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 on the Missouri, Yellowstone with fish, turtles to follow Our Adopt-A-Fish program will embark on its sixth year of allowing school classrooms and others to follow radio-implanted fish on the Missouri and Yellowstone Rivers. For the first four years, we tracked fish on the Missouri River of Montana and North Dakota, between Fort Peck Dam and the headwaters of Lake Sakakawea and the Yellowstone below the Intake Diversion Dam. Last year, we've added the Yellowstone River above Intake, too. For 2007, we'll add the stretch of the Yellowstone River near Billings Our biologists in the program are Dave Fuller, with Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks at Fort Peck, Matt Jaeger, with Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks at Glendive and Nate McClenning, with Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks in Billings. Mike Ruggles, the Lower Missouri River Coordinator for Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks at Fort Peck, will also be lending a hand. They'll give us weekly reports in April and May on the Adopt-A-Fish. In 2007, you will not only be able to follow the movements of paddlefish, blue suckers, shovelnose sturgeon, pallid sturgeon, catfish, burbot (ling), sauger and spiny softshell turtles that were implanted with transmitters in the Missouri and Yellowstone Rivers. It ought to be a lot of fun and, who knows, you might learn some neat stuff about all kinds of fish, too. Here's how it works. State and federal fisheries biologists involved with Adopt-A-Fish have trapped fish. They surgically implanted small radio transmitters in them. And they're keeping track of the electronic beeps that tell them where these fish are located in the river. The program is offering students a chance to share in what the biologists are learning about these fish and other fish that live in Montana's lower Missouri and Yellowstone. Each classroom can "adopt" two of the fish we're following, give them their own special names, then keep track of where they go. Anyone else -- even adults -- can follow the fish over the Internet, too, just by returning to this Web site. We'll help you learn about some other things about fish and the Missouri and Yellowstone rivers, too. You'll learn about native species, species that were introduced, the river itself and some history of the Lewis and Clark Expedition and Fort Peck Dam. You can even take a look at all 45 of the different fish species that live in this river. Some of them, very few people have ever seen. We've got some fish games and puzzles for you to do on this Web site, too. There's a story to read yourself, or have a teacher read to the class. We'll give you some fishing information in hopes that you go out and catch a few fish yourself. You can ask questions of a fisheries biologist. You can show off some of your work on the Internet. And yes, there are even some tests you can take just to see what you've learned. We'll be tracking these adopted fish throughout the months of April and May as they make their annual spawning runs up the Missouri and Yellowstone. We'll update their positions once a week and give you insights on some of the things that biologists noticed about their movements. If you're a teacher, the time to sign up your classes is now. All you have to do is go to our How to Adopt page or e-mail us at Missouri-Yellowstone Adopt-A-Fish and put Adopt-A-Fish in the subject line. We'll send you some teaching aids to help you develop lesson plans to go along with program. There will also be curriculum information on this Web site with suggestions on how teachers can incorporate information from Adopt-A-Fish into their lesson plans. If you're not a teacher, just sit back in front of your favorite computer and watch the fish go. What might you learn? Well, for one thing, you'll learn that the big fish those folks are holding up near the top of this page is an endangered pallid sturgeon. And the fish down below, the one with the long, long bill out in front is a paddlefish and they can grow to weigh more than 100 pounds. Both are residents of the Missouri and Yellowstone in Montana. For more information, just go to our How to Adopt page or e-mail us at Missouri-Yellowstone Adopt-A-Fish.  Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks U.S. Army Corps of Engineers U.S. Geological Survey U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service U.S. Bureau of Reclamation Walleyes Forever Montana PikeMasters The Billings Gazette 
Montana PikeMasters Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks |