Angry Birds

It has been a while since my last post but shutting Cisco's Landing down is a real chore.  Pulling boats, cleaning boats, winterizing and fiberglass repair on Waverunners, hauling boats over to Lee's Marine in Hyrum for service and winterizing and back to the lake for storage is all consuming for this old man as my help goes back to school or on Missions.  There was a little hunting and fishing thrown in there too.

So much for excuses.  Anyone that knows me is aware that I love to watch and feed birds as much as I like to hunt them.  Since my office is on the couch and the bird feeder just outside I observe feathery animals for hours.  I always like to see the changes in species associated with the seasons as migrations come and go.  However, there is one species that lives here all the time but only migrates to my feeder when it snows.  The turkeys...

Most folks think turkeys are dumb, docile and not smart enough to come in out of the rain.  That is true of the ones we buy out of the stores but my flock is rowdy, cantankerous, mean and think nothing of picking the hell out of each other.  They also have no manners leaving turkey droppings and feathers all the deck.  Above and beyond all they are pigs.  I throw chicken scratch to them on the ground and as soon as that is all scratched up, her they come to raid the black sunflower finch feeder. They bang it and shake it until all the seeds are on the ground and in their crops.

THE PICTURE ABOVE SHOWS REALLY "ANGRY BIRDS"

My daughter, Ashley, is a Bear Lake native.  She grew up here and has spent countless hours on and around the Lake boating, skiing, and just having fun.  Mike and Ash came up yesterday and instead of riding bikes, we went fishing.  She said she has never been fishing on Bear Lake from a boat which is true.  In the morning, we fished in the wind off of Sweetwater. When the downrigger popped she took the rod and after a long fight, she hauled in and released a 20 pound lake trout.  She said she was is in good shape for hiking but not reeling in a big fish.

In the afternoon we took the pontoon boat across the lake to Cisco Beach.  When the downrigger popped again she hooked, caught and released an 8 pound cutthroat.  She said that fish was a little easier to reel in. She prides herself has quite an angler now.  Apparently, Ash thinks it is not that hard to catch large, once in a lifetime, trophy fish on Bear Lake.  She certainly had fun texting pictures to her friends.

 

The Cisco Carp are having a great summer.  Countless kids and their parents come down the gangplank carrying bags of stales bread, cookies, chips and quarters for food.  Before long they are laying on the docks feeding and trying to touch the carp who are greedily slurping up everything that hits the water.  They thrash around like piranhas chasing the food all to the delight of the audience.  Apparently things are so good that they have attracted another species of fish to Cisco's Landing.  I saw a few last year but now they are plentiful.  They get up to about eight inches and are commonly mistaken for little carp.  Actually, the lake is too cold and has limited habitat for carp to spawn so they do not reproduce.  They are in the same family, minnows, and they are Gila atraria or Utah chub.  Utah chub have a very bad reputation for taking over fisheries because the can out compete rainbow trout for food.  During my career as a biologist I killed millions of chubs around the state with Rotenone.  It is a different story in Bear Lake.  They are native to the lake and have evolved with Bear Lake cutthroat trout who love to eat them.  Because of this predator their population is limited and the only safe haven is in the marina.  Enjoy it now "chubs", because when the water cools down the cutthroat will come into the marina and there will be plenty of food for them at Cisco's.

   

Bucket List

I have been too busy lately.  I hate when it goes from winter to summer instantly.  You all know what I am talking about.  Last winter when there was nothing to do and I was reviewing my "Bucket List" I once again began my quest of the great white sturgeon.  This has gone on for years with no success.  Lots of research but no direction. 

I had met a guide last fall when fishing for Chinook in Tillamook that said he fished for sturgeon so I contacted him and set a trip up even though it was early in the season.  The time finally arrived this past weekend.  As a fisheries biologist, I had seen and read about sturgeon but I had never touched or examined them.  That is how they got on my "Bucket List".  Fishing in the mouth of the Columbia River with the constant rain and wind, it happened.  With an anchovy on a single barbless hook the tap, tap, tap started.  The pole "loaded up" and the jerk.  The battle ensued and in a half hour an exhausted fish and angler finally met.  Too large to keep at 65" we held it for a minute and parted ways.  A sense of satisfaction came over me.  Another lifetime goal accomplished.  Never give up on your dreams.

