Activities

Brigid O' Donoghue is president
and founder of USSA

The United Special Sportsman Alliance believes EVERY child should have a chance to experience nature.

According to Founder and President Brigid O'Donoghue, United Special Sportsman Alliance, Inc. (USSA) is a Non-profit "dream wish" granting charity that specializes in sending critically ill and disabled youth on the outdoor adventure of their dreams!

The USSA has been granting outdoor adventures for eight years. The 100% volunteer staff of the USSA has taken kids, who would normally be overlooked for hunting or fishing opportunities due to their illness, on adventures all over the country and even into Canada. No game is too big or small for "Brigid's Kids" that have hunted everything from pheasant to black bear and whitetail deer to turkeys.

This big brother watches closely as his
sister attempts to catch "the big one".

This young lady gets instruction as she
takes aim with a 22 caliber rifle.

Genoa National Fish Hatchery has been delighted for the past three years to be a part of the USSA family weekend by providing an aquarium with fish for their viewing enjoyment, and by giving several presentations on fish and mussel conservation. In the downtime, Genoa personnel assist the families at the fishing ponds or simply by building relationships and support by listening to the incredible stories that these kids have gone through.

At the end of the weekend, I'm not sure who has been blessed the most, the kids and their families or the volunteers. I do know that Brigid with her video camera treasures each moment. For more information about USSA please check out their web site www.childswish.com.

- Tony Brady

Genoa NFH's traveling aquarium display
being used at the USSA family
weekend event.

Coasters clipped! Cooperative Efforts Continue to Restore Coaster Brook Trout to Lake Superior

A crew of 4 fin clippers traveled from the Iron River (WI) National Fish Hatchery to further coaster brook trout restoration efforts in the Lake Superior drainage by marking Genoa National Fish Hatchery's 2009 coaster brook trout production.

These fish are part of a joint stocking program with the Grand Portage tribe on the shores of Lake Superior. Coaster brook trout, a migratory form of the eastern brook trout that follow a unique life history and grow larger than traditional or stream resident brook trout, have declined in numbers and range since the late 1800's. Coasters migrate out of their natal streams and rivers after their 1st to 2nd year of life and move to the larger waters of Lake Superior to grow and mature. After reaching reproductive age of 3-5 years old, they return to their same birth stream to spawn. Many changes in habitat, fishing exploitation, species composition, and water quality have occurred throughout the Industrial Revolution, leaving just a few coaster populations considered viable in the U.S. controlled waters of the Great Lakes.

Finclippers from the Iron River hatchery
clip Genoa's 2009 spring production.

Coaster brook trout male

A total of 12,000 4 inch fish were marked for release in the spring of 2009, when they should approach 9 inches in length and be large enough to avoid most fish species in search of a fish dinner. Many thanks to Iron River and the team spirit demonstrated to further aquatic resource conservation!

- Doug Aloisi

The monitoring system being used
at the St Cloud waterworks.

Freshwater mussels: Rocks with guts or superheroes in disguise?

Mild-mannered freshwater mussels or clams as most people refer to them, when seen in a river, are not thought of as very heroic.

However, for a second year freshwater mussels produced by Genoa National Fish Hatchery are being tested as means to protect countless citizens against potentially harmful chemicals or environmental factors that might enter water treatment plants in Minnesota that rely on surface water sources. Due to their relative immobility in aquatic systems, and their need to filter large volumes of water, and possibly pollutants in the quest for food, mussels make ideal organisms to test river water quality. In 2007, a bio-monitoring system using freshwater mussels was installed at the Minneapolis Waterworks to monitor raw water by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

These mussels were supplied Mississippi River water from the Waterworks treatment plant influent while being connected to sensors that would send a signal to a computer. If the mussels show coordinated shell closure activity, it is an indication of poor water quality. Waterworks' personnel would then receive an alarm and further test the safety of the water.

This year Genoa NFH shipped 144 black sandshell mussels to St. Cloud, MN where they were used to start up two additional bio-monitoring sites, one located at the St. Cloud Waterworks and the second at the Excel energy plant in Sherburne County, MN. Genoa NFH is one of a very few select mussel culture facilities that can supply mussels greater than two inches in size to be used in monitoring systems such as these. With the addition of these two new monitoring sites, the EPA is testing the mussels' abilities monitor water quality in over 60 miles of the Upper Mississippi River. So I ask: rocks with guts or superheroes in training? You decide.

- Tony Brady

Here you see the black sandshells wired
to the monitoring system.

Biologist Nick Starzl is describing the
characteristics which make lake sturgeon
unique during the 2008 Blackhawk Park
Kid's Fishing Day. FWS photo.

Hatchery Assists Corps of Engineers Blackhawk Park withKids' Fishing Day 2008

The Genoa hatchery assisted our neighbors on the river by staffing an outreach display during the educational portion of their 2008 Kids' Fishing Day held on August 2nd. The Corps of Engineers Blackhawk Park facility holds an annual Kids' Fishing Day that typically draws participants from the three-state (Iowa, Minnesota, and Wisconsin) area. The hatchery was on hand to set up an aquarium and display featuring Upper Mississippi River fish and mussels for over 100 kids to see and touch live sturgeon, mussels, and various fish replicas. The participants were broken into three separate groups to see the three 25-minute presentations on angling techniques, forestry, and fish identification. After the informational clinics, the children headed down to the riverbank to catch "the big one".

This cooperative effort is a unique opportunity to partner with another federal agency to promote a conservation message to the next generation of natural resource stewards.

- Nick Starzl

Eight stations were set on islands in the river or in the river itself. At these stations, kids got to learn about frogs, turtles, birds, trees, fish and mussels. Genoa National Fish Hatchery's mussel biologist talked to the kids about mussels and their way of life in the river. After a short presentation, the kids got to get in the water and "pollywog" (run their fingers through the sand) for freshwater mussels.

Once every child found at least one mussel, everyone gathered back on shore to see what was found. The mussels were identified and the kids got to ask questions about mussels, before being asked to return the mussel to the river. At the end of the day, everyone had fun and enjoyed their time on the river.

- Tony Brady

Excerpt from A Sand County Almanac

But this, we now remembered, was a stream of parts. High up near the headwaters we had once seen a fork, narrow, deep, and fed by cold springs that gurgled out under its closed-hemmed walls of alder. What would a self respecting trout do in such weather? Just what we did: go up.

Drawing by Joe Tomelleri.

In the fresh of the morning, when a hundred whitethroats had forgotten it would ever again be anything but sweet and cool, I climbed down the dewy bank and stepped into the Alder Fork. A trout was rising just up stream. I paid out some line-wishing it would always stay thus soft and dry-and, measuring the distance with a false cast or two, laid down a spent gnat exactly a foot above his last swirl. Forgotten now were the hot miles, the mosquitoes, the ignominious chub. He took it with one great gulp, and shortly I could hear him kicking in the bed of wet alder leaves at the bottom of the creel.

Another, albeit larger, fish had meanwhile risen in the next pool, which lay at the very 'head of navigation,' for at its upper end the alders closed in solid phalanx. One bush with its brown stem laved in the middle current, shook with perpetual silent laughter, as if to mock at any fly that gods or men might cast one inch beyond it outermost leaf.

- Aldo Leopold