Mish mosh SW Montana fishing report - Late June

Carp flies now sold at Sportsman's Warehouse in Helena 

The huge variety of fishing options in Southwest Montana makes it much harder to write coherent fishing reports like I could do in Missoula.  I write reports every once in a while so that there is a non-biased, transaction-free source of information out there for anyone who cares.  I also use this blog as a personal fishing log which comes in handy sometimes for my own pursuits.  So here it is:

Big Hole River:
It was huge and the salmonflies have come and gone.  Usually, the fishing sucks for a couple weeks after the hatch.  It's called the "salmonfly hangover" and it can really suck.  I avoided the party this year due to my trip to Florida and the shitty conditions.  The river is dropping in nicely now and summer on the Big Hole should be the best it has been in years.  It would be awesome to be able to fish hoppers in the afternoon this year!

Upper Clark Fork:
As the river drops and clears, the caddis fishing will get insane.  The Upper is a caddis stream through and through.

Silver Bow Creek:
I haven't been out there yet this year but things usually get going right about now.  You'd be surprised by what may eat your larger attractor dry or simple streamer...

Missouri River (Craig reach):
I have to distinguish what area now because my Missouri River Range has grown so much over the last few years.  The dry fly bite is on big-time.  There are pods of snotty MO trout all over the river. You need to bring your A game.  Perfectly placed casts and drag free drifts are crucial.  Fly selection comes second in importance.  They will eat PMD spinners, caddis, and buzzballs like candy if you can present them properly.

Holter Lake Carping: 
I'm embarrassed to say that it was my first time on the boat up at Holter recently.  It is such a beautiful place!  I didn't have much info on carp fishing up there but I knew that they had to be there. They are, and they get big like in Clark Canyon.  The carp were tough and I got my ass handed to me. There is still a bunch that are spawning but I was able to find some over on the rockier eastern shore that were willing to eat.  I even landed one of the largest carp yet to date. I can't wait to get back up there again.  There are also some great trout in Holter!

Three Forks Ponds Carping:
The carping in the Three Forks Ponds is outstanding right now!  There are still some spawners but the ones that aren't are tailing in groups in the flats.  Throw a small black wooly bugger or small leech pattern for all-day action.

Clark Canyon Carping:
I haven't been down there since I've been back but I imagine it is the same as Holter.  They were in full spawn mode before I left and the fishing was hit or miss picking on the wallflowers. The carping should get better and better here by the day.  It's time to start thinking about callabaetis, damsels, and dragonfly nymphs perfectly cast and timed to be in the hot zone of a slowly cruising, golden submarine.

Georgetown Lake:
I will be checking in on Montana's finest brook and rainbow trout lake very soon.  The traveling sedge caddis should be underway as we speak and intensifying over the next few weeks.  Also, callabaetis, damsels, and dragonflies in nymph and adult form will play out as well.  The traveling sedge hatch on G-town is one of the finest of any hatch you will ever encounter.  Big bugs and big willing fish are what it is all about.  Have you ever had a 100+ fish dry fly day?


Thats all I got for now.

Montana Tech Restoration Ecology Seminar Presents: Amy Sacry of Geum Environmental Consulting

Milltown soil lifts and bank armor (photo taken from Geum's website)

Tomorrow, February 3, 2016, the Montana Tech Ecological Restoration Seminar presents Amy Sacry of Geum Environmental Consultants.  She will be discussing "Revegetation Theory and Practice." 

Geum and Amy have their hands in restoration projects all over Montana.  Most notably, they did the revegetation of the Miltown floodplain after the removal of the Milltown Dam and they are now working on the massive Upper Clark Fork Restoration Project. Amy is everywhere all the time and I've run into her at many different Trout Unlimited restoration projects as well.

This is not one to be missed!!  The seminar is on the Montana Tech campus, in Butte, Montana in the Chemistry and Biology Building (room 102) @ 4 pm.  This seminar is open to the public!

I'll see you there!

