. . . that roots are growing from the willows above the soil line. Some are 6" or more long. Losing my window for cutting willow to make hoops and finally thought might as well do it from the boat. So I took a "pleasure cruise" through the bottoms yesterday. Was surprised to see so many deer hunkered on the little islands that are normally high ground. The beaver lodges are growing taller. They'll be skyscrapers when the water returns to normal. Didn't see too many muskrats, as they've probably seeked out higher ground along the far banks of the river. Three continuous months now of river bottoms submerged on the Lower Wisconsin River.



and a closeup underwater

Thanks for the pics.

Interesting

There's a beaver dam connecting that dead tree above the anchor to the two trees in the middle continuing to the trees off to the left several feet under that water. One of my favorite bow stands in the bottoms. This was underwater for quite awhile last summer.

High water, the new norm down here.



And there's a beaver dam several feet under the prop connecting to the tree on the left. This dam is responsible for impounding many, many acres of water in this particular back marsh. Good thing the beaver build solid dams. It's still there.

How high's the water Mama.....

The Wisconsin River level here north of Rhinelander is high and has been since ice melt. Looks like your water level down river will stay high for the foreseeable future! Not helping muskrat population as most bank dens are inundated too!

Chris

And the majority of tribs are high too as they can't empty out. On our side over here we drain to Lake Michigan which is near an all time record high and that means all of our rivers are backed up several inches to a couple feet as well. In the central part of our county when you raise the water level say 2 feet you flood several hundred to thousands of acres as our river bottoms there are wide and flat.

Bryce

Ours was out of banks two month after that, back out now due to rains

We are setting new records here for days above the 10ft mark. River has been over 10ft since March and many days above 12ft which is considered flood stage..Been bouncing up and down between the 10ft-13ft for to long now.. Our normal river stage would be somewhere between 5.5 and 6 ft..high water getting real old. going to be interesting to see which islands have channels cut in them and what channels are sanded in. Lot of dirt and stuff moving out there..

Mac

saw a post"went to the river",laughed and thought"poor sob,the river came to me".

Lower Wisconsin River is finally dropping. What's emerging is a sorry mess. Three months plus of submerged islands and back sloughs. We drove down to Prairie du Chien last night to survey where the rendezvous was to be held this week. First time I recall it was cancelled. Still lots of standing water, exposed grass is yellow brown.

Upstream looks like river levels are dropping, though there's rain forecasted for tonight and most of tomorrow.

Good luck to the folks downstream.

one thing for sure in nature, there is always change.

This high water will allow some animals/plants to prosper others to suffer.

Alapaha has been low for a while here.. Low enough for me to stick my traps in the nearby swamp to dye.

Hopefully the recent storms haven't ruined my chances of getting them back

Hopefully the Mississippi at Rock Island Ill will go below flood stage Thursday, that will be 91 days over flood stage.

Bank to bank here with June rise. Lots of snow melt now and heavy rains minor flooding and small creeks running hard. Can't get sown to my fishing holes and will be awhile not.