The Wetland Gems® of North Central Wisconsin
Explore the map below to learn more about the thirteen Wetland Gems® sites in the North Central Region of Wisconsin.
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1
Atkins Lake & Hiles Swamp
County: Forest/Oneida
Property Owners: WDNR, USDA Forest Service
Located within the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest, this site is made up of a shallow, soft-water drainage lake surrounded by a vast complex of coniferous bog and other northern wetland plant communities. This site harbors what is considered to be one of the most ecologically diverse forested wetland complexes in the Northwoods. It is home to a number of rare plant and animal species as well as several boreal plant and bird species that are uncommon in Wisconsin. The lake edge features numerous species of sedges, rushes, and spike rushes, as well as arrowhead, broad-leaved cattail, and pickerelweed. Surrounding the lake are intermingled communities of open bog and fen dominated by Labrador tea, blueberry, creeping snowberry, sedge, and sphagnum moss. Animals inhabiting the area include muskrat, mink, beaver, black bear, and white-tailed deer. Abundant waterfowl and water birds, including the common loon, wood duck, blue-winged teal, and sandhill crane visit the lake.
For further details on access and location, visit the Atkins Lake & Hiles Swamp page of the State Natural Areas Program website.
2
Bear Lake Sedge Meadow
County: Barron
Property Owners: Barron County, Village of Haugen
Bear Lake Sedge Meadow occupies a large embayment of more than 150 acres along the southern shore of Bear Lake in Barron County. Bear Lake is a hard water drainage lake fed by Bear Creek, several other creeks, and groundwater springs. The site provides important stopover habitat for migratory birds and supports several rare birds. The large, open sedge meadow is dominated by woolly fruit sedge with sprinklings of three-fruited sedge, marsh cinquefoil, cottongrass, and blue joint grass. Open bog islands include bog shrubs like leatherleaf, bog laurel, bog rosemary, and Labrador tea. Bear Lake Sedge Meadow provides important stopover habitat for migratory birds. Common bird species include swamp sparrow, song sparrow, yellow warbler, sora, and sedge wren. The site’s wetland habitats also support several rare and unusual birds.
This site is an excellent site for birdwatchers. For details, visit the Bear Lake Sedge Meadow page of the State Natural Areas Program website .
3
Bogus Swamp
County: Langlade County
Property Owner: Langlade County
Swamp’s name is just that: bogus—this wetland complex includes a variety of northern wetland types, but much of the area is open rather than wooded, swamp habitat. More than 850 acres of wetlands at this site form and feed the headwaters of both forks of the Eau Claire River, which are productive trout streams. The site features a patterned peatland, one of only two strong examples of this rare wetland type in Wisconsin. These diverse, high-quality wetlands support a number of rare plants, butterflies, and birds. This Wetland Gem® is characterized largely by open and coniferous bog habitat with stunted, scattered black spruce and tamarack trees. The wetland complex supports a varied assemblage of bird species including some birds at the southern limits of their breeding range such as the palm warbler and Lincoln's sparrow. Rare birds using these wetlands include northern harrier and American bittern.
This is an excellent site for birdwatchers For information about how to access this site, visit the Bogus Swamp page of the State Natural Areas Program website .
4
Flambeau River State Forest
County: Sawyer/Rusk
Property Owner: WDNR
The Flambeau River State Forest, which has protected these lands since the 1930s, boasts many ephemeral ponds embedded within the forest matrix and associated with the Flambeau River floodplain. The Forest is characterized by much high quality and beautiful water features including diverse and extensive wetlands. While the site has excellent examples of various northern wetland types, the site is recognized as a Wetland Gem® largely because of the many examples of ephemeral ponds found here. Because of their small size and transient nature, ephemeral ponds are typically not recognized by the public as wetlands though they are protected under state law in Wisconsin. High-quality and diverse wetland habitats are associated with both forks of the Flambeau River and the site’s several streams and lakes. The shoreline habitat also includes small areas of alder thicket dominated by speckled alder. Other areas of this site feature coniferous swamp habitat characterized by white cedar, hemlock, and yellow birch and scattered ephemeral ponds. The Forest supports a number of rare wetland plants as well. Mammals found at this site include white-tailed deer, raccoon, black bear, otter, and wolves. The Forest’s wetlands are important to maintaining healthy riverine and lake habitat for a diversity of fish, including musky, sturgeon, trout, walleye, bass, and various panfish.
