All water is special but a few just hold my heart in them … the Totagatic is one of them. I learned of this river just last year when Andrew Jacobson contacted me and told me about the river. Being that I was going to be here to fish the St. Croix and Namekagon … it was an easy middle of the way stream and a real no brainer. You may remember my videos from fly fishing the Totagatic River last year; to say I did well would be an understatement and those few days on the river kept my mind going this last year of my teaching career, knowing I would be back there soon was all I needed!
So it would be no surprise for me to tell you that within a few hours of us pulling into the Totagatic County Park (a great camping area) I was off on another journey down this tannic river located in the Minong, Wisconsin area.
As fate or luck would have it, my very first fish would be the fish of the trip; a 20 inch smallmouth that came in between a few downed snags and gave me a few minutes of sheer joy as I had to be creative and hitch a ride on top of a deadfall to get the fish landed.
Over the course of the next few days I would fish the river a few times and in fact fished the top 9-10 miles of the river … oh, and caught lots of big smallies. The first outing that you are going to have available to you via my YouTube Channel came the night after a big rain. By big…I mean a 3 inch overnight soaking. I was surprised to see that the stream appeared normal and in fact appeared to be just like any other time on the river. If that had happened back home in Indiana, a rain of that size would have put us out of business for a week or so.
I would cover the upper 3 or so miles in about three hours and flowed gently with the current and was able to pull into eddies and other slack areas to ‘fish’ out a few more big smallies. It was for sure one of the most enjoyable afternoons I have spent on any waterway.
I hope you enjoy the video and remember you can leave me questions here on this site (down below in the comment section) or by emailing me at flyfishingwithjeff@gmail.com.
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