Saturday, September 26, 2009

Early Firearm Season and 6th Street dam Grand Rapids






I haven't posted since small game opener. So on Thursday the 17th Andy and I went out to Stockbridge for the evening hunt of the early antlerless firearm deer season in selected areas hunt. When we got the and began walking out and seen a mother doe with two fawns, still spotted this early on, away they ran and to our stands we went. I was pleased to see that the winter and trespassers were nices to my equipment as it was all still there and very much intact. we ended up seeing 8 or 9 deer that evening. I eventually seen one nice lone doe without any kids trailing so I decided that I would take her. Well, there's a reason we responsible hunters make it into the woods pre-season to check out equipment and clear shooting lanes, because had I done so I would have taken a nice mature doe instead of taking off a branch in front of me as the deer ran off. That was right before dark, so we got down and made sure we couldn't find any blood from the deer and determined it a clean miss. We ended up hanging up the hunt for the night and headed home. It was nice to get out that early in the year and atleas we seen some deer. Only a few more days until the archery opener!



This past Thursday morn I decided to head up to Grand Rapids to pop my 6th street dam cherry. Upon arriving at this carnival that is urban salmon fishing I took it all in for a couple minutes while reading the river and the locals. I made my way into the river downstream from everyone and found what appeared to be a decent trough running on a perfect drifters angle down from me. Worked that run for a while, had one hook up with a small coho, I didn't fight it too hard in hopes that it would shake itself off with as little stress as possible, and it did. No other hooks ups in that area, or hits for that matter, made my way all around the river to see what I could produce. The fishing had to be better erlier in the am due to the full stringers I seen leaving when I arrived and the few fish I seen caught while I was there.

I made my way right up to the spillway and fished there with skein for a bit with no luck. I then switched over to hardware, threw a mid size smelt pattern hot n' tot and on the first retrieve I had a monster king crush it as I was pulling it from the water, a five or so minute fight between the two of us ensued before his narly teeth ended up cutting my 14lb mono and away he swam, a fellow tried to help me net it, but it was an unsuccessful attempt. It was definately a nice fish, the biggest that I have ever had on for that long and lost, every bit of 25lbs maybe closer to 30. oh well, so is life I suppose. I didn't have any luck after that and shortly packed up for home afterwards.

I will probably make it back there at some point, maybe next wednesday, but I may wait to get back into the water until my 6 days off I am gonna have in October from the 6th to the 12th when I plan on heading up to Mesick for a few days of bow hunting and salmon fishing, hoping that Ashley decides to come up once her weekend starts that way we can hike the stretch of the North Country Trail we had planned to hike back in July when she got sick up there. The run should be going pretty strong again by then whether it be on the Manistee or the Betsie. Would like to go back out on the big water with Craig again if he wants to go out, but if he wants to run the drift boat in the river I won't argue as long as I have someone to fish with I'll be happy.

so until next time, good luck and tight lines!
-Zach

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