Guadalupe River Chapter Trout Unlimited

Editor: Bob Tuttle 207 Finn Austin, TX 78734 (512) 261‑4409

Contributors: Jeff Schmitt

OFFICERS DIRECTORS

President: Jeff Schmitt (512)282‑6016

Clem Bird

Cyndie Schmitt

VP Chapter Affairs: Alan Bray (512)263‑9619

David Hotz

Jeff Schmitt

VP Fishing Affairs: Erik Bataille (512)9194

Jon Morse

Marion Tilson

Secretary. Cyndie Schmitt (512) 282‑6016

Irving O'Neal *Jim Vynalek

Treasurer: Bob Story *EX Officio

Notice of Annual winter Meeting & Newsletter

DATE: SATURDAY JANUARY 22, 1994 PLACE: St. Thomas Church Activity Center adjacent to the church (just below Canyon Dam on South Access) ‑ Sattler, Texas. TIME: 10.00 AM ‑ Registration & Socializing Coffee Bar 10:30 to 11:00 ‑ Meeting Business

Raffle SOMETHING EXCEPTIONAL (See Raffle insert Sheet)

Program 11:00 ‑ 12:00 ±

LUNCH:(optional) 12:30 ‑ Always a fine meal. Well balanced, tasty, and nourishing. If you care to bring a delicacy to share, it would be most welcome. Margaret Ann Johnson, Betsy Story and others are to be commended for their work in the kitchen area. The lunch is self supporting so please feed the "kitty".

DIRECTORS MEETING AFTER LUNCH

Be sure that your TU National membership is current and that you are attached to our chapter and not another as all applications are checked against the latest National Chapter Roster. The Chapter labels used for the newsletter are furnished by National TU.

The October meeting had the highest attendance ever for our chapter. A lively meeting with an outstanding program about the Arkansas White River trophy trout fishing area was presented with slides and an entertaining talk by Charles Barton. The 4 piece Sage fly‑rod was one by Walter Zoch who grinned all the way to the lease. The door prize of some fine hand tied flies, donated by Robert Harrison, was won by Bill West. Past president Howard Itten received the Chapter's Honorary Life Membership award for meritorious service to the chapter. National TU certificates of Appreciation were awarded to Bob Story, Betsy Story, Clem Bird, Helen Bird, and Erik Bataille by Jim Vynalek on behalf of National TU.

A very spirited directors meeting followed lasting until 4:00. The Weather Committee came up with another beautiful day and another one is on order for the upcoming Winter Meeting.

THE PROGRAM....

Irving O'Neal our noted program director has arranged to have Judy Lehinberg as our guest speaker. Judy is nationally known for her salmon fly tying. She is also the Vice President for The Federation of Fly Fishers educational program for fly tying and flycasting. Judy is a long time member of Houston's Texas Fly Fishers. When not teaching at Lee's College she spends her summers in Montana fly fishing and guiding. The program will cover flyfishing in Montana and the Yellowstone Area. Her home is in Dayton, Texas. This should be an outstanding, not to be missed, event.

River Cleanup Project Report

On October 31, 1993 the Chapter in cooperation with the Guadalupe River Water Oriented Recreation District (WORD) held a river cleanup project. While the efforts of the participants were definitely successful, a disappointing turnout limited the scope of the project to less than what had been planned.

The project was focused on the area between the bridge at Whitewater Sports and the bridge at Rio Raft. Due to the small number of participants, the primary emphasis was placed on the area near the Kanz lease. In just over 4 hours, we managed to fill a full pickup bed with cans, bottles and other miscellaneous trash that was extracted from the riverbed. However, the job is far from complete. Almost no effort was made to clean the area below the Kanz lease down to Rio Raft. Also a portion of an old boat dock remains stranded on the island below the first bridge at Kanz.

A special thanks goes out to the following people who came to help us with this project: Charlie & Jason Kreitler, Ken Rupkalvis (these 3 are new members), Eric Bataille Bob Story and Jeff Schmitt (who donned the wetsuit and braved the cold air and water to clean out the deeper holes).

This effort definitely needs to be continued if we want to fish in a clean stream. However, due to the poor participation on the first organized effort, I am hesitant to schedule another event. I would like to ask all members to make a personal commitment to remove at lease 10 cans from the river each time the fish this winter.

J.S.

STOCKIING REPORT

Our first stocking of the 1993/94 season was held on November 30. 875 fish averaging 1.5 pounds each were stocked in each of the 5 lease locations. Almost all of the fish in this stocking were rainbow trout, although a couple of nice brown trout and even a stray cutthroat and brook trout were included in the hatchery truck. In addition, there were about 10 fish in the 20"+ range and quite a few 16" to 18" fish, which should make for some exciting fishing this season.

In cooperation with the ongoing TP&W Guadalupe River fishery study, these trout were clipping the adipose fin (small fin on top of the fishes back). Although some members continue to be concerned about the stress placed on these fish by the handling and clipping of a part of the fishes body, I remain convinced that the knowledge gained from this fin clipping program far outweighs the risk of losing a few of our fish to injury and disease. Fin clipping allows TP&W to positively identify over‑summering fish and will hopefully lead to improvements in the regulation and management of the fishery..

The second stocking of the season was scheduled for December 28. Approximately 3,000 8"‑10" brown trout were to be released into the river. Since TU is the only entity stocking brown trout in the Guadalupe River, it is not necessary to mark these fish for identification in the TP&W study.

Members are encouraged to utilize the creel survey cards provided with their lease cards. Notations concerning species and specific fin clipping information are welcomed with the creel suryey reports. Any reports received, will be reviewed in future newsletters.

