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mypubliclands · 8 years ago

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Restoring the Pahsimeroi River

Story by Sarah Wheeler, Public Affairs Specialist, Idaho Falls District. Photos by BLM.

Decades ago, ranchers who lived along the banks of Idaho’s Pahsimeroi River used to marvel at the salmon and steelhead runs. Even today, old timers tell of the days when so many fish crowded the river it sounded like a herd of horses slashing through the water. But it’s not that way today. Past and present irrigation practices, coupled with the naturally high infiltration rates in the basin, have resulted in the upper Pahsimeroi River no longer providing the connectivity, habitat, and flow required by anadromous fish.

When an opportunity presented itself to collaborate with restoration partners in the upper Salmon River region, the Challis Field Office staff jumped at the chance. The river restoration initiative is officially called the P-16/Furey Lane Water Conservation and Reconnect Project (the P-16 Project) and has become a top priority for the Field Office. Staff members have contributed countless hours of work to make the project a success.

“The P-16 Project is the keystone piece connecting the lower Pahsimeroi River, which is still occupied by Chinook salmon and steelhead,” said Mike Whitson, CFO Hydrologist and Project Lead for the P-16 Project. “Completion of this project really moves the needle, and is a monumental step in making the Pahsimeroi River system whole once again.”

The work began in September of 2015, with the reconstruction of the work started with reconstructing diversion structures and the installation of fish screens and irrigation pipeline. Those projects alone resulted in saving up to 15 cubic feet of water per second. That means up to 400,000 gallons per hour was kept in the river system. Other P-16 projects were designed to prevent fish from getting stranded in the irrigation system. Overall, the P-16 Project ensures that when spawning Chinook salmon and steelhead work their way from the lower reaches into the upper Pahsimeroi basin, the water connectivity they need will be there.

The P-16 Project isn’t the only work the Challis Field Office is doing to benefit the upper Salmon River’s watersheds. In partnership with Idaho Fish and Game and Bureau of Reclamation, the Challis Field Office recently installed a set of 90 artificial log jams and single trees in streams and rivers. These structures will improve in-stream habitat complexity and promote additional riparian recovery. In addition, BLM and partners planted hundreds of sedge/rush sod plugs and potted bare-root riparian trees and shrubs, and planted thousands of willows sprigs—all intended to improve recovery, improve habitat, and reduce erosion.

Through collaboration, teamwork, and a whole lot of hard work, BLM and our partners are helping to ensure that these phenomenal fisheries continue to recover. Hopefully, we will once again see robust steelhead and Chinook salmon runs in the Pahsimeroi River.

Learn more about BLM’s fisheries and aquatics programs here.

#Idaho #BLMidaho #fish #water #fisheries #rivers #conservation #hhydrology #salmon #nature #science

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investmart007 · 6 years ago

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IDAHO | June 28, Better Hurry: Chinook fishing update for South Fork Salmon River and Upper Salmon River

New Post has been published on https://is.gd/suTD0D

IDAHO | June 28, Better Hurry: Chinook fishing update for South Fork Salmon River and Upper Salmon River

South Fork is in prime shape and fish are throughout the river

IDAHO– Anglers wanting to fish for Chinook in the South Fork of the Salmon River better get there soon because the harvest share may not last until Fourth of July.

Fisheries manager Dale Allen said within four days of the season opener 25 percent of the harvest share of about 700 fish had already been caught. Some fish have arrived at the fish trap, and they’re distributed throughout the river.

Allen noted the number of anglers has been going up and the angling hours per fish caught has been inching down, and if those trends continue, the season could be over before the Fourth of July.

“This weekend will be key,” he said. “If a bunch of people show up and the catch rates keep increasing, they’re going to catch them quickly. If you really want to fish the South Fork, you better go now.”

Anglers can see the daily catch rates on poster boards along the South Fork of the Salmon River Road, and on the Chinook harvest page. Anglers can also call the salmon fishing hotline at (855) 287-2702 for updates on seasons and closures.

Upper Salmon River

Catch rates for Upper Salmon have been modest in the early season, and chances are good the Chinook season will last through the Fourth of July holiday and beyond. On Friday, June 29, the Fish and Game Commission will consider opening a third section to Chinook fishing near the mouth of the Pahsimeroi River.

