Anglers Log Over 3 Million Days Fishing in Montana

Saturday, May 05, 2001
Headlines

This article was Archived on Monday, July 01, 2002

Montana anglers spend over 3 million days a year in pursuit of an array of fish in the state’s rivers, lakes and streams, FWP’s latest angler survey reveals.

Montana angling surveys, funded in part by the Sports Fish and Wildlife Restoration Program, are conducted every two years. The first survey was done in 1958, when 1.42 million angler days were recorded. An "angler day" is one angler fishing one body of water for any length of time in a given day.

The 1999 Montana Statewide Angling Pressure Survey shows:

• Anglers log 3.18 million angler days fishing in Montana.
• Residents account for 75 percent of angling pressure in Montana.
• About 87 percent of Montana’s angling pressure is directed at either streams, rivers or lakes bearing trout species; rivers and streams account for about 52 percent of the activity with lakes accounting for about 35 percent of the trout-fishing activity.
• Canyon Ferry received the most angling use of any body of water in the state with 119,886 angler days.
• Fort Peck Reservoir received the largest amount of angling use for a warm water fishery with 112,018 angler days. It was also the second most fished water in the state.
• Anglers after walleye, bass, and other warm-water fish produce 137,425 angler days on streams and 221,108 angler days on lakes.
• July sees the most angling action with 499,177 angler days, or 15.7 percent of the year’s activity.
• The slowest angling month is December with 84,636 angler days, or 2.7 percent of the year’s activity.
• Most fishing activity takes place in Region 3 of southwestern Montana, which includes areas near Livingston, Bozeman, Dillon, Helena, and Butte, with 26 percent of the statewide total pressure.
• The upper Missouri drainage experiences the most use -- 519,977 angler days. The upper Missouri drainage includes the area above the mouth of the Marias River, excluding the Gallatin, Madison and Jefferson drainages. It includes the Missouri River proper, the Missouri River reservoirs -- Holter, Hauser, Canyon Ferry, Toston, and the Helena Regulating Reservoir, Spring Meadow Lake, the Sun River, the Teton, Smith, and Dearborn rivers, Prickley Pear Creek, and Belt Creek.

Montana’s 1999 Statewide Angling Pressure Survey, aimed at determining facts about fishing activity in Montana, is compiled by Bob McFarland, Systems Analyst with FWP Fisheries Research in Bozeman. The report is the result of monthly random sampling of licensed anglers, both resident and non-resident. McFarland, and his assistant, Deanna Meredith, sent out more than 85,000 angler surveys during the course of the year.