03-24-2008, 07:10 PM
Here's the answer to the Jeopardy category, fishes of the Missouri River: Goldeye.
And the question: What is the most common species caught in the river between Morony Dam downstream of Great Falls and the upper reaches of Fort Peck Reservoir?
That's right, goldeye. That thin, silvery fish with golden eyes that nearly everyone fishing the river in central Montana has caught. This bit of information and lots more like it comes courtesy of Mike Wente, a Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks fisheries technician.
Wente spent almost every weekend alone last year from mid-April to the first week of November floating the Missouri River. When he wasn't swatting mosquitoes or sidestepping rattlesnakes he was talking to anglers for a creel survey conducted every four years.
Goldeye composed 36 percent of the catch, followed by sauger at 15 percent.
The most common game fish caught in the upper river, Carter Ferry to Fort Benton, was smallmouth bass. And most of the anglers hailed from nearby Great Falls.
"Some of those smallmouth bass weighed up to 4 pounds," Wente says. That's good considering the state record is 6.66 pounds from Fort Peck Reservoir.
In the middle stretch, from Fort Benton to the Judith River, the most common game fish was catfish, and the angling crowd consisted primarily of folks from the area: Big Sandy, Geraldine and Winifred.
The lower part, from the Judith River to the Fred Robinson Bridge and downstream a bit, hosted anglers mostly from Billings. The top game fish catch there was a tie between sauger and catfish, though catfish took top honors in the small section downstream of the Robinson Bridge.
"There were two catfish caught weighing 26 and 27 pounds," Wente says. "And sauger up to 4 pounds."
State records for those species are catfish at 29.7 pounds, and sauger at 8.8 pounds. While overall catch rates were similar to 2003, the catch rate of sauger nearly doubled.
"Sauger are really making a comeback," Wente says.
To get complete information from the anglers' fishing trip, Wente handed out nearly 200 postcards with the promise that one lucky angler would be drawn from those returned for a $200 gift certificate to Scheel's in Great Falls. That fortunate person was Newell Schaub of Billings.
And what memories has Wente kept from his floating the Missouri alone three to four days each week for six months in 2003 and 2007?
"I saw lightening hit a cottonwood about 100 yards away from me," he recalls. "I almost ran into a moose out in the river. I came upon a car that had been stolen and driven into the river. And I had four cottonwood trees blow down from the wind, one within feet of my tent
And the question: What is the most common species caught in the river between Morony Dam downstream of Great Falls and the upper reaches of Fort Peck Reservoir?
That's right, goldeye. That thin, silvery fish with golden eyes that nearly everyone fishing the river in central Montana has caught. This bit of information and lots more like it comes courtesy of Mike Wente, a Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks fisheries technician.
Wente spent almost every weekend alone last year from mid-April to the first week of November floating the Missouri River. When he wasn't swatting mosquitoes or sidestepping rattlesnakes he was talking to anglers for a creel survey conducted every four years.
Goldeye composed 36 percent of the catch, followed by sauger at 15 percent.
The most common game fish caught in the upper river, Carter Ferry to Fort Benton, was smallmouth bass. And most of the anglers hailed from nearby Great Falls.
"Some of those smallmouth bass weighed up to 4 pounds," Wente says. That's good considering the state record is 6.66 pounds from Fort Peck Reservoir.
In the middle stretch, from Fort Benton to the Judith River, the most common game fish was catfish, and the angling crowd consisted primarily of folks from the area: Big Sandy, Geraldine and Winifred.
The lower part, from the Judith River to the Fred Robinson Bridge and downstream a bit, hosted anglers mostly from Billings. The top game fish catch there was a tie between sauger and catfish, though catfish took top honors in the small section downstream of the Robinson Bridge.
"There were two catfish caught weighing 26 and 27 pounds," Wente says. "And sauger up to 4 pounds."
State records for those species are catfish at 29.7 pounds, and sauger at 8.8 pounds. While overall catch rates were similar to 2003, the catch rate of sauger nearly doubled.
"Sauger are really making a comeback," Wente says.
To get complete information from the anglers' fishing trip, Wente handed out nearly 200 postcards with the promise that one lucky angler would be drawn from those returned for a $200 gift certificate to Scheel's in Great Falls. That fortunate person was Newell Schaub of Billings.
And what memories has Wente kept from his floating the Missouri alone three to four days each week for six months in 2003 and 2007?
"I saw lightening hit a cottonwood about 100 yards away from me," he recalls. "I almost ran into a moose out in the river. I came upon a car that had been stolen and driven into the river. And I had four cottonwood trees blow down from the wind, one within feet of my tent