00:00:05 Speaker 1: Greetings from the California Delta, where you would still suck at fishing. And the guy just tossed in a selfie of him giving Troy the finger and he says with a chuckle, Harley doesn't own boots. And I was like, oh, no, you're gonna freeze your ass off today. My name is Hayden Samac and I admit it, I have a problem. Rest assured. I've never met a captain who like just thinks it's funny as ship when you and your boys come out and get hammered you. Good morning to generate anglers, and welcome to Ben the fishing podcast that still hasn't figured out that Doc Martins don't really qualify as good winter boots. I'm Joe Surmelli and I'm Hayden Santa. Can please tell me like I would love to see you just like plunking around, you know, but like one of those big clowns shoot Doc Martins, like the ones with a giant viber like soul and like the like the red kind of tint on him, like like a straight edge kid. A are is not who there for their first right edge kids. No, they're not there for anybody who wants to wear them. Um, you can't see that anymore at least, Um, but that used to be me. I'd say you Now, I just wear Velcrow sketchers. Um, but I did wear docks for a very long time, all through high school pretty much because while you know, like my Navy polo shirt and Khaki said he's a good Catholic schoolboy, my boots said, my mom got me these Doc Martin's for Christmas because they're mad expensive. So um, yeah, that was a long time ago. So so like it was a little bit of a nod to uh to a rebellious streak then, I mean, like you kind of it was like kind of download rebellion, very subdued rebellion. Well, shoes were the only thing you were allowed to select for yourself in Catholic school, so you know, you do what you gotta do. But it also it always made me wonder, right, like Doc Martin's were they super cheap at some point because like, while mine we're always like shining and new, the guys and Rancid's were beat to death and there by cool. But it's some point like they just went to Hot Topic to buy a pair to right, like they were new and shiny at some point, well, well they were cheaper when before doc you know, completed his PhD and he was still missed the Martin. But have have you ever kind of noticed it's like like almost the opposite and fishing like nowadays, I feel well worn is not in Like everyone wants to have all this the new ship on all the time, like they want to look like they just kind of stepped out of the catalog and onto the water. It's like a flex you know. Yeah, no, I and I I agree for the most part. Like I can give you a prime example, like I have, Um, I have a pair of SIMS waiters that look like they've been fed through a garbage disposal and like they smell even worse, but they do not leak their their comfy as shit. Uh, and therefore they're my preferred pair, despite the fact that I have five other pairs and they're they're so gross that I've actually had buddies at SIMS. Be like, can you please stop wearing that pair of waiters in public? Which I don't get because it's like it's a testament to the quality of the product. Um, but guess what, Sims, you don't make that model anymore. Right, Like they don't make that that particular pair waiters anymore. I could go down the street and take it up with them, Well I could, I could, Yeah, we can both take it up with him. Dude. No, they've they've been like they've given me new waiters. I'm like, thanks, but I still like this old beat pair. But anyway, every single time I post a photo in those waiters, someone is like, dear God, get him some new waiters. And I'm like, why, you know what I mean, It's like it's like they're so comfy, they're so good. Well, I mean, like there are some accessories when it comes to fishing that like you just don't really need to upgrade unless there's something catastrophically wrong with them. And I mean this bar is like major jumps in like technological evolution. Like for instance, everybody was wearing like, you know, the Neopreme waiters and then you know the breathable you know, Gorgonet, and so now everybody wears those, and that's like an obvious transition you might make. I can relate to this in my waiting boots, man, I was rocking like this pair of ll Bean waiting boots. I think the ll bean I had since high school. I mean the things were literally coming apart, you know. They were like the vinyl was flaking off, and it was revealing that kind of like a sub floor like carpeting kind of texture that's under him. And I wore those things for I ship you not fifteen years and just recently I upgraded to a pair of Sims waiting boots only because I was like, man, these things are so much, so much lighter, right, yeah, I mean like necessity is one thing that things do get worn out to the point of no return, But I mean I've also just seen it get get kind of ridiculous, um, you know again, like with jackets and waiters and such. Like. Another example, I have an Aqua Skins dry top that I used to wear when I surf fished a lot more, and uh, in the early two thousand's, Aqua Skins was like the king dog of sexual sexual Like leave it in, I'm gonna start that over. Another example, I have an Aqua Skins dry top that I used to wear when I surfished a lot more, and in the early two thousand's Aqua Skins was like the king dog of technical surfishing. Apparel um, and they no longer are. In fact, I'm not even sure that they're that that company is around anymore. Um. But it was. This is like a really well made, expensive top and it's still fully functional. But in the year two, if I showed up in Montalk wearing it, I I'd feel like I'd I'd be labeled an instant Google just because I was still wearing that old dry top, you know what I mean? Like I hate that ship because it's not the latest and greatest whatever. Um, But something's good and well made, I will use it to death. That goes for rods and reels too, And I'd be willing to bet tons of you listening right now own a rod that you love that the company doesn't make anymore. Um. There have been some for me over the years. I've begged people at these are companies to bring back certain series over the years. You know, yeah, you know what you see It happen with bows a lot, sure, right. I always wait like two years or so after like a drastically new innovation has been made to buy like that new model, because by then, you know, there's always gonna be like some sort of like kink in it. You know there's gonna be something that's like not exactly right, so you want to give them that like year or two until they mess it up. But if you have a favorite old school rod that's been tried and true, maybe like like an ORBS Superfine or something like that, Um, you know, definitely get one of those in the fly fishing realm. If they no longer make your favorite like spin casting rod, I have an alternative suggestion for you, something that I think might even be preferable. Yes, yes, we'd point you towards our beloved sponsors thirteen Fishing and tell you to check out their line of rods, which has been with them since they're being getting so so nine years. The omen has been around. It was their flagship model, and I gotta say I'm genuinely a big fan. I have a pile of them, and it's it's tough to find like such a such a selection of models within a series, um, and such a well made stick, no lie for the you know, for in that dollar range. So something to think about as we inch or crawl towards open water. Angling spring is somewhere out there on the horizon. I'd like to think, you know, yeah, well, you know it is somewhere on the horizon, but I don't think it's as close as you might think, Joe, which is why we're staying firmly planned it on the ice for this week's Smooth Move. I know we are spring is uh yeah, it's still a ways out there. Yes, we're staying on the ice and we're joined this week by an old buddy of mine from New Hampshire, that being Tim Moore. Now, Smooth Moves is our segment dedicated to letting guides and Captain's bitch about dumb things clients have done. And let's just say, well, Tim doesn't care if you show up in a ripped Burton parka over an Anthrax T shirt to hit the ice. He probably would not be down with you showing up in Doc Marton's why so joining us for Smooth Moves today, old buddy man I haven't seen in a while. I'm seeing him digitally now. It's been a few years. Tim more of Tim Moore outdoors up in New Hampshire. What's going on, dude? How you been I'm good man. It's good to see your face. I think the last time we saw each other was an IE cast. Yeah, yeah, you're right. And the last time I saw you on the ice, we didn't see anybody's faces because it was so insanely bitterly cold today, Like we literally had our heads wrapped in animal pelts. It was brutal. That was That was a White Perch video shoot, and I remember that being extremely cold, extremely cold. Yeah, that was a stressful one for me. Why was that, I'm not priving to this conversation. Oh boy, yeah, what was one of those? Like Tim was on it and then we got there and like ship got all screwed up with the water, which tends to happen to me. Um. I also have recollections of like sort of sneaking through backyards to access ice places because the places we wanted to get home where no. Boy, Now, like there was a lot of not frozen areas, as I recall, it was, yeah, a fair amount of open water for February. Yeah. Yeah, But for anybody who doesn't know, so Lake Winnipissauke, that's the biggest lake in New Hampshire, right, the second largest lake in New England. Ah see that there you go. I don't even know all those fun facts, but we got together for White Perch which is kind of like a little bit of a maligned species throughout the rest of the country, like they exist in a lot of places, but Winnie is known for giants. I mean they're like they're damn near stripers. So we remember, we struggled for a few days, but then that that second day magic hour, like right at dark, I've never seen a screen. The screen was just solid colors and just for a half hour. You couldn't get a jig down there fast enough and they brawl. That was a lot of fun um. But you do a lot of other stuff up there. I know Hayden is excited to talk to you. He just called his first bourbon or cuss as you would call him out there, and he says, well, Tim, give me all his cusk secrets. And I said, well, I don't know how much cusk fishing Tim does, but here's your chance, Hayden. What do you got? Well, it's more I guess what Tim's got for me? Man, What do you got? Tim just just starts spilling secrets. Man. That