Gus Rich Point

Well, it is finally gone.  I am sure you are sick and tired of me talking about ice on Bear Lake, but bear (no pun) with me.  The ice left in the midst of a rainstorm, followed by a huge dump of spring snow.  It was wrapped up with a windstorm.  As I had said previously, here today, gone tomorrow.  Ice did stack in some areas.  Of particular interest to me was Gus Rich Point.

Gus Rich was a colorful individual whom I met shortly after arriving at Bear Lake in 1974.  He was an old guy then with his own chair in "Pulleys" Bear Lake Motor Lodge which we all frequented for morning coffee.  Now I am not claiming these facts are accurate, just stories I have heard.  He had the first Ideal Beach which was on the point between Garden City and Laketown.  In the old days he owned a bar with plenty of partying, gambling and even stories of a sunken boat with gold aboard.  I don't recall when Gus passed away but it wasn't long after I came here.

The reason I bring this up is because years ago the ice came off and ran a ground at Gus Rich Point.  It took the front out of the old Bar and completely filled it with chunks if ice.  It almost happened again this year.  The ice stacked up close but didn't do any damage.  History usually repeats itself or the lake just doesn't like buildings close to shore on Gus Rich Point.

I actually believe that the Lake is trying to erode the point off of its shore.  In a map of Bear Lake in the late 1800's the point extended further out.  I would also speculate that the "Rockpile",  are remnants of the point 1000's of years ago. 

Gus Rich Point circa 1985

Gus Rich Point 2013

Welcome back liquid water.  Everyone was happy to see you frozen over, we had lots of fun on you but got tired of the ice and the long winter.  Now get ready for fishing boats and it won't be long before paddle boards and wake boarders are skimming on your surface.

I guess that all my whining paid off.  The Monday blizzard that left two feet of drifted snow an my place apparently dumped enough warm rain and snow on the lake to stir and warm up the water to above freezing.  As the valley cleared on Tuesday morning the ice was gone.  I am more than willing to trade that for snow.

Ice Off Facts

I am tired….  I am tired of the snow on the ground….  I am tired of always having to wear a coat and long pants…. I am tired of looking out over the ice covered lake….  Most of these things are out of our control and are part of living in Bear Lake which I never get tired of.

The ice is on everyone’s mind.  First people want to know when it will freeze.  Once that happens, everyone is content until March.  Then it starts again, when will the ice go?

Many people assume that as the weather gets warm, it makes the ice soft on the top and it eventually melts.  That is true is small bodies of water but on Bear Lake things are different.  The rain and heat affect the ice surface but the water below needs to get warmer than 32 degrees.  The inflow from the Bear River and tributaries account for this impact.  This ice melts from the bottom up.  As the lake level increases it opens up a ring of water around the shoreline.  The lake then starts to get darker which means it is melting.  The wind starts pushing the huge ice mass around, it cracks and the blocks crash into each other.  More water opens up and one day, all of a sudden, it is gone.  It may push up on shore as a result of wind, but it will be bathed in a warm rain or just disappear.  I sure hope it melts before May.

Sure signs of spring are here  The turkey vultures have returned to Randolph, calves are frolicking around, turkeys are gobbling and the deer are nibbling the "first green bite"  Enjoy.

Mouth of Swan Creek working on the ice

I don't know how many times in the last week I have been asked it Bear Lake is open yet.  It should be because everything else is.  They also want to know when the ice will melt in the Marina.  I took this picture flying over the lake today.  You be the judge.

I am continually amazed at wildlife in the Bear Lake Valley.  This is a picture taken on 3-29-13 of an antelope feeding in the field west of the Chevron in Garden City.  Over the last thirty years I have watched antelope slowly migrate from the Bear River to the west,  Ten years ago I first saw them in the hills east of Bear Lake.  I then saw them cresting the top of Laketown Canyon.  Last year there a small bunch in the fields north of Laketown.  And now, this one on the other side of the valley.  If they were deer you might not be surprised but one thing that is different about antelope.  They can not jump fences,  They have to go under or around them.  There are a lot of fences between Laketown and Garden City.  Welcome.

Ice Breakers

Bear Lake State Park Marina looking west, March 22 2013

If you were to look at this picture you might think that Spring was coming to the lake.  The open water is actually the result of the water circulators around the moored sailboats to keep ice from forming. 

Boat Ramp

It is obvious that you can now launch your boat and go out on the lake as long as it is an  ICEBREAKER.

