Once again Saturday morning, remnants of winter are hanging on. The lawn and dock are covered with glistening, white, frost. Friday was quite nice even though the promised warming trend did not happen until late in the day. Around 3PM it was still 48F. The high temperature was around 6PM. Saturday is supposed to be even nicer with more sunshine and temps well into the 60F range. The nice days are supposed to continue right on through Tuesday before rain moves back in on Wednesday. The sunshine on Friday did get the lake water temperature to go up about 2F to 52F at 3 feet deep.
This is a "free fishing" weekend. Ontario residents can fish without a license Saturday and Sunday. Follow regular season and conservation license rules. (here on Limerick that means lake trout and pan fish only. NO bass fishing) Carry some sort of photo ID that shows you are an Ontario resident.
Took a late day ride to Mephisto Lake on Wednesday and a sample from the spring was submitted to the health unit Thursday morning. Usually have results within a week.
I put on my LWRA hat on Friday and sent out the invitations and agenda for the May 18th Board meeting.
Blackflies were awake at the dump last Sunday but have not had any of them around here on the north shore yet. This sunny, warm spell will probably wake them up.
Just finished reading one of John Irvings earlier novels, "The Fourth Hand." He is one of my favorite authors even though he got quite political in his last two novels. Anyway, around page 240 of this particular book the main character goes to a cottage on a lake in northern Wisconsin. There is a 4 or 5 page description of the experience that was 99% the same as we experienced here for many years before electricity. The struggle to light a propane refrigerator. The struggle to prime and get a gasoline water pump running, and so forth. Really brought back pre-1990 memories.
Definitely continue to avoid downtown Madoc. They are doing infrastructure replacement up the main street and easterly on St. Lawrence Street. If you are north bound, turn left at the skate park and then right on Rollins. If you are south bound suggest taking Hwy 7 west to Atkinson Rd. south. Take St. Lawrence street back toward Madoc, then turn right on Rollins. Turn left on Seymour back to Hwy 62 south of town. If you get too close to downtown and get stuck in the official detour you might be awhile. (and I would not want to try towing a boat through it.) From the distribution of construction materials it looks like the project will continue southerly along 62 out of the downtown core in the near future.
A very nice newer water access cottage will be going on the market this spring. About 150 feet of shoreline. 3/4 acre. Gray water septic. Composting toilet. Shoreline boathouse for easy storage of water toys. In the north-west corner of the lake. Cottage has been lovingly cared for through the years. The rules preclude me from posting a price, but I can tell you they are motivated and are thinking in a very fair range. I can put you in touch with the seller directly.
A second cottager has asked me to mention their cottage for sale also. It is by the islands. Water access. 106 feet of clean shoreline. It is also newer (relatively) and has been extremely well maintained. Sits on about 2/3 acre. The owner for the last generation is a capable do-it-yourself guy. Has a very nice bunkie and a newer 20 X 20 floating dock. Once again it is not permissible for me to quote a price, but I know that it is very competitive with similar sales over the past few years.
I have had a number of inquiries on both of them. Hopefully the owners can get them sold quickly this spring and we have a couple of new neighbors this summer.
The municipality will have a public information session on Invasive Species at the May 21st council meeting. 12:30 at the Community Center on Hwy 620. Note this is rescheduled from April 23.
The municipality will also be holding a public input session on "public boat launch ramps." Not sure of what form that session will be yet.
The Rogers 5G tower on Sutton Rd. is operational. The Rogers / FOCA special pricing plan is $60 per month this year. (unless you have a Rogers phone in which case it remains $50 per month) Even at the $60 price it is the best internet service for us on the lake. Once you are an LWRA member, we can provide you with a link to the "Rogers Preferred Program" webpage. It appears they throttle the 5G connection to 50MBps down, and 15MBps up. That is plenty of bandwidth for any single-family use. I have tested the connection and can stream three videos simultaneously on three separate devices with no buffering on any of them.
The municipality is on summer burning rules. Daytime burning is no longer allowed until November 1. No permits were issued last year. Campfires less than 3 feet by 3 feet are allowed from 7PM to 7AM. There have been exceptions for campfires in organized campgrounds in the past. I will check with the fire chief and see what the plans for permits and campgrounds are this year.
The dump is on summer hours. It is open Wednesday, Saturday, Sunday and holiday Mondays from 11AM to 6:00PM. It changes back to winter hours on September 1.
The 2025 fishing regulations are available on the Ontario.ca website. The Limerick chain of lakes remains at the very south end of fisheries zone 15. Pages 104 to 114 of the regulations book. Bass season opens June 28, 2025, and closes November 30. Lake trout season opened January 1 and closes September 30. The Limerick chain of lakes has a "slot size" for lake trout that MUST be returned to the lake if caught. It is roughly 16 to 22 inches. It is also a "one line" lake when ice fishing.
