recommendations to make the lake a more pleasant experience:

[flyhigh123]

I can't even consider dvl due to my 2 stroke. But I doubt that one will ever change.

[ghost2uu]

1. How about a fish cleaning station like every other lake in California.
2 Permanent restrooms with stalls where you can actually sit on the toilet and not have your knees pressing against the door of it.
3. How about some fishermen's hours. Enough of the kangaroo rat b.s. for keeping the lake closed. Fishermen must wait until daylight but park employees can go tearing up the road in the dark at 4 a.m.?
4. Get rid off all the *** hats working there. I pay money and use my time to come there. I don't need some punk acting like it's a privilege that I am there.
5. Shore fishermen getting screwed with the trail pass even though they can only go on 2 miles of shore line.
6. Open the lake earlier and keep it open later.
7. Please see #6
8. I like the trout plants taking place at the marina, it gives shore anglers a great shot at the fish as they spread out over the next couple days.
9. Updated trout stock information. It seems this is the only lake that hides it's stock days and locations. I can call any other lake and get the day and location stocked. Here is it some secrete society. (Thanks Kwin)
10. Please see #6

[sweetfish]

These are all great ideas.

My biggest beef with DVL is the fees. For me to launch my boat there and have 2 others fishing with me, the cost is $27.00 bucks. However with the same situation at Skinner and Perris I pay $22.00 for Skinner or $18.00 for Perris. I know it is only like 5 bucks but with 4 kids and other expenses the 5 bucks could be used on something else. Plus the hours are ridiculous. They should make it like other lakes 1/2 before sunset instead of the 6:30 or 6:45 cutoff.

[HuskerRod]

Believe it or not I beleive a lot of people are turned away because of simple economics. My DVL year pass cost me $450. My Perris Poppy Pass, which is good at Perris and a whole lot of other places, was less then half. Plus..........................DVL then tacks on a $3 per person fishing fee on top of the $450.00 annual pass every time you fish. DVL also charges an additional $25 for a shore fishing pass on top of the $450 year pass if you want to leave the boat at home and fish from shore. And for a while DVL was charging an additional $2 to tag your boat at the end of the day.....wow.

My personal gripe are the lake hours. The lake closes way to early, but unfortunately since it is designated a wildlife refuge area they are required to open no earlier then an hour after first light and close no later then an hour before sunset. To bad, those are some of the best times to be out there. This summer I'd fish until the lake closed, which was 7:00. Im not sure if it ever went to 7:30 pm, but I eventually just switched to Perris where I could beat the heat and fish considerably later.

[dockboy]

I like DVL a lot, even at 250 a round trip.

• Fees are pretty steep. For an additonal $5, I can launch and fish Irvine till 2am
• The inspections are good, but is it really necessary to deny non MWD tags? Its not 2008 anymore, just about every local lake has a quagga inspection or a cable system that works.
• Open it to the night fishing at least twice a month
• Open the lake earlier. Driving 2 hours knowing I cant even fish the best topwater period during the summer sucks
• Chop the fishing fee. I'm already paying $30 to launch at your lake and probably investing another $40 in gas at local gas stations. Adding a fishing fee is just greedy.
• Why can I launch a 2 stroke at Perris and Silverwood, and Big Bear (arguably far more "pristine" then DVL) but not DVL? They are all water supply no? So why the double standard?

[seal]

[*]Why can I launch a 2 stroke at Perris and Silverwood, and Big Bear (arguably far more "pristine" then DVL) but not DVL? They are all water supply no? So why the double standard? [/LIST]

Their time will come and I'd bet sooner rather than later.

[GdHkSet1]

Pretty cool to read all the feedback, I have a couple of gripes but my good experiences and many fun memories at DVL far outweigh the negatives of this fine
fisherie that they established back from the rearing pond to present day.

1. Extend hours of operation from at least Mar thru Oct

2. Shore access for handicap disabled( a long shot - due to the shore configuration and changing water levels) a fishing pier/dock would be cool but only when the water levels would be optimum)

3. Fee adjustments.

4. Allow Tubers

Thanks Matt for the thread and conversation.

[mod12man]

For us, it's simple. DVL costs $31.00 for me and my 2 kids and boat. Perris costs $18.00 for the same. Both are great fisheries, but the $13.00 savings is huge these days with money so short for everyone. We go to Perris 5 times for every 1 time that we go to DVL. If costs were the same, or even a bit closer, we would Fish DVL more often.

[BassinPLS]

Matt, Thank you for your thoughtful post of this thread. Hopefully you do not catch too much heat for it; but it is obviously "well intentioned"!

I thought I would share some insight I have in the additional development at DVL. MWD has a Master Plan of Development which was approved when the lake was developed. However, MWD is not in the development business. They are in the water business. The improvements in accordance with the Master Plan will, (eventually), been done by private developers. I am now retired; however, when I was working, I was to be the Project Master for the final engineering plans working for a partnership between Centex Homes and Eastbridge Partner. These two companies had been selected by MWD to develop the vacate lands east of the east dam. The way the development agreement with MWD worked was the private development entity would do a million dollars worth of improvements and in exchange the developers would get a million dollars worth of land to develop. The lands north of Domenigoni Parkway and east of the lake entrance road is Master Planned for housing. The land immediately east of the eats dam is planned for a golf course, another smaller lake for sail boats, etc., a hotel and other facilities, all of which I don't recall at this time. Part of the required improvements was to run a sewer line into the marina, which requires the installation of a sewer lift station to pump the waste out of the marina area. All of these improvements were to be made at the developers expense in exchange for land.

After extension number crunching I was advised by the original development team mentioned above that they were not able to get the numbers to work out because MWD was putting too high of value on the land, (in other words they would receive too little land for the costs of the improvements they were required to make). MWD let them bow out and started negotiations with the second place development team in the beauty contest. I was later told that due to the down turn in the economy they too backed out.

The economy will turn around and the Master Plan improvements will someday be developed, (I hope). One thing we have to understand is MWD is not in the land development business and we can only hope for better times allowing the improvements to proceed.

In the mean time...I sure wish the fishing at DVL would get back to were it was prior to the draw down!!

[Hardcor]

Hi Matt,
Thanks for this post and your videos. I find them very informative. I have only fished DVL twice this year and not had any problems other than not catching as many bass as I did in prior years. I had not fished the lake since before the ramp extension.

My Perris seal was respected both times and no boat inspection at all.
Never had any problems with the staff in the store and the guy at the gate is sure nice. Always compliments me for bringing my kids fishing.
As somebody else said, I do wish they had better restrooms and a sign at the gate or ramp telling us if the floating ones are out of order would be nice. That way I would not have to break the speed limit getting to the other one.

Is it really 25mph? I max out at about 40 but some of those 250hp guys are screaming across the lake. And those are the same guys who ask me why I put that bass in my live well. But they don't seem believe me when I tell them my kids like to look at them once in a while when the fishing is slow. Keeps them interested. But we always C&R bass by the end of the day. They just need to mind their own business. Sorry, getting off subject.

I feel for the shore fishermen but I would imagine it would be pretty expensive to extend the paths and/or make them better. And then there is the safety issue. How do provide emergency services for those anglers spread out all over the lake? Perhaps they could open up another part of the lake with an existing road just for shore fisherman.

I was approached both times this year by a young gal who was taking a catch census. Thought that was pretty cool and I told her that I hope the DFG keeps it up. Maybe they could provide a website so we could enter our hours fished and catch with some kind of incentive for posting our data. I am a data guy by trade and I know fish biologists use data to manage fisheries. I hope everyone is cooperating with that.

Great thread!

Nothing gets done as-s kissing !