Fish!!!

Nice Paddlefish! That looks allot like Intake Rapids dam on the mighty MO in eastern MT.

One more thing I did not mention. It was also banded.

Good ones Mark. Around here some people call them shovelbills. Here there is a 2 week snagging season in March but I've only caught them when using jigs for stripers. Do you eat them? Always wondered if they are good eating. Going to make some caviar?

Yes!!

Female?

Congrats!

Montana requires you to buy a tag for them. You have to put it on the fish as soon as you beach it.

You cast a treble hook out into the fast water with a 4-6 oz sinker under it about a foot. You then cast it out and jerk it in and take up the line and jerk again. This could go on for hours.

In my case I casted out, jerked twice and on the third jerk there was no weight so I thought I lost my sinkers. I started reeling the line in and it damned near took me water skiing. It took a lot of line as I had no idea where to set the drag and I set it too light. I tightened it while I was fighting the fish. I managed to get it close enough to shore that someone was able to gaff it. The rest is history. I ate way too much of it yesterday and had the trots today. I liked the fish, but not the raw back door.

The trots could have been caused by the cheap beer or skunk beer. :)

See the blood running down her back in the dorsal shot? That is where I hooked her.

Another reason it kicked my butt so bad is that a couple days before I had been collecting on top of my mountain and I dropped my hammer about 30 feet from the top. I didn't realize it until I got back to the truck. So I ran up the mountain PO. I strained about every muscle in my body.

The first day there were almost 300 caught. They are not going anywhere.

yep