Fishing Relieves Stress for Presidents, DA’s and Everyday People, Too

   Brian Wright isn’t the first or most famous public official to seek solace by donning chest waders and stumbling over rocky river bottoms with a fishing rod clutched in his paws.

   Wright, now in his eighth year as Barron County’s district attorney, thinks everyone needs a release; something that takes your mind off grief, work woes or common, everyday pressures. Wright finds his relief by hunting muskies in the endless rivers forking and coursing through northwestern Wisconsin.

   But unlike presidents and other politicians who escaped to Wisconsin to fish, Wright came here decades ago to live and work as a private attorney, district attorney and Eau Claire County circuit judge before becoming Barron County’s DA in 2018. Still, no one would blame him if he simply came here to fish.

     Brian Wright, Barron County’s district attorney, rifles a cast while fishing for river muskies in northwestern Wisconsin. — Patrick Durkin photos

   Some of our waters are legendary, after all. The Bois Brule River in Douglas County, for example, is dubbed “The River of Presidents” because five U.S. presidents have fished its waters:

   -- Ulysses S. Grant in the 1870s,

   -- Grover Cleveland in the 1880s,

   -- Calvin Coolidge in 1928,

   -- Herbert Hoover in 1928 and 1937,

   -- and Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1947.

   Hoover took his solitude seriously. He once wrote: “Presidents have only two moments of personal seclusion. One is prayer; the other is fishing — and they cannot pray all the time!”

   Hoover even banned reporters and photographers from following him around while fishing, declaring: “Fish will not bite in the presence of the representatives of the press.”

   That might also explain why fish seldom bite for everyday anglers who invite outdoor writers along. Wright, however, is no prisoner to jinxes or journalists, and so we rendezvoused before dawn Oct. 17 outside the Barron County Justice Center. We then set out to relieve stress, cast for river muskies and perhaps even catch one or two.

     A yearling buck crosses the river, alternating between wading the shallows and dog-paddling the deeper pools.

   As we drove to our first spot, Wright explained that aquatic weeds remained a bother in some rivers because of low water, soft bottoms and warm temperatures. He suggested we fish a river with sandy or rocky bottoms, and work its deeper holes with jerkbaits and shallow-running plugs.

   “And don’t be surprised if we see some deer,” Wright added after we parked and hiked a trail for a quarter-mile through the woods. “They like crossing back and forth through this section of the river.”

   The air temperature was 33 degrees where we parked, according to the Weather Channel, but it felt and looked even crisper as we descended into patchy fog between the riverbanks. I dipped a hand to test the river’s still-warm water, but regretted it when my fingertips soon numbed in the cold air.

   Wright, meanwhile, was already firing casts toward the opposite bank, and twitching his jerk bait through the pool before us. After I finished taking photos and tucked my iPhone away, Wright suggested I fan-cast the area while he moved downriver to give me space. Minutes later he shouted for me to look downriver where four antlerless deer waded through river and fog, their gray outlines flickering in the mist.

  Brian Wright releases the day’s only muskie back into the river.

   We weren’t the only river inhabitants to notice those does and fawns. As I finished retrieving my bait with a figure-8 motion, I heard splashing upriver and craned my neck. There, 30 yards away and closing fast was a fork-horn buck bearing down on me, alternating between hops and a dog-paddle whenever its hooves couldn’t touch bottom. Judging by its line of travel, it was trying to intercept the distant deer when they came ashore.

   In fact, the little buck seemed so focused on them that it didn’t see me in its path. Either that or the buck figured me for a waterlogged stump to brush past. Instead, I greeted it, wished it good morning and watched its left eye pop wide and white in its socket. The buck veered sharply toward the far shoreline, shook its coat like a retriever, and scaled the bank without a final glance to verify my identity.

   Wright soon hollered again, this time from about 75 yards to announce he was fighting a muskie. Sure enough, his muskie rod was bowed and a fish splashed beneath its tip. I secured my bait, waded ashore and followed the shallows to Wright. He was gently reviving his 33-inch fish in slack water behind a fallen tree trunk. A few photos later, the fish flapped its tail and scooted for deeper waters.

   That turned out to be our only fish, though Wright had triggered another strike earlier but no hook-up. “Might have been a pike,” he said matter-of-factly, as if making sure not to insult any northern pike within hearing range. We agreed we kind of like northerns, though some anglers vilify them.

   A group of does and fawns crosses the river through an early morning haze.

   Soon after, yet another batch of antlerless deer crossed upriver from us after the original four-some re-crossed between us. We retreated for Wright’s car about 10:30 a.m., with the sky brightening and the fog and deer now memories.

   We drove to another spot farther downriver, but Wright took care to temper my expectations. “It’ll probably be more crowded, and it’s starting to get late,” he warned.

   After we arrived in the parking lot, we assessed it as a good news/bad news scene. No one else was there, probably because the muskies weren’t biting.

   Still, we had to try, so we waded out to a midriver shallows and cast into deep pools upriver and downriver, letting our baits settle to the bottom before slowly retrieving them. A half-hour later, we retraced our path to the car when noon arrived without a strike.

  If Wright blamed the press for our slow action, he was too polite to say so publicly.