   

"Be a Part of the Story" - Clark Fork Coalition

Superstition Ball - A fundraiser for the Clark Fork Watershed Education Program

The Clark Fork Watershed Education Program is a great organization!  They are holding a formal Ball as a fundraiser in the Grand Hotel in Butte, Montana this Friday, November 13, 2015.

"The Clark Fork Watershed Education Program (CFWEP) has been a leading provider of environmental and restoration education programs and services in western Montana since 2005. Based at the Montana Tech Institute for Educational Opportunities in Butte, Montana, CFWEP offers multi-disciplinary science and history programs for schools, teachers, and students in and around the Upper Clark Fork Basin. CFWEP also offers public education and outreach services such as tours, events, and publications that connect the public with the science and history of the amazing landscape of western Montana.
The CFWEP is fully equipped to provide education and information regarding watershed health, ecosystems and biota in uninjured, injured and restored stream reaches, anchored by historic and environmental context. Along with our staff of science and education experts, volunteer scientists and environmental experts working in western Montana design research and monitoring programs and provide up-to-date information, often working directly with students, teachers and citizens who want to learn more about the natural world around us.
The CFWEP staff is supported by an Advisory Board of education, science, and local experts. CFWEP also works extensively with government agencies and community groups around western Montana.
If you are interested in learning more about the history of CFWEP, past successes, and some of the educational programs we provide, download the “CFWEP: Place-Based Science-Inquiry Education in a Superfund Site” PowerPoint Presentation."
-From cfwep.org

Clark Fork Coalition hosting Modesty Creek restoration presentation in Missoula (updated)

Photo from clarkfork.org

Next Tuesday at 12:00 pm, the Clark Fork Coalition will be having a presentation about the recently restored/reconnected Modesty Creek as part of their "Walks and Talks" series.  The presentation will be at their office in Missoula at 140 S. 4th St. W.  The  restoration site is upstream from the town of Deer Lodge.  Modesty Creek is a tributary to the Upper Clark Fork and has been diverted and disconnected from the Clark Fork for a long time.

Visit the Clark Fork Coalition's website for more information on the project and the field trip.

George Grant Chapter of TU's Annual Meeting

Clark Fork River Spring Cleaning Schedule

Get your feet wet for clean water! Temps are warming, streams are rising, and soon you'll be spending all your spare moments blissfully enjoying the river. Let's prepare for a summer of water recreation by cleaning up our favorite waterway. The Clark Fork Coalition is gearing up for an action-packed spring and we need your help! Check out our upcoming volunteer opportunities: Reserve Street Clean Up: April 10th 8:30am-1:00pm (lunch provided) Join CFC, the Poverello Center, and the Missoula Water Quality District to clean up trash under the Reserve Street bridge. This stretch of river has some unique needs associated with temporary camps along the river. Must be 18 years or older to participate. We will need 12 volunteers for this event. Annual River Clean Up: April 18th Times vary (lunch provided) Help CFC host Missoula's most popular volunteer event! We need help with set-up, registration, serving lunch, and helping things run smoothly throughout the day. Great opportunity to get involved behind the scenes of a community-wide river celebration. Contact Katie for more info on specific jobs and time slots. We will need 15+ volunteers for this event. Snowpack Monitoring: March 28th and April 25th All day Help predict spring and summer stream flows by monitoring Montana's snowpack! This is a full-day adventure in wintry conditions. You'll gain experience in snowpack data collection and enjoy a beautiful hike in the Sapphire Mountains. No experience required; snowshoes provided. Limited to 10 volunteers per outing. ~~~~~ To volunteer at any or all of these events contact Katie at katie@clarkfork.org or (406) 542-0539, x212. If you haven't done so already, please fill out a volunteer application. Have questions? Get in touch! Thank you for helping the river! Want to do even more for our rivers? BECOME A MEMBER TODAY and help keep our watershed clean, healthy, and whole!

