Whitefish man dies while fishing near Browning

Gary A. Nelson, 62, an avid outdoorsman from Whitefish, died Saturday while on a solo fishing trip to Four Horns Reservoir on the Blackfeet Indian Reservation near Heart Butte, south of Browning.

"That was probably his favorite piece of water in all Montana," Nelson's long-time fishing and hunting buddy, Ron Platke of Columbia Falls, said Monday.

Nelson's wife Carol is at their home in Whitefish, where he ran his own finish contracting business.

Glacier County Sheriff's Office investigators still are piecing together details of what may have happened to cause Nelson's death.

They received a call from a woman at 12:30 p.m. Saturday saying her father was at Four Horns and discovered a dog in a boat on the lake and another dog at a camper on the east end of the lake but no man in sight. Some men at the lake pulled the boat to shore and found keys in it. It reportedly had been seen tied at the shore earlier that morning.

Just after 3 p.m., searchers found Nelson's body reportedly about 10 yards from his camp, stuck on the bottom of the lake.

Platke, an assistant golf coach for Whitefish schools, said he first got word from his wife that something had happened as he was returning with his golfers from a tournament east of the Rocky Mountains. As he neared East Glacier he got another call from a Washington friend who told him the grim news that Nelson's body had been found.

Back in the Flathead, he and his wife went directly to Carol Nelson's home and made plans for Nelson's son, the Washington friend and Platke to pick up the two German shorthair dogs and Nelson's camper and boat from Four Horns Reservoir.

Once there, he learned from a deputy on the scene that the boat had blown from shore.

"I fished with Gary for 20 years, and when I saw that I knew something went wrong," Platke said.

An experienced hunter and fisherman, who saw 160 days of fishing last year alone, Nelson knew how to secure a boat.

"Gary really ties off the boat; he's been fishing on the east side" for years, Platke said. "He took care of his dogs and his equipment, and to have it all scattered out like that - something happened."

He said another friend was fishing at the Tiber Reservoir south of Chester and had talked by phone with Nelson at Four Horns Friday night. That friend reported a beautiful evening at the Tiber Reservoir that night, but it lies miles to the east of where Nelson was camped on the Rocky Mountain Front, where strong winds can kick up quickly.

"Gary was the only one on the lake," Platke said, "and that was the way he liked it."

Platke said searchers found Nelson's body by watching Tess, one of Nelson's dogs, as she jumped out of the boat and dove down into the water.

Glacier County officials said Nelson had cuts on his shoulder and neck, but no one is speculating on the cause of death yet. His body was sent to the State Crime Lab in Missoula for an autopsy before being returned to Austin Funeral Home in Whitefish.

Platke admired his friend's enthusiasm for the outdoors.

"He was the biggest outdoor enthusiasts I ever met, and I consider myself a pretty big one," he said. "And multi-state - we would hunt and fish here until there wasn't any more, then we would go to Nevada because the season was longer."

Nelson fished in Montana, North Dakota, Idaho, Oregon, Washington and Canada annually, Platke said.

"We would hunt pheasants on the east side, then we'd go to Nevada every year for chukar and to Hell's Canyon and Oregon. We had no boundaries," he said.

"We're married to the most wonderful women and they just totally understood. Every year we were trying to top the year before."

Before Gary and Carol Nelson moved to Whitefish in 1984, he had taught in the Browning school system. He continued to manage property rentals in East Glacier while he worked as a finish contractor in the Flathead.

The change in jobs allowed him more freedom for his outdoor pursuits.

"He was the most prepared, the most durable," Platke said. "He was an amateur only in the fact that he did not get paid for what he did. You cannot turn on the Outdoor Channel and find anybody more qualified to be out there than that man.

"His love for the outdoors was' unimaginable," he said, confessing that words escaped him. "The smallest things were huge to him. It wasn't about getting what he was after, it was about the trip, the adventure. Although he always got what he was after."

Nelson's family is planning a service for him at 11 a.m. Friday, Sept. 11, at Platke's home, 410 Hellman Lane, Columbia Falls. Call Platke at 253-0768 for directions.

Reporter Nancy Kimball can be reached at 758-4483 or by e-mail at nkimball@dailyinterlake.com