doesn't have to be in any particular order. State record, new state record fell up there not long ago, right two weeks ago. Two weeks ago, I don't remember how many pounds it was, but it was like fifteen or sixteen pounds. It's big five. I've caught thirty inches and they're just like you lift them up and they just keep coming, keep coming, keep coming. I think those fish are just so darn cool. I mean, for one, it looks like, I don't know how familiar you are with first light, but it looks like they're in that first light cipher camo pattern. And I think they're like totally beautiful fish, and they're everything I like about catfish without like everything I don't. I e like, basically just like those crazy as spines that they have. Man, they're super voracious, like they taste great. Man. To me, that is just like a pinnacle game fish. I love those things. Yeah, they're they're fun to catch. And the colors. You can catch one that's like really drab and brown, and then the next one will have this like the brightest yellow spots all over it, like snakeheads, man, same deal. Some are like super copper and some are just like black snakeheads whatever, the bourbon whatever they I called him a game fish a minute ago. I think it was like Minnesota or Michigan. Somewhere just classified bourbon is like game fish, you know, off the rough fish Minnesota. I think Minnesota they have the International el Pout Festival. Actually, I have so many friends that fish form out there that I've started calling an eel pout without even realizing it. And my name. Actual buddies are like their cusk, Dude. I've been sleeping out for him on the ice man. That is so fun. Tim just wants to go to his home take a hot shower. Yeah, anyway, So remind me, man, how many years now you've been guiding professionally and you do do open water as well, so everybody knows that year around full time. Um, next week will be sixteen years. Nice, six years full time, so you know, you know you listen to events, so you know what smooth moves is about. Um, I don't know. If we're going hard water open water, the floor is completely yours. Man, give us give us the most memorable the one year still scratching your head about over the years. That one is probably one that every one of my clients since has heard. And it's it's hard water. I mean, I probably have dozens of of not so smooth moves that I've done, but I've successfully managed to manipulate somebody else into taking the blame for him, right, I don't even remember. Yeah, yeah, so it was it was ice fishing. Actually I met these guys at the same parking lot that I met you the first day that we fished. He was side note to that real quick, just so people can get a visual, Like you had one snow machine and our our butt. Jim Fee, who's been on this show a bunch, was there and like you basically pulled him in a tiny sled behind us, and it was bitterly cold, and I just remember looking back and just seeing Jim bundled up in like a like the little sled down For the first day, it was just that was the problem was that it rained so like we were literally walking in ten inches of water on top of that ice all day. It was just it was crazy. And then and then that afternoon, as soon as the rain stopped, the wind came and that water was skimming over before we could get off of it. Oh dude, the tent was collapsed in the shop was collapsing around us. It was something else. So anyway, so that parking lot, let's go back to that park, Yeah, so Jason and Harley. Jason was he's as like three tattoo shops in the areas a tattoo. He decided to bring his shop helper Harley. And so I meet them, and I've known Jason for a long time and he they get out of the car and we say hello and do our you know, exchange pleasantries and all that, and to look down and Harley, Harley's wearing Converse all Stars low tops, and I with with with every ounce of hope that you could ever imagine. I said, Harley, don't forget your boots, praying to God that they were in the car like he just Jason locked it prematurely or something. And he says, with a chuckle, Harley doesn't own boots. And I was like, oh no, And I said, you're going to freeze your ass off today, and he said, I'll be fine. This this is what I wear all all winter walking around town. I'll be fine. And I said, Harley, I guarantee you that fine, that that is the very last time today you'll use that word. Is fine? Is gonna be so far out of your vocabulary that you're you're I said, but there is a word that I'll use later on, and I'll let you know when I when when I it's time for your new nickname an our And I look over and he's standing on one leg and I said, switching them up? I said, hey, Flamingo, how many times did you switched? Said four? And I said you got this was I used to do eight hour trips. I do six now I said, you don't have seven hours more to go? Oh yeah, so what so did how? How did did he did he make it? Did he made made it till noon? And then did you guys have to bail on the trip because he was wearing sneakers pretty much? Yeah, I mean they were they weren't fishermen, so they were like ready to go at noon anyway, But Hardy was hurting. There's nothing that will knock out a fishing trip quicker than like, uh, like a lack of proper footwear. I mean, I've seen, like I I it's actually conformed to philosophy that I have about pretty much any outdoor pursuit. Right, It's like you can buy really expensive rise, you buy really expensive you know, guns, flashers, this that and the other thing. Ultimately, like what is going to contribute to your success The most in pretty much any outdoor pursuit is being properly like outfitted as far as your retire goes to be able to like stay in the pocket like for the entirety, however long you want to do it. This is this is one of the reasons why, Um, I get invited on a lot of open boats. You know, Captain self will be like, hey, man, if you want to get out, I got open boat. I have had some similar experiences where a day has been cut short because you don't know who the guys on the open boat are and if one of them is somebody's buddies, cousin or whoever. Um, it's a long story to tell me about. Tell it sometime. But I got a chance to fish with Captain Frank Mundus, who was the inspiration for Captain Quinn, on his original boat, the Cricket. And there was a gentleman on board who was wearing a Hawaiian shirt and the shortest shorts I've ever seen. And it was raining sideways in June and like fifty six degrees and rough as shit, and we ultimately never got to wet a line. I never actually got to put a line in the water. With Frank because that dude was so shot and sick and freezing that we had to turn around. I could only imagine like Joe's murderous rage in that moment. It's actually hanging out with it. It's a great story. But I I sympathize with that. So so I mean, I imagine, you know, um so so note to self. Then you don't provide ice fishing clothes for clients. You don't have extra stuff, So that's on you. And there when they have to go to the ice fishing page on my website to book their trip, and there is a whole list of what to bring, what should I bring? And and I couldn't stress like I think. It says, good boots, good boots, good boots. Your feet will get cold first and stay called the longest. If you think wearing hiking boots is gonna be okay, you're wrong. And they wear hiking boots all the time. Hiking boots, hiking boots and under armour, under arms, great stuff. It's not good to fishing if you're moving. Under arms great stuff. If you're moving, it's not so good when you're when you're sitting still out here, like you know, everybody wears muck boots everybody for everything. Everybody always has neo pre knee highs. But like out Eastern, like the Midwest, I feel like that's like not the case man. I feel like the muck boot is underappreciated. Yeah, there's a bit of a following muck boot wears out here. But you go on any like New Hampshire Facebook fishing group and you'll see posts, you know, what are the best boots, and there's five choices of people that insist that they wear the best boots. But I mean, you gotta at least have to try hiking boots. I don't even consider that trying. No, So you're like laceless is like number one. Yeah, yeah, well what's your boot of choice? Man? I mean, so what matters most? Thickness of the soul. Like I've always been told that like soul thickness is helpful on the ice, right would agree? Some loft clam makes a really nice It's probably the most comfortable rubber boot of every warren. And it's warm, it's removable liners and there's a lot of loft into them. So air dead air is probably the best, you know, installation that you can have. If you took nothing else away from this, you now have a recommendation on what kinds of boots will get you through a day with Tim Moore on Lake Winni Kasaki, Yep. I had a lot of regular clients that wear those sub zero X boots from Clam those guys, those sneaker guys. Ever come back? No, no, Well maybe I will see you this winner. Man. I would love to come up there and catch a bigger cusk. Then Hayden's caught out in Montana. They're gonna get there together. Who knows? You guys are both experts. I'm an expert in a lot of things, Joe, I'm an expert in no things. Joe, tell you what low top Chucks might be a poor choice on the ice. But the but the high top ones in the in the classic off white color were the original flats booties. Did you know that? In fact, I know dudes that still wear them for that. It makes a lot of sense. Man. Like I was when I was a kid, I used to do a lot of like you know, just mucking around and creeks and stuff like that, and I those were my preferred shoe with choice. I mean it happened that it coincided with my EMO phase, so I did have a lot of high top Chucks on hand. But you know, we're gonna bring up your EMO phase again later by the way. Yeah, well, anyway, they may make sense because those flat booties come up high to protect you know, the backs or ankles from sting rays and ship you know. Yeah, though ironically the economics have kind of reversed. Like there was a time I think when chucks were dirt cheap, and like early early versions of flats booties were expensive. Now it's the other way around, sadly, right, Like high top Chucks, because I looked, are significantly more money than a pair of near preen flats boots. So well, that's like kind of the confluence of inflation and fashion trends, two topics you might expect to be covered by legitimate news source, which we are not. So