BirdTrout

Upper Wisconsin River Watershed, Wisconsin

1,660 miles of mapped stream across 2,180 square miles of drainage in Oneida, Vilas, Lincoln, Price, Forest counties, in 129 named streams. Wisconsin designates 413 of those miles as trout water, on 75 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 07070001 in the USGS Watershed Boundary Dataset. Every figure below adds up the river pages in this basin — same records, one basin at a time.

1,660 mi
of mapped stream
3,293 NHD reaches
2,180 sq mi
drainage area
1,395,062 acres
424,984 ac
public land
30.5% of the basin · 26 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 23% of this basin's stream miles (389.8 of 1,660); the rest is untyped and is drawn grey on the map above.

389.8 of the 389.8 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 23% of it.

What makes this watershed distinctive

The Upper Wisconsin drains the lake country of Oneida, Vilas, Lincoln and Price counties — 2,180 square miles, 1,045 mapped stream miles, 129 named streams — and its designated water is a third of the network: 413 miles on 75 streams, with 626 classified cold. The Wisconsin River runs 84.1 miles at Class II and III and the Spirit River 31.2 the same; the Deerskin River's 26.3 miles are Class I and II. The Tomahawk, Pelican and Somo rivers, 61.3, 34.4 and 28.8 miles, carry no designation. Public ground is 424,984 acres, the second-largest on this list: 89,340 acres of Oneida County Forest, 83,447 of Nicolet National Forest, the 65,886-acre American Legion State Forest and 58,667 acres of Lincoln County Forest held as public fishing grounds. No gauge here holds a July record.

