EIPS Newsletter
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December 2005 Newsletter You'll need Adobe Acrobat Reader to open this file. | |
| In This Issue: | December 2005 |
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The Pizza Ranch in Vinton was the familiar site of our last meeting of the 2005 year. President, Kacy Novak, began the meeting by welcoming everyone. A large crowd was on hand, and I believe we filled every available seat there. There was no treasurer’s report. Minutes were approved as printed in the last news letter. Kacy read a request from the Master Gardeners regarding their Winter Fair. They invited us to again put up a booth for our club. (FYI – this year Carol Sindelar and yours truly will be giving a talk on things to think about when planning your pond) Kacy asked for volunteers to man the booth during the day. Dennis Sindelar, The Hunerdosses, The Serbouseks, Joe Olsen, and Kacy, all raised hands. Kacy welcomed new members, Rose and Jim Milden from Cedar Rapids. Jim spoke briefly saying he was a member of the local garden railroad club. He was looking for a volunteer to come and talk to their group about ponding. He also mentioned he worked at Apache Hose and thus had access to certain plumbing supplies. So he was offering himself as an alternate source for some of our ponding needs. Monica Morley brought us a sample of the plaque the city wanted us to attach to the recent bench we purchased for their bike trail. The club voted to go ahead and purchase that. A majority vote also dictated that the new bench would be blue in color. After all new business was discussed, Kacy talked to the group about all our volunteer committees. She read the responsibilities of each group and asked that everybody sign up for at least one committee. Papers were passed around for people to sign committing to the group of their choice. If you couldn’t make the meeting, when you mail in your 2006 dues and fill out a membership form please check a committee box that you feel you can help with. As you know, the more hands the better. New to the committees this year is an Expo committee. In 2000 our club had what we called a pond Expo, where we brought in 4 speakers from around the country to come and talk to us all in one day. This year we’re looking into incorporating a small trade show also. It’s in a planning stage, but stay tuned for more information. We’re hoping for a “Spring Fling” to get us started for the 2006 ponding year. Following this, we did our volunteer recognition portion of our last meeting. This year the club gave away what we called EIPS BIG BUCKS! They are actually $5.00 gift certificates from various local vendors. Certificates and many thanks were handed out to all the people that had their ponds on this year’s tour. All 2005 officers where then thanked for their time and hard work in the past year. Special thanks went to Rosie and Herman Michaels for being pond tour chairmen and especially to Rosie for the extra work she went to in holding the Halloween party. Linda and Tim Nolan were thanked for collecting all the door prizes for the year. I incorrectly gave Carol (who started this entire door prize thing) the credit for writing all the request letters, when in fact the Nolans had done all that leg work also. Kacy mentioned the excellent work of the program committee this year. I believe Bonnie Happel and Mary Robinson chaired that committee. And last, but not least, we discussed our faithful and diligent all powerful web master, Josh Spece. (Josh, I know you can’t make most meetings, but your work for us is not forgotten or taken for granted) Josh reported that our web site saw over 14,000 pages viewed this past year! That’s unbelievable. Anyway, the club thought of a special gift for Josh, which I’ll make sure he receives in the months to come. (Thank you again, Josh) After all the many Thank yous, we discussed the pond tour location for next year. No location was chosen. We’ll again have to decide this at the February meeting. Election of new officers for the upcoming 2006 year was next on the agenda. I’d been busy emailing everyone I could think of in hopes that I could persuade (beg) someone new to take over the existing offices. And because we do have such a great bunch of members that are always ready to help, I was able to bring to the club a proposed slate of several new officers. Monica Morley had volunteered to be our new president, Pam Moore agreed to be our Vice President, Joe Olsen (who I had not contacted) spoke up and volunteered to be the new Treasurer. Good Ole, Carol Sindelar, agreed to again publish and distribute our newsletter and I agreed to continue to write up the meeting minutes for her to publish. There were no volunteers to take either Carol or my jobs, however if you weren’t present and would like to volunteer for either roll, please call Monica and let her know as both of us will willingly move over so that others may have the experience. The Rifes will continue to care for our library. With little discussion or