who the all knows what we're gonna talk about in this week's edition of fish News. Fish News that escalated quickly. Before we jump in here, I gotta give a quick shout out if I may to listener Chad Mason for an email he sent. Now. The subject line of Chad's email was simply, oh god, rule. Now we've got to bring this up because this is too funny, dude, come on and in it. Here's here's what Chad suggests. He writes, how bad if we aim to get the yeah man total down to know more than two per podcast, that seems like an achievable goal. It's a yeah man rate, like he did math, that would annoy only the most annal retentive listeners, who shouldn't be allowed to set the bar. But if Hayden get there by April first, here's the rule. He has to get assault Life tattoo in a highly visible look. There is absolutely no way. But I love how he combines the yeah man thing with you way back openly admit that you you'd pretty much get any tattoo, which is like a little cajol ng Yeah. I mean like when when I said I'd pretty much get any tattoo, I meant like, um, you know, like excluding like a I you did say you'd be open to a brand. You mentioned getting a first idea. I was joking. I was joking, man, yeah man, Salt Life dude. You know now listen, I would not know no, Chad, thank you. It is funny I would never let you get us, I say, yeah man, in that response, I think I might have. You might have. Don't to play it back, Yeah man, salt life, dude, time for tattoos? Are you sure it's life with like a y like that? Why don't you shut up my job? Um no, but I could not let you do that. I would never I would never allow that. So uh, funny idea. But no, that's not gonna wait, No, that can't happen. Like no, I like you too much. Oh thanks man, thank you. Well. Anyway, look, hey, I got an idea. Whoever loses this week has to get a yeah man tattoo on his upper RICKI no. Also, it's hard for me. I don't look cool anyway. Remember, folks, this is fishing news. This is a competition. Joe and I do not know which news story the other guys bringing to the table, and at the end of it, our audio engineer Phil Taylor will decide who wins and whether that yeah man tattoo has to have barbed wire or tribal accents around Joe, it is your lead, man, what do you I'd go? I go full barbed wire. Um. Yeah, so let's see, this is one of those weeks that produced a lot of great fishing stories, lots to pick from. So I'm extremely glad that it is my my lead this week, and I didn't have to grapple that much because it's my lead, because I knew this afforded the opportunity to cover what might be the greatest fish news story we've ever had. Um A ton of you guys sent this along, so finally now we can all get together and talk about Troy. So Troy, Troy, whose last name is is not known, but that's for the better. That's fine. Troy is from Minnesota and uh he and a group of his buddies frequently get together to fish both open water and on the ice, same group of dudes. Another member of that group, by the way, goes by Chappie, which instantly tells me he's a good time. And then there's group member David V. Now prayer the story about this on in forum dot com. It's extremely common for Troy to catch nothing when he goes fishing, but I would like to point out that does, not, however, make him a gooch. So we've talked a lot about the beach on this show. A gooch. You remember the gooch. I'm gonna explain. I'm gonna re explain the gooch here, so it'll fill you in because we've talked about the gooch on this show and see already you're going sexual body parts and that's not what it is at all. Well, yeah, you should have you were listening before you got here. Anyway, Anyway, to be to be a goucher, as we've said, your presence alone needs to ruin everybody's good time. You have to be the bringer of wind and rain or your aura by itself just has to stop everyone else from catching fish. That's what a goucher is. So like you're the guy that just brings the fishing down. Okay, but that's not Troy. He's not the gooch because everyone else on these trips is apparently successful. In fact, in this story, David recalls a trip where Chappie had tied one on pretty good the night before wound up sleeping in the boat for most of the following day. Troy had caught nothing that day, and suddenly, uh in the afternoon, Chappie rouses for just a brief moment out of his his hangover stupor, just in time to see his bober go down and he catches a fish. Right, So I don't even I don't even know these guys, but I love these guys because group has their version of Troy, and and Troy is necessary to keep ball busting levels up to you know, too proper levels and banner constant um. So he basically fills the role that I do here. Yes, correct, that is right, bing um. But what seems to have unfolded in this group is a is a game of ball busting one upsmanship. So they always gave each other a hard time, right as long as they've been fishing together. But Troy leveled it up not long ago by hiring Christopher McDonald, the actor who is obviously best known for playing Shooter McGavin in Happy Gilmore on Cameo. He hired him to record this video message, you guys really think you're gonna beat Troy on your ice fishing trip this year? That's Christopher McDonald of Happy Gilmore fame. Troy arranged this personalized message. I just want to say that cameo is one of the best inventions of like, oh it is recent times. In fact, one time, my buddy dropped an album that he had been working on for quite some time, and I hired Chris Hanson of To Catch a Predator to review his album Nice. My brother in law sent a valentine, had iced Tea sent a Valentine to my sister in law, freaking iced tea. I'm like, wow, I'm gonna see if I can find that video review man William Brown. Why does that name sounds so lyrically familiar? William Chris Hanson Here Hanson versus petitors and to Catch Repetitor William Gonna need you to have a seat right over there. I've been going through some transcripts and I see where you just released a single called Birthday Punches. I took a listen pretty good. Good luck with that anyway. Good luck with that. I'll be watching and listening. Please know that head wishes you all the best as well. Take care. I'll show you on the TVA cameo. I've never used cameo, but it's kind of cool anyway. So Troy had McDonald shoot that video and he just sent it around to the group to bust balls, and David said, okay, hold my beer and answered that by taking out ad space on a massive led billboard up near Brainerd, Minnesota, which is a super fishy town. Right. All the ad featured and this is like a big highway billboard was a giant photo of Troy and the words Troy sucks at fishing. Now closer, man, I did see this, and this is it wasn't your lead. You knew I was taking. I thought I thought that it could have been the olden crapy, but I I realized now that it could only have been this. It could only have been you, Troy. Well, there were there were better story and I don't know what you grab, but they're like there were like there were like some serious winds in Colorado stream access this week and that's like a major thing in Colorado. Awesome, And I'm so sorry, but like Troy sucks at fishing billboard just like scroll, I'm sorry, I have to do this, like this is like the greatest this is the greatest thing. Um So anyway, David and company, they could have stopped there with just that billboard that said Troy sucks at fishing, but nay, they went the extra mile to have the Troy sucks at fishing text change flash over to talk smack to him at Troy sucks too. At gmail dot com. And I mean that's just a straight bravo. I mean bravo, But I had to know a little more. You know, we're going to draft up an email as soon as we get done this podcast, right, I already beat you to it because I wanted answers to a few questions not covered in the news reports. So I tracked David down and reached out to him right now. First and foremost, I was curious about the financials of this one upsmanship, right, and I learned that to get Shooter McGavin to send you a cameo video that will cost you two and twenty dollars, which is pretty spendy. And props to Troy because he made the first move there, like he made the first move, but um an ad on the giant led billboard. Well, surprisingly that only costs David two so so so technically he won in terms of the spend, but not by much. But I have to give it the round to David, because while the Shooter McGavin video like that's good, it's only shared among the group, whereas David spent about the same amount of money for full public humiliation. So like his round like that's David's round. Um. Now, mind you, this only happened last week, right, but David told me that the Troy Sucks Gmail has already sieved over three messages from as far away as Costa Rica, Australia, and Sweden. He's gotten loads from Canada and emails from pretty much every state in the Union. Uh. Now he forwarded me, at my request, a handful of these emails, and and most are as you'd expect, pretty jovial and just jokey um. As an example, one says your mate has pumped you bad, looking forward to your reply. I suck at fishing too, Regards from Ballina, Australia. Um. Another another reads greetings from the California Delta, where you would still suck at fishing. And the guy just tossed in a selfie of him giving Troy the finger. Um, you know, and he was. He was naturally inundated with memes. But my favorite one, uh just had the subject line I'll fish with you, but the message just read that guy, so it was home gamut, whole whole gamut. Right. Uh so, Hey, congratulations to all parts involved, Troy included, because this is great and it leaves me wondering though, Troy, how are you going to top that? Like people are now expecting you to come back bigger and batter, and I got to I gotta tell you, I wasn't necessarily planning on watching the super Bowl, but now I'm going to just in case there's like a halftime commercial about David v sucking at fishing starring Troy. I mean, that is, in my opinion, really the only honorable response. Now, listeners, if I'm sure you know this, Joe and I live in separate parts of the country. Yes, I am in Bozeman and we are recording this podcast via video chat right now. Now, Joe, you might have noticed that I was looking down on my phone just then. Yes, uh, Listeners, on my Instagram story, you are going to find a a a photo of this billboard and it is going to have a poll beneath, and the poll will be requesting comments that we can send to Troy. I will be aggregating