This is big news! We are very pleased to announce that Ontario fly fishing guide & outfitter Rob Heal has joined the team at WILSON’S and will be working in our new Fergus fly shop when it opens in the coming weeks. Rob has been given the task of heading up and coordinating our fly fishing education and outfitting programs and we could not be more delighted to have him on our team!

If you are familiar with Rob Heal you already know that he is one of the most experienced and respected fly fishing drift boat guides in Ontario. Getting someone of Rob’s calibre is a coup by any measure and it is a union of strengths that will produce a level of outfitting, education and fly fishing retail in Ontario that has never been seen in the Province. To be honest, we can’t wait to get started! Anyone who has fished with or been guided by Rob over the past 16 years knows that he is passionate about teaching people and being on the river. This is a great opportunity for WILSON’S to take our fly fishing guiding and fly fishing school programs to a new level. Rob has been given the responsibility of putting together our new program and he has gathered together some of the other most skilled, experienced guides and pro-staffers in Ontario to create the most formidable team of drift boat and walk & wade fly fishing guides in the Province. Keep watching our website for more details in the coming days…

To learn more about what is happening with our new fly shop in Fergus, our schools and our guiding program please make www.CanadasFlyFishingOutfitter.com a favorite. We will continue to keep everyone updated via this blog and on Twitter @WILSONSFlyShop. In the interim please feel free to contact us with any questions or comments you may have – and of course guided trips! Rob is currently booking guided walk & wade trips on a number of destinations including of course the Grand River, the Credit River, Whiteman’s Creek, Bronte Creek, the Niagara River, the Humber River, the Ganaraska River, Bowmanville Creek, the Trent River, the Bighead River, the Mad River, the Beaver River, and the Saugeen River. We are also now booking fly fishing drift boat trips on the Grand River, the Saugeen River, the Maitland River, the Sauble River, and the Nottawasaga River.

We trust you will agree this is very cool but we have more announcements coming!

Stay tuned…

This photo appeared in today’s Globe and Mail and it may surprise many readers that there is fly fishing available within steps of a subway stop in the heart of downtown Toronto!

Find out where to go on the Humber and other good places to fly fish in Southern Ontario by checking out the fly fishing access maps in the member’s area of our website.

[Our June newsletter is online - check it out!]

Yesterday’s Globe and Mail published a short story about a joint effort by the Ontario Federation of Anglers and Hunters (OFAH), the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources (MNR), Toronto and Region Conservation Authority (TRCA), and Ontario Streams to stock 30,000 Atlantic Salmon fry on the Humber River. This picture, taken by Peter Power of the Globe and Mail, is of the salmon fry that were released on the Humber River at the edge of the Albion Hills Conservation Area.

Thank you to the Globe and Mail for covering this event. Their interest is appreciated and it is helping make people aware of the great work being done on the Humber River to bring the fishery back to what it once was. On that note, we won’t tell you exactly where this release took place but we will direct you to our fly fishing map of the Humber River that will be a pretty darned good place to start! While you are looking at our map section please don’t forgot to ‘Like’ us on FaceBook while you’re there… www.canadasflyfishingoutfitter.com/maps.php

I was recently invited by CBC Radio to do an interview on Metro Morning. This is CBC Radio’s flagship morning show that airs from 6 until 8:30am Monday through Friday and it is the top-rated radio morning show in Toronto. In spite of having to get up at 4:30 to drive downtown I jumped at the opportunity and although I stumbled a bit (I hadn’t had my first cup of coffee) I hope the interview got people in Toronto who do not currently fish to at least give it a try. I have to admit it was fun getting ‘behind the scenes’ at the CBC and the interviewer, Karen Horsman, was very pleasant and a delight to meet. The goal of the interview for the CBC was to get people thinking about fishing in the Greater Toronto Area but my goal was to get those same people thinking about taking up fly fishing. We covered a lot of ground in the 6 minutes we had ‘on air’ and I hope it helps get more people into our sport.

If you would like to listen to the broadcast (even just for a laugh…) you can click on www.cbc.ca/video/news/audioplayer.html?clipid=1896925442

With the snow finally – and quickly – disappearing I have been making occasional trips to the banks of my favorite stretches of river to check on the conditions and see if there are any new pools that may have been carved by the spring thaw. The other thing I have been doing is taking advantage of the lack of underbrush at this time of year to pick up garbage at access points and along the river banks. Candy wrappers, water bottles, cigarette boxes, coffee cups and lids and styrofoam containers are the usual haul but on occasion, like yesterday, there are things like beer bottles, copies of the fishing regulations (at least they were responsible on one level) and a hookah pipe which made for a very relaxing day for someone on the water last year…

I started carrying small plastic garbage bags with me while fly fishing a few years ago to have a place to put the refuse I found along the way. Although a small gesture, picking up any garbage I find makes every outing that much more rewarding. If you are heading out to check on your favorite water in the coming weeks we encourage you to keep a few small plastic bags and a pair of gardening gloves in the trunk of your car with a larger bag in which to put the garbage you find (the larger one will keep your car clean). If we all take a few extra minutes to do a little bit of spring cleaning it will make a world of difference.

Now, if I can only do the same thing around the house…