President’s Message:
Dear MMTU Members,
The weather has gotten a lot more comfortable so I hope you have all been caching those trophy fish. At this April MMTU Chapter meeting we had presentation of Mike Kruse’s Flycraft inflatable fishing craft at the Logboat Brewery. As as always Mike gave us an very thorough, informative an well thought out presentation. Mike is an excellent presenter and I always enjoy his presentations. Thank you Mike. Unfortunately I didn’t think to get a picture. Alas a picture of Mike teaching would be nice to have and might have been an entry into our annual photo contest. It probably won’t beat one of
those streamside baby pictures though.
This month we will be having our Chapter meeting on Tuesday May 3 at the Flicklin Shelter at Como-Bethel Park. We will have a social hour from from 6 pm to 7 pm, a business meeting starting at 7 andafter the meeting we will be showing a video on climate change in the Driftless Area.
There are a number of events coming up to put on you calendar.
There will be a stream cleanup on Mill Creek that has been organized by Bill Lamberson and Sam Potter on Monday May 9. After the cleanup many of us will likely choose to fish on the creek or one of the other nearby creeks that have wild trout. We will have more information at the chapter meeting. Please let Bill know if you are coming so we can have a head count.
Saturday May 14 there will be a Maramec Spring Park Kids Event and the Gateway TU Chapter (GTU) will be volunteering at the event. They are looking for volunteers from our chapter to assist as well. GTU has arranged with the TU Youth Coordinator to give free TU youth memberships so if you know of a youth that would be interested bring them along and spread the word. If you are interested in attending this event let me know, but if you just show up that will be fine too.
Tuesday June 6 will be the annual hot dog burn from 6 to 9 at the Collins Shelter at Stephens Lake Park. This has been a time honored tradition of the chapter.
From June 9 to June 12 MMTU is going on a road trip to the Wisconsin Driftless Area for days of fly fishing thanks to the efforts of Curt Morgret. More details were publish in the February Newsletter and there will be discussion at upcoming chapter meetings. If you know you are going please let Curt know because we will need a head count.
Okay that’s it. Tight lines everyone. Hope to see you meeting on May 3 at the Chapter Meeting, May 9 for the Mill Creek Clean up, or one of our other upcoming events.
Doug Grove
Mill Creek Cleanup The Mill Creek clean-up approved at our last meeting is scheduled for May 9, 9:00 a.m. That is the first day after turkey season. Sam Potter will take care of gloves and bags, I will provide lunch. Please announce this at the next meeting from which I will be absent, and put a note in the newsletter. I would appreciate an RSVP so that I can get a headcount for lunch. Ribeyes seemed to go over well last time, I will see if I can do that again.
Bill
Conservation Notes:
You may have heard of a TU Montana Guide and film producer, Hillary Hutcheson. She starred in and produced a video that you can scroll down and watch:
https://protectourwinters.org/drop-reveals-the-impacts-climate-change-is-having-on-the-rivers-of-the-american-west/ that follows a drop of water from the continental divide to the pacific. She began on the mountain with a famous skier. Then she fished and floated with various other guides all the way to coast. She spoke of the need to protect the rivers from climate change she is seeing and to preserve them for our kids.
Grizzly Creek: Climate Resilience in a hotter, drier West – by TU. This is very personal for me because I had planned to fish there 2 years ago. I got some great tips and flies from Mike Kruse and was psyched up to fish there, BUT a day or 2 later the fires broke out. The creek was inaccessible, in fact I70 was closed for about 2 weeks near the stream. Fortunately, Mike put me onto wild browns in another stream that could still be accessed. This is just one example of the harm climate change is doing, especially in the West.
The West is in the grips of another hot,
https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2021/07/11/heat-wave-west-las-vegas/
dry https://droughtmonitor.unl.edu/DmData/TimeSeries.aspx
summer, with more than 60 https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/14/us/oregon-wildfire-updates.html large wildfires currently burning across the region. At the same time, the effects of last year’s fires are apparent in many states; Interstate 70, a major artery for east-west transportation, has been shut down through Colorado’s Glenwood Canyon multiple times in the past two months due to mudslides
https://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/local-news/flash-flood-warning-both-directions-of-i-70-in- glenwood-canyon-closed resulting from last year’s Grizzly Creek fire. The epicenter of the ongoing drought
https://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/local-news/flash-flood-warning-both-directions-of-i-70-in- is the Colorado River Basin. Stretching along the spine of the Rocky Mountains, across the Colorado Plateau, and within the Sonoran and Mojave deserts, the Colorado River Basin has experienced ongoing declines in stream flows, record-setting heat, some of the driest years ever recorded, and previously unimaginable catastrophic fires.
Heat wave keeps baking West after all-time high in Las Vegas in July,
TU video on the state of our hydrology today in the Colorado River Basin