Fishing is a family affair |
GARY BALL
Special to Sun Media
You don't have to keep up to the Johnstons to get a real charge out of Canada's National Fishing Week, July 3 to 11 this year.
The Johnstons from Peterborough, Ont., are among the most fish-happy families in Canada. They just figure that the family that fishes together has a whole lot of fun -- together or on their own. If the season is open in the Kawartha Lakes region they call home, you can bet the Johnstons are out there fishing. For them, family fishing week is every week of the season.
Fishing is big in Canada with an estimated 4.2 million Canadian anglers on the water in 1996 (the most recent figures available from Environment Canada). In Ontario alone, about 17% of the population went fishing, using 27.4 million recreational days in pursuit of fish.
National Fishing Week is a coast-to-coast celebration of Canada's rich fishing tradition; an opportunity for new anglers to get involved. It is supported by all Canada's provinces and territories and backed by the industry group, the Canadian National Sportfishing Foundation. In some provinces and territories there are licence-free fishing days as a part of the events. For more information on National Fishing Week events in your region, contact the foundation at (705) 745-8433 or visit the websites www.catchfishsing.com or www.nationalfishingweek.com.
FUN AND COMPETITION
For Peterborough's Johnstons family, fishing is divided into two major chunks, fun and competition, with one as important as the other. If they aren't fishing in a tournament, they're pre-fishing for a tournament, talking tournament strategy or just plain "fun-fishing."
The Johnston fishing clan starts with Dad, Lynn Johnston, and Mom, Ann. Ann gets the lead role on this fishing team, as an angler herself and team quartermaster. But she launched the tournament family, buying Lynn his first rig for walleye tournaments ... a tin boat complete with 9.9-hp motor. That was nearly 20 years ago and Lynn has made quite a name for himself in tournaments ever since.
His fishing footprints are being followed by sons Cory, 18, Chris, 15, and daughter Nicole, 11, all active anglers for fun and for sport.
Their dad teamed with another Peterborough angler, Bob Gardner, the year Gardner beat up all the competition and won The Classic, Ontario's top bass tournament prize. He figures his tournament take (winnings not profits) at something more than $250,000 in cash and prizes.
The oldest of the Johnston offspring, Cory, started fishing at the age of two or three, his mom says. With his dad as a coach and tournament partner, Cory began to make a name for himself as a tournament angler to watch just a dozen years later. In 1999 he became (at 14) the youngest competitor to earn a berth in Ontario's bassin's showdown, The Chevy/Mercury Bass Tour Classic.
A berth in The Classic (earned through a qualifying tournament series) is the stuff of dreams for most tournament anglers. Cory did it in his first year of formal competition. He was so young that he had to cram for his boat operator's licence exam two days before The Classic. The boat licence let him operate his fishing rig, while there was a licensed adult aboard. But he was still too young to take the wheel of the family truck and trailer rig to and from the launch site. Dad Lynn was tied up with his own rig and enjoying the charge of fishing head-to-head against Cory in The Classic.
Mom Ann pitched in and handled the chauffeur and boat launch honours ... at 5:30 each morning.
If this were a Disney story, Cory would, of course, have battled the odds and fished bravely to win The Classic. This is a fishing tale, not a Disney dream. Cory, fishing alone, hung tough and weighed in a respectable 19.20 pounds of bass, good enough for 37th spot in a field of 50 adult bass specialists. Dad Lynn took 19th spot with 28.45 pounds of fish. He confessed to being relieved at finishing ahead of his 14-year-old son.
"Figured it was the only way I'd be able to live in my own house until the next season," he laughed.
Cory stuck with his fishing and still hits the tournaments hard. Sponsors like Shimano Canada and Lowe Boats have used him in fishing and boating shows and at in-store product promotions. In his first four seasons of bass fishing he banked his share of the tournament earnings and pro-staff fees, about $51,000.
FATHER AND SON
In 2003 15-year-old Chris and Lynn did really well as a tournament father and son pair winning Team of the Year honours in the Reel Fish'n and taking top spot (along with a boat and motor) in the Reel Fish'n wrapup Classic. The three fishing Johnstons partnered with each other and with friends they've introduced to the sport in too many tournaments to record here. They finished in the prize money in 16 of the 19 tournaments they fished and in the top three spots in seven of those, with an exciting four events in which they were the number two team.
Nicole? Well as enthusiastic an angler as she is, Nicole at 11, has yet to fish her first tournament, but she did catch a tagged rainbow trout five minutes before the end of a Peterborough youngsters' derby and won a new bicycle.
Mom Ann likes her children being involved in fishing, for fun and sport.
"My biggest problem is getting these guys to ... put the fishing pole down for supper."
