Yellowstone River

Yellowstone River is a tributary of the Missouri river, starting high in the peaks of Yellowstone National Park the Yellowstone river flows out of the park right past the town of Gardiner and down through Livingston. One of Montana’s finest rivers offering plenty of different floats to keep your trip filled with awe inspiring Paradise Valley views while floating along the Absaroka Mountain Range. Since it flows through Livingston this river is only a little over thirty minutes from Bozeman.

The Yellowstone River is a very fun river to float with huge amounts of water flowing and changing character from calm mellow sections to big drops in elevation with very exciting riffles usually holding plenty of fish through out. With some of the best hopper fishing and an abundance of native Cutthroat Trout, the dry fly fishing can be very exciting on the upper section. As the river flows through Livingston some of best summer fishing can be found right through town. Leaving Livingston and the sign of people behind it starts to open up to wide open ranches, down here it becomes a very big river with equally big fish.

The Yellowstone River experiences a long heavy run off season and becomes un-fishable for most of spring and occasionally into early summer.  An unexpected heavy rain fall can also push a good amount of mud down the river, slowing the fishing down even in to the middle of July. When the Yellowstone River becomes un-fishable, the drive time to nearby rivers from Livingston can increase past two hours.