The Gallatin River

If you've seen the movie "A River Runs Through It," you've seen the beautiful Gallatin River. Chosen as the backdrop for most of the fishing scenes in the movie due to the striking scenery, its headwaters are in Yellowstone Park where it winds through sage flats, picking up feeder streams like Specimen Creek and the Taylor Fork. This section is easy to wade and the chances you'll catch a good-sized fish based on the strict catch-and-release regulations in the Park are favorable. Also expect to see Rainbows and a few Cutthroat and Cuttbow hybrids.

The Gallatin enters a canyon at the town of Big Sky where it cuts through towering rock walls, and the resulting chutes and rapids provide classic pocket water fishing and a good early-summer salmonfly hatch, not to mention excellent rafting. This is the most popular stretch with fishermen, because of the dozens of public access points along the river.

At the point where the Gallatin exits the canyon, it flows through private ranchland where the water slows and warms. The fish count is lower here, but the water gets deeper and the habitat more varied-and large Browns and Rainbows can be found actively feeding in the spring and late fall.

The Madison River

The Madison is Mecca to fly fishing enthusiasts around the world. It's easy to access, easy to wade (relative to large, fast rivers), and the abundant insect life has trained the trout to be receptive to artificial flies. The Madison is definitely one of those on every true fisherman's destination list.

Like most of the fisheries near Yellowstone Club, the Madison River's source draws from Yellowstone Park, a stretch that historically has been a popular fishing area. The stretch of river just outside the Park enters huge Hebgen Lake, where large Browns and Rainbows cruise slowly for hapless insects and small forage fish. There can be great fishing on Hebgen and the much smaller lake immediately below it, Quake Lake, but the stretch below both all the way down to Ennis is the most popular fly fishing spot. This section has been called the 100 mile riffle because of its strangely even, choppy flow. It's known for great hatches and lots of big Browns and Rainbows, and fishermen have accesses all along this portion of the river.

Just south of Ennis is Ennis Lake, where the Madison is dammed. Below that (still flowing north), what locals call the Lower Madison offers excellent fishing, although its slower moving and is often quiet in the heat of the summer. Keep an eye out for really huge Browns in this section, particularly in the fall, or enjoy fishing in the early season as well.

The Yellowstone River

The Yellowstone River is America's longest free-flowing (un-dammed) river. Its also one of the finest wild trout rivers in the country because of its size. Most fly fishermen choose to float the Yellowstone, rather than wade it because its width and volume can be intimidating.

Its source, Yellowstone Lake in Yellowstone Park, feeds the river which cuts north through the park to the town of Gardiner, Montana. The water in the Park is deep and cold and there are good populations of native, wild Yellowstone Cutthroat that average 15'. Although the areas to wade can be hard to find and floating is not allowed on any Park rivers, the fish are big and happy to take flies when they bite.

The most popular fly fishing stretch is between Gardiner and Livingston, also called the Paradise Valley. Here you can catch Brown, Rainbow, Cutthroat, and the occasional Brook trout, all in one day. They grow big here, and they say one local fly fisherman caught a 10 pound Brown trout two years in a row! The unbelievable hatches make fishing electric. At the same time, the river can also be moody, and it seems to be more sensitive to weather variations than some other fisheries. But, even when the fishing is tough, the scenery is stunning, making Yellowstone one of the best fly fishing rivers in the world.