Bruce Farling, head of the Montana chapter of Trout Unlimited, also believes that the public benefits from restoration on private land. “There is a hell of a good cutthroat population in the Bitterroot again, and that’s because we invested in some pretty wise private property projects,” he says, referring to The Future Fisheries Improvement Program, created by the Montana Legislature in 1995 and run by the Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks. The program is financed by the sale of fishing licenses and provides matching funds to anyone who wants to improve habitat on their creeks, streams or lakes. It’s conservation work on private land supported, in part, by the state.
To get approval and money from the program, landowners must show that work done will improve the entire fishery and they must allow access to their streams, lakes, or creeks for recreational purposes. Most of the grant money goes to improving spawning grounds and fish passages, which, in the end, benefit entire fish populations throughout watersheds and ecosystems.
Dale Spartas bought 60 acres of ranch land three months ago near Big Timber, just north of Paradise Valley. The land includes an irrigation ditch, one spring creek with two small ponds, and a quarter mile stretch of the Yellowstone River. “My property has been totally abused, ” Spartas says. “It’s been grazed so hard that the banks are all filled in and all the cattails and willows have been totally eaten. It’s as bald as a bean out there and there is no way to keep the water cool.”
With the help of a Fish, Wildlife and Parks biologist and Mike Sprague, Spartas has applied for some of this Future Fisheries money. His waterways will be evaluated for their potential as spawning grounds for the Yellowstone fishery. His plan, with Sprague, is to create a 20- to 25- foot riparian zone around the streams as well as around his section of the Yellowstone. Gravel beds and larger pools will be built into the creeks as will a two-pond system on the creek, both of which can serve as good spawning habitat.
I don’t think in terms of multi-thousand-dollar improvements to anything I own, and I can’t fathom hiring biologists, geomorphologists, and engineers to help out with the yard work. I still like to think about what government agencies and non-profit groups are doing on public waterways to improve fish habitat. Yet I am confronted with the same set of frustrations about their work as many other people. Agencies and non-profits are good at, “educating, debating and legislating,” as Sprague put it, but they often work slowly and inefficiently.
