Out & About

HANGING OUT

Mountaineers pick up Dry Falls

The Spokane Mountaineers are planning to pick up where Highway 17 roadside litter crews must stop at Dry Falls overlook in Sun Lakes State Park.

Starting at 9 a.m. next Sunday, volunteer climbers will use skills they’ve developed to climb mountain peaks as they tie into ropes and descend the 400-foot cliffs, gathering trash as they go.

“In 1993, we had 50-plus people who picked up 51 bags of garbage,” said cleanup organizer Chic Burge, who said he was hiking in the area this spring and noticed the climbers’ services were needed again. While five rope teams clean the cliffs, others are needed to collect trash on non-technical ground, Burge said.

Info: (208) 664-2420 or (208) 659-8183.

OUTMEDIA

Student nets prize

Cassia Fox, 9, of Spokane has yet to catch a steelhead with a fishing rod, but she hooked a prize catch with her colored pencils: first place among Washington contestants, grades 4-6, in the Wildlife Forever National State-Fish Art Contest.

When the Evergreen Elementary School fourth-grader saw the contest announcement in the Outdoors section this winter, “she went on the Web, learned that steelhead are Washington’s state fish and she looked at dozens and dozens of pictures of steelhead and the habitat they live in before starting her drawing,” said Dan Fox, Cassia’s father.

The artwork was only part of her entry. “She had to write a report, so we ended up learning interesting things … that steelhead are endangered in certain areas … they go to the sea and come back again, so they share the problems salmon have,” her dad said.

OUTHUNT

Deer hunter profile

According to a recent University of Idaho survey, the average Idaho mule deer hunter stacks up like this:

45 years old;

23 years living in Idaho;

$40,000-$60,000 income;

20 years of hunting mule deer;

90 percent are male.

(See the shocking survey results that indicate what this average muley hunter wants from Idaho Fish and Game in Field Reports, page T2).

OUTLOOK

Best fishing times

Lunar tables from the U.S. Naval Observatory. Be fishing at least one hour before and one hour after peak times. Applies to all time zones. (* indicates best days.)

Through June 10

Today

3 a.m. 3:25 p.m.

Monday

3:55 a.m. 4:25 p.m.

Tuesday

4:50 a.m. 5:15 p.m.

Wednesday

5:40 a.m. 6 p.m.

* Thursday

6:25 a.m. 6:50 p.m.

Friday

7:15 a.m. 7:35 p.m.

Saturday

8 a.m. 8:25 p.m.

Next Sunday

8:50 a.m. 9:15 p.m.

See the Hunting-Fishing Report

every Friday in Sports