Kickapoo River - Ecology and Conservation

Ecology and Conservation

Wildcat Mountain State Park and the Kickapoo Valley Reserve form a continuous protected area. Most of the tributary streams and the Kickapoo River itself, upstream of Gays Mills, are good trout habitat due to the baseflow from coldwater springs and watershed and stream projects carried out over the recent decades. The river "contains over 500 miles (800 km) of coldwater streams with populations of Brown trout (Salmo trutta) and Brook trout (Salvelinus fontinalis). Half of these streams have naturally reproducing trout populations.

Recently a movement called "Save Taryn's Beaver" was launched to save a family of beavers on Weister Creek, a tributary of the Kickapoo. The beaver is a keystone species, increasing biodiversity in its territory through creation of beaver ponds and wetlands. Not only are riparian habitats enlarged as the circumference of a beaver pond is much greater than the circumference of the two banks of a stream, but aquatic plants colonize newly available watery habitat. Insect, invertebrate, fish, mammal, and bird diversity are also expanded. Beavers benefit bird diversity in numerous ways. Trumpeter swans (Cygnus buccinator) and Canada geese (Branta canadensis) often depend on beaver lodges as nesting sites. As trees are drowned by rising beaver impoundments they become ideal nesting sites for obligate cavity nesters such as wood ducks (Aix sponsa), goldeneyes (Bucephala spp.), mergansers (Mergus spp.), and owls (Titonidae, Strigidae). In addition, beaver ponds have been shown to increase the number of trout, their size, or both, in a study of brook trout (Salvelinus fontinalis), rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) and brown trout (Salmo trutta). These findings are consistent with a study of small streams in Sweden, that found that brown trout were larger in beaver ponds compared with those in riffle sections, and that beaver ponds provide habitat for larger trout in small streams during periods of drought. The importance of winter habitat to salmonids afforded by beaver ponds may be especially important (and underappreciated) in streams without deep pools or where ice cover makes contact with the bottom of shallow streams. Cutthroat trout (Oncorhynchus clarki) and bull trout (Salvelinus confluentus) were noted to overwinter in Montana beaver ponds, brook trout congregated in winter in New Brunswick and Wyoming beaver ponds, and coho salmon in Oregon beaver ponds.

In spite of the benefits of beaver to trout and bird abundance and diversity, the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources continues to recommend removal of trees and brush from the banks of several Kickapoo river watershed streams to reduce beaver colonization.