Mission Statement
The Lehigh River Stocking Association is a nonprofit, 501C-3 public organization dedicated to the restoration, revitalization and restocking of the Lehigh River. Our goal is the continuous improvement of this waterway and its tributaries. Our objectives are to insure clean water, a healthy and balanced ecosystem, an abundant fishery and access points for all citizens to enjoy. This will be to the benefit of all interests; including the businesses located throughout this region, the sportsmen and the people of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. This project has been ongoing for two decades with great success. We need and ask for your support for this outstanding program to continue.

1May11 Stocking underwater video

***Lunker Fest rescheduled to June 4th (same time and place) We are stocking contest fish on the 4th at 7:30-8 am so feel free to get there early to see the fish ***

NEW - STOCKING WALNUTPORT/SLATINGTON on SUNDAY JUNE 5th at 10:00, meet at Walnutport Main St Bridge at 10. Sponsors feel free to join us to help out.

Keep those sponsorships coming in - dollars received will go toward our next in season stocking event.

Great News - STOCKING Two More Trucks date to be

determined, this may hold off till fall!

Generous sponsorships have been received so we need to convert those dollars to trout and get them in the river. The LRSA board has voted to stock two trucks on Friday evening May 27th. Truck 1 will meet at Rockhill in Parryville at 6:30 pm to stock from there down to Palmerton. Truck 2 will meet at Walnutport Main St bridge at 6:30 pm to stock from Bertsch Creek to Slatington. Plan to stock 12-14 in class Brown and triploid Rainbow. Come out and help!

Contact LRSA - We want to know if you have questions, would like to comment on our programs or please also let us know if you have any complaints, we want to keep improving the organization. Our email is Lehigh.River.Stocking.Association@gmail.com

March 2011 Newsletter

May 1st Stocking completed - Truck 1 covered Glen Onoko to Lehighton and Truck 2 covered Parryville to Palmerton (photos)

April 3rd Stocking a Success - Truck 1 Northampton to Triechlers and truck 2 Walnutport to Slatington

Photos of Apr 3rd 2011 Stocking Northampton to Triechlers

Treichlers 2011

Save the Date - LRSA 1st Annual LUNKER FEST

on Saturday May 21st 9am-3pm at the Bowmanstown new boat ramp (off Riverview Rd). Non-motorized boats allowed. $15 entry fee (children under 12 free with accompanying, paying adult). Prizes include: free fish mount, 6 hr drift trip, fishing rods and more. Refreshments provided and plenty of parking space available. Must be LRSA sponsor to win. LRSA will target trophy trout stocking in the pool indicated in the picture below.

2011 is the LRSA's 20th Year!

VFW Map

2010 Fall Drawing Winners - Thanks to everyone who supported LRSA by buying fall drawing tickets. The winners from the November 30th drawing were: $200 - Dan Kintz, Bowmanstown; $25 - Shane Becker, Bowmanstown;, $25 - Elain Ezbiansky, Macungie; $25 - Bob Dunstan, Lansford; $50 - Kyle Scherer, Lehighton; $50 - Daniel Schaffer, Northampton; $25 - J.S.Cooke, Eason; $25 - Jim and Mary Kuchock, Kaska; $25 - Tom ??? Unable to contact him (be sure to put your contact info on the ticket!); $100 - D. Lakatosh, Walnutport

PLEASE RENEW YOUR LRSA SPONSORSHIPS FOR 2011 - Your sponsorship funds go directly to paying for trout stocking in the Lehigh, where all your favorite pools between Jim Thorpe and Northampton are replenished with beautiful trout. Go to the JOIN tab to join on-line or print out the form and mail it in. Thanks for your support.

