Montana Trout Fishing

Mike Morris is a friend who works with the National Center for Appropriate Technology (NCAT) and once lived in Butte, Montana. He is in town on NCAT business and came early for a little trout fishing. We had three intense days: one on a little native trout stream, one on a wilderness-quality mountain lake, and one on the Big Hole River. I like fishing with Mike for the thoughtful conversations. As a PhD philosopher, Mike takes the world and our choices seriously. As an angler Mike is a keen observer, carries a well-stocked selection of esoteric flies, and likes "matching the hatch" for things like crippled emerging Baetis mayflies. Even if he is catching trout on one fly, he'll still try other patterns to better understand what the trout might be thinking.

Day One: German Gulch Creek between Butte and Anaconda

German Gulch is a special place. As a tributary of Silver Bow Creek, pollution in the main stem prevented exotic (introduced) rainbow trout (from California) from hybridizing the native westslope cutthroat population. Cutties gleam like jewels of earth, sky, and water--a perfect expression of their native habitat:

They are not large fish, this being a small stream, but they are worthy of any serious angler. Please handle gently and release carefully:


Cutties evolved with the brief, food-rich summers of the Rocky Mountains. They take every opportunity to feed--even in open water on bright, sunny days:

High water blew out a chain of beaver dams on the creek this past spring. I think this gives the cutties an advantage over introduced eastern brook trout, which seem to prefer slower water. Here you can see what's left of a dam:

Day Two: An Alpine Lake

Many Miles Lakes (at the head of No Tellum Creek) are a group of glacial lakes along the Continental Divide near Butte and Anaconda. At the edge of the Pintler Wilderness, the area is accessible via a good trail known mainly to local residents. As I understand it, Butte and Anaconda residents take an oath to remove any trailhead signs that might help a Pilgrim find their way to this special place (view of a lower lake):

Non-angler friend Dave Carter joined us for the hike, and took this pic of Mike and I:

These lakes were originally barren of fish, but have a good population of rainbow and Yellowstone cutthroat trout. We caught many, many fish, and even brought a few home for a Montana surf & turf dinner of grilled trout & elk steaks. What a beautiful place:

Though cold nights are already bringing out the fall colors, a few hardy wildflowers are still blooming, including Parrot's Beak (Pedicularis racemosa):

And a species of Grounsel (Senecio spp):

I can never resist a good beetle photo. Biologists know that God was inordinately fond of beetles because he created so many species of them (!). Speaking of inordinate, note the length of the antennae on this guy (probably a long-horned beetle, Cerambycidae family, perhaps a Black Pine Sawyer Monochamus scutellatus):

Day Three: Homewater

No angler's visit to Butte America is complete without some time on the Big Hole. Fishing was not quite as easy as it has been for most of the past week or two, but it was good. That means the fish weren't "easy," but if you spotted a feeding trout and put the right fly over it with no drag, you'd get a rise out of it. Here's Mike on my homewater in the canyon, where we caught leaping rainbows (and a few browns) from small:

To medium (and a few large fish):

Whenever I tired of the intense concentraton necessary to make a good presentation to a rising fish, Molly The Dog was there to entertain me. If I'm fishing near a rock in mid-river and want a little company, she is more than willing to swim over for a visit. Here she is subduing a large, powerful, and angry stick into submission:

Conclusion

I'll conclude by citing some wisdom from my old friend George Grant, now deceased. George reminded anglers who got too cocky about all the fish they caught and all the wonderful skills they possessed about the reason we are able to catch so many fish: "We can catch them because they are there." Thank you, George, to you and all the other conservationists that fought for wild fish and environmental protection.