A recently released survey by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (http://www.census.gov/prod/2012pubs/fhw11-nat.pdf) shows that the number of hunters and anglers has risen since the last survey was done in 2006. It’s most recent analysis showed that the number of hunters and anglers age 16 and older rose from 33.9 million in 2006 to 37.4 million in 2011. Nationally, 33.1 million people fished while 13.7 million hunted.

All of those hunters and anglers generated a good deal of money by buying gear and going places to fish and hunt. By the USFWS estimate, hunting and angling expenditures accounted for about $89.8 billion in 2011 — $43.2 billion on equipment and $32.2 billion on trips.

Montana hasn’t seen the same trend in the last few years. Numbers for both hunters and anglers has declined, although in 2009 Montana set a record for fishing license sales at 391,000.

This post was written by Brett French, Outdoors Editor of the Billings Gazette