Printable View
I'm planning a fishing trip to Wisconsin in the middle of May and I was wondering if anyone out there and give me some tips. I believe we'll be staying in the Madison area and I'm looking for a couple trout rivers nearby that have public access for waders. I also need some help on what flies I will need to tie for mid May.
Any help would be appreciated.
Dale while I cant help you with your trip, I would like to welcome you to FAOL its a great site full of helpful people,
73's
Eric
KD7QDU
Spinner, who is on this board, is who you need to talk to. He is a guide out that way but Im sure he would be willing to point you in the right direction and help with flies. He also has a website but the name escapes me right now. He has a few posts on the Learning section, you can find him there. The "driftless" area, as its known, has some great streams so you wont be without a place to fish for long. Good luck!
I don't live there, but I have a good friend that does so I can begin to point you in the right directions. Your main two creeks real close to Madison are going to be Black Earth Creek and Mt. Vernon Creek. Both have quite a bit of public dnr access on them. Black Earth was profiled a few years ago in Trout and named one of the nations top 50 trout streams.
The sport shop in Madison is Fontana Sports - if you can catch the manager of the fly fishing section he'll give you good info on the hatches. Unfortunately I don't remember the his name. My friend down there was also referred to a good guide through Fontana. This link to Midwest Fly Fishing also lists a guide in Black Earth. http://www.mwfly.com/pages/guides.html
If you're more of a DIY person, these links provide lots of info:
These are maps of the designated trout streams along with a names key for the entire state by county. You're looking for Dane County for Madison and Iowa County is the next one west. http://dnr.wi.gov/fish/species/trout/streammaps.html
These maps are interactive and show public access easements for not only trout streams, but other activities. Use the DNR Managed Lands link - you can create and save your own PDF maps at the scale that's convenient for what you want to see. Green is land owned by the DNR, pink represents easements purchased by the DNR for public access. These are well marked with signs and have parking lots. http://www.dnr.state.wi.us/org/land/...s_mapping.html
Also if you don't mind going a little farther west (about a 2 hour drive) you can hit the Big and Little Green Rivers, which are also very nice.
I usually print the stream map and key and look at the hard copies of those while navigating the DNR managed lands maps and finding the public lands.
Hope that helps.
kb8uvm -- May is a great time for trout in Wisconsin. I just sent you a pm.
http://www.tightlinesflyshop.com/ind...on=Custom&ID=8
Check the hatch chart.
In May, in SWW, it's unlikely that you will see Little Black Stoneflies and Gray Drakes. Everything else is pretty reasonable.
Unless you're short on time, I'd probably take a pass on BEC. It's a hard little stream to begin with and get's relatively pounded being as close as it is to Madison, Milwaukee and Chicago.
Get a copy of Exploring Wisconsin Trout Streams by Born et. al., and a Gazeteer. That should set you up well enough for a small trip.
I want to thank all of you guys who have posted or sent me a PM with information about Wisconsin. Work is keeping me slammed the last few days and the info you guys are sharing has keep me dreaming while doing my job, it helps the day past faster.
I?ll take some time this weekend to figure out where base camp will be and then dig into all of this information.
this should fire you up a bit.
http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v1...view=slideshow
We're heading out to La Crosse, Wisconsin in July. I don't know if there will be any fly fishing opportunities out there but I will bring along a combo fly/spinning rig just in case.
I've learned from past experience, I never go anywhere without my emergency fly/spinning rod. You just never know when an emergency will come up and you'll be thankful that you have it. :D