THE OUTDOORS : Outdoor Notes / Rich Roberts : Both Trout Fishing and Scenery Improve With Warm Weather
Eastern Sierra weather has improved, and with it the features of the region.
“I’ve got a T-shirt, shorts and a pair of sandals on,” Fred Rowe said Tuesday by phone from Sierra Bright Dot Guide Service at Mammoth Lakes. “I’m watching the girls go by in their bikinis.”
With cold storms from the north having passed through, the trout fishing has been better, too. Hot Creek already had the best fly fishing and has picked up some more with mayfly and caddis hatches. Rowe said the fish are running from 10 to 14 inches, with a “fair number” of 16s.
“We recommend (size) 16 and 18 and olive-colored nymphs,” Rowe said.
On the Upper Owens River at Big Springs, spawners have started to move and feed, although Rowe said he wouldn’t rate the action as much better than fair.
There are mixed reports from Crowley Lake. “But earlier it was downright lousy,” Rowe said. “The guys that know how to fish the lake are really working hard, and if you put in your time and are in the right place at the right time, you tend to get lucky.”
The Twin Lakes are still strong, with a few mayfly hatches starting.
A limited California sport hunt for mountain lions remains in limbo, pending anticipated legal action by various individuals and public-interest groups.
The state hopes to get the matter into court and settle it as soon as possible. Last year, thousands of applicants lost their non-refundable fees when the Superior Court in San Francisco found procedural defects in a similar plan.
This time, said Lanny Clavecilla, a spokesman for the Department of Fish and Game office in Sacramento, “We’re proceeding with business as usual. We’re trying to avoid (refunds), but we’re not telling people not to apply.”
The California Fish and Game Commission, which has authority over hunting seasons, issued a regulation authorizing a limited mountain lion season, arousing several opponents, including the Mountain Lion Preservation Assn.
Applications cost $5 for the 190 permits available. Permits then cost $75, a hunting license $19 and a hunter safety course for a first-time hunter $10.
Is poaching a bighorn sheep a federal offense?
It is if you take it across a state line.
Wesley Blakeman of Huntington, Conn., was prosecuted in federal court under the Lacey Act because he took home a bighorn he had killed unlawfully in Wyoming.
After pleading guilty, Blakeman was fined $5,000, plus $1,845 in restitution to the state for the value of the sheep, had his U.S. hunting privileges suspended for two years and was ordered to ship the trophy back to Wyoming at his own expense and write letters to the Foundation for North American Wild Sheep and the North American Hunting Club explaining why he did it.
Blakeman had sent pictures of his sheep to those organizations, which ran them in their magazines. The latter gave him a plaque for the largest bighorn taken by a member that year. Blakeman also was told to return the plaque.
Blakeman had gone hunting in 1986 with Dubois (Wyo.) outfitter David E. Hansen, who was charged with 10 separate offenses.
The state also has charged Rock Springs (Wyo.) hunting companions Timothy Moore and Michael Baer with wanton destruction of a sheep without a proper license. They face up to $3,500 in fines and two years in jail, if convicted.
Briefly
The Department of Fish and Game says the 1988-89 mammal hunting regulations are available at its regional offices, including Long Beach, and at sporting goods outlets. Licenses and applications for big-game mammals--bear, deer, elk, antelope and bighorn sheep--also are available, but no tags may be purchased yet.
The world’s only known population of black-footed ferrets grew to 37 last week when 6 were born at the Sybille Wildlife Research and Conservation Education Center near Wheatland, Wyo. Researchers now plan to divide the group into two or three sites in the event that a disease or natural catastrophe would wipe out an entire colony. Breeding facilities in Nebraska, Minnesota and Virginia are being evaluated.
The DFG’s marine laboratory facility near Monterey will have its annual open house Saturday, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. The facility, located on California 1, 9 miles south of Carmel, cultures abalone and fish and studies marine pollution. . . . Since May 15, campfire permits, available at forest ranger stations, have been required in the Angeles National Forest.