arguments, it was pretty much a unanimous decision to accept this group. Hoorayyy! This being the last meeting of the year, it is also customary to have our year end distribution of our Grand Finally Door Prize! All year long, members have signed in at each meeting. At the end of the year, these names are put into one large drawing for several big prizes that are given away. (So if you came to 10 meetings, you have 10 chances to win and you must be present to win) First we drew for the regular door prizes. There were several prizes of fish food, with Judy Olson, Pat Beuter, Monica Morley, and Margie Thompson being the lucky winners. This meeting, Prairie Creek Landscape had sent 2 bags of Frog-a-roni. (Cute stuff, frog shaped macaroni!) to be given as door prizes. Linda Nolan and Rose Milden won the Frog-a-roni. (I’m hoping we see this at a meeting all cooked up sometime) Thanks to the Baileys for their donation. And last, but not least, the Grand Prizes! This year we received 4 great prizes with total values of over $800.00! (Drum roll please) The first was a Pond Master 1500 pump and filter (a $140.00 value) was won by Herman Michael. 2nd – a Tetra Tech. 1100 gph pump (valued at $169.99) was won by Gill Morley. 3rd – a Pond Master 9 watt submersible UV light (valued at $218.00) was won by Margie Thompson and 4th – was another Tetra 18 watt UVII light (valued at $275.00) and it was won by Joe Hunerdosse. Kacy has volunteered to take over the door prize job in the year to come. (Thanks, Kacy) Wow, what a great end to a great year! Kacy adjourned the meeting and everyone flooded the buffet. Several of the committees got together to discuss plans for next year, already. Thanks one more time to all the past officers and many volunteers that helped throughout the year 2005. I’ve said it before, I want to say it again – This club has to be one of the best around. We have so many people willing to do the work that is required to introduce the public to our ever changing hobby and help our present members with all their ponding questions and needs. Be thinking about what you want from your club in the up coming year and I’ll look forward to seeing you all in February. Have a safe and wonderful holiday season. Respectfully submitted ... Jackie Allsup Members who received EIPS BIG BUCKS for their hard work: Pond Tour Owners: Margie and Roger Thompson
2005 Officers Kacy Novak –president
Special Thanks for extra hard work Linda and Tim Nolan – organizing door prizes
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Remember, EIPS runs on volunteers. Please consider serving on a committee. Many hands make for light work | |
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The 4th Annual ISU Extension Linn County Master Gardeners Winter Gardening Fair will be held on Saturday January 21st, 2006 from 9am-4pm at Kirkwood Community College in Cedar Rapids. This year's fair offers 26 classes on a variety of gardening subjects for the beginning the experienced gardener. Keynote speaker Harlan Hamernik from Bluebird Nursery in Clarkson, NE will give a keynote presentation on Plant Selection for All Season Interest and will also teach classes on Xeriscaping and Clematis. Register for the event through the Kirkwood Community College Web site, by phone at 1-800-332-2055, or by stopping by the Kirkwood registration office and registering in person. Everyone is welcome at this exciting event. Hope to see you there! Visit the EIPS booth at this great event! | |
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(Koi Health Advisor) With the new ever changing weather, (cold one day, warmer the next) many of our pond owners are seeing their fish show signs of severe stress. My pond alone has frozen over and thawed out twice already and it’s only December. The most common symptom we are seeing is a condition know as “Laying over”. Laying over is nothing but severe fish stress. There are hardly any exceptions. Normally when fish are laying over, something is TERRIBLY wrong in terms of water quality or a parasitism is working them over too. I've seen the most Laying Over in icy winter water. When you'd disturb the fish, they would pretend everything was okay and swim around for a time. As with any fish problems, the first step is to test the water for ammonia and nitrites. Be sure to bring your water sample into the house and let it come up to room temperature before testing. I'd make sure my fish got into the low seventies as fast as safely possible. This, generally for us Iowans, means bringing the fish inside. Fish in winter ice water sometimes need to be warmed up for various treatments or to rescue them from genuine cold water illnesses such as Laying Over. To avoid shock, the fish should be put in a very large vat of this icy pond water in your garage. I repeat, you're going to use the icy pond water from your pond that the fish is used to. This vat should be at least 75 gallons in size or the temperature will equalize too rapidly and kill the fish. They cannot climb up more than 10 degrees F per 18 hours