Speaker 1: If you don't want to look like a complete and
Speaker 1: total gaper, take off the plastic shrink wrap from your
Speaker 1: rod handles before you fish with them. When you see
Speaker 1: the fish and are ready to make your final presentation,
Speaker 1: don't jump up and down in the air. If one
Speaker 1: of my boys in Louisiana threw a coin some gumbo,
Speaker 1: I'd be like, Oh, that looks delicious, spicy pecanti. In
Speaker 1: a very roundabout way, small mouths share some of their
Speaker 1: taxonomic history with one of the greatest black exploitation films
Speaker 1: in history. Good morning, degenerate anglers. Welcome to Bent the
Speaker 1: Fishing Podcast. It's still even after all these years are
Speaker 1: doing it gets a case of the bubble guts when
Speaker 1: it sees a v weig trailing the surface, beata stud
Speaker 1: red fish cruising a flat, a wide headed trout sipping
Speaker 1: in the seam, or a pop culture reference. Only a
Speaker 1: small amount of weirdos like us actually get. I'm Joe Surmellie,
Speaker 1: Miles Nulty and uh and to everyone out there listening,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna I'm gonna give you a ship like straight up,
Speaker 1: i am not the smoothest, the smoothest guy on the
Speaker 1: water or anywhere. Really, but I'm I'm especially prone to
Speaker 1: losing my ship when it comes to site fishing. That
Speaker 1: is true, That's totally understandable though, right Yeah, But I
Speaker 1: feel like I'm not supposed to say that. Like I
Speaker 1: feel like, you know, as fishing industry professionals, we're supposed
Speaker 1: to pretend that we're like these super hardcore, badass fish slayers.
Speaker 1: Don't might give my name and my game, but I'm not.
Speaker 1: I'm I'm I'm certainly no Rudy ray Moren for those
Speaker 1: of you who caught that reference. More to come later
Speaker 1: in the show. Uh. Straight up though, straight up when
Speaker 1: it comes to site fishing, big fish, I still com
Speaker 1: I totally get the yips, Dude, I still get them.
Speaker 1: It still happened, yeah, man, I mean so do I.
Speaker 1: But I've I've found it like my level of choke
Speaker 1: directly correlates to the number of shots. Right. It's like
Speaker 1: a math problem. Okay, so take the the average of
Speaker 1: shots times how many days do I have to enjoy
Speaker 1: this fishery, and then you get like the square root
Speaker 1: of how badly I'll ship the bed, you know, And
Speaker 1: then if you add in the variable of there's a
Speaker 1: video camera and this is important. The bed shooting percentage
Speaker 1: rate increases by pie. You know, yeah, yeah, I know
Speaker 1: that that. I think I think your math works out there. Yeah,
Speaker 1: But like dude, I mean, I think to have some
Speaker 1: real talk on this. For me, they are a particular
Speaker 1: problem with species, right, the ones that some of the
Speaker 1: ones that are supposed to be really hard. I don't
Speaker 1: have problem Like Florida permit, no problem. Not not that
Speaker 1: they're easy fish, not the easy fish, but I I
Speaker 1: don't choke and I have a good track record of
Speaker 1: presenting well to them and catching them. I don't know why.
Speaker 1: I know people with permit tattoos that haven't hooked one yet,
Speaker 1: Like they have the tattoo of the permit and haven't
Speaker 1: hooked on. Maybe that's the problem there. You go to
Speaker 1: put the cart before the horse there exactly. But like dude,
Speaker 1: Hawaii bone fish one example total Achilles heal for me
Speaker 1: and and for people who don't know out that fishery
Speaker 1: why does have bone fish And they're quite large as
Speaker 1: bone fish goes, and they get a ton of pressure
Speaker 1: not just from recreational anglers, but like people trying to
Speaker 1: kill them and like homeless people trying to net them,
Speaker 1: like they live a life of pure terror, so they're
Speaker 1: always neurotic. And and they come up into these very
Speaker 1: shallow sand flats to feed on shrimp and crabs when
Speaker 1: the tides are right, and you can stock them on foot,
Speaker 1: and it's all site fishing, Like you can see the fish,
Speaker 1: you can see their backs, you can see their their
Speaker 1: tails and their dorsal fins, and you watch them feeding.
Speaker 1: And so when you screwed up, you have no one
Speaker 1: to blame but yourself. And and I'm not exaggerating when
Speaker 1: I said I've had days where I blew fifty shots
Speaker 1: in a row, like fifty opportunities at feeding fish in
Speaker 1: one single tide without even getting one fish to eat.
Speaker 1: And like I get I get done with a session
Speaker 1: like that, and I'm like to have I wasted my life?
Speaker 1: Like what where did I go wrong? Like I've spent
Speaker 1: all these years fishing, and I still suck this bad
Speaker 1: at it, But it gets to me, dude, Hawaii bones
Speaker 1: definitely on the bucket list. I know a lot of
Speaker 1: people who who have gone to chase that dream, but
Speaker 1: I've I've never been there, right, so I can't really
Speaker 1: speak to that. All my boning has been done in
Speaker 1: the Bahamas and Turks and Caicos, and like that's a
Speaker 1: prime example to me of my math equation. You're you're
Speaker 1: never really or usually, i should say, in bone fish
Speaker 1: places for a day, Like you don't just end up
Speaker 1: in Biminy or Avoca for a day. So you've got time.
Speaker 1: So even if they're like, if you have one tough day,
Speaker 1: assuming you don't have like you know, awful weather for
Speaker 1: your entire trip, strong chance you're gonna get at least
Speaker 1: one good day out of it. But in in recent memory,
Speaker 1: if I'm being totally honest, my last bout of total
Speaker 1: site fishing suck was actually with you. You took me
Speaker 1: to a spring creek in Montana last winter, and it
Speaker 1: was it was one of those deals where it's like, Okay,
Speaker 1: it's big brown right there, he's in eight inches of water.
Speaker 1: You're gonna sneak around this way and mind your shadow
Speaker 1: and nail the drift with with a nymph and a
Speaker 1: ten foot leader on the first cast, Like that's not
Speaker 1: it's not happening that. I can't handle that. And I
Speaker 1: didn't handle that. I caught nothing that day. I remember
Speaker 1: you catching at least one fish that day. You're being
Speaker 1: very nice, but I lost one because when you walked
Speaker 1: away and I took the nymph off and put a
Speaker 1: giant wooly bugger on, I'm like, you're gonna You're gonna eat,
Speaker 1: and it did and I snapped it off and that
Speaker 1: was it. Maybe I'm giving you my more credit my memory,
Speaker 1: I don't know, but to be fair like that, that
Speaker 1: is a that is that creeks tough, and I had
Speaker 1: home field advantage. I've fished there. But but then so
Speaker 1: like another another example of of me blowing it on
Speaker 1: particular species, like last summer, we were filming doss boat
Speaker 1: in Minnesota, right and and when we're working on the
Speaker 1: buffalo episode. For those of you saw the cal and
Speaker 1: I were in. We would target buffalo in the morning
Speaker 1: and then the wind would come up in the buffalo disappear,
Speaker 1: so we had the rest of the day to fish
Speaker 1: for other species. And I of course would end up
Speaker 1: muskie fishing, even though it was middle of the day midsummer,
Speaker 1: because I have a problem. So I was on one
Speaker 1: of those like giant defiant swim baits that that Oliver
Speaker 1: and I loves and has turned me onto. And the
Speaker 1: lake we're on is crystal clear like ten ft of visibility,
Speaker 1: so I can see the bait the whole time. I'm
Speaker 1: watching it, and I'm tracking it, and I'm working along
Speaker 1: this weed edge and I can see it. And then
Speaker 1: there's this big, like three foot long flash, which, to
Speaker 1: be clear, if I'm being honest, that's not a big muskie,
Speaker 1: but still a three ft fagh. That's a big flash.
Speaker 1: It gets your heart rate up. And and I see
Speaker 1: this fish coming. It's all that up. It's charged the lure.
Speaker 1: It's not a follower. This fish is serious. It wants
Speaker 1: to eat, and I just have to just keep doing
Speaker 1: what I'm doing, and it's gonna eat. And I see
Speaker 1: it and I stop, Like the the cardinal rule that
Speaker 1: everybody knows in muskie fishing, the one thing you never
Speaker 1: do is stop your lure. And I know that, like
Speaker 1: I'm fully aware of that. I have told that to
Speaker 1: other people, but that's exactly what I did. And you know,
Speaker 1: of course, the fish is like, I'm not interested in
Speaker 1: that left and I told really, blew it gone done,
Speaker 1: no more shots. I've done that. I have done that
Speaker 1: very same thing with muskies several times because it's such
Speaker 1: a hard thing. And then you finally see one, it
Speaker 1: like takes your breath away and you gave at it.
Speaker 1: You become a gaper to use your nickname. I'll tell
Speaker 1: you what I have. I have never actually caught a
Speaker 1: muskie in a figure eight in my life because I've
Speaker 1: botched pretty much all my figure eight opportunities and just
Speaker 1: z when I should have zag because I got one,
Speaker 1: but it was like two, so I didn't really get
Speaker 1: like the hard pumping, you know, that's not that's neither
Speaker 1: here nor there. The point is that as soon as
Speaker 1: you see it, like now that I'm seeing it, I
Speaker 1: will screw it up right. So I've never got one
Speaker 1: in the eight. The handful of muskies I've caught eight
Speaker 1: way out and like you know, three turns of Laura
Speaker 1: and hammered it like a blue fish fifty ft out
Speaker 1: and those are great. I like those muski you know.
Speaker 1: But then, like think about it, what makes site fishing
Speaker 1: goofs even more likely? Because when you have somebody watching you,
Speaker 1: which is fairly common if you're in a I had
Speaker 1: a trip, you're out of town, like good chance, somebody's
Speaker 1: breathing down your neck, and then because then you it's
Speaker 1: it's instant Monday morning quarterbacking and that's the ship. It's like,
Speaker 1: oh man, you know you should have stopped and if
Speaker 1: you had stopped it, oh man, I would have kept
Speaker 1: that flood moving. Or my favorite, this is my favorite one. Right,
Speaker 1: oh man, if you just had a couple more feet
Speaker 1: between the fish and the boat, he'd eate that, you know,
Speaker 1: so like you ever have that one a couple more
Speaker 1: feets anyway, good site fisherman keep level heads and uh,
Speaker 1: our friend and guy, Alvin Didoze certainly keeps his head level.
