Bruce Peninsula fishing derby belly up

[Spiel]

Bruce Peninsula fishing derby belly up

 

 

May 27, 2009

Rob Gowan / www.owensoundsuntimes.com

 

 

The troubled economy has claimed the Bruce Peninsula Fishing Derby and the Chantry Chinook Classic may not be far behind.

 

After 27 years the annual Bruce Peninsula event, which attracts about 3,000 anglers to the waters of the peninsula each year, is being cancelled for 2009.

 

If the Chantry Chinook Classic loses money, as it did last year, this year’s July 25-Aug. 8 event may be the last.

 

“With the economy and everyone stretched so thin it just hasn’t been feasable this year,” Bruce Peninsula derby chairman Bruce Atchison said Tuesday. “We’ve had 27 great years, but this year with everything going on with the economy and some of our local sponsors and major sponors not having the financial way to help out as much, we were unable to do it.”

 

Atchison said it costs about $30,000 to put on the annual event and the committee came up “well short” of meeting the financial requirements for this year’s event. The derby ran each year beginning on the Thursday before the Labour Day weekend until the Sunday of the long weekend.

 

“Things were looking pretty good right up until February, March and everything sort of went downhill from there,” Atchison said.

 

Atchison said those involved with the event are hoping they can revive it once the economy rebounds.

 

“Whether it is the same format or something a little different, we are just not sure yet,” Atchison said. “We are still meeting to decide what we are going to try and do.”

 

The annual event attracted anglers from all over, including as far away as New York and Florida, Atchison said. It included the water of Georgian Bay from Wiarton to Tobermory and Lake Huron from Tobermory to just outside Sauble Beach and all the inland lakes in between. Each year, more than 1,500 fish were weighed in trout, pike, perch, largemouth bass, smallmouth bass and salmon categories.

 

Atchison said the quality of fishing in recent years hasn’t been as good as in the past and that also factored into their decision to cancel.

 

“The numbers of fish in all the derbies have been down and the salmon fishing has not been great in the past few years and the perch have not been as plentiful,” Atchison said. “We have been trying to do conservation things so this year we thought, let’s just let things be and see how it goes.”

 

Ray Walser, president of the Lake Huron Fishing Club, which puts on the Chantry Chinook Classic each year, said they have had no problem finding sponsors this year, but instead of giving cash, many are giving merchandise instead.

 

“Probably the biggest thing is that in the past people would often throw you a cash donation, but now it’s merchandise, which doesn’t cost them as much,” Walser said.

 

Walser said five or six years ago the club made a lot of money off the derby, which attracts about 1,100 anglers each year, but now they are either breaking even or losing money.

 

“We lost money last year, we broke even the year before and we broke even the year before that,” said Walser. “If we lose money this year I don’t see it continuing on. We cannot run the derby at a loss. There is no possible way.”

 

Walser said the size and numbers of fish have dropped in recent years and that has also had a negative impact on the event.

 

“Years ago if you came to this derby you caught a lot of fish, but now it is tough,” Walser said. “With the collapse of the baitfish in Lake Huron the salmon have collapsed along with them. We’ll always catch salmon, but we will never catch them in the numbers we used to.”

 

Fred Geberdt, co-chair of the Owen Sound Salmon Spectacular, which attracts between 3,500 and 4,500 anglers each year, is expecting more than 3,000 anglers to take part in the 22nd version of the event Aug. 28 to Sept. 6.

 

“There are some ups and downs, but we are holding our own,” Geberdt said Tuesday. “We have about 170 sponsors altogether and we found a few that had problems with a downturn in their profitable business for the year, but we had others who have stepped up to the plate that we never had before.”

 

Geberdt said the spring fishery actually looked good this year and the Sydenham Sportsmen’s Association, which puts on the event, has been busy with its hatchery getting fish ready to be stocked.

 

“You talk to anybody who was on the water this spring and we had a real good fishery this spring,” said Geberdt, who added that while collecting rainbow trout eggs at the Mill Dam in April fish numbers were high. “There is still some talk of the baitfish problems, but if you talk to the guys in Wiarton they had a real good run of smelt this year.

 

“We had a dramatic drop in size of Chinook salmon because of the loss of alewife . . . but we’re finding Chinook salmon have turned onto smelt and sticklebacks so our fish are well muscled. You don’t get the 30-pounders anymore, but we get comfortably good-sized 18- to 20-pounders.”