Here is an excerpt from the thank-you letter sent by the Rice Lake Association to the many volunteers who participated in The Great Weed Pull 2022. Several families from Lake of the Falls joined weed-pullers from all over Iron County and beyond in the effort to control Curly Leaf Pondweed in Rice Lake and the Turtle River during the first 2 weeks of June. While it’s unlikely that CLP will ever be completely removed from our watershed, this year’s effort was a great success and much progress was made.Go to ricelakeassociation.org to see photos of the weed-pullers in action, and please consider volunteering for next year’s event. It’s starting to look like we may be able to beat this, with everybody’s help!
“…We think back fondly on each and every day we spent with you on the water. The herculean effort you made to pull those big loads of pondweed into your boat. The friendly competition of who had the most bags of CLP. Your sense of humor and kind and gentle good nature. The sharing of a meal each day prepared by our wonderful Rice Lake family. The memories are endless and dear. And yet, we are painfully reminded that this can’t be a one time occurance. Curly Leaf Pondweed is relentless. Its containment will be our focus for the foreseeable future. We will continue to seek your involvement and help, asking you to reach out to your friends and neighbors . If you missed the opportunity to become a CLP warrior this year, there will be another chance. You won’t regret being a part of this history making event and meeting some of the most wonderful people of the Northwoods and beyond.
Our sincerest thanks,
The Rice Lake Association”
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And here is the DNR’s report from last year’s fish survey on Lake of the Falls, plus the Fall Walleye Electrofishing Data Collection Sheet from last October 5th. Thanks to Bill Dalpiaz for acting as our liason to DNR Fisheries Biologist Zach Lawson, who provided these documents. It seems that fish numbers are slowly declining all across the North Woods, but Zach is working on ways to improve our numbers here on LOTF. Any information he can get will help with that, so keep filling out the Fish Count Form!