Full of dinks.

[Deadstream]

59 minutes ago, fishinwrench said:

WTH did they need a bigger-better hatchery for, I wonder.

Use it or lose it?  They charge so much for camping anymore, the pool should be saved. I don't use it, never have but my friends kids loved it and now their Grandkids are getting that age.  

 

 

 

 

 

[tjm]

Pool & camping would be DNR & hatchery would be MDC, I believe.

Does anyone know how much of the trout tag monies goes to DNR to allow fishing in these parks?

[Bnorm]

I am not affiliated with the park at all but fish down there quite a bit and want to give my $.02 as to how I see it.

The Conservation Dept. gets every penny of money brought in by trout tag sales. Nothing is given to the concessionaire or the park department so every $ put in for tag sales goes right back into conservation. That is part of the reason they have to make a decision on where the money will come from to fix the wooden bridge, they get their annual budget for maintenance and have to make the best decisions they can. I haven't been to the pool there for decades but it looks like it will take a chunk of change to fix that up and seems to be contributing to the water situations they have been having in the campground for the past 2 years. I think it would be nice if they were able to fix everything but the reality is there is only a certain amount of money to go around and I hear that the price tag on that bridge is somewhere around $750,000.

As far as the hatchery goes, it is pretty empty right now and full of smaller fish which does make sense. The fish just spawned so they still have the eggs and young fry inside. The stocker size raceways are low because they have been stocking them all year obviously. Those narrow pens are filled with what will be next years stockers and they will grade them out into the bigger pools over the wintertime. If you go in the springtime all of the runways are full as they have a full years worth of stocker trout to supply the stream for the year. They had three events in October which they stocked large fish for, Ladies Day, Holland Derby, and the Redington showcase. I know they released a lot of lunkers and oversized stockers for those events and Ladies Day and the Derby might as well be called Fish Harvesting Festivals as the fish are overstocked and most of the participants at least keep all of the large ones they catch. They will also stock some of the worn out brood stock and other stockers into the urban program in a couple weeks so I am sure they are specifically reserving some for that.

I just fished there for the past week and can confirm that there are lots of small fish in the stream and not a lot of what experienced fishermen would considered to be keeper size. Keep in mind that out of the 200,000 tags they sell at Bennett for the year they will stock about 500,000 fish. At least 75,000 of these tags will be kids and novice fishermen that will keep any trout they catch making sure they get their limit to bring home. If they all get their limits that is 300,000 fish just to those tags with the other fishermen taking out only the nice bigger ones over the last 7 months. Remember those smaller ones in the stream right now will holdover and naturally grow to a really nice size by March 1. 

[snagged in outlet 3]

1 hour ago, Bnorm said:

I hear that the price tag on that bridge is somewhere around $750,000.

Did they put the job out to bid?  If they are doing the work the themselves did they put out a material source bid?  Seems extremely high for that little thing.  Some driven H-pile and timber ought to do the trick.  I've seen crane access trestles go for less.

[Bnorm]

I thought the price was crazy as well. I guess they are going to raise it up substantially from the level it is at now to keep it open during heavier flows which requires them to drive new piers and do something more permanent. That is what i gathered from a couple sources that attended the meeting last Wednesday.

[fishinwrench]

750k ?

Good God almighty, that had better be one hell of a 40' bridge !

[Basfis]

Fished a bit a Bennett Saturday. Was digging for my license to get a daily tag and was handed a tag. I asked about my license and was told “between you and the game warden “.  Shocked me. 

So, who gets the daily tag revenue?  

Completely agree with the small fish quantity and amazed by the numbers hanging out by “cleaning “ areas. Never seen that phenomenon to this degree. 

[fishinwrench]

Yeah they used to make you present a current fishing license before giving you a daily tag.  They don't care about that anymore because, as you said, hand him 3 bucks when you walk up to the counter back there and he will give you a daily permit.    The guy working the back counter is a slacker, you can just tell.

He was bitching about "the locals" when my daughter and I were in there, so I said "Hey, I'm a local".   He looks at me and says "Well?"

My kinda guy !    😎

[fishinwrench]

Whaddaya reckon it cost to build this one back in the day?

'bout 50 bucks?

[tjm]

19 hours ago, Bnorm said:

The Conservation Dept. gets every penny of money brought in by trout tag sales. Nothing is given to the concessionaire or the park department 

Can you give me a source link to that info? I have poked around but not smart enough to find it on my own. ty