Spring is the best time to view ephemeral ponds at this site. Other areas of the site provide excellent paddling opportunities. For information about how to access this site, visit the Flambeau River Hardwood Forest page of the State Natural Areas Program website .
5
Grandma Lake
County: Florence
Property Owner: USDA Forest Service
Grandma Lake, located within the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest in Florence County, is a pristine, soft-water bog lake surrounded by an open bog mat and an outer ring of a coniferous bog. While the lake itself is only 44 acres, with its wetlands the site comprises nearly 500 acres. Grandma Lake wetlands are valuable because of their diversity and their largely undisturbed character, and the site provides an excellent example of bog lakes common in northern Wisconsin. This Wetland Gem® site hosts an unusual and diverse collection of native plants including a number of rare species. Insectivorous plants species are quite common, including pitcher plants, narrow-leaved sundew, round-leaved sundew, and several bladderworts. A wide variety of wildlife species use these wetlands, including several rare and interesting bird species, including common loon, and merlin.
For information about how to access this site, visit the Grandma Lake page of the State Natural Areas Program website .
6
Hunting River Alders
County: Langlade
Property Owner: Langlade County
Hunting River Alders is an extensive wetland complex along an undeveloped, low gradient stretch of the Hunting River just a few miles upstream of its confluence with the Wolf River. The site features high-quality alder thicket as well as shrub carr, coniferous swamp, and marsh habitats. This Wetland Gem® is one of the best examples of the state’s alder thickets, which are abundant in the north-central region and commonly found along streams and lakes. Unlike at many other alder thickets, hydrology at the Hunting River Alders site has remained largely unaltered, providing stability for this native plant community. These wetlands are important for maintaining healthy in-stream habitat in the Hunting River, a trout stream. The site provides excellent habitat for a wide diversity of wildlife species as well as excellent paddling opportunities for human visitors. In addition to the dominant speckled alder, the site features pockets of willow and red osier dogwood-dominated shrub carr. A coniferous swamp dominated by black spruce and tamarack is also present. This site provides high-quality habitat for many mammals, amphibians, reptiles, and birds. Examples include river otter, beaver, wood duck, mallard, and alder flycatcher.
This site is best seen by canoe. For details, visit the Hunting River Alders page of the State Natural Areas Program website .
7
Jump-Mondeaux River Floodplain
County: Price/Taylor
Property Owner: USDA Forest Service
This riverine Wetland Gem® is a large floodplain forest located within the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest including the confluence of the Jump and Mondeaux Rivers. The site is characterized by meandering rivers flanked by floodplain forest of black ash and American elm with yellow birch, basswood, ironwood, and bur oak. The site includes some old-growth stands as well as areas of coniferous swamp and alder thicket, ephemeral ponds, and springs. Because this floodplain corridor has remained largely intact, it features a diverse plant community including several rare species. The undisturbed character of the floodplain also means that in-stream habitat is excellent and these rivers support diverse aquatic communities. Frequent scouring by overbank flooding maintains a relatively open and diverse understory featuring ferns, sedges, cut-leaved toothwort, trout lily, and marsh marigold. Birds using this floodplain forest include common raven, pileated woodpecker, winter wren, hermit thrush, northern waterthrush, blue-headed vireo, eastern wood-pewee, ovenbird, Baltimore oriole, scarlet tanager and Blackburnian, chestnut-sided, Nashville, and black-throated green warblers. The state-threatened red-shouldered hawk also uses the site. The rivers’ meanders, oxbows, and scenic beauty make this site a popular destination for paddlers.
