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This Week in Fish and Wildlife: FWP shares how fish were affected by the historic floods

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Posted at 10:02 AM, Jun 19, 2023
and last updated 2023-06-19 12:13:39-04

One year ago, the Yellowstone River was flowing in places it had not before. The Historic Flooding caused damage and changed some of the land around it.

It certainly affected those who live near it, but what about those that live in it?

FWP’s Morgan Jacobsen says they have received lots of questions about that. He says yearly sampling on the Yellowstone has continued.

Jacobsen says fish they sampled before the flooding have been re-captured. In some places, the numbers are actually pretty good. He says at Crowin Springs, there has been an increase in brown, rainbow, and cutthroat trout numbers. Brown trout numbers are also in the Mill Creek area, but rainbow and cutthroat numbers are down.

Jacobsen says the bottom line is the fish are still there. The fish in the Yellowstone have been dealing with flooding events for thousands of years and will deal with them again someday.

FWP expects the fisheries of the Yellowstone to fully recover from last year’s floods.