2024 Road Trip on Menominee River

[asherman]

Thanks for everyone that participated in this event.

 

[Dick G]

The dates shown on this post are a little confusing. Near the top it says August 3-18  2023  in bold black letters. In the second week of available days the dates jump from Wednesday 8-14 to Thursday 8-19 and Friday 8-20.  The real dates should be August 3-16,  2024.  These incorrect dates have been up on this post since last August. Time to change them?

[Ben K.]

8/6 - 8/9 sounds great! Just sent over the deposit. 

[Dick G]

I'll take the Monday and Tuesday,  August 19th and August 20th. Are there more dates available that week?

[ericg]

I will take tues thru fri  8/6 -8/9

Eric

[asherman]

Eric,

I have you down for those dates.  We need a $50 deposit.  You can pay via PayPal tor Zelle to isaliance2@gmail.com or you can mail a check to:

Illinois Smallmouth Alliance

895 Garden Ln

Wheeling IL 60090

 

[asherman]

Dick,

Unless we get a bunch of signups for the 2nd week, we will have to cancel the entire second week.

[Jason K]

Hello Folk!  Jason from Tinker’s Dam here.  The eagles are doing their best to eat their fill from shore but I expect there will be some left for all of you.  I took this from pic a few weeks back from the shore of the cottage next door.  
I am starting to get friends and family asking about August availability for the house. I hope that the ISA can fill the 2nd week as I really enjoy talking fishing and seeing your successes on the update post.  I’d like to know by Memorial Day if you’ll have enough people set up to enjoy it.  
Thank-you, Jason Kupkovits 

[Jesse pniewski]

I'll take 3,4,5 dates. Deposit will be sent 6/8/2024.

[Jesse pniewski]

Scratch that. I see payment must be in full. Check email @asherman

[Terry Dodge]

Kevin D. got a 19.9”. 

[ericg]

[ericg]

That jacket was at the cabin when we left today, is it from a club member?

[Jason K]

That’s the owner’s (mine).  I was looking forward to some running play by play on the trip.  How did you guys do this year? Anyone catch a 20” + smallie? Any good Walleyes?  My son caught a. 20” two weeks earlier about 4 miles south of the house. 

Any issues with the house? 

[ericg]

[ericg]

Picture is the second 20” of my life. (First one was at last years Menominee trip).

got it on a hula grub on the bottom by a drop-off on Friday.

[Terry Dodge]

7 hours ago, Jason K said:

That’s the owner’s (mine).  I was looking forward to some running play by play on the trip.  How did you guys do this year? Anyone catch a 20” + smallie? Any good Walleyes?  My son caught a. 20” two weeks earlier about 4 miles south of the house. 

Any issues with the house? 

Jason, the cabin is very nice and the fish as great as ever. I did not land a 20” but te two guys I hung with did and they did hook into some tasty walleye. 
 

Zoom in on the door…

[Kev-mo]

22 hours ago, Jason K said:

That’s the owner’s (mine).  I was looking forward to some running play by play on the trip.  How did you guys do this year? Anyone catch a 20” + smallie? Any good Walleyes?  My son caught a. 20” two weeks earlier about 4 miles south of the house. 

Any issues with the house? 

 

Hi Jason.

That's a beautiful fish your son is holding. Sorry no play by play this year. Some people post reports from the trip under this thread and others start a new thread in the "Out of State Fishing Reports" thread. I'll be posting some of my trip experiences in one of them sometime during the week. Personally this trip ranks as one of my top trips. Two fish over 20 with the last one coming Saturday morning on one last quick wade before I headed home.

The only "issue" with the house the house that I encountered was that the switch for the light/fan in the upstairs bathroom is finicky. Sometimes when turning it on nothing would happen and you would have to jiggle it a little or flip it back and forth to make it work. Either something is loose or the switch might need replacing.

The house and property are amazing and we truly appreciate being able to spend time up there each year!!!!

Kevin

[Corey Steffen]

Love to see all the pics, and looking forward to hearing more details in the coming days as folks have time to post details

[Paul Trybul]

Jason,
The house was excellent and it had everything we needed. The location is great from a fishing standpoint.  There is good wade fishing just upstream and downstream from the  house.  It also is in the middle of 2 nice access spots breaking it up into 4 or 2 mile floats. Personally I like to go slow and pick the water apart so that works out great. 

I was part of the first crew and drove up with Terry Dodge and Kevin C.  We hung out and fished together as a group and had Dave partner along a few times.  This is my 4th trip up there and this was the lowest and clearest water I've experienced.  It made for some of the most consistent fishing I've experienced up there.  I like to wade or fish out of a small kayak so low and clear is my preference.  Those fishing out of bigger boats may not share that preference.  It was very warm the first 2 days up there and we had water temps in the low 80's.  This made for an outstanding topwater bite.  i started out with a whopper plopper but Kevin C was doing even better on the chopcut jr.  On the 2nd day Kevin raised more giant smallmouth than I've ever seen go after a topwater in a day. Now raising them to the surface and catching them are two different things.  He still caught quite a few. For me it was a steady 30-40 smallmouth per day with some walleye and pike mixed in.  Keep in mind we had good weather, good conditions and I put the time in floating 4 miles and fishing 7+ hours every day.  I caught at least a 19" smallmouth every day and had a 20" & 20.25"  along with a walleye around 22".  I saw enough of that chop cut jr bite and used it the last 2 days were I caught my biggest. I know Kevin caught a 20.5" along with several 19's. It was Kevin's first time up there and there was no learning curve.  He immediately started catching fish with the first things he tried and his day 2 was like nothing I've ever witnessed before.  Here are some pics of our better fish.  I didn't get a good pic of the first 20" I caught so the 2nd pick was just a nice healthy 19".

