Speaker 1: Welcome to This Country Life. I'm your host, Brent Rieves
Speaker 1: from coon hunting to trot lining and just general country living.
Speaker 1: I want you to stay a while as I share
Speaker 1: my stories and the country skills that will help you
Speaker 1: beat the system. This Country Life is proudly presented as
Speaker 1: part of Meat Eaters Podcast Network, bringing you the best
Speaker 1: outdoor podcast the airways have to offer. All right, friends,
Speaker 1: pull you up a chair or drop that tailgate. I
Speaker 1: think I got a thing or two to teach you.
Speaker 1: Fishing with nets. There's two types of fishing when you're
Speaker 1: fishing with nets, commercial and recreational. Now I guess there's
Speaker 1: really four if you count catching fish and not catching fish,
Speaker 1: and we're going to talk a little about both of
Speaker 1: them today. But first I'm going to tell you a story. Now,
Speaker 1: this story has absolutely nothing to do with fishing nets,
Speaker 1: only a little bit to do with fishing. But fishing
Speaker 1: was what Tim and I started out doing before the
Speaker 1: incident occurred. It was many years ago, during the middle
Speaker 1: of the week, and we had both found ourselves too
Speaker 1: sick to go to work, but not too sick to fish.
Speaker 1: What a coincidence, I know, right, both of us at
Speaker 1: the same time Anyway, we loaded tams boat with our
Speaker 1: fly rods and crickets, which is just about the best
Speaker 1: medicine ever invented, and we took off for the Salaine
Speaker 1: River at Mount Elby. I know I've set it on
Speaker 1: here before, but the dot on the map that we
Speaker 1: all called Mount Elby has actually called Mount Elba Elba
Speaker 1: for the folks that like to look up the places
Speaker 1: of where I'm talking about. That was also the name
Speaker 1: of the boat ramp we were putting in at that
Speaker 1: would eventually be renamed in honor of my father, the
Speaker 1: Lloyd Wilton Buddys Mount Elba Access. When I petitioned the
Speaker 1: Arkansas Game and Fish Commission with a letter of my
Speaker 1: family's legacy in that area and that place on the
Speaker 1: river to rename it after my father, I related how
Speaker 1: we generationally interacted with the land and the river over
Speaker 1: the past nine generations. I didn't include the story I'm
Speaker 1: about to tell you, but that day we backed the
Speaker 1: boat in, parked the truck, and took off. It was
Speaker 1: hot that morning and we caught fish pretty quickly. We
Speaker 1: fished all the way down what we referred to as
Speaker 1: the Stretch, and that's the location on the river about
Speaker 1: three quarters of a mile along where the water deepened
Speaker 1: and the current slowed down in a long straightaway. At
Speaker 1: the end of the stretch is a place we call
Speaker 1: Bug Island. Now. When the river is at normal pool,
Speaker 1: it splits and wraps around the small island of willow trees, say,
Speaker 1: and the river rocks. It's shady and a perfect place
Speaker 1: to stop and cook fish. I've been doing it all
Speaker 1: my life and planning to do so again and in
Speaker 1: their future. We took a fish cooker and everything you
Speaker 1: need and clean and cook the fish right there. They'd
Speaker 1: never touch a cube of ice and go from swimming
Speaker 1: in the river to swimming in the live well, to
Speaker 1: being cleaned in the river and then being released into
Speaker 1: three hundred and fifty degrees of hot peanut oil. If
Speaker 1: you have the means, I highly recommend it. We were
Speaker 1: the only folks on the river that day. Everyone else
Speaker 1: was working, after all, it was the middle of the
Speaker 1: work week, but by the time we hit Bug Island
Speaker 1: it was close to noon in time to eat. It
Speaker 1: was also Africa hot, and the only relief from the
Speaker 1: bowl and sun was in the shade since there was
Speaker 1: no breeze. Still pretty hot under the trees and standing
Speaker 1: over that fire cooking fish didn't do anything towards cooling
Speaker 1: us off. We got done eating, got everything thing cleaned up,
Speaker 1: and was sitting and staring at that running water that
Speaker 1: flowed around the island and sweating. And I told Tim man,
Speaker 1: I'm about to burn up in the shade, sitting here
Speaker 1: like a dummy wearing the bathing suit I was born with.
Speaker 1: And with that we both stood up commenced to peeling
Speaker 1: off our sweat soaked t shirts and overalls until we
Speaker 1: were naked as pick birds, tenderfooting our way across the
Speaker 1: hot sand and rocks, until we waded out deep enough
Speaker 1: to cool off in the muddy water of our river.
