Field Reports: Docks updated at Texas Rapids
Work to install a new boat launch and dock at Texas Rapids on the Snake River is set to begin Monday, according to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
Work will continue into January to improve the existing dock and install two new handicapped-accessible docks.
During most of the work period, visitors will not be able to moor their boats on site and boat launching will need to be accomplished without the aid of a boat dock, officials said.
Texas Rapids, located 4 miles west of Little Goose Dam at Snake River Mile 66 on the south riverbank, is open year-round. Facilities also include a day-use area and primitive camping.
During the temporary launching facility closure at Texas Rapids, boaters can launch at Lyons Ferry Marina on Lake West and Little Goose Landing on Lake Bryan.
Rich Landers
HUNTING
Turkey hunt grows
There’s more to Idaho’s fall turkey hunting season than meets the eye in the 2007 turkey hunting regulations pamphlet.
After the brochure was printed earlier this year, the Idaho Fish and Game Commission made several changes to help increase the harvest of birds before they bunch up and become pests this winter.
Following are the adjusted turkey seasons for the Panhandle, according to Jim Hayden, Fish and Game’s regional wildlife manger:
Units 1,2,3,5 —Season continues through Dec. 15. Regular and “extra” turkey tags are valid, with option to purchase up to five “Special Turkey Tags” for $5 each. The special tags are good only in these units.
Fall limit is five birds, either sex.
Last week the commission made the additional change removing the daily limit, so hunters can take up to five turkeys in a single day, but the total season limit remains at five.
Units 4A,6,7,9 — Season continues through Dec. 15th. Regular and “extra” turkey tags are valid.
Fall limit is two birds. Only one bird can be taken in a day.
Rich Landers
LAKE ROOSEVELT
Schools go native
Nearly 8 acres in the Lake Roosevelt National Recreation area near Keller Ferry is looking more native, thanks to 247 students from several area schools plus teachers and parents who planted 2,000 bitterbrush saplings and other native plants last month to restore land that had been cleared by a developer.
National Park Service staff turned the work party into a learning experience on shrub-steppe communities, habitat fragmentation, non-native invasive species, and much more.
Rich Landers
FISHING
Walleye record set
Last Saturday, Bob Hart, 46, of Missoula caught his first walleye, a 14 incher. On Sunday, he caught his second walleye, a Montana state record.
The 17.75-pound fish was caught in Tiber Reservoir southeast of Shelby, eclipsing the 16.63-pounder caught in 2000 in Fort Peck Reservoir.
Staff and wire reports