Task for to discuss Gull River Water Levels and other Issues

LANDMARK ASSOCIATES LIMITED
380 ARMOUR ROAD, SUITE 140
PETERBOROUGH, ONTARIO
K9H 7L7
e-mail: landmark@on.aibn.com
Telephone (705) 742-3881
Toll-Free 1-800-477-2919


CC.
Dave Ness
Water Control Engineer
Trent-Severn Waterway
Telephone: 705 750-4902

Dear Sirs:

Regarding: The Gull River

Last fall and thru the early part of the winter the Gull was humping, that is not typical.

Now there is no water and lakes are at risk of being very low to start the season, this does not bode well for the summer and fall water levels throughout the system.

Likely, this coming season could potentially be one of the worst with regard to water levels.

Whitewater Ontario wants to communicate more with the Trent Severn Waterway and Parks Canada... and their overeers PWGSC the same, very same group being called to task over the Kipawa with their Environmental Assessment which concluded "pas de problem". (See Federal Court Judicial Review: T 452-06)

Historically this organization hasn’t been very open to any kind of input, usual responses tend to be things like; “you wouldn’t even have those lakes if it weren’t for us” or “flood control and safe navigation must be maintained throughout the Trent Severn System”.

Meanwhile unsafe navigation, flooding, dewatering, and environmental damage are common here. The priority has always been Trent water levels.

Our first goal will be getting a seat at the table - a spot at the water agreement table.

This is because a new water agreement change may impact our whitewater flow. We have to follow this as far as it takes us.

We are beginning the process of recruiting a few people who are keen to work on these types of issues. Of course a legal type would be a god send but regardless a few more bodies to attend meetings, define issues that we should pursue and meet with landowners and interested parties would spread the work around a bit.

In the end, however, the discussiosn around water level are ultimately for the greater good and we choose to be part of that representation along with whoever else is concerned.

Paddlers have spent a few hours over a couple evenings moving rocks around to focus the flow and clean up the eddies at the bottom of the Gull River. What we have done is essentially clean up the beaches and eddies at the bottom of the river and pile the rocks out from the existing rock walls to help focus the current into the bottom wave and clean up the eddy lines. These smaller rock walls instantly made a difference at lower lake levels. To the Paddler’s eye the wave at the bottom changed instantly. The first retaining wall we built was on the river left side(surfer’s right) where most people take out. We cleaned up the beach of 50-150lbs rocks and placed them on an angle just off of the rock wall. This fixed the eddy making it calmer, and made a defined eddyline and a small shoulder on the wave.

The next night we moved well over 100 rocks on the river right shoreline(surfers left) and cleaned up that eddy. We built a much longer retaining wall out on an angle to the wave which at the beginning of the evening was flat…not surfable and by the end of the evening the wave became a small surfable wave/hole with a foam pile accessible from both sides of the river! Of course all of these changes are more than likely temporary and only time will tell whether they actually work and make the river feature at the bottom better at more waterlevels. But this is some food for thought at what volunteers with a couple hours/ evening could accomplish. Being conscientious about taking rocks from above the water line that were strewn about and not stealing from the big existing walls, or degrading any integral river features. We will try and get over to the river and take some pics of our work as well as the low-low river.

Lets state clearly here that first and foremost we are conservationists, we love habitat that the Gull river provides and enjoy fishing for rainbows(catch & release) as well as running and playing on the water.

After seeing what the Dam operators have done to the Gull over the past few years and how the same beaurocracy higher up have shut the doors on future river mods on the Gull...We are perplexed. More facts are required: What is the methodology?

We need to understand out measured inflows, outflows, precipitation, monitored waterlevels, and control the flow based on low/high water thresholds are used. That way, if it is decided to dump water in the middle of winter, one can go to a public website and see why.

First of all, the river is man made and has been modified over the course of the river's life as we know it. The pictures from before it was a man-made and blasted reveal it was barely a creek...a trickle hardly suitable for fish habitat etc...

To tell the Gull River Association that there is no possible way for them to get a machine down to the water to move and replace some river features like eddies and rock walls(that are man-made in the first place) is lame... but then to drop the river level by 5ft in less than 30 minutes leaving rocks with algae and gravel bars exposed to the sunlight and air in the middle of spawning season to feed the reservoirs above for Trent Severn river levels later on in the summer and Hydro is completely beyond reason!

At least this organization could be consistent in their priorities. It's not cool to move some rocks and modify river features with a heavy machine(which has been steam cleaned before-hand) but it's ok to leave all that 'protected' fish habitat exposed to the air for hydro and tourists in their power-boats down in another county. That is the message we are getting. Consider that the Rainbows are stocked in the lakes above and below anyway...not even native...or have already been wiped out once.

There is building frustration with this whole situation and mentality on our "home" river. ‘Cash is King’ because the environment and waterways are protected up to a certain price-tag.

Something to think about…we all use the river, why can’t we help maintain and improve it by moving a few rocks that are serving no real purpose or cleaning up the eddies from rocks that have moved in over the spring flood?

This kind of seems like our responsibility, and if we go about it in a responsible and thoughtful way, the fish could even benefit from our work...of course we will also benefit from a better river with features that are more user-friendly and consistent.

Whitewater Ontario

Peter Karwacki
President


Who is Whitewater Ontario:
www.whitewaterontario.ca



Stemming from the above

A task force is being assembled to meet with officials of the Trent Severn Waterway and Parks Canada, and Public Works Goods and Services Canada - maybe Steven Harper will attend (joke here).

right now we need to assemble some factual information, and pictures would be worth a thousand words.

If any of you have photographs of the Gull at LOWWWWWW water that would be highly instructive especially if dates are available.

Any references to historical guages, fish spawning, cancelled events due to low flows, also, any correspondence with TSW or its officials, any hard communications relevant to the following issues would be appreciated:

Navigation of Water Control Structures
Water flows
Extremely high or low levels
River modification or reparations and bank stabilization
Photographs of usage.
Historical documents: relevant to the 25th anniverary of the Minden Wildwater Preserve.


Please sent to


Peter Karwacki,
President, Whitewater Ontario
1620 Trenholm Lane
Ottawa, Ontario,K4A 4B6
kayaky@hotmail.com