January 2005 NEWSLETTER
Upcoming club events:
January
* Membership (annual family) dues are due!
* Nominations for officers are encouraged!
* Annual meeting date to be determined SOON –
Feb??? Mar???April??? if you have an
opinion or would like to chair this event, please contact Bart ASAP!
Thanks!
February
* Fun trial and training day – February 12th
– Hellsgate State Park
March
* Fun trial and training day – March 19th
– Hellsgate State Park
April
* Fun trial and training day – April 9th
– Hellsgate State Park
* SRSGDA sponsored NSTRA trial April 16th & 17th
May
* Fun trial and training day – May 21st
– Shea Meadows
June
* Poker shoot – TBA
July
* Family picnic – TBA
August
* Sporting clays – TBA
September
* Fun trial and training day September 3rd TBA
November
* Youth hunt
* Turkey shoot
DID YOU KNOW?
The website is newly updated and ready for your viewing! This is
a way for you to retrieve old newsletters, learn about upcoming events,
see/post pictures of club members, dogs, and so forth. Check out:
http://www.SnakeRiverGunDogClub.org
Our Webmaster, Devon St. Pierre, can be reached via email at:
Webmaster@SnakeRiverGunDog.org
Idaho fish and Game
February Flush count
Dennis newman - IDFG
(208) 790-2068, or (208) 799-5010
volunteers are needed! You and your dogs are needed to assist
counting birds in specific habitat and specific locations.
Call for details; assigned locations
are available in Moscow, potlatch, and other palouse areas.
Did you get your survey?
Did you fill it out?
Did you mail it back?
THANKS – we appreciate all of the wonderful information contained
in the returned surveys.
Happy New Year!
What a great fall – wonderfully mild and offering great
opportunities to fill our bird bags and freezers. We hope that
all of you enjoyed time in the field with your dog(s), had a great
holiday season, and are ready to jump into 2005!
SRSGDA has really grown – 2003 and 2004 enjoyed a membership
roster of 60 families. Some of the old members bid fond and
sorrowful farewells to dear hunting companions. Many members have
experienced the challenges in developing a new hunting
companion. A few members have added new additions to their
families – both human and four-legged! New members, new
dogs, and new babies – you name it, and we’ve experienced
it as a group!
Our club survey confirmed a few things about activities and events that
you like or dislike, and shared a few new things that your officers
will do our best to adopt and implement. Overall, what everyone wants
to do more of is: (drum roll please)
Fun trials and training days!
This is no big surprise and we have scheduled FIVE (5) for 2005.
An overwhelming majority of you indicated that you had a high interest
in volunteering for fun trials. So, when the call for volunteers
is sounded, please make sure you answer the call – we cannot do
it without you! Birds orders will be managed by the exec team,
locations are pre-arranged, so the real job of the event chair(s) is to
organize the volunteers, pick a topic/expert for a training session,
and run the day!
The next areas of interest are expanded training sessions, outreach,
and creating hunting partnerships and members’ only group
hunts. We need more time to reflect upon our clubs role in this
and gladly welcome additional thoughts. Although a high priority
in terms of events, this was a relatively low priority in terms of
volunteer interest or capacity. Another result of our survey
indicated a priority interest that is rather high for youth hunts, but
volunteer interest or capacity is low.
A component of the survey asked about receiving the newsletter.
Most responses wanted a hard copy via USPS; many indicated that they
like both; and, a few wanted only an electronic version. Everyone
wants to receive it at least every other month, with approximately 20
responses requesting something every month.
Insurance ($444.00) and the newsletter ($838.50) are the largest single
expenditures the club has annually. Currently, fun
trials/training days break even, or we have made enough money
sponsoring previous NSTRA events to provide for a cushion to cover
expenses in the event of a cancelled trial – like last May.
Although our membership has grown, we are concerned that we do not have
enough of a buffer in our club’s income (60 x $25 = $1500) to
cover additional expenses for the equipment & supplies necessary to
conduct club events and business. The decision was made to
increase our club dues to $30.00 beginning with the calendar year
2005. This will ensure that we always prepared with enough
reserve for the unexpected!
We hope that all of you will continue to participate fully and continue
to bring forward new members, new dogs, and new ideas!
STILL In search of:
A roving reporter, or six, to provide salient and scintillating sagas
of SRSGDA members’ adventures in training, trialing, and
traipsing a-field (hunting)…I guess we could also include
trap! Any thoughts are appreciated; pictures are nice; can be in
final form or just simply “blurbs” to be edited.
PLEASE send to SRSGDA Secretary Nance Ceccarelli via USPS or
Secretary@SnakeRiverGunDog.org
Snake
River Sportman and Gun Dog Association