The mild weather continues in our region, and that makes getting out on the water that much easier. Let’s hope that it holds up a few weeks longer. It will be as long as a couple more weeks before we see the Wenatchee River and the Columbia above Rock Island Dam open to steelhead fishing. It is difficult for the WDFW to commit to a season on the Wenatchee earlier, given that so many of the steelhead intended for the Wenatchee are straying over Rocky Reach Dam. The good news is that it appears that an agreement has been signed by the PUD, the WDFW, the City of Leavenworth and some other agencies that will allow the Black Island juvenile pond to be used as an acclimation pond for steelhead. Somewhere around 50,000 steelhead will be reared and smolted in this pond as early as next spring. The impact of the return of these fish won’t been seen for a couple of years, but these fish will be imprinted on the Wenatchee River and could mean consistent steelhead seasons on the Wenatchee in the future. This has come about due to the hard work by Dan Davies, Bob Stroup and Rollie Schmitten, all members of the Icicle Valley Chapter of Trout Unlimited.