East Rosebud Lake

Drainage: East Rosebud
Approaches: Drive-to. Roughly 45 miles south of Columbus, Montana, and passable in a two-wheel-drive vehicle. East Rosebud Road, Forest Road 2177, dead-ends at the trailhead.
Elevation: 6,206 feet
Fish: Brown trout, common and self-sustaining. Rainbow trout, common and stocked. Brook trout and Yellowstone cutthroat, both rare. Montana FWP.
Coordinates: 45.19423, -109.64268
Bugs: Not a problem on our visits.

Getting there

You drive to this one. That is the whole approach, and it is worth saying plainly, because almost nothing else in this guide is reachable without boots.

From MT-78, turn south onto Roscoe Road and go 2.3 miles, cross the bridge, then turn right onto East Rosebud Road and follow it 10.6 miles until it dead-ends. There is room to park and to turn a horse trailer, and a vault toilet. The Forest Service campground sits on the east side of the lake.

FWP is direct about one thing worth knowing before you go: most of the lake is private, and access is provided by the East Rosebud Lake HOA.

The hike

There isn't one, and that is the point. East Rosebud Lake is the front door to the entire drainage. Every page that follows in this section starts from the parking area here.

The East Rosebud Trail, #15, leaves the trailhead and runs southwest past the lake before turning up the valley. Our GPS put the trailhead at 6,217 feet, and the trail is still within roughly 250 meters of the middle of the lake at the half-mile mark, so you get shoreline for a short stretch and then you are into the timber. Elk Lake is the first water past it. The same trail carries on 16 miles to Fossil Lake, which is why the parking lot fills the way it does.

The lake is shallow. FWP measures it at 9 feet average and 20 feet at the deepest, which matters if you are bringing a boat or planning to fish deep.

Tips & safety

• Navigation: No route-finding required. The road dead-ends at the trailhead. Two-wheel drive is enough.

• Camping: Forest Service campground on the east side of the lake. Everything past the trailhead is wilderness camping, and the first good sites up the trail are a long way in.

• Fishing: This is the sleeper. FWP's 2020 survey sampled 50 brown trout here averaging 15 inches, the largest at 25.5, and a 2017 survey sampled 35 browns running up to 26.5 inches. Rainbows are stocked on a regular cycle, most recently 1,077 fish in 2023 and 2,065 in 2021. Brook trout and Yellowstone cutthroat turn up rarely. A drive-to lake holding 26-inch browns is not a common thing in this range.

• Bugs: Nothing that stood out.

• Access: FWP notes most of the shoreline is private and access comes through the homeowners association. Park where you are supposed to, stay on the public access, and do not give anyone a reason to tighten it.