a group email. If you feel like being on that email, respond to the poll with your comment to Troy, and I will make damn sure that it gets to him. Please enter your password. You have one unheard message for the FOPS facers so I'm going to pot fresh. I'm not sure why I'm having so much trouble using stamps to purchase fresh Poka. Please call Bob. End of message, delete press seven save deleted. Alright, Joe, So this week on fish News, we are we're gonna go back to the European coast and talk about something way less fun than a billboard ragging on your buddy or a group of Irish fishermen out gaming war gaming Russians. Um uh So. I originally saw this on Inside or So that's my original source there, although I've I've picked up bits and pieces from other online publications, some of which I've now bought subscriptions to. So thank you meat Eater anyhow. Dude, quick thing about that, if you if you just keep changing browsers like a million times, eventually you'll get beyond the paywall. Sounds like I owe you money again, Meat Eater anyhow, don't support journalism. We wouldn't want to do that, all right. So look, this past Thursday, it emerged that the second largest fishing vessel in the world, the f V Margaris, lost or dumped a massive catch of fish, depending on who you ask. The fish in question were blue whiting uh, type of cod most often used for fish sticks and other commercial fish products like you know, like cod oil and fish meal. Estimates put the number of lost fish somewhere in the range of one hundred thousand fishes. It's a lot of a lot of count now now I said, uh, lost or dumped, because there are varying accounts of how all these dead fish ended up floating off the coast of France. So from my understanding of it, the first group of folks to bring this to global attention was the controversial conservation group Sea Shepherd If. Yeah, if you don't know uh, if somehow you don't know about Sea Shepherd um, they're widely considered a group of extremists, even by the standards of like other conservationists. In fact, as reported by the BBC, in two thousand and twelve, the Ninth Circuit of Appeals issued an injunction forbidding vessels in the Sea Shepherd Fleet from approaching within five hundred meters of any Japanese whaling vessels, citing the Sea Shepherd fleets use of often violent tactics UH in their anti whaling efforts. Japan has at least at some point labeled the Sea Shepherd crew is eco terrorists, and in that injunction I just mentioned the judge just flat out called them pirates and told them to mind their own damn business. Okay, so that's the Sea Shepherd folks. All that said, The c Shepherd folks are the people who first bought this to light. Uh. Now, Joe, do you think they're on the lost it or dumped it side? Mm hmm, I'll go with dumped at Alex you would be correct. So the Sea Shepherd contends that the one thousand blue whiting were actually by catch and dumped it sea in order to save the f V Margaret's uh the trouble of having to go to port and declare by catch as required by the EU law. On the flip side of this, we have the narrative as according to the definitely not financially invested Pelagic Freezer Trawler Association, who just happened to represent the Dutch company that owns the mark gears uh and contend that the fish were not dumped, but rather the net broke due to the presence of abnormally large blue whiting overwhelming what they call the cod end of the nets and What they mean by that is like not like an unusually law large catch, but like the individual sizes of these like specimens like these were on an individual basis very large blue whiting. Anyhow, So a real quick lesson on this type of fishing vessel. The margaris is a a midwater pelagic trawler. When people hear trawler, for whatever reason, they immediately think of something like dragging up the bottom, and that's not what this is. It's a pelagic trawler, so it targets fish above the sea floor with these like giant ass nets. In the case of this vessel, um these nets are nearly a mile long. Um also a it's what it's what's called a freezer trawler, which is basically a fishing vessel capable of processing it's catch at sea. And we actually touched on this a while back in uh in that cod story I I did about the about the cod fisheries off the coast of Maine. Um. Yeah, heart of the decline of that fishery was related to the advent of these ultra efficient fishing vessels, and there are a bill need to fish harder and longer. Anyhow, the p f A put out as the Freezer Trawler Association UH put out a statement. I'm a member, put out a statement saying that, yeah, that this event was due to an unusually large catch, basically breaking the net. So which is it? It would seem as if the c Shepherd folks make a half decent argument in that going back to Port to declare by cash would be a huge pain for the Margearis and ultimately cost the vessel like just just a ton of money. Sure now that I mean, yeah, exactly, Yeah, I mean there's there's financials at play here. I'm sure right now that line of thinking makes for a compelling argument, except when you consider the blue whiting is a target species. The p f A points out that the Marghearis has a quota for blue whiting and that it makes no sense to dump a valuable fish. I'll mention that in everything I've read, there hasn't been a suggestion of, like, what more desirable fish the fishing vessel may have dumped their catch up blue whiting in order to make room for you know, it's not like they were like, oh yeah, I mean they ran into this school of ship with like their of blue whiting with their net down. Well, so they're a freezer trawler. So they lost that that net, that's what they're saying. And then what was in the hold? What what did they have? Goes to mention that It doesn't mention that I or at least not in anything that that that I saw. Um So look, the reason I picked the story is it kind of you have two factions of folks, right, You have like the Shepherd, you know, inclined folks who are like everything that happens is like an environmental disaster. And then you have the other, uh you know, hard line stand which comes from like the commercial fishing industry that goes, well, no, actually we didn't do anything wrong, and this is like a huge loss for us. It just kind of highlights the danger of like picking one side and like digging your heels and on it. You know what I mean. I do know what you mean. I think you know you're talking about a middle ground here in commercial fishing. I don't because they're ever going to be peace, love and harmony here. I don't because every recreational angler and uh you know, environmental group like c Shepherd will always believe that the commercial fleet is not on the up and up. I mean there's pages of data, there's associations governing both sides of this, But I mean, I don't think there's ever gonna be a win there. You know, anytime something something that that you want, you know you can't have. I'll use flounder as an example. Well, it's very hard to catch keeper flounder in Jersey now and the you know, the limit is very small, and that really hurt the recreational fishing community. Right, But if you ask any devoted flounder fisherman, like, what's the problem, that's God's goddamned draggers. That's right where you go. That's right where you go, even though there's regulations on those guys that we assume are being followed, and they'll tell you they are, and everybody else will tell you they won't. So like, if you're looking for like the shangri la where everybody's happy, it's very clear that all the commercial operations are doing exactly what they're supposed to do, and those things also match what environmental and recreational groups want to see. I don't know if that ever exists. Sucks, but I don't I don't think that's ever going to exist. Right, Well, this is basically like the latest installment of that fight. And uh, you know, it's something that I thought was worth bringing to folks attention. So anyway, that's basically what happened to C. Shepherd is like, these guys are bad fish dumpers and the Polagic Freezer Troller Association is now paying their pr guide double and uh Frances, uh Frances looking into the issue. Well France, they come from France. They'll let us know what happens there. Um yeah, man, it's tough deal. You hate to see any fish wasted. But if who's right, who's wrong? No way to answer that question. Their net may have broke. Ship happens. Ship breaks all the time on boats. God knows, I know it because I've had many boats and something is always broken. Anyway, Uh Phil, commercial commercial fishing, travesties or Troy who sucks it? Probably commercial fishing as well as recreational fishing. Uh let us know. We're gonna hear from Phil. He's gonna judge us. And then when we're done with that, we're gonna do a fin clips, which we haven't done in a while. Um on on, oh yeah, you're right, Phil did the last finclips. It's gonna be It's gonna be on Hayden's current favorite fish, so we'll we'll listen to that, and then as soon as he catches something else he hasn't caught before, we'll have another fin clips on his new favorite fish. Joe, you do not suck at fish News. You're the winner this week, I believe it or not. I actually met Chris Hansen once. It was a little awkward at first, but after he told me to put down the ziema and to take a seat, you know, he actually had a pretty eye opening conversation. He told me I should have gone with a smear knof Ice or Bartels and James, and you know, God damn it, he was right. He was right. I've recently become obsessed with a fish. I've been pouring over studies in why everything from academic lectures to YouTube catch and cooks. I've been fishing for them as much as my free time allows, like camping on the ice the last three weekends in a row, falling asleep with my flasher on and hoping I'll wake to the sound of bells jingling on the end of my dead stick. I've probably bought a thousand dollars worth of gear between tip ups, jigs, shelters, a negative degrees sleeping bag which really is in a negive degree sleeping bag, um, a buddy heater, and I couldn't even tell you what else. My name is Hayden Samac and I admit it, I have a problem. My girlfriend would agree. The object of my obsession is a fish by many names h lawyer, eel, pout, cusk, and scientifically load of load to, but you might know them best as bourbon. A bourbon is the only fresh water gataform meaning cod like fish, and it thrives in cold water lakes and