Little Elkhart Chapter of Trout Unlimited

Meeting Minutes – May 8, 2019

Meeting Attendees

     Tom Vanderputten      Leonard Gustin   John Hollister   Lee Troyer   Cristin Woolsey   Jim Mock

      Keith Loutzenhiser     Mark Holcomb   Nick Christofeno  Jim Philips  Tim Pote    Mike Beachy

Meeting Minutes

• The meeting minutes for April 10, 2019 were approved.

Fishing Reports

• Opening Weekend for the season was a bust high and cold water.  Sunday May 5th after the outing Mike caught a 14” brown at Hoovers, Nick caught a nice rainbow today at 100 South of The Little Elkhart.
• Unfortunately Mike ran into a group of guys camping at Hoovers during opening weekend, and they seemed to be bait fisherman. Mike did alert the DNR.
• The Meadow (Wilbur Yoder) and County Rd 43 (The Schwartz Brothers) are both off limits due to turkey season. Both open again on May 13th.

 Treasurer’s Report

• Keith Loutzenhiser submitted the financial report for April 2019. The total summary for all accounts was $ 26,856.44
• Financial report from the outing showed  Net Funds raised at $ 3,766.44
• Dan Burns donation of $ 150. Three Rivers Fly Fishing donation of $ 500.
• Indiana Gaming Commission reports are due 10 days after our outing (CG-9, CG-INV, CG-DIST)

Outing Recap

• Steve Mack purchased a cord to upgrade his projector.
• 448 tickets sold for the raffle. 61% from mailers 39% from face to face sales. 21% from fly shows and 9% from other clubs. 40 tickets were unmarked and probably sold at the outing.
• Lee Troyer suggested changing the format to keep the outing interesting. Jim Philips suggested that we need to broaden our appeal outside fishing. Tom Pote of SJRFF offered an idea aboput event outreach.
• Mark Holcomb has volunteered to be the chairperson for next year’s silent auction, and has many new ideas to incorporate.
• Mark Holcomb made a motion which was seconded by Keith Loutzenhiser to purchase a video projector for hookup with the LECTU laptop. This would be used to run the LECTU slide show at events. In addition to be used at our annual outing. The motion was carried by the members present.
• Brandon will purchase a projector.

Communications

• Brandon will send a LECTU communications notice with the summer work day schedule.

Brown Trout Stocking

• Lee Troyer has filed health reports with Indianapolis and this completed the application process.
• May 17th is the target date for planting 500 browns from Seven Pines.
• Seven Pines has a delivery the same day to Issac Walton and LECTU will receive a discount on the transportation costs.
• Mike Beachy, Tom Cripe and two more volunteers will assist in the stocking.
• LECTU has received permission from Hoovers, Wilbur Yoder, and the Middlebury Water Dept. to access those areas of the Little Elkhart. In addition, some will be stocked at County Rd. 43
• An additional 500 brown trout will be stocked in the fall (Sept/Oct). The actual date will be determined when we are closer to the fall.

Corson County Park

• Mike will contact Rhonda DeCaire at Elkhart County Parks to get clearance on procedure
• LECTU will obtain names and addresses of property owners
• LECTU will formulate a letter to send to property owners
• LECTU will face to face with the property owners

Advanced Fly Casting

• Charlie Ray will incorporate FFI Fly Casting Skills Challenge into the program.
• A tentative date of June 1st has been established with the venue to be determined.
• The cost will be $ 20.00 per person ($5.00 will be for LECTU).
• There needs to be at least 4 people for the class

River Fest

• The Middlebury Parks event will be August 24.
• LECTU will have a booth at this event.
• Nick Christofeno is the LECTU person for this event.

Middlebury Parks Fishing Derby

• This event will be held in August and the town of Middlebury has requested assistance from LECTU.

LECTU Summer Workdays

• LECTU will cut the trail on June 15th. Mike, Tom, and Jim Mock have volunteered. Nick has also volunteered and will bring at least one additional person.
• The following will be the work days for the stream restoration and preservation work. These are all Saturdays. July 13th, 27th. August 3rd, 17th. September 7th.
• LECTU will complete The Meadow Project. Adding kickers and deflectors.

Youth Outing

• Cheryl Mast at Camp Amigo needs fly fishing instructors for June 8th.
• Subsequent to our meeting Cheryl Mast contacted Keith and told him that due to timing issues the Camp Amigo fly fishing class was cancelled for this year.

Cub Scouts

• Matt Miller scout master has a fence style crossing project and has requested assistance from LECTU.

Next Meeting – June 12, 2019 at 7:00 PM at the Middlebury Library

Tom Vanderputten - Secretary