People, Places & Events

Severe storm program set for March 27 in Chandler
Special to The Monitor
ATHENS–The 2007 storm season in north Texas was one for the history books. Widespread devastating flooding, large destructive windstorms, tornadoes, and hail all made appearances in our area.
The toll on life and property was significant, with dozens of casualties and damage in the tens of millions of dollars.
The 2008 severe weather season is just around the corner.
• Are you ready for whatever this year has in store? Do you have a severe weather plan at your home and workplace?
• Can you recognize the clues that suggest large hail, flash flooding, or a tornado is possible?
• Do you want to become part of the severe weather warning system in your county?
As part of its area-wide weather preparedness campaign, the National Weather Service in Fort Worth will answer these and many other questions in a severe storm spotter training program from 6:30-8:30 p.m. Thursday, March 27.
The program will be held in at the community center in Chandler and will be co-sponsored by the Henderson County Emergency Management Office.
The 2008 program will emphasize three fundamental concepts for severe weather events: observing, reporting, and safety.
The program will discuss thunderstorm formation, severe weather production, and features associated with severe storms.
The presentation will also review tornado formation and behavior, and safety when thunderstorms threaten.
The program will discuss spotter operations and recommended procedures when spotting.
The two-hour presentation will be in multimedia format, featuring numerous pictures of storms and nearly 25 minutes of storm video clips.
“We have some new material in the 2008 spotter training program”, warning coordination meteorologist at the Fort Worth NWS office Gary Woodall said.
“Nearly all of the photos and video clips are different this year. We’ll have many more identification cases, and we’ll discuss the operational aspects of storm spotters in more detail,” he added.
Despite revisions to the program, the fundamental purpose of the spotter training - and of the storm spotter network as a whole remains unchanged.
“We could not do our job as well as we do without storm spotters. Radar is a great tool, but it only tells us part of a storm’s story. Spotter observations complement the electronic data we use to analyze storms.
The combination of spotter reports and radar data gives us the best possible picture of the storms and what’s going on inside them”.
The program is free and open to the public.
“By coming to this program, you will learn a lot about thunderstorms,” Woodall said. “Even if you don’t become an active storm spotter, you will learn about how storms work and the visual clues you can identify when storms are in your area.
“We will discuss severe weather safety tips. This will better prepare yourself and your family for the threats that storms pose,” he added.
The Henderson County severe weather program is one of more than 40 conducted between January and early April.
The National Weather Service in Fort Worth provides forecasts, warnings, and weather services for 46 counties in north and north-central Texas.
For more information on severe weather and the National Weather Service, visit the Fort Worth Forecast Office’s website at http://www.weather.gov/fortworth.

Agriview
By Rick Hirsch
HC Extension Agent
ATHENS–“What good does it do to grow big fish if you can’t catch them?” asks a Texas AgriLife Extension Service fisheries expert.
The answer is “no good at all,” if you’re a landowner managing a pond or lake for big mouth bass, AgriLife Extension wildlife and fisheries expert Dr. Billy Higginbotham said.
Higginbotham is one of the organizers of the upcoming two-day event, “The Largemouth Bass: Better Fishing Through Private Water Management,” set Friday-Saturday, March 28-29.
The event will feature some of the best known bass experts from the South.
There is no other event on managing the largemouth bass that is as comprehensive as this one in any of the Southern states.
The event will be held at the Edwin L. Cox Jr., Texas Freshwater Fisheries Center in Athens.
Situated on 107 acres, the center has more than 300,000 gallons of indoor and outdoor aquariums, educational facilities and a visitor center.
The program has been designed primarily for landowners who manage their own water impoundments for bass fishing.
Program topics will include basic bass pond management info – water quality, controlling aquatic weeds, bass diseases and parasites, fertilization and feeding, and fish-stocking strategies.
But there will also be sessions on cutting edge bass management, such as current efforts by Barry Smith to breed the largest “catch-able” bass possible.
Smith, who is one of the founders of the American Sport Fish Hatchery in Alabama, has been crossing northern and Florida strains of bass, then selecting for size and catch-ability.
It is generally accepted that though Florida bass can grow larger than northern bass strains, the Florida lines are much harder to catch.
For example, the Texas record largemouth bass weighed 13 pounds in 1980, when northern bass genetics were dominant.
The current world record bass weighed more than 22 pounds, and the current state record, now that Texas bass are heavily influenced by Florida genetics, is more than 18 pounds.
This should be a must-see for anyone wanting to raise really big bass in their ponds that they can actually catch.
When was the last time you had the chance to talk one-on-one with a professional bass angler who had just won $500,000?
Bassmaster Classic winner Alton Jones of Waco will speak on fishing techniques for largemouth bass in small impoundments at the Athens meeting following the Friday evening fish fry put on by the Texas Game Warden Associations.
Jones took home the top prize of $500,000 at the Bassmaster Classic in Greenville, S. C., Feb. 24.
More than three days of competition, Jones weighed in 49 pounds, 7 ounces of bass.
“This is the fulfillment of a dream I’ve had since childhood,” he said. “My grandfather taught me how to fish and I wish he could be here to see this.”
Jones has qualified for Bassmaster Classic competition 11 times and won more than $1.5 million in tournaments.
Participants will be treated to a presentation on how to determine the age of a bass by examining its ear bones. Another tour will give a behind-the-scenes view of the center’s bass spawning facility.
Registration for the event is $60 per person before Saturday, March 15, and $90 per person after March 15.
For more information and register online at http://agrilifevents.tamu.edu  or call (979) 845-2604.
Alternately, participants may mail a check to Texas AgriLife Extension Conference Services, 2139 TAMU, College Station, TX 77843-2139. Make the check payable to Account 07-254100-60001.
Additional info can be obtained by contacting Higginbotham at (903) 834-6191, bhigginbotham@tamu.edu  or Michael Masser, (979) 845-7370, mmasser@tamu.edu
The event is sponsored by AgriLife Extension, Texas Parks and Wildlife Department and the Henderson County Wildlife Committee.
Important dates
March 24-29, Henderson County Livestock Show, Fair Park Complex, Athens
8 a.m. March 28-29, The Largemouth Bass: Better Fishing Through Private Water Management, Texas Freshwater Fisheries Center Conservation Center Building, Athens. $60/Person, http://agrilifevents.tamu.edu
3 p.m. April 3, Cow-Calf Clinic and Commercial Heifer Show, Henderson County Fair Park Complex, Athens.
6 p.m. April 10, Henderson County Master Gardener Spring Conference, Cain Center, $20 in advance, $25 at the door.
Rick Hirsch is the Henderson County Extension Agent - Agriculture for Texas Cooperative Extension. Visit our web page at http://henderson-co.tamu.edu.