The Kiap-TU-Wish “work season” aligns with our fiscal year which spans April 1st to March 31st. Our work consisted of tree planting, seeding/mulching, stream shocking, and tree and brush removal. Additional tasks for which I recorded volunteer hours included installation of bluebird nest boxes, opening and cleaning them in the fall, and closing them up again in the spring. Time spent watering trees and shrubs that were planted on the new Cady Creek restoration was also logged. A total of 31 volunteer workdays this past year consisted of, 25 brush/tree removal days, 3 seeding/mulching days, 2 stream shocking days, and 1 day dedicated to tree planting. As you might imagine, the bulk of our time was spent removing trees and brush from stream corridors and accounted for just over 1,400 of the total 1,573 habitat volunteer hours.
Total habitat volunteer hours are down from several years ago when totals reached or exceeded 3,000 hours. My biggest disappointment as our volunteer coordinator is the low turnout for brush and tree removal workdays. Of the 283 individuals who are currently on the MailChimp list for receiving workday notices, only 56 turned out at any one time over the season to help with our work.
Our clearing operations began in October at the close of the inland fishing season. We cleared box elders, buckthorn, and honeysuckle from the Quarry Road site just upstream of the Hwy 35 bridge and had plans to involve the Greenwood Elementary 3rd graders as a part of their service learning project by providing an opportunity to help burn all of the slash. A blizzard on the scheduled burn day resulted in deep snow cover which lasted throughout the winter and forced us to postpone the event until April 21st of this year.
Starting in early December, we moved our workdays to Cady Creek and at the direction of Kasey Yallaly (WDNR) began clearing box elders and other invasives from the stream corridor between the upper two parking lots on 50th Street. This will help facilitate periodic mowing and allow for easier stream access. Between December 2022 and March 2023, we spent 17 days at this site logging in over 1,100 hours during that period. This particular stretch of Cady had undergone streambank restoration back in the late 1990s and some of the box elder trees along that stretch had trunks over 20” in diameter plus we cleared and removed a number of trees that had fallen into the creek.
I would like to recognize the efforts of a number of volunteers who turned out time and time again to help with the workdays, these include: John Skelton 21 workdays, Dave Gregg 18 workdays, Jim Tatzel 17 workdays, Loren Haas and Trish Hannah 13 workdays, Jeff Dahl 11 workdays, Jim Sackrison 8 workdays, James Patterson and Steve Cox 7 workdays, Matt Janquart and Greg Olson 6 workdays, and John Kaplan, Ted Higman, Don Fritz, Dave Kozlovsky and Jeff Himes 5 workdays. I dare say that most of those listed above have more than a few grey hairs on their heads and I hope that in looking to future projects an influx of youth would certainly enhance our habitat efforts.
Box elders, buckthorn and honeysuckle are growing on our easements faster than we can cut them down. The WDNR no longer has the funds or manpower to handle any of this work and it depends on our chapter to step up to the plate each year to do what we can to keep the easements and restorations within our chapter area from becoming overgrown and unfishable.
I took on the job of volunteer coordinator some 12-15 years ago when I was still in my 50’s and my body was easily up to the task. Despite turning 70 in January, I still hope to continue leading workdays for another 10 years. I would, however, appreciate some more participation from more of the individuals who are listed in our pool of volunteers.
This fall we will continue to hold workdays throughout the brushing season from Oct. 15th when the fishing season closes, until such time in the spring when we can no longer burn the slash from the removed trees and brush. It’s my hope that we can return to earlier times when 25 or more volunteers turned out on a regular basis with occasional workdays consisting of 30 or more.
I intend to start a new volunteer list before the beginning of the next brushing season. The list will be called “Brushing Volunteers” and it is my hope that if you request to be on the list you will do so with the intent of participating in our workdays on a regular basis. Knowing that we have a committed list of volunteers is important when assessing the time and effort necessary for each project as I continue to work with Kasey and the Kiap-TU-Wish board to determine what future habitat projects.
