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And what a day it turned out to be. The flotilla arrived early and set about its task with purpose. I was inspired at the number of children that were involved as well. The usual barkings on channel 69 kept us all entertained. The fishing was a bit hit and miss, or as some call it too may LDRs. The kokes were deep and somewhat elusive, and I was beginning to wonder if this was going to work out. But the later bite turned on for the patient, and as a result we took in 80 whole kokanee. They were packaged and vacuum sealed and turned over to the rehab that evening. I had called and had Kim (the rehab worker) meet me there, but I did not tell her how many we had to give. When I arrived she said she would be with me in a minute as she was putting eye drops in one of the owls they are nursing back to health. I had her help me bring the kokes in to the freezer. You should have seen the joy welling up inside her. She could not believe how many we had, or how that it could have been accomplished so quickly - literally a matter of days. I simply explained to her that kokanee fishermen/women/kids are of the very most special and caring sportsmen there are who care so very much about all of our natural resources - and that includes not only our fish, but our waters, all the fauna and flora the beauty of the land, and the people that inhabit it. And I also told her that we do not sit idly by and let others fill the need. She told me with confidence, that with this donation our project bird will make it for sure. She said she might even give the golden eagle in their rehab one of the kokes. But she also said that they get about 2-3 osprey per year, and the need for whole fish is on-going. Sure gave me some insight to the efforts of these volunteers. While this donation would seem large, it looks like it will be enough to take care of just this one bird. One incident so typifies the "event." Jason Cruce (Limit Stick) posted this: My crew today was Caddis Skipper, his oldest boy, me, and my boy. We had to fight for our fish today... literally! We found a little late morning bite at the dam thanks to a tip from CM. Not wide open but enough to keep the boys happy. Some made it in the box several did not. One was the hardest Kokanee fight I'd ever witnessed. As my son is fighting a fish an osprey drops out of the sky, gets the fish and starts to fly off. Little Limit is not having it. He keeps reeling, takes up the slack in the line which make the bird crash land. This happens several times, but this bird must be hungrier than the bird we are trying to save because it won't let go. Now I'm afraid the line might be tangled around the bird resulting in injury. How could this happen. I'm out here trying to save an osprey not kill one. I thought about cutting the line but choose to steer to boat in its direction hoping it would let go once we got close. It did and Little Limit kept on reeling. Slow and steady, rod tip up... Whoever said Kokes were hard to land? Weird???? Fight one Osprey for fish that we gave to another Osprey. All in all not a lot of fish but a lot of smiles on the boys' faces. And here is the proof. You can see the lure and the dodger still hanging on the fish:
And to the victor:
Tax deductible financial contributions can be made to: For additional DFG licensed wildlife rehab facilities go to http://www.dfg.ca.gov/wmd/rehab/facilities.html It looks like this event will be an annual "must do" and should spread to other lakes such as Berryessa and New Melones which are reasonably close to other raptor rehab centers. Kari Freidig, Vice President for Wildlife Rehabilitation & Release the following note:
R & D Web...Dynamic Website Creation |
I contacted Gary Coe and others at KP about the need, and also posted in the kokanee forum on the FishSniffer. I also announced the opportunity to Project Kokanee folks. Many calls crossed back and forth and all kinds of Sniffers, KP and PK members and friends committed to come for the day and donate the catch. 
