6 Montana Habits That Get Transplants a Strange Look in Every Other State

You give a passing driver a friendly little wave from the wheel.

They stare back like you’ve lost it.

That’s one of the moments when Montanans who’ve moved away realize home did some things differently.

Here are the Montana habits that can earn transplants a strange look in other states.

1. Shaking Dice at the Bar

In Montana, shake-a-day is one of the most common games found in liquor establishments, the state Department of Justice’s Gambling Control Division wrote in a 2012 newsletter.

State law caps the shake-a-day game at 50 cents.

Montana Code Annotated 23-5-160 also lets you shake dice, alone or with an owner or employee, to decide who pays for your drink.

The jukebox gets a version too, limited to a predetermined amount of money, not to exceed $2.

2. The Montana Wave

The Montana wave is a way of saying hello from the road, according to the Montana Arts Council’s State of the Arts magazine.

The classic version is two fingers raised off the steering wheel.

A single finger lifted off the wheel counts too, and it’s far from an insult.

The Palm raises all four fingers, a step up in friendliness.

The Classic is the gold standard in Big Sky Country.

A nod works only as a reply to another nod.

3. Shed Hunting

Television station KRTV called opening day of antler hunting at the Blackfoot-Clearwater Wildlife Management Area a much-anticipated tradition, with hundreds of people gathering on May 15, 2025.

The area opens for antler hunting each season at noon on May 15.

In 2026, nonresidents couldn’t enter until May 22.

More broadly, nonresidents aren’t allowed on a wildlife management area for the first seven days it’s open.

Nonresidents also need a $50 license for shed hunting on those areas.

On national forest or Bureau of Land Management land, you don’t need a season or a license, resident or not.

4. Huckleberry Picking

Huckleberry picking is a generations-old practice in Montana, according to the Flathead Beacon.

On the Flathead National Forest, you don’t need a permit to pick up to 10 gallons of huckleberries a year for personal use.

One picker leaves the berries within 30 feet of the roadside for kids, tourists and older people.

A grizzly bear may eat up to 30,000 berries a day before hibernation, or about 18 gallons.

5. Roadside White Crosses

Some 3,000 crosses mark the places where people died on Montana's roads over seven decades.

Television station NBC Montana reported in 2021 that Montana's American Legion chapters post and maintain them, and that the program remains unique to the state.

The Legion's guidelines call for each cross to be sixteen inches tall and twelve inches wide.

The Legion discourages family and friends from decorating them, since decorations reduce a cross's visibility.

6. Livestock Brands

Montana's Department of Livestock had 55,567 brands on the books on January 1, 2022.

Under Montana law, you can't brand livestock unless the brand has been recorded with the Brands Enforcement Division.

If you own a brand, you have to re-record it every 10 years, a cycle that began in 1921.

By the end of 2021, 47,663 of those brands had been re-recorded, and the department recorded 1,000 new ones.

An applicant can register a brand for cattle, horses, sheep and bison.

If you're moving cattle or horses, you need a brand inspection before crossing a county line or leaving the state.

The Youth Deer Hunt

Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks schedules a youth deer hunt to line up with the annual two-day teachers' convention, when most public school students have no school.

In 2026, the hunt ran October 15 and 16 for kids ages 10 through 15.

If you have a kid ages 10 through 15, those two days off can turn into a deer hunt.

4-H Livestock Auctions

At the 2025 Marias Fair, the 4-H livestock auction brought in $751,971 on 126 head, a new gross record again this year.

The 1,185-pound beef champion steer sold to Frontline Ag Solutions for $8 a pound.

Flathead County's 4-H program sells at a different fair, the Northwest Montana Fair, and it sets different rules.

If you're a 4-H member there, you can tag a maximum of two market animals, and only one of them goes to the fair.

To sell it, you have to show that animal in both the Market Class and the Showmanship Class.

Sheep have to weigh between 110 and 160 pounds, swine between 220 and 295, and beef between 1,050 and 1,550.

Bear-Resistant Trash

In parts of Missoula County, you take out the trash with a bear in mind.

Missoula County and the City of Missoula adopted the Bear Buffer Zone garbage ordinance in fall 2023, and it rolled out in three phases.

Phase 3 took effect April 30, 2026, requiring residents in the designated zones to use bear-resistant garbage containers.

Since September 1, 2024, the Potomac Valley Bear Mitigation Area ordinance has required all garbage there to be stored in a bear-resistant manner.

Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks recommends keeping garbage bear-resistant and checking your property for anything else that could draw in a bear.

How Video Gambling Compares

The state Department of Justice says Montana has more than 1,400 licensed gambling operators and locations offering more than 16,000 video gambling machines.

You can find legal gambling establishments in every county.

A Montana Free Press analysis of state licensing data counted about 16,500 machines, slightly more than one for every 69 residents in fiscal year 2026.

Nevada reported 149,367 licensed slot machines in mid-2025, about one for every 22 residents.

South Dakota's fiscal year 2025 report lists 11,120 active machines, just over 84 residents per machine.