rivers. There are circumpolar species endemic around the world above forty parallel. What makes them so interesting to me is their uniqueness. These fish are singular when it comes to many facets of their existence. Let's start with their physicality. The bourbon truly looks unlike any other freshwater species of fish. For starters, they have a singular barble at the base of their chin, which is actually where they get their common name of bourbon. You know, barble bourbon. Uh. They're a long, cylindrical fish with no noticeable scales excepting the largest specimens, and even then it's mostly around their head. Additionally, many bourbon have this beautiful modeled pattern, and as you heard me mentioned to Tim a little earlier, it reminds me a lot of the first lighth cipher Camo pattern. Bourbon are also some of the only fish that communicate with sound, using muscles around their swim bladder to make percussive noises. Bourbon are truly nocturnal and come up from their deep water daytime haunts into the shallows to spawn and feed at night. Speaking of spawning, bourbon are unique in that they spawn in the dead of winter, mostly under ice. Besides the timing, their method of spawning is a little unique. As broadcast spawners, they congregate into balls of writhing fish which some folks call mating balls, and release milt and eggs into the water that hopefully fertilize and land safely in the substrate, where they'll incubate and hatch into larval bourbon. Aside from my admiration of the fish itself, what I really like about bourbon is catching them. Uh. In my own limited understanding of bourbon fishing, you know, I'm still new at this. Most of it is done through the ice. I like to set tip ups in ten to twenty ft of water with a number six trouble hook egg sinker and a short twenty pound floral leader for bait I like chunk sucker um. I've also had luck jigging for bourbon with a heavy one ounce glowing jig with a glowing tube or grub and a piece of sucker meat. Uh. Folks make bourbon specific jigs known as pound pounders to catch them, which are which are basically heavy glowing araddling jigging spoons, and a lot of folks fishing into great effect should you catch them. I found bourbon to be delicious. Their flesh, in my opinion, is just about the best tasting of any freshwater species I've ever had. Their livers, which comprise ten percent of their body weight, are perfect for making patte. I made one the other day, and Steve Rinella, the man himself, told me it was among the best things he'd ever eat. I'd have to agree, although I'm not sure it had as much to do with my culinary prowess so much as the deliciousness of the primary ingredient, the bourbon. So there you have it. And Neophyte's description of a bourbon and catching them. I'll be fishing for them, admiring them, and eating them as often as possible going forward. And while I was very pleased indeed to catch my first walleye the other day, I think bourbons are sincerely my new favorite fish. Post him if you got him. We'd love to see photos of you with your personal best bourbon, So make sure to throw those up on the old Instagram and use the Degenerate Angler and Bent podcast hashtags, and if you want to hear us sing the praises of your favorite fish, right to Bent at the Meat Eater dot com with your nomination. So first, I think we can put bourbon to bed for a while now it's getting almost as annoying as my snakeheads. But I gotta bring something up. Right. You went out the other night bourbon fishing with our colleague Sam Longgren, Right, yes, okay at Sam posted a picture of you on a ground pad in your sleeping bag, holding a nice bourbon. And I didn't really think anything the shot like nothing, nothing struck me really, um, but you you happen to have some wicked hat hair in that photo that kind of gave you like the swooping sideways Emo bangs, and listener Chad Camp wrote in and said that you look like someone whose dad took him to see the Black Parade, and I was, and I was like, O MG, was that of my chemical romance reference? Bravo, Chad. I not have done better myself. It's so ironic, though, because I think people think you're high, which you aren't, and now they think you're an emo kid, which maybe you had a phase, but I really like that's not really your jam now, Like that's not what you're listening. I had a straight up emo kid phase, man, and you did. Oh yeah, man? It started. Uh. It started with me coming from a like like it wasn't like a Catholic school, but it was where you'd wear like uniforms and stuff. And then I went right into like our public school system after like that grade school kind of ended. It ended at sixth grade, and I had a wicked crush on this chicken Nicole and I just remember being like, all right, I'm going to be emo now because it seems like that's where this girl lay so okay, So I committed. Man. I had like I had like a little piece of my hair dyed red and ship oh good for you. So you're you're, You're. My dad took me to get it died. My dad took me to get it died. So we didn't take me to the Black Parade, but he took me to like the Red Salon. I guess that's so okay, there's there's an age gap between us. So then like who was your band during that phase? Like, like who was the big deal in the you not you not? It was my Chemical Romance they used scared me? Okay, all right, well then before you Helena is still a great song. Helene is a pretty good song. I'll give him. I'll give him Helena. Quick story though, right my high school band headlined a show in Jersey that My Chemical Romance opened, and it was ship no true story. It was their first show ever, and we were like dorks. Look at these nerds, freaking whiney chumps. They're singing about their feelings like not masturbation and drinking mad dog like we do like the cool kids do. Yeah, anyway, if y'all got any of that Black Parade money's still kicking around, you know, you can help out a fishing brother my Chemical Romance. But yeah, dude, that's a that's true story. Uh, speaking which, how about we help a They're out this week in our own way with a new edition of the bent Helpline. What do you laughing at, Martini? You're not an idiot, you're not a gamblony hell boy, you're a fisherman. Best, what's your emergency? So welcome to the bent Helpline, where we read or I guess play if you're sending it in an audio file, your listener questions and then Joe and I do our best to answer them. Uh. This week we got a question from Kinger eleven eighty six, whose question is simply, why can't I get a goddamn steelhead to bite? I'm going absolutely mad? Now, Hayden chose this question. By the way, I want to preface it with that, don't you preface before I preface. I heard you about to say preface. Oh don't don't double preface me. I'm going to preface it by by saying, if you're a West Coast dude, I can't really help you based I think, but you're coming up against in that fishery is a declining at least if you're talking about wild fish. As we touched on there like plenty of rivers that have hatchery fish, but if you're fishing for wild steel head um, the numbers are not good and swinging flies is hard. Bro. You know, like like that. That's that's basically Can we can we be totally open and honest with our listeners about this question? Can we do that? Maybe? I don't know, it depends. My first question when you suggested this question was is he a West Coast guy or an East Coast guy? Like an East Coast guy right? And I was like, how do you know? And you were like, because I feel it just looking at him, he's an East Coast guy. So yeah, I mean, neither one of us are experts in west side steel um. So if that's if that's what you're trying to catch, uh, let us know and we could point you to some experts in that arena. But and if you're more interested in East coast steel, let us know that and help me prove my point to Joe that folks asking this question are fishing the Great Lakes. You're probably right. I'm not. I'm not on that because people know that that we both love Great Lakes steel. I just think it's funny because I'm like that's very open ended and we don't know where he's from. Um, I'll tell you what the real question here, Like, the real variable is if he's talking, uh, fly or spin. Now, you have probably done more spin fishing for steelhead than I have. And while I don't think that I've done more fly fishing for steelhead than you have, it is still something that I feel very confident speaking towards. So why don't you take the lead and give him some spin advice and then I'll follow you up with my take on fly fishing for him. Well that's fine, but I'm going to take a different approach because I think because of the lack of information we have here on on on how he's trying to target these fish and where he's trying to target these fish. Like anytime somebody's like I'm really having trouble catching this or I want to catch bigger these, Um, the simplest piece of advice is get out there and target them as much as you possibly can, Like, no matter what you are trying to fish for, if you are struggling, because again, dude, it's it's hard without knowing, Like what did you go once last year? Did you go fifteen times like even if you don't really know what you're doing, the more you go, the more you'll figure it out, which will ultimately lead to catching more and bigger fish. So um, you know in in in terms of spinning, Um, well you're really quick. And you know something I want to tack onto that is you gotta be careful of like what kind of media you're consuming and what where It originated when I was first getting into Steelhead. It was actually a bus drive like my my like school bus driver is the one who really fostered that interest. Man that that dude was great. His name was Tony Spagnola. He used to give me all sorts of fly tying material that he wasn't using anymore, all sort of like stacks of magazines from like the nineties that were just like that dude was awesome. Thank you Tony publicly. Um. But one thing that he also gave me was a a VHS copy of um Ship. I forget what like the movie was called. It was that Lonnie Waller, No, Lonnie Waller is like a very famous you know, uh West Coast steel header And he had this one video I think it was on the babbying where he was catching all sorts of steel and like throwing like waking flies for him and picking them up off the surface, and like that was my introduction. Is steelhead fishing that said, not super applicable in uh in the Great Lakes fisheries. So one thing that I would