Fishing Report 7/20/25
Boardman River Report
The Boardman remains nice and cold - great for this time of year. We saw a quick bump in flows Wednesday night with rain but the river is mostly back to normal flows for this time of year. If you want to explore the Boardman, concentrate your time on the lower-light periods of the days 7AM-NOON and 6PM-9PM have been best. The water is clear so focus your efforts on areas with depth or structure.
This is the time of year when we start to downsize our setups - think 3 & 4 weight rods. Fish have been responding to smaller terrestrials like Hippy Stompers, Chubby Chernobyls, the Yeager, and flying ants. If you’re feeling confident in your casting, generic droppers will produce. Things like pheasant tails, hare’s ears, and pat’s rubber legs. If you’re fishing a flat, calm piece of water utilize the dead drift, otherwise work some twitches into your presentation.
Upper Manistee River Report
The cooler evening temperatures and recent rain storms have really set up the trout for a nice reprieve from the scorching heat of early July. Water temperatures are great and the spike in the water should provide the fish some comfortable feeding conditions. This should really set up great fishing conditions for the next few weeks. Look for the trout to be out in the middle of the river feeding as the water drops and clears. Summer streamer action should be good for the next few days. If you are looking for dry fly action, head upstream above M-72 to CCC Bridge and even down to 3 Mile as those sections will drop and clear quickly.
Flying ants, beetles, small hoppers, Hippy Stompers, Chubby Chernobyls, Yeager flies have been working well and we have been finding some nice trout looking up over the past couple of weeks.
Lower Manistee River Report
The Lower Manistee below Tippy Dam has been good for smallmouth and they have been looking up for poppers, surface bugs and frogs earlier in the day and chasing down baitfish patterns in the afternoons. Soft Chews, diving frogs, Boogle Bugs and various poppers have been the best producers. Murdich Minnows, and other baitfish patterns have been working well as subsurface flies. When we were out the other day there were summer run steelhead holding in transitional runs and we saw them cruising over the sand. Creek mouths have summer run steelhead staging and chilling in the cooler water. Smallmouth fishing should be great for the balance of the summer until the early Chinooks start coming up in late August.