President — Bruce Vandervort, 5338 US Hwy 101, Humptulips, WA 98552; phone: 360-288-2466; e-mail: brucevandervort@hotmail.com
Vice President West — John Consolini, 17030 Marmount ST SE, Monroe WA 98272; e-mail: itrap4you@yahoo.com
Vice President East — George Brady, P.O. Box 535, Pateros, WA 98846; phone: 509-923-2326; e-mail: cascadeb@televar.com
Executive Secretary — Ralph Dobson, 13723 Heatherwood Dr., Mill Creek, WA 98012;
phone: 425-530-2124; e-mail: ralph.dobson@verizon.com
Treasurer — BJ Thornily; 63 Redmond Rd., Republic, WA 99166; phone: 509-775-2936;
e-mail: bobbiemike@yahoo.com
NTA Director — Bob Maier, 38 Francis Dr., Walla Walla, WA 99362; phone: 509-529-9568; e-mail: bob_maier@hotmail.com
Membership options:
• Individual membership including subscription to The Trapper & Predator Caller — $30
• Junior (under 18) with subscription to The Trapper & Predator Caller — $15.50
• Associate (non-trapper) including subscription to The Trapper & Predator Caller— $15.50
• Senior Citizen (over 70) including subscription to The Trapper & Predator Caller — $10.50
• Lifetime membership — $250
• Lifetimer subscription to The Trapper Predator Caller — $10.50
Dues entitles members to all newsletters, meeting notices, discount entry to workshops and the annual rendezvous. All monies are used to protect your right to trap.
Complete membership application on first page of
association section and send dues to:
WSTA
(A non-profit organization.)
P.O. Box 12669
Mill Creek, WA 98082
PRESIDENT’S REPORT
Hello all,
We held the Spring Business meeting in May. It was a long meeting as we had quite a few changes to the bylaws on the agenda. There really was nothing earth shattering but we needed to update things. We have actually not been in compliance on a number of things such as term limits for a quite a while because of the difficulty of finding willing candidates. Anyway, the proposed changes were discussed and with a few changes were passed.
We spent quite a while discussing our legislative problems. As you know our efforts over the last nine years to get Initiative 713 modified have been unsuccessful. I brought up new wording that I had been working on for a bill. It pretty much went over like a lead balloon so I guess we will start from scratch. A new draft of a bill might or might not include some of the language I presented. That will be up to the legislative committee.
George Brady, chair of the legislative committee, gave a presentation on plans for a more comprehensive lobbying effort. We plan to take a more active role next year in speaking to legislators about the problems created by the current laws and what it will take to fix them. We will still depend on our lobbyist Ed Owens. We do however intend to supplement his work with our own lobbying efforts.
Eric Degman gave a presentation on plans for the Rendezvous. Eric is taking this job seriously and he has some really good ideas. There will be more activities for the youngsters and non-trapping spouses. A few less demonstrations and more participatory activities. There will be some prizes too so maybe we can keep some of you that leave early around to the end.
Also this year there will be water in the campground at the RV spots and a reduced price for tent camping. It should be a great time, so don’t miss it.
Fairs are a problem for us right now. As you know we have had a booth at the Puyallup Fair for it seems like forever. George Sovie along with Tom Mitchell have been taking responsibility for running this booth. Tom had to quit a couple years ago and George is not going to be able to continue.
George will be here this year for the start and the first weekend, but we need someone else to take this over. I have a plan to keep it going this year, but if anyone is interested, I wish they would let me know. I’m thinking we could divide this up so one person would take charge of the booth for one weekend so we would need three people. This way would divide the workload so as not to overwhelm one person. This year, George will try to run the booth the first weekend and I will do the last weekend along with teardown so I really need a person for the second weekend.
You would have helpers to man the booth, but we need someone to be in charge. If we can’t get anyone, we might have to discontinue our involvement in the fair. This was suggested in the past, but I really would hate to see that. I will still run a booth at the South West Washington Fair in August.
The day after the Spring Business meeting, we held a fur handling workshop. I was truly underwhelmed by the turn out. I don’t think I would be interested repeating if that’s all the interest there is. In the future, we will probably just hold fur handling demonstrations in conjunction with other events.