Thank you to Air Products and Chemicals for their generous contribution of $2,000 to support the LRSA water qaulity program. LRSA submitted grant application ($186,000) to US Fish and Wildlife for fishway at Parryville Dam. Unfortunately, the Growing Greener grant application ($50,000) we made was not successful, this was to study to improve performance of the Lausanne Tunnel AMD passive wetland treatment system and to address the untreated bypass flow in Nesquehoning Borrough (north of Jim Thorpe). This study will use flow data obtained from the flow devices LRSA installed last year with grant funds from Sierra Club. A third grant was also submitted ($21,000) to the US Fish and Wildlife for a Lehigh River water quality monitoring system to be installed in the Palmerton Area (intended to be on-line, like the one we have in Jim Thorpe).

New: A four year profile of Lehigh River water temperatures - 2006,2007,2008 and 2009

MARCELLUS SHALE HYDROFRACKING ISSUE - The hydrofracturing of the marcellus shale by gas drilling operations threatens the health of the Delaware and Lehigh rivers. The threats are multiple and include: 1) huge volumes of pristine headwaters are extracted for the operation, from 2 to 5 million gallons per well. 2) the toxic chemicals injected into the water are not disclosed (Haliburton Loophole) and it is understood that some of this is cancer causing. 3) some of the fracing liquid comes out of the well and must be held in sealed ponds. The liquid is toxic to fish and people and is not treatable in waste water plants. It is possible that this toxic fluid will contaminate surface waters and well water supplies. On the other hand, probably some jobs for out of state folks and natural gas production is probably good. On balance though, the deal seems more threatening than it is worth, at least until enforceable regulations are in place. Lets hope DRBC does their job in protecting the watershed from this new "gold rush". - opinions of Matt MacConnell, LRSA President.

Link to Gasland trailer -

Under water video

LRSA Social Event Held 12Jun2010 - Click for Photos and Lunker Video

Some stocking photos are provided for your interest. Top - Bill Derhammer sports a tiger trout (brook, brown hybrid) caught in the Jim Thorpe area June 2nd. Above John Unger holds nice brown while John Berry keeps a tight line on Tom Gyory's boat between Walnutport and Rockdale, blue winged olives everywhere Tom says.

Water Quality Data On-Line
Using grant funds, the LRSA has developed a water quality monitoring system and have deployed this in Jim Thorpe. LRSA has re-installed this for the 2011 season as of March 1st 2011. http://dms.telog.com/TelogE/DesktopLoginPage.aspx?ReturnUrl=%2fteloge%2f ShowData1.aspx User Name: Lehigh River Password: LRSA (note, case sensitive) Expand the subdirectories by clicking the + until the measurements are listed. Click on the parameter of interest and the trend will be charted and data values tabulated. Click on the "properties" tab to select the time window and/or to add multiple parameters to your charts. The data can be easily exported to Excel (csv file) by clicking the export tab or printed directly.
Lehigh River Hatch Chart
courtesy of Brian Tartar, Silver Springs Outfitters . Stay tuned for results of the macro-invertebrate study!

2010 STOCKING RECAP:

Saturday May 8th Successfull - Truck 1: 9am @ Northampton Pavillion (off Canal Street below Cementon dam); Truck 2: 9am @ Walnutport Main St Bridge

Sunday May 23rd - Truck 1: 9am @ Glen Onoko; Truck 2: 9am @ Lehighton at Dunbar Beverage parking lot.
Thursday June 10th - 1 truck: 7:45pm at Parryville Rockhill parking area (did Parryville, Bowmanstown and Palmerton).Parryville, Bowmanstown and Palmerton were stocked the evening of June 10th. Nice average 13" rainbows, some browns, some 17 inchers. Water temperature was about 66 deg F but the fish seemed to do fine.

