Western Montana treats walleye, perch, and smallmouth like they are pirhannas. We all pay big bucks for them to wipe them out every year.
I fly-fished ID this year for 5 days ,cost me like $40, MT is pretty much the same although maybe a little bit more for the Lic.I don’t think they do a whole lot of walleye stocking after they started managing the levels on peck for natural reproduction. As far as tourism goes the legislature rolls however the environmental groups tell them too. Any industry other than tourism and real estate is sort of frowned upon. Locals out vacation homes in. So yes if a guy wants to pay a few hundred for a license to catch some 10in trout that’s what they’ll shoot for.
I fly-fished ID this year for 5 days ,cost me like $40, MT is pretty much the same although maybe a little bit more for the Lic.
Anybody who takes it upon themselves to put any fish in a lake its not supposed to be in is a serious dink period, weather it be walleye, perch, trout, salmon, muskie, whatever.
i don’t think the dratted environmentalists are driving these decisions, but tourism and trout fishing, especially fly fishing industry. A huge industry in the western states, fly fishing shops and guides and float boat sales places everywhere. Money talks for better or worse.I don’t think they do a whole lot of walleye stocking after they started managing the levels on peck for natural reproduction. As far as tourism goes the legislature rolls however the environmental groups tell them too. Any industry other than tourism and real estate is sort of frowned upon. Locals out vacation homes in. So yes if a guy wants to pay a few hundred for a license to catch some 10in trout that’s what they’ll shoot for.
In a lot of these western states like MT and ID they are just trying to get back to the native cutthroat and bulltrout in the mtn. streams and lakes. They are killing off Rainbows and Browns to do so, so its not like they are just targeting walleyes. Once these streams are back to the native fish i think they are pretty self sustaining to be honest. I would also have to assume there are federal grants involved with these projects since a lot of the water is in national forests etc. There is even a certain segment of trout guys that don't like these projects because they prefer the bigger Rainbows and Browns. I personally thinks it pretty cool to stand in a gin clear ID stream and watch wild, native, west-slope cutts pick a big fly off the surface.