The Division of Wildlife Resources takes time each month to speak with Castle Country Radio to discuss various topics. Conservation Outreach Manager, Aaron Bott stopped by the radio station to discuss ice fishing conditions and the new trail camera regulation.
The conditions are becoming favorable for ice fishing, especially at Scofield Reservoir. “Scofield as usual is our best place to go. You’ve got 10 to 15 inches of ice up there and thankfully at night the temperatures are dropping well below freezing. So things seem to be happening especially over there by the dam, that southside has a lot of action. Folks have been telling me they’ve been catching a lot of trout so it sounds like Scofield is the place to go right now,” stated Bott. As for other bodies of water around the Energy Loop, Millsite Reservoir is slowly collecting ice and at this point has about 5 to 6 inches. While Joe’s Valley is still a bit shallow with only about 3 to 5 inches of ice.
“Some of our other waterbodies we haven’t really just check yet because of gate closures during the past snowstorm that we had come through and very low water levels. So Electric should be good to go fishing on, we haven’t gotten any fishing reports from there yet. But the rest of the Energy Loop it’s just about the sweet time of year where you can get out and go fishing,” stated Bott. Anglers are urged to be cautious when out on the ice. Make sure you are taking the necessary precautions to keep yourself safe while out enjoying the wintery conditions.
Just this week the Utah Wildlife Board voted to restrict trail camera use. “We as an agency conducted two surveys reaching out to hunters, big game hunters, to find out how they felt about trail cameras. We presented our findings to the Wildlife Board just this last week and they voted to ban or prohibit all trail cameras. That includes non-held transmitting and non-transmitting devices, basically from July 31 to December 31, that’s during the entire duration of the hunt, this is on both public and private lands,” explained Bott. The rule will go into effect for the 2022 hunting season.
To keep informed on DWR please visit their website at https://wildlife.utah.gov/ or their Facebook page.