Speaker 1: It might as well have been ours, we were the
Speaker 1: only folks on it. We swam around out in the
Speaker 1: deeper water for a while, then paddled our way back
Speaker 1: up to the shallow shoal that tapered off the bank
Speaker 1: of Bug Island. We were fixing it, get out and
Speaker 1: get dressed and fish our way back to the truck.
Speaker 1: But then Tim scooped up a huge river mussel along
Speaker 1: the way, and we laid there on our stomachs in
Speaker 1: the shallow water admiring that huge fresh water mussel, our
Speaker 1: lily white behind glowing above the surface of the water.
Speaker 1: I heard a noise behind us that sounded oddly like
Speaker 1: a boat paddle bumping the side of a boat. Judging
Speaker 1: from the look of hard that washed over Tim's face,
Speaker 1: he'd heard it too. Then out of the blue, y'all
Speaker 1: catching any fish. We looked back over our shoulders at
Speaker 1: the same time to see an older couple float by
Speaker 1: with fishing poles in their hands and big smiles on
Speaker 1: their faces. I don't know what happened next, or what
Speaker 1: they did. I slid under the surface, backed out into
Speaker 1: deeper water, and only came up to take a peek
Speaker 1: to see when they were gone. When I could no
Speaker 1: longer hold my breath. Tim had done the same. I'm sorry,
Speaker 1: mister and missus whoever you were, but with two teas,
Speaker 1: that's just how that happened. Fishing with nets commercial fishermen
Speaker 1: have always intrigued me. There's just something about making a
Speaker 1: living catching fish that appeals to kids, and that's when
Speaker 1: my attraction began. I mentioned Carls one stopping last week's episode.
Speaker 1: It was the bait shop on the edge of town,
Speaker 1: where not only could you buy a bait and tackle,
Speaker 1: but also turkey calls, duck calls, and ammo. You'd also
Speaker 1: see the commercial fishermen in the area, stopping by the
Speaker 1: visit or pickup supplies, or meeting folks that had ordered fish,
Speaker 1: seeing those big hoop nets in the boat, and knowing
Speaker 1: that guy was paying his light bills with fish he'd
Speaker 1: caught from the river. Now, walk could be better than that,
Speaker 1: I dare say nothing. That's got to be the easiest
Speaker 1: job there is. Right now, anyone that's listening that has
Speaker 1: ever had even the smallest experience of fishing a hoop
Speaker 1: net knows that I have finally done it. After all
Speaker 1: most a year of telling stories and talking about country
Speaker 1: living on this platform, I have finally said the dumbest
Speaker 1: thing I'm ever going to say by suggesting that easy
Speaker 1: is an adjective that describes any portion of commercial fishermen.
Speaker 1: There was a time when I thought being a duck
Speaker 1: guide would be a great idea. Who wouldn't want to
Speaker 1: get paid to go duck hunting? And there's always more
Speaker 1: to the story. Duck hunting, in a way was what
Speaker 1: brought my brother Tim and I to net fishing. We
Speaker 1: talked about it forever. But over twenty five years ago
Speaker 1: we met a man from Louisiana when he came up
Speaker 1: with a group to hunt with us, and his name
Speaker 1: was Jerry Boger. Now, Jerry would later start bringing his son, Zach,
Speaker 1: along with others over the years, and he and his
Speaker 1: family became instant friends of ours, and they have remained
Speaker 1: just like our family ever since. I can go months
Speaker 1: without talking to Jerry and pick up the phone and
Speaker 1: give him a call and it's just like I talked
Speaker 1: to him yesterday. Where am I going with this? Well?
Speaker 1: Jerry Boger is a good fisherman, and most assuredly he's
Speaker 1: the best net fisherman I know. And it was his
Speaker 1: advice and tutelage that inspired my brother Tim to call
Speaker 1: me one day and say, I'm buying some hoop nets
Speaker 1: and we're gonna start fishing them in the Arkansas River.
Speaker 1: You gonna be my help. I don't recall there being
Speaker 1: a question as to whether or not I'd be participating,
Speaker 1: So after checking the Arkansas regulations on fishing nets, Tim
Speaker 1: bought three wire hoop nets and some bait from the
Speaker 1: good folks down at Nets and more. The fish net
Speaker 1: company in Jonesville, los Inna. He brought them back home,
Speaker 1: sent me a picture of lane in his yard and
Speaker 1: I'd never seen wire nets before, but man, they look cool.