Speaker 1: He's a very even keel guy. He is. He's very met,
Speaker 1: he's very on the level. He's mellow. Yeah. He's also
Speaker 1: no stranger to site fishing. So we brought him back
Speaker 1: for our Smooth Moves segment where we call up guides, outfitters,
Speaker 1: captains and sometimes even shop jockeys, anyone who makes a
Speaker 1: living helping other people catch fish. Really and we asked
Speaker 1: him to tell us ridiculous or hilarious or idiotic stories
Speaker 1: about things that clients do. And wouldn't you know it,
Speaker 1: Alvin has a story that we'll get more of your
Speaker 1: Monday morning sidecasting quarterbacks saying well played, bro, good job.
Speaker 1: One of my favorite smooth moves that I witnessed quite
Speaker 1: often on the boat on the skiff fishing for tailing
Speaker 1: red fish in shallow water, very skittish fish, and it's
Speaker 1: one of those kind of games where you gotta go
Speaker 1: to from zero to a hundred at the blink of
Speaker 1: an eye. So we're cruising around, we're looking for fish,
Speaker 1: looking for fish. No fish, no fish, no fish, no fish.
Speaker 1: All a sudden, there's a fish sixty ft one o'clock. Okay,
Speaker 1: hang on, we're gonna little get a little bit closer.
Speaker 1: We're get a little bit closer. Okay, you're good. Good,
Speaker 1: put a cast out there. And then the move is
Speaker 1: the body pump, where okay, we're trying to sneak up
Speaker 1: on this fish in like eight inches of water. They
Speaker 1: can feel every vibration for him a mile away, and
Speaker 1: all we gotta do is ease up on them. In
Speaker 1: the skiff, I'm pushing it as quietly as I can,
Speaker 1: trying not to spook him. And right before my client
Speaker 1: makes the cast, he's got to do a little hop
Speaker 1: the body pump when you kind of jump up in
Speaker 1: the air a little bit and then come down. Don't
Speaker 1: ever take your feet off the ground. It's just like
Speaker 1: a little like compression move. And it's awesome because what
Speaker 1: happens is it sends the pressure wave through the hull
Speaker 1: of the boat all the way up to the fish,
Speaker 1: and before the fly even hits the water, the fish
Speaker 1: is gone and I'm looking for another fish. So yeah,
Speaker 1: the body pump class. You see this happen all the time, Alvin,
Speaker 1: Like a lot of people sort of subconsciously do the
Speaker 1: body pump. Yeah, yeah, it's it's a weird thing. I mean,
Speaker 1: I don't do it, but it's just because I've seeing
Speaker 1: it happens so many times. It's burned into my mind.
Speaker 1: Like when you see the fish and are ready to
Speaker 1: make your final presentation, don't jump up and down in
Speaker 1: the air. I've never I've never thought about it. But
Speaker 1: now I'm thinking back, and I'm like, oh god, I
Speaker 1: probably do the body pump. Like I probably do that.
Speaker 1: There's some variations on the body pump, you know, like
Speaker 1: the two step or the three step, you know, the
Speaker 1: pat pat pat, or the double the little the little
Speaker 1: like tap dance of excitement. Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's that's just a variation. Let me just think about it,
Speaker 1: you know, Um, is that. I'm just curious, you know,
Speaker 1: double tap, triple tap, two step. It's a move with
Speaker 1: a lot of names, but they all have the name
Speaker 1: result spooked fish. Oh yeah, I've done that. I've I've
Speaker 1: body pumped probably two steps. I don't I don't know,
Speaker 1: I've probably three steps. I think that probably that might
Speaker 1: have been what cost me. Uh this tarpan that I
Speaker 1: blew it on after I flew all the way to
Speaker 1: Cuba to catch one. And that's the worst, right like
Speaker 1: that is the absolute worst, when you screw up on
Speaker 1: a destination fishing trip all the way overseas in a
Speaker 1: middle seat to get over here U. And for me,
Speaker 1: that's when the self loathing comes out. If I'm gonna
Speaker 1: be again from this is an honesty day for me.
Speaker 1: Like I if I blow it on a nice trout
Speaker 1: somewhere close to home, I can I can shake that off.
Speaker 1: I can forget about that one. I'm on. I'm onto
Speaker 1: the next one. There there'll be another one. It's fine.
Speaker 1: I can do this tomorrow. But on the road, like,
Speaker 1: I've not just let myself down now, I've let a
Speaker 1: guide down to and having been a guy like I
Speaker 1: know your guys gonna say, oh, don't worry about it,
Speaker 1: We'll find another one, right, because that's what guys do
Speaker 1: that their professionals as a job. But but that guy
Speaker 1: actually thinks, God, this guy sucks. Yeah, and like, yeah,
Speaker 1: the guide takes your failure personally and then pretty much
Speaker 1: hates you. That's just the truth. That's how it goes.
Speaker 1: And I know it. Yeah, And no matter what, look,
Speaker 1: whether you're with a guide or by yourself. Right, I've
Speaker 1: found over the years in in sightcasting scenarios, at least
Speaker 1: for me personally, like you have to nail the first
Speaker 1: one or two shots. Like if you execute and get
Speaker 1: those first one or two, it's it just sets you
Speaker 1: up for success. It's fine, everything else is great. Then
Speaker 1: like that gets the confidence way up and I tend
Speaker 1: to be more on it for the entire rest of
Speaker 1: the day. But the more you screw up early on,
Speaker 1: the more you miss on those first couple of shots,
Speaker 1: I think, the more likely it is you'll keep screwing up. Right,
Speaker 1: And then that's that's that's why you gotta keep your
Speaker 1: cool from the outset. You channel your inner Andre three thousand.
Speaker 1: I don't think I have an inner, Andrea. I think
Speaker 1: I have more like an inner rivers Cuomo, And this
Speaker 1: feels like a good time for us to bring in
Speaker 1: this week's awkward moments in angling. Seems like a good
Speaker 1: time for that. Let's do that. But it's a picture
Speaker 1: a la block. Who are we slapping on the awkward
Speaker 1: moments in angland chopping block this week? The chopping block
Speaker 1: in which the blood of our last victim, Alex Reid
Speaker 1: is still trying in the wood grain. The answer would
Speaker 1: be the answer, Hey, man, come on, I like it.
Speaker 1: I like it. I'm not I'm not giving you a
Speaker 1: hard time, Okay, all right, Well, the answer would be
Speaker 1: Mr John, I'm gonna say Brower, but it could be
Speaker 1: Brewer because there's elements of his name that could go
Speaker 1: brow or brew So one of those two do you have?
Speaker 1: You have an opinion on that. I'm going with Brewer,
Speaker 1: just because I like the idea of him being you know,
Speaker 1: but that's all John, No matter who you are, your
Speaker 1: John Brewer for the rest of this um. Anyway, John
Speaker 1: sent us his photo along with these opening lines. In
Speaker 1: the email, he says, here's a pick from a few
Speaker 1: years ago that is objectively pretty silly, but I'm still
Speaker 1: slightly proud of okay, which is a slightly weird and
Speaker 1: the way I see it, um, it's inclusion here on
Speaker 1: this segment, John will either make you more proud of
Speaker 1: it or possibly less because you've given us so much
Speaker 1: to talk about with this image, and we we've kind
Speaker 1: of had a habit of starting like with the attire
Speaker 1: or these the scenario in awkward moments, and we sort
Speaker 1: of like end up coming around to the fish at
Speaker 1: some point. But this time we're going to start with
Speaker 1: the fish because initially I couldn't find the fish. Wait,
Speaker 1: there's a fish. I'm kidding. I'm kidding. Yes, there's a fish.
Speaker 1: Of course there's a fish. We know there's a fish.
Speaker 1: But before we talk about that fish, I just want
Speaker 1: to say, Man, I loved this photo. It's a good
Speaker 1: one so much. It's a good one. If I were
Speaker 1: described as photo, it would be just like pure unfiltered, unpolished,
Speaker 1: no ego, no bullshit, fishing joy. Right when I see
Speaker 1: this photo, that's what I see. I've seen someone who
Speaker 1: is like transcended all the bs about taking a photo.
Speaker 1: Was just like, oh my god, I'm having the greatest
Speaker 1: day fishing. Was like it's he's like it's still pretty positive,
Speaker 1: still pretty positive. He's just like in this photo, he
Speaker 1: just he radiates everything that is good about fishing, you know,
Speaker 1: setting aside the fact that in order to find the
Speaker 1: actual fish in the picture, I had to do that
Speaker 1: like squint and refocus, that that we all developed with
Speaker 1: the Magic I three D picture books were kids. I
Speaker 1: was definitely getting there, you and I did, and some
Speaker 1: of our younger listeners would be like, what's up, what's
Speaker 1: a magic guy? Um? But there there is in fact fish. Um.
Speaker 1: It's an extremely tiny trout okay. And while John didn't
Speaker 1: specify the species, I'm thinking can micro cutty. It's a
Speaker 1: mountainous setting, could could be a micro Brookie like a
Speaker 1: main setting. It's really it's hard to call okay um.
Speaker 1: But according to John it was worthy of photo documentation
Speaker 1: because it was his first wild fish and by that
Speaker 1: I assume he means his first wild trout caught on
Speaker 1: the fly. And you know what, like Bravo, there's nothing
Speaker 1: wrong with that. Props for that judgment, no judgment. And
Speaker 1: my money is on Cutty not Brookie, just from what
Speaker 1: I can see. But it's hard to tell, uh. And
Speaker 1: it's it's not only hard to do because the fish
Speaker 1: is like really truly. I mean, if you guys look
Speaker 1: at this, you'll see like tiny tiny, But also because
Speaker 1: whoever took this photo was standing like ten ft away,
Speaker 1: which is you know, good depth of field. The background
Speaker 1: is gorgeous, but it's it's not so good if you're
Speaker 1: if you've got like a macro subject that you're trying
Speaker 1: to capture. Also, we got to talk about the hold
Speaker 1: in this or like whatever that is. I don't even
Speaker 1: know if we can call it a hold. So John's
Speaker 1: got his fly routed his right hand end, and I
Speaker 1: got in sort a quick tip here if if you
Speaker 1: don't want to look like a complete and total geper
Speaker 1: all of you out there, take off the plastic shrink
Speaker 1: wrap from your rod handles before you fish with them.
