About this ebook
The Bighorn
River, which runs through the Crow Indian Reservation, opened to the general
fishing public in 1981 from action taken by the U.S. Supreme Court. The Bighorn River in Montana begins below
the Yellow Tail Dam and After-Bay. The
After-Bay was constructed to hold the super saturated Nitrogen water, created
by peek power generation from Yellowtail Dam, allowing the Nitrogen too
dissipate before entering the Bighorn River.
At times the trout below the After-Bay experience high levels of
Nitrogen and the trout get Nitrogen Narcosis, the “Bends”; this can decimated
the trout fishery.
The Bighorn River flows northerly through
a wide valley that is heavily farmed and there are irrigation diversion in the
lower river divert large volumes of water from the river. The highest trout populations and fishing
crowds are in the first 13-miles of river below the Yellowtail After-Bay. The species composition, Rainbow and Brown
Trout, in the Bighorn River have fluctuated wildly since the 1981 trout fishing
opener. The latest Rainbow Trout
population decline is due to Whirling Disease infestation throughout the
Bighorn River.
The Bighorn River is a large western
river with very few places a person can walk across the width of the
river. The water is generally clear,
except during run-off when water is released over Yellowtail Dam. The shoreline along the river and the many
islands are filled with large Cottonwood Trees.
The fishing on the river is either
exceptional or it is poor. Some of the
runs below a riffle-run may contain over a thousand-trout in just a few
hundred-yards of river. Many of the
guides on the river have their client’s fish nymphs through these large pods of
trout. Fishing in this manner can get
anyone into hooking fish. The reason
is, the trout are stacked in the run like cordwood and while the trout is gilling
for oxygen their mouths open and the tippet is pulled through their mouths and
the fly inadvertently sticks the fish in the mouth. I have observed this many times while snorkeling.
This books purpose is to provide factual data and useful information
needed to experience a successful day fishing for Wild Trout in the Rocky
Mountains.
It is not uncommon to spend hundreds if
not thousands of dollars in the pursuit of fishing for Wild Trout. This book can provide the needed information
for a successful fishing trip: water
temperature, water level, water turbidity, air temperature, weather conditions,
daily hatches, stomach analysis from Wild Trout landed, “GDB” flies fished, fly
fishing presentations, trout species, trout lengths and geographic
location. An Outfitter or Guide will
charge you $300.00 to as high as $500.00 for a day of fishing but by reading
this book you will be able to catch Wild Trout on your own.
The “GDB”
Flies used to catch and land all the Wild Trout contained in this book were
“Originated” and “Hand-Tied” by the Author.
About the author
Gary David Blount was born in Dunsmuir, California in December 1955 to David Oliver Blount and Irene Rose Blount. Gary lived on the banks of the Sacramento River and began fishing as soon as he could hold a fishing rod. In 1964 his family moved to Moreland, Idaho on the banks of the Snake River. While living in Moreland, Gary’s father purchased a piece of property on the Henry’s Fork of the Snake River outside the town of Last Chance, Idaho. Gary’s father was a schoolteacher and every summer they would fish the Henry’s Fork of the Snake River and all the waters in the “Golden Triangle” of Yellowstone National Park. In 1966 the family moved to Sandy, Oregon on the banks of the Sandy River. At this time the Sandy River was one of Oregon’s best Salmon and Steelhead Rivers. At age eleven Gary began tying his own flies with fly tying instruction from his next-door neighbor, George Mac Alevy. George was a professional Fly Tier and wrote a weekly fishing column “By the River’s Edge” in the local paper. In 1984 Gary moved to Missoula, Montana and obtained a job with Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks as a Fisheries Technician. Gary’s duties consisted of: determining species composition, distribution, size, abundance and age of Wild Trout in Region 2 in Montana. In August of 1984 he was assigned to perform a cursory sampling on Rattlesnake Creek, which flows through the town of Missoula. Rattlesnake Creek upstream from the Water Company Dam, which is three-miles north of Missoula, had been closed to all fishing since 1940. After two-days fishing Rattlesnake Creek Gary realized the fishing regulations on Native Westslope Cutthroat Trout were far too liberal in the region and most of the Westslope Cutthroat Trout brood stock were being over harvested from all Western Montana waters. Gary had spent all summer performing population estimates on over eighty bodies of water in Region 2 and had not seen a fishery that even compared to the fishery in Rattlesnake Creek. Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks did not have the funds available to do a study on Rattlesnake Creek so Gary originated a privately funded research project, “Rattlesnake Creek Research Project”. Today there are special regulations for Montana’s Native Westslope Cutthroat Trout in all of Western Montana waters as a result of Gary’s “Rattlesnake Creek Research Project”.
Gary moved to West Yellowstone, Montana in 1989 and worked as a fishing guide for two-years before becoming a licensed fishing outfitter. Gary owned and operated Yellowstone Catch & Release Outfitter until 1996. In 1994 Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks made an Associated Press Release which stated: the Madison River had Whirling Disease and the Rainbow Trout population had diminished from 3,000 Rainbow Trout per mile of stream to less than 300 Rainbow Trout per mile of stream. This Associated Press Release unfortunately forced Gary out of the outfitting business. Gary and his wife Laura now live in Clarkston, Washington on the banks of the Snake River where he is publishing a separate book on each river he has fished while living in Montana.