Every named stream in the basin

All 129 of them, longest first. 48 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
Wisconsin River 84.1 Cold — Class II, Class III
Tomahawk River 61.3 untyped — —
Pelican River 34.4 untyped — —
Spirit River 31.2 Cold — Class II, Class III
Somo River 28.8 untyped — —
Deerskin River 26.3 Cold — Class I, Class II
Haymeadow Creek 22.6 Cold — Class II, Class III
Willow River 22.0 untyped — Class III
Little Rice River 21.0 Cold — Class II
Little Somo River 20.1 Cold — Class II, Class III
Squirrel River 17.4 untyped — —
Bearskin Creek 17.3 Cold — Class I, Class II, Class III
Noisy Creek 15.5 Cold — Class II, Class III
Big Pine Creek 15.2 Cold — Class I
Gudegast Creek 15.1 Cold — Class I, Class III
Johnson Creek 15.0 Cold — Class II
North Fork Spirit River 13.6 Cold — Class II, Class III
North Branch Pelican River 12.8 untyped — —
Pickerel Creek 11.9 untyped — —
Spring Creek 11.4 Cold — Class I, Class II
Swamsauger Creek 11.4 untyped — Class III
Scott Creek 11.4 Cold — Class II, Class III
Rocky Run 11.3 Cold — Class II
Brown Creek 11.0 Cold — Class I, Class II
Jennie Webber Creek 10.9 untyped — —
Muskrat Creek 10.7 Cold — Class I
Pioneer Creek 10.7 Cold — Class I, Class II
Tamarack Creek 10.4 Cold — Class I, Class II
Rice Creek 10.3 untyped — —
Lost Creek 9.8 untyped — —
Buckatabon Creek 9.7 Cold — Class II
Brant Creek 9.7 Cold — Class I, Class II
Spirit Creek 9.7 Cold — Class I
Plum Creek 9.4 Cold — Class I, Class II
Enterprise Creek 9.2 Cold — Class II
Ritchie Creek 9.0 Cold — Class II, Class III
Thunder Creek 8.7 Cold — Class II, Class III
Fourmile Creek 8.6 Cold — Class II, Class III
Mishonagon Creek 8.6 Cold — Class I, Class III
Trout Creek 8.3 Cold — Class I, Class II
Green Meadow Creek 8.3 Cold — Class I
Kaubashine Creek 8.0 Cold — Class II
Twin River 7.9 untyped — —
Bear Creek 7.5 Cold — Class II, Class III
Skunk Creek 7.0 untyped — —
Pine Needle Creek 7.0 untyped — —
Marheime Creek 6.4 Cold — Class II
Swamp Creek 6.2 untyped — Class III
Knox Creek 6.2 untyped — —
Coffee Creek 6.1 untyped — —
Camp Six Creek 6.0 Cold — Class II
Armstrong Creek 5.9 Cold — Class I
Stella Creek 5.8 Cold — Class I, Class III
Crescent Creek 5.7 untyped — —
Manson Creek 5.6 untyped — —
Somo Creek 5.6 untyped — —
Blackjack Creek 5.5 Cold — Class I, Class III
Hay Meadow Creek 5.4 untyped — —
Little Willow Creek 5.4 Cold — Class I
Bootjack Creek 5.4 untyped — —
Saint Germain River 5.2 untyped — —
Neptune Creek 5.2 untyped — —
Gus Johnson Creek 5.2 Cold — Class I
Portage Creek 5.1 untyped — Class III
Newbold Creek 5.1 untyped — —
Langley Creek 5.1 Cold — Class I
Meadow Brook 5.1 untyped — —
Thoroughfare Creek 5.0 untyped — —
Starks Creek 5.0 Cold — Class I, Class III
Hay Creek 5.0 Cold — Class I
Military Creek 4.9 Cold — Class I, Class II
Clukey Creek 4.9 Cold — Class II
Bergman Creek 4.8 untyped — Class III
Beaver Creek 4.7 Cold — Class I
Little Deerskin River 4.7 Cold — Class I
Ninemile Creek 4.7 Cold — Class I
Boot Creek 4.7 untyped — —
Shepard Lake Creek 4.4 untyped — —
Jersey City Flowage 4.4 untyped — —
Stony Creek 4.3 Cold — Class I
Little Somo Creek 4.3 untyped — —
North Branch Pine Creek 4.3 untyped — —
Lobischer Creek 4.2 untyped — —
Misery Creek 4.2 untyped — —
Lassig Creek 4.2 untyped — —
Hilts Creek 3.9 untyped — —
Pine Creek 3.7 Cold — Class I
Jennie Creek 3.6 Cold — Class I
McGrass Creek 3.5 Cold — Class II, Class III
Twin Creek 3.5 Cold — Class II
Flanigan Creek 3.5 Cold — Class I
Horsehead Creek 3.4 Cold — Class I
Papoose Creek 3.4 Cold — Class II
Rennhak Creek 3.3 Cold — Class I
Spring Meadow Creek 3.2 Cold — Class I
Hutchinson Creek 3.2 untyped — —
Angelo Lake Creek 3.2 untyped — —
Mill Creek 3.1 untyped — —
Sucker Creek 3.1 Cold — Class I
Lela Creek 3.1 Cold — Class I
Hauser Creek 3.0 untyped — —
Mud Creek 2.9 untyped — —
Oelhafen Creek 2.9 untyped — —
Little Pine Creek 2.9 Cold — Class I
Caps Creek 2.8 Cold — Class II
Heal Creek 2.7 Cold — Class II
Yukon Creek 2.6 untyped — —
Howards Creek 2.4 untyped — Class III
Newbold Spring Creek 2.3 untyped — Class III
Threemile Creek 2.2 Cold — Class II
Slaughterhouse Creek 2.1 Cold — Class I
Swan Creek 2.1 untyped — —
Goodyear Creek 2.1 Cold — Class I
Carlson Creek 2.0 untyped — —
Mosquito Creek 1.9 untyped — —
Found Creek 1.9 untyped — —
Little George Creek 1.9 untyped — —
Star Creek 1.7 untyped — —
Marsh Bay Creek 1.5 untyped — —
Cuenin Creek 1.5 untyped — —
West Branch Plum Creek 1.3 untyped — —
Ila Creek 1.2 untyped — —
Kitty Creek 1.2 Cold — Class II
Lone Stone Creek 1.1 untyped — —
Hardell Creek 1.0 Cold — Class II
Rice River Flowage 0.8 untyped — —
Brazell Creek 0.6 untyped — —
Smallpox Creek 0.6 untyped — Class III
Twin Lakes Creek 0.1 untyped — —

Public land in the watershed

424,984 acres in 26 units, which is 30.5% of the 1,395,062 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 195,926 46% 6
Wisconsin DNR 127,037 30% 17
US Forest Service 102,021 24% 3

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.