This river system provides excellent paddling opportunities. For information about how to access this site, visit the Silver Creek & Mondeaux River and Mondeaux Hardwoods pages of the State Natural Areas Program website.
8
Kissick Alkaline Bog
County: Sawyer
Property Owner: WDNR
Kissick Alkaline Bog is a 135-acre State Natural Area located within the Kissick Swamp Wildlife Area in Sawyer County along the Washburn County border. The site features a 10-acre backwoods lake surrounded by extensive open bog and coniferous bog habitat. . An open bog mat of sphagnum moss surrounds the open water portions of the lake. The mat is hummocky with small wet depressions that support a variety of bog plants like sundews, arrow- grass, northern bladderwort, and boreal bog sedge. Surveys of the site have documented more than 100 vascular plants, 14 species of orchid, and many rare plant species. The northwest corner of the site features a large area of coniferous bog grading into coniferous swamp habitat dominated by black spruce and tamarack. This Wetland Gem® supports a diversity of animal species including mammals like boreal deer mouse and bog lemming. It is an excellent place to view a variety of moths and butterflies. The site also supports numerous amphibians including leopard frog, green frog, and American toad. Rare birds documented at the site include bald eagle and common loon.
For information about how to access this site, visit the Kissick Alkaline Bog page of the State Natural Areas Program website .
9
Rice Creek
County: Vilas
Property Owner: WDNR
Located within the Norther Highland-American Legion State Forest in Vilas County, this Wetland Gem® comprises a two-mile stretch of Rice Creek surrounded by a large 435-acre wetland complex of coniferous swamp, fen, and sedge meadow. Marsh habitat growing within the creek features extensive and lush beds of wild rice and other aquatic plants. Adjacent to the creek is a high quality fen that is fed by groundwater seepage. The fen supports at least seven species of orchids and the rare bog arrowgrass in addition to the more common bog buckbean, alpine cottongrass, and pitcher plant. Flanking the fen is a large coniferous swamp dominated by Northern white cedar. Plants in the understory include heart-leaf twayblade, naked miterword, yellow bluebead lily and striped coralroot. The Rice Creek wetland complex supports a diversity of bird species including red-breasted nuthatch, winter wren, barred owls, and pine siskins along with the occasional rare gray jay and yellow-bellied flycatcher. The rare bog copper butterfly is also found here.
For information about how to access this site, visit the Rice Creek page of the State Natural Areas Program website .
10
Savage-Robago Lakes
County: Florence
Property Owner: WDNR
This Wetland Gem® site features several small lakes—Savage Lake, Robago Lake, Dorothy Lake, and Mud Lake—which collectively are considered one of the finest remaining wild lakes complexes in Wisconsin. The diverse and high-quality wetland habitats that surround and connect these lakes are what give this complex its exceptional wild character. This Wetland Gem® site includes the Haley Creek Swamp State Natural Area and is a part of the larger Pine- Popple Wild Rivers Area, a designation given by the state legislature to only three rivers. Wetlands of this site, along with many other wetlands acres in this corridor, are critical to the health and quality of these beautiful and valuable rivers. Old-growth coniferous swamp, alder thicket, fen, and marsh habitats make up this intact wetland complex. The site boasts a diversity of wetland plants and supports numerous rare plant species. This Wetland Gem® and the Wild Rivers Area provide excellent wildlife habitats. Notable bird species include bald eagle, osprey, and many songbirds including the rare boreal chickadee. The area also supports mink frog and red-backed salamander.
This area provides many exceptional opportunities for outdoor recreation. For details, visit the Savage Lake page of the State Natural Areas program website or the the Florence Wild Rivers Interpretive Center website .
