Category: deep creek lake

By Michael A. Sawyers, Cumberland Times-News, Md.
McClatchy-Tribune Information Services

Dec. 31–As January started, grumbling could be heard on both sides of the North Branch of the Potomac River.

The deer harvest was down dramatically and hunters didn’t like it. For example, the kill during West Virginia’s 2010 firearms season decreased 31 percent from the previous year.

On the Almost Maryland side of the big river, officers and members of the Allegany-Garrett Sportsmen’s Association fumed, insisting upon a minimum antler point rule, drastically reduced bag limits and other restrictions they believe are needed in Region A.

Maryland Wildlife & Heritage Service biologists, halfway through a two-year regulation cycle, made no changes for the 2011 hunts.

Head deer guy, Brian Eyler, said there was no need to fix something that was not broken. The firearms season buck kill in Region A rose by 12 percent later in 2011.

The Maryland General Assembly got under way in January. Hunters missed the boat by not strongly supporting a bill that would give the Department of Natural Resources control over the regulation of Sunday deer hunting. If that bill is introduced in 2012, hunters need to buy their boat tickets early and let the politicians in Annapolis know this is something we want.

It was announced in February that chronic wasting disease was confirmed in a deer killed on the Green Ridge State Forest. That was the first, and so far the only, CWD deer found in the state. Special regulations were established for hunting deer in that locale. Hunters didn’t seem all that concerned about the matter.

Additional land added to the Warrior Mountain Wildlife Management Area pushed that public parcel to almost 5,000 acres.

In March it became official. The Maryland Fisheries Service made it illegal to wear felt-soled waders in water anywhere in the state. The ban is intended to inhibit or stop the movement of rock snot, a yucky algae, from the Gunpowder and Savage rivers to other waters. It was the second-worst sham ever pulled off on Maryland anglers by the state agency.

A Hagerstown man charged with hunting bears over bait in eastern Allegany County was not found guilty after his attorney argued successfully that the Maryland Natural Resources Police had no right to go onto the private property.

Blu, the Labrador retriever handled by Maryland Natural Resources Police Officer Curt Dieterle, was trained to sniff and find trout and immediately began doing so when the trout season opened. Some of those trout were illegally caught.

In April, Maryland’s spring gobbler season began. It would have a couple firsts. In Allegany and Garrett counties, hunting was allowed on one Sunday and on all lands, both public and private. The 2012 season will have two Sundays available in those counties. Also, afternoon hunting was allowed for a portion of the five-week season.

On April 14, Kenneth Files III of Falling Waters, W.Va., (right) caught a Maryland record muskie from the Potomac River. It was 45 inches and weighed 31.75 pounds.

The West Virginia Division of Natural Resources announced that bow season would open on the first Saturday in October, adding time in tree stands for archers. Byron Chambers, Romney, was one of the natural resources commissioners who helped make that additional opportunity available.

May came and went without a regulations hearing being conducted by the Maryland Fisheries Service. It would be discovered later that no meeting was held because no regulation changes were proposed. In 2007, the agency made it illegal to use bait or keep brook trout in 111 miles of the Savage River drainage, saying at the time that the regulation would be revisited after five years to determine if it should be maintained. Instead, the regulation was allowed to move into its sixth year of existence. I have no information that would lead me to believe anything other than we were told an untruth. This regulation, by the way, is the greatest sham perpetrated upon the state’s anglers, especially those living in far Western Maryland.

Also in May, the Maryland Fisheries Service announced that trout it had purchased from a private supplier that were stocked in the North Branch of the Potomac River, Jennings Run, Wills Creek and Sideling Hill Creek were infected with whirling disease.

Gobbler hunters killed 339 spring birds in Garrett County, 287 in Allegany and 2,847 throughout the state.

In June, the Maryland B.A.S.S. Federation completed a permanent weighing station for tournaments conducted at Deep Creek Lake State Park.

The Maryland Wildlife Service announced that a new access road from U.S. Route 220 will be built onto the Dan’s Mountain Wildlife Management Area. That work will begin early in 2012.

The Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation announced in August that it is footing the bill for a year-long look at the possibility of reintroducing elk into Allegany and Garrett counties. Since then, there has been zero information released about the effort. The Times-News heard that the Garrett County commissioners opposed the plan and Chairman Gregan Crawford confirmed that an official letter had been written by the elected officials rejecting elk for that county. Bill Miles of the Maryland Legislative Sportsmen’s Foundation said, though, that the investigation will continue.

A bear population survey for Maryland’s three western counties took place. Laboratory results of the DNA analysis of bear hair is expected to provide a new bear population number in the next month or so. The last survey was six years ago.

My old Beer/Deer Fridge died. I replaced it with The Beer/Deer Fridge II, which has worked wonderfully in chilling a bow buck in September and a gun doe in December as well as Busch Lite and that goofy beer stuff my sons stick in it during the holidays.

Maryland Fisheries Service decides to suspend licenses of recreational anglers guilty of violations. Four suspensions were for violations in Almost Maryland.

The Maryland bear season lasted four days in October during which 65 bears were killed. The greatest harvest was 68 in 2009.

Pennsylvania hunters killed 53 elk in that state.

Highly placed wildlife officials in West Virginia and Maryland confirm that representatives of the automobile insurance industry have never contacted their agencies concerning deer hunting regulations, including bag limits.

As of mid-December, 75 bears had died on Maryland roadways during 2011, according to an unofficial tablulation by the Cumberland Times-News. That’s a record.

Outdoor Editor’s note: In recent weeks, three people have told me they don’t believe that a record deer kill took place in Allegany County. I asked each of them, “Where did you see that a record deer kill took place?”

