Details

The Middle Trempealeau River Watershed is approximately 131,498 acres in size and consists of 490 miles of streams and rivers, 397 acres of lakes, and 5,115 acres of wetlands. The watershed is dominated by forest and agriculture and ranked high for nonpoint source issues affecting groundwater in the watershed.

Date  1991

Nonpoint and Point Sources

This watershed and additional portions of adjacent watersheds were selected in 1989 as a priority watershed project in the Wisconsin Nonpoint Source Pollution Abatement Program. A priority watershed plan will be completed in 1991 and will be amended to this plan at the time it is completed.

Date  1991

Ecological Landscapes

This watershed is located in the Western Coulee and Ridges Ecological Landscape in southwestern and west central Wisconsin and is characterized by its highly eroded, driftless topography and relatively extensive forested landscape. Soils are silt loams (loess) and sandy loams over sandstone residuum over dolomite. Several large rivers including the Wisconsin, Mississippi, Chippewa, Kickapoo and Black flow through or border the Ecological Landscape. Historical vegetation consisted of southern hardwood forests, oak savanna, scattered prairies, and floodplain forests and marshes along the major rivers. With Euro-American settlement, most of the land on ridgetops and valley bottoms was cleared of oak savanna, prairie, and level forest for agriculture. The steep slopes between valley bottom and ridgetop, unsuitable for raising crops, grew into oak-dominated forests after the ubiquitous presettlement wildfires were suppressed. Current vegetation is a mix of forest (40%), agriculture, and grassland with some wetlands in the river valleys. The primary forest cover is oak-hickory (51%) dominated by oak species and shagbark hickory. Maple-basswood forests (28%), dominated by sugar maple, basswood and red maple, are common in areas that were not subjected to repeated presettlement wildfires. Bottomland hardwoods (10%) are common in the valley bottoms of major rivers and are dominated by silver maple, ashes, elms, cottonwood, and red maple. Relict conifer forests including white pine, hemlock and yellow birch are a rarer natural community in the cooler, steep, north slope microclimates.

Date  2010

Lakes and Impoundments

Impaired Waters

Projects including grants, restoration work and studies shown below have occurred in this watershed. Click the links below to read through the text. While these are not an exhaustive list of activities, they provide insight into the management activities happening in this watershed.

Arcadia was founded and settled by four men from Dodge County, Wisconsin: Collins Bishop, George Dewey, George Shelley and James Broughton. In 1856, the settlers petitioned to become a town. They needed a name for the new town, which up until this time had been called Bishop's Settlement, for its founder, or Barntown, for the many barns built by the early settlers. At a meeting, the women of the settlement were given the privilege of naming the town. Mrs. David Bishop offered the name Arcadia, which had been suggested to her by Noah Comstock. Comstock, a well travelled resident, said that the area reminded him of the mountain region of far away Greece, where the Arcadian peasants led a life of simple contentment amidst their wild surroundings. At the first town meeting, in the Spring of 1857, Bishop was elected chairman. The first school was started that year, with Sarah McMasters the first teacher. George Shelley opened a store, and Albro C. Matterson started a blacksmith shop the next year, 1858. Dr. Briggs and David Massuere began work on a flour mill in 1860, but all development slowed to a crawl while the Civil War raged, and the mill didn't begin operation until after the war. By 1867 times began to improve leading up a big boost in 1873 with the completion of the Green Bay and Lake Pepin Railroad. There was some difficulty planning the railroad's route. Its final placement along the Trempealeau River caused the town of Arcadia to move from the original upper town to the lower town where it is located today. The story is told that part of the reason for the final location of the railroad was that the person that owned the land in lower Arcadia gave the railroad the right of way so that the rest of his land would become more valuable. Arcadia has suffered from regular flooding ever since. The railroad was important to the growth of Arcadia and still plays an important role in its continued prosperity.

Date  2010