Johnson's Pond

 Johnson's Pond Kid's Fishing Event

The Mancleona Bass Festival feels this is an important communiy event that helps define our local culture.

Johnson's Pond is located in the village of Mancelona.  The community and local land owners have designated this pond for the use of children.  It is annually stocked with trout for a kid's fishing event for the opening of trout season.  It requires a huge cooperative undertaking to keep this resource viable from caring volunteers and friends.  A recent partnership between our local school and fish hatchery has brought about a lot of excitement.

The 2008 event was fantastic!  The Jordan River Fish Hatchery provided trophy size brook trout for the kids to battle.  These were truly beautiful fish.  The Village of Mancelona provided hot dogs, chips, and pop for everyone to enjoy.  Each child that caught a fin clipped fish received a gold Sakajaweha dollar coin.  The workers from the fish hatchery masterfully cleaned the hundreds of fish that were caught.  A huge thank you to the Jordan River Fish Hatchery for their effort and time spent to make this the best kids fishing event in recent history.

Be sure to plan a visit to Mancelona with your kids next year!

It’s not your Imagination, it’s Nature!

This is a catchy tag line right? Well sure, but that‘s not all it is. Recently some very forward thinking people in and around Mancelona and Antrim County have taken it upon themselves to help cure “Nature Deficit Disorder,” starting with a new after school program called “Imaginature.” Oh! Yes, there is a name for all these kids slumped in chairs playing Game boys and PSPs. Yes there’s a name for slouching in front of the TV for all hours of the day. In our day it was just called laziness. Now it is called Nature Deficit. Our parents’ cure was to boot us outside where we belonged or they “provided some opportunity” like raking leaves, hoeing the garden, or mowing the lawn. We called it “work.” Anyway, remember when you hopped on your bike and were gone all day playing baseball or catching crayfish and frogs? Now we have to organize a “play date” just to get kids together, much less get them out of doors. We are proud to do just that!

Mancelona Public Schools Choose Success program, together with Jordan River National Fish Hatchery have been forging partnerships with many organizations and private citizen volunteers to deliver after school programs designed to get students out of doors and into nature. As part of the program the students will be raising brook trout at the hatchery. These brook trout will be cared for by the students until the fish are ready to be stocked into Johnson’s Pond for the Annual Opening Day Children’s Fishing Event in the Village of Mancelona. Since the fry that recently hatched won’t be catchable size this spring, hatchery staff have arranged for a transfer of about 500 mature fish to the hatchery. The students will learn about brook trout biology and ecology, fish culture and hatchery operations, while tending to the trout during their visits to the hatchery over the coming year.