Membership Renewal

April is time to renew your membership. We had a very busy year particpating and sponsoring many things in and around the Lake. We hope all of our members will renew and get involved with all of our fun and projects this year. The Lake is in better shape than when the first Salvinia arrived. We know now how fast the Salvinia can take over. Our goal is to try and stay ahead of it this time. Please renew your membership and help La. GCLA Keep Caddo Lake Natural.

Membership Drive

We are starting a new year at La. GCLA. We have come along way in the last year. We have even more planed for the coming year. We will neeed the help of everyone for 2010. April is time to renew your membership. We will be putting out a news letter to remind you. If you have been meaning to join now is the time to get involved. The lake is in the best shape it has been since Giant Salvinia arrived. The good lord and mother nature have cleaned or killed a large portion of the Salvinia and we plan to keep it down this year. Please spread the word, get involved, and join La. GCLA to help Keep Caddo Lake Natural.

Crappie USA

Crappie USA has scheduled their second Tournament of the year on Caddo Lake. Saturday February 13 2010 at Earl Williamson Park Crappie Anglers from all over the south will fish for the biggest Crappie Caddo has to offer. While the pro's are on the lake the kids will fish at the park for prizes and awards. The pros will weigh in at 4:00pm so come out and see what they bring in.

Mardi Gras

The La. GCLA will sponsor the Krewe of Caddo parading the streets of Oil City Saturday January 30,2010. We will line up in front of Town Hall at noon,register and roll out at 2:00 sharp. We invite all to participate or just come watch. The kick off party will be Friday the 29th at the SOC community Center at 7:oopm. There will be live music and good food please rty to come enjoy the fun. For more information contact Dan Fulghum at ferrylakecamp@aol.com.

Christmas on Caddo

Come celebrate Christmas on Caddo with the La.GCLA. The fun will begin at 3:30pm at Earl Williamson Park in Oil City. The only Fire Works Show in Caddo Parish will begin at 6:30pm. We will be serving hot Frito Pies and a membership drive. Look for our banner and come say Hello.

October Feast

Saturday October 24, 2009 we will have our October feast to honor our Corporate members. We will be at Earl Williamson Park. We are grilling up some wonderful food and will be eating at 1:00. Please join us and meet our Corporate sponsors in person.

Caddo Lake National Wildlife Refuge

The Louisiana Caddo Lake Association will sponsor the Krewe of Caddo Mardi Gras parade on January 30,2010 in the streets of Oil City. We invite all to attend or take part. We will line upin front of Town Hall and register at noon and roll at 2:00pm sharp. The kick off party is on Friday night the 29th of January at the SOC Community Ceter at 7:00pm. Live music and good eats are on the menu. For more information contact Dan Fulghum at ferrylakecamp@aol.com

NW Louisiana News

The following page from the "nwlanews.com - Your home for news in Bossier and Webster Parishes" web site has been sent to you by Vijay Nath You can access it at the following URL: http://www.nwlanews.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=15273&Itemid=57

NY Times - feature on Caddo Lake

Copy and paste the following in your web browser for a very interesting article on Caddo Lake. http://travel.nytimes.com/2009/05/22/travel/escapes/22Caddo.html

Greet, Meet, Eat

The La. GCLA had a great gathering at the Earl Williamson Park on Saturday April 25,2009. The menu consisted of BBQ chicken, Smoked Sausage, Boiled craw-fish, perch fried golden brown, and all the trimmings. The fellowship was even better.

We had the pleasure of joining the Oil City Gusher Days Bass tournament. The men brought in some beautiful bass to the scales. Many of us got to see our first Bass over 10lbs.

We had such a good time we may not wait til next year. We will talk about doing this again in the fall.

News from Jack Canson on the TX side

Hello Denise, Thank you for this report. I think I should point out that the figures you have are for the Louisiana side of the lake only.

On the Texas side, Cypress Valley Navigation District sprayed 2,880 acres and Texas Parks & Wildlife sprayed 50 in 2008.

LDWF used 1,142 gals of herbicide at a cost of $41,748. CVND used approximately 2,900 gals herbicide at a cost of $140,825.

So total acres sprayed at Caddo Lake in 2008 was 4,280, consuming $183,473 worth of herbicide.

Those are the official figures from LDWF and TPW/CVND for that year. I don't have a current estimate of number of acres on Texas side infested with giant salvinia, but it is acknowledged by TPW that it is greater than the 700 - 1,000 acres LDWF estimates on the LA side.

I have just returned from a trip to California where I visited a mechanical removal job site and spent several days talking with aquatic vegetation control contractors in both the Monterey Bay and Oakland areas.

The Caddo Lake Institute, with funding from the City of Marshall and private contributors, has arranged to bring a mechanical harvesting crew & equipment in for a Trial Project, tentatively set to begin May 4, 2009.

The object of this first Trial Project will not be to see how much IAV can be removed per man hour. It will be to see how effectively an integrated program involving mechanical removal, temporary boom containment, and follow-up herbicide applications can be in several specific areas.

