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BIG ISLAND FIRST NATIONS, ONTARIO — When I fish, it's usually a solitary affair. There may be other folks in my boat, but I like to be the only boat around.

I avoid fishing in the same area if others are there first, and, if someone moves into the spot where I’m fishing, I usually pull up lines and move on. Luckily, the lake where I like to fish has more spots than boats.

The same usually holds true for ice fishing. But once each winter, in years when I get the chance, I join a boisterous outdoor ice party called the Big Island Fishing Derby, sponsored by the Big Island First Nations band of Ojibwe.

Entry tickets are $40 and the rules are pretty simple. From 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., you can bring in any walleye or pike you catch to get weighed, but it has to be alive. Organizers encourage catch and release.

It's mostly a day of organized confusion.

This year, the crowd that gathered seemed especially loud and happy. Maybe it was the fact it was 26 degrees above zero and not 26 below. Or maybe it was the first big social event many had been at in months, a chance to see friends and neighbors they hadn’t seen in a while due to winter’s cold and ongoing pandemic precautions.

If you think Minnesota’s COVID-19 rules were tough, Ontario’s were far more restrictive (indoor masking is still required.) Maybe this was their COVID coming-out party?

For most of the day, I sat in my little green tent and listened. Occasionally, I’d look up from watching my fish-finder and out through the clear plastic windows to see what the closest source of commotion was.

Kids, all seemingly enjoying a sugar high from Mountain Dew and candy bars, played king of the hill on snow piles and took turns taking rides in sleds pulled behind snowmobiles. Their giddy laughter was almost constant for seven hours.

Occasionally, I’d hear an older person laugh, too. And every once in a while, you’d hear someone holler with excitement, off in the distance, and then a truck would start up and head toward the derby weigh station housed in a trailer parked on the ice. Some of the trucks even had mufflers.

The staccato crackle of gas-powered ice augers was almost constant, too, along with the whir of the popular new battery-powered augers, as contestants sought new holes with more fish under them.

Young boys were showing off their snowmobile skills, and the "brrraaaaat" sound of a machine accelerating from 20 to 50 mph in seconds was often in the air, just off in the distance, safely away from any anglers.

There were upward of 100 trucks and cars parked on the ice, spread out over a mile or so, a couple dozen snow machines and probably 300 or more people. The ice sagged a little in one area, sending water gushing up out of holes in that spot. But with a solid 3 feet of ice under us, there wasn’t much danger of anyone going through.

The fishing, for me and some friends around me, was painfully slow. Agonizingly slow. Frustratingly slow. I’ve written about some of my best days on my favorite lake, with dozens of walleyes caught in a matter of hours.

But here’s a disclosure of honesty and incompetence that I never thought I’d have to make: I did not catch a single walleye that day. Not even a little one. That’s never happened there before.

Granted, it was a spot I'd never fished before, and wouldn't have fished if not for the derby. But in seven hours of fishing I managed only a single northern pike. Just to stretch my legs, I stuffed the fish in a plastic bag and drove it up to the weigh station. The scale stopped moving at 4.13 pounds. Not much, but at least I was on the board. The pike went back in the lake.

But that was it. I never caught another fish. It was among the worst days of fishing I can recall — if fishing was only about catching. In the past, I’ve done pretty well in these events. I caught the fourth-place walleye one year and fifth place another time. One year, I won an expensive fishing rod and reel set in a raffle. Another year, my daughter won a pink Barbie fishing rod-and-reel combo.

Alas, this year, my 4.13-pound northern pike finished in sixth place, one fish out of the money. It took a 14-pound pike to win the northern category. The biggest walleye was over 6 pounds and garnered the angler a $2,500 cash prize.

After the fishing ended at 5 p.m., contestants gathered at the tribal hall, where a raffle was held, with giant-screen televisions, fishing rods, a battery-powered ice auger, an iPad and dozens of other prizes handed out. Just not any to me.

I didn’t catch a single walleye all day. I didn't win a prize for my pike. I didn’t win a single thing in the raffle. But I caught myself smiling as I walked, empty handed, back to the truck. It had been a joy to be around so many people having so much fun, goofing around outdoors, whether they were catching fish or not.

Just for being there, at their party on the ice, I was the big winner.

John Myers reports on the outdoors, environment and natural resources for the Duluth News Tribune. He can be reached at jmyers@duluthnews.com .