There is no USGS gauge on this river. No flow, no water temperature, no normal to compare against — not a fault, simply a river nobody measures. The run status below leans on the calendar and on dated reports instead, and says so where it does.
Public Access Points
Named Access Sites
Bear River Valley Recreation Areaentered from West Lake Street or Sheridan Street; the parking beneath the US-31 bridge; and Bayfront Park at the mouth
Run status is rebuilt twice a day from the live gauge and the DNR's own run windows. The windows are typical timing, not a forecast — what actually moves fish is water temperature and a rise, and the run tracker carries both for every river at once.
Kings Chinook Salmon
Tailing off
Typical: Aug 25 – Oct 25, peak Sep 15 – Oct 5
Pinks Pink Salmon
Tailing off
Typical: Aug 20 – Oct 15, peak Sep 8 – Sep 30
DNR reported pink salmon here in October 2025 alongside the chinook and coho. Pinks are odd-year dominant in Michigan, so an even year is thinner — but not empty, because some fish return at two years old and some at three.
Coho Coho Salmon
Building
Typical: Sep 10 – Nov 12, peak Sep 28 – Oct 25
Browns Lake-run Brown
Building
Typical: Sep 15 – Nov 15, peak Oct 1 – Oct 31
Steelhead Steelhead
First fish
Typical: Sep 25 – Apr 15, peak Oct 25 – Dec 20
DNR stocks about 5,000 yearling steelhead a year into the lower river, along with a thousand brown trout.
Upstream limit
Lake Street Dam, Petoskey Four of this river’s historic dams are gone. This one is not, and it still blocks the run close to the mouth — so the fishable water is a short stretch through downtown Petoskey. The whitewater park is above the dam and did not open passage. A study of what to do with the dam was still unresolved as of 2026.
Whose fish
Stocked
Access
Bear River Valley Recreation Area, entered from West Lake Street or Sheridan Street; the parking beneath the US-31 bridge; and Bayfront Park at the mouth. Wade and bank, in a short reach of pools and riffles dropping through town.
Crowding
Busy, and openly so. Anglers are on the mouth in downtown Petoskey through the run in every kind of weather, and the single-hook rule above the footbridge exists because of the pressure the dam pool attracts.
Regulations
Read this one twice. From the north edge of the footbridge above Lake Street up to the Lake Street Dam you are restricted to ONE single-pointed, unweighted hook no larger than half an inch from point to shank. That is an anti-snagging rule on a short, crowded dam pool and it is enforced. Above the footbridge the river is Type 4 water up to Walloon Lake.
What to throw
Small and legal. Single eggs and beads on a single unweighted hook in the restricted reach — weight goes on the leader, not the fly, and know the rule before you tie anything on.
DNR The state's weekly fishing report of Sep 30 named salmon on this water. Read the report.