'Stumpy' questions are finally answered

For 20 years, the mammoth, three-legged gator living in a fenced pond behind Savannah River Ecology Lab has encouraged countless guesses as to its length, girth and weight.

Last week, those questions were answered once and for all. But it wasn't easy.

"It took nine of us, and it was still hard to do," said Cris Hagen, a wildlife technician and herpetologist.

The idea, he said, was to capture the big gator, named "Stumpy" for its missing front left foot, and get him to cooperate while being placed on scales.

"We noosed him, basically, and then kind of man-handled him out of the water," Hagen said. "A bunch of us held him and we taped his mouth and tied him up."

Lifting Stumpy was another chore altogether.

"He was so big ,we were afraid if we just picked him up, the weight of his belly would hurt him," Hagen said. "We ended up getting an aluminum extension ladder and making it into a stretcher-type device."

Stumpy, who - according to rumor - originated as a problem gator on a Kiawah Island golf course and evolved into SREL's unofficial mascot, was loaded into a pickup truck and driven to a weigh station within Savannah River Site.

"We weighed the truck before we got started, then weighed it again with Stumpy," Hagen said. "The scales are certified, so we know they're accurate within 10 pounds.

When all was said and done, Stumpy's measurements were documented for posterity: The official length was 12 feet, 4 inches, and the reptile weighed 630 pounds with a 5-foot-3 belly girth.

Now we can all stop guessing.

GET READY FOR STRIPERS: There is good news on the horizon for fans of striped bass fishing in Thurmond Lake, where trophy-sized fish are becoming more and more common.

The National Striped Bass Association has scheduled two major tournaments at the reservoir - starting out with a pro event Feb. 23-25, with a weigh-in being organized at White Columns Inn in Thomson.

Cliff Ellis, the association's sales director, was in town last week doing some setup work for the February tournament and a much larger event - the National Championship Tournament - that will be held at Thurmond Lake in December.

The national event likely will lure 100 or more boats, with activities likely to be held at the tournament site at Columbia County's Wildwood Park.

Participants will come from across the nation, including Missouri, Oklahoma and Pennsylvania.

The association, now in its fifth year, has grown to include more than 16,000 members, Ellis said. For information on tournaments, striper fishing and other details, visit www.fishnsba.com.

EAGLE CENSUS: Biologists fanned out across Thurmond Lake last week to conduct an important annual bald eagle census, and the preliminary results came as good news to Corps of Engineers wildlife biologist Jeff Brooks.

"It was, basically, pretty close to last year but a lot better than some of the years before that," he said. "They spotted 15 at Thurmond, one at Russell and four at Lake Hartwell."

The 2005 census found 14 eagles at Thurmond Lake, compared with only five eagles in 2004.

The annual census is conducted each January in hopes of estimating how many bald eagles nest or travel throughout the lake areas.

"We try to do it in winter, which is the migration season for eagles," Brooks said.

"We think a lot of these are migrating birds, but there are also some nesting areas we'll be checking too."

Thurmond Lake, which has 70,000 acres of water and an abundance of mature, shoreline timber, traditionally attracts most of the birds in the area, he said.

"The established timber, and plenty of coots, brings them there," he said. Eagles often feed on coots.

The lake's eagle population has declined since the late 1990s, when a mysterious brain disorder known as avian vacuolar myelinopathy, or AVM, killed dozens of eagles, along with even larger numbers of coots, Canada geese and other birds.

Reach Rob Pavey at 868-1222, ext. 119, or rob.pavey@augustachronicle.com.