Outdoors - Hunting and Fishing

Heritage Day and fishing derby in Delta on June 1

The City of Delta’s Outdoor Heritage Day and Youth Fishing Derby takes place June 1 at Confluence Lake. The fishing events begin at 8 a.m. with a “Pathway to Fishing” program from the Colorado Sportsmen Wildlife Fund and a fishing pole giveaway. The fishing derby (for youths 16 and under) begins at 9:15 a.m. Outdoor Heritage Day exhibitors will have booths, activities and demonstrations from 10 a.m. until 3 p.m. All events are free, family oriented and the day includes ...

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Deer insights

Sometime within the next two weeks, a new generation of mule deer will start to appear. Pregnant does typically begin dropping fawns in the final week of May and the births continue until the end of June or early July. If all goes as planned, within a day or two of birth, many of those new fawns will be wearing radiocollars as part of several ongoing, multi-faceted research projects by Colorado Parks and Wildlife into what’s causing the general decline in mule deer numbers. That ...

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Putting 
the bite 
back in 
Harvey 
Gap

With a setting sun lighting the waters of Harvey Gap Reservoir, a group of Limon High School students Thursday evening took the hard-earned product of months of school work and unceremoniously tossed it overboard. The students showed little sadness at the release of 250 tiger muskies in the reservoir a few miles north of Silt. Maybe that was because of all the time they spent enduring the sting of sharp teeth, and even occasionally watching the fish they were trying to raise eat each ...

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Colorado Mule Deer Strategy aims to restore state’s herd

Sometime this summer, what’s being plotted as a path to reverse the decline in the state’s mule deer herds will be unveiled. Colorado Parks and Wildlife, with a lot of help from state and federal land-management agencies, hunters, conservation groups and, most important of all, the general public, will open discussion on a new mule deer initiative titled “The Colorado Mule Deer Strategy.” It won’t be a set-in-stone policy but rather an adaptive management ...

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All-women seminar set for Saturday

Forget the pressure. Women learn better when they are among their peers. “Many ladies want to hunt or fish, but they don’t have a mentor,” said Kathleen Tadvick, education coordinator for Colorado Parks and Wildlife. “This class is perfect for them because it teaches the fundamentals of fly fishing, archery and the safe use of shotguns in a comfortable, women-only environment.” The class is Parks and Wildlife’s “Cast, Blast and Twang” ...

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More bears, more licenses

The Colorado Parks and Wildlife Commission’s approval May 9 of more black bear licenses for Grand Mesa is part of a statewide plan to rein in a bear population that may have gotten out of hand. Bear licenses across the state this year were increased, but nowhere saw as great an increase as the eight game-management units in the Grand Mesa bear management area. From 480 licenses in 2012 to 1,000 licenses in 2013, the inflation continues a trend in which the number of Grand Mesa bear ...

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Increase in licenses reflects concern over black bear numbers

It’s not a good time to be a black bear in western Colorado. After years of seeing the state’s black bear population grow amidst a chorus of complaints from hunters, livestock growers and farmers, Colorado Parks and Wildlife is set to reverse that growth. Several years of black bear research are saying the state’s bear population is substantially higher than previous estimates, something ranchers have been saying for years. “In my country, there’s a bear ...

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As herds improve, deer hunting tags receive lift

The Colorado Parks and Wildlife Commission on Thursday approved slight changes in deer licenses (up) and elk licenses (down) for the 2013 big-game hunting season. Total deer-license numbers went up by 4 percent to 82,600 for the 2013 hunting season in response to the constant appetite for deer hunting. West of Interstate 25, 67,700 licenses will be available in the draw. State big-game manager Andy Holland told the commission that demand for deer licenses remained steady over the past ...

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The stars come out Saturday at Highline Lake

Enjoy the wonders of the universe, at least as we know it, Saturday night when the 2013 Summer Star Party, presented by Colorado Parks and Wildlife and the Western Colorado Astronomy Club, opens the skies over Highline Lake State Park. Club members will have high-powered telescopes, videos, and a world or two of astronomical information to share with park visitors. The focus this year is on Jupiter and The Beehive Cluster - a cluster of stars in the constellation Cancer that contains a ...

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Vega State Park opens to boating

The ice is gone and Colorado Parks and Wildlife has opened Vega State Park to boaters. The Island boat ramp is now open and the Oak Point and Early Settlers boat ramps are expected to open by Memorial Day weekend, depending on water levels. Beginning May 15, park personnel will turn on the water in the campgrounds as well as the dump station and camper services building. “Vega State Park is popular place for visitors from across the state,” said Park Manager Kedrick Robinson. ...

