Packed house at Festival of Arts, next up Trout Lake Fair
Trout Lake News
Andrew Christiansen
SCULPTURE: Work by Ann Fleming at the Festival of Art.
So the Trout Lake Festival of the Arts is over and it seems to have been another successful festival despite the somewhat odd weather; thunderstorms early Saturday morning, cooler and very windy on Sunday. The count of cars parked on Saturday was the highest ever, more than 700, indicating record attendance that day. Rumor had it that a Miata car club from Portland made the Festival the destination of their Saturday excursion and drove into the parking lot 40 strong. How neat! Visitors were slow to arrive on Sunday but by early afternoon a good crowd was in attendance, enjoying the art, the music, and the food. While savoring the memories from this year, I am already looking forward to repeating the pleasure next year.
In the meantime the Trout Lake Fair approaches. It is held the first full weekend in August, which this year is Aug. 4 and 5, at the Jonah Ministries (the old school) site. There will be a baking contest, a flower and veggies contest, and a yarn and thread contest. There is a 5K fun run before the Fair starts and a parade to kick it off at 11 a.m ., which will include, it is rumored, a wedding float this year. The firemen have a breakfast at the school from 6 a.m. to 10 a.m. There is food available at the Fair from booths run as fund raising activities by school groups and the Fair board. The excellent baked goods, submitted to the baking contest are raffled off toward the end of the day, providing a wonderful opportunity to obtain and consume a prize winning baked item. Among other events there are children's games including a pedal-power tractor pull, a pet show and a Timber Carnival. It is always fun to watch the contestants attempt to set a record time for sawing the log with a two person cross cut saw. The Community Foundation holds a fund raising silent auction. There is star gazing on Saturday night and a contra dance after the community potluck on Friday night. And the White Salmon Jazz Band performs on Saturday at 11:30 a.m ., just after the parade ends. Come, visit, and enjoy all the Fair has to offer.
A long time resident has recently expressed concern that weeds are beginning to infest Trout Lake Valley. She perceives that the weed population is growing here and believes the problem should be addressed with weed removal activities. The Knapweeds are especially prevalent and destructive of habitat and agricultural lands; they spread rapidly crowding out native and desirable plants. They are difficult to control because they produce a lot of seeds and should be dug or removed or killed before they go to seed. Another very aggressive weed plant that is just moving into the Valley which, therefore, would be easy to control if the effort is made soon, is Scotch Broom. This plant is fairly easy to uproot. Again this should be done before the seeds develop to reduce the chance of spread. Scotch Broom seeds can stay dormant in the soil for many years. Scotch Broom forms the masses of yellow blooms that are found along Highway 141 in the spring; it can be observed that this plant is crowding out the Oregon Grape and other native plants along the road side. The Klickitat County Weed Board, (509) 493-6091 is a good source of information and advice about weed removal. Let's all do our part to preserve the habitat, natural and agricultural, in Trout Lake by removing weeds wherever we find them.