It's been said that flyfishing is the most enjoyable way to take any game fish anywhere. No flyfisher will quarrel with that. Many of us would add it is also the most enjoyable and most productive way to take panfish like bluegilIs and crappies.

This article was supposed to focus on a best Wisconsin fishing spot. Where it is, what is caught there and how.

Wisconsin is close to being a flyfisher's Valhalla. There is no place in the state where an angler could conceivably be far from fun with a flyrod. For a flyfisher to try to select one best fishing spot is like a kitten designating a favorite leaf in a bed of catnip or a waxwing the most delectable berry on a mountain ash.

For instance, southeastern Wisconsin, although thought of as being predominantly urban, is blessed with an amazing number of lakes and ponds. The DNR lists fifty in Waukesha county alone that contain bass and panfish.

The hilly southwest where every raindrop starts looking for a route to the Mississippi as soon as it touches down, is an area of fertile streams. The creeks contain trout and the rivers, smallmouth, both prime fly rod fare.

Here the relatively new, six county, January first stream trout opening extends the fly fisher's season through nine months. My favorite here are the fish-for-fun sections of Castle Rock and Doc Smith creeks in Grant County. Since no fish can be kept they contain a much greater than average proportion of large trout. If quality trout fishing is your bag, these two streams are worth getting acquainted with.

Shades of brown or gray and combinations of both in dry flies seem to produce well here in season. As for nymphs, my favorite here, and now that I think about it, just about any stream in the state, is the silver nymph.

It is a grayish pattern with brown hackle and mottled feather overlay and underlay on a silver tinsel body that gives a translucent effect. Size 14 works well.

In Wisconsin's southern most part, Rock and Dane Counties mark the division between east and west. Here the lake region ends and the streams begin.

The Madison lakes in Dane County have long been regarded with awe by flyfishers. For years their fertile waters produced baskets of large black bass and 11 inch bluegills almost on demand. Striped bass also provided heart stopping action on a fly.

In the last couple of years, however, following an ill-advised weed poisoning program, the stripers have disappeared and large bass and bluegills are as rare as the weed beds that used to harbor them.

Whether it's nostalgia, proximity, or just the hope that springs eternal, I spend a couple of evenings a week all summer with a fly rod and waders on the north end of Lake Waubesa, which is one of the Madison chain. I guess it is still one of my favorite best fishing spots. Maybe the challenge has something to do with it.

I rarely return without a mess of fish even now. Most of them crappies with an occasional walleye and enough decent to make it exciting. A tremendous crappie hatch about three years ago is starting to pay off in respectable size fish.

I fish the very north western tip of the lake and reach it via Libby road. The road ends at a parking area with a launching site suitable for canoes and small boats. These and a long strip of county owned shoreline make access easy.

To my way of thinking, the best strategy here is the use of chest high waders and an eight or eight and one half foot rod. A rod like this will probably take a number 7 weight forward line which is heavy enough to turn over small bugs and streamers and light enough to present size 12 and smaller wet flies and nymphs without alarming splashes.

There are no longer weed beds to guide you, so wade out as far as you comfortably can and start fishing. Cover the half circle towards open water with casts about ten feet apart. Repeat this several times before moving. At dusk extend the area fished to include the full circle around you. Fish move in towards shore as the sun sets, so it is real important to prospect the water between you and shore at this time.

Make long casts and retrieve back close to where you are standing before picking up. Fish don't seem to be as wary of someone in the water as they are of boats.

The most productive time is late afternoon and evening. There are no weeds to concentrate feeding fish so they cruise, picking up food on the move. Evidently it is mostly insects, because nymphs and wet flies are more successful than minnow imitations such as streamers. If you take a fish cast the fly right back and retrieve it through the same water. Crappies often cruise in schools and bluegills in groups of three or four, all about the same size.

Here is where good periphery vision can pay off. If you think you see a momentary flash or glisten out of the corner of an eye, the chances are you did. Often sunlight will flash off a fish underwater just when one turns to take food. This seems to be more noticeable off to one side than when looking full on.

Anyway, turn and put your fly there instantly. This is one of flyfishing's advantages. You don't have to retrieve all the way back to cast again. Just pick up the line and fly and put them down where you thought you saw the flash. It is amazing how many times a fish will take when you do this.

I usually start fishing with a nymph tied on the end of the tippet and a gaudy streamer like a Micky Finn on a dropper about eighteen inches above. A size 12 silver nymph seems to be best. Occasionally a fish will take the streamer but usually it's the nymph.

It seems like the streamer attracts them but they hit the nymph. At any rate, the two together are much more successful than either one alone.

As evening approaches, watch for surface activity. If you see signs of rises, change to a size 12 popper and cast to the circles the rises make. A yellow body with brown hackle is always a good bet.

Large bluegills will try to kill anything sitting on the water by slashing at it with their dorsal fins, so if you have a hit and miss it, putting the popper right back in exactly the same spot will almost always bring another hit. Doing this three or four times will usually enrage the fish enough so it will take fair and square and be hooked.

Crappies are sometimes attracted to a popper and will only play with it. At these times tying the popper on a dropper and letting a nymph follow it underwater will often take the crappie on the nymph.

Slow start and stop retrieves are usually best with both surface and sunken flies. Most takes will be while the lure is motionless so be sure to try lengthy pauses.

Carry an ignition file or a little hone and keep the fly hooks sharp. This is important because you will have takes with a lot of line out and ultra sharp points are essential for successful hook setting then.

Always have a landing net handy. Crappies especially, have thin skinned mouths and without a net you will lose a lot of them. A floating live basket attached with a short line to a wader suspender is also nice. Many evenings you will catch more fish than you want to keep and since they were taken on a fly, the ones you don't want can be returned unharmed when you quit fishing.

Central and northern Wisconsin have enough streams, lakes and ponds so that a flyfisher with an hour or two to spare should be happy any place.

In the north there are a lot of small deep lakes whose margins are partially or entirely bog. The sloping bottom that other lakes have, has been eliminated by this encroaching bog.

The shores often shelve out over the water and lush swamp grasses and an occasional tamarack overhang water that is 12 or more feet deep.

In contrast to Waubesa's 2,113 acres most of these are from 15 to 50 acres and the water in them can range from crystal clear to tannic acid brown.

Planet Lake in Price County is one of my favorites. Approximately 40 acres in size, it is very deep along most of its shoreline.

It contains the blackest largemouth bass and the most beautifully colored bluegills I have ever seen.

Like other bog lakes, Planet Lake is best fished from a small boat or canoe.

Size 8 or 10 peacock herl nymphs are almost always productive here. Try to stay out from shore 40 to 50 feet and place the fly right up against the shoreline grass. Let the fly sink then move it slowly with frequent pauses out into the lake.

When the fly has been retrieved eight or ten feet, pick up and cast again, placing it over about two feet along the shore and repeat the process until all the shoreline you can reach has been covered. Move the canoe and do it again.

Logs lying on the water are worth special attention. Try their shady side first and retrieve parallel to the log. On this lake small yellow poppers with gray or brown hackle and deer hair bugs are good producing floaters. Size 10 or 12 take both bluegills and bass.

Fish these similar to sinking flies, paying special attention to the corners formed by logs or other debris jutting out from shore. Retrieve with short pulIs and long pauses. Hits will usually come while the bug is stopped.

Planet Lake is three miles east of Fifield on the south side of highway 70. Ralph Erickson and his wife live on the lake and will rent you a boat or let you launch a canoe from their pier for a small fee. Tell them I sent you.