Speaker 1: I was excited. But it was like ordering the Charles
Speaker 1: Atley strong Man course from the back of a comic book,
Speaker 1: and when the mail man delivers it, you realize the
Speaker 1: muscles ain't included. What do we do with them? Now? First,
Speaker 1: let's talk about what a hoop net is. Imagine a
Speaker 1: dip net that you'd use to boat of fish after
Speaker 1: you caught him with a rod and a rill, but
Speaker 1: instead of having a shallow bottom in it, think about
Speaker 1: it being three and a half feet in diameter and
Speaker 1: fourteen feet long. About every two feet is going to
Speaker 1: be a round fiberglass hoop that holds the net in position,
Speaker 1: giving it a cylindrical tube shape when both ends are
Speaker 1: weighted with a head rope and a tail rope and
Speaker 1: stretched tightly between the two weights. And there's all kinds
Speaker 1: of different diameters, meshing sizes and links of hoop nets.
Speaker 1: This is just an example, but they all have what's
Speaker 1: called a throat inside or flu where a separate mesh
Speaker 1: funnel gradually narrows down into an opening that fish can
Speaker 1: easily swim in through, but can't easily swim out of. Now,
Speaker 1: once it gets in there, you got him, unless he's
Speaker 1: small enough to swim out through the mesh of the net,
Speaker 1: which is why there are mesh sized regulations on the
Speaker 1: net so the small fish can get out. Now. These
Speaker 1: contraptions are strictly made for rough fish like buffalo and drum.
Speaker 1: And while catfish is a game fish in Arkansas, it's
Speaker 1: the only one that can be harvested using a net
Speaker 1: or a trap. Bring them under four inches can be
Speaker 1: called in a basket trap and used as live bait
Speaker 1: for flathead catfish. And that's a whole other podcast and
Speaker 1: one we're planning on doing lately this year. But this
Speaker 1: hoop net I've talked about, ain't going to catch fish
Speaker 1: until we get it in the water. So where do
Speaker 1: we fish it? Remember Jerry from Louisiana, Well, Jerry will
Speaker 1: tell you that when you're fishing in current and the
Speaker 1: river is inside its banks, that you've got to find
Speaker 1: those eddies to conceal instantly catch fish. A fish can
Speaker 1: obviously swim anywhere it wants to, but they have travel
Speaker 1: patterns and tendencies, just like all creatures. They like gathering
Speaker 1: in those eddies. What's an eddy? Well, how about I
Speaker 1: tell you what one is. The definition of an eddy
Speaker 1: is a circular movement of water counter to a main current,
Speaker 1: causing a small whirlpool. Now let me describe it to
Speaker 1: you like this. Men, you were sitting in a boat
Speaker 1: facing up river. The river in front of us has
Speaker 1: a curve that bends around to the right and continues
Speaker 1: on the downstream. Side of that curve is where the
Speaker 1: eddy forms. As the current comes around that bend, it
Speaker 1: forms a circular motion known as an eddy. Fish congregate
Speaker 1: there to catch bait, fish and groceries that get swept
Speaker 1: up it concentrated in the water. It also gets them
Speaker 1: out of the strong curve and allow them to rest
Speaker 1: while they eat. Survival is the name of the game
Speaker 1: and in justin calories, while expending the minimal mountain necessary
Speaker 1: to do so is priority numero uno. But you can't
Speaker 1: just find an eddie, weight both ends and chunk your
Speaker 1: net in the river. That's no pointo. You're gonna have
Speaker 1: to drag and sound check the depth of the water
Speaker 1: to see if there's any obstacles. In there that could
Speaker 1: damage or keep your net from laying out properly. And
Speaker 1: I'm sure those garment depth and so on. Our units
Speaker 1: like Claying I had on our big CEA arc boat
Speaker 1: last January would easily do the trick. But if you
Speaker 1: find yourself out of modern technology, a net drag on
Speaker 1: a long rope will do the trick. Most net drags
Speaker 1: that I've seen are around sixteen to eighteen inches long
Speaker 1: and made a solid round inch and a half steal
Speaker 1: on the bottom. They'll have four pieces of quarter inch
Speaker 1: rod at even intervals bent in the shape of a U,
Speaker 1: and well that to the shaft that look like a
Speaker 1: grappling hook on the other end as well, that an
Speaker 1: eye to attach a rope, and you'll use it to
Speaker 1: drag across the bottom looking for obstacles like tree tops
Speaker 1: or somebody else's net, or anything that could damage or
Speaker 1: keep your net from fishing properly. You're also going to
Speaker 1: need that drag to pull your net up when it's
Speaker 1: time to check it and you're looking for a clean
Speaker 1: shelf or a bottom where you can lay your net
Speaker 1: out flat on the bottom like a cardboard paper towel tube.
