Wonder
about some part of Montana’s natural world?
E-mail us at: tdickson@mt.gov
Illustrations by Peter Grosshauser and Jeff Tolbert
Which
are more common in Montana: mule deer or white-tailed deer? And do they
ever interbreed?
Mule
deer are still more common, though whitetail numbers continue to increase.
Montana’s estimated mule deer population is roughly 330,000, and the
whitetail population is roughly 240,000. The two species occasionally
interbreed, usually a whitetail buck mating with a mule deer doe.
Which
is larger: the golden eagle or the bald eagle?
They
are basically the same size: big. According to the National Audubon Society’s
Sibley Guide to Birds, the golden eagle is slightly heavier (10 pounds
versus the bald eagle’s 9.5 pounds), but the bald eagle has a slightly
wider wingspan (80 inches versus the golden’s 79 inches). From a distance,
the way to tell them apart is to know that the bald eagle soars with
wings in a nearly flat plane, while the golden’s wings are in a shallow
V.
How
many fish does FWP stock each year?
Bob
Snyder,
FWP hatchery supervisor in Helena, says the figure varies from year
to year depending on factors such as egg-taking conditions in Fort
Peck Lake and other waters. “But generally, we rear and stock around
8 million trout and salmon annually and between 45 and 85 million
fish, warm-water and coldwater species combined,” Bertellotti says.
What
percentage of elk hunters shoot a bull elk each year?
Despite
what you might think from reading hunting magazines, relatively few
elk hunters bag a bull elk. The overall success rate on bulls, cows,
and calves combined for elk hunters in 2003 was roughly 25%. Of the
29,000 elk killed, 13,700 were bulls, making the success rate for
bulls slightly less than 12%. Most of those bulls were spikes
and raghorns.
While visiting relatives in Plentywood, we saw a bright green snake roughly 2
feet long. What could
it have been?
You
were lucky to have seen a smooth green snake, one of Montana’s rarest reptiles.
Found mainly in meadows, where it blends in with green grasses, the smooth
green snake hides under logs, boards, and rocks, feeding mainly on insects.
Other
than the ears, is there some way to tell a mule deer doe from a whitetail
doe?
Look
at the tail. The tail of a mule deer, doe or buck, is ropelike with
a black tip. The tail of a whitetail, doe or buck, is wide and brown—except
when alarmed, when that species flares its tail, exposing the white
underside for which the whitetail deer is named.
Is
it true FWP pays no taxes on wildlife management areas and its other lands?
No.
FWP makes annual payments to counties at the same rate a private
land-owner would pay property taxes. The department provides counties
with payments-in-lieu-of-taxes, as they are called, totally about
$300,000 each year for wildlife management areas and fishing access
sites exceeding 100 acres. FWP pays no county taxes on state parks,
affiliated park lands, office buildings, or fish hatcheries.
Could
the seismic and thermal activity Yellowstone National Park ever create
a new volcanic eruption in our state?
Not
in Montana, but scientists say a massive eruption from the park itself
is long overdue. The next eruption could be 2,500 times the size
of the Mount St. Helens volcano. If that occurred, access to the
park would likely be closed until further notice.
Which
are the most scenic drives in Montana?
That’s
definitely in the eye of the beholder. That said, the U.S. Forest
Service has designated three routes in Montana for their outstanding
scenic value: the Beartooth Scenic Byway between Cooke City and Red
Lodge, the Pioneer Mountains Scenic Byway southwest of Butte, and
the Kings Hill Scenic Byway through the Little Belt Moun-tains southeast
of Great Falls.
Other routes touted as must-see drives include the Going- to-the-Sun Road in Glacier National Park, U.S. Highways 287 (between Augusta and Wolf Creek) and 89 (between Livingston and Yellowstone National Park), and Montana Highways 43 (along the Big Hole River, southwest of Butte) and 69 (south from Boulder).
I
still hear people call your department “Fish and Game.” How
long has it been since the name changed, and why don’t more people
get the name right?
The
name was changed to Fish, Wildlife & Parks in 1979 to reflect
the department’s expanding responsibilities to manage all wildlife
and Montana’s state parks. As to why the “new” name
still hasn’t caught on after 25 years, apparently old habits
die hard.
Why
are the headwaters of the Missouri designated at Three Forks and not farther
up the Jefferson River?
The
U.S. Board of Geographic Names considers the Missouri River’s
origins to be the confluence of the Gallatin, Madison, and Jefferson
rivers at Three Forks, in accordance with the Corps of Discovery’s
designation in 1805.
