Passport to Texas

Passport to Texas from Texas Parks and Wildlife and the Sport Fish Restoration Program

Freshwater fish hatcheries have supplemented Texas’ natural fish populations for decades.

Hatcheries have been employed by Texas Parks and Wildlife or its predecessor agencies for more than seventy-five years. Eighty years.

Todd Engeling is chief of inland hatcheries.

The first hatchery was constructed in Texas—that we have a record of—in about 1925. At one time, Texas had up to 17 different facilities, but today we operate five.

Including the Jasper Hatchery, built by the Civilian Conservation Corps in 1932. The facility occupies 227 acres of land, and has 63 ponds covering approximately 65 surface acres.

At that time, it was dug with minimal machinery, with teams of mules digging ponds and laying in clay pipes and things like that. It has received some renovation over the years, but the last significant renovation was done in 1945.

More than seventy years old, the Jasper Hatchery has seen better days. So a new hatchery is being built to replace it.

This facility will be comparable in size in terms of acreage, but it will incorporate new technologies. And most of that will be just in construction technologies, durable construction technologies, that will allow us to operate this facility for fifty plus years, and to meet our needs into the future.

The new East Texas Hatchery—that’s tomorrow.

That’s our show…with support from the Sport Fish Restoration program… providing funding for the operations and management of the Texas’ state fish hatcheries. For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

 Fish Hatcheries in Texas: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Passport to Texas from Texas Parks and Wildlife

Before you sell seashells by the seashore, you first have to find them. Surprisingly, summer beachcombing may not yield the results you desire.

I feel the best time to go shelling is in the wintertime.

Paul Hammerschmidt, with coastal fisheries, is a lifelong and—admittedly obsessive—shell collector. He says winter storms churn up the Gulf bottom, sending marine critters and their calciferous containment onto the beach. To improve your chances of finding a variety of intact shells, Hammerschmidt says stay clear of crowded beaches.

If you get a chance to go to some more isolated beaches, like down on Padres island, or something like that, where the population of humans is not quite so thick, you’ll have a much better chance of finding some really unusual shells.

Such as a pretty little shell called baby ears—which looks like…well…baby ears. Or, there’s another special shell worth searching for called spirula.

And it’s a coiled, snail-like shell. But it doesn’t belong to a snail—it belongs to a little squid. And it’s inside the squid, and when the squid dies, that little thing has a lot of chambers in it with gas, and it floats and washes up on the beach. Those are very pretty, bright white, and they’re very fragile, so you have to be careful with them.

This winter, instead of heading to the slopes for skiing, head to the beach for shelling…you can still have hot cocoa when you’re done.

That’s our show for today….remember: life’s better outside…For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.
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Information on Shell Collecting

Shell Clubs:

http://www.bcfas.org/museum/SSSBC/SSSBCdemo/ShellClubs.html

Shell Organizations:

http://www.bcfas.org/museum/SSSBC/SSSBCdemo/ShellOrgs.html

Images of shells of the Bolivar Peninsula:

http://www.crystalbeach.com/b17.html

 Shelling Collecting, 2: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Passport to Texas form Texas Parks and Wildlife and the Wildlife Restoration Program

For $10-dollars by mail, or $9 online, anyone can enter Big Time Texas Hunts for the chance to win one of seven exclusive hunting trips, including the popular Texas Grand Slam—an opportunity to hunt all four of Texas’ premier big game animals.

White-tailed deer, mule deer, pronghorn antelope, and desert bighorn sheep, which is very rare to get the chance to do that.

Linda Campbell is Program Director of the Private Lands and Public Hunting Program. Other packages include the Whitetail Bonanza, Premium Buck, Big Time Bird Hunt, Exotic Safari and more.

Enter as many times as you wish to for one or more packages. Most of our hunts are held on private lands—high quality ranches with great lodges. We feed people well, and they’re fully guided. And it’s a really neat opportunity.

The goal of the program is to raise money for wildlife management and research, habitat conservation and public hunting opportunities in Texas. Deadline to enter is October 15.

And that is so we can draw the hunters, get them in touch with the outfitters and people can get in the field. In certain areas the rut happens early, so we want to get the hunters in touch with the outfitters and get them going by the time deer season begins.

We have a link to the Big Time Texas Hunts web page at passporttotexas.org.

That’s our show… with support from the Wildlife restoration program…For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Passport to Texas from Texas Parks and Wildlife

Blackland Prairie once covered more than 20-million acres in Texas. Jason Spangler of the Native Prairies Assoc. of Texas says because of cropping and livestock overgrazing, less than one percent of this native habitat exists today.

It’s the most endangered large ecosystem in North America.

You can find a thriving 500-acre example of Blackland Prairie in Bell County thanks to the restoration efforts of Bob and Mickey Burleson.

I don’t think that any of our neighbors think of it as anything but Burleson’s folly. They all think that grass is for grazing to the ground.

Over four decades the Burleson’s visited remnant prairies collecting seeds they later used to restore their land.

Eventually it started working naturally to come back to a climax of what had been here. And, it’s still doing that. We haven’t gotten to the place where the Big Bluestem is the dominant—and that’s what would have been at one time—but we’re getting there.

The Burlesons won the Lone Star Land Steward Award for their dedication to land restoration and stewardship.

It’s what belongs here. This is where I live, This is my home, And this is what I love. (birds chirping)

Learn about land management at passporttotexas.org.

That’s our show… For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

 Lone Star land Stewards: Burleson's Prairie, 2: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Passport to Texas from Texas Parks and Wildlife

On August 14, Texas gets its newest paddling trail located at Lake Arlington.

We’re very excited. This will be our first lake trail. And, not only that, it will be our first urban trail.

Ron Smith, with Inland Fisheries, is part of the paddling trail team. The new 10.9 mile trail hugs the shoreline of Lake Arlington, and is a partnership between the Arlington and Fort Worth Parks and Recreations departments.

The cities actually split right there on the lake. So, it’s a neat partnership for us and for them.

Smith was part of the team that surveyed the proposed site for the Lake Arlington Paddling Trail.

You know, one of the things we do here is we’re providing and improving public access to waterways around the state. So, when we go out, we look certainly at the access point. Does it need improvement? Do we need an additional one? We like for our trails to be between four and twelve miles.

What to expect when you put in at this new trail….that’s tomorrow.

That’s our show… For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

 Lake Arlington Paddling Trail, 1: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download