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Speaker 1: Good morning, Welcome to the Big Outdoors News Radio seven

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Speaker 1: hundred WLW, Cincinnati, Chip Hard Tom Cross in the studio

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Speaker 1: and I got Tom welcome back. Well, thank you. It's

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Speaker 1: been a long time, but we've been on a couple

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Speaker 1: of projects over there. No no, I had to come

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Speaker 1: out to Adams County and dig you out of a snowbank, Okay,

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Speaker 1: to get you to get in here. Okay, snow this

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Speaker 1: word you know, Well, I just I wanted to thank you.

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Speaker 1: It just got you know, Danny and I carried the

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Speaker 1: ball pretty well. Okay. I'm glad to be part of

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Speaker 1: this team. Though. Well, welcome back, sir. Now I appreciate.

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Speaker 1: Before I get off, we get off on the main

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Speaker 1: subject this morning. Shout out to Gary Jeff Walker and

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Speaker 1: his cast of characters. I attended his twenty ninth anniversary

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Speaker 1: party and there was a gentleman there by the name

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Speaker 1: of Gary Robbins drove five hours from northern Ohio to

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Speaker 1: come down. He collars me and he goes, I'm in

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Speaker 1: Shelby County and we have the oldest sportsman's club in

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Speaker 1: the United States at one hundred and fifty five years.

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Speaker 1: I said, oh, that's interesting. I'll mention it Gary on

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Speaker 1: Saturday morning, so I went back and did some research.

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Speaker 1: He was wrong, and he's The Shelby County Deer Hunters

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Speaker 1: organization is the third oldest deer hunting club in the

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Speaker 1: United States. And what is the oldest. I couldn't find

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Speaker 1: the oldest, but the second oldest is place called Winnis

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Speaker 1: Point up in northern Ohio. So, but the Shelby County

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Speaker 1: Deer Hunters are roughly one hundred and fifty five years old,

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Speaker 1: so that's pretty good. Yes, they managed to hang in

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Speaker 1: there when we shot the hell out of all the

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Speaker 1: deer okay, back in the when we were meat hunting,

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Speaker 1: back in the early part of the century. So okay,

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Speaker 1: the big I've got DJ Johnson here. He's a state

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Speaker 1: rep from Owen's Borough, Kentucky, and he has introduced bill

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Speaker 1: titled House Bill three ninety, which will regulate catfishing in Kentucky.

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Speaker 1: Representative Johnson, welcome to the big outdoors. We'll call you

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Speaker 1: DJ for the time being, and delighted to have you.

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Speaker 1: And this is some exciting news.

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Speaker 2: Well appreciate that, and I'm glad to be with you

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Speaker 2: guys today. I appreciate the opportunity to have a conversation

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Speaker 2: about our trophy catfisher and the Ohio River and the

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Speaker 2: run Kentucky.

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Speaker 1: Well, we've been hearing for years from the the from

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Speaker 1: your to you know, your your average catfisherman, that the

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Speaker 1: stock of big catfish in the Ohio River in particular

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Speaker 1: has been depleted by you know, by the commercial catfishing industry.

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Speaker 1: So Tom, I know you want to jump in, so

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Speaker 1: you go right ahead, but you know, so we want

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Speaker 1: to get this out there and and of course find

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Speaker 1: out the status as well. What does spurregd you to

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Speaker 1: introduce this legislation.

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Speaker 2: I had a constituent come to me and he's a

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Speaker 2: very very avid recreational cat fishermen, and he also has

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Speaker 2: been involved with some catfish tournaments locally in the Orangsboro area,

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Speaker 2: and he just pointed out that our tournament basically died

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Speaker 2: away got off because we're the dwining population on catfish.

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Speaker 2: You know, if you're going to come to a catfish tournament,

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Speaker 2: you're looking to catch a large coffey catfish at some point,

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Speaker 2: and it was just getting harder and harder to do.

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Speaker 2: And he asked me if there's anything we could do

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Speaker 2: about it, and we started looking at options, and over

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Speaker 2: the years we've evolved to the point where we've got

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Speaker 2: house built three ninety seven.

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Speaker 1: That same complaint is that goodbye fishermen on this side

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Speaker 1: of the High River, the northern portion of it, that

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Speaker 1: the commercial fisheries is pretty much decimated, the trophy catfishery,

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Speaker 1: the town here on the high River.

