flipped to April 1, there were 71,332 additional coho released in the river.
That robust stocking pattern began more than 50 years ago, establishing the first significant salmon fishery in the state. After the coho, which are native to North America's Pacific coast, spend several years in Lake Michigan, they return to the Platte to spawn, creating a fishing bonanza that draws fishermen from across the map. Guide Brad Dunkle of Wildwood Anglers in Sylvania and his clients are part of that group.
"There's just a ton of cohos in the Platte right now," Dunkle said late last week after returning from a very successful outing in his drift boat on the Platte, a 30-mile long river that snakes its way through the Pere Marquette State Forest before entering Lake Michigan in the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore.
After they are stocked in the Platte, the young fish will feed opportunistically on insects and other forage before eventually making their way into the lake where they move to a diet primarily composed of alewives and smelt.
Following several years of feeding and growing in Lake Michigan, coho move up the streams to spawn. Coho salmon spawn only once and then die and the stocking program is necessary since there is not enough natural reproduction in the Michigan rivers to sustain the fishery. Anglers try and target these fish, which average 4 to 8 pounds, as they move up the rivers in the fall.
"We got in the river early and waited a half-hour or so after sun-up and these waves of fish just started charging up the river," Dunkle said about a recent trip to the Platte. "We hit them every way that a man could. The salmon fishing can be insane at times, and this was definitely one of those times."
The anglers used chuck-and-duck rigs with minnow patterns, Lefty's Deceiver, and Jersey Turnpike streamers. Other anglers have had success landing coho with spoons, large spinners, and big jigs.
"There's some deceivingly fast water in the Platte, with riffles dumping into swinging bends," Dunkle said. "With those riffles you typically have gravel and then a big bucket where the depth goes from 2 to 6 feet. You want to make sure you have a decent amount of weight and you don't have any loose line because that will lift your fly over those fish's heads."
Although the coho run on the Platte is often epic, Dunkle added that there are significant coho runs on other Michigan waterways, giving anglers plenty of fishing options.
He said there are coho to be had on the Big Manistee River, the Grand River, and the St. Joe River. He added that some coho will make the run up the Grand and then surge into Red Cedar Creek where it joins the Grand in Lansing.
"You can even catch these fish in the creek as it runs right behind Spartan Stadium," he said.
The rivers of west Michigan that offer outstanding salmon fishing and more are many, since there are also major runs of chinook (kings) and/or coho and/or steelhead on the Muskegon, Pere Marquette, White, Betsie, and the Little Manistee rivers.
"The best fishing is found at different times of the year on different streams, but these are all very popular fisheries with anglers," said Heather Hettinger,
A fisheries management biologist who works the Platte, Boardman, Elk, Jordan, Boyne, and Bear River watersheds for the Michigan Department of Natural Resources. "These are all non-native, introduced species that have done really well in Michigan waters."
As to the question of selecting a fishing destination during Michigan's fall salmon and steelhead circus, Dunkle said his decision is based on weather, stream flows, and the intel he receives from other guides and anglers.
"It's almost like cheating when you get all of that good information. The toughest part of the picture right now is deciding where to go," Dunkle said. "Everywhere on the map the fishing is pretty phenomenal right now. It hadn't been like that until just recently, but we're getting a lot more runs going and some of these rivers are piling up with fish."
First Published October 4, 2021, 1:36pm
