wisconsin's coho salmon are running

King salmon are still present in Wisconsin's Lake Michigan tribs but their numbers have seriously declined from the pinnacle of their run earlier this fall. Most of the early running kings have already spawned and since then, died. Their stinky corpses pile up in the slack water and it gives a good indication of just how far into their run we are. Late running kings are still present and some can still be quite fresh but look for them in smaller numbers.

With a good portion of the kings gone the cohos now have plenty of access to the spawning gravel. The mild rain we experienced last week was just enough to stimulate a run of fresh coho salmon into the Oak Creek in Milwaukee Wisconsin.The coho are active enough to chase a fly on a fast strip or move to hit a fly on a dead drift. Look for these salmon to be active for the next few weeks taking into consideration the flows.

This coho was taken on a heavily weighted streamer retrieved at a lightning speed. She hit from the darkness of a deep pool and her power was tremendous.She took two very impressive runs leaving me with some serious slack line when the fish came racing back towards me. But, it was my day, and I got the best of her. She was beached in just a few short (but adrenaline pumping) minutes. Neal made his way over just in time to squeeze in a photo.

an oak creek fresh female coho on the strip