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Wildlife commission eyes emergency fishing regs at Harvey Gap

Final license numbers for the 2013 big-game season and an emergency fishing regulation to protect tiger muskies in Harvey Gap Reservoir are among the items to be considered when the Colorado Parks and Wildlife commission meets Thursday in Grand Junction. The meeting begins at 8:30 a.m. at the Doubletree Hotel, Horizon Dr. A full agenda and meeting details are available online at http://wildlife.state.co.us/ParksWildlifeCommission/. Thursday’s agenda includes the consideration of an ...

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Hunting 101

Anyone who knows the history of hunting safety in Colorado also knows how worthwhile the many volunteer Hunter Education instructors have been to generations of Colorado hunters. In 1970, in response to a rash of hunting-related injuries and deaths, including two young boys killed while riding a motorbike near Gunnison during hunting season in 1967, the state adopted mandatory hunter safety training and the wearing of blaze orange. Colorado’s legislature made it a requirement that ...

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Parks and Wildlife adds tiger muskies to fish mix at Harvey Gap

Tiger muskies, the hybrid sterile offspring of muskellunge and northern pike, again have been stocked in Harvey Gap Reservoir, and the Colorado Parks and Wildlife commission is set to enact an emergency regulation at Harvey Gap to protect those young predators. The emergency regulation, which would prohibit anglers taking northern pike by spearfishing, archery or gigging (using a hand-held pronged spear), is among the items the commission will consider Thursday during its meeting in Grand ...

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Bass fishing nearing its seasonal peak at Lake Powell

PAGE, Ariz. —  It’s a typical year at Lake Powell, As soon as the water warms, bass move onto nest sites and then retreat as water cools. If the home cove is protected from wind, it stays warm (53-60 degrees) and bass spawn. But if strong wind cools the water, spawning is delayed until the next calm period. Lake level (as of Monday 3,597 asl) is the selling point for coming sooner rather than later to fish for spawning bass. Now, the lake is stabilizing, ready to start ...

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Wyoming bowhunter kills record whitetail buck

According to the Wyoming Game and Fish Department, a whitetail buck killed in September by an archery hunter was the largest recorded whitetail buck taken by an bowhunter in Wyoming. Shane Sanderson, 39, of Kinnear, shot the 10-point whitetail on Sept. 1, opening day for the Wyoming archery season for deer. Sanderson, a lifelong hunter who has been archery hunting for 13 years, had scouted the big buck since August and was waiting in a blind when the buck, accompanied by two smaller ...

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Calming water means start of bass spawn

Lake Elevation: 3,597 Water Temperature: 53-63 F http://www.wayneswords.com PAGE, Ariz. — Wednesday, the wind was howling and keeping Lake Powell water temperature down in the low 50s. My advice: Don’t be discouraged. The wind will stop, the temperature will rise and the warming water will usher in the annual bass spawn. If sight fishing for bass is high on your list, then the fun begins as the water calms and continues into the first part of May. Largemouth bass will be ...

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Take it from a pro

By Sunday afternoon, the weekend storm had blown through the Pleasure Park, leaving sunny skies, a crisp wind and higher flows on the North Fork of the Gunnison River. After a day of rain and accompanying snowmelt, the streamflow gauge on the North Fork near Leroux Creek was reading around 240 cubic feet per second, not too high for wading anglers to reach the mainstem Gunnison above the Pleasure Park. This gauge is just above the confluence of the North Fork and the Gunnison and ...

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Easing the frustration of early season fly fishing

March and April can be the most frustrating time for an angler. Low water, extreme clarity and no hatches are the major problems to overcome. The Gunnison River this year has been running about 300 cfs (minimum low), very clear and with sporadic hatches. For the most part, nymphing is the most successful method in these conditions. We have all heard the saying “you are standing where you should be fishing.” Normally we think the fish are holding in deeper water, so we wade ...

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Reservoir draw-downs 
top spring fishing news

Colorado anglers will have their hands and their nets full this spring with the planned draining of two major fish-producing reservoirs. The first 2013 weekly fishing report sent out last week by Colorado Parks and Wildlife reminds us the previously announced draw-down of Miramonte Reservoir near Norwood continues with no bag limits for trout and smallmouth bass. Colorado Parks and Wildlife plans to treat the reservoir with rotenone this fall in an effort to rid the lake of smallmouth ...

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Lost generation

As this page reported Sunday, deer-hunting licenses in the Gunnison Basin will see a slight increase this fall thanks to a growing deer herd. However, the story isn’t limited to what is happening around Gunnison and entails more than simply having more deer on the landscape. Although it’s true there are more deer in places, there still aren’t as many as biologists would like to see. Some of it’s the inherent nature of mule deer, which are susceptible to hard ...

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