Student angler groups in Minnesota, North Dakota get young people involved in the outdoors

"The Minnesota DNR felt so strongly about giving families and students the opportunity to fish that the Student Angler Organization was given a financial grant to build a new platform to do virtual tournaments during the pandemic," he said.

Students would catch, record and release their fish on water, measuring their catches using a bump board and with a length-to-points conversion.

"The virtual tournament was a great substitute when we couldn't get together in person," he said. "It was so good that when the SAO could resume in-person tournaments, the Minnesota DNR approached the organization and said, 'We would love it if you would do both in-person and virtual tournaments.'"

From there was born the

Lund Virtual Fishing League

, Agre said.

Today, the SAO conducts the virtual league, while the Minnesota Student Angler Tournament Trail hosts in-person events. Both groups have their own board of directors.

In the Lund league, students from age 5 through high school seniors can fish any body of water they want, just like a real tournament. They even conduct rules meetings and award ceremonies, all of it done through Zoom and Facebook.

Last year, there were about 240 two-person teams that participated in the league, a number that has been about average for the past several years.

Another difference between the two groups is that the in-person tournament is conducted on one water body, Agre said, while in the virtual league, student anglers can fish any bass water they'd like.

"You can be at grandma and grandpa's cabin, you can be at the lake down the road, you can be on vacation wherever," he said. "We've been able to open up a lot more opportunities doing it that way."

The aforementioned Lake Agassiz High School Fishing League, which Agre helped establish in 2019, is its own entity but has much the same purpose as the SAO — giving kids the opportunity to fish among their peers and helping them develop an appreciation for the outdoors.

When Fargo resident Chad Engels heard about the fishing league, he kept an eye on it, thinking it might be something he'd like to be a part of one day. That day came in 2022 when he started the Shanley High School Fishing Team in the league. Over the past few years, he's seen many students impacted by their participation, no less than his eighth-grade son.

Engels said the league is a great way to introduce students to team sports and the outdoors, as well as learn about the importance of conservation.

Ten schools from North Dakota, all of them in Cass County, participate in the Lake Agassiz High School Fishing League. In total, there are more than 250 student anglers this coming season. When the Shanley team started in 2022, it had 12 anglers, Engels said, but it has grown to 44 this year.

"We're one of the bigger ones this year," he said. "It's quite the program."

Engels likens student angling to another outdoors sport. "Clay shooting sports have really taken off across North Dakota and really across the United States, and competitive angling is experiencing the same type of growth now," he said. "It's been pretty cool to see that."

The league holds four tournaments in the summer, typically in June and July, which includes three regular season tournaments and its championship. Teams are divided into divisions, similar to some other sports, according to angler skill level — variety, junior varsity and open, the latter aimed at beginning anglers.

It is a catch-photo-release format with a length-to-points conversion for three each of the eligible tournament species of fish — walleye, northern pike, muskie, smallmouth and largemouth bass, crappie and other sunfish. The biggest five fish for a boat is tallied for points.

Boats can fish up to three anglers per boat. All of the tournaments are held in the Detroit Lakes and Pelican Rapids areas.

Engels said many of the coaches in the league have sportsmen backgrounds, angling and hunting among them; many, like Engels himself, are dads with boats. But the league is always looking for more boat captains.

He said the "secret sauce" of the program is the volunteers "who get the kids out on the water during our four tournament nights." Boat captains, he promised, "will always get more out of it than what they put into it, that much I know."

For the students, it's about helping develop an appreciation for the outdoors, something that Engels said will last a lifetime. He also said the aim is to grow the number of sportsmen and women in society, "so we have more people out there who care about the lakes, our fisheries, our environment and water quality."

For additional information about the Student Angler Organization and how to get involved, visit the group's website at studentangler.org.

To find out more about the Lake Agassiz High School Fishing League, including how to become a boat captain, visit

lakeagassizfishing.org

or its Facebook page,

facebook.com/LakeAgassizFishing

.