be very cognizant of is where your steel head information is coming from. If you're an East Coast dude and you're taking in a bunch of like West Coast media, that's going to kind of skew your perspective on steel head fishing, and it might give you might be arming yourself with techniques that aren't super applicable. Yeah, it also varies quite a bit within the East Coast fishery. As an example, like, um, the Grand River in Ohio, beautiful river. I've only ever fished it once, and I fished it in the fall during a road trip, you know, across the Great Lakes to hit all these steel rivers in one shot, and we struggled. We had one really nice fish, but we struggled, and then come to find out later I've had a lot of people tell me, well, actually the Grand fish is better in spring than it does in fall in winter, right, But yet thirty miles down the road on the Ashtabulah or whatever. It's the it's the complete opposite. So it really can vary, and and it's it's hard to break down. Um, you know a lot of this into specifics. But what I can tell you, whether it's fly or spinning, like one thing I've always been taught. Um, you know, I've always tend to steal head fish in the colder months. And everybody wants to swing, right, even the Great Lakes guys like, oh man, I want to swing one. I want to swing one up, And that doesn't necessarily mean a fly like I know people who target them with inline spinners swinging been with Yeah, sure, exactly right. Um, but that has a very as I've always been told, a very small window, like once that water gets much below like forty degrees, it becomes very hard to get one a true swing. Now, backtrolling is a different story. That's because that's not really swinging, but true swinging across the run, aggressive fish charges over eats lower or fly. There's a very small window. So like, no matter how you're fishing, keep that in mind. It once that water gets gets cold, everything now becomes slow and you bounce that ship right off their face. It doesn't matter if it's an egg sac or an egg fly or a nymph, Like it becomes a slower presentation. Yeah, I'd also like pay attention to when you were going after him, because steel head, I've noticed or like a I mean this is a widely held observation, steal it or like a fickle fish man. If you've got like a front coming in or you're in the middle of like a cold snap or something like that, and like the only reason the water isn't frozen is because it's moving. A lot of times that can spell like you know, frustrating day on the water. That said, if you're like trying to pick your spot and you notice that you know the what it's, you're gonna be in a warm spell right, like one of those, Like my favorite steel head fishing is like a mid February warm spell where the water just bumps up two or three degrees and all of a sudden it's on fire. I pay very close attention to that. Now, that's like a conditions based thing, on a technique based thing. Um, I think that you'd be the first thing that I would look at is your weight Uh, the steel I like relate to the bottom heavily, particularly when it's cold, right, which is when most people are fishing for him. Anyhow, a lot of times you're going to run into problems if you are not using enough weight. You really need to like get the fly down there. Forget like the really pretty space cast, forget your snap tea and ship. If you're just trying to catch one man, I would chuck and duck man, I would I would chuck and duck. I always figure if I didn't lose at least ten flies in a session, I wasn't doing it right. Yeah, Like it is super common, at least on the Salmon River where I've done most of my steel heading. That's where I've done most of money. Yeah, dude, Like you know the drill. Then it's like if you get if you get ten clean drifts and your ship comes back and you didn't hang up and bust off, you're like, wow, must be my birthday, Like like you are constantly breaking off, Like that is all part of it. Yeah. I would also suggest going for um. You know a lot of times in these major Great Lake steelhead fisheries, you'll see people fishing a lot of like super sparkly ship, whether that's like the crystal meth fly or like giant stas eggs. And I personally have never had particularly good luck fishing that way. Most of what I've been fishing is stuff from my trout box, you know, size, you know, there's nothing wrong with fishing the four teen pheasant tail, particularly with like a beadhead. Maybe you want a little like hot spot or like a popa blue on it. I think is like a real popular thing to do. But I tend to like, uh like flies like that. Yeah, I see, I I take a slightly different approach. I don't. I feel like maybe I don't give the fish as much credit as you do, especially in the winter when you know their hold up. I just keep changing ship and like it's like, oh they're on pink, Oh they're not. Now I'll just go to yellow. Ope, got another one, Like it's just something different. Um, And that's not necessarily you know, doesn't necessarily happen that way all the time. But um, I mean that's the other thing too. Without knowing exactly which river he's fishing and what he's looking for, I mean, come on, dude, especially on a weekend, all winter long. You want to know if they're steel heading in particular hole question one, is anybody else fishing it? If yes, they're probably steelhead there. So once they get concentrated in the winter, once they're in that winter pattern, it's very common. How many times you have you gone up there and it's like whack, wrack, whack. At first light, it's like a whole and boom gone, just a little sunlight comes up. They didn't go anywhere. They're still right there, but like that was their feed window. So again, this is all this all stuff you learned just by you know, doing it for a long time and pounding a lot of water. Yeah, yeah, And uh. The the other thing that I would, you know, advise our listener to do is don't think of them so much. Is I mean, they are, but like, don't think of him so much as giant rainbow trout and fish them in the same way that you might fish rainbow trout. What I look for is um a lot of like frog water, like where you might expect to find a brown trout, perhaps you know, on on the inside edges of those seams where you have like you know, you have a run coming down and it hits the bank real hard, and you'd be like, Oh, they're gonna be in that like deep cut in this seam on like the far side of that bank. A lot of times that's not where I find him. I find him on the inside of that seam, where like it kind of like eddies out a little bit. And it's a lot of times when you hear as you hear people talking about a walking speed, like if the water is moving at a walking speed, that might be where steel head hangs out. And and I've noticed that that is, uh, that's true. The other thing, um, you know, as far as like reading the water, uh, and like the actual like river condition goes, is what time the year you're fishing for him? Where they One of the most frustrating experiences I ever had was in the beginning of the pandemic. I took I took a girlfriend steelhead fishing, and I was just hammering the spots where I'd catch them all winter long and nothing was happening, Like, in fact, we we hooked a couple smell like we're not smell um, what the do you call them? Baby fish? Smolt host the fishing podcast Folks One Letter Off, And I was like, what the hell is going on? And I called my guide buddy and he was like, well, dude, have you ever been up here in the spring? I was like, you know what, I haven't. He was like, well, go to like the gravel. Yeah, and so so I went. I went over to the gravel and we started like hooking a bunch of fishing. It was awesome. So you gotta keep in mind what time of year you're fishing. If you're fishing early in the fall, they're gonna be in those runs behind salmon. If you're fishing in the winter, they're gonna be in that frog water. And if you're fishing in the spring and for dropbacks, they're gonna be on those gravel bars where they're spawning or where they've just spawned. And if that hasn't helped you, join us next week for chapter two. Yeah. Alright, well, uh, king are eleven eighty six. Thank you for sending that question in and I hope that was helpful, although I'm sure you are just more confused. Uh. If you want to if you want to have your question answered on air, or if you want to send a voice memo and hear yourself on air, UH, you can get that to us at Bent at the meat Eator dot com. Or you can maybe slide into Joe or my d M s on the old Instagram. So that's it for this week kind of sort of. Maybe there's a little clue for you. See how many people pick up on that. Anyway, thanks again to Tim More for dropping by. Hopefully I'll see him this winner and uh maybe stick a bigger bourbon than you and talk about it for weeks on end. Yeah, well you won't, man, you won't because uh, you know I do a lot of night fishing. Oh there's another tip for you. Um, I'm calling it out. I'm also calling you guys to keep sending those sale bent items, bar nominations, helpline questions, and awkward photos to Bent at the meat Eator dot com. Yes, please keep doing that, and keep using those degenerate angler and Bent podcast hashtags which try to put eyes on every single one of those. And finally, when you've worn out those docks on the ice or those chucks on the flats, do the right thing. Tie the laces together and throw them over a power line. Hipster kids that don't fish need something to photograph. M hm. Alright, folks, if you've if you stuck around this long, we have a little something extra for you. Since we started the bent Helpline. Uh, you know, we've got a ton of great listener questions, so many in fact, that we can't answer them all. So Joe and I decided that we'd make like a little bonus track. Yeah, we've done this before a while ago. We had a bonus sage Lee Wisdom Hidden Track all a tool CD from the nineties, and it seemed to work well. So this is a good idea. Um, and yeah, every now and again, like here and there, we're gonna drop this little segment that we're calling night Fishing after the outro and extend the party just a little longer. So crack a buckskin, sinking to that lawn chair and watch your globe bobbers, because it's time to go night fishing. So listener, Zack Mahollock, that's uh at Zack Underscore maholic on the Instagram wants to know this is a fun one. He says, solo trips can be fun, but how do you get your fishing buddy to stop canceling? Last minute? Boy? I can