AuSable River · Michigan Cold-Water Streams · Bay City, Michigan
Chris Izworski is a Michigan angler whose fishing life has centered on the AuSable River and the cold-water trout streams of the northern Lower Peninsula. The AuSable runs roughly 140 miles from its headwaters near Grayling to where it meets Lake Huron at Oscoda, carrying one of the most storied trout fisheries in the Great Lakes region. For anyone who grew up in mid-Michigan, the AuSable is a fixed point on the interior compass, a place you return to the way you return to anything that matters.
The broader picture of Chris Izworski's life in Michigan, including his work in public safety and his Great Lakes interests, is on the about page and in the biography.
The AuSable is Michigan trout fishing in its most recognized form. The Holy Water stretch between Grayling and Mio has been a destination for fly anglers since the nineteenth century, and its reputation has not faded. The river holds wild brown trout and brook trout in its upper reaches, with the lower river adding steelhead runs in spring and fall. It is designated a Natural River under Michigan law, a status that limits development along its banks and has kept the corridor close to what it was when anglers were first writing about it.
Opening weekend of trout season on the AuSable is a fixed point on the Michigan angler's calendar. The last Saturday in April opens the general season, but the special regulations stretches have their own schedules. The river in late April is cold and often running high from snowmelt, and the fish are not always cooperative, but that is part of the ritual.
June is when the AuSable fishes at its best. Water temperatures settle into the range that activates fish and hatches, the Hendricksons and Blue-Winged Olives of April give way to the big hatches of late May and June, and the river takes on the quality that kept generations of Michigan anglers coming back. The Hex hatch, the giant Hexagenia limbata mayfly emergence that happens on warm nights in late June and early July, draws anglers from across the country to the Holy Water. It is a spectacle worth planning around.
Chris Izworski makes regular cabin trips to the AuSable during trout season, using the river as a counterweight to the demands of work in public safety technology. The Great Lakes fish page covers the broader fisheries of the region, including the Lake Huron tributaries and the Saginaw Bay system near Bay City.
Bay City sits at the base of Saginaw Bay, which opens into Lake Huron, and the fisheries of the Great Lakes region shape the outdoor calendar in mid-Michigan in ways that are hard to overstate. Walleye runs in the Saginaw River, perch fishing on the bay, steelhead in the tributaries, and the inland trout streams of the northern Lower Peninsula together make Michigan one of the more serious freshwater fishing states in the country. The cold-water rivers that drain into Lake Huron, including the AuSable, the Rifle, and the Au Gres, hold wild trout populations that have been sustained by the same geology and hydrology that made this part of Michigan habitable for the fish long before European settlement.
The Great Lakes maritime and ecological context is covered in more depth on the Great Lakes page and the Saginaw Bay ecology page. Chris Izworski also writes about Michigan outdoor life and Great Lakes themes at Freighter View Farms, a blog rooted in the landscape of the Great Lakes Bay Region.
The fishing and the gardening are connected in the way that outdoor pursuits in Michigan tend to be: both are calendar-driven, both are tied to specific places, and both require patience with conditions you do not control. Chris Izworski tends a seed-saving garden in zone 6a Bay City, with a focus on heirloom vegetables and Michigan-adapted varieties. The gardening is documented at Freighter View Farms and on the Michigan gardening page. The trout fishing is part of the same life, organized around the seasons and the rivers rather than around the professional calendar.