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Trout fishing near Wausau, Wisconsin

Last updated 2026-09-24 · water classified by WDNR

WDNR classifies 170 named streams as trout water within 40 miles of Wausau, Wisconsin — 1360.6 miles of it inside that circle. The most of it is Prairie River, 15 miles out, with 51 classified miles that WDNR classifies Class I. The closest is Prairie River at 15 miles. A classification is WDNR's statement about the water, not a record of a fish in it and not permission to stand on the bank — check access and the current regulations before you go.

The trout water within 40 miles of Wausau

Ranked by how much classified water lies inside the circle, and by nothing else. Distance is a straight line to the nearest point of the stream rather than to its middle, because the question is how far you drive before you can park — this app carries no road network and will not print a drive time it cannot compute. A stream that runs out of the circle is counted for the part that is inside it, never for its whole length.

Stream Miles out Classified miles WDNR class Size Thermal class
Prairie River 15 51 Class I medium stream 100% cold
Middle Branch Embarrass River part of the stream 24.1 49.1 Class II small stream 100% cold
Plover River 15.3 36.3 mixed Class II 43%, Class I 37%, Class III 20% small stream 80% cold, 20% cool
North Branch Embarrass River part of the stream 25.8 30.5 Class I small stream 83% cold, 17% cool
Little Wolf River 20.5 29.4 Class II medium stream 100% cold
West Branch Red River 27 29.3 Class I medium stream 100% cold
West Branch Eau Claire River 22.7 27.6 Class II medium stream 100% cold
Comet Creek 19.5 26.3 Class I small stream 100% cold

170 named streams clear the circle in all and the 8 holding the most classified water are named. The rest carry less water than something a reader would pass on the way to it.

A stream marked part of the stream carries classified water outside the circle too, and the mileage here is only what is inside it. The thermal class is published by WDNR, and it describes the reaches inside the circle rather than the whole stream.

What WDNR is saying, and what it is not

Every row above is on the list because Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources publishes a trout classification — Class I, II or III — per segment. That is WDNR saying it classifies and manages the segment as trout water, and which of the three classes it puts it in. It is not a record of a fish caught there, it is not a promise about any particular day, and it is not permission to walk to the bank — the land beside a classified stream can be private, and in most of these five states most of it is.

No species are named on this page. Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources classifies the water and does not publish which trout a segment holds, and this site will not put a fish in a named creek on its own authority. The classes above are what the state does say.

Where you can get to the water

Named public access standing on classified coldwater within 40 miles, nearest first. Each of these has a page of its own here, and that page says which list it came from — one of the five agencies, or OpenStreetMap, which is where most of the bridges and two-tracks a trout fisherman actually parks at are recorded. A site being on this list is not a claim about who owns the bank on either side of it, and the water named beside it is the classified reach the site stands nearest to rather than the one it is named for.

25 of them are in range and the 10 nearest are named.

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Open this water on the map →Every reach around it coloured by today's water temperature, with the access points along it.