Speaker 1: This is like a basic thing that we should all know.
Speaker 1: And if you don't know, hey maybe no one's told you,
Speaker 1: but now you have no excuse take it off before
Speaker 1: you fish. Anyway, that's a that's a pet peeve of mine, like,
Speaker 1: like I see that, and I've had people saying, like
Speaker 1: why do that to keep the cork nice? Like no,
Speaker 1: I have to take that off. Take it off, just
Speaker 1: the cork feels good in your hands. Plastic feels terrible anyway.
Speaker 1: So he's got a shrink raptor rod in his right hand,
Speaker 1: and then he's like he's also holding his leader in
Speaker 1: that hand, but then further down the leader with his
Speaker 1: is his other hand. He's like way up in the
Speaker 1: air holding further down the leader, and I just don't
Speaker 1: get it. He's like way above his head holding that
Speaker 1: leader from which the fish is dangling, and I don't understand.
Speaker 1: I can't see why any one would hold their fish
Speaker 1: that way. Yeah, Like, yeah, he's got his one hand
Speaker 1: extended way up and and this this tiny dangler is
Speaker 1: hanging right in front of the screaming yellow life jack
Speaker 1: at the John's wearing. So basically, if you're just like
Speaker 1: doing a quick glance, it looks like John was, I
Speaker 1: don't know, like photographed in the middle of doing the
Speaker 1: Y M c A while holding a flyer on because
Speaker 1: you can't see the fish like you have to hunt
Speaker 1: for Unfortunately, though, right the fish is kind of the
Speaker 1: least of John's offenses. Okay, because perched a top, John's
Speaker 1: like Napoleon dynamite hair. Okay, it is some cross between
Speaker 1: a cowboy hat and like a crocodile dundee hat. Right,
Speaker 1: it appears to be hand Yeah, it's crocodile dundee. It
Speaker 1: appears to be made of felt. It is extremely mint green.
Speaker 1: It's so minty. Uh. It has a band that could
Speaker 1: possibly be made of like amber beads featuring Dino d
Speaker 1: na um. And he's even got the chin strap there
Speaker 1: since tightly under his chin, like he's all in on
Speaker 1: the hat. Like the hat is secure. The hat is
Speaker 1: not coming off in a hurricane. Um. And the hat
Speaker 1: and the strap it frames his face nicely. And that's
Speaker 1: a face that's wearing Ken Griffy Jr. Sunglasses. Wow, that
Speaker 1: was That was a menagerie of reference points you just
Speaker 1: gave there. You don't even know where to go, so
Speaker 1: many directions I'll go with, I'll go baseball. That was.
Speaker 1: That was a Griffy reference, a Griffy Junior reference, which
Speaker 1: it's very rare you get to sneak one of those in.
Speaker 1: So that was good. I like that. And and uh,
Speaker 1: you're right on, dude. Those shades do look a lot
Speaker 1: like like like the Griffy shades that he was so
Speaker 1: famous for. They've got that same Uh, I don't know,
Speaker 1: inverted trapezoid thing. And yeah, the glasses are quite sporty,
Speaker 1: but I gotta say John does not look particularly athletic
Speaker 1: in the rest of his countenance in this photo. Dude's
Speaker 1: kind of like a hot mess out there. Again, lots
Speaker 1: of joy, but not really all that I'll put together.
Speaker 1: You got like joy because his both his pants are
Speaker 1: rolled up, but one pant legs rolled up higher than
Speaker 1: the other significantly. And he's got like his his his
Speaker 1: his fishing shirt wide open, and one side's hanging down
Speaker 1: further than the other. And and then his life jacket
Speaker 1: is also wide open. It's like straps falling everywhere, which
Speaker 1: again not real good for fly fishing to have straps
Speaker 1: and things to catch your line hanging everywhere. Despite all
Speaker 1: of those, however, perhaps the least sporty thing in this
Speaker 1: photo is the watercraft that has parked on the beach
Speaker 1: next John. I would actually, I would actually argue that
Speaker 1: the vessel he's used to catch this fish makes to
Speaker 1: catch more significant, because I wouldn't want to fish out
Speaker 1: of it. No I do, dude. I want to say
Speaker 1: I fished out of worse, but I'm actually not sure. Uh,
Speaker 1: it's like you gotta you guys gotta it's it's like
Speaker 1: a two person inflatable canoe kayak hybrid that I'm gonna
Speaker 1: say came from Walmart. And there's there's nothing wrong with
Speaker 1: inflatable Walmart boats. But they they've got limitations, right. They're
Speaker 1: not like your best fishing vessels. They don't have any
Speaker 1: gear storage, and they're very very easily punctured by sharp
Speaker 1: objects like I don't know, hooks for example. Uh. Also,
Speaker 1: how the hell do you cast out of that thing? Yeah,
Speaker 1: there's because there's he's not standing up in that or
Speaker 1: if he has got maybe that's why he's wearing a
Speaker 1: life jacket. You know, it's a warm day and he
Speaker 1: just figures I'm gonna spill. But like, you can't understand
Speaker 1: when we say inflatable, we mean all parts. It's not
Speaker 1: like inflatable with a hard frame like this seats like
Speaker 1: there's no part of the boat that's not filled with air. No,
Speaker 1: it's a rubber raft canoe kayak thing. Stability for for me,
Speaker 1: for a man of my stature is like a huge factor.
Speaker 1: And I've been I've been on several watercraft that were
Speaker 1: built better than this, and I still got the jitters
Speaker 1: like I recall a time that me and another fella
Speaker 1: through giant swim baits on musky rods out of a
Speaker 1: rickety ten foot John boat for a few days. But
Speaker 1: I think that probably most of us have been on
Speaker 1: boats like this right where it's like everything is going
Speaker 1: to be fine as long as nobody moves. It's like
Speaker 1: no sub movement, or like if I go this way,
Speaker 1: you go that way and we don't have to be
Speaker 1: in sync. It's it's yeah, yeah, or just go really
Speaker 1: really slow and that's all fine. Again. This is the
Speaker 1: kind of watercraft that is perfectly fine if you're booze cruising, right,
Speaker 1: But fly casting requires motion and mobility and movement, and
Speaker 1: I don't think John's gonna send this this rig off
Speaker 1: any sweet jumps. That's That's what I'm guessing. Way to
Speaker 1: rein that one back in we'd love to see a
Speaker 1: video though, if you ever decided to shoot the shoots
Speaker 1: in that sled though, John, Oh, good one, good one.
Speaker 1: I'd also like to add that John concluded his email
Speaker 1: by calling this fish a turning point and angling for him,
Speaker 1: which is cool, but then he goes in ruins the
Speaker 1: sentiment by adding that he hasn't picked up a flyer
Speaker 1: out again since this day. That truly, to me, that's
Speaker 1: the bummer of all of this, of the whole thing,
Speaker 1: because again, despite all the ship we've been talking, the
Speaker 1: main attribute to this photo that I want everyone to
Speaker 1: take away is the joy of John, like he is
Speaker 1: having a sublime life moment here. Yeah. And I know
Speaker 1: we might attrashed you, but you were. You were happy
Speaker 1: and and happiness matters in this day and age with
Speaker 1: my friend. Um. Yes, John, please pick that fly right
Speaker 1: back up again. You should. Um. Hopefully we've also just
Speaker 1: created a turning point in your head gear choices. If
Speaker 1: we had Bent hats, i'd send you one, but we don't,
Speaker 1: so you're gonna have to settle for stickers. John. We
Speaker 1: do appreciate you sending the photos so we could have
Speaker 1: some fun with it. And remember, if you want to
Speaker 1: be subjected to this madness, send your awkward fishing photos
Speaker 1: to Bent at the meat eater dot com. Remember, you
Speaker 1: guys can now see John's photo on me and Miles instagrams.
Speaker 1: That's Joe dot Smellie one three eight and water Miles.
Speaker 1: That's that's they're basking and all its glory on the interview. Yeah,
Speaker 1: poor guy, poor guy. But in fairness it's critical. I
Speaker 1: think that you learned the basics of macro photography for
Speaker 1: tiny fish, which makes me wonder, like if maybe John
Speaker 1: doesn't have Instagram, because if you know what you're doing,
Speaker 1: even a little bit, like you can take a shot
Speaker 1: of a four inch mud mineau and make people think
Speaker 1: you're the ship. You know what I mean? If you
Speaker 1: do it his way, you just just end up on
Speaker 1: bent and get trampled over a hat. I really hope
Speaker 1: that was like his favorite hat. I wonder, I wonder
Speaker 1: if John's an archaeologist. I like, maybe that's his archaeologist hat,
Speaker 1: or like maybe the hat that's been handed down through
Speaker 1: his archaeologist generations of fans. I don't know. I'm making
Speaker 1: up a store that that would make us real jerks
Speaker 1: if we were like making fun of his lineage. Anyway,
Speaker 1: speaking of getting trampled, let's head down river in an
Speaker 1: inflatable flamingo toward the waterfall of uncertainty and see who
Speaker 1: swan dives over that drop like a pro in Fish News,
Speaker 1: Fish New that escalated quickly. All right, this this week,
Speaker 1: I have a shout out. I want to start with,
Speaker 1: if you've followed this show since the very beginning. You
Speaker 1: might remember that our first ever end of the line
Speaker 1: segment covered the beetle spin, and in that I wind
Speaker 1: and complained that Johnson stopped making the magnum size at
Speaker 1: some point, and recently, yeah, you remember me complaining about that.
