Fishing in Theodore Roosevelt National Park

Theodore Roosevelt National Park sits in the North Dakota badlands, where the Little Missouri River cuts through eroded buttes and clay breaks on its way north toward Lake Sakakawea.

The river — locals call it the Little Mo or the Little Muddy — is the park's only fishable water, and it runs through all three units: the South Unit near Medora, past the undeveloped Elkhorn Ranch Unit, and on through the North Unit south of Watford City.

The Little Mo earns its nickname. The water carries heavy silt and runs cloudy most of the time.

Roosevelt himself noted the catfish and "other uncouth finny things" in these mud-choked waters, and the fish community reflects that character: chubs, minnows, bluegill, carpsuckers, and catfish make up the bulk of what's in there.

Walleye and fingerling pike turn up on rare occasions. The sport fishing that makes sense here is channel catfish, goldeye, and sauger — but the park is straightforward that quantity and quality are unpredictable.

This is not a destination fishery in the conventional sense. What you need is a North Dakota state fishing license. No separate park permit is required to fish the Little Missouri through the park.

Hunting is not allowed inside park boundaries, but the river itself is open to fishing. The appeal here isn't the catch rate. It's fishing a wild, largely unvisited stretch of badlands river that looks much as it did when Roosevelt ranched here in the 1880s.

The North Unit in particular is quiet — fewer visitors, more dramatic canyon walls along the river bends.

If you want numbers or target species, the Little Missouri National Grassland surrounding the park and the waters near Lake Sakakawea to the east will serve you better.

But if you want to wade a silty prairie river through broken badlands country with almost no one else around, the Little Mo inside the park is its own thing.