speak to this one man like it's like the bane of that was like the bane of my early fishing existence. Because the guys I'm sure like you and a lot of like folks listening can relate. We're just into it more than apparently everybody else. Well that's that, and then that is the truth. I gotta tell you, Um, finding fishing buddies with the the full fire that you have if you have said fire, it's not always as easy as you think. Like the most hardcore fishing buddies that I have, none of them live close to me, like like they're scattered all over the country, and it's like such a treat to get together. But and this is not this is not certainly not shipping on anybody that I fish with regularly. It's just a matter of like you know, family life and stuff like. There's not a lot of other dudes that have the schedule I have where I can sneak out Wednesday morning if I wanted to, you know, um, and I will push aside all obligations on a weekend to go fish for something. Not everybody can do that. It's just it just is what it is. Um. But this, this, this question certainly resonates with me because I also have some of those people that they are notorious for that and what I what I've essentially used them for. It's like, let's say I'm going somewhere and I'm like, it'd be fun to drive up that morning with somebody and shoot the ship in the car and grab a sandwich and have some good conversation. So I'll ask that person, but I've already made up my mind that if they bail I'm also totally okay going on the same trip doing the same thing by myself. So it's like a little bonus. I'm like, I'll throw it out to him. Chances are he's going to bail out the night before, but it's not gonna stop me from doing what I want to do. So like, that's not the dude you ask when you want to float eight miles, you know what I mean? Like that's like your battles. Yeah, that's like you're dedicated, you know, mission buddy. I would call them mission buddies, and then I would call them like trip buddies exactly, Like the trip buddy is like inclined to be like yeah, man, well you know I was going to but um, you know, my my buddy, they're going to have like this like party for whatever whatever, and like I so I I don't think I can make it anymore, and I'm always just left like how could you man? Already? Yeah, I mean it is that, but it's but it's also like, how could you like to do anything more than this? There is no party that I would attend over. I don't know, like, yeah, you know, over the chance to do this Joe a little bit of nice fish. There's no party. I have missed funerals over the years. Um, there's no there's no football game, there's no sports event on the planet zero zero. Ship's going down during the super Bowl. I'm there. I love I love fishing like during like big sporting events, because you know that there's gonna be half as much pressure. Hot tip exactly. Anyhow, I would just a just a gun gun anyway. I I would get uh, I would get a new fishing buddy for like missions, man, And I would chalk it up to like, if you want to take friends fishing sometimes, just realize that, like it's going to fall through a lot, man. I don't think there's too much that you can do about it except find folks that are equally dedicated. And in that case, I would invite them to stuff that you already have very well planned. Right, there are two types. There's like the impromptu thing, and then there's like the well planned thing. And I would I would invest more energy into trips further out with people you know are going to be down then, like you know, hoping that your fishing buddy shows up. Yeah, yeah, I would totally agree, find new friends or just call that guy when it's a trip that like he would enhance the trip slightly, but not enough to make you cancel. If he can't go there, you go. Okay, So, Zach Malac, thank you for that one. Um. Now, friend of Bent, Nathan clump At Nathan does activities on the old Instant Slam wants to know if we've ever gone noodling. No, no, no, no, that's a that's negative. People have been trying to get me to go noodling for years now. I know people that noodle, um, but that is a that is a hard note for me, does not appeal to me at all. Yeah. No, nobody has ever invited me noodling. Although when I was a kid, I had a friend whose dad like mercilessly made fun of me because I thought it was ca noodling catfish and noodle that's a German dumpling, I believe. I think it's uh. I think it's more of a cliquialism for love making. But the god, I hate that guy. You know. If that dude's listening, man, you know I hate you. Um. But yeah, I guess short answer there is no and I have no desire to Joe. It's yeah, yeah, and it's a little bit twofold. Like honestly, I bow fish every once in a while. I think that's fun. But otherwise I've just never gotten eaten up with any methods beyond rotten reel. Like I'm not into spear fishing. Get nothing against it, It's just I'm not into that. So on one level, it doesn't appeal to me because I would just rather catch them on a rotten reel. And even though I have some very good friends that are hardcore noodlers that are like, look, man, I've been doing this ship for twenty years. I've never had my hand taken off by a beaver or a snapping turtle. Like that's a myth. It doesn't happen. I'm like, I understand. It's like the same odds as dying in a commercial airline crash. But I have that kind of luck, dude, Like if I will commit to it and the first log I stick my hand in, I'll lose like my pinky and my ring finger. It is almost guarantee easier thing to do. Just not do that because I'm not excited about it anyway. Um, but great question. So sorry to all the people who are going to try and convince this the noodle. Now you know that's coming. You know what I mean? I might be you should do it. Yeah, you should. I was gonna say you should do Just just reach out to Hayden. Just don't even bother with me. Moving on gauge Atwood, which is an awesome name. At gauge Atwood, He asks, Am I a prick because I hate bait fishing? I YEA great man. I don't get like, I don't get it when people divide themselves into camps like I am just as likely. You know, if somebody hits me up and it's like yo, West branch of the Delaware Drakes are coming off right now, get up here, We're gonna get in the boat, down down, let's do it, man. Um. But if somebody's like yo, let's go like chunk catfish. I'm like, yes, I I do not understand it when people divide themselves into these like weird camps. Well, and that's that's really what Ben's been all about, right. We invite anglers of all walks of life, all factions here. I'm certainly everybody knows I'm the same way. I'll fish anything. I I really don't care. And I could go into a whole tirade about how people look down on bait fishing and if I, if I had more time, I could totally say some things that, by the end, I promise would make everybody who thinks bait fishing is simple and easy look at it completely differently. I don't really think we have the time for that. But here's what I'll say. Are you a prick because you hate bait fishing? No, you're not a prick because at the end of the day, you know, we always try and preach this message of don't put yourself in a silo, you know what I mean. But hey, dude, if you're a fly guy and that's all you ever want to be, rock and roll man, that's cool and no no love lost. If that's your deal. So I don't know if you're a prick, but you are incredibly closed minded, Like you are incredibly closed minded because I don't know how many I can't say this enough, Like people miss all the connective tissue routinely between every kind of fishing. In other words, if you spend time drifting meal worms and garden war for trout and you get good at that, you not have a leg up on nymphing and vice versa. There's things you can learn from one that translate to another. Watching how a fish attacks a big live shiner under a bobber will teach you something about what to do with a swim bait. There's, it's there's, it's all connected, and I don't understand why so few people, I feel like often see that. But it only makes you better at whatever. The main passion you have is by being open minded and being willing to fish a million different ways. That's my that's my opinion. Yeah, I agree with your wholeheartedly. All right, Um, moving on our buddy, uh Jordan's Derek at Derek the Fancy Caveman wants to know how drunk is too drunk on a guided trip? Oh you first? Um, okay, I happen to know that Joe and I have very different opinions on this. All that's okay, that's okay. These opinions are good, Yeah, sure are. But um, Joe has kind of swayed me to his argument, which we'll get to in a minute. But my initial thoughts on it, and I guess, I guess something I'd stand by is it really depends on what you're doing. First off, I want I want to preface this by saying, whatever you're doing, don't put yourself in an unsafe situation. Even if you're on a a a a thirty foot you know, party boat in calm seas, getting blackout drunk around the water is always a bad idea. It's never a good call, that said. Man. You know, if you're say you're at a bachelor party and you guys just want to go catch you know, a handful of mahi mahi, there's nothing wrong with throwing back, you know, a couple of coronas or something like that, you know, but don't get don't get drunk to the point that taking care of you or um part in the pun like reeling you in becomes an activity for the captain, the mate, the guide, whatever. I also want to say that there are certain types of trips where I would not suggest drinking at all. Uh. Those include walking wades, uh, drift boat trips. I wouldn't get drunk on bone fish flats. I wouldn't have anything to drink in a lot of scenarios. Man, if it's contextually appropriate, dude, have like a couple of beers. But like I would say, don't get drunk to the point that you'd be like above the legal limit, Like if you would get pulled over, you might be too drunk to do what you're doing as far as fishing goes, Okay, yeah, man. And and look, I'm not gonna say don't ever don't ever have drink when you're fishing. Um because I do. It's well, yeah, because because I do. But it's it's certain scenarios, you know, a cold beer on a float trip for small mouth or trout drinking, drinking a cold beer on the on the on the seventy mile running after tuna, fishing all day awesome. Otherwise And and some people would say this is a very Unamerican opinion. Drinking and fishing do not go together for me, like they do not go hand in hand like they