Richard Bong State Recreation Area in Kansasville

Wildlife refuge within the recreation area

Located eight miles southeast of Burlington on Highway 142. As a recreation area, the park is developed to accommodate a wide variety of activities, including passive ones—walking, running, bicycling, swimming, canoeing, fishing, picnicking, in-line skating, snowshoeing—and more active or motorized ones, such as snowmobiling, ATV riding, hang gliding, hot air ballooning, and model airplaning. The park also has places to train dogs, train falcons, go horseback riding, and hunt (in season.)

Wolf Lake has a boat ramp, fishing pier and beach. There is a Nature Center and two campgrounds.

Other amenities include a handicap accessible cabin, picnic shelters and toilet facilities. Adaptive equipment available for people with mobility impairment, including sit skis for cross country skiing.

For the nature lover, however, it should be noted that only 280—or 6%—of the park’s 4,515 acres are intensively developed. The remainder is managed for conservation. There are almost 30 miles of trails for hiking, mountain biking and cross-country skiing. Identified as an ebird hotspot with 254 species recorded. Great egrets, sandhill cranes, and great blue herons are known to nest in a wildlife refuge within the park.

Entrance fee or Wisconsin State Parks sticker required.

For more information go to Bong Naturalist Association.

For several kinds of WDNR maps click here.

Photo album of prescribed burn on Flickr.

Story link:

The first day of 2024 brings multitudes out to the parks!

Gallery (click to enlarge)