ONTARIO MÉTIS FACTS

For generations, family fishing—including commercial fishing—has been an important component of the Upper Great Lakes’ Northern Lake Superior Historic Métis Community’s traditional Métis way of life, including for the numerous Métis families living around Lake Nipigon. The Nipigon-area’s prominent Métis de Laronde family, for example, has practiced a Métis way of life rooted in the region’s lands and waters for generations. The de Laronde’s fishing traditions are immortalized

The Métis Nation of Ontario’s 1994 Founding Delegates Assembly adopted several resolutions to defend the exercise of inherent Métis harvesting rights and pursue negotiated harvesting agreements within the province. To guide these eventual negotiations, Founding Delegates also adopted resolutions articulating foundational Métis values, including strong direction that conservation and preservation become primary aims and objectives in any future Métis harvesting agreement: “The

The Upper Great Lakes Métis have been consistently recognized as a proud and distinct collectivity across generations, leaving a clear and repeated impression on those who travelled through the region. In the 1830s, for example, British writer Anna Jameson documented her journey through Georgian Bay, describing the Métis men in her party as, “picked men… young, well-looking, full of glee and good-nature, with untiring arms and more untiring lungs and spirits.” Jameson’s accou