The 40th anniversary of the Orillia Perch Festival, organized by the Orillia District Chamber of Commerce, will wrap up Saturday.
This year’s festival began June 5 using a virtual platform via a cellphone app where anglers are asked to submit a photo of their catch so they can be entered into daily draws.
“It’s been a new thing for us, getting the app developed, and we seemed to be having some troubles with it at first, but we ended up getting it all straightened out and running smoothly,” said event organizer Doug Bunker.
“We had a lot of positive comments from people who were happy to get out in their bubble with their family and/or friends.”
Due to numerous factors, participation for this year’s perch festival is down from previous years.
“People using the app might have been intimidated, but I’ve heard from a lot of the older anglers who had no problem. We still have registrations coming in today and we will have a final count at the end of the event,” Bunker said.
“I don’t think we will reach our normal numbers this year, but the reviews from the participants show that they are pleased, and I think that’s what it’s all about.”
Bunker said the chamber will have to decide whether the virtual format is something it wants to use in the future, even in non-COVID years.
“It’s a system that we’ve got working, and we’ve invested a fair amount of money into it,” he said.
“I know there are some anglers that hope we go back to the traditional format because they like the social activity of everybody meeting and looking at the perch at Tudhope Park. So, we are going to have a meeting ...”
This year’s format expanded the festival's fishing area beyond Orillia, as anglers were able to catch their perch anywhere in Simcoe County.
“It really gave us a bigger footprint of areas where people could go fish,” Bunker said.
“The event used to draw a lot of people into town, and it still does in some ways. It’s a great draw and Orillia is known in the fishing community as the perch capital of Canada.”
This year there are 22 tagged perch up for grabs, with various prizes to be won. Janet Sammut, of Milton, caught the $1,000 tagged perch, sponsored by Chippewas of Rama First Nation, while fishing in Orillia.
“In usual years we have an actual tag on a fish, but this year it was done by a computerized randomizer, which is how all our draws are done now,” Bunker explained.
“This year has been special because we haven’t had any kids catch tagged perch in a number of years and, the first day, a four-year-old girl caught a $100 tagged perch, sponsored by the Orillia Fish and Game Conservation Club, and then a 14-year-old girl the next day caught a $500 tagged perch that was sponsored by Orillia Power.”
This Saturday the draw for the top prize, a new Lund 1650 Angler fishing boat from Gordon Bay Marina, will take place.
“It’s a fisherman’s dream. It’s loaded," Bunker said.
"It’s got a four-stroke horsepower engine, a Helix fish finder, a custom tunnel cover and a custom trailer,” he said.
Participants can still register for the perch festival here. Registration is open until the last day of the festival, Saturday. However, signing up sooner rather than later is recommended because every day participants fish, they get a chance to enter the daily draws.
“You could fish one day and win a $30,000 boat, fish two days and you get two chances,” Bunker said.
Registration is $25 for adults and $5 for children.
