Pigeon River Country Association Newsletter – August 2008

Editor’s Overview: If this edition of the newsletter seems a bit late, it is because of the nature of the principal news or issue — the catastrophic release and choking of the Pigeon River back on June 23rd which was traced (again!) back to the dam and impoundment (pictures on page 4) on the privately owned Song of the Morning Ranch. It is was the central topic of discussion at our annual meeting, one of the main topics taken up by the Advisory Council, and the subject of the testimony delivered by our Association President, Ray Hoobler, before the Michigan Natural Resources Commission meeting in Lansing on August 14th (first item below).  This will be followed by an account of our annual meeting held on July 6th by our Association secretary, Greg Keith, and a synopsis of the July 25th Advisory Council meeting.

Pigeon River Country Association President’s Statement to the NRC      (August 14, 2008)

Thank you for allowing me to address you about the dam failure and silt spill on the Pigeon River that happened 6 weeks ago on June 23, 2008.

It is, perhaps, worth remembering that this is not the first or even the second time there has been a major accident involving this dam. On May 15, 1957, a 1.09 inch rainfall washed out the dam and produced a 12-foot head of water that roared down the Pigeon River. Luckily no one was fishing at the time and campers received notice to move to high ground in time to avoid injury. Needless to say fishing use dropped almost to zero that year on one of our prime brook trout streams.

The earthworks were replaced with concrete and the dam became known as the Song of the Morning Ranch dam after a yoga ranch that was started on the 800 acre property. On July 3, 1984, the Song of the Morning Ranch dam operators ignored a DNR order to gradually draw down the impoundment to make critical repairs and released large quantities of water and silt from the 65 acre impoundment in their rush to get access to the bottom of the dam’s gates. The result was another silt spill into the Pigeon with the destruction of an estimated 22,000 fish!

The second accident resulted in a four year long court case that resulted in a Consent Order that required, among other things, “implementing an approved dam safety and management program” by the Song of the Morning Ranch so that there would never be another disaster on the Pigeon. But, on June 23, 2008, there was another failure and a massive release of water and silt into the Pigeon followed by the total closure of the dam for almost an hour.  The impact was dramatic. There were hundreds of dead fish immediately downstream, silt covered the banks and gravel spawning beds, and insect habitat was destroyed. (You might be especially interested in the report of a (dead) 19 inch brown trout a mile downstream from the dam.) The Fisheries Division has spent months of manpower conducting an up to date fish count and evaluation of the damage. They have not yet released their report nor has the DEQ yet announced their analysis of what went wrong at the dam.

Two days after the spill I met a man at the Sturgeon Valley Road bridge a mile downstream from the dam who said he was camping ‘at the Tubes’, a popular campsite a mile further downstream where a family can swim in the Pigeon River. I would guess that he came up there with his wife and kids to spend several days at a lovely primitive campsite in order to give them all some good memories of northern Michigan. But, instead, he said that he couldn’t allow his kids to swim there because the water was so filthy!

A week after the release Rick Kropf and I canoed a three mile stretch of the Pigeon including the part that goes through the Song of the Morning Ranch. The trip started out in a lovely, moderately paced 30 foot wide stream going through forested hills, a couple of meadows, and past an occasional cabin. After a mile or so, the river started to slow and the shores widened and became a grassy plain, 50 to 75 yards wide, and then, as we entered the impoundment, the river itself widened out into an extremely shallow pond, perhaps 150 yards across. We could see blades of grass growing out of the middle of the pond as we looked down towards the dam itself. We had difficulty locating the channel on the right and found that it was no more than five or six inches deep anywhere. Of course we couldn’t see the bottom since there was rich, black silt everywhere.

We portaged across the dam using the steps the Song of the Morning Ranch provided. Then, as we rounded the next bend, we got our first whiff of rotting fish! It was not the last. The gravel beds the trout need to spawn were mostly dark, covered with silt. The water was clearer, but I can only guess at the damage to the insect populations. We took the canoe out after another mile and three more whiffs of rotting fish.

We waited until your August meeting to express our concern with the hope that further information might become available. However the Pigeon River Country Association believes that these reports are not necessary.  It is clear to us that the third disaster in 51 years means that the dam must be removed. Otherwise you can expect to hear of another massive silt release in 2033!

Strong action is required to see that this natural resource remains a quality place for fishermen, wildlife, campers, hikers, and other users. I urge you to see that the Song of the Morning Ranch dam is removed, that the DNR costs for evaluating the damage are reimbursed, and that there is a substantial fine. The Pigeon belongs to all the citizens of Michigan, and they have all been injured by these events.  ( Ray Hoobler, PRCA President )

PRCA Annual Meeting took place beginning with lunch at noon on Sunday July 6, 2008 at the Forest headquarters and information building. The membership turnout (see photo on page 4) was supplimented by a rather large representation from the Song of the Mornuing Ranch who seemed to be in a rather mixed state of both embarrassment and defensiveness regarding their dam’s most recent spill into the Pigeon River. They were given ample time to speak and were also subjected to quite a few questions. However, to emphasize the Association’s determination to see this environmental hazard removed for good, a vote was taken among the Association members present which resulted in a unanimous backing of the PRCA board’s decision to pledge $1000 to the effort organized by Trout Unlimited to resolve this issue.

          Among other items, PRCA member Laurie Marzolo, who has been the DNR’s interim part-time PRCF manager since Joe Jarecki’s retirement, but who expects to return to her full-time job as manager of the Atlanta State Forest, expressed her pleasure at having served in this capacity, but announced that she expects to be replaced by a new full-time PRCF manager in the fall. She also introduced the PRCA-sponsored summer intern, Darren Swan, who spoke about his many duties, especially installing all the new signs necessary to impliment the revised Concept of Management.

