December 11, 2000

We had a fantastic year. The walleye, perch, steelhead, white bass and smallmouth all were here and hungry. Limits, limits and more limits were taken each day. The year started out bad as weather would not settle out; wind, rain and blow every day. Once the weather quit we enjoyed a great year. Even though the fish were cooperating the business was not there. Lorain does not seem too take much interest in promoting sport fishing. These were concentrated areas of fish. There was not a great lake wide stretch as was apparent years ago. Much of the area to the North and Northeast in deep water was for the most part bare in regard to fish recorded .I have been in this lake for 70 years I have seen it's ups and downs. But, the resilience of this lake is outstanding when you consider the pressure put on this resource God bless this lake; it has been good to all of us . Capt R A Jaycox www.walleye.com/majestic.htm

   WASHINGTON - In a significant ruling on the use of police power, the Supreme Court struck down random roadblocks intended for drug searches, saying they are an unreasonable invasion of privacy under the Constitution. Law enforcement in and of itself is not a good enough reason to stop innocent motorists, the majority concluded on November 28. "Because the checkpoint program's primary purpose is indistinguishable from the general interest in crime control, the checkpoints contravened the Fourth Amendment," which protects against unreasonable searches and seizures, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor wrote. But the reasoning behind those kinds of roadblocks - chiefly that the benefit to the public outweighs the inconvenience - cannot be applied broadly, O'Connor wrote. "If this case were to rest on such a high level of generality, there would be little check on the authorities' ability to construct roadblocks for almost any conceivable law enforcement purpose," the opinion said. Could we perceive roadblocks for creel checks?

  ALBANY, New York - Whirling disease has wiped out about one third of the hatchery raised rainbow trout that officials had planned to release into waterways throughout New York next spring, according to the "Albany Times Union" newspaper. About 175,000 fish were destroyed because of the parasitic infection, the newspaper said. Officials from the New York DEC estimated the value of the destroyed fish at about $60,000. Fish infected with whirling disease cannot be stocked under state policies.

   Whirling disease causes fish to swim erratically, and infected fish can also suffer skeletal deformities. Trout and salmon species are affected by the disease, and domestic strains of rainbow trout are especially susceptible to the illness. There is no known health hazard to humans who consume fish infected with the whirling disease parasite.

   "The exact way the infection was introduced into the fish population is unknown", DEC spokeswoman Jennifer Post said. Scientists believe the outbreak occurred at the state's Randolph hatchery, perhaps when an animal who had been exposed to diseased fish passed the infection on to the hatchery fish, she said. In 1994 and 1995, about 650,000 brown and rainbow trout had to be destroyed at four state run hatcheries because of a whirling disease outbreak. DEC biologists have recommended about 2.15 million brook, brown and rainbow trout be stocked next spring. About 30% of the rainbow trout have been lost to whirling disease. Officials said the overall total of trout for stocking will likely fall by about 10% due to the outbreak. Courtesy: Lehigh River Stocking Association