Clark Fork River Missoula Montana

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by Kay Novy

Title

Clark Fork River Missoula Montana

Artist

Kay Novy

Medium

Photograph - Photography

Description

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Thank you to the person in Cottonwood Heights, UT who purchased this print! Enjoy!

Designated as one of the largest Superfund clean-up sites in the nation, the Clark Fork vies for the title of the comeback kid with the likes of Ali and Rocky Balboa. After a hundred years of mine waste discharge and heavy metal accumulation at the Milltown Dam, the river has yet to be declared champ, but the restoration and rejuvenation of the Upper Clark Fork has been stupendous. With fish counts at zero in the late �60s in the Warm Springs area and reaching over a 1,000 per mile 10 years later and almost doubling again, the brown trout population has attracted a great deal of angling pressure. From Warm Springs to Rock Creek the river varies considerably in the number of trout per mile due in part to thermal seepage, irrigation, years of drought, algae blooms and the insidious presence of whirling disease.

But the good news is that the Milltown Dam, just above Missoula, was removed in the spring of 2008, along with tons of toxic sediment. A marked improvement of clarity and the removal of sediment on the gravel beds is noticeably apparent one year later. For the past 100 years genetically programmed spawners have been blocked from reaching the Blackfoot River, Rock Creek and the upper river. The return of prodigious hatches of insects below the dam has already begun and large fish counts will follow. Missoula�s Kelly Island to the confluence of the Flathead River continually improves. Fish, Wildlife and Parks Biologist Rod Berg estimates on average about 600 rainbows per mile with the larger 18- to 20-inch fish in the Superior and St. Regis area. Beware of the Alberton Gorge just below the town of Alberton and extending for approximately 18 miles. 2

Uploaded

July 16th, 2015