They said they read it in the Cumberland Times-News.

“No, you didn’t,” I replied.

I have given this much thought and believe that some people who read articles about the buck kill being up on the opening weekend of firearms season compared to one year ago and then up for the entire firearms season somehow think that means a record was set.

For the record, the record in Allegany County for bucks killed during firearms season was 2,615 that were dropped in 2001.

HAPPY NEW YEAR

Contact Outdoor Editor Mike Sawyers at msawyers@times-news.com or 301-784-2523.

Buying or selling real estate in Garrett County or Deep Creek Lake, Maryland
? Call Jay Ferguson of Railey Realty for all of your real estate needs! I take great pride in referrals, and I assure you, I will take great care of your friends, family & colleagues!

Elaine Blaisdell Cumberland Times-News

McHENRY — The Property Owners Association of Deep Creek Lake held the second in a series of workshops on Friday to discuss five areas of concern for future well-being of the lake and surrounding areas.

The five areas of concern were developed at the first workshop, held on Dec. 3, 2010.

They are as follows:

• Economic benefits and cost.

• Commercial, agricultural and residential impacts.

• Communication and education.

• Erosion and sediment process.

• Biological environment.

For each of these five areas, a panel of experts was assembled to answer prepared questions from a moderator and also impromptu questions from participants in the audience.

In regards to the economic aspects of the lake, panel members were asked questions regarding what costs and benefits visitors might impose on the watershed and in what fashion the county and state account for those effects.

Garrett County has about 1.2 million visitors a year and the population of the county is about 30,000, according to Nicole Christian, president and CEO of the Garrett County Chamber of Commerce.

“That is a significant impact on the number of people utilizing our roads, utilizing our services here. You have to consider that when considering the overall impact on the watershed,” said Christian. “Tourism is a very important driver of our economy. I think it’s safe to say the benefits far outweigh what the costs are.”

Another benefit of the visitors, is the fact that the transient population pushes economic development bringing in better technology, better restaurants and a better cultural environment, according to Jeanne Neff, who served as the president for The Sage Colleges in Troy and Albany, N.Y., for 13 years.

In regards to economic impact, panelists were also asked what responsibilities the county should accept to ensure a constant stream of visitors.

“I really appreciate the way the county commissioners have taken an active role in understanding all of the resources in the county and in trying to understand what their role is,” said Christian.

The panelists were also asked what can the tourism industry as a force be responsible for the stewardship of the lake. Christian noted that it was important when looking at tourism to consider not only the lake but the entire lake watershed.

“When we talk about the tourism industry we are talking about a lot of stakeholders, not just the people in McHenry or the property owners around the lake or the dock owners,” said Christian. “I think it’s very important from a stewardship standpoint that we always have very open line of communication from all the stakeholders; workshops like this are very extremely important.”

Christian said it was important to protect the county’s resources, but not so much so that it stifles the tourism industry.

“It’s important to protect what we have but not by putting up a fence around it,” said Christian.

In regards to the commercial, agricultural and residential impacts of the lake, panellists were asked if commercial and residential landowners should be responsible for their impact on erosion or lake quality.

The four panelists were in agreement that they should be held responsible for their impact.

There are already restrictions in place to reduce the impact on erosion and to maintain the lake quality and they are becoming more stringent, according to John Nelson, director of planning and zoning for Garrett County.

Nelson estimated that in two years there will be stricter regulations in regards to livestock in the streams.

They were also asked if what requirements/regulations are now in place to insure that the lake is not degraded by agricultural and residential contaminants such as E. coli, geese droppings and fertilizer.

Geese droppings are not favorable for the environment and are hard on the crops, however, the birds can be hunted, according to Bill Bischoff, a local farmer.

“If you don’t like the geese droppings, talk to the DNR,” said Bischoff.

E. coli is rarely contracted from water and it is not showing up in tests done by the Health Department, according to Bischoff.

Contact Elaine Blaisdell at eblaisdell@times-news.com.

More here.

Buying or selling real estate in Garrett County or Deep Creek Lake, Maryland? Call Jay Ferguson of Railey Realty for all of your real estate needs! I take great pride in referrals, and I assure you, I will take great care of your friends, family & colleagues!

By Judy Colbert judy@judycolbert.com

November 3, 2011 | 9:30 a.m.
Although you’ve barely put away your bathing suits, the folks at nearby ski and winter resorts have been preparing, almost since the last snow season ended, toward this winter.

No, we don’t have 15,000-foot mountains that climb above the tree line, but we do have plenty of options within a few hours drive. Snowmaking starts as soon as two consecutive nights are cold enough to let the frozen mixture stick and accumulate. Tentatively, the slopes are scheduled to open between the day after Thanksgiving and the middle of December, and will stay open until the middle or end of March. They run out of skiers long before they run out of snow, which means plenty of room and no lines for spring skiers.

For now, if you want to interact with the snow with a minimum of time and travel, here are a few suggestions and a short update on some of the “what’s new” information.

At Deep Creek Lake, you can enjoy cross-country skiing, snow shoeing, tubing, ice skating (on an outdoor 50-foot-by-85-foot oval rink), and a mountain coaster at the Wisp Resort. Wisp has the state’s only vertical slope (700 feet) to go along with those other activities and a zip line that runs during the winter. Within the Deep Creek area, you can also go snowmobiling, enjoy a sleigh ride or go dog sledding.

More here.

Buying or selling real estate in Garrett County or Deep Creek Lake, Maryland? Call Jay Ferguson of Railey Realty for all of your real estate needs! I take great pride in referrals, and I assure you, I will take great care of your friends, family & colleagues!