Speaker 1: Here's a little something extra at my house. All my
Speaker 1: kids call those tubes dut does because they could never
Speaker 1: pick an empty one up to play with it without
Speaker 1: sticking it to their mouth and going dut to door.
Speaker 1: Do you alls kids do that or mind? The only
Speaker 1: ones probably just mine. I live in a circus. All right,
Speaker 1: let's get this thing in the water. We're going to
Speaker 1: need a heavy anchor and a long length of rope
Speaker 1: rope that's tied to the head and the tail is
Speaker 1: dependent upon the depth of the water. Jerry likes to
Speaker 1: use five sixteenth hollow braided line for a big hoop net.
Speaker 1: He's gonna use about thirty pounds of weight or more.
Speaker 1: That's gonna be on the anchor, and that's gonna go
Speaker 1: on the tail end of the net, and it's always
Speaker 1: pointed upstream. Get your weight in the line and then
Speaker 1: the tail end of the net. We start feeding that
Speaker 1: net out, tail in first, and we're gonna float downstream.
Speaker 1: Take all the slack out of that net, and to
Speaker 1: link the rope we've got tied to the head end.
Speaker 1: That rope is attached to a rope that's called a bridle,
Speaker 1: and it goes from one side of the coop to
Speaker 1: the other on the front, kind of like a handle
Speaker 1: of a bucket. The head rope is tied right in
Speaker 1: the middle. Stay with me now, because we're gonna review
Speaker 1: this and get squared away in your brain bucket in
Speaker 1: just a minute. Pulling further downstream about thirty to forty feet,
Speaker 1: if not further, We're going to attach a small weight
Speaker 1: around ten pounds, and from that weight we're gonna run
Speaker 1: a twenty foot line with two to three pound weight
Speaker 1: with a float tied in the middle. Now, this keeps
Speaker 1: the rope off the bottom and makes it easier to
Speaker 1: catch with a drag. It doesn't take long for salt
Speaker 1: to cover a rope up, and that makes it hard
Speaker 1: to find. The float sure makes it easier. Now, I
Speaker 1: know what you're saying. Why don't you just run a
Speaker 1: float from the weight on the headline to the surface
Speaker 1: to be easy to run without even having to worry
Speaker 1: about using the drag. Well, let me tell you why,
Speaker 1: the same reason you like your truck. When you park
Speaker 1: it and walk away, folks will not only covet your
Speaker 1: hoop nets, but they will also run them, steal your
Speaker 1: fish and take your nets. All right, erase the blackboard
Speaker 1: and you'll cranium un let's review it. We found an
Speaker 1: eddy that has a clean bottom where we can place
Speaker 1: her hoop net. On the tail end of our net,
Speaker 1: we attached a long length of rope and a big anchor.
Speaker 1: Splash goes the anchor, and now we're slowly motoring or
Speaker 1: floating backwards down the river, letting the net pull out
Speaker 1: of the boat slowly as we hold a little tension,
Speaker 1: so it goes in the water like it's fishing already.
Speaker 1: Letting the head rope out, we dropped a ten pound weight,
Speaker 1: followed by the float and the rest of the rope
Speaker 1: with a small weight. Now it's time to go do
Speaker 1: whatever and be confident that while you're occupied with some
Speaker 1: other activity that you're also fishing. With every tick of
Speaker 1: the clock, I'm on the yard, also fishing, eating supper,
Speaker 1: also fishing, slumbering in the bed, also fishing. The hardest
Speaker 1: part for me in tim was not going back to
Speaker 1: check our nets. You gotta let them fish, and time
Speaker 1: is on your side. If you remember, we didn't bait
Speaker 1: this net. We're catching fish that are just out making
Speaker 1: a living and doing their thing, swimming upstream. Now they'll
Speaker 1: still be snacking grub as it floats downstreaming into the
Speaker 1: water column there brought them there in the first place.
Speaker 1: We're just going to have them hemmed up where we're fishing,
Speaker 1: and they'll be just as healthy and full of vigor
Speaker 1: when we run the net a minimum five days from
Speaker 1: when we set it. So after a week we're going
Speaker 1: to head back to the river. We're going to chunk
Speaker 1: our drag in to catch a hold of that headline.
