The nearby vast Lake Simcoe is something of a beacon for anyone in south and central Ontario keen on fishing.
But for the Aurora BassMasters, focused on recreational competitive fishing, anything within a two-hour drive is game, further out if higher-level competition beckons.
“We like to go everywhere,” says current president Scott Cochran, who, at 16, joined the club in 1995 during its first year. “What we like to do is always keep the tournaments within a two-hour drive of downtown Aurora.
“We go all the way up the 400 corridor and fish Georgian Bay. We fish the Kawarthas.”
The Aurora club was Canada’s first BassMasters. Now there are more than 30 clubs in Ontario, serving as a division of the Bass Anglers Sportsman Society based in the United States. It attracts both recreational and competitive fishers and hosts 10 tournaments every year.
Local tournaments serve as qualifiers for regional events that can lead a rare opportunity to participate in the elite Bassmaster Classic, a high-profile tournament with healthy cash prizes geared for professionals.
But for Cochran, Aurora BassMasters is at its core about the community, taking part in local events and giving back.
Every year since most of its existence, Aurora BassMasters has hosted the Urban Fishing Festival in early July at Fairy Lake, in the heart of Newmarket. Partnering with the Newmarket Optimist Club, as well as York Region’s police and fire departments, and with the help of sponsors, members come equipped with 300 rods and reels and get the fishing for prizes.
The club also has a highway cleanup day, usually around Earth Day. Members volunteer to clean the surrounding area along both sides of a two-kilometre section of Old Yonge Street in Holland Landing, pulling out about a ton of debris.
Longtime member Wil Wegman was the backbone for conservation efforts within the club for many years. Wegman, who died from cancer last year, had created an ongoing relationship between the club and the provincial Natural Resources Ministry, where he worked, and the Lake Simcoe Region Conservation Authority.
“We’ve removed water soldier, which is an invasive weed, out of certain bodies of water around the Lake Simcoe watershed. We’ve helped with wild rice stocking in Barnstaple Bay at the top end of Lake Simcoe. We’ve improved bass-spawning habitat in the Talbot River, which is on the northeast side of Lake Simcoe, too,” adds Cochran. “And we’re always getting new projects that we can get into as well.”
When it comes to the fishing part, members take the catch-and-release approach. They use bass boats equipped with proper aeration and live wells to keep the fish alive to protect the resource. But members have created an app that allows them to weigh fish as soon as they catch the fish, allowing them to quickly return the fish to the water.
The club emphasizes that boats aren’t necessary, anyone can join and can easily find a spot on a member’s boat. While bass can be fished from shore, privatization of many shorelines limits access to lakes, Cochran explains.
“Our tournaments are both boater and non-boater,” he says, “they’re randomly paired up before the tournament begins.
“This is more about getting people on the water and introducing them to fishing or helping them to continue their lifelong passion to fish.”
Bass season is from late June until November in Ontario when the tournaments are held, but the club meets monthly all year-long, including all 40 members.