11
Spider Lake
County: Ashland
Property Owner: USDA Forest Service
Spider Lake, located within the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest in Ashland County, features a high-quality, undisturbed stand of lowland hardwoods dominated by black ash and grading into the coniferous swamp to the northwest. The site is considered one of the best hardwood swamps in the region because it is relatively large (283 acres), has a wide diversity of age and size classes among canopy trees, and has unaltered hydrology. This Wetland Gem® comprises a high-quality lowland hardwood swamp dominated by black ash of various ages and size classes; some of the older ash trees are more than 130 years old. A diversity of bird species use these wetlands, including ruffed grouse, veery, swamp sparrow, black-and-white warbler, black-throated green warbler, northern waterthrush, northern parula, great-crested flycatcher, and yellow-bellied flycatcher, a species of special concern in Wisconsin. Of particular note is the presence of a great blue heron rookery and the gray jay, a bird of northern coniferous forests. Mammals are known to inhabit the area are white-tailed deer, snowshoe hare, black bear, and red squirrel. Timber wolves also uses these habitats.
There is no direct access to this site. For details on how to hike into the site (topo map and compass required), visit the Spider Lake page of the State Natural Areas Program website .
12
Toy Lake Swamp
County: Vilas
Property Owner: WDNR
Toy Lake Swamp is a large wetland complex of more than 2,300 acres located within the Northern Highland-American Legion State Forest in Vilas County. This Wetland Gem® features one of the best examples of lowland hardwood swamp in the state as well as high-quality coniferous swamp, alder thicket, and marsh habitats. These wetlands surround the shallow, small Toy Lake, which supports dense marsh vegetation. Extensive lowland hardwood swamp habitat occupies the wetter areas of Toy Lake Swamp. Black ash, alder, and mountain maple dominate these hardwood swamp habitats, which also include tall shrubs like mountain holly, highbush cranberry, and winterberry and groundlayer plants including golden and swamp saxifrage. Mature coniferous swamp habitat dominated by northern white cedar lies north and east of Toy Lake. Wood sorrel, bog goldenrod, winterberry, and bluebead lily comprise the understory in this habitat. This Wetland Gem® provides excellent habitat for a diversity of moths and butterflies, including the bog fritillary, freiga fritillary, and silver-bordered fritillary. Birds using this area include black-throated blue warbler, Blackburnian warbler, chestnut-sided warbler, mourning warbler, and broad-winged hawk. The site also supports numerous rare birds including black-backed woodpecker, gray jay, boreal chickadee, yellow-bellied flycatcher, and Cape May warbler.
For information about how to access this site, visit the Toy Lake Swamp page of the State Natural Areas Program website .
13
Turtle-Flambeau-Manitowish Peatlands
County: Iron
Property Owner: WDNR
This large Wetland Gem® comprises more than 25,000 acres of diverse and high-quality northern wetlands in the Turtle-Flambeau Peatlands State Natural Area and the Manitowish Peatlands, a large managed area within the Northern Highland- American Legion State Forest. These wetlands flank the Turtle-Flambeau Flowage, which was created in 1926 by flooding lowland wetlands at the junction of the Turtle and Manitowish Rivers. The site features a variety of wetland plant community types including coniferous bog, coniferous swamp, open bog, sedge meadow, shrub carr, and the rare patterned peatland. Patterned peatlands are created by mineral-rich water flowing in linear, open-water swathes (“flarks”) alternating with narrow zones of vegetation growing on sphagnum moss-covered peat ridges (“strings”). This Wetland Gem® is important because of its size, quality, and diversity as well as the abundant and diverse wildlife it supports. Mammals using this site include white-tailed deer, black bear, fisher, beaver, and river otter. The flowage has the highest density of breeding pairs of the bald eagle, osprey, and a common loon in Wisconsin. These wetlands help support a healthy fishery in the flowage, which includes black crappie, smallmouth bass, muskellunge, and walleye. Other rare bird species found at this site include common loon and merlin.
Some areas of this large site are accessible by canoe. For information about how to access this site, visit the Turtle-Flambeau Peatlands page on the State Natural Areas Program website .
