The Grand river alsom boasts mre then incidental smallmouth action throughout the summer, making for a nice pre-steelhead warm up to the main event.
But as the day's shorten and the water drops below 70 degrees, anglers' attention switches to upward movement of the action packed steelhead. Besides the Little Manistee strain there are strays from
Pennsylvania,
Michigan and
New York, as well as natural reproduction from many Grand feeder streams.
Grand’s levels oscillate greatly from snow and rain, run off can result in furious conditions making it unfishable, sometimes a week needs to pass before optimum levels are in place. Optimum levels might only last a few days, before dropping too low. Never flowing crystal clear, slightly stained water seems to give
Grand River steelies an unusual boldness, and allows anglers to use stout tippet, and perhaps slightly more aggressive techniques.
Warmer water, above 40 degrees in early fall and early spring, try swinging streamers such as buggers and zonkers. As water cools later in fall dead drifting eggs and beadhead nymphs along the bottom to metabolically slower fish is the best bet, Tandem patterns are also popular with a streamer and an egg. The
Grand River has healthy populations of golden stones, green caddis, crayfish and sculpins.
The Little Manistee spring run usually begins in early March with April and May being the best time. There are a lot of fish in the river during this time with spawned out and hungry returning fish also in the river.
