Mitch Calvert
One of the district’s popular fall fishing tournaments will not be a go this year.
Dale LaBelle, owner of LaBelle’s Birch Point Camp on Northwest Bay, said he no longer will be hosting the annual “Fall Bass Classic,” citing negative publicity associated with late fall tournaments.
“There’s just been a lot of bad publicity out there about fall tournaments in the newspapers and magazines,” LaBelle remarked, noting evidence has suggested a high mortality rate among tournament bass caught late in the year after they are reeled up from the deeper depths.
“We’ve always had enough anglers, getting teams isn’t the problem and the fishermen were great, but another thing was trying to work our customers around the tournament,” LaBelle added.
“We got a lot of fall crappie and bass fishermen that come out here, so we can’t really justify taking away cabin space [for the tournament].”
LaBelle said having the tournament so late in the year added other headaches to the already big undertaking involved with hosting such an event.
“It’s so much work, and it’s hard to get sponsors. Everyone is sponsored out by then,” he reasoned.
“It’s disappointing because it was good for the area and we had families fish together in it,” LaBelle lamented. “And since we decided to cancel it, we’ve had 15 people call and ask, but we just felt there’s other things we can do for a couple years and we’ll see after that.”
Another problem that arose last year was a scheduling conflict with the annual Rainy River Walleye Tournament as both ended up being on the same weekend.
“Rainy River changed their dates and we ended up on the same day,” LaBelle noted. “I used to fish in Rainy River all the time, even won it one year, and I’d like to go back and fish it but obviously couldn’t leave my own tournament to do that.”
LaBelle said the prospect of holding the tournament earlier in the year was never really an option, either.
“There’s so many tournaments in the summer already, and the economy isn’t very good right now,” he said.