Our first project of the field season was on Gilbert Creek in Dunn County. The project is located within Gilbert Creek Fisheries Area and on Gene Holte’s easement and is 1,300 feet in length. This project is in cooperation with the Clear Waters Chapter of Trout Unlimited, Dunn County Fish and Game Assn, and Dunn County. This project was a continuation of past 3 years of trout habitat projects along this section of Gilbert Creek. Gilbert creek is a Brook trout reserve stream that has had numerous habitat projects completed on it and this newly acquired easement will allow us to tie in many years of habitat work together. It is a highly visible section, just off HWY 29 which will allow the public to safely park off the busy Hwy in a 75×50 parking lot. Work started on 5/9/22 and project was complete on 5/24/22. We created 1 rock island, 3 spawning riffles, 98 root wads and used 3,025 tons of rock which comes out to 2.3 tons per stream foot.
Our second project of the year was on Sand Creek in northeast Dunn County. This is a highly visible project that enhanced habitat and access to the stream in the park of the town of Sand Creek. It is now a great spot for senior citizens and the youth to fish due to the location and access from a parking area with the potential of catching a trophy brown trout. We partnered with ClearWaters TU, and the Town of Sand Creek. Work started on 5/25/22 and project was complete on 6/15/22. Total distance is 650 feet. We installed 8 LUNKERS, 1 plunge pool, 5 riffles and 1 rock v weir and hauled in 440 tons of black dirt, used 1,325 tons of shot rock and 125 bales of straw. We removed all old, unstable and unsafe trees within the park and will plant more trees in the near future.
Sand Creek City Park
Our next project was on the Trimbelle River-Halvorson easement. This project was partnered with KiapTUwish Trout Unlimited. We completed 3,200 feet with potential for more stream footage downstream on the same landowner’s property/easement. Native species such as Ash, Oak and Maple will be left standing to provide some shade, but this site is a horse pasture with very short turf grass. The project started on 6/20/22 and we finished on 8/16/22. We installed 22 riffles, 41 root wads, created 5 islands, 5 back water refuges, 2 ERO’s, 5 rock v weirs and 1 cross log while also adding too many to count mid-stream boulders and boulder clusters. We used 7,500 tons of shot rock @ $7.98/ton which comes out to 2.34 tons per stream foot and 400 bales of straw @ $8.00/bale and 900 pounds of Orchard grass.
The final project of the field season took place on the headwaters of Gilbert creek, which is owned by the State. We completed 1,550 feet with 1,550 more feet to be finished next field season. We started 8/17/22 and we finished up for the year on 9/15/22. Thirty-six root wads, 3 ERO’s, 16 riffles and 3 backwater refuges were installed. This project site will make for great spawning areas for Brook trout once we are able to flush out the fine sediment and create more spawning riffles.
Volunteers Needed to Staff Youth Game Fair on Sept.10
For the past 6-7 years, our chapter has been participating in the Peasants Forever Youth Game Fair. Boys and girls ages 12-16 have the opportunity to tie a fly, get a lesson in fly casting and, they have the opportunity to catch a sunfish or bass in the lake at the club. The event goes from 9:00-3:00 pm. You don’t need to spend the entire day there but, if you can spend a few hours to help out mentoring kids down at the lake, helping to teach fly casting, helping a youth tie a foam panfish fly, or even man our booth to talk about the importance of the work our chapter does, your help would be appreciated. Currently we have 5 volunteers and could use another 4-5. Refreshments including coffee, soda and water are provided as well as a meal for all participants in the event. Please email Tom at thschnad@hotmail.com if you can help out at this event.
Twenty-three workdays were held this past season. Volunteers worked at clearing two different sites on the upper Kinni — upstream of the DNR handicap fishing pier parking lot on River Drive and upstream and downstream of the DNR parking lot on Hwy 65 just downstream from Liberty Road.
At the River Drive site, we cleared box elder, honeysuckle, and some monster old-growth buckthorn, with trunks on some trees exceeding ten inches in diameter. One-quarter mile of stream bank was cleared on both sides over a span of of 16 workdays, which included one mid-week workday with the third-grade class from Greenwood Elementary in River Falls, their instructors, and a dozen parent chaperones joining in to help drag and stack tree-cut limbs onto a huge bonfire. Former DNR wildlife biologist Marty Engel joined us for this event and took the students streamside to teach them a little bit about entemology by showing them some of the aquatic bugs living in the stream.
The final seven workdays this season were spent clearing out a tangle of dead downed trees along with box elder, buckthorn, and a thicket of silver maple saplings which were growing far too close together.
