FISHING REPORT 4/29- 5/5

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Fishing pressure is down...

Fishing pressure is dropped at just about every location we visited this week. Water levels continued to drop over the last weekend in April and are expected to stay low in clear through most of the week. Hopefully we should get some rain over the up in coming weekend.

The anglers out fishing are reporting average success rates on both Kamloops and steelhead at the Lester, French, Sucker and Knife rivers with yarn being the go to method. Seems as though not a lot of anglers are using flies these days on the lower rivers. As the temperatures rise we recommend digging a little deeper into your fly box. You can check out our "fly box" for some ideas if you are uncertain on what flies to use. As a rule of thumb, dull down the fly color as the rivers clear up. By the way, River temperatures are ranging from the upper 40s to the mid 50s and running clear.

We saw minimal fishing pressure on several middle shore rivers this week. The overcast conditions early in the week helped increase hook-ups with several anglers. Water levels continue to drop with temperatures peaking in the 50s.

Not to much action spotted in the Grand Marais area early in the week tough, Steelhead were reported caught from the Temperance, up to the Brule. Water levels are low and continue to drop...we need some rain! The smaller tributaries are really low with only a few fish visible if you are lucky. Water temperatures were in the mid 50s on the larger rivers.

As of Thursday, the DNR reports trap operations at the French River have counted a total of 64 unclipped steelhead, 13 clipped steelhead, and 581 Kamloops. The totals for the Knife River are 143 unclipped steelhead, 154 clipped steelhead and 21 Kamloops. The DNR also stated, "Anglers should be aware that there is a research study going on with archival tags recording temperature and depth implanted in Kamloops and steelhead. These fish will possess a tag printed with $50 reward for return, MNDNR Duluth, call 218-525-0853 x223. Anglers should return the whole fish, without freezing, so that we can obtain growth and diet information along with the tags".

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