Ronald Grim, specialist in cartographic history at the U.S. Library of Congress, says when Lewis and Clark reached what is now known as Three Forks, in late July, they found three rivers of roughly the same flow and size. “They probably could not determine which was the main branch of the Missouri,” he says. “It’s easy to second guess them now, 200 years later, but it was difficult back then. Bear in mind that at one point they actually thought the Marias River [150 miles downstream] was the Missouri.”
The unofficial source of the Missouri is 298 miles away, up the Jefferson, then up the Beaverhead River, and then east along the Red Rock River to Brower’s Spring, on the Con-tinental Divide near Mount Jefferson and Red Rock Pass.
Where
did the name Apsáalooke come from, which was used in the March/April
issue to describe what are also known as the Crow Indians?
Susan
Stewart Medicine Horse, manager of Chief Plenty Coups State Park
and a Crow tribe member, says that Apsáalooke (Ab-ZOLL-ah-guh)
is the preferred spelling and pronunciation and that previous versions
(Absaroka, Absor-akees) were incorrect.
When
duck hunting, I have a hard time distinguishing the brownish hen mallards,
gadwalls, pintails, and wigeon.
Any advice?
Jim
Hanson, FWP Central Flyway coordinator in Billings, provides these ID tips: “A
hen mallard is a large, ‘chunky’ brown duck with some orange on
the bill and an iridescent blue patch bordered by white stripes on the back
of the wing. A hen pintail is a big-but-slim brown duck with a bluish gray
bill and a long, ‘pointy’ appearance at the head and tail. A hen
gadwall is a brownish duck usually with some orange on the bill and a small ‘window’ of
white feathers on the trailing edge of the wing. A hen wigeon has a short,
blue-gray bill, a dark smudge around its eye, pinkish flanks, and a small area
of white in the middle of the wing. For more on duck identification, go on
the Web to www.npwrc.usgs.gov/resource/tools/idguide/idguide.htm.
Is
it true that Fort Peck Reservoir has more miles of shoreline than the California
coast?
It’s
hard to believe, but the reservoir, with its hundreds of arms and
points, has nearly twice as many shoreline miles as California’s
Pacific coastline: 1,520 miles (U.S. Army Corps of Engineers) versus
840 (World Atlas USA). Fort Peck is also the largest hydraulically
filled (water and sediments pumped from the river bottom to form
the dam structure) dam in the United States.
Is
it possible to visit the site of the Mann Gulch Fire, made famous by Norman
Maclean’s Young Men and Fire?
Yes.
The gulch, where in 1949 thirteen smoke jumpers died in a forest fire,
is a small canyon running through the Gates of the Mountains Wilderness,
20 miles north of Helena. You can get there by Missouri River tour
boat, which runs daily during the summer, or by hiking in across the
wilderness area. A small monument marks the site where the firefighters
perished.
How
do you tell the difference between a walleye and a sauger?
It’s
not always easy, because they are both members of the perch family,
often live in the same reservoirs and rivers, and look almost identical
with their long body and glassy eyes. To tell them apart, look at the
tail. The lower tip of the walleye’s is white, while the sauger’s
is not. Also, the sauger’s first dorsal fin has dark spots, but
the walleye’s doesn’t.
Walleyes, which are not native to Montana, are generally larger than sauger, averaging roughly 16 inches and running up to 33 inches. The native sauger averages about 13 inches and runs up to 28 inches. The state records are 16.63 pounds and 8.81 pounds respectively, both from Fort Peck Reservoir.
I
once read there was a subspecies of bighorn sheep in eastern Montana and
the Dakotas, called the Audubon bighorn, that went extinct in the early
1900s. Is that true?
Bighorn
sheep did disappear from that area back then, but they probably weren’t
a separate subspecies. According to research published in 2000 by
Rob Ramey, curator of
zoology at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, there never was a distinct
Audubon subspecies. The “extinct” sheep were just regular Rocky
Moun-tain bighorns that once lived east of the species’s current range.
However, the “Audubon bighorn” mystique lives on throughout the
northern Great Plains. Read more about the Audubon Bighorn myth here.
The
Montana state highway map shows the state’s lowest point near the
Idaho–Montana border on U.S. Route 2. But where exactly is the spot?
I
want to actually stand there.
Then
put your waders on, because that spot, 1,820 feet above sea level, is in the
middle of the Kootenai River where it crosses the Idaho–Montana
border. The river flows from Montana to Idaho, so the elevation drops as
you follow it west.
Are
the mountains southeast of Havre called “Bear Paw,” “Bears
Paw,” or “Bear Paws”?