Speaker 1: So recently I got this photo from from listener Chris Lawler,
Speaker 1: and there is holding up a brand new in the
Speaker 1: box magnum sized beetle spin at his local tackle shop,
Speaker 1: and I was like, what did you find that? Yeah,
Speaker 1: And so at first I chucked it up to a
Speaker 1: regional oddity because Chris lives in Canada. So I was thinking,
Speaker 1: maybe Johnson decided to only market the larger sized beetle
Speaker 1: spins up north. But that just doesn't make any sense.
Speaker 1: So so now I figure I'm wrong. I gotta do
Speaker 1: a little more digging, thinking new old stock, right, I
Speaker 1: would be like, oh, it's new old stock. I knew
Speaker 1: something was up. I'm like the old stock, or like
Speaker 1: but what what? What the hell is going on? So
Speaker 1: I went back into internet whole and it turns out
Speaker 1: you can still get the half ound sized beetle spins
Speaker 1: here in the US. You just have to really look
Speaker 1: for them specifically. Okay, if you search the Internet for
Speaker 1: Johnson original beetle spin, which is what I did when
Speaker 1: I was right in the end of line segment, you
Speaker 1: will not find anything larger than a quarter ounce. If, however,
Speaker 1: you google half ounce beetle spins, you will discover something different.
Speaker 1: Long story short, it seems like the super sized beetle
Speaker 1: spins somewhere got rebranded as salt water lures and separated
Speaker 1: out from the original beatle spins, and so now they
Speaker 1: only come with gold blades and are only available and
Speaker 1: a handful of colors. But they do still exist. So
Speaker 1: I just want to say thanks to Chris for sending
Speaker 1: me down that deep, deep hole and also sending me
Speaker 1: a couple and uh and forcing me to figure out
Speaker 1: the mystery. Thanks Chris, based on on what you just said,
Speaker 1: only gold and certain colors, what they're push and him
Speaker 1: for what trout and redfish? Right? Trout and redfish? Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1: Well that's good news. Um, you and twelve other freshwater
Speaker 1: fisherman is super excited right now, all right, I got
Speaker 1: I got just one baby shout out quick one uh
Speaker 1: to listener Anthony, it's either marchant or Marchant. Okay, it's
Speaker 1: one of the two. Rarely do we get a name
Speaker 1: where I'm like, oh, it's just Smith, so that's okay. Um.
Speaker 1: But he wrote in following up to our little convo
Speaker 1: about good luck charms and and pre fishing rituals and
Speaker 1: things like that, and I just thought this was fun
Speaker 1: and I'm gonna steal something from him, he wrote, after
Speaker 1: the pre fish dump, but before the morning cigarette, when
Speaker 1: we are gathering our gear, I will look over at
Speaker 1: my brother Alex or my buddy Nick and go, you
Speaker 1: boys ready to get skunked, or you boys ready to
Speaker 1: wash some loures. We do this to lower expectations and
Speaker 1: not get worried about catching any fish. I have never
Speaker 1: heard somebody say you ready to wash some loures. Nope,
Speaker 1: And I am stealing that, Anthony. That's a good one.
Speaker 1: I'm taking it. So that's it. That's my shout out. Wash.
Speaker 1: I washed a lot of loures. You'll probably be washing
Speaker 1: some magnum beetlespins pretty soon. Good stuff, good stuff, alright,
Speaker 1: on too news. As a friendly reminder, this is a competition, Miles,
Speaker 1: and I do not know what stories the other guy
Speaker 1: is bringing at the table. At the end of it,
Speaker 1: as always are, our audio engineer, Phil the Ayatollah of
Speaker 1: Rock and Roller, will judge us and declare winner. And
Speaker 1: right after that we're gonna do a little trivia with
Speaker 1: our friend Mandy Yorick. You are up man, you have
Speaker 1: the the you get to start today, all right. Uh
Speaker 1: So for my first story, I'm gonna I'm gonna be
Speaker 1: sticking with that that that Canada theme I brought up
Speaker 1: my shout at and I'm also gonna be piggybacking a
Speaker 1: little bit off of what Sam Lungeren covered last week
Speaker 1: when he was on here talking about is he still
Speaker 1: Is he still alive? Before we go last I heard,
Speaker 1: I heard, I have not received any It did a
Speaker 1: couple days ago. He's not dead and I don't think
Speaker 1: I don't think any of badsab to him yet. So um,
Speaker 1: you guys, remember he was talking about concerns over Olympic
Speaker 1: Peninsula steel head potentially getting listed under the Federal Endangered
Speaker 1: Species Act and how that would impact fishing for them
Speaker 1: and the whole culture of steel heading out there. Right,
Speaker 1: So we're gonna move from the northwest to the even
Speaker 1: farther northeast and talk about a similar situation playing out
Speaker 1: on the East coast of Canada. The Department of Fisheries
Speaker 1: and Oceans is considering listing certain Atlantic salmon populations under
Speaker 1: the Species At Risk Act or SARAH, which is the
Speaker 1: Canadian equivalent of the E s A. If it goes through,
Speaker 1: this listing would apply to salmon populations in over a
Speaker 1: hundred thirty rivers in Quebec, Nova Scotia, and Newfoundland and Labrador. Okay,
Speaker 1: so let's start with with some basic facts about Atlantic
Speaker 1: salmon populations in Canada. Much like the ste letting the OP,
Speaker 1: they're not doing so hot. They've dropped from about nine
Speaker 1: hundred thousand mature fish returning in about one hundred thousand,
Speaker 1: and that's approximately four thousand fish below the estimated minimum
Speaker 1: to maintain a viable population. Also, much like the steelhead
Speaker 1: in the OP, the reason for these continuing declines are
Speaker 1: numerous and they're not easily fixed. So the Canadian Committee
Speaker 1: on the Status of Endangered Wildlife has recommended a threatened
Speaker 1: or endangered listing, which the Department of Fisheries and Oceans
Speaker 1: or DFO, is currently considering. That might sound like a
Speaker 1: good idea, right The fisher in terrible shape. Give them
Speaker 1: the highest level of protection available. Let's save these bastards.
Speaker 1: But salmon conservation groups disagree. The Margarite Salmon Foundation, St.
Speaker 1: Mary's River Association, Nova Scotia Salmon Association, and Atlantic Salmon
Speaker 1: Federation are voicing strong opposition to the listing and spearheading
Speaker 1: a campaign to pressure the Canadian government to stay away
Speaker 1: from this move. Again, I'm gonna feel familiar that you've
Speaker 1: heard these arguments before. Yeah, listing these populations could put
Speaker 1: an end to recreational fishing, which would alienate the primary
Speaker 1: advocates that the fish currently have. We all know anglers
Speaker 1: put more time, effort, and money into saving the fish
Speaker 1: they love than anyone else, including you know, the pea
Speaker 1: people and the conservation groups. Right, so taking away our
Speaker 1: ability to fish for them could functionally cut off all
Speaker 1: that major support. And you know, even better than I do,
Speaker 1: the kind of money that Atlantic standon fishermen dropped like big, yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I'll have several things to say so but I'm not done.
Speaker 1: But like that, that's that is one group of anglers
Speaker 1: who spends money, right and so yeah, So advocates also
Speaker 1: worried that the closing these rivers would put additional pressure
Speaker 1: on the rivers that are still in good shape. Right.
Speaker 1: These are all arguments we've heard elsewhere, but some of
Speaker 1: their concerns did feel unique to me and seem to
Speaker 1: go even further. According to the Guysborough Journal, which is
Speaker 1: a regional newspaper Nova Scotia, a SARAH listing does not
Speaker 1: compel DFO or other government agencies to do anything about
Speaker 1: the actual threats a species might face, such as resource extraction, agriculture,
Speaker 1: and unregulated fishing. In a statement on their website, People
Speaker 1: for Salmon Atlantic Salmon Federation states SARAH would take people
Speaker 1: off the water, threatening a long tradition of shared stewardship.
Speaker 1: Yet experience shows that serious threats like open netpen salmon
Speaker 1: aquaculture would be left alone. Dear Dr Green, a board
Speaker 1: member for the St. Mary's River Association, claims, when a
Speaker 1: species is listed under SARAH, there is a general prohibition
Speaker 1: against harming and harassing that species. This has been known
Speaker 1: to impact critical research, recovery and restoration efforts. So it's
Speaker 1: possible that sting these fish could not only like prohibit
Speaker 1: fishing for them, and not actually help the major issues
Speaker 1: or stop the major issues that are threatening these populations,
Speaker 1: but could also limit the ability of researchers and conservation
Speaker 1: groups to study and manage these fish and fisheries, as
Speaker 1: doing so might fall into the category of harassing protected wildlife.
Speaker 1: I do have to say the Department of Fisheries and
Speaker 1: Oceans is still considering this issue, and they have stated
Speaker 1: publicly that even if they do list these populations as endangered,
Speaker 1: they may still allow recreational fishing and other research and
Speaker 1: conservation activities. So all of this is to say, Canadian listeners,
Speaker 1: and we know there are some of you out there,
Speaker 1: if you care about salmon, this is a good time
Speaker 1: to write an email to your Minister of Parliament and
Speaker 1: the Department of Fisheries and Oceans and tell them what
Speaker 1: you think. Remind them that fishing is conservation, that that
Speaker 1: anglers can and should be conservationists and stewards of the resource.
Speaker 1: Their decision on this listing is expected later than this year,
Speaker 1: and they're they're taking public comments, So I think now
Speaker 1: is the time to no matter how this goes down,
Speaker 1: get your voices heard so it doesn't go in the
Speaker 1: way that all of these groups are worried it might
Speaker 1: go yeah, yeah, no, And I totally agree with that,
Speaker 1: and I will say I am certainly no expert by
Speaker 1: any means on Atlantic salmon. I fished for them in
Speaker 1: in in the Canadian Maritimes once. I thought it was awesome. Um,
Speaker 1: But it's one of those species that that me and
Speaker 1: a lot of other East Coasters in general, like you're
Speaker 1: intrigued by. Like I have friends we've talked about doing
Speaker 1: Atlantic salmon trips for years. We never actually get around
Speaker 1: to doing it. But I'm I'm just intrigued by these fish.
