Awhile back I had a few questions about a chain of small (by southern/western standards) reservoirs in my area.

At that time I was advised to find out when the electric company does their water releases, and that I needed to time my fishing with the release of that water.

I talked to a fellow that works on the turbines. He told me that since Wisconsin Public Service (they are the area power company) have the ability to store electricity, they are required by our DNR to comply with RIVER FLOW.

From my understanding they need to keep a flow going through the gates at a rate that would equal that of the river. The only real time the gates are really wide open is when we have substantial rains.

The sizes of these flowages range from 1500 acres at the head, then 1800 acres to progressively smaller 300 acres more or less until it goes back to straight river and ending in Lake Michigan. The flowages are more then 100 years old. I saw a draw down of the second reservoir last year, the trees left looked like telephone poles. There was water in the basin, but it looked more like an agricultural ditch then a river (no real features).

Questions: How much of the original river channel do you think is still left? Armed with the information on the river flow thing, how would you handle these "Hill land" reservoirs. There are Muskies, Northerns, Walleye, as well as Small and Large-mouth bass.

By the way, I would be happy to forward maps of both of the flowages to anyone that might want to help me I.D. areas to fish.

I have some insight on wisconsin river flowages...pm me.

In short, we have found that the head of the flowages or river protions are good fishing when the are pushing more water than normal...high rains, spring floods, or during the week!  yes, they push a litle more water durig the week when the guys are working the gates. Otherwise, you are better off fishing areas that the fish aren;t dependant or use to current changes like large backwaters, oxboxs, mainlake.  Foward some maps I will try to mark them up for you.  I have 25 years expeiernce on Wis river flowages.