CLEARFIELD – Walmart Distribution Center, Woodland, presented Pat Domico with a check totaling $5,000 Tuesday for Squirrel Tails for Trout. Walmart has donated $20,000 over the past four years.
Squirrel Tails for Trout takes harvested squirrel tails and sells them to a fishing lure company, Mepps Spinners. Mepps then creates hand-tied, dressed hooks for its world-famous lures.
Mepps has tried hundreds of other natural and synthetic materials like bear hair, fox, coyote, badger, skunk, deer and even Angus cow, but “nothing works as well as squirrel tail hair.”
“Squirrel tails are made of mostly hair, not fur,” Commissioner John A. Sobel, board chairman, explained, “and there’s something unique to the quality … that’s particularly attractive to fish.”
Domico uses funds raised through Squirrel Tails for Trout to stock the West Branch of the Susquehanna River, and Sobel said, it particularly benefits area youth hunting/fishing organizations.
This year, Domico said, the Susquehanna River and Parker Dam will be stocked nine times. “We’ll put in about $15,000 worth of fish because people believe in this program.”
Sobel recalled his youth when the Susquehanna River in the Clearfield and Curwensville areas was void of aquatic life. “There were no fish – at least not in this stretch of river.
“Through Pat’s efforts, his organization has stocked thousands of trout – big trout – and made good fishing for our folks and those who come here. It’s a real asset to local tourism.”