Stories from Wednesday, September 12, 2018

Competing against three ranked teams and five ranked individuals, Harris-Lake Park cross country duo Jaden Rueter and Cole Ihnen ran well at a meet hosted by West Lyon Monday evening. Rueter, a junior, placed 31st in 21 minutes, 5.71 seconds. Ihnen, a sophomore, placed 39th in 23:09.19...

Spirit Lake made quick work of Lakes Conference rival Spencer on Tuesday night. The Indians topped the Tigers in straight sets, winning 25-8, 25-15 and 25-12 in Spencer. Junior Emma Loveall led the charge with 10 kills, six digs, two blocks and an ace...

Competing against six ranked teams and 13 ranked individuals in Storm Lake on Tuesday, Spirit Lake cross country runners held their own. The Indian girls placed sixth and the boys placed fifth. "I was very pleased with our performances tonight in a very tough meet with many ranked teams and individuals," Spirit Lake coach Tim Heinitz said...

Harris-Lake Park's rough start to War Eagle Conference play continued Tuesday, as the Wolves fell to second-ranked (1A) Gehlen Catholic in straight sets. The Wolves lost 25-10, 25-7 and 25-16 in Lake Park. Wolves senior Taylor Meyer had five kills, three assists and seven digs on the night...

Editor's Note: This is the fourth installment of a weekly series previewing prep football in Dickinson County. Dickinson County teams went 2-1 for a third consecutive week to improve to 6-3 overall on the season. Spirit Lake defeated Central Lyon/George-Little Rock on the road to move to 3-0. ...

The 12th-ranked (1A) Harris-Lake Park volleyball team dropped a War Eagle Conference road trip to unranked Akron-Westfield on Tuesday, Sept. 4. The Wolves fell behind 2-0 with a 25-13 loss in set one and a 25-23 loss in set two. They bounced back with a 25-20 win in set three, but fell 27-25 in the fourth and final set of the night...

The Okoboji volleyball team fell to Rock Valley in five sets Thursday, as the Rockets won three straight sets to top the Pioneers in the Siouxland Conference opener in Rock Valley. "Overall, we played well and did a great job serving," Okoboji coach Ashley Linquist said. "We did a lot better job of moving the ball around to all hitters. We struggled with short serve receive and tips, but will continue to practice that."...

Okoboji boys and girls cross country teams, both ranked seventh in Class 2A, faced stiff competition Saturday in Holstein at the Tim Thomas Invite hosted by Ridge View. "I thought both our girls and boys teams had a tremendous day competing on Saturday," Okoboji coach Brad Peter said. "Both races were loaded with ranked schools from 2A, 3A and 4A. To come home with both teams finishing in the top 7 and three top-10 finishes on the day is incredible."...

Whether you call them trash bandits or just ‘coons, most everyone in Iowa has met this prominent Midwest mammal. While they may have a rather unfavorable reputation in urban environments for ransacking trash cans, they’re one of the best urban-adapted animals in existence today and fill a necessary ecological niche around the world. See how well you know your local masked bandit with the trivia below!...

The campaign to reduce and eliminate tree stand accidents by raising awareness of this issue and providing education about safe tree stand hunting best practices appears to be getting positive results. Nationally, the estimated number of falls from tree stands requiring emergency room visits decreased by 28 percent in 2017...

Iowa’s pheasant hunters can expect to find more birds this fall when they head to the fields, predict state wildlife experts. That forecast is based on the recently completed statewide population survey of pheasants, quail, partridge, cottontail rabbits and jackrabbits.
Iowa’s pheasant population increased in every nine county region except northwest where it was similar to last year. ...

In-line planer boards are a very effective tool for catching walleyes and trout. In recent years some anglers have been employing boards to catch a variety of other species of fish. On a recent trip to Big Stone Lake on the Minnesota/South Dakota border we caught a bunch of perch in a short period of time, and planer boards were instrumental in our ability to do so. Here’s how we did it...

Saturday, Aug. 12 was quite a celebration here in northwest Iowa as the third annual Okoboji Blue Water Festival took place at the Green Space in Arnolds Park. One of the big attractions was the fishing seminar. At high noon under the shade of the big tent, over 70 eager anglers took their seats to hear the words of Iowa native and highly acclaimed tournament angler Tommy Skarlis. ...

Make that five straight for the Spirit Lake volleyball team, as the Indians clinched yet another first-place finish at their home tournament held Saturday. Spirit Lake defeated Sheldon, West Bend-Mallard, Estherville Lincoln Central and North Union twice. The Indians' lone loss came to North Iowa, as they went 5-1 on the day...

Okoboji hoped to add to its win total Friday night after a narrow victory over Sibley-Ocheyedan the previous week. However, the Pioneers simply didn't have the size to matchup with former 8-Player powerhouse Graettinger-Terril/Ruthven-Aysrhire, as the Titans topped the Pioneers 30-7 in Graettinger...

After struggling to negative yardage in a shutout loss to Northwood-Kensett last week, the Harris-Lake Park football team bounced back with a convincing victory over River Valley in the first week of district play Friday. The Wolves defeated the Wolverines 44-6 in Correctionville...

Spirit Lake's diverse attack was simply too much for Central Lyon/George-Little Rock to handle Friday night, as the fourth-ranked (2A) Indians remained undefeated on the season with a convincing 35-14 non-district road win over the Lions. The Indians totaled 459 yards of offense and limited the Lions to just 217 — 98 of which came on two long scoring runs...

Authorities on Thursday announced charges against a Jackson, Minnesota, man who is suspected of strangling his mother at their shared home on July 1. The Jackson County Attorney's Office released a statement of probable cause for a sequence of events that begin at about 7:10 p.m. on the last Sunday before the Fourth of July...

District Court Judge Carl J. Petersen on Monday said he will only grant attorneys "a short continuance" as they take depositions in the Nicholas Everett Thompson attempted murder trial. Thompson was scheduled to stand trial on Tuesday. Petersen now says the trial is "specially scheduled" to begin at 9 a.m. Tuesday, Sept. 25...