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Speaker 2: That's the concern. And you know, I'm typically I'm a

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Speaker 2: pretty strong business oriented guy, but we also have to

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Speaker 2: have some restraints, some protections natural resources. And that's what

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Speaker 2: three ninety seven is about. Really, it's about conservation of

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Speaker 2: not catfish in general, but specifically and very limited to

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Speaker 2: trophy catfish, which basically is thirty five inches or longer.

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Speaker 1: DJ. Let me, let's face it, if you your beer.

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Speaker 1: The average cat fishermen out there, like all of them

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Speaker 1: that I know, they're they're they number in the thousands.

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Speaker 1: They pretty much they practice catch and release. I don't

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Speaker 1: know of anyone that actually keeps a trophy catfish for

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Speaker 1: whatever reason. But you know, you're talking fish that are

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Speaker 1: you know, close to a century old in a lot

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Speaker 1: of cases, and uh, these are the I mean, that's

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Speaker 1: the that's your great gem pool too.

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Speaker 2: You're exactly right. That that is the breeding the level

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Speaker 2: where the breeders are is at the trophe trophy catfish size.

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Speaker 2: And just talk a little bit about the length of

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Speaker 2: the lifespan for catfish. It takes a minimum of about

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Speaker 2: fifteen maybe twenty years just to reach the minimum trophy size,

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Speaker 2: and then they go, as you said, they go much

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Speaker 2: larger than that, and so we're talking years and years.

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Speaker 2: And what we're running into is when the commercial fishermen

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Speaker 2: take the fish out of the river, they're taking them

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Speaker 2: out of their natural habitat. They're taking them to a

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Speaker 2: different habitat where they just don't survive, survive for very long.

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Speaker 2: They're in there for you know, different people say different times.

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Speaker 2: But if we say it's a period of months as

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Speaker 2: opposed to a period of years, if you do the math,

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Speaker 2: if it takes fifteen years to get to a specific

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Speaker 2: size and they only last a couple of months after that,

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Speaker 2: and you just keep taking them out at that rate,

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Speaker 2: eventually there are no trucking catfish left.

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Speaker 1: That's right. DJ Johnson, state representative from Kentucky. Our new

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Speaker 1: best friend here at seven hundred wlws Big Outdoors, We're

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Speaker 1: going to hit a short break and we'll be right back.

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Speaker 1: I'm making an effort to better myself. That's why I

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Speaker 1: moved to this eco commune where I'm building my hut

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Speaker 1: from my own dunk. That's also why I listened to

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Speaker 1: Scott Sloan. He's a straight shooter that goes after real

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Speaker 1: answers for real problems. But he also knows how to

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Speaker 1: get me laughing.

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Speaker 2: I face the same problems you do, so let's talk

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Speaker 2: about him and I have a little fun along the way.

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Speaker 1: Just like me, Sloaney's not afraid to get his hands dirty.

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Speaker 1: Check out Sloaney Monday morning at nine on seven hundred WLW,

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Speaker 1: and be sure to catch his podcast on the iHeartRadio

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Speaker 1: app Doors News Radio seven hundred WLW, Cincinnati. Chip part

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Speaker 1: Tom Cross. Our guest is State Representative from Kentucky, DJ Johnson,

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Speaker 1: and he had introduced House Bill three ninety seven, which

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Speaker 1: is really a conservation measure to protect trophy catfish and DJ,

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Speaker 1: we obviously will have a lot of questions and then

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Speaker 1: you'll say something and Moore, we'll think of more. But

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Speaker 1: you know again, next next next week, I'll have a

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Speaker 1: Captain Jason Ice on to talk about that Operation River Raid.

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Speaker 1: But in the meantime, what what do these cover all

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Speaker 1: Kentucky water? Does this bill cover all Kentucky waters and

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Speaker 1: the Ohio River?

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Speaker 2: It does, and it's current version it does that. There's

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Speaker 2: some conversation about some individuals are looking for maybe an

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Speaker 2: opportunity to limit it a little bit, but the current

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Speaker 2: version and the version that at this point I would

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Speaker 2: move forward with covers all Kentucky waterways in the Ohio.

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Speaker 1: River is thirty five inches across the board. You know,

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Speaker 1: the three species of catfish for speaking of which are channels, flatheads,

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Speaker 1: and blues, and they'll achieve different sizes.

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Speaker 2: So uh no, yeah, and you're exactly right. I just

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Speaker 2: used thirty five inches because that's kind of a common

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Speaker 2: desominator without spending a lot of time defining those three

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Speaker 2: different species and the different links we're talking about, So

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Speaker 2: I just generally say thirty five inches.

