Tournament brings out the community in us all

Sometimes you can be taken fully aback by the generosity of a group of people. On Sunday at the weigh in of the Sioux Narrows Bassin for Bucks tournament, Joe Pritchett silenced the crowd when he asked them to chip in to help a tournament fisherman Roy Lemay who had fallen from a ladder and sustained several back fractures that will leave him a parapalegic.
Without hesitation, everyone in the crowd reached for their wallets and as Dorese Harrison walked through the crowd, holding a hat, it filled and became heavier and heavier. By the end of the weigh-in, the hat required two hands to hold it up and the cap brimmed over with financials support for the injured fisherman.
Not to be outdone, the tournament announced that it would top up the support with the proceeds from that days profits.
True community support and spirit shone through from the community of fishermen and community in Sioux Narrows.
The annual Bassin for Bucks tournament has a different format than other tournaments in the area. Prizes are awarded each day for first through sixth finishes with grand aggregate prizes awarded at the end of the third day of fishing. The tournament may not have the hoopla of Fort Frances, Rainy River or Emo, but it has a real community closeness.
That might be because so many of the anglers earn their living guiding at the lodges on Lake of the Woods and are part of the community of Sioux Narrows-Nester Falls. It might be that they take so many out of town anglers into their homes and share the richness of experiences that they have accumulated in their lives fishing on the lakes of Northwestern Ontario.
It might be that the tournament goes out of its way to encourage husband and wife teams and to encourage parent children teams.
Just as anglers arrive from across Canada and the United States in Fort Frances for the Fort Frances Canadian Bass Championship, friends have drawn to Sioux Narrows fishers from the US and Canada.
This year, for the first time in many years, the tournament had to suffer through summer weather. It may have mixed up the fish, but it put smiles on everyone’s face. The winners Bob Horley and Jim Fadden who were in 37th place after the first two days of fishing, brought in a bag weighing 20.29 pounds mid way in the final weighing.
They had to sit through the balance and watch the top ten come to the Big Top. Each of the top ten teams were marked with the weight they needed to win, but the expectation that one of them would knock off Horley and Fadden kept disappearing.
Sunday was Rob Horley’s and Jim Fadden’s Day. They probably have set a new record in Bass Tournament fishing in coming from so far back in a bass tournament to win it on the final day.
Other community tournaments are still on the horizon. They include the Robert Ottertail Jr. tournament on Lac La Croix, The Crowe Lake Classic, the Rainy River Walleye tournament, and a new walleye tournament hosted by Naicatchewenin (North West Bay) First Nation.

–Jim Cumming,
Publisher