Speaker 1: And you you brought up, you know, spending money. Um.
Speaker 1: The one thing that that I think is different here
Speaker 1: or strange. Again, I'm not that familiar with the totality
Speaker 1: of the West Coast steel scene either, but it just
Speaker 1: seems a little different to me because I almost feel like,
Speaker 1: if you really want to experience Atlantic salmon fishing in Canada,
Speaker 1: good Atlantic salmon fishing, you have to be willing to
Speaker 1: pay a shipload of money to do it, like you
Speaker 1: you cannot just you can't just go up there and fish.
Speaker 1: It doesn't work that way. So, I mean, part of
Speaker 1: the reason why I've I've never I've never gotten there,
Speaker 1: like I've always wanted to do um, the rest of Gooche.
Speaker 1: There's a few rivers up there that I've always wanted
Speaker 1: to do, but you're not exactly getting media invites, and
Speaker 1: I don't have that kind of coin. So this is
Speaker 1: interesting to me that these fish are are that they're
Speaker 1: attributing any hurt really towards over recreational fishing, because from
Speaker 1: my view, and again this is my ignorance, it seems
Speaker 1: like in the overall scheme of things, there's so few
Speaker 1: people doing it because it is such an elite thing
Speaker 1: to do that that really this is harming in the
Speaker 1: overall scheme of things, a very small amount of anglers.
Speaker 1: It's not like saying, well, you can't nobody can trout
Speaker 1: fish uh in in Montana, It's like tons of people
Speaker 1: do that. The Atlantic salmon thinks seems like such a
Speaker 1: small group of very rich people that do it, you know.
Speaker 1: I mean, I think that's true for travel anglers. I
Speaker 1: think that the local cultures of those places are still
Speaker 1: very much tied to Atlantic salmon fishing. And those aren't
Speaker 1: those aren't huge communities, but the people who live there, man,
Speaker 1: that's in their blood. It's what they do, it's what
Speaker 1: they've always done, and I'm the same boat man. I've
Speaker 1: always wanted to fish at lang Sam, and I've never
Speaker 1: done it because the same deal right now. No one's
Speaker 1: offering up media trips to go at like salmon fishing
Speaker 1: because they don't have to and I can't afford it,
Speaker 1: So I've never done Uh. But I do think one
Speaker 1: thing to point out this is this legislation, this, this
Speaker 1: potential listing is not aimed at angling. That would just
Speaker 1: be a consequence of it. They're talking about listening to
Speaker 1: them just because they're in really bad shape, and the
Speaker 1: angling groups are jumping on that and saying whoa, whoa,
Speaker 1: we'll hold on. If you do that, you're gonna push
Speaker 1: us out. And I think that's gonna have unintended consequences
Speaker 1: that you don't want. So I don't see this as
Speaker 1: like the big bad government trying to attack anglers. I
Speaker 1: think there's an opportunity where anglers need to step in
Speaker 1: and say like, hey, we're on your side, We're part
Speaker 1: of the solution here, let's work together. No, and I
Speaker 1: completely understand that. I think I know they're not targeting anglers.
Speaker 1: I just if you look at these two stories side
Speaker 1: by side, the Steelhead and the Olympic and and and
Speaker 1: the salmon totally understand. I have friends up there who
Speaker 1: live up there, and yeah, they spend a lot of
Speaker 1: time Atlantic salmon fishing. They're lucky enough to live where
Speaker 1: the waters in their backyard have wild freaking Atlantic salmon,
Speaker 1: which I think would just be the bomb. I can't
Speaker 1: even imagine that, um, But it's it's a harder fight,
Speaker 1: I think, to to bring that awareness to on our
Speaker 1: side of the border, because it is such a small
Speaker 1: group people that are going to do that. Like, I
Speaker 1: want to see this work out, because I still have
Speaker 1: that dream and I don't want to get off on it.
Speaker 1: But I I fished the mirror machee one time and
Speaker 1: we did very well. But we also did it in
Speaker 1: the spring during black salmon season, and I was ignorant
Speaker 1: and didn't really understand the difference between the two. So
Speaker 1: while it was cool and it was super fun, I've
Speaker 1: never had that bright silver eating a bomber experience, you know,
Speaker 1: Like I haven't had that yet, and I hope to
Speaker 1: do it. I'll just say that I don't want to
Speaker 1: have to go to Russia to have that experience, which
Speaker 1: you kind of do right now, exactly but it's also
Speaker 1: I will say, it's also a bummer, um, just to
Speaker 1: hear that. It's so problematic because so many states in
Speaker 1: the US have tried to re establish their runs, and
Speaker 1: in the back of your head it's always like, man,
Speaker 1: they're faced with so many issues. I don't know if
Speaker 1: I'm ever going to see that in my lifetime. But
Speaker 1: you know, hey, if I I can always go to Canada,
Speaker 1: if I really want to, I can always go to Canada.
Speaker 1: And now to hear that ship like that might be
Speaker 1: off the table too, not good, Like that's that's not good. So, um,
Speaker 1: I hope that. I hope that works out because I
Speaker 1: will get there someday. Uh. In the meantime, I have
Speaker 1: a feel good story. Yeah, this is a much more
Speaker 1: feel good story than that. Uh. And it's winters, so
Speaker 1: I just generally don't feel good, you know. So this
Speaker 1: is like a ray of sunshine in my cold, bleak existence. Uh.
Speaker 1: And several listeners actually sent this my way, and it
Speaker 1: comes to us from USA today headline angler hooks giant
Speaker 1: Lake trout while on the phone with surgeon. Okay, so
Speaker 1: uh this happened also in Canada. We're very Canadian today.
Speaker 1: I just realized there's just nothing good going on in
Speaker 1: the States. Now that I think about it, my second
Speaker 1: story is not in the US either, Do something, people
Speaker 1: make some news, help us out here. Uh So this
Speaker 1: happened in Canada, British Columbia, um and not long ago.
Speaker 1: Fifty seven year old Murray Zelt had to have emergency
Speaker 1: surgery to remove an obstruction in his intestines and that
Speaker 1: went well. He recovered nicely, but naturally after surgery, you
Speaker 1: make a follow up appointment right with your doctor. And
Speaker 1: now Murray lives in the town of one hundred mile House, Okay,
Speaker 1: and the closest big town I guess with legit medical
Speaker 1: facilities is cam Loops, where we get all those famous
Speaker 1: rainbow trout, you know, the Camloops fish. But that's roughly
Speaker 1: two and a half hours away from where Mary lives. Well,
Speaker 1: the morning that he was supposed to head to that
Speaker 1: the doctor's office, he gets a call that, due to
Speaker 1: newly tightened restrictions because of the COVIDS, they wanted to
Speaker 1: switch his follow up to a phone call instead of
Speaker 1: in person. So Murray says, hell, I'm up early. I
Speaker 1: got up mad early to drive to cam Loops. Now
Speaker 1: I don't have to go to cam Loops. I'm as
Speaker 1: well go ice fishing at nearby Horse Lake. And I
Speaker 1: really don't think he had to think about this too
Speaker 1: hard because just two days earlier he had caught his
Speaker 1: personal best lake trout through the ice on Horse Lake
Speaker 1: and that was a nice fourteen pounder, good fish. Right,
Speaker 1: So Mary heads to Horse drills a bunch of holes
Speaker 1: and gets after it. Uh. And he jigs for a
Speaker 1: couple of hours with nothing, no, no, zero bites, and
Speaker 1: then his surgeon calls and Mury begins his post surgery
Speaker 1: follow up. Um, and the doctor had all good news,
Speaker 1: said everything is great, you look good, and then as oh,
Speaker 1: by the way, you're free to resume outdoor activities now.
Speaker 1: So the irony and that right out of the gate, right,
Speaker 1: But as those words came out of his surgeon's mouth,
Speaker 1: Murray's jig gets slammed. So what does he do? Right?
Speaker 1: He puts the surgeon on speaker phone naturally, and his
Speaker 1: surgeon is is apparently an avid angler, and they enjoyed
Speaker 1: the fight together via cell signal. Okay with his surgeon
Speaker 1: post follow up. So so he immediately had to admit,
Speaker 1: I'm sorry interrupt, but immediately had a been like I'm
Speaker 1: allowed to. Yeah, he was like she's sitting on He's like,
Speaker 1: I'm sitting on a frozen lake right now. So I
Speaker 1: just got wrecked. Check this out with the clearance. Here's
Speaker 1: the kicker, right, here's the kicker, the laker that he
Speaker 1: hooked while on the phone with the surgeon, Wade twenty
Speaker 1: seven pounds, shattering Murray's other PB by thirteen whole. Damn
Speaker 1: isn't that great? Isn't that? Isn't that nice? And most
Speaker 1: impressive to me is um the quality of the cell
Speaker 1: reception on horse Laking because I looked it up on
Speaker 1: a map and y'all are out there, Like I would
Speaker 1: have just assumed that was you know, like, please God
Speaker 1: let this text go through country. So you know, I
Speaker 1: I think it's a wonderful story. And I also give
Speaker 1: the surgeon credit, like this is a guy who's probably
Speaker 1: very busy and very official, but like he hung around
Speaker 1: on the phone to listen to the lake traffic get caught.
Speaker 1: That was probably the highlight of his day, Let's be honest.
Speaker 1: He's like, yeah, there's someone dying in the next room,
Speaker 1: but I gotta hear how this ends. We'll get to
Speaker 1: the we'll get to the gall stones later. What do
Speaker 1: you got what? Yeah, so congrats to marry. Mary looks
Speaker 1: like a character in his photos. He's like he's the
Speaker 1: way he's smiling with his with his fur hat on.
Speaker 1: He looks like somebody in grumpy old men who would
Speaker 1: be really fun to hang out with, Like I like,
Speaker 1: I feel like Murray would be a good time to
Speaker 1: to jig lakers with. I like anyone who fishes in
Speaker 1: a fur hat. I'll admit that you started this story
Speaker 1: out by describing how you your cold bleak winter existence.