[Corey Steffen]

Awesome pics!   Thanks for posting.   Some year I gotta find a way to make the trip.

[Paul Trybul]

I'm going to share with the group a big fish pattern I've figured out on the Menominee during lower water.  I first noticed it last year and really focused on it this year. 3 of the 4 Brutus class fish I've caught in the past 2 trips up there have come on this pattern.  There is quite a bit of this type of structure on this river and I feel like it originates from all the logging and thousands of logs that have been floated down this river.  They've formed a bit of a dredged drop off in the rocks near the main current flow.  The best ones typically have a large shallow flat off the shore usually less than a foot deep. This can extent 10 yards or more from the shore.  Then a sudden drop off into the main channel with good current flow.  The fish will hang out along this drop off.  I bomb long cast down river with a prop style topwater like a whopper plopper or a chop cut jr then slowly bring it up river against the current.  It hovers and moves slowly over the bass and that prop gurgle seems to be too much for these top end predators to resist.  It really triggered some violent strikes. Then you have to hang on because they typically run you right into the heavy current in the main channel. I'm no artist but I drew a cross section of the river and imagine you're facing down river with the current flow, 

[Kev-mo]

Agreed ^^^^^^

[Kev-mo]

Here's some pics and stories from my trip. I stayed all week and I this is my 7th trip. The first couple of years were a learning curve but I have good confidence now. Seems like my trips start slow. Not sure if this is due the company of good sticks or me just acclimating. I usually have a better topwater bite but I think my timing was off on some days. 

My biggest three fish went 19.99, 20.25 and 20..5 and that was also the order in which they were caught. The 19.99 came on a whopper plopper Sunday night. It was right up on shore. Basically take Paul's fish above and put it next to the reed. Tried a couple times to make it 20 but it wasn't happening. My 20.25  came on Monday night in some fast water. I just floating through randomly tossing the plopper. I had a fish hit after like one or two reels. Initially it felt like it was only about 14 inches or so. However after it figured out there was hook in it's mouth it breached about 2 foot out of the water. I'm sure an expletive of some sort was uttered..... then began a 50-75 yard roller coaster ride down downriver with the fish surging towards the bottom and breaching a few more times. I was just hanging on trying to keep her off the bottom and not crash. For those that anchor or stick a foot out you should experience the roller coaster once. This is probably my 5th or 6th ride and believe me the adrenalin rush is addictive!! I spied an area in which it looked like I could hop out and try to corral this fish into my net. I somehow managed to jump out at the perfect spot where two rocks held my kayak without me needing to hold it. This fish jumped one or two more times and on the last jump I could see only one hook of four was between me and heartbreak. Finally got her in the net and we both chilled while our heart rates got back to normal.

My best day was a weather day/Thursday. Several of us set off downstream around 8-8:30 am. It started to rain after I launched and it started coming down hard enough to send me under a tree for the next 30-45 minutes. Once it let up I continued my float. This also the day that I started to anchor after figuring out how my system was supposed to work. I dislike catch phrases but anchoring is a game changer. Between anchoring, floating, paddling back up some eddies and catching I spent about 12 hours on this section. I had my best day ever. About 30 fish were caught including 3 at 19 or better, 7 at 18 or better and 3 at 17 or better. All plastic drifted in the current.

My biggest fish came Saturday morning. I decided to wade for about an hour before I headed home. One last hurrah as it were. I think this fish hit on my third cast with the plopper. This was an older fish and a little light feeling for her length  but still put up a decent fight with a few breaches. I knew she was big but was not expecting 20.5.  I caught fish in areas as described by Paul, also tight to shore and anchoring allowed me to pick up fish mid river like I've watched Ken do the last several years. I was only able to anchor in some spots due the lower slower flow. 

Good to see everyone again! Looking forward to next year!

 

[Paul Trybul]

1 hour ago, Kev-mo said:

My 20.25  came on Monday night in some fast water. I just floating through randomly tossing the plopper. I had a fish hit after like one or two reels. Initially it felt like it was only about 14 inches or so. However after it figured out there was hook in it's mouth it breached about 2 foot out of the water. I'm sure an expletive of some sort was uttered..... then began a 50-75 yard roller coaster ride down downriver with the fish surging towards the bottom and breaching a few more times. I was just hanging on trying to keep her off the bottom and not crash. For those that anchor or stick a foot out you should experience the roller coaster once. This is probably my 5th or 6th ride and believe me the adrenalin rush is addictive!! I spied an area in which it looked like I could hop out and try to corral this fish into my net. I somehow managed to jump out at the perfect spot where two rocks held my kayak without me needing to hold it. This fish jumped one or two more times and on the last jump I could see only one hook of four was between me and heartbreak. Finally got her in the net and we both chilled while our heart rates got back to normal.

 

That's what I call your "A River Runs Through It"  moment . If you've seen the movie with Brad Pitt, you know what I'm talking about.  Had that with a musky down the rapids with Ben K a few summers ago.