(Editor’s note: Dick Smith is a long-time board member of SWMTU and avid fisherman. This article first appeared in Trout Talk.) By Dick Smith The carp come onto the long flat to feed and the smallmouths shadow them. Sometimes there will be two or three bass swimming along with a carp. Generally the bigger the...
Author: Dick Smith (Dick Smith)
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Fly fishing for pike
(Editor’s note: Dick Smith is a long-time board member of SWMTU and avid fisherman. This article first appeared in Trout Talk.) By Dick Smith The Grand River is famous for its big pike, but they are generally caught by accident by someone who is fishing for something else. Pike are very specialized predators. They hunt...
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Fly fishing for smallmouth bass
(Editor’s note: Dick Smith is a long-time board member of SWMTU and avid fisherman. This article first appeared in Trout Talk.) By Dick Smith In the second summer of their lives, when they are about 5 or 6 inches long, smallmouth bass begin to feed heavily on minnows, and for the rest of their lives...
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Floating soft hackles
(Editor’s note: Dick Smith is a long-time board member of SWMTU and avid fisherman. This article first appeared in Trout Talk.) By Dick Smith My friend Evert VanderWal spent a lot of the first summer after he retired fishing the Muskegon River. He fished almost every day and he developed a system of fishing soft...
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Nymph fishing for steelhead
(Editor’s note: Dick Smith is a long-time board member of SWMTU and avid fisherman. This article first appeared in Trout Talk.) By Dick Smith The farther upstream steelhead go, the more likely it is that small flies will be needed to catch them. If the water is very clear, or shallow, or cold, or the...
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Fishing streamers for steelhead
(Editor’s note: Dick Smith is a long-time board member of SWMTU and avid fisherman. This article first appeared in Trout Talk.) When steelhead come up the large rivers of Western Michigan in the fall, they are inclined to lie close to the bottom, near one of the main lines of current where they take up...
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Great Lakes Steelhead history and tactics
(Editor’s note: This article first appeared in an edition of Trout Talk. Dick Smith is a long-time board member of SWMTU and avid fisherman.) Steelhead have been in Michigan since 1876. Rainbow trout have been a spectacular success in the Great Lakes. A lot of Atlantic salmon were planted in Michigan streams before rainbow trout...