do for so many people. I've always been of the opinion of, like, if what I really want to do is drink and get a load on, I'll go to the bar, or I'll have a barbecue at my house. And I especially have never been able to figure it out. I've never been able to figure it out. Uh, people who get hammered on charter trips. Now, you in most scenarios you fish like shit, or you don't fish at all because you end up passed out in a bean bag or whatever. Some captain now has to deal with you. And you're paying seven eight hundred, twelve hundred dollars to be there, Like, what a freaking waste man. And and here's the thing. I know, a lot of captains in all arenas fly offshore, you name it. I've never heard one of them say, you know, it was a really good time taking these guys out yesterday, A and two of them got hammered and we're thrown like that's why most captains, most captains I know, it is like zero hard liquor, no flat, You ain't bringing a bottle. You can bring beers, you can bring some white claws, whatever you're into, but rest assured. I've never met a captain who like just thinks it's funny as ship when you and your boys come out and get hammered. They might not give you a hard time. They might have you back they need to make money. But when you leave, no, yeah, nobody's like that, was that was awesome? No, they want you to catch fish, not get ship faced. Um. So you know, for me, it's like a beer or two and in a laid back summer scenario, I will go to the bar and pound them with you after we fish ice fish. What I don't give a ship I am. I am about that man, some chicken wings and a couple of pictures of beers after the fact. But for me, like with my family, my dad, my grandfather, nobody that I ever grew up fishing with, was it like a six pack goes hand in hand with the cat and and and I find, honestly, man, like I've been doing a bunch of ice fishing lately. And you know, when you're ice fishing, like you have a couple of beers. Typically I find um that said, what I really find is myself opening a couple of beers and then not drinking them because I I get like so tuned into like the jigging and stuff. I don't want to stop jigging to like take like a sip of this beer. And then what inevitably happens is I have like most of a beer in a can. I ignore it for an hour and a half. I come back to it, it is now frozen. And then so I just pop open another beer and the same thing happens. And now I'm picking up a whole bunch of you know, two thirds full beers on the ice when I pick up my stuff to like leave. Yeah, similarly, man, I I same deal. It's never my beer ever that gets drunk on a fishing trip because I don't ever bring it. I'm not asking for it, but it is always in in some downtime. So like, you know, you're floating the river and dudes like, did its junk water for the next mile? Just chill. By the way, I got two beers in the cooler. You want one? Good? Yeah? Sure, yeah, right on, But like I'm not sipping that between work and a rising fisher streamer. You know that's all right? Well, hey look let's let's let's move on, man, And I'm going to spring this on you. We've made Jordan Derek. We've made Jordan Derek feel bad enough. Um. Now, I didn't put this one in the queue because I thought it would elicit some feelings from you. And if you don't want to do this, we can just cut it here and I'll edit everything and make it or Phil will edit everything and make it all smooth. John Maloney one wants to know do you consider Great Lakes steel head actually a true steel head? Do you want to open this can of worms? I'll I've opened this can of worms before I'll answer it. Um, I say yes, No, I say no. Well, well I'm more right than you are, Joe, and I'm sure. I'm sure we're gonna get a whole bunch of Listener responds to it. I let's hear your argument first. It all depends on your definition. Genetically speaking, Are they genetically the same as a as a West Coast salt running steelhead trout? Yes, they are same fish on a genetic level. But if if you went back in time to the dictionary or encyclopedia before all this this ship started happening, with all these planner fish all over, the definition of a steel head is a rainbow trout that leaves fresh water, goes out, lives, eats, and breathe salt water, and comes back. So if that, if you are accepting that as the definition of a steelhead trout, then by definition, Great Lakes steel head are not true steel head. Does it mean they're not awesome? No? Does it mean that they don't fight as hard as West steel? No? I mean all that's happening here right is the lake is the ocean and they run up the trip. So it's the same They're doing the same thing. But by definition, no, I do not think so. Well. By definition, the new Oxford American Dictionary defines a steel head as a rainbow trout of a large migratory variety. So, uh, you're wrong the Oxford Dictionary. When was that updated? What years? That is your Oxford Dictionary coming through? Is? I don't know, man, Well see don't say that, and then it may be like, huh, you're wrong. When was it? When was that? Yeah, it's on the internet, the internet. What's the Oxford dictionaries anyhow? Like, okay, so to me, man, you know, people defined it by the salt. I define it as migratory tendencies. And it's like, but we would agree that that o g original steel head. Like in the time of Native Americans before any of this, they ran the saltwater or nothing. That was what a steel head was. There was no steel head that didn't run the salt water. Yeah, that's fine, but like you know, to that uh, you know, to that end, it's like, do you consider like to me, that would be akin to like considering Atlantics or like coconese not salmon. Well, there's salmon. In terms of genetics, it's a salmon. It it is a salmon. So okay, well, like so wouldn't like a genetic steelhead be a steelhead by that logic, I think you can go with either definition. Like I said, genetically speaking that it is a steel head. But you're you're asking. You asked me, and you said, true steel head. What's a steel like? Aren't rainbow trout in general just landlocked remnants of like steelhead? Isn't that? Actually? I actually don't. I actually don't know that. I don't know. I thought that that's why, um, finding wild rainbow trout only happened west of the Continental Divide, And it was that is I believe, And it was because rainbow trout were landlocked steelhead. You know, so so so, but like by that like definition, man, I I would consider any large rainbow trout that goes out into a large body of water and then returns to spawn a steelhead. And you know, I get why, like people are are are drawing lines, and I think a lot of it has to do with um hatchery sentiment, like like they people don't want manufactured fishery. It's it's manufactured. Ye's no way around that. But um, I don't know, man, I think that this argument is do you consider the Delaware River to be a large body of water? Yeah, well, well because not not in the not in the same way that I'm talking uh lakes. It's like a moving body water. I think, like that's like I think that's like the divider line. It's not like it's not I'm not talking Yeah, that's not what I'm talking about, man. I'm not talking about something living in a river and then going up to a tributary. I'm talking about a a. I know that the ocean is not a still body of water, but like I'm I'm talking about like a a you know, a a still tidal body of water. I know that the Delawarever is titled okay, but get so in the weeds here. But like I have to, I have to throw this out there. You got a reservoir out in North Dakota, I don't know where, full of giant rainbow trout. When those fish go to spawn, they're looking for a trip. They're gonna circle the edge. Some reservoirs will have it, some lakes will have it, some won't. But bye bye, they want to run a trip to spawn. Well, then I was steel ahead. So the question that I would ask you would be what was like the um the breeding stock sourced from? Like are those rainbows or are they like steel head or or are they like of you know, for instance, like the Eel River strain of steel head that was like moved to this area to do this thing. Yeah, I I I don't know. But also, if I'm not mistaken, a true steel head does genetically vary from a landlocked rainbow trout. Like, they are features about them that are different. Their eyes are shaped differently, their eyes look in different directions. You know what I think that this is. You know what? I think this is pretty analogous to it's um. The conversation around grizzly bears and brown bears. Like what separates those two because like I think, genetically they're identical. The differences that brown bears have um access to marine resources, i e. Like salmon, And that's why brown rs are they considered like a separate like subspecies, because they get so much larger because of this marine resource. And I think that steelhead it's very much the same thing. It's like they have access to these you know, uh feed resources that allow them to get bigger, Like you know, it's not bugs, it's it's it's ale wives, you know, ship like that. And I think when you couple that with like the migrating migratory tendencies in this specific way where they go, you know, it's I think it's different than the rainbow trout circling the lake. You know. The steelhead are out there and they're doing their thing in like big open water and then they stage, they they they they stage in these like groups and then they make spawning runs. And I don't think rainbow trout do exactly that same thing even in a lake. Okay, well we have officially cleared it up, then great Legs steel head are in fact steel head I don't ever need to talk about this either. We did. We did work here today. We did. We did, man, Joe, I think it's like a really fun news segment. Um. I think it's something our listeners are going to appreciate, and you know it's it's it really is a nice way to unwind after a long marathon podcast recording session with you is just to hang out and shoot the ship a little bit. Totally, totally. Nothing. Nothing helps me on wine from recording podcasts all day, like recording more pots. So if you have have questions that you might think are a are appropriate for night fishing, or questions that you want to hear on the Bent helpline that might end up here, make sure you send those to me and Joe. You can either do it via voice memo or a you know, just a textual written format via our Instagram, or you could send those into Bent at the meat Eater dot com