Between the two sites, nearly 1,600 hours of volunteer time was recorded. Not counting the Greenwood event, 66 volunteers participated in the work, and 34 of those individuals attended workdays more than once. Eight volunteers are deserving of special recognition for attending multiple work days: John Skelton, 22 days; Jim Tatzel, 21; Dave Gregg, 16, Tom Anderson, 15; Trish Hannah, 11; Steve Cox, 10; Dave Kozlovsk,y 10; and Paul Mahler, 6.
Workday volunteers receiving awards
The DNR no longer has a budget for doing maintenance work on the multiple miles of easements existing on streams within our chapter area. I would like to say that we are making a dent, but the fact is that brush and buckthorn are growing faster than we are able to control it. I do wish that more members of the chapter would turn out for workdays to help out with this cause.
This season, I had as few as three volunteers turn out for one workday and as many as 18 on two occasions. In years past, I can recall workdays with over 30 volunteers. I hope that more of you will make it a point to turn out to help with maintenance work during the 2022–2023 winter season.
Nate and his crew will be restoring a section of the lower Trimbelle at the Halvorson easement this summer. You can probably expect to see an announcement for 2–3 seeding/mulching volunteer opportunities there. In addition, I will post for the usual volunteers to help Kasey and her crew with their stream shocking survey work on larger waters like the Rush, Kinni, Willow, EauGalle, and Trimbelle.
Pheasants Forever has signed on to assume maintenance on the South Fork of the Kinni. Grant funding enabled their volunteers to cut the massive stands of sand bar willows which had taken over many areas there. They also cut a lot of box elder trees and did herbicide treatment on all of the cut stumps to prevent further growth.
The Kiap TU Wish fiscal year runs from April 1st to March 31st. Each year Randy totals up the volunteer hours which have been spent working on our area streams for a report which goes to TU National.
Randy organized 22 brushing workdays this past year amassing just over 1,300 volunteer hours. There were also four days where volunteers assisted the DNR with their annual shocking surveys. There were three workdays centered around treating buckthorn with herbicide, one seeding mulching workday, and one lunker building workday adding another 170 hours to the total. We worked with the 3rd grade class at Greenwood Elementary to hold a brush burning day bringing total hours to over 1,600. Aside from the Greenwood service-learning day, there were 63 different individuals who volunteered their time at workdays. Thirty-four of those individuals attended two or more events.
Several individuals deserve special recognition and thanks for the number of workdays which they participated in. Leading the list is John Skelton with 21, Jim Tatzel with 20, Dave Gregg with 15, Tom Anderson with 14, Trish Hannah and Steve Cox both with 10, Dave Kozlovsky with 9, and Paul Mahler, Pat Sexton and Loren Haas with 6. Bill Farquhar, Matt Janquart, Scott Wagner, William Mahler, Ben Toppel and Jon Rock each attended 5 workdays. Pete Kilibarda, John Kaplan, Jeff Himes, Keith Stein, Jim Sackrison, and Greg Olson each attended 4 workdays. Randy also has Mark Peerenboom, Colleen Grant, Michele Bevis Rainbow Barry, and Al Hopeman listed as having attended three workdays.
Thank you all for your hard work and dedication in answering the calls that bring you out in all sorts of weather to improve habitat for trout. The next workday will start with a reset to zero. If you are one of the more than 200 on our email list who didn’t participate in a workday this past year, We hope to see you in this coming season.
Kinni Workday This Saturday March 26thThe snow might all be gone but, the rain we are receiving this week will keep things wet enough to keep cutting and burning buckthorn and box elder slash. The worksite is at the DNR parking lot on Hwy 65 between Quarry and Liberty Roads. Randy will be there starting at 7:30 on Saturday morning and plans to work till noon or shortly after. Come for an hour or two or spend the entire shift there. We need chainsaw operators who have completed the safety training and a bunch of regulars to drag, stack and burn the slash. Randy will have some portable pumps on hand to control any fires that threaten to get out of control. Hot dogs and cookies will be served up at the end of the shift. Please email Randy at randyca999@gmail.com if you plan to attend the workday. Randy reports there was a hatch of stoneflies and BWO’s starting towards the end of the shift last Saturday. Bring your fishing gear along and wet a line afterwards if you choose. This could prove to be the final ‘brushing’ workday of the season but, don’t bet on it.
