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Greetings from TCTU Streamkeepers.
As we approach the winter season with some occasional swaths of snow and freezing temperatures, our Streamkeeper group is wrapping up our monitoring activities until next spring. This year we expanded our monitoring efforts from three to six streams. We doubled the number of volunteers that are monitoring streams in these targeted areas, and we have a nice contingent of general Streamkeepers that are monitoring some other streams.
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by Steve Kaukola, Habitat Committee Chair
TCTU volunteers accomplished a phenomenal amount of work in the few years up to the end of 2019. There was major brush clearing along the South Branch of the Vermillion River, as well as on Hay Creek south of Red Wing. The COVID pandemic stopped everything in early 2020 as DNR policies prohibited organized activities on its Aquatic Management Areas (AMAs) for the next 18 months. As TCTU Board elections brought in several new members in January 2020, I was appointed as the new Habitat Restoration Coordinator. The former coordinator, Tony Nelson, has still been active assisting in this area. The October edition is here, with articles on Late Fall and Winter Fishing, Bristol Bay, and the Rush Creek Fish Kill situation. 
Greetings from TCTU Streamkeepers. Welcome to October!
In my last outing I noticed the water levels on the Kinnickinnic River were very low. While sight fishing, I spotted several very large trout. One almost jumped in my net! I was unable to lure them to a dry fly or nymph but was successful in netting many very nice size browns. I also managed to catch a few leaves both on the water and on the branches as the trees start showing their fall colors and brilliance. In this month’s report, I am sharing a Streamkeeper tip and observations from targeted and general Streamkeepers. Our targeted streamkeepers will wrap up our scheduled monitoring efforts during October as our air temperatures flirt with freezing levels. The accuracy of our tests decreases when the air temperature is below freezing. We encourage our general and targeted Streamkeepers to visit our streams during the off season. Water temperatures and general observations of stream health can still be made and are valuable. We do have the ability to make more limited observations, such as water temperatures, water levels, water quality, etc., during the winter months. And of course, the winter season is the preferred time to be doing some habitat work. On September 15th, we posted a letter explaining recent developments with the Kinni, and the potential involvement of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (ACOE).
The River Falls City Council will be meeting on Tuesday, September 27th at 6:30 pm, and the agenda includes an update on the Kinni as well as, we expect, a discussion of the ACOE proposal. A few members of KinniCC and its partners will attend the meeting in person, and we will be delivering statements supporting the ACOE proposal on behalf of Trout Unlimited and KinniCC. Bob Luck, TCTU President, will be at the meeting, along with Duke Welter and KIAP-TU-WISH board member Gary Horvath. We do not feel a large in-person presence is called for at this meeting, but if you would like to see the meeting virtually, you can click here for instructions. As of now, we expect the actual vote on the ACOE proposal to take place on October 25th. We’ll keep you posted! The September edition of the Hotline is here, and it has some great information! Some of the articles I found particularly interesting were:
by Jim Sauter, Streamkeepers Coordinator
Greetings from the TCTU Streamkeepers! Welcome to the fall season of 2022. Our stream temperatures are beginning to moderate due to our shorter days and cooler evenings. On a recent visit to the Kinni, the sun set at about 7:24 pm! We recorded stream temperatures in the 52 degrees to 75 degrees range over the last month. Some additional precipitation in some locations would be helpful, although many streams have recovered nicely from the drought conditions of 2021. Download the August Edition of the Newsletter from our Friends at the Hiawatha and WinCres Chapters!
TCTU President Bob Luck recently sent out the following note to donors who have contributed to Free the Kinni
There have been some important recent developments in our effort to Free the Kinni that I would like to share with you. To date, TCTU and KIAP-TU-WISH members have donated $26,000 against a goal of $30,000. Total donor commitments as of now exceed $280,000. Thank you! Recently, the City of River Falls (CRF) received an offer from the Army Corps of Engineers (ACOE) to take over the removal of both the Powell Dam and the (upper) Junction Falls Dam, and to conduct a full ecological restoration of the river in the area affected by the dams. The WinCres and Hiawatha chapters have started to distribute an excellent monthly newsletter called "Southeast MN TU Hotline". Watch this space for the next edition. Meanwhile, here is an article from Hotline Editor Carl Berberich that does an excellent job summarizing where we stand with Trout in the Classroom:
The end of Trout-In-the-Classroom (TIC) program for Minnesota??? What??? Say it isn’t so. I sure was surprised when reading an email from John Lenczewski of MNTU this spring (May 12) asking for TU members to call their state legislature Senate members for support of the Legislative-Citizen Commission on Minnesota Resources (LCCMR) projects. This was because, the Republican controlled Senate was passing its own version of the LCCMR appropriation bill. |
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February 2023
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