County lake
By TOOTSIE SNELLING
Marion County Park & Lake reporter
The calendar says it's almost spring! Yesterday afternoon felt like it too, and this week is supposed to get into the 70s. I got out and walked around the lake and there were several others out also enjoying the day. I'm on a "Walk Across Kansas" team so you will see me, and others, walking several times during the week. There are six of us on the team and we have to walk 423 miles (all of us together) in eight weeks. (No problem, I hope??) I'll keep you posted.
I could smell the smoke yesterday as the pasture burning season has started. The evening skies soon will be red as the Flint Hills start to burn to make way for green pastures. Can't wait to see the emerald green!
Fishing has been kind of slow this winter. The crappie just never took off in the heated dock like the past year. They were just starting to bite when we got the big rain that raised the lake three feet and muddied it up, so now have to wait for the water to clear up a little. The rain water ran in and those windy days did warm up the water temperature. Dale took the water temperature in several places on Sunday and it was running 46 to 50 degrees, so it has warmed up a lot. The lake level is about normal again, maybe six inches plus. This will put us in good condition going into the summer.
Eight thousand channel cat were delivered to the lake this past week. They came from Arkansas. One load came Monday evening, then the driver went back for another load and returned Wednesday evening. Dan Snelling came out and helped Dale dip them out of the tanks. They ran from 12 to 20 inches and the average was 14 to 16 inches. They were really nice channel. Several fishermen were trying their luck to catch them this week and several were successful. (Remember the limit for the county lake is five channel cat, per person, per calendar day.)
We had a few boat or bass fishermen out over the weekend. Vaughn Berg from Marquette, caught a 20 lb.14 oz. flathead while trolling, using a rattle trap.
John Waner caught a 5 lb. 12 oz. wiper at the north end in the warmer water.
So, spring has sprung, better get out your fishing pole and get it dusted off and come fishing! We even had a couple of campers out too.
They said, "they just couldn't wait to get out."
If you haven't picked up your trash bags here at the office PLEASE do, it won't be long before we get another batch of them.
It was a costly winter here. Someone kicked out the plastic front of the pop machine in front of the hall. It belongs to the Pepsi Co., and replacing it was around $500. If you don't get pop out of it or it is jammed up, please come and ask us, we will give you a can of pop, instead of kicking it in. They are considering removing it.
Also, someone sprung and broke the ladies' door of the shower/restroom and it was hanging open all night. We can't fix it and have to wait for repairmen to come from Wichita. I wish people would appreciate the nice things of life instead of destroying them. We are considering locking them at night, then they will have to use the cold, dark, outside ones.