Missoula area fishing report - Bighorn Edition - Early August

Handsome Ram

Rock Creek:  The fishing at Rock Creek is elementary and outstanding right now.  The hell with salmonflies, give me the spruce moth!  The spruce moths have cyclical hatches (like a lot of our bug friends) and this year is a heavy one.  I've been seeing them on all the local streams and the fish are more excited than me about it.

Get off the paved road and away from people.  Make sure to have decent wading boots with studs because the rocks in the creek are super slick right now and the flow is still good.  Fish the shallow faster-fast riffles with your Elk Hair Caddis selection and move your way downstream hitting above and below every mid-stream rock.  When there is good pocket water or riffle which runs up against the bank, stand in the middle of the river and cast towards the bank.  You should be catching bucket-loads of small fish with lots of bigger fish mixed in.  If not, your fishing skills need some work because it is unreal up there right now.  Honestly, your fish count will directly correspond to your ability to move up and down the stream to cover water.  I covered about 2 1/2 miles and caught fish on the dry, all day long.

While I was climbing on top of a log jamb, I looked down and saw a huge bull trout hiding in the shade right underneath me. I froze and tried to slowly reach for my camera as he slid slowly into better view.  Then, I could see him look right up at me and, POOF- gone.

Clark Fork:  The Clark Fork is in great shape and the fishing is really good, even around town, and even with the tubers.  I caught some great fish right in between tubers this week.  It's funny to have a drunken audience when your catching fish, especially because most people don't realize that there are such great fish right around town.  I just wish the tubers didn't trash the place. Anyway, the spruce moths are gonzo and the big fish are one em, big-time.  The Kingfisher Fly Shop put a great tip in their fishing reports.  They mentioned using a Prince nymph as a dropper under your whatever.  Boy, whatever the trout are taking that for, I don't know.  But the Prince nymph dropper is working like an electrofishing wand right now.  I switched over to a double Prince set-up but that was not as effective.  It seems like the trout want the dropper on a pretty short leash.  Anyway, in the afternoon, cut the prince nymph off and trail an Elk Hair Caddis of the back of your smaller hopper for the spruce moth.  The big fish are eating on top - nuff said.

Bitterroot:  The lower Root is also fishing great with smaller hoppers and spruce moths as well as some remaining PMDs and caddis in the evening.  Although it's been hotter than a two dollar pistol here in Montana, we are still maintaining good flows on all of our streams.  Hopper season on the lower Root is really fun.  There are a lot of BIG cutthroat down here love to slow-sip the hopper.

Blackfoot:  I haven't been up there in a while but with the insane amount of spruce moths I've been seeing everywhere, I'm thinking the Blackfoot would be really fun right now.

Lakes and ponds:  You tell me.  It's up in the air whether I'll be fishing an alpine lake, wildeness stream, or restored mine disaster this week.  Stay tuned.

Hey baby, why the long face?

Montana traffic jam

Planes and trains in the Clark Fork River

Old Clark Fork train wreck

Yet another train has derailed and dumped its load into the lower Clark Fork.  This train had denatured alcohol and airplane fuselages.  Most of the trains that pass through here carry crude oil and open coal cars.  It is only a matter of time before one of these toxic trains derails into the Clark Fork!!  After everything the Clark Fork has been through and the money and resources spent to clean up historic disasters, here we are again, risking it all.

This picture shows an old derailment downstream from Superior.  A couple of years ago there was another which spilled tons and tons of lumber (again lucky!!).  Last year one derailed upstream of Superior at the first big swirly hole down from Forest Grove.  And now this.

Here is the Missoulian article about the derailment.

The view from Lake Berkeley (updated Oct. 2017)

Nestled high up in the Rocky Mountains exists Montana's deepest lake.

The Berkeley Pit

The Berkeley Pit is a 1,780 deep open pit copper mine that is a half mile wide and a mile long.  In 1982, operations at the pit were halted and the giant pumps which kept groundwater out of the pit and old mine shafts under Butte were turned off.  Since that time, the groundwater level below the Butte Hill has been rising back to pre-pumping levels and filled the much of the 10,000+ miles of tunnels below town and also the pit, creating beautiful Lake Berkeley.

