Montana’s Clark Fork Fish Carry a Toxic Health Warning

If you are thinking about catching dinner from the Clark Fork River, well, you might want to hold off.

Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks has had on the books a standing advisory for a large stretch of the Clark Fork for years. From just west of Missoula through Paradise, they say, don’t eat any of the fish. Not sometimes. Not if it “looks fine.” Not even just one. The warning applies to all species, all sizes.

The reason? Decades of junk in the water. We’re talking dioxins, furans, PCBs. It’s nasty stuff left by old mills, mining, who knows what else. And if the toxins in the fish are any indicator, the sludge didn’t just disappear; it sank into the mud. And it is still showing up in the fish.

And that’s not just some small reminder printed on a pamphlet. This is serious health guidance. Those sorts of chemicals can cause real damage over the long term.

I literally just had this conversation with my son. We were up at Holter Reservoir fishing and he asked if the rainbow trout we caught were safe to eat. I told him, yeah, they were good, because those fish had come from the headwaters of the Missouri River. That small moment got to me, though. Because now we have to teach our children to ask that sort of question. Remember when “Can we eat this?” was the last thing you thought about when fishing in Montana?

But here we are.

So if you’re casting a line in the Clark Fork, catch and release is the way. If you’re after something to keep and cook, hit one of the lakes, Flathead is one of the least polluted lakes in the country. Also, if you’re ever uncertain, FWP has a complete fish consumption guide you can refer to.