Matthew Dickerson, Addison Independent, May 13, 1999 (reprinted by permission)
With spring turkey season approaching the halfway mark and trout season just getting into full swing, it's time for a quick update. First the turkeys. I stopped by the Vermont Field Sports reporting station late Tuesday morning to get a sense from the folks there how good the hunting has been this year. The answer was more than encouraging.
The season runs the whole month of May. During the entire spring season last year, there were 96 birds reported at the Vermont Field Sports station. When I entered the store on May 11--with a full 20 days left to go in the season--they had already recorded their 100th turkey. By the time I left, they were up to 101. Douglas Yantz of Middlebury had bagged the 101st bird that morning: an 18 lb, 14 oz tom. It was his second of the season. (The spring limit is two.) A few days earlier he had shot an 18 lb, 8 oz bird: #88 to be reported at VFS. Douglas took both bearded birds in New Haven. The second one he called in to about 20 yards and got cleanly in one shot. In addition to Yantz's two toms, the VFS books showed several birds topping 20 pounds along with a few over 21 pounds.
With over half of the season remaining, it looks to be a year for the record books. To what can we attribute the success? The general consensus around the VFS cash register was that the turkey population--which was already quite healthy--has been helped by a mild winter. And it could get even better next year. The hens were nesting early this year, and hunters have reported some unusually large clutches of eggs. Ken Mcilroy, a well known turkey expert who came up from Alabama to give a turkey hunting seminar sponsored by VFS, was suprised by how advanced the season was. Based on emerging foliage, he expected Vermont to be a month behind Alabama. Instead, with the warm dry spring we have experienced, he found that Vermont's turkeys were on roughly the same nesting schedule as those in the southern states.
As for trout, last week brought a taste of unusually good fishing for early May. Water temperatures were reaching the ideal range for trout. With very little snow run-off this year, and an unusually small amount of rain, the streams are running low and clear--levels more common in late June than early May. Some nice hold-over browns and rainbows have been pulled out of the lower New Haven and Middlebury rivers. And with the states annual stocking efforts well underway, there are plenty of mid-sized hatchery raised trout in many local streams. Some other locals rivers that are stocked annually include the Furnace Brook, Baldwin Creek, Lewis Creek and Otter Creek. Silver Lake and Goshen Dam are also popular fisheries. The CVPS access road to Goshen Dam is usually open by late May, and the reservoir is fishable from the shore. Silver Lake requires a short hike, and though fish can be caught from the shore the most succesful anglers there are those who hike in some sort of canoe or raft.
Finally, if you're willing to drive a ways, the states so-called "trophy program" has already stocked some rainbow and brown trout in excess of 16" in the Black River (Cavendish), and the upper Otter Creek (Mt. Tabor). Though I wouldn't quite call a 16" fish a trophy, it's still a nice feeling to have one on the end of your line.