Source; Originally published by IDFG.IDAHO.GOV

#Chinook #Fishing #Idaho #Idaho Department of Fish and Game #South Fork Salmon River #TodayNews

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obkov-obzavejdane-bani-blog · 7 years ago

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Снимка На Деня Майк Kruse

Снимка На Майк KruseДнес снимката на деня “слънчево затъмнение над Забравена Река, планина, Централна Айдахо” Майк Kruse.

Слънчево затъмнение на 21 август 2017 г., както се вижда от долината на Pahsimeroi в Айдахо. Снимка на деня се избира от различните ОП галерии, включително задачи, галерии и ОП конкурси. Задачи седмични победители, които са включени в ОП страница на сайта, Facebook, Twitter и…

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dallasinterstatedruglawyer · 8 years ago

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‘Robin Hood’ drug dealer rebuilds life as novelist, painter, inventor

TWIN FALLS —��Sting operations to catch drug traffickers don’t typically employ 40-something mothers of two as confidential informants. But Richard Urrizaga wasn’t a typical drug trafficker.

It was April 10, 2003, when the 49-year-old Urrizaga rode up to Boda’s Bar in Hollister in the passenger seat of a blue Subaru. At 6 feet, 240 pounds, with long hair and a mustache, Urrizaga still cuts an imposing figure 13 years later. That day in 2003, detectives hiding nearby watched him walk from the station wagon into the bar with the Subaru’s driver, a woman.

Ten minutes later, two more women walked in. The 40-something mother, a confidential informant for Idaho State Police, introduced Urrizaga to her friend “Kelly,” undercover ISP Detective Salena Mink.

“Salena did a good job,” former ISP narcotics detective Cliff Katona remembered recently. “I think Richard might have had an attraction to her … Richard liked Salena.”

After a brief exchange, Urrizaga handed “Kelly” a half-pound of methamphetamine inside a Walmart grocery bag, and “Kelly” paid him $6,500 in bills whose serial numbers had been recorded by ISP detectives. After the deal was complete, she used a code word to alert the officers listening to her wire transmitter.

A SWAT team burst into the bar and arrested Urrizaga and all three women. The arrests of “Kelly” and the informant were for show, to help them avoid suspicion. But for Urrizaga, that walk from the Subaru to Boda’s was the last time he walked free for 12 1/2 years.

“That was the last time I seen daylight,” Urrizaga remembered last month in the living room of his Hagerman home. “I made the delivery and they were right there.”

Now 62, Urrizaga was released on parole a year ago after serving a little more than his minimum sentence. Straightaway he went to work rebuilding his life: self-publishing one of the four books he wrote in prison; making colorful art he hopes to sell; playing his guitar; working on patenting a clock, a can opener and several other inventions; and spending lost time with his wife and grandchildren.

It’s a far cry from the large-scale trafficker he was in 2003, when a Twin Falls County judge dubbed him the “Robin Hood drug dealer” because of letters of support that poured in from friends ahead of his sentencing.

Urrizaga might be a clean, sober and changed man — “I have never been happier in my life than I am right now,” he said last month — but he’s still using the business sense, work ethic and salesmanship that made him a wanted drug trafficker in Nevada and Idaho. Now, he’s putting those traits, inherited from industrious Basque ancestors, into art, music and writing.

The salesman’s latest sell is a new version of himself.

His nonfiction manuscript, the lighthearted tale of his prison time in Nevada, Idaho, Minnesota and Texas, seems like his most promising work. But in the meantime he has self-published a novel, “The Outlaw and the Pocket Watch,” a Basque yarn inspired heavily by the story of his grandfather’s arrival to the U.S. in the early 20th century.

Urrizaga wrote the novel while imprisoned, with characters inspired by his experiences and those industrious ancestors. But Urrizaga’s most fascinating character is not in his books but in himself — a man dubbed by a judge ��a person of bad character” but described in friends’ letters as “the best boss ever,” a “big teddy bear” and a “dear and supportive friend.”

