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In This Issue:1. What's New?2. Our Website 3. Do You Remember? 4. Progress and Plans 5. Taking Care of Business 1. What's New?How about our First Annual River Clean Up on May 10th for something NEW? That's right, we proposed the idea to the Forest Service, Park Service, and other stakeholders and lo and behold - it happened! Thanks mainly to the hard work of our newest Board Member, Eddie Hard. We had a great turnout of about 25 people and we did a lot of good things to improve the appearance of the streamside and roadside from Boyden Cavern to the End of the Road. Photos of the event will be coming soon to our online photo gallery.We helped the SWAMP (Surface Water Ambient Monitoring Program) efforts already this year by pulling stream samples and field parameter measurement at 9 sites and handing them over to the U.C. Davis contract lab contact within the time limit required. We look forward to seeing what the results look like! We are glad to be able to help increase the information available on the river. The good news is that late storms are bringing our snow pack up to nearly normal. The bad news is the algae in the river are the worst we've ever noticed. Many freshly fallen trees are now in and across the river at many points this year, though the river sediment load doesn't look bad yet. This erosion could possibly be the source of the nutrients for the algal bloom, but we, once again, don't know for sure yet. Further data gathering happen during the River Clean Up weekend May 10 and a Bioassessment Workshop will be held on June 18 on the river. Call Bill at 916-601-9954 or email wetemplin@att.net for more details. We hope that the snow melt runoff scours off the heavy algae before the peak summer season so there will not be a lot of dead plant material floating around to decay and use up the oxygen in the water when the temperatures warm up. 2. Our WebsiteOur volunteer webmaster John Schinnerer, from his remote location in Hawai'i, took time out from his vacation in Paradise to place a notice about the River Clean Up right up there on the front page. Thanks John! It probably helped us get the good response and turnout that we had on May 10.The number of visits to this web site has broken previous records each month this year with 635 in January, 830 in February, 868 in March and 950 in April. Our previous high was 571 in November 2002. The word must be getting out! 3. Do You Remember?...When there was a large icehouse located just north of the old store?
The old store was located west of the present amphitheater. I remember the icehouse having no electricity and so they trucked in large blocks of ice. The price was cheap and the block seemed to take up about half of the space in your ice chests. Oh, to have those large blocks of ice once again.
4. Progress and PlansWe are trying to improve on "getting the word out" about what's going on in the South Fork Kings River, Kings Canyon, The National Park, National Forest, and National Monument.There seems to be a lot of excitement and activity happening in Kings Canyon lately. We keep finding out about more work being done to study the fishery, the fish habitat, and fishermen's preferences/success rates. Lots of people have close attachments to this area. We are finding more and more people who care about it like we do! |
Your newest board member, Eddie Hard, picked up on the suggestion in the last newsletter and got us involved in the National River Clean Up day on May 10, 2003. No Moms, he did not select the date, but we thank all of you Moms who celebrated part of your weekend with us. It was recommend that we set up another date in the Fall, possibly September 27, Free Fishing Day, to have a River Clean Up after the heavy recreation period and before winter rains have a chance to wash the litter into the stream. Anyone interested?
There are lots of activities taking shape in the canyon this summer! In June, we have set the week of June 16, following many of your visits to the Canyon for Father's Day, to meet with all parties interested in selecting sections of the river to monitor for "bioassessment". A bioassessment is a specific procedure (or set of procedures) used to identify what types of critters exist at various cross sections in a river or creek environment. Rocks are turned over and the critters are caught and identified to provide information on the health of the stream. If you are interested in learning more and helping with this effort, please call Bill at 916-601-9954 or email wetemplin@att.net In July, we hope to take part in the "Great North American Secchi Dip In" by visiting Hume Lake and taking measurements of the lake's clarity - and possibly in the Kings River too if we can get the proper tools. About mid July we hope to help the U.S. Forest Service with their elevations survey of the stream channel. Anyone with experience in surveying or who would like to learn can contact us and we will give you more information. If making outdoor displays is more to your liking, there may be opportunities to help the U.S. Forest Service decide where and what to put on displays like the ones on peregrine falcons and the Grizzly Creek watershed at Grizzly Falls. They will most likely contain information on the type of fish and critters that they eat and how management of their habitat can improve the number and quality of fish that we get to meet. In August we don't presently know of any activities planned. In September there is the Celebrate Sequoias Event on September 6th, held annually at Grant Grove where we have had tables of handouts and information on the Friends of the South Fork Kings River. There will possibly be another river clean up on or about September 27th, which is Free Fishing Day in California! There seem to be more activities popping up every day, so take part in some of them! How can you help? Ask not what your river can do for you, ask what you can do for your river (who said that?)! We are interested in hearing from YOU, and we want to continue building our base of interested folks who live in the local area and enjoy making the trip to the South Fork Kings River area more often if they have a good excuse! Have a GREAT SUMMER! We hope to see you. 5. Taking Care of BusinessOur account for FOSFK shows a $410.64 balance in checking, with an $81.47 balance in our primary account. We have to leave $25 in the primary account at all times, so the total funds available are now at $467.11 as of the 3/31/03 statement.Expected expenses:
Your Board of Directors: Marlene Ballard |