As
with so many place names, there is no definitive answer. The state
highway map has them as the “Bears Paw Mountains,” though
history books call the 1877 confrontation in which Gen. Nelson Miles
finally captured Chief Joseph of the Nez Perce the Battle of the
Bear’s Paw. And Havre area fisheries manager Kent Gilge says
everyone in that part of the state calls them the Bear Paws. When
in doubt, you can’t go wrong with the local nomenclature.
What’s
the difference between a grizzly bear and a Kodiak bear?
Both
grizzly and Kodiak are names given to brown bears, which are
found throughout northern Europe and Asia as well as North America,
says Mike Madel, FWP bear biologist. The Kodiak is the common
name for the brown bear subspecies found off the Alaskan coast
on Kodiak, Afognak, and Shuyak islands. Grizzlies are inland
brown bears. Brown bears that live along the Pacific coast are
called coastal brown bears. Kodiak and coastal brown bears weigh
roughly one-third more than their inland cousins.
Twice
in July while fishing, I saw a garter snake with a live sculpin in its
jaws. Is it common for land-based snakes to enter the water to catch fish
or other prey?
The
answer is yes for Montana’s racer snakes, garter snakes, and
ribbon snakes, says Walt Timmerman, a herpetologist and the Recreation
Bureau chief with the FWP Parks Division. However, prairie rattlesnakes,
bull snakes, and rubber boas “wouldn’t be caught dead eating
fish,” he says. Timmerman adds, “It’s rare for anyone
to see a snake eating anything in the wild, so a person who sees that
twice in one month is extremely lucky.”
Were
there ever any yaks along the Yaak River?
Not
the horned, shaggy, Asian kind. According to Names on the
Face of Montana, by Roberta Carkeek Cheney, yaak is
an Indian word meaning “arrow,” which describes how
the river “cuts across the bow of the Kootenai River in
northwestern Montana and Canada.”
I
thought the Yellowstone River was the longest undammed river in the lower
48 states. Then I saw on the state highway map something called the Lower
Yellowstone Diversion Dam, a few miles north of Glendive.
That
structure and several like it farther up the Yellowstone are dams,
but they don’t store water like the massive Libby or Yellowtail
dams. Roughly 6 feet tall and made of rocks, diversion dams are submerged
during high water. But when water is low, they can be seen diverting
water from the Yellowstone into irrigation canals.
Do
wolves really howl at the moon? Or are they just making noise when the
moon happens to be out?
According
to Fred H. Harrington, a professor of animal behavior at Mount Saint
Vincent University in Nova Scotia, howling is a social glue that keeps
wolf packs together: The pack that howls together stays together. He
says that wolves howl to find their companions and alert rival wolf
packs to keep their distance.
As for howling at the moon, it’s possible that wolves may be more active on moonlit nights, when they can see better, or maybe people hear them more often on such nights, because they are out walking around in the light of a full moon. “But a wolf howling at the moon,” says Harrington, “would be wasting its breath.”
How
do you tell a cutthroat trout from a rainbow trout?
The
most dependable way, says Mark Lere, FWP Fisheries Division Habitat
Restoration Program officer, is to look for the red or orange “cut
throat”
slash on each side of the lower jaw. Another fairly reliable indicator is
that cutthroats have black spots that are more dense toward the rear of the
body, near the tail. The rainbow trout’s black spots are more uniformly
spread out along the body, Lere says.
Color illustrations of rainbow and cutthroat trout can be found in Montana’s fishing regulations booklet.
What
are the odds of drawing a bighorn sheep hunting permit?
Better
than those for winning the state lottery, though not by much. Hank
Worsech, chief of FWP’s License Bureau, says your chances depend
on what district you put in for, whether you’re a resident or
not, and how many other hunters are applying. “In some places,
the odds are less than 1 in 100 most years,” he says. “But
in other districts, where access is real remote, there aren’t
many sheep, or we allow ewe hunting only, you might have a 50:50 chance
or better. There’s no pat answer; it depends on a lot of different
factors.”
The
Wolverine character in the X-Men movies and comic books has foot-long,
retractable, razor-sharp claws. What about real wolverines?
According
to Brian Giddings, FWP furbearer coordinator, wolverines do have sharp
claws, but they aren’t razor sharp, can’t be drawn in like
a cat’s, and are only about 1 inch long. Unlike the fictional
superhero character, real wolverines don’t use their claws to
slash and kill enemies, either. “They use them mainly to excavate
ground squirrels, marmots, and pikas, and to dig through snow to get
to elk carcasses in the winter,” Giddings says.
