Find a shady spot to spend summer days

With our sweltering heat, find a cool shaded stream bank to relax. These are always a pleasant place to sit, even on the hottest of days.

Northwest Montana offers almost unlimited opportunities to find your own special streamside hide-a-way.

I have such a spot.

I found it while hunting. It is on Plum Creek land that is open for free public recreation use. It is a small meandering stream only 3 feet wide. It flows through a clump of spruce somehow spared from the loggers' saw. During the summer, the spruce provides shade from the hot sun and the forest floor is always a cool carpet of small plants and flowers.

I cannot pass by this spot without stopping to soak up the peace and quiet.

So on these hot summer days, go and find your own special cool streamside place. Montana has more than 20,000 miles of streams and rivers, with northwest Montana having more than a fair share.

Your starting point is a Forest Service map which shows public land ownership and usually shows corporate timber land ownership such as Plum Creek land. The Fish, Wildlife and Parks Department has a free map showing public lands around the Flathead Valley.

Plum Creek has a very neighborly "open lands" policy that allows free public use of their lands. Between National Forest land, state land and Plum Creek land, there are literally a couple million acres of forest land open for public use within an hour's drive of the Flathead Valley.

Examine your maps to find where streams and roads intersect.

From there take a short hike up or downstream to find your special spot.

Two brief words of caution.

If you are on land administered by State Department of Natural Resources and Conservation (School Trust lands), you may need a recreation use permit. These can be purchased at most sporting goods stores.

If you have purchased a conservation license, which is necessary prior to purchasing a state fishing or hunting license, then you have already paid a special $2 fee which allows you to fish and hunt on state DNRC land.

However, if you are a just a hiker or bird watcher, those types of uses are not covered by the purchase of a conservation license.

I find it almost impossible to sit alongside a stream without trying to catch a fish. So take along your fishing pole, then you are legal with the DNRC.

Also, remember that Plum Creek has been selling some streamside property. Your ownership map may be a little out-of-date.

The hot weather has really warmed the surface water on our lakes. So swimming is great, but lake fishing is a little more challenging.

Last weekend ,I found the rainbows and kokanee were really deep, in the cool waters at 25-40 feet of depth. Fishing at that depth is easiest with leaded core line or down-riggers. If your fish finder can locate a school of fish, then vertical jigging works well, especially for kokanee.

Last weekend, my wife caught the big fish of the trip, a nice 3-pound rainbow. She was trolling a small rainbow-colored spoon. While she caught a bigger fish then I did, I give myself some credit for being the guide.

So go out and enjoy our lakes and streams on these hot summer days.