Speaker 1: I believe I believe those are the words you use
Speaker 1: very much. So, yeah, that is my story. Is is
Speaker 1: about our collective cold bleak winter existence and somebody who's
Speaker 1: trying to maybe make it a little less bleak. It's
Speaker 1: it's a little short. I don't have a lot to
Speaker 1: say about this. I just think it's it's kind of
Speaker 1: cool and uh. It's about the use of de icing
Speaker 1: salt on roadways. If you, if any of you out
Speaker 1: there living in Arizona or Florida, someplace that doesn't have
Speaker 1: ice U there are states and cities in parts of
Speaker 1: the world where we get regular snowfall and uh, and
Speaker 1: that snowfall you just call it salt. It's not It's
Speaker 1: just salt. The people in Flagstaff are really hating us
Speaker 1: right now. But there are other in northern climbs. We
Speaker 1: get we get the snow and the ice, and it
Speaker 1: takes up on the roads and and makes for dangerous
Speaker 1: driving conditions right and and cities and and and states
Speaker 1: and towns will spread some combination of sodium, potassium and
Speaker 1: magnesium chlorides on the road ahead of, during and after snowstorms.
Speaker 1: These compounds lower the freezing point of water and make
Speaker 1: the snow and ice melt faster, and at least in theory,
Speaker 1: make the roads safer. Here in the US, we use
Speaker 1: a lot of this stuff, like two hundred million tons
Speaker 1: per year, which I didn't realize until I check this out,
Speaker 1: and I I used half it out on my driveway,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. It might make traction on
Speaker 1: the roads better. But these these salt compounds also have drawbacks,
Speaker 1: as anyone who has ever lived in a state that
Speaker 1: used a lot of roads will tell you. They wreak
Speaker 1: havoc on the undercarriage your vehicle by causing rust and corrosion.
Speaker 1: You probably know about this I'm guessing is just gonna
Speaker 1: say I had just had my whole try reframed, and
Speaker 1: I'm sure the salt had something to do with it. Definitely,
Speaker 1: it definitely did. And it's not just bad on vehgles.
Speaker 1: It's really bad on vehicles, but it also damages roads
Speaker 1: and bridges and like messes up all kinds of infrastructure.
Speaker 1: So it's it's bad for things, and I'm speaking specifically
Speaker 1: of things like cars and roads and bridges and metal.
Speaker 1: It's great for not getting sued by ups like you
Speaker 1: don't want him to slip on your step, you know
Speaker 1: what I'm saying. I'm not I'm not negating the necessity
Speaker 1: of these things. I'm just I'm just pointing out that
Speaker 1: they have some drawbacks, and some of them are environmental
Speaker 1: because all the all the snow and the ice it melts,
Speaker 1: it turns into water, and the water carries the chemical
Speaker 1: compounds into streams and rivers and wetlands and lakes and oceans.
Speaker 1: Are you gonna be talking about your own state and
Speaker 1: this at all? We don't use it? You're not. That's
Speaker 1: why I was gonna ask. That's why I was gonna say,
Speaker 1: because Montana, like you guys, are a big no no
Speaker 1: on salt. We're we're a big note. I'm not. I
Speaker 1: decided I kind of admitted this out of that story
Speaker 1: because I don't thin anyone care that much. But yeah,
Speaker 1: we we avoid it for just this reason. No, I
Speaker 1: don't want bring it up because the last time I
Speaker 1: was out there and there was heavy snow and I
Speaker 1: was sliding all over the place walking around town. I'm like,
Speaker 1: why doesn't somebody salt this ship? They were like, oh, no,
Speaker 1: don't say that, we don't. There's no salt here. I'm like,
Speaker 1: what anyway, we love our trout too much, dude, we
Speaker 1: love our trout. No, it's a good thing. You're smarter
Speaker 1: for it. It's a good thing. So there's all the
Speaker 1: context and and this little fun little twist. Bentleister John Brewer,
Speaker 1: whose name should sound familiar since we just made fun
Speaker 1: of him fishing photo, sent us a story from the
Speaker 1: magazine Popular Science, and and that story is written by
Speaker 1: Monica Blazynski, who's a materials scientist working on alternatives to
Speaker 1: d icing salts. She's analyzing how how fish, insects, and
Speaker 1: plants deal with ice in an attempt to develop more
Speaker 1: benign anti freeze compounds one of the most promising potential
Speaker 1: sources fish blood. Species like the Antarctic toothfish create glycoproteins
Speaker 1: that keep their blood from freezing even in the coldest
Speaker 1: waters on Earth. Blazinski and her colleagues have now isolated
Speaker 1: a compound in those glycoproteins primarily responsible for their anti
Speaker 1: freeze characteristics. She writes, these small compounds lock into place
Speaker 1: with water molecules like a key in a lock to
Speaker 1: prevent ice from forming. And I'm sure that is a
Speaker 1: massive oversimplification for people like me, but I can kind
Speaker 1: of see it now. You can't just dump a bunch
Speaker 1: of fish blood on an icy road and have it
Speaker 1: do the same thing. It's salt like that that that
Speaker 1: won't work. The glycoproteins break down quickly in open air,
Speaker 1: and frankly, that's probably good news for the Antaric toothfish,
Speaker 1: because otherwise they might be in trouble. I already haven't
Speaker 1: seen one in years. I was wondering how they were
Speaker 1: doing where I used to catch them all the time.
Speaker 1: So instead of doing that, we're not just like slaughtering
Speaker 1: these fish and spreading their blood everywhere. Blazynski and her
Speaker 1: colleagues have discovered that polyvinyl alcohol, an inexpensive compound that's
Speaker 1: non toxic to humans and aquatic life, is surprisingly similar
Speaker 1: to the active anti freeze agent in fish blood. They're
Speaker 1: working to engineer slight changes to the chemical structure of
Speaker 1: p v A based on what they're they're learning from
Speaker 1: studying the fish to create a cheap, readily available d
Speaker 1: icing compound that will not rust your car or pollute
Speaker 1: your rivers. So there you go, Like, that's my favorite
Speaker 1: story for the day. Yeah, that's great. I saw this
Speaker 1: headline and at first I thought they were going to
Speaker 1: try and like figure out how to do this with
Speaker 1: fish blood, but basically they're learning from the fish blood
Speaker 1: how to synthesize this. Yes, yes, no, no actual fish blood.
Speaker 1: I'm all for that, I really am. And you know,
Speaker 1: we're we're joking about the salt out here. I feel
Speaker 1: like salting out here. It's one of those things that
Speaker 1: most people know, like it's it's really not good, but
Speaker 1: we're so in it, man, like we're so ingrained in it.
Speaker 1: It's it's just not going away, Like it's not You
Speaker 1: can buy salt for people who don't live in salt
Speaker 1: places where you need when you need the ship. You
Speaker 1: can buy salt anywhere, like as of Thanksgiving, Like you
Speaker 1: can go to the gas station they're selling bags of
Speaker 1: salt out in front of the seven eleven there bags
Speaker 1: of salt. You can go to the post office and
Speaker 1: they got salt. And like, it's so crazy here. If
Speaker 1: there's snow forecast for five days from now, they start
Speaker 1: salting the ship today, Like they'll be salt on the
Speaker 1: roads today. I I think I think this is great.
Speaker 1: I just I applaud Montana, And I'm sure there's other
Speaker 1: states where they like really took that to heart and
Speaker 1: we're like, we don't need to do this to get
Speaker 1: through our winter. Here, man, five days out, chance of flurries,
Speaker 1: get the trucks out there, salt that ship down. You
Speaker 1: could cure meat on the day on the damn street. Dude,
Speaker 1: don't like the kids just don't do it. Yeah, but no,
Speaker 1: I think I think that would be incredibly smart if
Speaker 1: we could figure out how to do that. And and
Speaker 1: it is no joke. Yeah, I mean, you know, the
Speaker 1: fish is one thing, Yes, that's obviously very important to us,
Speaker 1: but the truck stuff is no joke either. Man. I
Speaker 1: mean my frame just rotted straight through. So if you
Speaker 1: don't have to deal with that, good for you. Um well,
Speaker 1: I will incorporate fish blood in a sense into my
Speaker 1: next story, as well as probably a pinch or two
Speaker 1: of salt. Okay, because we bang bang on right there.
Speaker 1: We recently got an email from a listener that said,
Speaker 1: we don't dabble in fish cookery on this on this
Speaker 1: program as much as he would like. And I kind
Speaker 1: of disagree because apparently he missed my riveting expose of
Speaker 1: fermented sushi a few weeks ago. Where were you on
Speaker 1: that one, bud? But that's okay, it's all right. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna try and make up for it with this one.
Speaker 1: And this comes to us, of all places, from the
Speaker 1: South China Morning Post headline pet food Malaysian woman's koi
Speaker 1: soup raises eyebrows after she makes meal out of dead fish.
Speaker 1: And it's exactly good word play, right there, pet food,
Speaker 1: I got it, I got it. Say see, they're pretty smart,
Speaker 1: they're pretty smart. Good journalism. We're there. Um it's exactly
Speaker 1: what it sounds like. This is from the story just
Speaker 1: a little bit here. Japanese ki are typically thought of
Speaker 1: as expensive ornamental fish rather than food, so a Malaysian
Speaker 1: woman calls quite a stir on social media when she
Speaker 1: shared pictures of her dead Petki being turned into soup.
Speaker 1: Amanda omt you A first posted the photos on a
Speaker 1: Facebook group with more than two million members called cooking
Speaker 1: Fails of the Day. Al Right, so that's that's she's
Speaker 1: that's where she went. Okay, that's where she went. Okay.
Speaker 1: In her post at you included a photo of over
Speaker 1: a dozen of her dead pet Koi fish laying on
Speaker 1: the floor, which, according to her, all died of suffocation
Speaker 1: when her domestic helper forgot to turn off the water
Speaker 1: supply to the fish tank, resulting in low oxygen. Now
Speaker 1: I read that and reread that several times. And I'm
Speaker 1: not a fish tank nerd, but do you think they
Speaker 1: meant that the domestic helper forgot to turn on the
Speaker 1: water supply. Like, if you forgot to turn off the
Speaker 1: water supply, wouldn't your COI be overly oxygen eated? I
Speaker 1: would think think about that, doesn't You're right? That doesn't
Speaker 1: make it unless there's just some weird stuff in the No.
