I have already sent out emails to our members here in Iowa but I would also like to extend invites to our members who might also like to particapate in a couple of great opportunities here.

As many may remember my city, Cedar Rapids had a terrible flood back in 1988. Along with the damage to homes and businesses (that was in the news) the flood also destroyed a wetland project that was created by the Indian Creek Nature Center. These wetlands were restored to serve once again as a breeding/nursery araea for our state threatened grass pickerel. They are in the process of starting over and have said they could use both technical and manual assistance. One of our members has volunteered but if you'd like to also contribute in any way you may contact the director at: rpatterson@indiancreeknaturecenter.org I have not received any times or dates yet if you'd like to contribute manually but if you are interested let me know and I can keep you posted.

I also received a reply form the DNR and they could use any volunteers who would like to participate in a Trout Run clean-up at the Decorah fish hatchery in NE Iowa near the Minnesota border. It will be April 21st at 8:30. If anyone would like to help with this I will contact them with the number of volunteers to expect. I'll probably be leaving @ 6:00 am and sure would love to meet some other NANFA people there.

Both of these events would be excellent opportunities to get our name out and show our value in Iowa.

I would love to participate in the Indian Creek Nature Center event, and possibly also the Decorah event. If I were to attend either, would you want to do some collecting afterwards or beforehand? I haven't done any collecting in Iowa, and their species seem to be quite different.

Sure. I have a few spots I could take you to.

I'll keep you posted on the wetlands. It would be great to meet up with you in Decorah.

I'm located in the quad city area. I would love to do a collecting trip, but I don't know of spots around here. It would be nice to have fellow nanfa people show me some places and what not.