Milwaukee River

The 104-mile Milwaukee River runs from the Kettle Moraine State Forest down through the city of Milwaukee to Lake Michigan, delivering one of the most accessible urban steelhead fisheries in the Great Lakes. The removal of the North Avenue Dam in 1997 and the Estabrook Dam in 2018 opened the lower river to anadromous fish for the first time in over a century, and the river now hosts strong fall and spring runs of steelhead, Chinook salmon, and Coho salmon that can be fished from downtown Milwaukee neighborhoods. The upper river through Ozaukee County supports smallmouth bass and northern pike in a slower, more rural corridor.