It is a beautiful spring day outside at Bear Lake.  Everyone knows that spring begins next week and they can't wait for the snow to leave and the green to appear.  This will begin everywhere around us, but not in the Bear Lake Valley.  We have, as close as I can estimate, 24,393,600 tons of ice to melt.  We are an icebox which will affect our temperatures and it is going to take some time to turn the ice into water.  This is especially true considering the lake is covered with snow that reflects heat.  In fact it is still making ice.

Ice pushed up around the shoreline

                                       

If you travel along the shoreline you will see ice being pushed up on shore.  This is not due to the wind or changing lake elevations but expansion.  This action is actually very important to the littoral zone of the lake.  After years of low water, dead trees and Pharagmites in addition to sandbars and rocks are now encased in ice which is now moving them up the shore.  

Rocks and sand on their way back up the beach

                                        

With that much ice mass nothing can resist it.  So when it melts, I hope  in April, things will look different   At this lake elevation a lot of strange things can still happen once the icebergs start banging around.  When breakup get closer I will talk about what happens then.

Goodbye trees

  

I hope you are all getting used to seeing white.  That will be the predominate color here for the next while.  When I look out over the pristine white lake, sometimes I see fly specks (ice fishermen) standing shuffling their feet, sitting on a bucket or out of sight in a tent.  If fishing is slow there isn't a lot to talk about but sometimes the conversation turns to the "springs" in the lake.  They all watch out for them.  There are some off the marina, the Rockpile, RV point and the east side.

I remember years ago Eldon Robinson and I ventured out to Popcorn springs off Fish Haven.  It had been well known for years, about a half mile off shore.  When we got out there, there was a circle of open water about 25 feet across.  Eldon decided to see how deep it was and ventured to the edge with his depth finder only to promptly fall in.  He got out but refused to go to shore because the fishing was good.

The USGS did a study a some years ago on Bear Lake and one of the things they were interested in was what kind of water was coming out of the springs.  We had mapped a lot of them so they sent divers down to collect water samples.  Much to our surprise, it was determined that they weren't springs at all but methane gas seeps coming up from the faults on the lake bottom.  As the gas bubbled out at the bottom, the bubbles kept getting larger due to reduced pressure as they reached the surface.  This disturbed the water column and brought warm water up, thus keeping a hole open.

                                                                Cisco Beach Vent  

The gas vents along the east side, especially off First Point, smell of rotten egg gas (hydrogen sulfide).  The most prominent one close to shore is just south of the Cisco Beach Boat ramp (picture).  Now there are springs in the lake, some identified when it was low but I guess the water is not that different in temperature and have low dissolved gases.  There are two methane seeps in the marina and I know there is no water because when they excavated the enlarged marina it was dry.  The lake is always full of surprises so just don't fall in a methane gas seep.

Bear Lake Turkeys

It is a tough winter so far for the flocks of Garden City turkeys.  These Merriam turkeys are an exotic species to the area.  I had never seen a turkey in the wild until I went to the Black Hills in South Dakota.  Through my adult life I read about turkeys, how smart they are and the effort of western states to introduce them for hunting.  Things started off slowly but within the last five years they have taken off (no pun intended).  As far as I can tell they were never stocked by a State agency in Bear Lake.  I am sure some moved over the mountains from Mink Creek/Riverdale area.  I personally believe the turkeys around Garden City originated when Ben Negus was raising them and they got away and headed up to Bridgerland, so you can blame or praise him.  Anyway they have expanded all along the west side of the Lake, in the hills around Garden City and up Cottonwood Canyon in Round Valley.  Wildlife Resources decided they were a huntable population and included this area in the Cache Unit.

I love to watch and hear turkeys.  Their domestic cousins are dumber than dirt and that is what most people think all turkeys are like.  The wild ones are smart and a real challenge to hunt, which I have done many times.  You just can't go out walking around and flush and shoot them like other birds.  Turkeys have incredible sight and can see anything that is out of place.  Once alarmed, they can run 20 mph or fly long distances.  For their size and weight, they are incredible fliers.  When they flush, they are in the air instantly, dodging trees or landing at the tops of the highest ones.