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Speaker 1: Thirty five inches for a channel cat is a that'd

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Speaker 1: be a record, that'd be a record. Yeah.

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Speaker 2: You know, what what we're talking about is the term

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Speaker 2: trophy catfish is the important term there. And then you

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Speaker 2: kind of fill in the blanks on the different species,

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Speaker 2: different sizes of it.

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Speaker 1: How would does legislation work specifically.

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Speaker 2: So this is more this is not really about fishing

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Speaker 2: of the catfish. It's more about the transportation of catfish

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Speaker 2: for commercial purposes. So that would be where the enforcement

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Speaker 2: would come into effect. Is it's not so much out

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Speaker 2: on the river seeing who's got wide in a boat,

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Speaker 2: but it's at that point where commercial fishermen or anybody

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Speaker 2: for commercial purposes. And I say that because there are

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Speaker 2: commercial fishermen without commercial licenses. We can talk about that

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Speaker 2: another day. But it's actually in the transported and if

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Speaker 2: you're identified as transporting a trophy catfish that needs the

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Speaker 2: definition of truphy catfish, then there would be it would

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Speaker 2: be a Class A misdemeanor, and then over and above

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Speaker 2: that it would require a five hundred dollars payment to

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Speaker 2: the Kentucky Fish and Wildlife It's kind of a restitution

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Speaker 2: payment per incident.

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Speaker 1: So this is is since in essence prohibits that the

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Speaker 1: transportation across a state line into another state, or even

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Speaker 1: anywhere within the state of Kentucky.

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Speaker 2: This specifically deals with transportation within the state of Kentucky

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Speaker 2: that I mentioned crossing state lines.

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Speaker 1: That would be I guess left to the neighboring states too.

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Speaker 1: I guess determine how to handle you know what's coming out, don't.

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Speaker 2: I don't pretend to be a lawyer, but I think

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Speaker 2: you run into interstate Commerce Clause issues at that point.

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Speaker 1: I'm glad to hear you're not a lawyer. I have

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Speaker 1: a I have had a couple of them in my career,

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Speaker 1: and I loved them dearly.

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Speaker 2: Okay, do you want to just get off this topic

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Speaker 2: and do lawyer jokes?

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Speaker 1: I love it? So what? Uh? What's been the reception

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Speaker 1: from the commercial fishing Uh?

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Speaker 2: In Well, of course they're not particularly happy with it.

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Speaker 2: I'm impeding on their ability to earn a living, and

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Speaker 2: I understand that. Again, I'll just mention that generally speaking,

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Speaker 2: I'm a small government business. Kind of we'reing a guide.

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Speaker 2: But here's here's the issue. We're talking about a conservation

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Speaker 2: of a natural resource. And like I said, if you

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Speaker 2: do the math, it takes fifteen years to get a

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Speaker 2: fish to a certain size, and it takes two months

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Speaker 2: to in that fish in a different environment. What I

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Speaker 2: want to have happen is the people who get to

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Speaker 2: go catfish now and catch a trophy catfish. I want

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Speaker 2: the future generations. I want their kids and grandkids, their

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Speaker 2: great grandkids that have the same opportunity. And if we

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Speaker 2: don't take some put some guardrails up, take some measures

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Speaker 2: to protect that the natural resource, that natural resource is

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Speaker 2: going to disappear.

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Speaker 1: How many commercial fishing operations actually in Kentucky you have

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Speaker 1: a handle on that. I don't.

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Speaker 2: That's probably a big question. I think I'll find it out.

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Speaker 2: I would say that there are a few that, uh

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Speaker 2: well that there's strictly topy catfish. So there's a few

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Speaker 2: those and I would like to find a way to

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Speaker 2: help them out. And we're still looking at weight hand,

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Speaker 2: tweak the language and maybe do that, But by and large,

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Speaker 2: I would say the trophy catfish is a part of

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Speaker 2: the overall fishing experience they have at the pay Lakes.

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Speaker 2: I'm not trying to put a pay lake out of business.

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Speaker 2: I don't want to put a businessman out of business.

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Speaker 2: But once again, and I'll reiterate this many times, if

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Speaker 2: we don't do something to put some guard rows along,

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Speaker 2: they're going to be out of business anyway, because we're

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Speaker 2: going to run out of trophy catfish.

