Click here for interactive river map From Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks
America's longest river gets it's start in Montana near the town of Three Forks. Right from the start the Missouri is running big and wide on it's long journey across North America to join the Mississippi over 2300 miles away.
The swift currents of late spring and summer make it a popular river for floaters. The land the Missouri slides by has substantially the same appearance as when it was explored by the Lewis and Clark expedition over two centuries ago.
Of particular interest to fly fishermen is the stretch of river below Holter Dam, north of Helena. From the town of Wolf Creek downstream, it's a blue-ribbon rainbow trout fishery that looks more like a giant spring creek than a whitewater Montana river.
It has spectacular hatches of tricos, caddis, baetis and midges. It's also a good streamer and nymph fishery which produces some big brown trout in addition to the more numerous rainbows.
