Pike Eats Trout
I sort of feel bad for the little trout, but the footage is amazing so thank you little trout for sacrificing yourself for this video clip. Check out the link below.
Jumping Brown Trout Video
This short clip below has me thinking of warmer times, looking forward to the upcoming trout season. Even though right now it feels so far away. Big week this week for tying and hope to generate some good content video wise. I know we will be tying a few good foam patterns for the July / August foam hatch. Make sure to come back to links. In the mean time a little video for ya. See if you can see the brown trout hunting down the dragonfly before it jumps.
Thank you 2018
Thank you 2018 it was a great year, a few of our most liked Images from our Instagram account. Looking forward to 2019 as we have a new lens to play with (more about that soon) and hoping to get back into the underwater game a little bit more. Thank you to all for all the follows and likes. See you on the water in 2019.
Jon Ray
Brown Trout Eating Something
Brown Trout Eating Minnows
Been a fun fall of shooting Mother Nature dining out. Started with the Heron and Pike images. Now here is another image of the cycle of life. Had the opportunity to fish below Tippy Dam for Brown Trout. While working on a few patterns that that we will be adding to the Hawkins YouTube channel here this winter. I shot some video of the flies in action and then extracted this still image of the brown trout showing off his main meal, with my small dinner mint sized fly in his mouth.
What minnow did this Brown Trout eat?
Big Brown on the Muskegon – Pic of the Day
Most years Kevin Feenstra will post some sort of Monster Lake-Run Brown he has guided too and this year is no different great job Kevin. Awesome fish. Make sure to follow Kevin on Instagram for more amazing images. Also click the link to see both images of this enormous Lake-Run Brown Trout.
Two Great Blue Herons eating Pike
Had the opportunity to shoot two different Great Blue Herons enjoying a shore side lunch this week. I have never seen this before a Heron eating a Pike, but in less that one week it happened on two separate occasions.
Great Blue Herons now have my attention to say the least with how they hunt and how effective they are. They can really do a number on a fishery. I thought they really only targeted smaller fish and smaller amphibians. But that is not the case.
Down the hatch it goes, another Pike meets his maker.
Blue Heron trying to figure out how to slurp down a pike.
2018 XL Steelhead
XL Steelhead
I like to think of the steelhead season like a hockey game. It has three periods to the game, that last a total of 6-7 months. Period one is the Fall-Run, then Winter Steelhead, and the final period is Spring Steelhead. In the first period of this game, the Fall Run we have had some XL sized Steelhead show up. In my personal experience fishing the Manistee River, we had some epic battles with steelhead. These battle would make your cry on one hand, and almost laugh on another. The pure strength , speed, and power of these fish left my anglers helpless, and these XL steelhead finished them off so quickly that we didn’t even know what happened. I relate this too a UFC Fight. Round 1 first 10 sec TKO.
Steelhead Guides
But two of my fellow Steelhead Guides had the opportunity of landing two extremely large steelhead. Fellow Guides and Scott Fly Rod Pro’s. Kevin Feenstra and Brad Petzke shared these images and my mouth dropped. Kevin’s fish came from the Muskegon River on a swung fly. One of his Halloween Leech patterns. (FYI now available commercially for sale)
20 pound Steelhead caught on the Muskegon River
The second fish of XL size was shared by Brad Petzke who guides the Upper Peninsula in Michigan, less is known about this fish as Brad works really hard to find steelhead hot spots so we are going to respect that and provide no additional details. But if your looking to fish the UP you have to give Brad a call. I’m not sure if this steelhead was eating baitfish out of the Great Lakes, or Big Macs at McDonalds. The girth on this fish is very impressive. Great job Brad and thank you for sharing.
Amazing Steelhead from the UP in Michigan
Second Period
I look forward to the second period as winter steelhead fishing probably provides one of the best opportunities to land a XL Steelhead. With water temps dropping these big Boyz don’t have full speed anymore. Still have plenty of power to pull us all into deep timber but, the best chance to land a XL is starting now. Stay tuned hopefully for more XL Steelhead pics to come.
Pic of the Day – 2018 Fall Steelhead Run
The 2018 Fall Steelhead run has begun, so far size of the fish is very impressive. Looking forward to the next 2 months. Make sure to check out the fishing reports for the Manistee River and the Muskegon River for more pictures and updated information. Hope to see you out there, have a great fall.
Pic of the Day – Swing Hat and Kings
Joe Custer with his lucky Mangled Fly Swing Hat ( will be restocking this item soon!) sent in this pic from a recent trip to BC staying at the Dean lodge at BCWest with Deneki Outdoors.
If this trip interests you contact Kara Knight is lodge manager.
Shane McKay is head guide and in the picture with Joe.
Nice work Joe!
Booking Smallmouth Trips on Traverse Bay
Grand Traverse Bay Smallmouth Bass