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Speaker 1: Oh you got that right. Well, listen to DJ Johnson,

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Speaker 1: State Representative, State of Great State of Kentucky. You said, tight,

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Speaker 1: we got to hit a short break, Chip Hard, Tom

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Speaker 1: crossed the Big Outdoors News Radio seven hundred WLW Cincinnati

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Speaker 1: back a moment and in the new podcast doubt Hey

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Speaker 1: we're back that we got and he's Radio seven hundred

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Speaker 1: WLW Cincinnati, Chip Hard Tom Cross and stick around. It's

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Speaker 1: gonna be a hell of a great day at the

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Speaker 1: Big one, the nation station. You got Gary Jeff Walker

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Speaker 1: and his cast of characters who I met, every last

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Speaker 1: one of them, Science, Mike Geez, Radio, Rick Lynnette, everybody

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Speaker 1: who Dick from Dayton. I saw him at a distance, Okay,

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Speaker 1: all right, because all he would do is say, well,

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Speaker 1: why can't I call you? Okay, you can call Gary

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Speaker 1: Jeff and talk that Gary Cheff. Okay. But it was

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Speaker 1: a great party, great time, and congrats to Gary Jeff Walker.

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Speaker 1: He is the man of the hour and he's coming

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Speaker 1: up after the news. So with that though, we turned

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Speaker 1: back to State Rep. From Kentucky DJ Johnson and House

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Speaker 1: Bill three ninety seven, which is about conservation of the

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Speaker 1: catfish species, specifically trophy catfish in the state of Kentucky.

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Speaker 1: And DJ, you know, I think this is fantastic because

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Speaker 1: we've been hearing it forever. Uh here in Ohio, we

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Speaker 1: know that if you take a big blue catfish, there's

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Speaker 1: no question it's not going to survive in a pay lake. Okay,

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Speaker 1: there's just I'm surprised that they last even a month

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Speaker 1: in there. Okay, it's just not some it's not the environment,

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Speaker 1: especially it came if they come out of a river

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Speaker 1: system where they need current to survive and you put

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Speaker 1: them in a in a pay lake, they're they're they're

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Speaker 1: d o A. They're done dead on arrival. And uh,

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Speaker 1: you know, I think that the flathead is a much

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Speaker 1: heardier catfish and channels as well, but it's still it's

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Speaker 1: still about conservation as you as you said, and you know,

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Speaker 1: we don't want to hurt the pay lake people. But uh,

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Speaker 1: you know, there's I mean, there's ways that the expectations

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Speaker 1: have gotten too high for what you're going to catch

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Speaker 1: in a pay lake. I'm stuck with, you know, five

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Speaker 1: pound channels and things like that. You know, otherwise, get out,

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Speaker 1: get out there, get out in your get out in

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Speaker 1: your boat, or go sit on the bank of the

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Speaker 1: Ohio River or some other some other place and catch

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Speaker 1: your own damn trophy catfish.

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Speaker 2: I did, you know, I'm gonna I will be. I'll

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Speaker 2: be kind of the devil's deft on that. I very

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Speaker 2: much white people who go to pay lefts and they

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Speaker 2: have a fishing experience. You're right, I don't know if

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Speaker 2: I mentioned this or not, but I'm actually not a fisherman.

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Speaker 2: I'm I'm It's just not my thing. But I do

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Speaker 2: care about sustainability.

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Speaker 1: Sure, absolutely, And you know, I might have been a

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Speaker 1: little bit tough on people that fish, you know, pay lakes.

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Speaker 1: It can be a great experience first time, a couple

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Speaker 1: of times, whatever, camaraderie, you know, have a couple of beers, whatever,

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Speaker 1: But you know, it's it's it's it's about the fish

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Speaker 1: that are going in there, coming from somewhere else.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, and again I'll just emphasize that this is strictly

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Speaker 2: talking about trophy catfish. We're not talking about the general

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Speaker 2: catfish population, which is doing very well in our rivers

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Speaker 2: in Kentucky. How many, but when you target a specific category,

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Speaker 2: then that category is obviously going to suffer.

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Speaker 1: How many rivers in Duckie are actually fish commercially for catfish? Tom,

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Speaker 1: that was an unfair question.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm not a geologist. Or a geographer. So I'm

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Speaker 2: a legislator.

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Speaker 1: Come on now, and you're not a lawyer.

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Speaker 2: Okay, I'm not a lawyer.

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Speaker 1: That's even better. But no, that that's that's fantastic. So

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Speaker 1: DJ keep it up. Where is this bill now? And

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Speaker 1: how far has it got to go?

