Flathead Lakers (Montana, USA) Home Page

What Are Your Chances of Sighting the Monster? Loch Ness has nothing on Flathead Lake, according to Laney Hanzel, retired fisheries biologist. Laney's fascinating history of sightings — sober & otherwise — on Flathead Lake is a must read.

Tips for Lake Stewards. Practical advice for property owners.

Macman’s fishing report. By popular demand, it’s back — and so are the fish. We know you’ll enjoy it.

Streamflow & lake levels information for the Flathead basin and adjacent environs. Links to realtime data for local streams, rivers, lakes, and reservoirs; links to the U.S. Geological Survey, National Weather Service, and other agencies. Part of our lake levels section.

Stillwater Riverbank Restoration. Just east of Kalispell’s vocational-agricultural school, the Stillwater River was moving its west bank westward. Stakes that a science teacher placed near the water disappeared in a year or two. Something had to be done — and was. An ongoing story, with photographs.

Minimum flows and drought years. Hydrographs for Flathead Lake, the Flathead River below Kerr Dam, the south fork of the Flathead River below Hungry Horse Dam, and Article 56 minimums, for drought years from 1926 through 2003. Annual means for Flathead Lake. Graph displaying annual average elevations for water years 1908-2005.

What’s New

UPDATED, April 28, 2008. Flathead County Commission rejects North Shore Ranch proposal 2-1. The Flathead Beacon’s story on the commission’s vote is available on its website. The Daily InterLake also published a story on the vote on its website. Background information is available on our North Shore Ranch page.

We are grateful to Commissioners Gary Hall and Joe Brenneman, who voted against the proposal, for their leadership and careful review of the impacts of this subdivision proposal.

Thanks also to all of our members who spoke up on this important proposal.

Now we must take advantage of this opportunity to make our conservation vision for the North Shore a reality.

NEW What We Did in 2007. A detailed summary of our projects and accomplishments during 2007, and a special tribute to three departed stewards of the lake whose dedication and service were a gift and inspiration to all of us.

British Petroleum abandons attempt to drill for coalbed methane in B.C. Flathead. The decision was announced February 21, 2008, by Senator Max Baucus, who has worked 30 years to protect the North Fork, at a public meeting in Kalispell. Cline Mining, however, still plans to dig a giant coal mine in the headwaters of the B.C. Flathead. Online news reports are available from the Daily InterLake, the Flathead Beacon, and the Missoulian.

The electronic edition of our Winter, 2007, newsletter is available for downloading. Included are updates on North Fork mining issues, reports from the annual meeting, and a story on development threats to Flathead Lake’s north shore..

Flathead County is still wrestling with proposed additions to the Subdivision Regulations concerning stream and river setbacks. For more information view the Flathead Lakers’ letter to the planning board and read the technical working group’s setback recommendations.

Flathead Lake Monster story sighted in Flathead Beacon. Lakers board member Laney Hanzel received a nice, and more than well deserved, write-up in the Flathead Beacon newspaper for his tireless efforts to document sightings of a monster in Flathead Lake. Lakers members and others, of course, have been reading about Hanzel's findings here ever since they were published in our newsletter a decade ago.

Zebra mussel Exotic species pose serious threat to Flathead Lake. Non-native species such as the zebra and quagga mussels, and the Eurasian watermilfoil, could wreak ecological and economic havoc to the lake. Help us keep these pests out of our ecosystem. More information.