Speaker 1: I can't. I can't figure out how that, dude. Some
Speaker 1: some some tank people are gonna write and be like,
Speaker 1: oh you pH and I always keep my fine. I
Speaker 1: don't know, I just I just caught me off guard.
Speaker 1: That didn't seem right to me. It's irrelevant and the
Speaker 1: long run, um, anyway, this woman documented every single step
Speaker 1: of this process. So first it's it's more than a
Speaker 1: dozen deadki. Then there's the shot of all the beautiful
Speaker 1: koi hacked into a million pieces in a strainer, right,
Speaker 1: just like rough, it's a rough chop with a cleaver, right.
Speaker 1: And then you've got a pot full of ki simmering
Speaker 1: on the stove, and then the finished product, a steaming
Speaker 1: hot bowl of koi soup. Now here's the thing, right,
Speaker 1: They're just carp That's all they are right there. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they're very pretty carp And lots of people, Asians, especially
Speaker 1: eat carp. That's not weird. It's part of their culture.
Speaker 1: They eat carp all the time. But despite knowing this,
Speaker 1: the shot of the bowl, the finished bowl of soup
Speaker 1: makes me gag a little. And I attribute this gagging
Speaker 1: to two things. It's one, it's just the color of
Speaker 1: the fish. Like there's a very vibrant, still very vibrant,
Speaker 1: bright orange and white koi head in the middle of
Speaker 1: the bowl with those boiled out, glazed over eyeballs, and
Speaker 1: it's to me, it's just off putting. I'm sorry. In second,
Speaker 1: the broth looks like dirty dishwater like it looks to
Speaker 1: me like it would have no flavor other than that
Speaker 1: of your pellet fed ki. So I know the eating
Speaker 1: of carp is not weird, but I mean, you saw
Speaker 1: the pick. Does the soup look good to you? Does
Speaker 1: it look like good soup? So you set me these
Speaker 1: photos and uh no, it it doesn't look like the
Speaker 1: fish soup that I prefer to make. But you know what,
Speaker 1: I don't think you can judge, particularly a soup, just
Speaker 1: by how it looks. You eat with your eyes. First, man,
Speaker 1: come on, if one of my boys in Louisiana threw
Speaker 1: a coin in some gumbo, I'd be like, oh, that
Speaker 1: looks delicious, spicy pacanti. It's just like a bowl of
Speaker 1: starchy potato water with a giant ki head in the
Speaker 1: middle of it. Dude, I'm I'm saying I would reserve judgment.
Speaker 1: I would try it, and I would reserve judgment until
Speaker 1: trying it. And I don't have the highest hopes because,
Speaker 1: like you said, these are pellet fedki I don't think
Speaker 1: they're gonna be the most the tastiest to all the fishes,
Speaker 1: but I've been wrong before. Even if she made the
Speaker 1: soup out of regular carps, she bought up the fish
Speaker 1: market and posted it to to a cooking Facebook group,
Speaker 1: I'd still be like, well, that looks shitty, Like that
Speaker 1: doesn't The coy just takes to a whole other level.
Speaker 1: But the vibrant colors, I got to admit, dude, the
Speaker 1: vibrant colors in the super are are just a little strange.
Speaker 1: As you are off, it does it's it throws you off.
Speaker 1: So um. Anyway, some of the comments from the social
Speaker 1: media post are interesting, and remember this is on an
Speaker 1: Asian version of Facebook. This isn't our Facebook, so these
Speaker 1: were all translated in the story. But one person wrote,
Speaker 1: no way, they are too cute. Another jested that this
Speaker 1: was a dish for nobility, and my personal favorite, someone
Speaker 1: asked how they were because if they were good, they'd
Speaker 1: consider setting up a tank and rearing them just for
Speaker 1: eating purposes, like to have your own like like like
Speaker 1: like raising chickens. That'd be very expensive cheap. I don't
Speaker 1: know what coit costs over there, but they are they
Speaker 1: are not cheap, so um yeah, KOI soup. I mean
Speaker 1: it wasn't wasteful. I guess. I guess it's better than
Speaker 1: put them in a garbage back. And they surely would
Speaker 1: have clogged the toilet, especially one of those low pressure toilets.
Speaker 1: Like there's no way you're getting all them down. I
Speaker 1: fully support it. I fully supported you know you had
Speaker 1: the toy. They're dead, they're fresh. I might have tried,
Speaker 1: I might have gone with a different preparation, but I
Speaker 1: I the basic idea of what she was doing, I'm
Speaker 1: fully in favor of. I probably would have fried him,
Speaker 1: but I'm an American, so of course I'm gonna fry them.
Speaker 1: What the hell else am I gonna do? I'm not
Speaker 1: creative enough to think of other ways to prepare my fish. Uh? So,
Speaker 1: I love what she was doing. And I think she
Speaker 1: was trolling everybody, and I think that's kind of fun too.
Speaker 1: I think she was just like, look what I did.
Speaker 1: I ate my pets. How piste offer you people? Now?
Speaker 1: Now Phil has got to troll everything we just went through.
Speaker 1: What do you want to do this week? Phil? Do
Speaker 1: you wanna play hookey on your surgeon? Uh? And and
Speaker 1: go ice fishing. You want to spread some rock salt
Speaker 1: across the streets in Montana. Uh, cook some cook, some
Speaker 1: Koi soup, save some Atlantic salmon. Lots of options, and uh,
Speaker 1: we'll see what Phil comes back with. The winner of
Speaker 1: fish News this week is John Brewer. John, between your
Speaker 1: awkward fishing photo and contribution to fish News, you're practically
Speaker 1: a third co host this week. I hope Joe and
Speaker 1: Myles send you more stickers than you know what to
Speaker 1: do with. And I cannot wait to hear your end
Speaker 1: of the line segment. You gotta be highly skilled for
Speaker 1: these shows. You understand that? Are you well versed? There?
Speaker 1: You very smart man? All right? Today's trivia contestant is
Speaker 1: one of my absolute favorite Minnesotans of all time, Mandy Yuric. Hey, guys,
Speaker 1: how's it going good? So for those you out there
Speaker 1: who don't know Mandy, first of all, you should. But
Speaker 1: she's a She's a tournament angler, an ice fishing savant.
Speaker 1: I learned a lot from her, radio, TV host, phishing
Speaker 1: gear designer, former hunting guide, and uh, most importantly for
Speaker 1: this segment, a trained biologist. And I know I missed
Speaker 1: some stuff there, Mandy, because you do like everything. But thanks,
Speaker 1: thanks for thanks for coming on. No, this is awesome,
Speaker 1: Thanks for the invite. Yeah, of course, so you're ready
Speaker 1: to play. You're gonna do some trivia. I'm ready to play,
Speaker 1: all right. So, so, like we just nailed all those
Speaker 1: things you do put on your biologist had for this one, right,
Speaker 1: and and to start off with this isn't the actual
Speaker 1: trivia question. I'm just kind of checking you out here.
Speaker 1: Do you know off the top of your head the
Speaker 1: scientific name for smallmouth bass? No? And I should No,
Speaker 1: I wouldn't have either. And I'm gonna I'm gonna butcher
Speaker 1: the pronunciation, but I figured you'll probably help me with that.
Speaker 1: Is it? Is it microp terris or micropterus? Yes, she
Speaker 1: doesn't know either. That makes me feel better, all right,
Speaker 1: So I'm going with microp terraces Dolo mew right, that's her.
Speaker 1: That's your scientific name for the small mouth. And in
Speaker 1: a very roundabout way, smallmouth share some of their taxonomic
Speaker 1: history with one of the greatest black exploitation films in history,
Speaker 1: which is, of course Dolomite. Right, have you seen Dolomite?
Speaker 1: Mandy just jump in real quick and say I've heard
Speaker 1: this question, good, best of luck. Miles went so far
Speaker 1: out in last field I went, I went deep on
Speaker 1: this one. So the question for you today is this,
Speaker 1: how did smallmouth bass end up with a Dolomite inspired name?
Speaker 1: And one of the following three things is true. If
Speaker 1: you get this right, you win, and you'll get a
Speaker 1: great fame and absolutely no fortune at all. All right,
Speaker 1: So here we got a copy of Dolomite one. No,
Speaker 1: it'll be VHS or maybe beta max. I'm going beta max,
Speaker 1: all right, So is it a Rudy ray Moore, the
Speaker 1: creator and star of Dolomite, once did odd jobs in
Speaker 1: a fisheries lab that did research on smallmouth. He told
Speaker 1: one of the lead investigators that he should name smallmouth
Speaker 1: after Dolomite because quote, that's a badass fish and it
Speaker 1: needs a badass name. Second option B. In his youth,
Speaker 1: Rudy Raymore spent a lot of time in Detroit with
Speaker 1: his uncle Frankie. The two regularly fish that Detroit and
Speaker 1: Huron rivers. Young Rudy was kind of a science geek,
Speaker 1: so he memorized the Latin names of all the fish
Speaker 1: they caught. When Rudy invented his famous pimp character Dolomite.
Speaker 1: Decades later, he named it after his favorite fish, the
Speaker 1: smallmouth or see. In eighteen o two, a small mouth
Speaker 1: bass was sent to Paris from an unknown source in
Speaker 1: the US. The theologist to examine the specimen gave it
Speaker 1: the scientific name Dolomue, after one of his drinking buddies,
Speaker 1: a local mineralogist who he idolized because of Dolomu's reputation
Speaker 1: with the ladies. Subsequently, the rock Dolomite was also named
Speaker 1: after Dolomue, again probably due to the guy's reputation as
Speaker 1: a player. Because he didn't even discover that mineral. Carl
Speaker 1: Linneaz did, all right, So to recap to recap, because
Speaker 1: I know I just gave you a lot, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: I'm gonna just give you a short recap. Here is
Speaker 1: it a. The creator of the movie Dolomite also named
Speaker 1: the smallmouth bass b The creator of the movie Dolomite
Speaker 1: named his famous character after the smallmouth bass or see.
