poor. The stocking and management policy eliminates the possibility 

 of such "token plants" being made in the future by stating that no 

 less than 100 fish per surface acre shall be liberated. This figure is 

 the minimum. The actual number planted per surface acre will 

 depend upon the productivity of the water and the fishing pressure. 



The policy statment takes into account that a great number of 

 Montana lakes are so contaminated with undesirable fishes that re- 

 sults commensurate with the cost cannot be obtained by fish plant- 

 ing. This will be discussed in more detail under another section; 

 therefore, it will suffice to state here that rehabilitation of such 

 waters is an integral part of the over-all program. 



Over the large eastern portion of the State of Montana, fishermen 

 depend largely upon small stock-water reservoirs or ranch ponds, 

 for fishing. It is desirable that the northern pike and other "warm- 

 water" fishes which are shown to be well suited to these waters and 

 which will reproduce in these waters be planted from the hatcheries. 

 Many of the ponds will be managed for trout or walleyed pike. 

 Neither of these fish will reproduce in these waters to any degree, 

 but by the stocking of small fish in these ponds, excellent fishing can 

 be .maintained at a nominal cost. 



General Fisheries Management 



In pioneer days fish were abundant, the land had been only 

 sparsely settled and developed, modes of transportation were slow, 

 and methods of taking fish were crude and inefficient. Since those 

 days the human population has increased and brought with it an 

 increase in land use and development, modes of transportation have 

 advanced so that any portion of Montana is only a day or less away 

 from any other point in the State, and fisherman skills have developed 

 greatly. The result of these changes has been that fishing success 

 has declined. Why is this so ? 



Increased fishing pressure is given nearly all the credit for this 

 decline, but can the fisherman himself be blamed for all the decline 

 of today's angling success ? The question can be answered with a 

 resounding NO, although in most states, Montana included, the major 

 part, if not all, of the fisheries program has been developed upon the 

 theory that fishing pressure is the chief factor in declined fishing 

 success. In this section the causes for this decline will be discussed 

 as discovered by the "new-look" at the fisheries resource, together 

 with the program which has been designed to retard, stop, and even 

 turn the course of this decline in the resource. 



Kinds Of Fish In The Waters 



As Lewis and Clark wound their way through the waters of the 

 Missouri River and its tributary drainages they found the only "game 

 fishes" present in these waters were grayling, whitefish, and cut- 

 throat trout. While they found other species of fish, it is important 

 to note that they found no carp and no Utah chubs, nor did they 



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