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Speaker 2: It's come out of the committee in the House, and

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Speaker 2: it's a House bill, so the process has got to

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Speaker 2: go through. Is we got to get it Harry on

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Speaker 2: the floor and a boat on the House floor. Assuming

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Speaker 2: that happens, it would go over to the Senate, and

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Speaker 2: the effect of what we start process again. I would

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Speaker 2: go to the Natural Resources Committee on the Senate side,

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Speaker 2: presents to that committee, assuming that they would vote it

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Speaker 2: out of committee. Then it would go to the Senate

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Speaker 2: floor for a final vote there and then be at

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Speaker 2: to you know, yes or no vote from the governor

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Speaker 2: with respect to ETO. That's a general process.

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Speaker 1: We're a year away, maybe.

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Speaker 2: You know. I don't know if I'll get it through

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Speaker 2: this this session. The way the Kentucky journalist Smily works

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Speaker 2: is we are in session for only two to three

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Speaker 2: months out of the year, depending on what year it is.

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Speaker 2: I won't get them all that right, but the rest

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Speaker 2: of the year. We're in what we call the interim period,

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Speaker 2: and that's where we have conversations to talk about what

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Speaker 2: we need to do in the next session and we

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Speaker 2: can actually vote. So you know, there's an outside chance

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Speaker 2: I'll get it through this session. But if we don't,

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Speaker 2: then I'll just keep working with people, try to refine

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Speaker 2: the language if we can find better ways to do it,

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Speaker 2: and I'll try again next year.

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Speaker 1: Well, if we can help you any at all, we'd

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Speaker 1: be happy to do so, and have your crack aid

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Speaker 1: put me on your press list to keep me updates.

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Speaker 2: We will do that absolutely.

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Speaker 1: All right, Well, well, we'll cut you loose to go

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Speaker 1: about your legislative day, and we appreciate your time on

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Speaker 1: the Big One.

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Speaker 2: I appreciate you getting in touch with me. I'm excited

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Speaker 2: about again preserving lifestyle for Kentucky.

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Speaker 1: Absolutely, and you're welcome back any time, and I suspect

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Speaker 1: that we will hear from you again. With that, We're

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Speaker 1: going to hit a break. Chip ourt Tom Cross the

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Speaker 1: Big Outdoors News Radio seven hundred WLW, Cincinnati, home of

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Speaker 1: the Cincinnati Reds, back in the moment. Hey, we're back.

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Speaker 1: I'm going to keep Tom around for another week. At

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Speaker 1: least hopefully won't have to dig him out of a snowbank.

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Speaker 1: Next time, I might have to pry him out of

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Speaker 1: a boat on the river or somewhere fishing, I keep writing,

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Speaker 1: we might have to cross some floodwaters. Well, I need

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Speaker 1: to apologize if I offended anybody that likes pay Lakes.

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Speaker 1: I'm sorry, Okay, it is It's an experience. Sometimes it's

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Speaker 1: the only experienced fishing that people can take advantage of.

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Speaker 1: You know, when I was a kid, I fished a

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Speaker 1: lot of pey legs leg out there and a million

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Speaker 1: and several other ones, and and I enjoyed it. But

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Speaker 1: we didn't really have trophy catfish. We have fish. We

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Speaker 1: have big carp put they could put carp in place

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Speaker 1: a carp and we was all day long. We love

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Speaker 1: to get them carp. I tell we used weedy bowls

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Speaker 1: and everything, you know. And I have lip. You have

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Speaker 1: lips like a carp the moore rods and reels drug

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Speaker 1: and a drug in the liquid corp. I I a

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Speaker 1: catfish that the Payleck well limey is like. We used

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Speaker 1: to be able to get them. And they call them

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Speaker 1: boo reflections and they was they shovel heads. Yeah, but

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Speaker 1: they hit lures pretty good back in the day. I

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Speaker 1: know it, I know it, but I think a good

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Speaker 1: option is carp Put all the carp in there you

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Speaker 1: want until you can walk across them. Okay, now they

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Speaker 1: have the cheap alternative rush there. Well they that's before

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Speaker 1: they got the idea. Okay, Hey, there's bigger money out there.

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Speaker 1: All right, Tom, I'll see you next week. Okay, what's

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Speaker 1: that Chip Hart? Tom crossed the Big Outdoors. Gary Jeffers next,

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Speaker 1: and Mike Gallen later on in the morning on the

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Speaker 1: Nation station seven hundred WLW Cincinnati. Be safe in the woods,

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Speaker 1: save in the water, and go Reds.