Lake Berkeley is not known for its fishing, it's best known as a potential time bomb.  The water in the pit has a PH of about 2.  The acidity of the water causes metals to dissolve and more sulfuric acid to form creating the positive feedback loop otherwise known as acid mine drainage (AMD) or acid rock drainage (ARD).  This does not bode well for most life forms.  I think everyone's heard the story about the snow geese by now (and then it got worse in November 2016).

Water treatment plant

A water treatment plant was built in 2003 to treat the water once it has reached a certain height but that won't go into operation for another 8-10 years. 

Another fun fact about the pit is that the walls sometimes collapse, making mini-tsunamis.  One of the largest landslides beached a research pontoon boat 40 feet above the water surface.

For now, the pit just sits there slowly filling.  MT Resources (the mine next door) used to mine the pit water for copper at a rate of 13 million gallons a day.  They are not currently mining the water anymore.

So, aside from the amazing history of Butte and the awe of human endeavor, why should people be aware of the pit?  Well, the pit and its sister lake, Yankee Doodle Tailings Pond lie at the headwaters of the Clark Fork River.  This is Montana's largest waterway and a major tributary to the Columbia River.  If anything catastrophic were to ever happen, there would be a lot of people and wildlife which would be very seriously affected. 

Another update is that the color of the water turned a beautiful green this spring.  Buttians attributed this to St. Patricks Day.  I've been told it's due to naturally changing chemistry as well as the fact that there is more copper at the surface because Montana Resources stopped mining it. Who knows?

RBM goes volunteering with Montana FWP

I love to volunteer for events, especially if it involves digging around in the river on a beautiful morning for the benefit of trout.  Today, I was part of a small crew assisting Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks with some maintenance on an important local fish ladder.

Marshall Creek fish ladder

Quick Background Bullet-points:  

• Marshall Creek is an important spawning tributary for cutthroat and rainbow trout that reside in the Clark Fork River.
• The creek comes out of the mountains and goes underneath the highway through a large concrete culvert to reach its mouth at the Clark Fork River.  The outlet of the culvert used to be perched way up above the Clark Fork.  Ladd Knotek of MTFWP said that trout attempting to spawn could not make it up into the culvert and into Marshall Creek. Mr. Knotek also mentioned that for a time, the stream was considered a pure strain cutthroat stream due to this disconnection.  In 1997 the Clark Fork experienced a major spring runoff and, due to the high gage height of the river, the distance to the culvert was breached by some rainbow trout.  Rainbow genetics showed up in the local population of cutts.  This made the stream a candidate for the ladder and a re-connection to the rest of the system.   
• In 2003 the fish ladder was built "basically by hand" due to difficulties posed by the location.
• Biological monitoring of Marshall Creek since the installation of the ladder has shown that it is very effective and that it is heavily used. 
• The ladder was originally armored with a bunch of angular rocks on that leading edge.  Most of the reinforcement has washed away over the years along with the rocks which provide the structure for the bottom pool.  These rocks also hold an important metal baffle in place.    

When the rainbow and cutts are spawning, the level of the Clark Fork usually comes up to even (sometimes more than) with the pool at the bottom of both cascades.  The fish enter the ladder by jumping out of that pool and into the opening of the concrete structure in the right of this picture.  They then ascend a series of pools and turn the corner...

Once they're out of the ladder, they are at the height of the old culvert.

Once inside the culvert, the trout benefit from these baffles which were installed in the culvert to slow the flow of water and provide rest areas.

Will Schreck from MT FWP with 2 guys from Westslope TU hauling rock

Salmonfly (Pteronarcys californica) nymph 

re-built bottom pool

Our hard work put the ladder in good shape to provide our local trout access to their spawning grounds.  I hope they all get up there and get it on nasty!!

Volunteer season is here!  Stay tuned for more opportunities.  I will post them here.  There is a such thing as trout karma!

New release from Classic Journey Outfitters

I think this one is their best one yet!

Happy Monday!