Eleven Mile: CPW Inventive Mosquito Lab

Dear Ms. Fishergarten,

Thank you for your recent letter(s) to Colorado Parks & Wildlife. We always appreciate hearing the keen insight and ideas of our park visitors.

We likewise appreciate your frankness in describing your experience at Eleven Mile State Park, to wit, “a cesspool of long grasses fostering dense clouds of starving mosquitoes the size of Pterodactyls.” 

We find it refreshing that, after actually viewing your photos from your visit, you would send a second letter amending your description to “a cesspool of long grasses fostering dense clouds of starving mosquitoes the size of Pterodactyls against a stunning backdrop of Colorado’s snowy springtime splendor and strikingly gorgeous lake.” 

We sincerely regret the “bites that burned and itched like legion demons and their red-hot pokers of hell.” Even so, we regret that we cannot “run a mower around the lake shores,” nor can we “maybe also edge a little around the campsites.” CPW balances a delicate ecosystem with the increasing needs of its many visitors.

We trust that you will visit us again at Eleven Mile and bring bug spray. And as always at that location, flies and lures only.

Respectfully,

CPW

“Well,” Fishergarten said regretfully to FisherSpouse, as she carefully folded the note back into its envelope. “I tried to help. That place is a West Nile petri dish.”

“I told you to wear The Shirt,” he answered, focused on the reel he was spooling. "That's why we have it."

“The one you got from FisherSon?” she asked, remembering.

The Shirt, not a fashion statement

The Shirt is a taupe button-up men’s 2XL that comes infused with insect protection technology, sun screen capabilities and wick-away properties. Fishergarten also heard that it can tie a solid Trilene knot in the right circumstances, though she hasn’t tested that yet. “But that’s yours.”

“Mosquitoes don’t bite me,” he said casually.

This is fact. FisherSpouse emits DEET from his pores. In the past, Fishergarten has tried to understand this using the scientific method:

Observation: FisherSpouse can fish obliviously in a cloud of mosquitoes and emerge mosquito-bite free, while Fishergarten’s bites make her look like Quasimodo.

Hypothesis:  FisherSpouse is naturally immune to mosquitoes due to some biological factor as yet undiscovered.

Prediction/Deductive Reasoning: If we place FisherSpouse in a large cloud of aggressive

mosquitoes, we will find that he naturally emits DEET and deters them.

The floater/diver lure

Perform an Experiment: Go back to Eleven Mile and its mosquitoes (experimental lake) and fish with the floater/diver lure with the little lip on the front that is way cool because when you reel it in over Eleven Mile’s pebbly shallow shoreline, it looks like a real fish in the water even if it didn’t catch anything. Oh, and also go and fish at Lake Pueblo where a relentless shale surface seems to lessen mosquitoes (control/placebo lake).

Analyze Results: FisherSpouse had no mosquito bites from either location. Fishergarten was in the seventh layer of mosquito-bite hell.

Draw a Conclusion: FisherSpouse emits DEET. We know it. We don’t need an experiment to know it. Suck it, science.

“Mom, you can’t fish Colorado without mosquitoes,” FisherSon explained patiently. FisherSon favors fishing Colorado’s Western Slope wilderness, which one locates with coordinates rather than names. “Wear The Shirt I gave you guys.”

He paused, then continued.

“You didn’t spend enough time there. You know you have to go back.”

This, too, was true, she knew. Fishergarten could return to

Eleven Mile: Stunning backdrop of snowy springtime splendor

Eleven Mile. While she was at it, she would toss a line into Spinney Mountain and Antero, and possibly add a chapter to her coming book, “Colorado Fishing: When Mosquitoes Wear Camo.” She could further test the properties of The Shirt and report back on the outcomes.

What about you, FisherFriends? Have you fished Eleven Mile from the shore? What conclusions did you draw? What did you catch – fishwise and diseasewise? Tell us your story in the comments below.