J.S.

Trout Unlimited Guadalupe River Chapter Chapter Honor Roll

Chapter honors the following distinguished members with Honorary Life Membership. This honor is reserved for commendatory recognition of individuals whose pe nal se contributions to the Chapter are deemed to resolve had significant

impact and otherwise were outstanding.

Honorary Life Members

James Keeton

Bill Pabst

J. Bill Parvin

Glenn Richardson

Chad Oliver

Lt. Col. Paul Schubauer

Hazel Schubauer Tom

Whitehouse Bill Cobb

Howard Itten

DONATION RECEIVED ......

The Alamo Flyfishers FFF Chapter has made a donation of $250.00 towards our trout stocking program. While many of the Alamo Flyfishers are also members of Trout Unlimited, support our chapter, and participate in the lease access program, some only reap the benefits of our stocking programs via their fishing the publicly ible areas of the river. this contribution on accessi their part is in recognition of the benefits they derive from our stocking programs. On behalf of the members of the Guadalupe River Chapter of trout Unlimited, we thank the Alamo Flyfishers for their contribution and look forward to seeing them on the stream.

FROM THE PRESIDENT...

CALL FOR VOLUNTEERS....

Our most pressing need for a volunteer was filled at our last meeting when Judy Presswood volunteered her husband, Ron, to take over the duties a Chapter Treasurer. Pending Board approval at the April meeting, Ron Presswood will take over the job of keeping up with the chapter's fiscal affairs and issuing the lease cards. Mucho thanks to Ron!

The Chapter continues to need more people to become involved in Chapter activities. If we are to become more than just a "fishing club," we need people to take an active interest in expanding the Chapter's current scope. We could use volunteers who would be interested in the Chapter newsletter, public relations and various Chapter committees. Or, if you are just a resource that could be called on for special projects now and then, that would be welcomed also. If you want to become more involved with the Guadalupe River Chapter of Trout Unlimited, please let me know at the next meeting or, better yet, give me a call.

Fish Survey of The Guadalupe

During the week of October 25, Texas Parks and Wildlife conducted an electroshocking survey on the Guadalupe River. Accessible areas of the river from just below the dam downstream to just below the bridge at Camp Bean were surveyed. The purpose of the survey was to count and identify the species and size of the various game fish and bait fish in the river and to use that information on a comparative basis with previous survey information. Although many of us TU'ers were quite nervous about our fishery after a long hot summer of low strewn flows, the preliminary results of the survey are actually pretty encouraging.

I was fortunate enough to be allowed to go along and observe the TP&W electroshocking operations for one of the 4 days they worked the river. Most of the observations that follow are based on what the TP&W personnel told me about the balance of the weeks activities and y personal analysis of the survey results, not on the scientific analysis the TP&W will conduct on this data. During the day I was along, we sampled 2 trout. For the week, 8 trout were located, 7 rainbow and 1 small brown. One of the trout that I observed was very healthy looking 14" rainbow that was taken below the bridge at Rio Raft. Another healthy rainbow, about 12", was taken from a riffle below the second dam at the Kanz lease. No trout were located in the area immediately below the dam. Almost every fish located was fin clipped, which identified it as coming from the trout we stocked last spring, as opposed to a state stocked fish.

While 8 trout over the course of 4 days does not seem like a lot, it is actually very encouraging information when taken in the proper context. First, you may recall that I reported in the last newsletter that during a similar shocking operation in May, TP&W found 31 trout. One preliminary conclusion I draw from this information is that we saw 25% as many fish in October as we saw in May, right after our spring stockings. In addition, once you see what these guys have to go through to get a shocking boat into the water that has a potential to hold trout, you can understand why you might not see a whole lot of them in a shocking survey. The problem of low water and big boats was magnified in the October survey at 125 cfs flows, when compared to the May survey conducted at over 300 cfs I personally believe that this fact probably lowered the number of fish that could be sampled in the October sample and that a 25% holdover ratio might be a conservative estimate.

Participating in a shocking survey like this provides an enlightening insight into the overall ecosystem in the river. In addition to fish, which included several perch species, smallmouth, largemouth and rock bass, a lot of suckers and few (but only a few) stripers, you get a good look at the food chain in the river. Our river is full of baitfish which range from Texas shiners, to a very interesting little fish called a Stone Roller, to some little guys with some Latin names that I didn't quite catch. This may explain why some of us do so well fishing streamers to our trout. After the baitfish, I saw many crawdads, ranging from 1" to almost 6", a helgramite and the biggest green adult mayfly I have ever seen. Very little else in the way of bug nymphs or larva were observed The guys a TP&W explain the lack of bug life as being the result of a coldwater river located in the middle of a warmwater ecosystem, providing little in the way of insects to "seed" the river.

Overall, I have to say that I am encouraged by what I have seen and learned. We know for sure that at least some of the fish that TU is stocking have held over during a summer of low flows and high temperatures. We have at least some evidence that this holdover rate may be at least 25% and could possibly be higher. We know that TU stocked fish appear to be holding over at a much higher rate that the state's "put & take" fish. We know that the fish we have sampled appear to be well fed and healthy and that even though there may be a lack of coldwater aquatic insect life in the Guadalupe, the trout seem to have an abundant supply of baitfish and crawdads to feed on.

I hope to help TP&W expand on the information they are learning from these surveys by participating in either marking or tagging the fish we stock this year in a manner that will allow u to differentiate them from last year's fish. This will, at minimum, allow TP&W the opportunity t observe the possibility of 2 over summering seasons and, if we actually tag fish, possibly the opportunity to track their movement and growth rates.

J.S.