Speaker 1: Small mouth bass were named after a famous French ladies
Speaker 1: man whose reputation as a player was so good. He
Speaker 1: also got the mineral Dolomite name for him, even though
Speaker 1: he didn't discover it. I gotta go a ce man.
Speaker 1: That's an epic answer. I don't care if it's true
Speaker 1: or not. That thing's epics nails it for you. Because
Speaker 1: when I tried this questions, I was like, I don't
Speaker 1: remember anything you just said. I was just so excited
Speaker 1: to make a connection between dolomite and smallmouth bass that
Speaker 1: I couldn't let it go. Yeah, you went way off
Speaker 1: the rails with that one, just way off alright. But
Speaker 1: I feel like, I feel like I have to defend
Speaker 1: myself because I wanted to ask many a smallmouth question, right,
Speaker 1: because she's like a small mouth savant and she's a biologist,
Speaker 1: and so I was. I was. I was digging in there,
Speaker 1: and I learned the scientific name for small mouth. I
Speaker 1: learned that it shares the same root as dolomite, which
Speaker 1: was just too much for me to pass up. And
Speaker 1: then I learned the history of how both the mineral
Speaker 1: dolomite and the small mouth got their name from a
Speaker 1: French society scientists better known for his infidelity than his research.
Speaker 1: And I could not leave it alone. I realized that
Speaker 1: when when I went out like way out in left field,
Speaker 1: but I couldn't help myself. I'm sorry. I know, it's
Speaker 1: just all those things. It's just so you, it's just
Speaker 1: so Miles. Those things. Well, thankfully Mandy has been on
Speaker 1: the show before and even played trivia before, Otherwise she
Speaker 1: may never come back again after that. I I think
Speaker 1: Mandy learned something, That's what I think, and I I
Speaker 1: happen to know that she is the kind of person
Speaker 1: who appreciates learning. So I think I think Mandy will
Speaker 1: be back. I hope she'll be back, and she'll be back.
Speaker 1: We'll have her back. I'll get her back. If she
Speaker 1: soured on you, I'll get her back. Look if she's busy.
Speaker 1: If she's busy the next time we call her, that
Speaker 1: will just be one more thing for me to feel
Speaker 1: shameful about. On the Shame Wizard Shame. But, as you're
Speaker 1: about to hear an end of the line, Joe is
Speaker 1: currently feeling completely shameless, especially for a guy who supposedly
Speaker 1: saddled with Roman Catholic guilt. This week, in honor of
Speaker 1: the pending Valentine's Day, or as I like to call it,
Speaker 1: corporate Loveday, Joe is going to take a slight departure
Speaker 1: from our standard profile of like a single bait and
Speaker 1: instead dig into the backstory of an entire bait manufacturing
Speaker 1: company that definitely did not suffer the shackles of shame.
Speaker 1: That's not loud enough. Compacting everything Frank Johnson contributed to
Speaker 1: Fishing into a single end of the line segment would
Speaker 1: be almost possible. To say he was an innovator is
Speaker 1: an understatement. Engineering genius is very fitting. And while I
Speaker 1: never had the chance to spend time with Frank, who
Speaker 1: passed away in twenty six, I have rubbed elbos with
Speaker 1: a lot of people that did, and they've all got stories.
Speaker 1: While Frank was a brilliant, book smart man, he also
Speaker 1: knew how to have a good time, and in the
Speaker 1: case of our Valentine's linked story today, he knew how
Speaker 1: to translate a good time into a smart business move.
Speaker 1: Although Frank invented products like the aluminum interchangeable UNI butt system,
Speaker 1: which has pretty much become standard on all big game
Speaker 1: trolling rods, he is arguably best known as the man
Speaker 1: behind mold Craft Loures. Frank had gotten into the injection
Speaker 1: molding business in the early nineteen seventies and actually helped
Speaker 1: develop the tooling to create the first ever mass produced pacemaker.
Speaker 1: But after a few years, the stress of developing products
Speaker 1: like pacemakers and jet engine parts that could cost someone
Speaker 1: their life if you messed up kind of took its toll.
Speaker 1: And that's when Frank combined his engineering skills and his
Speaker 1: lifelong love of fishing to create the first soft injection
Speaker 1: molded one piece big game trolling lures, trademarking the term
Speaker 1: soft head to refer to his family of baits. Frank
Speaker 1: would end up developing lures like the wide Range, Bobby Brown,
Speaker 1: and Spooler, all of which are still in shops today
Speaker 1: and considered timeless classics in the offshore scene, having caught
Speaker 1: countless monster marlin sailfish in Wahoo the world over. But
Speaker 1: those aren't what got mold Craft off the ground. The
Speaker 1: first lure Frank ever produced was the Squirt Squid, available
Speaker 1: in four lengths and five colors. These semisoft molded squids
Speaker 1: would become game changers as teasers in both the recreational
Speaker 1: and tournament worlds, as well as for commercial captain's green
Speaker 1: stick fishing for giant bluefin tuna. Matter of fact, you
Speaker 1: watch Wicked Tuna outer Banks and you'll still see the
Speaker 1: original squirt squids skipping around behind those boats. Then one
Speaker 1: faithful day, shall we say, in the midnight teen seventies,
Speaker 1: Frank was shown a photo of a young lady having
Speaker 1: a really good time with one of his squirt squids,
Speaker 1: and she wasn't on a boat. If you catch my drift. Now,
Speaker 1: Frank could have just laughed this off, but instead, seeing
Speaker 1: he was a firm believer that sex does in fact sell,
Speaker 1: he retooled some of the squirt squid molds and began
Speaker 1: a for a into the adult novelties market, And just
Speaker 1: as he was in the fishing market, he was a
Speaker 1: pioneer in this market too. Playing off the popularity of
Speaker 1: the pet rock, Frank named his creation the pet Well
Speaker 1: you get it, I don't have to say it. In
Speaker 1: the Screw magazine awarded it the title of product of
Speaker 1: the Year. Now. I chatted with Frank's son, Frank Jr.
Speaker 1: Who runs mold Craft now, and he told me the
Speaker 1: pet rock with a C received this high honor because
Speaker 1: most adult toys at the time were made of latex,
Speaker 1: and if you happen to be a person that had
Speaker 1: an allergic reaction to latex, those toys weren't very fun.
Speaker 1: At all. Frank's product, on the other hand, was the
Speaker 1: first of its kind made of injection molded vinyl, which
Speaker 1: caused no allergic reactions. Hence they were fun for the
Speaker 1: whole family. Now. I heard a rumor from several people
Speaker 1: over the years that the toy side of the business
Speaker 1: got so huge Frank Johnson started a whole other company,
Speaker 1: that being Doc Johnson, which is still one of the
Speaker 1: biggest adult toy manufacturers in the world. I was even
Speaker 1: told that this very day, one side of the facility
Speaker 1: is pumping out candies for use in the cockpits of
Speaker 1: sport fishing boats, while the other side is churning out
Speaker 1: candies for the bedroom on the love boat. So is
Speaker 1: Frank Johnson actually Doc Johnson? Answer, He's not. Frank Jr.
Speaker 1: Debunked this rumor once and for all, though he did add, man,
Speaker 1: I wish we were Doc Johnson. Frank Jr. Explained that
Speaker 1: while their sex toys made the company money for a
Speaker 1: long time, they eventually had to kick that side of
Speaker 1: the biz out of the water bed because as years
Speaker 1: went on, the novelties market became flooded with cheaper products
Speaker 1: from China, and while Frank's products may have been better quality,
Speaker 1: the cost of goods made it impossible to compete for distribution.
Speaker 1: According to Frank Jr. However, all the molds are still
Speaker 1: ready to go at the manufacturing facility in Florida. He
Speaker 1: even said, if I ever need a couple of thousand,
Speaker 1: he's happy to run me a batch. I'm good on that.
Speaker 1: But when I got my first boat many years ago,
Speaker 1: I did buy dozens of mold Crafts junior hookers. They're
Speaker 1: actually the smallest trolling chugars the company makes. But my
Speaker 1: little single outboard beater wasn't exactly getting me far enough
Speaker 1: off shore to pull a squirt squid teaser or wide
Speaker 1: range or Bobby Brown for Marlin. Those tiny chuggars knocked
Speaker 1: the fire out of Benita, false albacore and chicken dolphin
Speaker 1: in my meager inshore range, though, and every once in
Speaker 1: a while I'd even get a schoolly bluefin to rise
Speaker 1: to that daisy chain of tiny hookers For a twenty
Speaker 1: two year old full of piss in vinegar in a
Speaker 1: third hand eighties six pursuit pretending to be tread Barda
Speaker 1: that was the most orgasmic feeling in the world. We're
Speaker 1: We're gonna get some emails about that one, especially from
Speaker 1: all you people who were piste off that we made
Speaker 1: fun of penis shaped lures. Well, yeah we are. And
Speaker 1: you know what, I'm not sorry because there's a difference here.
Speaker 1: Penis lords are and we're stupid and pointless. Okay, erotic toys,
Speaker 1: they're just a that's a celebration of human sexuality. There
Speaker 1: you go. If you want to complain about that distinction,
Speaker 1: you can vent your frustration and an email to Bent
Speaker 1: at the meat Eator dot com using the subject line girls,
Speaker 1: screw yourself Joe. Yes, yes, I will gladly read every
Speaker 1: single one of those. Also, uh, send awkward fishing photos,
Speaker 1: bar nominations, and sale in items um to that same
Speaker 1: email account and use those degenerate Angler and Bent podcast
Speaker 1: hashtags for the chance to get yourself some sticker packs.
Speaker 1: It is only February, but I am already looking forward
Speaker 1: to embarrassing myself with some site fishing next spring. I
Speaker 1: can't wait for that. I look forward to those those
Speaker 1: moments of scumulation. Before we go, I want to leave
Speaker 1: you with a question, and I'm serious about this. Does
Speaker 1: dark house spearing count as site fishing? M hm, I'm
Speaker 1: personally saying no. I'd say it counts a spearing, which
Speaker 1: naturally requires a good line of sight no matter what
Speaker 1: you're chucking at. But let's hear from you.