Fly Fishing the Driftless Area
A Poetic Sport
If you look at a satellite image of the Midwest, you'll notice along the upper Mississippi a green, variegated strip, oddly shaped, like tendrils of moss on a rock. These are the blufflands of the Driftless Area, a topographical and geological anomaly, quite distinct from the plateau of the Great Plains. This region, comprising parts of Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, and Iowa, was, it seems, never glaciated. Here, the terrain is rugged and varied, with many valleys, great and small, young deciduous forests, full of a rich array of flora and fauna. Farmland, marsh, river bottoms, and wild woods intermingle. And most importantly for our purposes, sparkling, spring-fed trout creeks lie amongst hill, field, and forest, ribbons of living diamond, flashing, and flushed with abundant aquatic life.
Though less well-known than the great trout rivers of the western United States, the Driftless Area contains, on a smaller scale, some phenomenal fishing opportunities. There are many advantages to fishing this jewel of the Midwest.
The Driftless abounds in hidden creeks, some of them not much more than a trickle, yet still home to populations of brown trout, and sometimes the native brookies. While the Driftless contains its share of full-sized rivers suitable for fly fishing, such as the Root, Kickapoo, and Whitewater, most of the waters in Southeast Minnesota and West-central Wisconsin, where I've done the bulk of my fishing, aren't going to take your breath away with their size and power. But they may take your breath due to their delicate beauty, charm, and, of course, surprisingly rewarding fishing.
There's a certain intimacy with the environment and wildlife (including the trout) that comes with fishing a small stream. For one thing, most of the streams are too shallow for boats, which means you'll be wading a good deal. You literally enter into the world of the stream. And oftentimes, the trout you seek are just a few feet from you.
The close proximity of the fish and small-scale maneuverability of the terrain requires great stealth and finesse on the part of the fisherman. In some ways, this can be an advantage compared to big river fishing, especially for a beginner. As Sheridan Anderson writes in The Curtis Creek Manifesto, “A creek demands a certain delicacy that is impossible to learn on a big river. This is why a good creeksmith can readily adapt to a river, while a big-water angler is the proverbial bull-in-a-china-shoppe when confronted with a brook.”
Because most of the waters in the area aren't as dramatic as, say, the rivers of Montana, a lot of these streams go unnoticed and underfished—which is to the advantage of the enterprising angler. These rivers, streams, and creeks, generally, are not crowded. I can count on one hand the number of times I've run across other anglers while out fishing. While there are, of course, some more popular spots that are overfished, there are loads of streams in the area that have little, if any, activity, resulting in some quite robust trout populations. To quote Sheridan Anderson again, “Many times I've found that a fifteen or twenty minute stroll up a side-stream or creek will yield the best fishing of the day. This is because the majority of the world's hackle-jockeys tend to sneer at the smaller waters, deeming them unworthy of their skills—may they always cherish that delusion.”
I can remember one favorite haunt of mine (which will remain unnamed for reasons of, um, legality, or something) that I fished a good deal with my brother-in-law. It seemed to go mostly unnoticed by other fishermen. It was small enough that you could jump across it in some places, yet it held hundreds of trout just in the mile or so stretch we fished, including some that approached 20 inches (for reference, the average trout in this area will measure up at about 9-11 inches).
The smaller size of these rivers and streams and the fact that they weave in and out of little rural towns and farmlands also makes them easily accessible, especially on the Minnesota side of the Big River. Some of Minnesota's Trout Unlimited chapters have done excellent work in stream improvement and establishing easements specifically for anglers, complete with parking areas and stiles for crossing those pesky cattle fences (just watch out for bulls and steers once you're on the other side...). In my experience, these Minnesota streams are easier to fish than their Wisconsin counterparts due to these improvements, which often include the clearing of brush and the addition of stones to line the sides of the stream, prevent erosion, and create undercut banks and other trout habitat.
The driftless region is home to a wide array of insects that trout find delectable, especially mayflies, stoneflies, and caddis flies. Some of the most common mayflies are the Baetis genus and Ephemerellidae family, while the families of caddis flies include Brachycentridae and Hydropsychidae. For this reason, popular and effective patterns to toss out there on a Wisconsin or Minnesota stream include the Adams, Blue-Winged Olive, Pheasant Tale Nymph, and Elk Hair Caddis.
Besides these bugs, you'll see lots of other wildlife while on (or, more accurately, wading in) the water, including beavers, waterfowl, eagles, deer, and frogs.
I particularly associate the sound of frogs with these streams. I can hear it now: the sonorous hum of the spring peepers beginning to vibrate out over the valley as evening alights. A gentle haze hugs the sides of the bluffs that rise past the treetops, those ancient hills, seeming like the backbone of time itself. It's that last, magical half-hour before dark, when the fish are biting like mad. I send my fly forward, settling delicately on the surface of the stream with a hope and a prayer.
This is a pristine place, untouched, unruffled, a place of peace.
Maybe it's not just the lack of glacial pressure; maybe it's called the “driftless region” because you never want to drift away from it.