Several weeks ago, when Brian Vickery suggested I compete in the upcoming Canadian Fly Fishing Championships, I was rather hesitant to do so. This year's competition is being held on the Grand River, and although the Grand is less than an hour from where I live, I have seldom fished it in the past. I have preferred some of the further away rivers like the Saugeen and Thames.

Ernie With A Nice 22" Rainbow From Crabapple Creek, Texas

But Brian convinced me to sign up with "Team Osprey," (yeah, I know.. very original name for a fishing team!), captained by Ernie Kalwa. I'm glad Brian convinced me as well - I've had the opportunity to meet some other great anglers as we prepare - and of course it's given me an excuse to do a lot of fly fishing so far this spring!

I thought I'd like to profile the 5 other members of our team over the upcoming weeks, starting with Captain Ernie. Ernie is a super guy that knows the Grand River well as he lives only minutes away. He's also been a judge in a previous Canadian Fly Fishing Championship event, so he's well suited to captain the team. But not only has Ernie fished the Grand often, he's also had many opportunities to fly fish in Texas where a relative of his operates a fly shop, and out on the Bow River near Calgary. In fact, he just returned from The Bow a few days ago and I'm waiting to hear about his success.

It seems that Ernie has angling in his genes. Not only was he born on the river - the Indian River near Peterborough, Ontario, his father, grandfather and great-grandfather were avid anglers. Under the tutelage of dad and grandpa, Ernie grew up throwing hardware with spinning gear to the local fish at Crooks Rapids, now known as Hastings while sometimes heading onto other Kawartha Lake waters.

Of course, like all good (ok, I'm being facetious!) anglers, Ernie has become a fly only fisher. Living in Elora provides him with great opportunities to spend a few hours each day when he can, fishing for the brown trout that the Grand River has become famous for. As well as fly fishing, Ernie spends his time working as a database consultant, a jazz musician and is serving his second term President of the Central Ontario Musicians' Association.

Maybe he'll provide some musical entertainment for us during the competition.

I've had the pleasure of spending several hours fishing with Ernie on the Grand River and have found him to be a very helpful as well as knowledgable angler. It was he who put me on to the feeding lanes where I caught 7 brown trout in one hour of evening fishing a couple of weeks back. And for the record, Ernie hooked and landed over 14 trout that evening!

As soon as Ernie gets settled back in from this trip out west, he'll be getting a phone call from me to plan another outing as soon as possible with him, to the Grand. I know that I'll be the beneficiary of some knowledge that I'll putting to use!

Previous Features

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