There has been, as we all know, skepticism about the potential benefits of mechanical removal at Caddo Lake. It is my view, and a view shared by others, that there is no data to support a valid position one way or the other regarding mechanical removal. For that matter, I've not seen any evaluation of herbicide use on giant salvinia at Caddo Lake.

Although we are told that herbicides are retarding the expansion of giant salvinia I am unaware of any testing that has been done with controlled areas to support that belief. Given the large funds that will be needed in the future, it is imperative that we can support our treatment plans and strategies with better data than has been relied on thus far.

Our project is intended to produce useful data of that sort for combining mechanical removal & herbicide applications, using temporary containment booms and other techniques to maximize the effectiveness of both.

There are indeed obstacles at Caddo, and not just the submersed stump problem. The greatest obstacle is the long distances and other difficulties associated with the fact that there are a very limited number of shoreline locations where removed IAV can be offloaded.

That is to say that even if IAV can be efficiently lifted from the water and conveyed to transport barges, distances transport barges would have to travel to acceptable shoreline removal sites will drive up the cost significantly.

There are, however, a number of strategies for dealing with that problem. Techniques ranging from mechanically reducing water content of removed plants before transporting them to incineration at removal sites are currently in development.

We should all bear in mind that our first experience with giant salvinia originated in May, 06. We are only now entering our 4th growing season since then, and if increases continue exponentially as they have been we are in for a very rough time.

On the Texas side, in our prolific shallow and Cypress studded swamp areas, the situation is getting grim. There are several areas previously inundated with water hyacinth that are expected to see giant salvinia as the dominant species this year -- Turtle Shell and Hog Wallow, to name two.

Worse, we are already experiencing heavy matting. Spray team operators have told me they are seeing giant salvinia matting up to 12 inches thick in some areas.

As USGS IAV specialist Dr. Randy Westbrook told me in a telephone call a few days ago, once giant salvinia mats you have no hope whatsoever of controlling it with herbicide. Randy, and others I have spoken with, think our part of the country will inevitably require mechanical removal, integrated with containment and other strategies.

I think so, too. We simply have to start somewhere, get hands-on experience, monitor, measure & evaluate carefully, and improve & innovate as we move forward.

Our Trial Project will begin operations in Buzzard Bay near the state line. We will submit a treatment proposal to LDWF as well as TPW and seek permission to work a day or two on the LA side of the line. James Seale has indicated to TPW's Tim Bister that he is interested in our project and will cooperate as he can. We are pleased about that, because James has had probably more experience fighting giant salvinia than anyone in our two states -- at Lake Bistineau alone -- and his observations and advice will be greatly valued. I will request a meeting with James soon to discuss all in detail.

Also we will hold a Community Meeting outlining our Trial Program at the Karnack Commnity Center Monday, April 13, at 6 PM.

I have also asked Dan Fulghum if I could take 15 minutes or so to make a similar presentation to the LA GCLA meeting April 14 in Oil City.

We certainly don't want to get anyone's hopes up or represent that we think we have the solution. We simply believe we need to get some first-hand data at Caddo. It is entirely possible we will be unable to justify moving toward an integrated program following the Trial Project.

Although we will be employing a contractor with an experienced crew for the harvesting activities, we will be seeking volunteers to assist with monitoring and measuring and other tasks associated with evaluation.

More information will be made available before and after these meetings.

Thanks for this opportunity to add this information to yours.

Best regards, Jack Canson Caddo Lake Institute

Nominees for Officers & Board Members

Anyone interested in serving as an Officer or Board Member of the LA GCLA is asked to contact an existing officer of the organization prior to the second Tuesday in April, 2009. Contact ferrylakecamp.aol or gildon1122@yahoo.com

Vote Steve Riall Caddo Parish School Board April 4

LA GCLA News Update

Our meeting location has been changed to Oil City Town Hall at 202 Allen Street in Oil City. Our March 10th meeting will be at 7 p.m. in the Council Chambers. We'll be making final plans for our annual meeting in April. Watch for details coming soon in a mail out.

We have been in touch with the Jefferson Institute and historian Sam Collier, of Vivian, regarding our historic water trail. Phase One of this project has been completed which entailed a study of the different historic sites in and around Caddo Lake. Sam Collier will be in touch with us to inform us how we may help move this project forward. Further updates will be at our March meeting.

Fishing report

The fishing is beginning to pick up. the water temperatures have warmed to 55 degrees. The male bass and crappie are moving into the shallows around 4 foot deep trees. The larger females are still in deeper water.
A few crappie are being caught on Yo-Yo's at night. The large females are still in the deeper channels.
A few catfish are being caught in the cypress breaks and on trout lines. The next few weeks should have all the fish migrating to the shallows.

From the Wild Life and Fisheries

The Wild Life and Fisheries have has been spraying for the Salvinia for the last two months on Jeemes Bayou.