Counting down the days until the fisheries meeting

How about this weather? As I write this, I had a doctor’s appointment earlier this morning and ended up driving through a near white-out on roads that were snow covered and moderately slick. Twenty-four hours earlier, these same roads had been, for the most part, clear and dry. By around 2 p.m. this afternoon, the sun was shining and temperatures had risen to slightly above freezing.

As the saying goes, “if you don’t like the weather, wait a minute!”

Since I mentioned a doctor’s appointment, I’ll bring you up to speed on my recovery from total shoulder replacement surgery. My surgeon is ecstatic at how well I’m doing. At about 5 ½ weeks post surgery, he was amazed at the motion I have in the joint and the almost total lack of pain.

However, now for the hard part!

I’m right at the point where a lot of the healing has happened, but isn’t anywhere near the fully healed final recovery. That means I need to be very conscious of what I’m doing so potential damage isn’t done just because “it doesn’t hurt when I do this.”

The reality is that I’m probably looking at about a year before that “fully healed” label can be applied.

So what’s happening around the Valley?

Today is the second day of the Big Lake Chamber of Commerce Ice Fishing Derby. Yesterday saw the start of the Iron Dog on Big Lake, held in conjunction with the start of the fishing derby. You can visit the derby happenings later today and cheer the kids on in their efforts!

That NRA-NMLRA basic muzzleloading class I mentioned in last week’s column was cancelled for lack of students signing up by the deadline date. If you have the interest, courses like this don’t come along every day. You need to take advantage when they do happen!

This coming Thursday, Feb. 23, marks the beginning of the Upper Cook Inlet Alaska Board of Fisheries meeting at the Sheraton Hotel in Anchorage.

The meeting is scheduled to run through March 8. The daily meetings will begin at 8:30 a.m. Public testimony is scheduled to begin perhaps as early as Thursday afternoon, but is more likely to begin Friday morning. Public testimony will continue daily until all who have signed up to speak have been given a chance to be heard.

Since most of the testimony will be given over the weekend, folks who otherwise can’t miss work should be able to tell the board their thoughts on how our fisheries resources are being managed in Upper Cook Inlet.

You need to sign up prior to speaking. If you have a friend attending the meeting, they can sign you up on the “blue card” and you can get your ranking in the order of speakers. If you miss your “first call to speak,” you will have a second call after the next break or lunch break, depending on where you land on the testimony list. The best way to be sure you can be heard is to attend the meeting. You might be surprised at what you’ll hear from other speakers!

If you want to continue watching the reversal of a 20-year decline in our Northern District salmon returns, you need to tell the board how important our salmon resources are to your lifestyle. Tell the board not to undo the changes they made in salmon management at the 2014 meeting.

The board will also be deliberating proposals affecting sportsfishing for our resident, freshwater fish species along with several aimed directly at reducing or restricting how our personal use fisheries will be managed. If you go down to the Kenai Peninsula for some or all of your fishing activity, an equal or even larger number of proposals have been submitted affecting how those fisheries are prosecuted.

The last time the Mat-Su Borough Fish and Wildlife Commission went to the UCI board meeting, we asked for some fairly significant changes to the management of Cook Inlet salmon stocks. A whole lot of Valley folks assisted in making these requests. We were able to show the board why the changes were necessary and the board granted most of our requests.

This time around, we aren’t asking for much in the way of change. What we are asking for is for the board to maintain the status quo and give the management plan changes a chance to work. Your help is needed to accomplish this.