With the school year coming to an end, many people enjoy leisure activities. Little is better than relaxing on one of the many nearby rivers or lakes while fishing.With so many places to fish, and so many big fish to be caught – Michiana offers a variety of opportunities for fisherman looking to catch  walleye, Northern Pike, muskie, steelhead, different types of salmon, smallmouth bass, and massive blue and flathead catfish.

Some are more elusive and rarer than others. The easiest ones to catch are smallmouth bass. With smallmouth you just need to find rocks on the bank of the river and throw a lure right toward them. If there is a smallmouth there, it will most likely bite as they are highly aggressive. The others are a little trickier requiring a boat, or local knowledge of the area.

Catfish are weird, because they will not actively go out of their way to take your lure, so you need to give them something they want. Most people will either use something that smells really bad, such as chicken liver, or they’ll use a live fish and let it swim around. You need to find one of their holes that they like to hide in, and cast your bait close to it, and then just let it sit. It is not the most exciting type of fishing, but when you hook one it’s a lot of fun because they are usually big and they fight hard.

With pike you need to find the type of weeds they like to hide in, and this can be tricky. Once you find it though, you really just need to throw something shiny, and most of the time a pike will attack it because they are highly aggressive. They are fun to catch and they usually get really big.

Walleye are also hard to catch in the river as they change where they are at a lot. To find them you need to find a shelf that comes up really fast, after being deep. This is where they will be at, and once you find this put a jig and minnow on and just jig over the shelf.

Muskie are the hardest to catch as they are one of the most elusive fish in the world. They are known as the fish of 10,000 casts and many fisherman dream of catching them. Like pike you need to find the weeds they like to be in, and then cast a bucktail over it. You will most likely not catch one right away, as they like to follow your lure, and this will get your heart racing. When they follow it, you need to keep them interested so start doing figure eight motions around the boat, and try and keep its attention until it bites. This fishing usually requires a lot of casting, but when you catch one it is the best feeling in the world.

Remember to have your fishing license if you are 18 or older and plan to fish.