 

A few of us are turkey feeders.  Since Bear Lake doesn't  have nuts and berries like their native range has, they have become dependent on humans during bad winters.  The snow or predators don't seem to bother them so they head to the nearest feed yard (not many of those around anymore), open area, roadside or feeder to bum food.  I feed birds year around.  That is what I do instead of having a horse although it costs about the same.  My feeders are on the deck and the turkeys showed up a few years ago feeding on spilled bird seed.  Now they flying in and land on the rail and peck and shake the feeder until they have all the seed.  Fights erupt between them with the "Jakes" (year old males), hens and toms constantly trying to rise in the "pecking order".  They run off all the other birds including magpies.  It is great sport to watch them start changing appearance and colors for spring breeding as they come in at the same time every morning.  There is one thing I can be sure of however.  They won't be around during the spring turkey hunt. They are smarter than that.....     

Bear Lake is totally ice covered.  Normal winter weather has returned.  Lots of people think that it has been extra cold this winter but this has been typical in the past.  In 2007 the lake froze around the same time and it was the last time anglers were able to dip Bonneville cisco through the ice.  The lake froze again in February 2008 an stayed frozen until May.

Now is the time.  If you have never have dip netted cisco before or if it has been years, do it through the ice.  You don't get wet, the fish aren't spooky and even the kids can do it.  Just find a hole off Cisco Beach, bring or borrow a cisco net and start dippin'.  It is best first thing in the morning but during the peak of the run they spawn all day.  You can even put a lure without hooks down the hole and jig it to attract fish that you can then dip.  This is the best technique for kids.  At times, you can catch a lot of fishing in a hurry so don't get carried away throwing fish out on the ice or you may receive a visit from the friendly game warden who has been watching you through a spotting scope up on the road.  Once the fish are on the ice you can't put them back.  You have to have a current fishing license which allows you to catch 30 fish but remember, you can only catch your fish, not Mom's who sitting in the vehicle or the 18 month old baby.  The same friendly warden will give you a ticket for the over limit of fish "you" take out of the hole which usually cost at least a $1 apiece in fines.

  

Don't take more fish than you want.  Many people feel that it is their responsibility to catch limits and then find out it is a pain in the butt to clean 100 cisco.  When they get tired of cleaning (usually around 20) they think that they will save the rest for bait.  Well, most people never use them and they go out to the cats or in the garbage in the spring.  What a terrible fate for these beautiful endemic fish.  Leave what you don't need in the lake.  

So have fun, take pictures and don't step into any holes that have a thin sheet of ice on them.  After you get some cisco go into deeper water or off shore and fish for whitefish and trout.  It is the best time of the year and you don't need a boat.  Good luck,

ICE?????

Everyone is wondering if Bear Lake is frozen.  Well as of 5:00 pm there was still a large area of open water off Cisco Beach and North Eden.

The fog is in the valley today but I suspect it will freeze by the end of the weekend.  I bet the cisco are spawning below the ice now.

It is cold outside.  Somehow all the snow that fell in the past five days missed us.  As a weather freak, I have observed over the years that winter storms that come across Nevada frequently miss Bear Lake.  It is the weather that comes from the Pacific Northwest that pound us.  The lake and what it is doing also has a lot of impact on the weather.

As I sit here on Sunday morning it is well below zero but there is not much fog.  That tells me that the lake is now in the process of serious freezing.  I can see the huge shards of ice forming on the lake.  The north end will be the first to freeze.  It is much colder there.  Just look at the temperatures in Dingle and Bern as the cold air follows the Bear River into the Valley.   The lake is much shallower in the north end so there is no deeper, warmer water to mix with the surface.  Ice then forms down the west.  The accompanying  picture was taken this morning showing the ice formation off Fish Haven and Swan Creek.   It freezes clear but the condensing snow/ice makes it white.

It then shoots out in front of Garden City and freezes out off Ideal Beach and Gus Rich Point.  There is a natural back eddy current there that keeps the water colder.

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 At this point people down by the lake can only see ice and think the lake is frozen.  Not so.  The east side with its deep water and  current upwellings keep the water warmer and discourage the ice.  Eventually it will freeze and the last area to become solid will be right off North Eden.  Two major current cells collide there and as the cold winds pour down North Eden Canyon it keeps the water stirred up. The only sure way of telling if the lake is totally frozen is to go to the Overlook.

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The lake has not totally frozen in the past four (?) years.  Will it freeze totally this year?  I think there is a good chance of it which will make a lot of fishermen happy.  We will have a nice clear winter but spring will be delayed by three weeks and the water will still be chilly on the Fourth of July.