On Tuesday, November 25th, volunteers brought two new, state-of-the-art fish pens to Markley Cove, Lake Berryessa.  Sunny Lampe and his son, Kyle, carefully manouvered the two pens down the freeway from Sacramento on a flatbed trailer behind their truck.  Sunny mentioned it was a bit stressful at times – these are big pens, destined for placement into the CIFFI pen project at the Lake. 

The pens were designed and built by Dallas Freeman, contractor, who donates a lot of time and effort to CIFFI.  His partner in the construction is Kyle Haynes, Sunny’s son.  The pens are a new design and are strong, solid and very versatile, with entry doors on one side- a great improvement over our past pen structures.  Markley Cove’s forklift assisted in taking the pens off the flatbed and Dallas kept a close eye on his project.

Within the next few weeks, the other two pens will be completed and once again, delivered to Markley Cove.  Once the four pens are at Markley, Sunny will arrange for a compatible date, and an army of volunteers will move the pens onto a barge and subsequently over to the pen area where they will be placed into position.  This will be coordinated with Dept. of Fish and Game who will then provide trout to be placed into the pens.  Here, they will grow to larger sizes, prior to release in late spring of 2009.

A very rewarding experience – and thanks to Sunny, Kyle, Dallas and Troy Barr and JT Tidwell for a job well done.  And thanks to the membership who continues to support our efforts – we are making a difference!  Here’s to good fishing at Lake Berryessa!