          The meeting ended with the reelection of the existing officers and thanks expressed to Eugene Horan for his five years of service as official PRCA representative on the Advisory Council and his continuing representation on the Council’s Oil & Gas Committee.  (At a later board meeting, in which Eugene participated, Mike Brown was elected to take his place. Another board meeting is scheduled for October, when we hope to have much fuller information available from the DNR and DEQ on the extent of the dam release damage and the steps that these agencies are prepared to take to see to it that this devastation in the heart of the Pigeon River Country Forest never happens again.)

Advisory Council Meeting  

The Pigeon River Country Forest Advisory Council met on Friday, July 25 at the forest headquarters.  Fifteen (later 16) voting members were present.  New members of the council were introduced, the agenda approved and the minutes of the April 11 meeting were reviewed. 

At the beginning of the public comments, Richard Kropf, speaking for the board of the Pigeon River Country Association, announced the decision taken at the Association’s annual meeting that the Association would pledge $1000 toward the resolution of the situation created by the sudden release after the thunderstorm that occured on June 22nd of silt accumulated behind the dam situated on The Song of the Morning Ranch.

The rest of the public comments period was taken up entirely by a group horseback riders accompanied by several state legislators (Tom Casperson, Kevin Eisenheimer, and later Joel Sheltrown) protesting the new restrictions on horseback riding within the Pigeon River Country Forest. Among their complaints were lack of adequate representation in the decision-making process surrounding the update of the concept of management, lack of documentation of supposed abuses of the forest by horseback users, lack of sufficient involvement by the state legislature, dishonesty on the part of the DNR director regarding funding issues, and what they see to be a general prejudice against horses and their riders.  All this commotion led to a motion proposing that these new restrictions be suspended for a year during which all these matters would be revisited.  The motion was defeated by a vote of ten to six.  At this point the horseback riders and their attending legislators walked out.  (See the editor’s remarks regarding this issue after this report.)

Bud Slingerlend and Pete Gustafson (both long-time PRCA members) were then honored for their long years of service on the advisory council.  A letter of support to the Huron Pines organization. proposed by chairman Ken Glasser regarding a grant application for the Pigeon River Habitat Initiative was reviewed and approved. 

The recommendation of the oil and gas committee regarding the Schmude Oil Co. proposal to tap into Antrim shale gas deposits by a means of lateral drilling from outside the forest boundaries into non-development leased land along the forest’s periphery was further explained by Rick Henderson of the DEQ.  A vote was then taken, fourteen approving, one opposing, and one abstaining.

The standards and limitation committee then reported on the meeting July 10 which has given over entirely to discussion of the Song of the Morning Ranch dam release, questions as to how it happened, how much damage has occurred, and what can be done to prevent this sort of thing in the future.  Almost all the members of the committee seem determined to have the dam removed or rendered inoperable, and representatives of the DEQ and the DNR assured the committee that they are working with the Atty. General’s office in Lansing to explore possible remedies.  The motion proposed by the standards and limitations committee which was worded as follows “The Pigeon River Country Advisory Council recommends the steps be taken to ensure this never happens again; that the dam be removed; and that the DNR and DEQ should take appropriate action to ensure that the dam operate safely during a resolution of this issue to protect the Pigeon River watershed.”   The council’s vote was unanimous in favor of the motion.

The usual mid-meeting break was cancelled and the ex-officio reports were made by the Forest Management, the Wildlife, and the Fisheries division representatives.  The acting PRCF manager, Laurie Marzolo, spoke about the failures of the new foot bridges over the Pigeon and Black rivers (see photos on page 4—the engineers from Lansing are looking into it), further building removal at the former MCCC camp as well as the former Kronlund property, and the removal of the low concrete dam associated with the latter on the Black.  The Cheboygan County road commission has announced its intention to replace a culvert over Oxbow Creek. The fisheries division is looking into the possibilities of special fishing regulations for Osmun Lake.

    Wonder of wonders, the meeting was adjourned over an hour earlier than usual.  The next advisory council meeting is scheduled for Oct. 17 at 6:30 PM at the Forest Headquarters.

(Additional Editor’s remarks)

Having personally sat on the committee or work group that was assigned to the task of reviewing the new regulations on recreational use of the Pigeon River Country Forest that met for two long afternoon sessions back last winter, I felt obliged to follow the delegation of horseback riders and two of the state legislators who abrubtly walked out of the July 25th Advisory Council meeting after the defeat of the proposal mentioned above and to talk to them on the front porch of the Forest headquarters building.  I wished to assure them of three things: first, that the present regulations are not fixed for all time, second, that the idea of a year’s moritorium on the new regulations had been considered by the committee and rejected  (on the basis that we’d had years of experience with the problems only getting worse), and that, third, after the effects of the present restrictions have been studied for a year or so, alterations in these regulations will be considered.

However, it soon became clear to me that most of those present, especially one of  the state legislators (who happened to be from the western part of the UP), had little or no knowledge of the origins of the Pigeon River Country Forest, its special character, or its needs.  The fact that there are also special regulations restricting the use of  snowmobiles, bicycles, and other vehicles seemed to make no impression, unless it was that they were against regulations of any sort. It is obvious that we in the Association have a lot more work to do in this regard. (More on this subject in the next newsletter  - R W Kropf)

 PRCA Annual Meeting. Acting PRCF Manager Laurie Marzolo in the center delivering her report.

Lower part of the Song of the Morning Ranch pond

with main administration building to the right.

Song of the Morning dam across the Pigeon River

as viewed from downstream.

Control gates under the roadway of the Song of the Morning Ranch dam.

High Country Pathway bridge over the Pigeon R. near Pine Grove Campground (before collapse).

Buckled HCP bridge over the Black R. repaired with temporary braces.