2010 Pre-Season (one week ahead of dual openers) Trout Stocking Big Success! -
- Lower section - March 27 at 9am LRSA stocked from Northampton Pavillion up to the dam, Laureys Station and Treichlers with average 15" Rainbow and Brown trout, average 12 inch Brook trout. Beautiful fish, great color. Thanks to those who came out to help out. Pictures will be available in a couple days.all the way up to Slatington. The 2nd Truck 2 met @ Walnutport Main St bridge at 9am and stocked Slatington and Walnutport also with 15" average Rbow and Brown and 12" avg Brookies. BONUS - 6 20+ inch Browns were stocked in both the Triechlers/Lauries and in the Walnutport/Slatington areas! A couple examples at left.
- Upper Section - April 10, got to the Glen a little early (~8:35) sorry about that! Stocked 14-16 inch brown and bows, 12" brookies from the Glen, through Jim Thorpe (at access area by parking lot and up above the gate about 1/2 mile), then down along the Packerton stretch then finished up at Dunbars in Lehighton. 4 or 5 big fish (25+ bow and brown) released. 2nd truck met at Parryville about 8:45 and stocked behind Rock Hill and at the confluence with Pohopoco, then Bowmanstown 895 bridge, then new boat ramp (East Penn pool). New this year we traveled down the D&L trail on the west bank all the way down to 873. Lots more access to prime river which is normally hard to get to with 248 traffic. Lots of help at both trucks. Thanks everyone enjoy!!
- We did tag about 6 fish in each area. If you catch a tagged fish, please contact LRSA with: species, date and place caught, whether fish was released, the lure used. We will enter the tag numbers into a drawing at the June meeting and will draw donated prizes (tbd).

If you havent renewed your sponsorship

PLEASE BECOME A SPONSOR or

RENEW!

We are low on sponsors this year for some reason and will not be able to meet LRSA stocking targets without your support.

Tight Lines.

**LRSA Video Clips**
June 2nd, 2007 Fishing Clip at Glen Onoko

Francis E Walter Dam Release Schedule - for details go to the Links Below. These are the presentations made to the public by the Army Corp of Engineers in 2009, 2008 and 2007.

FEW Flow Management Plan for 2009

FEW Flow Management Plan for 2008

FEW Flow Management Plan for 2007

Lehigh River Fisheries Management Plan
May 1, 2007
Prepared by:
David A. Arnold and Daryl J. Pierce
Fisheries Management Area 5
Division of Fisheries Management
Bureau of Fisheries
Pennsylvania Fish

DCNR Secretary Michael DiBerardinis this week named the Lehigh River as the commonwealth’s River of the Year for 2007.

The designation recognizes the watershed’s role in eastern Pennsylvania history and its promising recreational future. The Lehigh River drains portions of 10 counties and stretches more than 100 miles.

“The Lehigh River is alive and thriving, with water quality better now than it has been the last 150 years,” DiBerardinis said. “There are scores of partners working to preserve, protect and enhance this great state resource, and its resurgence has pumped new life into the communities surrounding it.

“Once a historic transportation corridor for coal bound from Carbon and Luzerne counties to Philadelphia, New York and beyond, the Lehigh River helped fuel America’s Industrial Revolution,” DiBerardinis said. “Now, mountain bikers, hikers and hunters are seen where mules and canal barges hauled coal and other cargo. Where dams once contained the mighty river, anglers in great number now seek trout, American shad and other species found in a healthy waterway.”

DCNR annually designates a “River of the Year” to applaud local residents, governments, non-profit and conservation organizations working to improve waterways and the quality of life in their watersheds across the state.

The Lehigh River winds 104 miles from its headwaters near Gouldsboro, Wayne County, to its junction with the Delaware River in Easton, Northampton County. Its watershed drains Berks, Bucks, Carbon, Lackawanna, Lehigh, Luzerne, Monroe, Northampton, Schuylkill and Wayne counties. The Lehigh is the Delaware’s second largest tributary.

Water Quality Data On-Line

Lehigh River Hatch Chart

courtesy of Brian Tartar, Silver Springs Outfitters . Stay tuned for results of the macro-invertebrate study!

2010 STOCKING RECAP:

FEW Flow Management Plan for 2009

FEW Flow Management Plan for 2008

FEW Flow Management Plan for 2007