River Report, June 17, 2020

The Old Au Sable Fly Shop Fishing Report We’ve got our last cold front of the season behind us—we hope.  Fishing shut down for a few days, but now we should be back on track for the goodness of June. The Manistee has some fine brown drake nights in the bug forecast.  And the Au … Read more

River Report June 1, 2020

The Old Au Sable Fly Shop Fishing Report. It’s finally June. The trials and tribulations of May are behind us. High water is giving way to clearer, more fishable conditions. And, best of all, the drakes are started. Anglers can find gray drakes on most of our waters and brown drakes have exploded on area … Read more

River Report May 21, 2020

The Old Au Sable Fly Shop Fishing Report. The River just keeps on flowing unconcerned about what we’re doing and unconcerned with what we want to happen. Hendricksons have largely moved through the system, but I surely wouldn’t go to the river without some parachutes and I’d be looking for Hendrickson spinners at dusk.  We’re … Read more

River Report May 7, 2020

The Old Au Sable Fly Shop Fishing Report For all of the most obvious reasons this has been the strangest Spring ever witnessed on the Au Sable River. We’re all in lockdown and our lives are dynamically changed. And though I am in no way tone deaf to the situation, I was doing my best … Read more

OPENING DAY 2020

April 23, 2020 OPENING DAY The Old Au Sable Fly Shop Fishing Report It’s nearly impossible to believe that this is already the Opening Week of trout season.  Yet, it feels like a long time coming. Home for many weeks during this long, lingering early-Spring, life has ebbed between accomplishment and adventure and wasted time … Read more

River Report April 14, 2020

The Old Au Sable Fly Shop Fishing Report Ponds are alive with croaks and creaks and peepers are peeping. Fish are moving around the rivers and into the shallow bays and shelves on area lakes. The songbirds are cheerfully back on sunshine mornings. An occasional trout is eating an occasional fly from the surface of … Read more

River Report – August 21, 2019

The Old Au Sable Fly Shop Fishing Report This has been the finest August I can remember – cool nights and warm days. Michigan has the best weather in the country right now.  And fishing is, well, really pretty good for late Summer.  Water temperatures and flows are solid, so daytime angling is alright.  Tricos … Read more

River Report – July 29,2019

The Old Au Sable Fly Shop Fishing Report Somehow the world has turned enough to put us right into August.  Understanding where Summer started to slip away is a head scratcher.  Seems like we just got started and already we’re only weeks from September. I guess it’s because everything in our trout fishing world took … Read more

River Report – July 17, 2019

The Old Au Sable Fly Shop Fishing Report Well I guess we have to call the Hex Hatch finished for 2019. Sort of anyway.  Our insect hatches never turn of like a light switch; instead, they sort of linger and nag at anglers like a leaky faucet.  It’s hard not to pull on damp, mildewed … Read more

River Report – July 10, 2019

The Old Au Sable Fly Shop Fishing Report Hex have blown up on the Au Sable since the last report. While it certainly isn’t over yet on the Au Sable it is well past peak emergence.  The bugs will be less consistent than they have been over the last week, but nice fish will continue … Read more