The Renaissance man’s description of himself is intriguing, too: now, as a husband, father, grandfather, artist, author, musician, record collector, poet, conservationist, humanitarian, Democrat, Christian and proud Basque; before, as a salesman, a casino card dealer, a bartender, a well organized criminal, a junkie and, like the protagonist of his new novel, an outlaw.

It’s a tale stranger than any self-published novel.

‘Whole world was on fire’

Soon caught by a darker culture, Urrizaga still identifies with the one he was born into.

His paternal grandparents came to the U.S. from the Basque region of France and Spain around 1920. “The Outlaw and the Pocket Watch” reflects the experience of his grandfather, John Urrizaga, becoming a successful sheep rancher in Nevada.

John worked a two-year contract for a Mormon rancher, and at the end of that contract, he made a deal: He’d work another two years, but instead of accepting money, he wanted a cut of the sheep. The rancher agreed, and two years later, John was in business for himself. Then he called for Richard’s grandmother, Julia, and the couple started a family.

John and Julia had three boys and lived in Ely, Nev. The middle boy, John, followed in his dad’s footsteps to become a sheepherder, plying his trade in Idaho’s Pahsimeroi valley. That’s where, on a blind date, he met the woman he would marry. On Jan. 6, 1954, in Salmon, Wilma gave birth to the couple’s first child: Richard John Urrizaga.

After the younger John and Wilma had a second son, John was drafted into the Army, and eventually the family moved to Fort Polk, La. This was in the years following the Korean War, so John never had to leave the country or fight, but the family didn’t avoid tragedy. While they were in Louisiana, a disease tore through John’s herd, killing all of his several thousand sheep.

“He lost everything he had,” Wilma remembered during a phone interview.

When John was discharged from the Army, the family went back to Ely, where he grew up, and started their lives from scratch.

In the same place John’s father had cut out a good life for his family, John and Wilma and their growing family thrived as John went from doing odd jobs as a truck driver and mechanic to owning a gas station and several other Ely businesses.

“The guy played monopoly and always had hotels,” Urrizaga said.

Wilma, meanwhile, went to work raising Richard and his three brothers. While John’s businesses flourished, so did the boys.

“I had an excellent childhood,” Urrizaga remembered.

Wilma remembers her eldest son as outgoing. “He played baseball and basketball and was very good at both.”

At an eighth-grade graduation ceremony, Richard was honored with the “Principal’s Award,” an elusive honor given out only in the years when a student truly earned it.

“He did very well in school,” Wilma said. “He could have done even better if he applied himself more.”

In 1971, when he was 17 and a high school junior, Urrizaga married his high school sweetheart, Holly Davis. The newlyweds shared the same birthday, but Holly was three hours older.

The couple had their first child, Qwyntun, in 1972, the year Urrizaga graduated from high school. Angelique was born in 1974 and Alicia in 1976.

Urrizaga speaks fondly of growing up in Ely, but Nevada’s vices started to make an imprint at a young age. At about 10, Urrizaga sold newspapers in downtown Ely, which took him in and out of bars, cathouses and casinos — establishments that would play a large role later in his life.

Coming of age in the ’60s and ’70s also meant Urrizaga grew up with the specter of Vietnam, and as the oldest of four boys he thought he’d be drafted and be “off like a dirty shirt” the day he turned 18.

“I was gearing up to be put to death waving the American flag,” Urrizaga recalled. “You’re seeing death on the television every day. I had friends that never came back. And when you grow up with that, I’m affected by that.”

The drug culture of the times also influenced him. He started experimenting with marijuana, which he didn’t like because he was allergic to it, and psychedelics. Being big into music — he’s a huge Rolling Stones fan and played in several bands — also contributed to his drug use.

“I grew up with The Rolling Stones and Cheech & Chong,” Urrizaga said. “It was part of the culture. Jimi Hendrix dies at 27, Janis Joplin dies at 27, Jim Morrison dies at 27, Vietnam was raging and there were race riots everywhere. You got this turmoil, it seems like the whole world was on fire. And the culture I grew up with, that culture used drugs.”

Urrizaga said many of his friends who experimented with drugs cleaned up.

“They became bankers, doctors and lawyers, but I got into a different culture,” Urrizaga said. “I got into the gaming business.”