Tracy

Where was the public input on this? Was there a forum where the people could voice concerns or ask questions? How about a risk assessment? My comments are about a terrific riffle that had nearly perfect fish holding structure that is now covered in about 2 meters of dirt. Down river not 800 meters is a bridge where these improvement lines could have easily been run. This probably came down to the cheapest possible solution to the city not the most well thought out one. This has nothing to do with my “inconvenience”. That was nowhere in my remarks. I thought this to be another mismanaged project by the good folks at Lafarge when I saw it (in their never ending quest to develop every square meter of that part of the river). If you don’t think all that development on the section between 22X and Deerfoot is going to have a negative impact over the long haul your are kidding yourself. Eventually the province, the city and our country is going to wake up and realize that this river is a gem and responsible for a large portion of recreational income. Hopefully it wouldn’t be too late.

They also ruined two really fine fishing spots. No matter how hard they try to "restore" that section it will never be as good as it was. Shameful.

My experience on the river has been in June/July. You will not have the problems with water temps in May or June. That is only an issue in July and August. I know a fishing buddy of mine has fished it in May and said they had BWO's and some PMD's. We did well on CDC styled PMD's (16) as well as parachute adams (also 16) or female parachute adams in a yellow colour (16) in June for sure. There are several floats in the canyon section. All are good. The Canyon on the Missouri does not equal white water as it does on some rivers up here. The whole Missouri system from Holter to Great Falls is placid and spring creek like. For fish numbers Holter to Craig is hard to beat. Second favourite float is Craig to Dearbourn. Canyon sections below some of the tribs can get blown out in accordance with run-off so call ahead to see where they are down there with that. I hear they are getting much needed snowpack, but with Montana they have to sustain cool temps all spring otherwise it all can melt very quickly and before you know it they are back to water deficits. Just a function of the arid nature of that country down there. Call Chris and Jerry at the Trout Shop in Craig. They are the definitive source of info. down there. Nice chaps. Real easy going. Cannot help with the beer selection though.

We make the drive down there to fish it on occasion. Do not go down in July/August w/o calling ahead. The dam is not bottom release and the temps get into the 70's(F). In fact the Montana Fish & Wildlife folks have been closing it down when this happens. In June the PMD's have been great the last 3 years. Fish will start to get into the tricos in early July but if the temps are high they will not "pod" up. There is a 14/16 caddis that comes off (brown colour) that the fish get on in the evenings. Fish are nice. Not quite at the Bow size but they are strong. Fishing tends to be more dry fly. Harder to nymph most sections because it is more like a huge spring creek. Holter to Craig is the most popular float but the canyon sections are nice as well. We have caught nice fish as far down as Cascade Montana. Ratio is 8-1 in favour of the rainbows.

Those poor people from Quebec probably never had a chance. Thoughts and prayers to their family and loved ones back east.

Fellows thanks for all the feedback. It is good to see so many ethical fisherman on this fine forum. This behaviour should not be tolerated in any form. The problem I guess is how to deal with it. My fishing buddy is a disabled fellow with a very bad back and walking much further than a couple hundred meters is not a reality. So from that perspective we don't have the options that some of the more fit fellows here have. My thinking on this is that if is obvious that we are working a spot we have "claim" to that place until we leave. In my mind that is part of what separates us from others (the ethic). We should not be required to leave a place that we waited all day to fish just because some other fellow shows up at dust and decides to fish. The responsibility should be on that fellow to move on to other water. I don't know how we educate others that this is how things are in our sport. That is the much harder part.

That is exactly what me and my fishing buddy would have done. Better to be ethical and do the right thing than arrogant, selfish and inconsiderate just to get what you want my pappy always use to say.

I can understand this viewpoint and it may have some relevancy. I'm not sure these fellows would have been the type to just move on as you put it. They didn't even respond when my fishing buddy tried to say "hi" to them so I'm not sure they would have responded to a asking them to leave even if done gently.

Actually all three were fly fisherman. Two looked very novice. The other fellow looked like he knew what he was doing.

I see your point there. We just didn't expect guys to get so damn close to us even if it was just about 200 meters from the car. Just expected a little common sense courtesy. There just seems to be less and less of that lately in just about every walk of life.

My fishing buddy said hi when we passed their car. They didn't even bother to respond. I try to avoid be confrontational when up there because you never know what you might encounter with people. We did stare at them and stop fishing altogether when this happened and I know they knew that we were not happy about it.

We had to leave at about 10:00. With the drive and plans around the house today we had to pass on the night fish.

First let me point out that this is not intended to be a rant against my fellow fisherman on our local rivers in Alberta. Last night a fishing buddy and I are fishing a favourite section near Policemans. We made a long trip up from Lethbridge to fish this and were heading back that same evening. It's a spot that everyone here has probably fished a time or two. We get there early in the afternoon even though it's hotter than heck. We stake out a section that is no more than 20 meters apart and start fishing to some risers just upstream from us. At about 7:30 two 20 something fellows show up and walk down the bank and basically stand where we were casting to the rising fish. I look at my buddy and he has the same disgusted look on his face that I have. The fish are put down. These fellows are no more than 3 rod lengths away upstream of us. Then at about 8:30 another chap shows up and squeezes in between us and these two other gentlemen. I was amazed by this. It's almost as if these guys showed up and were going to fish this spot no matter how many other people were there already. They had no plan "B" to fish elsewhere and instead of improvising they just decided that their fishing was more important than being ethical and moving on to another spot. This is not the first time that this has happened to me on the Bow and just wondering what some others out there thing of this kind of fishing tactic or behaviour? Canadian

Just order them on the net. Fast shipment to Calgary. Really nice selection and in bulk cannot beat the price.

Togens hooks out of BC. Cheap and very near Tiemco quality. Plus Canadian.