Stories from Thursday, August 16, 2018

Iowa Lakes Community College head women's basketball coach Ashley Martin announced last week the signing of Brianna O’Donnell, a 6-foot-2 forward from Richfield, Minnesota, to the Iowa Lakes women's basketball team. “We are thrilled to add Brianna to our women’s basketball family,” Martin said. ...

We’d all like to install ultra low flow or waterless toilets to conserve water. It’d be nice to redo our plumbing so that our gray water is recycled into our lawns. These can be expensive projects and while they’d be nice, the fact is, you can conserve water at little or no cost. Here are three simple tips to help you conserve...

The rusty patched bumble bee was designated as endangered by the federal government in 2017, after determining that the population had declined 87 percent in the last 20 years and is only present on 0.1 percent of its historic range. Named after the rusty patch centrally located on the backs of workers and males, but not queens, it once occupied grasslands and tallgrass prairies in the Upper Midwest and Northeast...

Depending on where you live, the young people and their teachers are getting ready to go back to school, football season is either here or just around the corner, and the fall fishing season is not far off. Some folks may not like this progression of seasons, but many anglers do. They know that autumn can provide the best fishing of the year for both numbers of fish and trophy fish...

This past week, I had the opportunity to participate in both the Prairie Lakes Conference (PLC) and the Okoboji Blue Water Festival. It brought together the opportunity to showcase the best clean water practices, while at the same time focusing on the many challenges we must do more to battle. Because if we run out of water, what do we do? That is certainly not a pleasant thought...

Iowa Lakes Community College was recently honored by the National Junior College Athletic Association (NJCAA) for academic achievements during the 2017-18 college year. Each year the NJCAA recognizes both teams and individuals for academic success. Four Iowa Lakes teams received honorable mention for earning a team cumulative grade point average above  3.0. These teams include women's swimming and diving (3.24), softball (3.14), women’s soccer (3.11) and women’s golf (3.11)...

The Iowa High School Athletic Association and its title sponsor, the Iowa Farm Bureau, are proud to have secured the HeadStrong Concussion Insurance program for the IHSAA’s participants in the 2018-19 school year. HeadStrong provides “first-dollar” insurance coverage for all students (males and females) in grades 9-12 participating in the practice or play of interscholastic sports sanctioned by the IHSAA. ...

Fall sports are an exciting time for the entire community, and local sports specialists want to ensure it’s a safe one for the athletes themselves. Local medical professionals collectively comprising Sports Medicine Northwest are providing care for area athletes in various ways. ...

A childhood goal became a reality for 64-year-old John Eller this summer. The lifelong Lakes Area visitor-turned-resident swam each bay of West Okoboji. It took 29 total days and 16 days of swimming, starting June 16 and ending July 15 in Smith's Bay on the lake's southern shoreline...