Opening Day! The third Saturday in May is the traditional opening day of fishing season in Montana. It was established way-back-when by FWP before “conservation groups” and “concerned citizens” pressured to open certain sections of selected rivers and streams earlier. Some stretches of the Madison are now open all year long. This worked fine before Montana got invaded by “sportsman” from all over the world. Before the fly-fishing craze hit full force…before the land boom, condos and subdivisions. So now we can fish just about everywhere all year…right smack in the middle of the rainbow spawn in March/April…right smack in the middle of the brown trout spawn in the Fall.
Like a lot of things in Montana…”it used to work just fine”…but it just doesn’t anymore.
So I fished yesterday on Opening Day. Felt pretty good.
