The Evening of Fishing that Forever Changed My Life

Alec Underwood is the federal conservation campaigns director for the Montana Wildlife Federation.

Fly fishing has graced me with countless adventures and lasting memories since I was seven years old. Yet there are few moments in my entire life that stand out as vividly as an evening spent on the Madison River with my father in 2007. It was late June and we were in Ennis, a well-known Montana fishing town with a welcome sign that promisingly reads “Welcome to Ennis, Pop. 840 people, 11,000,000 trout.”

Feeling tired from a multi-day, relentless pursuit of good trout fishing, Dad and I decided to fish close to town, just below the Main Street bridge. It was a perfect evening for fishing — warm with a soft breeze and an abundance of caddis dancing in swarms above the willows. Surprisingly, not another angler was in sight as the sun slowly lowered on the horizon and splashy trout rises began covering the long glide in front of us.

Since I was not a dry fly aficionado at the time, my chosen tactic was to cast downstream, swinging a size 14 elk hair caddis across the surface. Little did I know that the method which had proved to be so effective on the Firehole River a couple of days before, would lead to one of the greatest evenings of fly fishing I have ever experienced to this day.

In the few hours of absolute madness that ensued, I landed so many trout that I lost count — which had never happened before because I loved nothing more than trying to out-fish my dad. To this day I estimate that anywhere from 50–75 trout came to hand in that single evening, ranging from 8–19 inches in length.

It’s easy to get lost in the euphoria of a great hatch on a beautiful river with the glow of the evening light on the Madison range. But the number of fish were of little importance in the grand scheme of things. The towering mountains seemingly watched in approval as a young fly fisherman’s life was about to change. It was that evening when I decided Montana was where I ultimately belonged.

As destiny would have it, I arrived in Missoula five years later to attend college at the University of Montana. More importantly, I began to develop a deep connection to some of the world’s greatest trout rivers and the landscapes they run through. Fast forward another nine years and I am now lucky to be working in conservation to protect those very public lands that I have become so attached to.

I’d like to think that my passion for fly fishing would have drawn me to the Northern Rockies regardless of that night on the Madison, but I’ll never know for sure. The knowledge that so many of my great fishing and hunting buddies moved here with similar stories gives me a comforting feeling. It’s a feeling that inspires hope that there will always be good people who will fight to protect the places we love: our public lands and waters that are essential to our quality of life.

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So many of our country’s parks and public lands written about in these love notes would not exist but for the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF). This important conservation program was permanently funded when Congress passed the Great American Outdoors Act earlier this summer. You can learn more about the Land and Water Conservation Fund here.

Would you like to write about public lands that you cherish? Please email Mary Jo Brooks at brooksm@nwf.org for guidelines.