fish and wildlife

The levels of toxins associated with blooms of blue-green algae have reached above the "danger" level at Red Lake in Alpine Count, and at the "warning" level at Indian Creek Reservoir.

The Alpine County Health Department has been working with The Lahontan Regional Water Quality Control Board, California Department of Fish and Wildlife (Red Lake), South Tahoe Public Utility District (Indian Creek Reservoir), and the Alpine Watershed Group (AWG) in determining these levels.

SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, Calif. - Tahoe Resource Conservation District (TRCD) is inviting the community to attend a virtual field tour for the Johnson Meadow Restoration Project on August 18 from 5:00 p.m. to 6:30 p.m.

TRCD acquired the Johnson Meadow property in 2018. The 206-acre meadow, located along Upper Truckee River in the heart of South Lake Tahoe, provides valuable habitat and ecosystem services as well as community open space for all the residents and visitors of South Lake Tahoe.

Following a successful three-day operation in October, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service this week released more than 4,600 Lahontan cutthroat trout into Lake Tahoe, helping to restore the iconic species to its native waters.

Lahontan cutthroat trout are the largest inland cutthroat trout in the world and the only trout native to Lake Tahoe.

The 4,645 fish from the Pilot Peak strain, originated at the Lahontan National Fish Hatchery Complex in Gardnerville and were released into the Nevada side of the lake this week.

SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, Calif. - The largest wetland restoration project in the history of the Lake Tahoe Basin is now underway in the Upper Truckee River Marsh. The major project to restore the marsh in South Lake Tahoe has been years in the making to fix the environmental damage done by the creation of the Tahoe Keys.

SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, Calif. - The California Tahoe Conservancy (CTC) Board has authorized spending $1,036,750 to implement three high-priority projects to reduce fire risk and improve forest health in South Lake Tahoe and on the west shore.

During their meeting on Thursday, the CTC Board approved funding for projects that include:

- Spending up to $211,250 on forest thinning on Conservancy land in the South Lake Tahoe Ski Run and Bijou neighborhoods,

- A grant to the South Tahoe Public Utility District for up to $338,000 for forest thinning on the grounds of its treatment plant, and

SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, Calif. - The annual Fall Fish Festival returns to the South Shore on Saturday and Sunday, October 5 and 6, 2019, from 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.

Celebrate the annual fall migration of the Kokanee salmon at the Taylor Creek Visitor Center on SR-89.

The Fall Fish Festival focuses on a variety of fish species that live in Lake Tahoe and its rivers. In addition to the Kokanee, these species include the federally threatened Lahontan cutthroat trout and little-known smaller fish, such as speckled dace.

LAKE TAHOE, Calif./Nev. – The Tahoe Basin is bear country and natural resource and law enforcement agencies are working diligently to remind residents and visitors to practice proper food storage and trash disposal when living in or visiting bear country. To help spread the message, a new website has been launched, TahoeBears.org, where residents and visitors can go to learn everything they need to know about living, visiting and playing responsibly in bear country.

LAKE TAHOE, Calif./Nev. – Lake Tahoe natural resource and law enforcement agencies remind residents and visitors to practice proper food storage and trash disposal at all times while in bear country. Intentional or unintentional feeding of bears can result in unwanted bear behaviors, increased human-bear conflicts, and public safety issues, as well as fines and possible jail time for violators. Each year law enforcement and state wildlife officers respond to hundreds of calls in which bears may pose a public safety threat or are damaging property. In some cases, the bear must be euthanized.

STATELINE, Nevada – The Sustainable Destinations Top 100 program recognized Lake Tahoe as a global sustainable destination at a tourism trade show in Berlin, Germany this spring.

SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, CALIF. - El Dorado County Sheriff's Office responds to calls throughout the county. The following are calls that only pertain to the South and West Shore, including Meyers, South Lake Tahoe, Meeks Bay, Tahoma and the Echo Summit area. There may be some missing calls due to sheriff's logs not being completed at time of story.

Some of those recently added to last week's log:

11/7

Was it the cakes, cupcakes or muffins that brought a mountain lion cub into a Pollock Pines bakery on Monday? A local baker found the 40-50-pound feline inside the shop after it walked through the doors.

Deputies from the El Dorado County Sheriff's Office (EDSO) arrived at the bakery after a passerby met the bakery employee outside the shop and called 911.

According to EDSO Sgt. Anthony Prencipe, about 10 people had gathered outside the bakery to watch the unlikely customer.

LAKE TAHOE, Calif./Nev. - This year marks the tenth anniversary of Lake Tahoe’s Watercraft Inspection Program. Under the program, every motorized watercraft is inspected to ensure it is clean, drained, and dry and not carrying aquatic invasive species before launching at Tahoe. Thanks to diligent boaters and watercraft inspectors, no new aquatic invasive species have been detected in Lake Tahoe since the program began 10 years ago.

SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, Calif. – The National Forest Foundation (NFF) has received a major grant from the California Climate Investments Forest Health Grant Program to conduct important forest health work on the Tahoe National Forest, the Lake Tahoe Basin Management Unit (LTBMU) and State Responsibility Area (SRA) lands in the Truckee / Tahoe region.

Location

A major drug ring that stretched from Mexico into El Dorado and Placer Counties and beyond was broken up with the arrest, conviction and sentencing of Francisco Felix, 45, of Mountain House on July 13, 2018.

Felix will be in prison for up to 20 years for his role in leading a large, multi-defendant drug-trafficking conspiracy that moved significant quantities of methamphetamine from Mexico into California and throughout the United States, and that controlled at least three large marijuana grows in the Central Valley of California, U.S. Attorney McGregor W. Scott announced.

On Saturday, June 23, 2018, from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m., the Sugar Pine Foundation will co-host a Tahoe yellow cress (TYC) planting with the Tahoe yellow cress Adaptive Management Working Group at Baldwin Beach, which is National Forest System land managed by the USDA Forest Service Lake Tahoe Basin Management Unit (LTBMU). In addition, the LTBMU will host a TYC information booth at the Native Species Festival on June 23, from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the Taylor Creek Visitor Center.

The South Lake Tahoe City Council will take a look at vacation home rental (VHR) fines at their meeting on Tuesday, May 15. In a story that has had national attention, the $1,000 fines for violations of parking, noise and other ordinances for each the renter and homeowner have become the spotlight.

Council will look at the fines and rules for parking and bear boxes, and the fact that both renter and homeowners are fined for each instance.

SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, Calif. - The four bear cubs who have been spending the winter at Lake Tahoe Wildlife Care (LTWC) will soon be heading back into the wild.

Last summer, the nonprofit organization in South Lake Tahoe lost two of their six cubs suddenly to a virus called Canine Adenovirus. This came as a shock to the group who has rehabilitated animals from not only Lake Tahoe, but from around the state since forming forty years ago in 1978.

Conserving and restoring Lake Tahoe’s natural environment and revitalizing its communities requires a delicate balancing act. Historically, building consensus around how to strike that balance has been one of the region’s greatest difficulties.

Lake Tahoe reached its strongest-ever consensus on that balance with the 2012 Regional Plan and its focus on sustainable redevelopment to restore natural areas, bring legacy development up to modern environmental standards, and create walkable, bikeable, and vibrant town centers.

SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, Calif. – The Fall Fish Festival will take place at the Taylor Creek Visitor Center on Saturday and Sunday, October 7 – 8, 2017. The Taylor Creek Visitor Center is located on SR Highway 89, three miles north of South Lake Tahoe, California. Hosted by the U.S. Forest Service Lake Tahoe Basin Management Unit in collaboration with the Tahoe Heritage Foundation, the festival is an opportunity to learn about the variety of fish species that live in Lake Tahoe and its streams including the federally threatened Lahontan cutthroat trout.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has awarded $197,250 to the Tahoe Regional Planning Agency (TRPA) to assess and restore wetlands in the Lake Tahoe Basin. Today’s announcement coincided with the 21st annual Lake Tahoe Summit in South Lake Tahoe.

TRPA will use the grant to develop a regional plan for monitoring changes in wetlands over time, prioritizing wetland restoration efforts and establishing goals for successful wetland projects.

Get ready for a wild time as the Tahoe Institute for Natural Science (TINS) and the U.S. Forest Service Lake Tahoe Basin Management Unit (LTBMU) host Wild Tahoe Weekend.

Join them June 24-25, 2017 at the Taylor Creek Visitor Center, just three miles north of South Lake Tahoe on Highway 89. Residents and visitors are invited to attend this free family event.

In their ongoing battle with aquatic invasive plants in the Tahoe Keys, the area's property owners association has applied for a permit to test herbicides in the lagoon in 2018.

This summer,the Tahoe Keys Property Owners Association (TKPOA) has been both combating aquatic invasive weeds while also testing out methods for future eradication of the pesky plants from their channels. They will be hosting a public meeting to update the community on their ongoing efforts on Tuesday, November 1 from 6:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. in the South Tahoe Public Utility District board room.

During the 2014 Kokanee Salmon run at the U.S. Forest Service's Taylor Creek Visitor Center in South Lake Tahoe, many visitors attempted to get a "selfie" with the bears who frequent the area in search of Salmon. This disregard for both the bear's safety as well as the public's prompted USFS officials to issue warnings and threat to close the area.