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October 2022 FlyCaster

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Firstly, I hope you’re able to make good use of the remaining open water fishing days. Spring Lake has been quite productive recently with members experiencing some great backswimmer fishing – mostly in the afternoons. Rainbows over 20” have not been uncommon and the Tiger trout stocked a year ago are now about 15 to 16”.  Not many reports of Brown Trout being caught, however. 

The Cold Lake Fish Hatchery truck showed up at the lake on September 16th with some young triploid fish to stock – 4,291 Campbell Lake Rainbows averaging 6.8 cm and 2,000 Bow River Browns averaging 8.7 cm.  Another truck arrived on 20th September with some larger fish – 4,000 triploid Rainbows, Trout Lodge/Jumpers averaging 26.1 cm.

And a question – some members have noticed a wooden cross, about 6’ tall on the west side of the lake directly across from our boat launch but don’t know what, if anything, it commemorates. Anyone know?

ACA has installed the aerators at Spring and other local lakes ready for the winter. Let’s hope this is not for the last time at Spring Lake. As reported in the last Newsletter, ACA will be permanently removing them in April 2023 unless public access to the lake is not improved. (If you missed the Newsletter you can read it on ETFC’s website http://www.edmontontrout.ca/ ).  From what we hear there has been no progress in negotiations between ACA and Spring Lake Village Council. ETFC Executive is meeting on October 18 to discuss the issue.  Hopefully, there will be a possible solution in time for our in-person meeting at Queen Mary Park Community Hall, 10844-117 St on November 15th 7:00pm with Todd Zimmerling, ACA’s CEO, as our guest speaker.

In other news, our raffle closed on Oct. 4th and the winning tickets for each of the 5 prizes were drawn at the Penny McKee library that evening. Witnesses were on hand to authenticate the draw and the process was videotaped. The winners who have given permission for their name to be made public are:

  • 1st: Cut and Wrapped Pork Package with Freezer valued @ $650 – Sean Weberg
  • 2nd: Custom Made Sage GFL 9′ 6/7wt 2pc Fly Rod valued @ $500 – Kevin Chase
  • 3rd: Fly Box with 150 Handmade Flies valued @ $350.00 – Randy Hunter
  • 4th: Cabela’s Heavy Duty Cooler valued @ $275.00 – Myron Samycia
  • 5th: Pflueger 8′ 6″ 6/7wt Fly Rod valued @ $225 – Kate Weberg

Many thanks to Ernest Kitt for organizing the raffle, to all those who contributed to the prizes and helped sell tickets (special thanks to Paul Lanteigne) for selling a large number of tickets), to ACA for its help with advertising, to the Fishin’ Hole for allowing us to sell tickets at its store, and to Penny McKee Library for allowing us to use their facility for the the draw.

Deb Anderson
President 

August 2022 FlyCaster

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Greetings to all members and I hope you’ve been able to spend some days on the water and are planning more for the fall. Some updates on what will be and what has been happening:

Oct. 4th Raffle draw – ticket sales have been slow, and the club needs more of its members to help sell them, buy them, or both. Please contact us at  info@edmontontrout.ca if you’re able to help this raffle be a success.
Meetings: we’re planning to return to in-person meetings at Queen Mary Park Hall this fall but due to the unavailability of bookings in September our first meeting at the hall will be on Nov.15th. Todd Zimmerling, CEO of the Alberta Conservation Association, will be our guest speaker on the topic of ACA’s aeration program with particular reference to Spring Lake (more on that below). Speakers and topics for future meetings are being planned but if you have any suggestions or requests please let us know, again at info@edmontontrout.ca

News re Spring Lake:
As many of you know, there’s been concern expressed for many years to AEP Fisheries Management, to Spring Lake Village, and to the Alberta Conservation Association (ACA) about the lack of opportunity for the public at large to access the fishery at Spring Lake.  There’s some very limited foot access, but it’s very difficult to find a place along the shore to fish from and impossible to launch anything other than a small, light boat unless you own lakeshore property in the Village, pay to stay at the Resort, or are a member of ETFC. ACA finally decided to address the issue and asked for a meeting with Spring Lake Village Council. ACA explained to them that the funding for aeration that ACA receives does not allow it to meet all the requests from across the province to aerate local lakes; that, as that funding comes from the angling public via licence fees, it must prioritize locations that can be reasonably accessed by the angling public at large, and that, in its opinion, Spring Lake did not currently meet that benchmark. ACA asked the village to create a public access point and even offered to purchase a strip of land and construct a boat launch itself.  However, the village council was reportedly unwilling to work with ACA to resolve the concern.
ACA then informed the mayor and council, with a copy to ETFC, that it was left with no option other than to reluctantly inform the village that the aeration equipment would be removed from Spring Lake in April ’23 to be used at a public fishery elsewhere unless there was improved public access to the Spring Lake fishery by that time. Our understanding is that the village council is reconsidering the issue but that no official response from the village has yet been received by ACA. Further, ETFC has yet to receive any response from the village to its January ’22 letter requesting that the village consider supporting the costs of aerating the lake.
There’s a good possibility that a way to provide for improved public access will be found in the next 8 months.  ACA is still searching for possible solutions and has kept the ETFC executive fully informed of its discussions and actions. Todd Zimmerling will provide an update and answer questions at the Nov.15th meeting.  We will also update all members as and when anything further occurs on this issue.
 
Meanwhile, you may have noticed that we have installed some signage at the property to clarify the parking area. Thanks to Campbell for his work. Reports are that the fishing has been slow during the heat of the last few weeks but there’s optimism that the backswimmers will start flying soon and that fishing will improve.
 
Deb Anderson,
President
 
  

ETFC Raffle

Draw Date: Oct 4, 2022

$5.00 / Ticket     License # 592730       2000 tickets printed – Must be 18 to Purchase Ticket

Ticket Information – contact Ernest Kitt: 780-945-1668 or petpro@shaw.ca  or Paul Lanteigne 780-217-1906 Paul@eecmotors.com 

Prizes:

  • 1st: Cut and Wrapped Pork Package with Freezer valued @ $650
  • 2nd: Custom Made Sage GFL 9′ 6/7wt 2pc Fly Rod valued @ $500
  • 3rd: Fly Box with 150 Handmade Flies valued @ $350.00
  • 4th: Cabela’s Heavy Duty Cooler valued @ $275.00
  • 5th: Pflueger 8′ 6″ 6/7wt Fly Rod valued @ $225