Big Sable River Lake Run — Salmon, Steelhead, Brown Trout

First runners · Chinook salmon as of 1 October 2026

1.1 miles of run water on the Big Sable River, from Lake Michigan up to Hamlin Dam. 4 species run it, on windows curated from MDNR guidance.

Open this river in the app

The run corridor The mouth Hamlin Dam — the run stops here

The colour is this river's run stage today, read off MDNR run-timing guidance. Where along the corridor the fish are is not modelled here — only the sixteen rivers the staging estimator covers carry that. Drawn 1 October 2026, north up, and it is a map of the river rather than of the lake it runs from.

1.1corridor miles
2NHD reaches
4species that run
Lake Michiganthe lake they come from

The Big Sable's run corridor is 1.1 miles long and two NHD reaches deep, ending at Hamlin Dam — the outlet of Hamlin Lake. That ceiling comes from OpenStreetMap way 909209148, waterway=dam, rather than the EGLE inventory, which does not list it under that name; the same standard already carries Ocqueoc Falls in this site's own river records, a named and mapped structure. There is no pier zone here: the river mouth runs 0.0 to 0.53 and the lower river 0.53 to 1.05. No state boating access sites are recorded in the corridor.

Four Lake Michigan fish use that short piece of water. Chinook stage off the harbour through August and enter as the river cools, Aug–Oct with an October peak. Coho overlap them and hold later, Sept–Nov. Lake-run browns run with the salmon and stay after them, peaking October. Steelhead carry two runs on one calendar, Oct–May, peaking March into April. The windows are month-grained agency guidance.

The questions about this river

One page each, answered from the same records as this one.

What runs the Big Sable River

Each window is calendar guidance curated from the state's own run-timing prose, not a regulation and not an observation. The stage beside it is this site's reading of that window against 1 October 2026.

Chinook salmon — Aug–Oct peak Oct First runners. Fish stage off the harbour through August and enter as the river cools; the run peaks in October.
Coho salmon — Sept–Nov peak Oct–Nov First runners. Overlaps the chinook run and holds later; peak October and November.
Lake-run brown trout — Sept–Nov peak Oct First runners. Runs with the salmon and stays after them; peak October.
Steelhead — Oct–May peak Mar–Apr Staging, 1 day out. Two runs on one calendar — a fall push from October that winters in the river, and the spring run that peaks March through April.

The ceiling

Hamlin Dam is where the run stops. Everything above it is upstream of the fishery — a fish cannot pass it, so the water above holds resident trout and not run fish, whatever the calendar says.

OpenStreetMap way 909209148, waterway=dam, name 'Hamlin Dam' — the outlet of Hamlin Lake. Not in the EGLE inventory under that name; OpenStreetMap is the standard Ocqueoc Falls is held to as well, and for the same reason: a named, mapped structure.

The run water, mouth to ceiling

Zone	What it is	River miles
Mouth	the river mouth	0.0–0.5
Lower	the lower river	0.5–1.1

River miles from the harbour mouth, walked up the NHDPlus HR mainstem. Fish arrive at the bottom of this table and work up it as the river cools and rises.

Access

No state boating access site falls inside this corridor's box. That is the record saying nothing, not this page saying there is no way in — the public land layer on the live map is the better answer for a river fished from the bank.

Open the Big Sable River on the live map →
The Big Sable River river page — gauges, temperature and regulations by reach →

Regulations

Great Lakes tributary rules are their own rules: seasons, gear and possession on run water differ from the inland trout regulations, and they differ by river and often by reach. Michigan's regulation summary is here, and the state's own guide is the regulation.

Tackle

General guidance by species, not by river — there is no record of what a given river fishes best with, and a page that invented one would be worse than a page that says so.

Chinook salmon Spinning: a medium-heavy 8'6"–9' rod, 15–20 lb line, heavy spoons and crankbaits off the pier, skein or spawn under a float in the river.
Coho salmon Spinning: a medium 7'–8'6" rod, 10–14 lb line, small spoons and spinners. Coho chase, and a moving bait outfishes a still one.
Lake-run brown trout Spinning: a medium 7'–8' rod, 8–12 lb line, minnow plugs and spoons fished at dusk and after dark, which is when these fish move.
Steelhead Float fishing: a long 10'6"–13' rod, 8–12 lb main line, spawn bags, beads or jigs under a slip float — the method that covers a run without wading it.

Nearby run rivers

The next corridors up and down this shore, nearest first.

The rest of the run

Open the lake-run map →Every run river, with where the fish are holding today.Or get BirdTrout on the App Store