This morning we presented an award certificate and a check to our Ice-Out winner for 2012, Judy Lavely, of Danville. We had a pretty good turnout - both Judy's sons were there and her granddaughter, Maddie; George and Judy Anderson and Don and Audrey Walker, and of course my co-chair Diane Rossi and Bill; and my right hand, Fred. The reporters for the Caledinian Record and Hardwick Gazette were on hand, and briefly there were a couple of fishermen - but they had either been out on the water a while or decided it was too cold and windy to stay, so shortly after we all arrived, they pulled their boat out of the water and left. Here's a short slide show of our "event."

It was fun - Judy said she didn't use any special process to pick the dates, and she had random picks during both March and April. She got her tickets from her brother, Terry Powers, on Island Drive.

Don Walker, one of the "founders" of the Ice-Out Contest, advised her to "use the money for something fun." I'm sure Judy will put it to good use, AND have fun with it.

Joe's Pond Association will also use the money for "something fun," the free fireworks display on the 3rd of July; but we will also use some of it for water quality control. We have an inspection station at the fishing access staffed by students each summer, and so far it has worked well to keep invasive species out of our pond. Programs like that cost money, but even even though the inspectors rarely find anything dangerous on boats going into the water, it would only take one small piece of milfoil to start a very costly infestation we might never be able to recover from.

Diane and I thank everyone who bought tickets and helped us out in so many ways. The Ice-Out Contest requires the cooperation of all of our members and many, many others to make it successful. We have fun doing it, and although not everyone can win, I think people have lots of fun just being part of it all. We've had some very nice notes from people all over the country, and we thank those folks for letting us know you enjoy our contest.