BirdTroutOpen the map Is the Popple River good for rainbow trout?
Yes, on the classification rather than on a thermometer. WDNR has stocked rainbow trout into the Popple River across 2 recorded plants, between 2024 and 2025, and WDNR classes most of its typed water as cool — but no USGS gauge on this river reports water temperature, so this site has no measured July mean to hold against the 55–65 °F band this fish wants. That is a stocking record and not a survey: it says WDNR put the fish in, not that anyone has since found one holding over. Fish of 8–16 inches are what Wisconsin reports as typical.
What the state's records say
- Species
- Rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss)
- In Wisconsin
- introduced
- Record here
- stocked — no survey record on this water
- Holds in
- 55–65 °F, stops feeding above 75 °F
- Typical
- 8–16 inches
- Spawns
- Spring — March into May — on gravel, which is what separates it from the two autumn spawners above.
Introduced, and the least widely reproducing of Wisconsin's three stream trout: stocked broadly, wild in a smaller share of the classified water than brown or brook.
Is the water cold enough
No USGS gauge on this river reports water temperature, so there is no measured July mean to put beside the species' band. WDNR's classification of the typed reaches is Cool, and that is a classification rather than a thermometer.
| Gauge | Now | July mean |
|---|---|---|
| POPPLE RIVER NEAR FENCE, WI | 59.0 °F | 70.9 °F |
What you may keep
Wisconsin DNR classifies this water as Class I, Class II, Class III. The management tier on those reaches is stocked, wild, wild supplemented. This is a designation of the fishery and not the season and creel rules.
WDNR trout stream classification → Wisconsin season and creel rules →
What to fish for it
- Fish Eggs — October–January and April, #10–16
- Little Brown Stonefly — February–April, #12–16
- Blue-Winged Olive — March–May and September–November, #16–22
- Blackfly — April–June, #18–22
- Cranefly — April–June and September–October, #6–10
- Grannom — April–May, #14–16
- Green Rock Worm / Green Weenie — April–June and September–October, #10–14
- Hendrickson — April–May, #12–14
The insects recorded from this river's region, earliest first. The full calendar →
More about Popple River
Popple River — live water temperature, regulations and access