BirdTrout
Reefer Creek, Wisconsin
15.8 mapped river miles, draining 12 square miles, in the Nemadji basin watershed. No gauge stands in it; the nearest is 4.1 miles away, and what this page knows about its temperature is Wisconsin DNR's classification of the water itself.
50°F and colder is cold, through cold-transitional and cool, to warm above 70°F — the same four bands, breaking at 58, 64 and 70°F, that the app paints. Grey is water nobody has measured.
The nearest live reading
The nearest gauge is 36.9 miles away, at Namekagon River At Leonards, Wi — not a reading of this water, but of what the region is doing today. A closer gauge has stopped reporting — USGS carries no water-temperature series for it at all, so no number here comes from it.
The pills above go to USGS. These are this site's pages for the same gauges — a thirty-day chart, the monthly means, the record, and today's reading against the five-year normal for today: 04026005.
The character of the water
Reefer Creek is Class I water under Wisconsin DNR, managed as wild, with 7.6 of its 15.9 NHD miles typed Cold — 48 per cent, and nothing classed otherwise. Just under half the creek is described by the classification and the rest is not covered by it. There is no gauge in it, though the nearest is unusually close: 4.1 miles off on the Bois Brule, which is another stream and reads only for itself. The creek is 7.9 feet across at the median, third order, draining 12.03 square miles over the 15.8 miles of axis mapped, which is essentially its whole NHD length. No block of public land in these files fronts it, no named tributary is recorded, and Wisconsin has no access file, so the class and the size are what this page can stand on.
Thermal classification
Wisconsin DNR's classification of this water, reach by reach. A class, not a temperature — no July mean, because none was measured here.
| Reach | Typed miles | Band | Wisconsin DNR type |
|---|---|---|---|
| RM 15.8–8.2 | 7.6 | cold | — |
Wisconsin DNR has classified 7.6 of the 15.9 miles NHD carries for this stream — 48% of it. Every typed reach carries the same class, cold. The untyped reaches are not warm water — they are water Wisconsin DNR's inventory does not reach, and the mile ranges above span only the reaches it does.
Questions about this river
- Reefer Creek fishing report — what it reads right now
- When to fish Reefer Creek — hatches, seasons and temperature
- Reefer Creek fishing regulations — season, size and gear by reach
Wisconsin DNR classification
Wisconsin DNR classifies this water as Class I. The management tier on those reaches is wild. This is a designation of the fishery, not the season and creel rules — those change yearly and live with the agency.
WDNR trout stream classification →
Species
Wisconsin DNR designates this as trout water — Class I — without naming the species. No fish survey or stocking record for this water is in the files this site reads.
Hatches on this water
42 insects are recorded from northern Wisconsin, which is the region this river sits in. That is a claim about the region and not a survey of this stream: nobody has recorded which of them has been caught here. Open the river in the app and the hatch panel will narrow it to the ones whose temperature window today's reading is inside.
| Insect | Peak | Water | Size |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fish Eggs Other |
October–January and April | 33–60°F | #10–16 |
| Little Brown Stonefly Taeniopteryx / Strophopteryx spp. |
February–April | 38–50°F | #12–16 |
| Blue-Winged Olive Baetis spp. |
March–May and September–November | 38–58°F | #16–22 |
| Blackfly Simulium spp. |
April–June | 40–65°F | #18–22 |
| Cranefly Tipula spp. |
April–June and September–October | 40–65°F | #6–10 |
| Grannom Brachycentrus spp. |
April–May | 48–58°F | #14–16 |
| Green Rock Worm / Green Weenie Rhyacophila spp. |
April–June and September–October | 45–68°F | #10–14 |
| Hendrickson Ephemerella subvaria |
April–May | 45–58°F | #12–14 |
| Alderfly Sialis spp. |
May–June | 52–66°F | #10–14 |
| Caterpillar Lepidoptera larvae |
May–September | 55–75°F | #8–14 |
| Crayfish Orconectes spp. |
May–October | 55–78°F | #4–8 |
| Giant Black Stonefly (Salmonfly) Pteronarcys dorsata |
May–June | 50–62°F | #4–6 |
| Green Sedge Rhyacophila spp. |
May–August | 48–64°F | #12–16 |
| Light Cahill Maccaffertium ithaca |
May–July | 55–68°F | #12–16 |
And 28 more — the year-round records, mostly: midges, scuds and sculpins, which are in the water every day and are therefore never the news.
Tributaries and watershed
Reefer Creek sits in HUC 8 04010301, the Nemadji basin, and drains 12 square miles, Strahler order 3 at the mouth. 14 NHD reaches carry the name for 15.9 miles in total — more than the 15.8 miles of drawn mainstem, because NHD counts side channels and braids as their own reaches.
Other water nearby
The closest 6 rivers on this site, straight-line from the middle of this one — not drive time.