By DENNIS APRILL, Outdoor Perspective
April 1 marks the opening of trout season statewide, but in the Adirondacks, in the best of years, it is usually two to three weeks later before the rivers are fishable and the interior ponds are free of ice.
The Champlain and St. Lawrence valleys should be the places to go, early on.
When the stocking does start, fish available will be similar in numbers to last year, according to Rich Preall, Department of Environmental Conservation fisheries biologist in Ray Brook. He says, "Salmon and brook trout to be released are 100-percent of last year, splake 93-percent, and yearling browns, 83-percent; the latter has been the case in recent years as the focus shifts to 2-year old, larger brown trout that are at 100-percent stocking level, or the same as last year and there are 1,000 surplus fish to be distributed statewide."
The only species that is down markedly is the Raquette Lake strain of lake trout (30 percent), but the decrease is not one of budget constraints; rather, it was a poor egg collecting fall 2009.
With New York about bankrupt, it is a relief that all the state hatcheries are working at capacity and the improvements to the big Rome hatchery are still going on, the result of past funding. Rome raises rainbow, brown and brook trout, the core of Adirondack fish stockings. With DEC travel very restricted and personnel down to two fisheries biologists in Ray Brook and two in Warrensburg, it is unlikely any initiatives, like further work on brook trout research and restoration, will take place.
Special snow goose hunting season opens
The special spring snow-goose hunting season opened last Thursday, March 11, and runs through April 15.
Because of the mild winter and apparently early spring, waterfowl hunters this year may actually be able to hunt these mostly white geese, also referred to as "light" geese.
Since the 1970s, snow goose numbers along the Atlantic flyway have skyrocketed, so much so that these geese, which winter in the south and mate in the far north tundra, are now destroying fragile Arctic plants.
The U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, in response, issued a special Conservation Order allowing for a spring hunt.
Hunters are allowed to use not only electric calls but more than three shells in their shotguns, something not allowed during the regular fall season.
This hunting season is in addition to the normal spring hunting season that ended March 10. There is a 15-bird-per-day bag limit.
It is clear that the U.S. Fish &Wildlife; Service wants the snow goose population reduced. In 2009, according to the New York Department of Environmental Protection, about 1,450 hunters in 20 New York countries shot nearly 7,700 birds (5.3 per hunter).
The logical place to hunt these birds is in the Champlain Valley or St. Lawrence Valley.
Personally, I have never seen a snow goose in my section of the Adirondacks.
Hunters still need a valid Duck Stamp plus a regular license to hunt snow geese in the spring.
Kings Bay DU celebrates 25 years
The 25th-annual membership/dinner banquet of the Kings Bay Chapter of Ducks Unlimited is April 10 in the Blue Room of Peck's Rainbow Banquet Hall in Altona.
The featured shotgun this year is a Fausti Stefano Elegant Extra over/under 12-gauge. Kevin Hicks will once again be the auctioneer, as he has for more than 20 years.
Auction/raffle items include DU paraphernalia, local artist carvings, handcrafted furniture and an array of rifles and shotguns, plus an Albert Barcomb hand-carved pintail decoy. Admission remains the same as last year — $45 for single, $65 per couple — and this includes the meal (prime rib or stuffed chicken breast) and membership in Ducks Unlimited.
For details, contact Sherb House at 298-4925 or Rick House at 846-8331.
E-mail Dennis Aprill at daprill2000@yahoo.com and check out our Web site at www.pressrepublican.com/0105_outdoor_perspective for more photos and past articles.
