Calendar

Sept 3 - Oct 31 Fall office hours, open Wednesday & Saturday mornings
Oct 31 Fishing season closes and boats must be removed from all the lakes

Headlines

Fishing - we've had a good first half of the season, with many reports of large fish caught at all the lakes. Fishing had its usual slowdown in late July and August due to warmer water, but as all our anglers know, fall fishing can be excellent. We are again stocking fish (12-15" rainbows), >3 lb. trophies, and palominos from Crystal Springs Trout Farm. These were placed in all the lakes except Shagwa. The ratios stocked are 65% rainbows, 25% trophies, and 10% palominos. We also stocked some more Donaldson trout at Shagwa. As always, we tune the number of fish based on the fish kept at the lakes. This is why it's so important to help our patrol staff know how many fish you're catching and keeping. This spring we stocked a double load at Letitia and one and half loads at Apache. In June we stocked one and a half loads in Snake and Ramona. Similarly, we stocked only a half load at Nokomis as that fishery is reaching its optimum capacity. We post a stocking report in the office window so please check there for the latest stocking information. In April we stocked 750 (very expensive) browns into Erie and Apache and 250 (also very expensive) Tiger trout in Nokomis. We continue stocking Nokomis with aggressive trout as a way to manage the perch. It'll take a few years to bring the perch under control, but just like Apache, we know this approach works. You can help us by removing any perch you catch (they do not count towards your possession limit). Our next stocking will be in late September / early October. Overall, the 2025 fishing season has been very good - we hope you have a successful fall fishing!

Runoff Water Status - The spring runoff started slow this year and unfortunately, we were called out for almost all of May which prevented us from storing our usual water volume during that time. Despite the rain/snow the first week of May, we didn't get much local runoff, as the very parched soils absorbed most of it. We ran our Elkhorn exchange water right in order to capture the May runoff in Hiawatha and Apache. Fortunately, the monsoon-like rains of later May/early June significantly increased the runoff (see the photo of our upper pipeline) such that we filled all the lakes except Papoose. In July we were able to top off Shagwa and since then have been running a very small amount of water into Hiawatha.

Weeds - some of the lakes have seen more weeds this year than past years. Erie has been particularly hard hit, likely due to the lower water levels early this summer. Our biologist has treated Erie three times this summer and hit the other lakes that had weed beds. Once cooler water temperatures return, weed growth will slow down in all the lakes. Speaking of weeds, we're a little behind on our annual thistle campaign, but expect to make the rounds during mid-August.

2024 Fall Projects - our main project this fall was refurbishing the dam at Shagwa. This involved building a clay mix cut-off wall on the down-slope side of the dam. We also moved the outlet to the NE corner. Together these will help reduce seep that naturally occurs through the dam and better direct it downstream. We completed the Bellaire inlet ditch pipeline in cooperation with CPW. We also completed several small maintenance projects this fall - work at the upper Mitchell headgate and Elkhorn headgate, cleaning out the toe drains at all the lakes, and did some access improvements at Erie.

Pelicanator Pelicans - as many have observed we've been getting more pelicans on the lakes who indiscriminately eat (gulp down) our very expensive fish. We asked the Federal Migratory Bird office what we can do about this, and they said, "as long as they're not actively breeding / raising young, we can chase them away". By that they mean, harass but not harm. We purchased a remote controlled "Pelicanator" (see photo) and have been using it to chase away pelicans at various lakes.

While there has been a little bit of a learning curve with the Pelicanator, it seems to be working well. We have been successfully hazing the pelicans during July and August. We have seen up to six or more on a lake at one time, with the majority of the time being singles or pairs. Last year we were averaging 15 pelicans at a time over two months. That means they ate about 3,800 lbs of our fish! The next step has been to add some floating decoys (that look like the pelicanator) out in the water to discourage their return. Let us know if you see anything wrong with the decoys as we are still learning how to best make them work.

We have heard that there are some folks trying to help us haze the pelicans (i.e. remote control boats, slingshots, etc.). As much as we appreciate the effort, everyone should be aware that pelicans are a migratory waterfowl that are protected under the Federal Migratory Bird Act. Unless you have permission from the Federal Migratory Permit Office in Denver you should not be hazing the pelicans.

Boat Removal - We'll once again remove boats after October 31 from all five boating lakes - Apache, Erie, Hiawatha, Letitia, and Nokomis. We'll send a letter by early October, to any registered boat owner advising them to take action by Oct 31. If you don't register your boat, we don't have a way to warn you to take it home. Boat owners can do one of the following:

Any boats remaining at the lakes after Oct 31, will be taken to our locked "boat yard", if you can describe your boat, you can bail it out of the yard for $200.

We appreciate your help in keeping our lake shores clean.