Fees reduced on the reservation

Wow. We had quite a surprise on our first fishing trip to the Blackfeet Indian Reservation in early June. Our destination was Duck Lake, and we'd purposely waited until the rainbows had completed their futile spawning attempts.

Actually, there were still quite a few rainbow trout cruising the shallow water, but we concentrated our efforts in deeper water and were rewarded with a few nice trout for eating.

The surprise wasn't the fact the ‘bows were still chasing each other. The real surprise was that the tribe has lowered the daily fishing permit fee from $20 to $10. The consecutive three-day non-member fishing permit fee dropped from $30 to $25, but the non-member seasonal permit increased from $65 to $75.

I wondered about the reasons behind the changes, so I tried to call the tribal fish and game department. No phone number is listed in the sportsman regulations.

I called the number listed on the Blackfeet Tribal Fish and Wildlife Web site every day last week and the message was consistently "the mailbox is full." No one ever picked up the phone on their end.

Wondering if there were any other changes, I found a copy of last year's regs and compared them to those valid for 2011-2012. The daily limit for combined trout has increased from five fish, including one over 20 inches, to five fish, two over 20 inches. And I also noted "only hooks with a maximum 5/8-inch gap between shaft and point may be used when fishing for trout species."

After wearing out our legs battling the wind on Duck Lake, we drove to Hidden Lake. The water was definitely warmer and a few midges were hatching.

The snowy mountains were resplendent in a bright blue sky, and bent fly rods made a day on the reservation even more special.