A Small Amount

The Author with a nice brown caught in unrestricted waters on opening day.

Recently there’s been much discussion about the additional gear restrictions that just went into effect in the State of Michigan. Those who defend the restrictions often stand by the flawed argument that the restrictions only cover “a small amount” of the total trout water in the State of Michigan. Several holes are obvious in this premise. We’ve already found out that gear restrictions have no basis in biological science, but for now, let’s ignore that and explore the pitfalls in this “small amount” argument.

Special regulations defenders will tell you that gear restrictions are only applied to 1% of all of the available trout water. According to Trails to Trout there are a total of 12, 500 miles of trout stream in the state of Michigan. Currently, 186.5 miles of Michigan’s trout streams are gear restricted, so the math does indeed work out to about 1.5% of the water. However, also according to Trails to Trout, the DNR only designated 868 miles of Michigan’s trout streams as “Blue Ribbon.” Again from Trails to Trout a Blue Ribbon trout stream is our best waters as defined by this quote:

“Michigan is blessed with an abundance of cold, quality trout waters offering 38,000 plus miles of rivers and streams, including over 12,500 miles of classified trout streams. Remarkably, 868 miles are considered premier top-quality streams, which Michigan classifies as its Blue Ribbon Trout Streams (BRTS).

A Blue Ribbon Trout Stream must meet certain standards or criteria. It must be one of Michigan’s best trout streams, be able to support excellent stocks of wild resident trout, have the physical characteristics to permit fly casting but be shallow enough to wade, produce diverse insect life and good fly hatches, have earned a reputation for providing an excellent (quality) trout fishing experience, and have excellent water quality.”

Based on that definition, it’s pretty clear to see that the Blue Ribbon designation was reserved for the best of the best trout water in the state.
Now that we know what a blue ribbon trout stream is, here’s a detailed table that summarizes all the gear restricted mileage in the state of Michigan as is available on the DNR website here:

River Miles Designations

Au Sable (Burton’s Landing to South Wakeley) 9 miles – Blue Ribbon
Au Sable (South Wakeley to McMasters) 8 miles – Blue Ribbon
Au Sable (Mio power line to McKinley Bridge 15 miles – Blue Ribbon
Au Sable, North Branch (Sheep Ranch to Main) 20.7 miles – Blue Ribbon
Au Sable, South Branch (Chase to Lower High Banks) 4.3 miles – Blue Ribbon
Au Sable, South Branch (Lower High Banks to Main) 11.5 miles – Blue Ribbon
Black River (Tin Shanty to Town Corner Lake Stairs) 4.4 miles – Blue Ribbon
Cook’s Run (Hwy 16 to South Branch Paint River) 4.5 miles – Blue Ribbon
Duck Creek (RR to Middle Branch Ontonagon) 6.5 miles – Not blue ribbon
Escanaba River (Boney Falls to Mouth Silver Cr) 14.2 miles – Not blue ribbon
Fox River (Fox River Campground to M-28) 7.5 miles – Blue Ribbon
Huron River (Moss Lake Outlook to Wixom Rd) 2 miles – Not blue ribbon
Johnson Creek (Napier Rd to mid. Branch Rouge) 6 miles – Not blue ribbon
Little Manistee River (Spenser’s Bdg. to Johnson Rd) 7.5 miles – Blue Ribbon
Manistee River (612 to M-72) 9.2 miles – Blue Ribbon
Manistee River (M-72 to Subset Trail) 16.7 miles – Blue Ribbon
Paint Creek (Gunn Rd to Tienken Rd) 5 miles – Not blue ribbon
Paint River (Mouth Cooks Run to Mouth N. Br. Paint) 10 miles – Blue Ribbon
Pere Marquette (M-37 to Gleason’s Landing) 8.5 miles – Blue Ribbon
Pere Marquette (Gleason’s Landing to Rainbow Rapids) 10.5 Blue Ribbon
Pigeon River (Elk Hill Camp to Pine Grove Camp) 5.3 miles – Blue Ribbon

It’s easy to notice that almost all of the gear restricted water is on designated blue ribbon trout streams, which by the definition above are “one of Michigan’s best trout streams.” The total gear restricted mileage that is blue ribbon is 152.8 miles. That adds up to 17.6% of the total “Blue Ribbon” trout water. The small amount isn’t quite so small when you start to look at only the best water.

Let’s look at this from yet another angle. What if you live in Grayling, and you prefer to fish non-restricted trout waters? Where do you go? Well, 68.5 miles of the Au Sable are restricted. So instead of east, let’s go west. Now you’re looking at the upper Manistee. Yet, 25.9 miles of the upper Manistee are now gear restricted as well. Almost 100 miles of the gear restricted waters are within 50 miles of Grayling, so if you live in Grayling, you must travel long distances to find any non-restricted big water. These gear restrictions are not distributed equally across the state, and therefore put an undue burden on the non-restricted anglers in north-central Michigan.

Finally, today we have 186.5 miles of gear restrictions, but I don’t believe that the organized fly-fishing groups like Anglers of the Au Sable intend to stop there. Here’s a link to what they approached the DNR for in the winter of 2010: Anglers of the Au Sable’s Requested Gear Restrictions

As you can see it appears The Anglers are not content with just the Au Sable and have put a bull’s-eye on the upper Manistee system as well. This one well-organized fly fishing group asked for well over 100 miles of restrictions in one small geographic area. This says nothing of the 500 other nominations for gear restrictions totaling over 1300 miles that were received by the DNR from other groups and individuals all across the state.

You may still believe that gear restrictions are just a “small amount.” And you may believe that a “small amount” of gear restrictions are ok. But if think that there will never be another request for more gear restricted blue ribbon water, I’d be willing to give you 2:1 odds that you are wrong.