Grand River Fishing Report: June 2015

J une fishing on the Grand River is full of opportunities; you have smallmouth and largemouth bass, northern pike, walleye, gar, big flatheads, bluegills, sheepshead, and more. Fishing can be great from the headwaters all the way down to the mouth of Grand Haven depending on the species you are looking for.

If you are looking for some good panfish action try the bayous down near Grand Haven, the bluegills should be on their beds and biting anything that gets near them. Fishing leaf worms or a piece of a crawler under a bobber is a good way to catch a bunch of gills. Fly fishing bead-headed nymphs, or top water spiders are a fun way to spend your day as

well. Bass fishing is usually going well in the bayous, try pitching a wacky rigged senko, a tube bait, or spinner bait into the openings of the weeds or off from the drop offs A variety of fish can be caught
 pitching crankbaits or throwing
streamers along the shorelines of
the Grand River. I usually target
log jams, rocky shorelines, and
deeper holes with Rapala Husky
Jerks, Shad Raps, X-Raps, and Smithwick Rogues. If you are fly fishing try throwing big ugly streamers, which resemble a baitfish or crawfish in white, yellow, black, brown, green or a combination of the colors. You never know what you will catch on that next cast as you will usually catch a mix of bass, northerns, gar, sheephead, and sometimes walleye.

If you are looking for some big catfish, the Grand is a great choice for the month of June. Try fishing live creek chubs or cut bait in front of log jams, cast them out on a three-way rig and let them sit on the bottom. Use heavy gear for this as you never know when you will have to wrestle that 30 to 40 pounder out of the wood.

Pier fishing out in Grand Haven at the mouth of the Grand River can be good for sheephead, catfish, and skamania steelhead. Sheephead will eat just about anything, spoons, jerkbaits, crankbaits, or bait fish are good choices. Catfish can be caught on just about anything sitting on the bottom, alewife, shrimp, skein, crawlers, etc. will get you into some cats. Although Michigan does not stock any skamania steelhead anywhere near Grand Haven, we see strays from Indiana’s stocking sites, and they are usually caught on alewife or shrimp either set on the bottom or under a bobber.