without serious stress or death. Let the vat slowly warm to garage temperature using the ambient room air. USE NO HEATER. Do nothing to accelerate the warming process. It's meant to be slow! As the fish warm up, they will become more active. Make sure the vat is covered. Once they have been in the mid sixties for 24 hours, you can raise the temperature with a commercial aquarium heater or a paint-bucket warmer, by five degrees per day til in the low seventies. Salting your pond water will also help with stress. If your fish are scratching or flashing, you need to have them also check for parasites. Parasites can make fish lie over also, so we need to try to find out the ACTUAL cause before we begin to shotgun a remedy. Bringing fish threw the winter should not be a matter of good luck, but good husbandry. ...Jackie Allsup {Editor’s note: Normal winter behavior is little movement in an upright (normal swimming) position. Only if the fish deviate from normal should you be concerned about your fish’s health} | |
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At the November meeting we will begin the process of planning 2006 activities. EIPS is run by volunteers. All planning is done by the membership. If you have some ideas, we all what to hear about them. We will be inviting everyone to volunteer for a committee: PLEASE PICK ONE TO JOIN: Each committee will be responsible to meet and establish a chairman for their group. If too many volunteer for one group (or it is considered full) and others have none, you may be asked to rechoose. So first to volunteer get first choice........... Following are the 2006 committees and the names of those who volunteered at the November meeting. COMMUNITY SERVICE COMMITTEE: * works with the water garden tour committee to bring to the club membership ideas as to where to apply the proceeds from the tours. * see that money gets dispersed * in the case of a project that requires club participation, they will be responsible for organizing materials, getting volunteers, (does not mean they are responsible to do all the work involved) and carrying through with said project. PROGRAMS COMMITTEE: * responsible for finding and organizing programs and speakers for meetings. * plans and organizes club activities, such as trips, club workshops, etc. *Bob & Stephanie Geers 363-2448 hawkskier@yahoo.com
COMMERCIAL RELATIONS: * responsible for making contact and maintaining our relationships with area retailers. (Letting them know we exist) * establish club discounts or promotional door prizes. * Distribute club information to dealers so they can give to customers. *Kacy Novak 362-0487 cqknovak@msn.com HOSPITALITY COMMITTEE: * welcoming new members * mentoring new members * Promote library * name tags and club membership cards * Generally help members realize the discounts and benefits to joining. * Historian—Organizing scrap books or collecting pictures of club activities. *Gary & Jo Hunerdosse 364-6627 gfhunk@mchsi.com
WRITING COMMITTEE: * help write for and organize the newsletter * assist the secretary *Carol Sindelar 365-1839 fishlounge1@cs.com
{Note to the writing committee: a reminder of which month you signed up to submit an article in 2006.} February - Joe Olsen
If you would like to submit an article for a specific month or any month, contact Carol WATER GARDEN TOUR COMMITTEE: * finding ponds and getting the tour organized * recruit volunteers to help at the ponds * establish times * print programs * coordinate and help with publicity. *Brandy & Lisa Lanham 362-7672 lanhamb1@earthlink.com PUBLICITY COMMITTEE: * organizes and gets publicity for meetings and activities. * Works closely with Pond Tour group to get advertising everywhere. * develops and maintains our club informational brochures and sees that they get to the Commercial Relations committee for dispersal. * Organizes booths at area events. *Carol Sindelar 365-1839 fishlounge1@cs.com RECOGNITION COMMITTEE: * sends thank you notes to presenters & business sponsors. * puts together year end recognition programs for officers and volunteers *Ron & Edna Rife 247-0206 RLrife@aol.com
EXPO COMMITTEE *Jackie Allsup 934-3665 Cedarserviceja@aol.com
Some organizations have magic elves who come around when we are asleep and get things done so we can enjoy the benefits. It may seem like EIPS has magic elves because there are some people who will just “do it” when no one else will help or plans have fal7len through. But we don’t like to function like that. And we don’t have magic elves. All we have is you...the members... To keep an organization fresh and interesting it needs new ideas and enthusiastic helpers. Please consider being actively involved in EIPS. If you would like to help with a project but don’t know how, just ask. The president or secretary can put you in touch with someone who can be your guide. Become part of the team. And help EIPS have another successful year promoting the ponding hobby. | |
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Eastern Iowa Pond Society Membership Application | |