At this time, I would like to take the time to thank a couple of long time supporters of the Trappers Association, Vic Peterson and Blaine Nalder. Vic donated a large lot of beaver to the association this year and Blaine donated eight beavers. That in itself would be worth a word of thanks, but these two have given generously in the past to the point that they deserve a special thanks. Next time you see them, shake their hand and say thanks. It’s guys like that that keep this association’s head above water.
On that note, I thought I would mention that we will be holding a cash prize raffle for members much like we did last year. Our income is down this year on our auctions so far and it looks like we will need a bit of a boost from the raffle. Cash prizes have been donated.
Now here is a momentous occasion. We actually have someone else send in a report. I want you all to lavish praise on John for the high quality of the report and for what a generally great guy he is so that maybe he will continue to send in reports.
That’s about it for now. See you at the Rendezvous.
— Bruce Vandervort
Western Washington Vice President
Good news, bad news. Let’s start with the bad news first. We lost two more of our trapping members and friends. Jim Scoggins passed away at the age of 94. Jim owned the John Deere Dealership and Tractor Repair Shop in Pomeroy. Jim was married for 54 years. Jim is survived by two brothers, four grandchildren and three great grandchildren. Jim had a lot of hobbies such as hunting, fishing, camping and his greatest love was trapping. He was once the president of WSTA.
Jim was a county commissioner for eight years and on the hospital board for a number of years. Jim built Bluebird houses and ran a long line for miles so these birds had a place to nest. Jim was awarded the WSTA Hall of Fame last year. Larry, his son, told me that Jim was honored to receive the award. Jim was a storyteller and what a storyteller he was. Jim was one of a kind and a friend to all. He will truly be missed.
The other friend to all of us was Carl Jensen. Carl passed away at the early age of 73. Carl is survived by his wife Sylvia, two daughters and three grandchildren. I have got to say that Carl was a true woodsman. Carl had the love of the woods and you could always find him up in the mountains. Like Tom Mitchell said; Carl had the sense of direction equaled by no one. He had the love of hunting, fishing, camping and, of course, trapping. Carl put up some of the best looking fur that I have ever seen. I learned a lot from Carl personally and he will be missed by me and all that knew him.
Jim and Carl are a big loss. These two fellows had so much knowledge that they shared with everybody. They will truly be missed by many. Until we meet again, rest in peace. If you know of any members that have passed away, please let us know. Contact your Regional or County Rep, the Exec Secretary or myself to let us know.
Now for the Good News. It has been a busy year so far. Bruce our President, George our Eastern Washington Vice President, Ralph our Secretary, Bobbie our Treasurer, myself and others have been working hard to get trapping back like we had it before I-713. We had our Annual Fur Sale with several fur buyers and quite a few trappers. Prices paid by the buyers seemed to be better than expected.
Spring Business Meeting was held back in May and it was well attended by your Regional and County Representatives. Several topics were on the schedule and the one that we spent a large amount of time on was changes to the bylaws. We updated several articles to the bylaws. Other topics such as the newsletter dates, the Hall of Fame Awards, regular awards, Web site and our annual Rendezvous were discussed.
As for this year’s Annual Rendezvous, Eric Degman has put together a great program. This is going to be a great rendezvous that you shouldn’t miss. There is going to be something for everybody. Eric put together programs for the women and the children along with demos for everyone to attend with some of the best trappers in the Pacific Northwest as speakers. At this year’s rendezvous as all of the others, we will have Trapper Training and the Wildlife Control Operators Classes. Make sure you sign up early if you’re going to attend any of these classes. If you need information on the training classes, contact either Bruce or George Brady. The dates for this year’s rendezvous are Aug. 21, 22 and 23. The Rendezvous this year will be held once again at the Chelan County Fairgrounds just outside of the town of Cashmere in Eastern Washington. Come one, come all. It’s going to be as great as usual.
The following day after the Spring Business Meeting Bruce put on a Fur Handling Workshop. There were several instructors including Bruce Vandervort, Marsee Wilson and Alan Worrell. It was well attended except I think we had more fur than people. Talk about a pile of fur at the workshop. We had beaver, river otter, nutria, mink, muskrat, coyote and even bobcats. We would like to thank everybody that donated the animals for this workshop. This was a hands on workshop and all that attended had a pile of critters to choose from to work with.
Well enough for now, see you all at the Rendezvous. Come and see old friends or meet and make new ones, pick up your supplies, stay for the auction and just have fun.
— John Consolini
