Popular Attraction

A full house of fishermen and Oliver Lake enthusiasts crowed into the Kimball County Transit building meeting room to get an update on the history, current happenings, and future plans for the popular recreational site.

South Platte Natural Resource General Manager Galen Wittrock introduced the Oliver Reservoir Advisory Committee and then talked budget. The Oliver operating budget is $78,537, and the donations box has netted over $21,000 the past year. Wittrock explained that donations work better for Oliver because if there were a fee, then an employee would have to be hired to enforce the fee. Donations have come from all over the United States and many foreign countries.

Long-time Oliver Lake supporter Larry Stahla was slated to give the history of the lake, but while he was under the weather advisory member Jim Young handled the role.

Young explained the process for Oliver Lake started in 1909 as the Kimball Irrigation District. The district was to irrigate 5,000-7,000 acres. The dam was started in 1910 and was scheduled to cost $250,000. It was completed in Dec. 1911, and the total bill came in at $260,000.

In building the dam, they used 60 teams of horses for construction, and it was the fastest completed dam in history.

When the dam was finished, and the canals were running with water, local farmers first experimented with sugar beets in 1911 and recorded an impressive 20 tons to the acre.

By 1974, after 60 years of irrigating area farms, the Nebraska Department of Water Resources Director ordered the Kimball Irrigation District to make "repairs on the aging dam or the water in it would be returned to natural flow along Lodgepole Creek."

With only 23 landowners in the Kimball Irrigation District, repairs were not feasible; the district recommended that the dam be breached.

From 1975 to 1980, Save the Lake raised thousands of dollars, and dozens of locals volunteered equipment and time. On July 18, 1980, Oliver Dam passed the final inspection, but irrigation wells had affected the flow of Lodgepole Creek along with lake seepage and evaporation, so for all practical purposes, the lake was extremely low and unusable.

Two significant weather events came to the aid of Oliver. In 1981, 9 inches of rain fell near Albin, Wyo., and in two hours Oliver went from empty to full – and reports say that water was within one foot of the emergency spillway. In 2013, a huge snowstorm hit the area and the melting snow helped the water level at Oliver.

The South Platte NRD acquired Oliver 10 years ago for recreational activities. The south side of the lake is considered a primitive area with only walking accessibility. Oliver is still considered a "high hazard dam," so the water level is maintained at a safe operating status.

SPNRD's Chris Kaiser explained the health/safety monitoring done on Oliver. Quarterly the SPNRD samples for bacteria and yearly samples are sent in for nitrates.

For many, the most exciting information was presented by the Nebraska Game and Parks. Stocking the lake will occur in early June.

The Nebraska Game and Parks highlighted species: "Walleye abundance at Oliver in 2021 was 17.7 fish per gillnet. After a surge of water in 2014 that nearly filled the reservoir, the population has rebounded back.

Walleye in Oliver are slower growing and do not reach the minimum length limit of 15 inches until their third or fourth growing season. The average size of walleye collected in the 2021 survey was approximately 13.8 inches, and the largest collected was 24.7 inches."

Catfish which were sampled in 2021, measured 15.4 inches total length, although the gillnet catch was 4.5 fish per net which is low. Oliver gets stocked on an annual basis with 10-inch channel catfish at four fish per surface acre of water.

The white crappie fishing population declined after 2011, although they grow well in Oliver. According to Game and Parks, crappie are most vulnerable in the spring when they move into shallow water to spawn. Popular angling methods include jigs with plastic tails, small crank baits, and live minnows fished with a float or bobber.

Wittrock also credited locals who clean up trash often left by campers. There are no plans to alter the "Pack it in/Pack it out" system.

Even though the area is suffering from drought conditions, Oliver continues to maintain a good water level.