OUT & ABOUT
OUTCLASS
Safety courses geared to boaters
Summer is a marvelous time to enroll in the “America’s Boating Course” taught by instructors from the Spokane Sail and Power Squadron. The lessons go beyond safety to a spectrum of information on boat handling that’s useful to anglers and waterfowl hunters as well as summer recreation families.
The eight-hour course, already offered several times this year, is being taught again over four consecutive Tuesdays starting July 18 at the squadron’s clubhouse, 925 W. Jackson. These classes satisfy Washington’s new mandatory boater safety education requirement, which will be phased in for all boat drivers over the next 15 years.
Preregister: 328-6165. Cost: $40 or $20 for student accompanied by registered adult.
Basic Water Safety, a 90-minute session designed for any family that recreates around water is set for 6:30 p.m. Wednesday at Mountain Gear, 2002 N. Division. It’s free, but pre-register, 625-6200.
OUTMEDIA
Ice Age Floods program Tuesday
Book: “On the Trail of the Ice Age Floods,” a geological field guide to the mid Columbia Basin, by Bruce Bjornstad (Keokee, $19)
Details: The most comprehensive consumer guidebook to the cataclysmic floods that carved this region’s landscape some 15,000 years ago. Diagrams on photos and maps help readers comprehend how almost unimaginable amounts of water formed 70 present-day land forms. Also includes 30 hiking and biking trails, five driving tours and two aerial tours to view flood features.
Author program: Bjornstad will present a slide lecture in Spokane, July 11, 7 p.m. at REI, 1125 N. Monroe.
Info: Keokee Books, (208) 263-3573, www.keokeebooks.com.
OUTRIDE
Wildlife agents get in gear
Northeastern Washington wildlife agents have a new all-terrain vehicle for chasing down backcountry poachers.
The Polaris Ranger six-wheel drive ATV is from the U.S. Smokeless Tobacco Company’s program to boost law enforcement and emergency responders. The vehicle will be used primarily in Stevens, Pend Oreille and Ferry counties, where road closures and other restrictions protect grizzly bears, caribou and bull trout.
“This equipment will give us the ability to pursue violators in terrain that is either inaccessible by or very damaging to our trucks,” said Fish and Wildlife Department Sgt. Mike Charron.
OUTLOOK
Best fishing times
Lunar tables from the U.S. Naval Observatory list peak fishing times. Be fishing at least one hour before and one hour after given times. Applies to all time zones.
(* indicates best days.)
Through July 16
* Today
12:20 a.m. 12:10 p.m.
* Monday
— 12:50 p.m.
Tuesday
1:20 a.m.1:50 p.m.
Wednesday
— 2:25 a.m.
Thursday
3:20 a.m.3:45 p.m.
Friday
4:10 a.m.4:35 p.m.
Saturday
5 a.m. 5:25 p.m.
* Next Sunday
5:50 a.m. 6:15 p.m.