Wild Rivers Expo highlights fishing up north
Bob Rice got his first fishing pole at around age 7. It was a simple rig, he recalled, with a hook — on which he skewered a worm — a line and a bobber.
By age 9, the Michigan native had moved on to fly fishing, often traveling north with his father in the summers.
Rice, 53, was snared by the sport. Now living near Iron River, he is president of the Wild Rivers Chapter of Trout Unlimited, which is sponsoring its annual Fishing Expo on March 31 at Ashland’s Northland College. The free event will include fly-tying workshops, food, talks by experts and a fundraising raffle and auction.
“It was a combination of things,” Rice said of his lifelong love of fly fishing. “A big part of it was spending time with my dad.”
Rice, a former resident of Chicago and Minneapolis, moved to near Iron River about 15 years ago to be closer to wilderness.
“But I also just really liked rivers, the experience of seeing how trout feed and interact with insects,” he said. “I got interested in and excited by that stuff from a young age. I can’t remember a time in my life when I wasn’t fascinated by fish and rivers.”
The story is much the same for Dick Berge, a former Madison high school art teacher who said he began fiddling with fishing tackle when he was around 8. He, too, started out with a hook and a bobber.
It wasn’t long after that that his parents bought him a fly-tying kit for Christmas and he became entranced by the sport. During his years teaching at Madison East High School, he’d sometimes incorporate flies into his classes, having students draw them.
A former president of the Wild Rivers Trout Unlimited chapter, Berge, 80, and his spouse — also an erstwhile teacher — retired and moved to the Northwoods two decades ago. Berge often fishes the Brule and White rivers, even during the winter when the weather is balmy. He figures he’s tied more than 100,000 flies in his lifetime. Some of them look like pieces of art.
Berge said anglers catch everything from relatively small trout to smallmouth bass to 50-inch muskies on fly fishing tackle in northwestern Wisconsin
waters that vary from small streams to ponds to massive Lake Superior.
Rice and Berge said fly fishing in northwestern Wisconsin isn’t as wellknown or appreciated as angling in the small streams that crisscross the Driftless
Area of southwestern Wisconsin like veins. But their region has some advantages, including fishing for migratory Lake Superior salmonids such as brown trout, steelhead, coho and king salmon.
And there are few better places to learn about the region than at their chapter’s expo, they said.
The event started around 20 years ago and is the chapter’s major fundraiser to pay for the work it does on habitat restoration, education and youth outreach.
“All of those things help us fulfill the mission of Trout Unlimited, which is to preserve, protect and and restore North America’s cold-water fisheries and their watersheds,” Rice said.
He said the chapter’s local, state and federal conservation partners in the region will have tables at the expo to explain the work they are doing. Paul Piszczek, a fisheries biologist with Wisconsin DNR, will speak at the event and discuss a large-scale habitat project to improve a failed railway grade in Nebagamon Creek, a tributary to the Bois Brule River in Douglas County.
“This expo is a way to connect our membership and the general public to a lot of the conservation work that is happening in our seven-county geography in northwest Wisconsin,” Rice said.
But not all of the discussions will be about northwest Wisconsin fishing. Bayfield-based guide Weston Thier will be on hand to talk about his angling and cultural experiences in South America over the past few winters.
Though the expo has a general focus on flying fishing, Berge said it will also include information on other kinds of fishing, including trolling and plug casting on the Great Lakes.
More information: The Wild Rivers Expo will be held from noon to 6 p.m. March 31 at the Ponzio Center at Northland College in Ashland. The event is free. See tu.org/events/wild-rivers -expo.
Ashland is home to a number of colorful murals that depict the region’s history. In addition, visitors might also want to stop at the Ashland Historical Society Museum on Main St. and the Northern Great Lakes Visitor Center outside Ashland. For other things to see and do, as well as places to stay, see visitashland.com.
Getting there: Ashland is about 340 miles north of Milwaukee. The Ponzio Center is at 1411 Ellis Ave. on the Northland College campus.