Thanks to FOG volunteers and Wisconsin DNR partners Advanced Fisheries Technician Jim Cox and Fisheries Technician James Zarzycki, all 21 of the fish cribs built in March 2010 have been successfully towed to their final resting places in the Gile Flowage.

 

The Flowage's spring water levels, even lower than usual, made it impossible for the DNR to tow the heavy log cribs off of the shorelines where they were constructed. 

 

With a little help from Mother Nature, June's rains raised the Flowage's water levels slightly. Seven cribs, constructed along an island shoreline near deeper water, were the first to be moved.  The remaining 14 cribs, assembled along the mainland, remained high and dry until the middle of June.  Additional rains provided just enough water to tow them out into the Flowage. Even so, volunteers report that the cribs proved to be really tough to dislodge from their rocky resting places.

 

If installation proved impossible this spring, the cribs would have been left on the shorelines and most likely damaged over the winter.  Reconstruction and re-stuffing the cribs with brush would have been needed next spring. Plus the Flowage would not have benefited from having these additional cribs providing habitat to improve the Flowage's fishery.

 

Thanks to our DNR partners and FOG volunteers for saving the day and all the hard work that was done in March to build the cribs. Your determination to finish the project is really appreciated!