Speaker 1: We put it out tail then first, so we're going
Speaker 1: to do just the opposite to run it. And when
Speaker 1: you throw your drag out, you're aiming for the head
Speaker 1: rope that's the end with the little float holding the
Speaker 1: line off the bottom, so it wouldn't get sealted in.
Speaker 1: Now you don't have to do that it, So don't
Speaker 1: be hollering at me about this is wrong and it
Speaker 1: ain't the way your grandpa did it. While I'm interested
Speaker 1: in hearing how you did it, I ain't about to
Speaker 1: listen to anything I've described here is wrong because it ain't.
Speaker 1: Now how do I know it ain't well, Jerry's son, Zach,
Speaker 1: owns one of the best restaurants in Louisiana, and I
Speaker 1: understand that's a bold statement because there are a lot
Speaker 1: of great places deed down there. But they run fish
Speaker 1: through that restaurant faster than grass runs through a goose.
Speaker 1: And Jerry provides a large portion of the fish, and
Speaker 1: this is how he catches them, and they feed a
Speaker 1: lot of folks. It's called Big Zach's Place at Logusport, Louisiana.
Speaker 1: Y'all check it out and tell them I sent you.
Speaker 1: But guess what, we ain't done yet. Me and Tim
Speaker 1: don't even fish the county nets that I just described
Speaker 1: we're going to, But right now we're fishing that big
Speaker 1: nets little brother, which works the same way, but it's
Speaker 1: a lot easier to handle, and we use bait. The
Speaker 1: wire nets we fish are eighteen inches in diameter and
Speaker 1: four feet long. They're the same as regular hoop nets,
Speaker 1: except there's no hoops. The net mesh is held in
Speaker 1: place by wire on the inside, which is concer great
Speaker 1: reinforcement wire. You just bend it into a loop. You
Speaker 1: can fish them several ways, one of which is how
Speaker 1: I just described with a big hoop net. Another way
Speaker 1: is to suspend it vertically beneath the water with a
Speaker 1: throat facing down above the bottom. Fish will feed upwards
Speaker 1: drawn it into the net by the bait, and you
Speaker 1: can also just bait it up and chunk it overboard
Speaker 1: in a good spot you've already picked out. Now, the
Speaker 1: bait we use is usually soy beans and cheese mashed
Speaker 1: them into a big old block, and we put it
Speaker 1: in a mesh bag and throw it inside and it
Speaker 1: slowly dissolves. It leaves a scent trail of food downstream,
Speaker 1: and as the fish feed upstream they follow it into
Speaker 1: the net. Tim and I fish ours and current, always
Speaker 1: with a mouth facing downstream and anchor tie off the tail.
Speaker 1: That's pretty simple, in a very effective way to catch fish.
Speaker 1: It's also a lot of fun and we have a
Speaker 1: great time doing it. I be interested in do it.
Speaker 1: Check your regulations where you live. Hit the folks up
Speaker 1: down there in Jones, Louisiana, and you will get you
Speaker 1: a net that you can fish. Hey, I hope you
Speaker 1: all enjoyed the Squirrels and coons in Arkansas film Clay
Speaker 1: Bow and I did over on the Made Eater YouTube channel.
Speaker 1: If you haven't seen it, hop on over and check
Speaker 1: it out. Clay's Alaska Wolf episode dropped this week too. Man,
Speaker 1: it's good. We got two more loaded and ready to
Speaker 1: fly and they'll be dropping over the next two weeks
Speaker 1: on Tuesdays. We'll also be at the Black Beary Bananza
Speaker 1: in Bentonville, Arkansas, on March the ninth. Tickets are available
Speaker 1: on their website. You just search Black Bearry Bonanza and
Speaker 1: you'll see the link. It's gonna be a lot of fun.
Speaker 1: There's gonna be some great demonstrations. We're gonna record a podcast.
Speaker 1: I'll be MCing the al Hooton contest and get ready
Speaker 1: for this Case Knives will have a booth there, and
Speaker 1: my friend John Pantusso and my fellow ar Kansen Chris
Speaker 1: Taylor will be there too. Chris is a knife maker
Speaker 1: and has designed to build three skin and knives for case.
Speaker 1: I got all three of man something special. Rince the
Speaker 1: youngins off, help Grandpa find his teeth, and y'all come
Speaker 1: see us. It's going to be a good time until
Speaker 1: next week. This is Bret Reeves signing off. Y'all be careful.