BirdTrout

Upper St. Croix River Watershed, Wisconsin

1,134 miles of mapped stream across 2,026 square miles of drainage in Burnett, Douglas, Washburn, Bayfield, Polk counties, in 77 named streams. Wisconsin designates 241 of those miles as trout water, on 50 streams.

Open in BirdTrout
Map key
Public land — where the bank is open to walk and fish
USGS gauge — live water temperature
Water temperature — the colour of every stream in the basin

50°F and colder is cold, through cold-transitional and cool, to warm above 70°F — the same four bands the app paints. On this map the colour is Wisconsin DNR's own classification of the stream, not a measurement, except at the gauge dots, which read live. Grey is water Wisconsin DNR has not typed.

The watershed in numbers

HUC8 07030001 in the USGS Watershed Boundary Dataset. Every figure below adds up the river pages in this basin — same records, one basin at a time.

1,134 mi
of mapped stream
2,477 NHD reaches
2,026 sq mi
drainage area
1,296,636 acres
348,402 ac
public land
26.9% of the basin · 22 units

Cold, cool and warm water

WDNR's trout stream classification, which types the stream by the trout population it supports rather than by measuring the water — every reach it calls Class I, II or III carries WDNR's own cold designation. It covers 15% of this basin's stream miles (164.7 of 1,134); the rest is untyped and is drawn grey on the map above.

164.7 of the 164.7 typed miles in this basin — 100% — are cold or cold-transitional water. Every typed reach carries the same class, which is as likely to be the coverage as the water: Wisconsin DNR has typed 15% of it.

What makes this watershed distinctive

The Upper St. Croix drains 2,026 square miles of Burnett, Douglas, Washburn and Bayfield counties, and its designated water is a smaller share of the network than its northern neighbours': 241 miles on 50 of 77 named streams, out of 1,134 mapped miles, with 165 miles classified cold. The St. Croix itself runs 84.7 miles at Class III; the Clam River runs 56.4 and its North Fork 46.2, both carrying all three classes, and the Eau Claire River 30.2 miles at Class III. The Yellow River's 44.7 miles are undesignated. Public ground is 348,623 acres, the third-largest total in the state here, and it is county forest first: Douglas at 163,691 acres, Burnett at 73,883, with 31,602 acres of Chequamegon National Forest. No gauge in the basin holds a July temperature record.

Every named stream in the basin

All 77 of them, longest first. 36 have a page of their own and are linked; the rest are in the app. The class column is Wisconsin DNR's designation of that stream. "Now" is the live USGS reading where a gauge stands in that stream.

Stream Miles Class Now Designation
Saint Croix River 84.7 untyped — Class III
Clam River 56.4 untyped — Class I, Class II, Class III
North Fork Clam River 46.2 untyped — Class I, Class II, Class III
Yellow River 44.7 untyped — —
Eau Claire River 30.2 untyped — Class III
Chases Brook 26.3 untyped — —
Sand Creek 20.7 Cold — Class I, Class II
Moose River 19.3 untyped — —
Thompson Creek 14.0 untyped — Class III
Indian Creek 12.8 Cold — Class II
Bashaw Brook 12.0 untyped — —
Hay Creek 9.6 Cold — Class I
Beaver Brook 9.4 Cold — Class I
McKenzie Creek 9.2 Cold — Class I, Class II
Somers Creek 8.6 untyped — —
Leo Creek 7.7 Cold — Class II, Class III
Lord Creek 7.6 Cold — Class II
Sawyer Creek 7.6 Cold — Class I, Class II
Perkins Creek 7.4 Cold — Class I
Upper Ox Creek 7.2 Cold — Class II
Crystal Brook 7.1 Cold — Class I
Buckley Creek 6.7 Cold — Class II
Mud Creek 6.5 Cold — Class II
Dody Brook 6.5 Cold — Class I, Class II
Buckety Creek 6.4 Cold — Class II, Class III
South Fork Clam River 6.4 untyped — Class I
Knapp Creek 6.1 Cold — Class I
Rock Creek 5.6 untyped — Class III
East Fork Moose River 5.4 untyped — —
Sucker Creek 5.4 untyped — —
Lower Ox Creek 5.2 Cold — Class II, Class III
Mulligan Creek 5.2 untyped — Class III
Beaver Creek 4.6 Cold — Class II
Beebe Creek 4.5 Cold — Class I
Catlin Creek 4.4 Cold — Class I, Class III
Tars Creek 4.1 untyped — Class III
Montgomery Creek 4.1 Cold — Class II
Arnold Creek 3.9 Cold — Class I
Bacon Creek 3.8 Cold — Class I
Park Creek 3.7 Cold — Class II, Class III
Whisky Creek 3.5 untyped — —
Dahlstrom Branch 3.4 Cold — Class I
Rocky Ridge Creek 3.3 untyped — —
Boyles Brook 3.2 Cold — Class II
Clemens Creek 3.0 Cold — Class I
Glendenning Creek 3.0 untyped — Class III
Porcupine Creek 2.7 untyped — —
Bearsdale Creek 2.6 untyped — Class III
Sheosh Creek 2.4 untyped — —
Spring Brook 2.4 Cold — Class I
Black Creek 2.3 Cold — Class II
Iron Creek 2.3 untyped — —
Moore Farm Creek 2.1 Cold — Class I
Kent Creek 2.1 untyped — Class III
Trout Brook 2.1 untyped — —
Spring Creek 1.9 Cold — Class II
Carlson Creek 1.7 untyped — —
Crooked Creek 1.7 untyped — —
Lower Tamarack River 1.7 untyped — —
Barrett Creek 1.7 untyped — —
Namekagon River 1.6 untyped — —
Saint Croix Creek 1.4 Cold — Class I
Crystal Creek 1.4 untyped — —
Ekdall Brook 1.4 Cold — Class I
Shunenberg Creek 1.3 Cold — Class II
East Brook 1.0 Cold — Class I
Bear Creek 0.8 untyped — —
Sioux Portage Creek 0.6 Cold — Class I
Sangeta Creek 0.6 untyped — —
Bear Brook 0.5 Cold — Class I
Upper Tamarack River 0.3 untyped — —
Kettle Brook 0.3 Cold — Class I
Bear Paw Creek 0.2 untyped — —
Redhorse Creek 0.1 untyped — —
Kettle River 0.1 untyped — —
Crotte Creek 0.0 untyped — —
Black Brook 0.0 untyped — —

Public land in the watershed

348,402 acres in 22 units, which is 26.9% of the 1,296,636 acres the basin covers. Private inholdings carried in the same source file are excluded, here and on the map.

Managing agency Acres Share Units
County forest 274,073 79% 6
Wisconsin DNR 42,727 12% 15
US Forest Service 31,602 9% 1

The biggest named blocks of it, each with its own page — the streams on that ground, what is open to hunt on it, and where the access sites are.

Best time to fish

The hatch calendar for northern Wisconsin, which is the region this basin's centre falls in — the same regions the app's hatch panel uses. It is a regional record, not a survey of this watershed: nobody has counted insects basin by basin. Year-round records (midges, scuds, sculpins) are left out; they are true every month and they are not what a calendar is for.

January

February

March

April

May

June

July

August

September

October

November

December

42 insects are recorded from northern Wisconsin. Each links to its own page, with the flies that imitate it.

Neighbouring watersheds

The subbasins that share a boundary with this one and carry coldwater streams.