Sturgeon (Menominee R. trib.)

Spring scouting trip. Water was really high. Looking at the gauge now, it was on its way up to the highest for the year, e.g. 1990. Too beefy to run. There did not seem to be a good line through the lower section.

There is a nice hole on the river right channel offering play at 372cfs. Possibly sticky at high/er levels. Followed by a few 2-3 foot ledges and a small but fun wave near the end of this section.

I received these photos from another boater (not recalling who right now) and figured they should be shared. They show the tail-end of the dam removal process.

In 2006 Ran at 1600 cfs. Carried up from the take out to about 1 mile above where the dam used to be just above a narrow dells. (The point where the canyon pretty much ends) and ran back to the parking lot. At 1600 cfs this run is a hoot! But be cautious to search for logs. During our run the rapid where the dam used to be had logs choking the main channel to river right so we had to take the river left channel. There are 3 holes at the end of the rapids that look pretty munchy. In fact 2 of our group got stuck in the bottom most hole on river right and kept them for a while before finally flushing them.

In 2007 Ran at same level and holes at end of run are now more like big waves and not so keepy. The river right channel just below where the dam used to be was log free, but looked low head damish. We took the river left channel again.

Myself and three others paddled this yesterday. It has

a very dramatic inner gorge with high banks of sand.

The re-bar appears to be gone and so is the dam, but

watch out for logs. We put in from a wooden bridge

off of G69. This gave us a long flatwater approach.

Although it was very scenic, and even had a little dells,

most whitewater paddlers will want to just carry up

and only run the whitewater.

The dam as it appeared before the
removal project in 2003.