Articles by Kade McCormick
Kade McCormick is an avid outdoorsman and conservationist based out of Calgary, Alberta. Growing up in a family devoted to hunting, fishing and conservation, his upbringing was filled with floating rivers, chasing birds and volunteering at Ducks Unlimited (DU) banquets. While attending Lethbridge College for a degree in Ecosystem Management, Kade put lacrosse behind him to focus on fly fishing, hunting and a career in conservation.
Kade was a summer student with DU before working full-time as project and land manager in southwest Alberta for 5 years. During this time, Kade finetuned his skills in fly fishing in southern Alberta and began guiding with a drift boat on the Bow River with his family outfit, Red Willow Outdoors Inc. In the fall, he spends more time hunting upland gamebirds with his French Brittany, Bob. He has now spent 10 years dedicating his life to the pursuit of the outdoors.
Kade now works as a fisheries biologist for the Alberta Conservation Association in west-central Alberta. He has volunteered with various DU chapters, Pheasants Forever Calgary, and Trout Unlimited, and strives to make a positive impact to Alberta’s fisheries.
Kade is a contributing author to Barry Mitchell’s Alberta Fishing Guide and The Fishin’ Hole online content and has been published in the Alberta Hunting Regulations.
His fly rod has travelled from northern Saskatchewan to the Caribbean saltwater flats, and from Vancouver Island to the east coast of New Hampshire. Most of his time, however, is spent fishing the variety of species southern Alberta has to offer. Though if he had it his way, he may just hunt for trophy brown trout.
A fish feeding on the surface will have two distinct looks. The first is when it eats a bug sitting on top of the water surface. It will stick only its snout out of the water. You can often see a bug float into its range and anticipate the eat.
There is mystique about the night. The silence. I cannot help to wonder what monsters stir, not to be seen in the light of day. Brown trout being nocturnal, it only makes sense. But to the advantage of all trout, night is when aerial predators are held mostly at bay.
Alberta is littered with quality, accessible trout streams, but a lot of travel is involved in exploration. Your buddies and an online search can’t always prepare you for current river conditions, how do you know what to expect?
Spring weather lifts the burden of old man winter off southern Alberta and coaxes fly fishers from their vices onto open rivers. As some of the only open water around, early migrants bring the river to life. Franklin’s gulls break the silence of winter, ducks are flashing their breeding plumage, and soon swallows will fill the sky in a frenzy. Itching to just get back on the river, expectations are tempered with shaking the dust off your cast and soaking some rays in mind. Low water temperatures hold fish from being active early, but quality trout still show themselves.
