00:00:02 Speaker 1: If you're in a boat ram and he pulls in with salt life all over his stuff, like he's probably the one that's gonna put his truck in the water. You spine this dinghis we're gonna accept for coin, and there are two options. They actually retrofitted pool cues like real pool cues, with real seats and guides to use his musky rods. Did you get it on a jail? But no, you cannot adopt a Will's captish. Good morning, degenerate anglers, Welcome to Bend, the fishing show that buys daiki hooks from the wish app Because really, do we seem like the kind of guys who can afford dach hooks at the fly shop? No, come on, I'm Joe sph Melli and I'm Miles Nulty. All right, So, a few weeks ago we made a joke at the expense of rent a cops, and I had no idea how sensitive a subject we were touching on. So to all the private secure aty professionals out there who took offense, please accept our heartfelt hope that you can find your senses of humor a little trivia effect for you. I used to work as a retail security guard. Yes, I was once a rent a cop. And even though I was very very bad at that job, because I could not have cared less how many beastie boys cedeeds disappeared to the jam sport backpacks, I've earned the right to make rent a cop jokes. If you're daily grind evolves sitting in a tiny little box handing out vendor badges and making regular patrols around the sales floor looking for people to profile, you can absorb a little good natured ship talk. It's weird, but I could picture you in that role in your younger days, like just not giving a shit about anything, year old ponytail halfway down my back. It was a job. In general, though, I will say, um, I think people's like waning lack of ability to make fun of themselves. It's just a growing global problem, like just in all facets, like we have people. You know, I make fun of myself constantly wondering, like wondering how I've gotten this FEI in life. But yeah, man, I'm with that. If you're a mall security guard or toll booth operator, that the kid that rounds up the golf balls at the driving range, you know, a fishing industry professional. Three words that do not belong together, like do yourself a favorite, laugh at yourself. It's okay, nothing bad is gonna happen. You might enjoy it. So no, we're all ridiculous apologies, but it's kind of like a sorry, not sorry. You know, we make fun of ourselves all the time, and for good reason, we deserve it. Uh. That said, I do have empathy for security guards like that. Truthfully, that is the most boring job I've ever had. And and to make things worse, break room coffee is terrible. It is. It is absolutely nothing like the black Rifle coffee that I'm currently enjoying. I'm a medium rose kind of guy, and their coffee saves variety is exactly what I need right now. So it's not just a clever name. Lately, the mrs and I have been hot on their Jest Black And tell you what, I'm not really a black coffee drinker. You know, I'm the weenie that fills half the mug with the Snickers flavored coffee. Mate. First, you know, Uh, it's just me, I'm just me being me. But the Jest Black is truly perfect drank jet black, and a little reminder that this podcast is entirely fueled by Black Rifle Coffee. Black Rifle Coffee Club keeps members fully stocked with premium fresh beans delivered right to their doors, and they support all the folks who support US military veterans, first responders, firefighters, and healthcare workers. So you can feel good about giving them your hard earned money. Head on over to Black Rifle Coffee dot com backslash meat Eater and they will take care of all your coffee needs. Use the code meat Eater a checkout and they'll even hook you up with your order. Yeah, and that coffee has also been fueling hours of cold calling and emailing Miles and I have been doing lately to uh, you know, talent agencies and man, you just trying to trying to coun our way into getting some some new fresh guests on this show, whose whose voices may sound more familiar, like we hang out with fishy people, but we're like, you know who who would resonate with the masses beyond the fish world. It's not easy. It's not easy. No, And and let's be clear, the operative word there is con Yeah. Anyway, somehow it worked kind of I don't know how to put this. We don't have an actual fishing report for you this week because I mean, all right, look, we got Brad Pitt to record something for us, and we're not really in a position to tell bread Pitt what to do. We didn't even get to talk to Brad. They wouldn't let us speak to Brad um not that I I mean, you know, that's that's fine, but this all went through his people. He's got people, so instead of a fishing report, we got h I don't know what do you what do you call this? I don't really know what I'm what I'm really introduce thing, except I'll just say here's Brad Pitt, ladies and gentlemen on the Bent podcast. You go ahead and enjoy this one. Hey, hey, hey, hi Brad here. So someone asked me to do this podcast and I was like, but bow, what's the podcast? And also who the hell are these guys? But when I found out it was about fishing, right, I was like, can I share my words? And they were like, yeah, you can do whatever you want to do. So I'm really into fishing poetry, not so much fishing or poetry, but fishing poetry, you know, if you know what I mean. So yeah, here are some poems that I wrote. Chasing Eternal Rises, pain, elation, euphoria, desperation, the rusted pull tab from a candid metaphorical kombucha, The smell of summer in the streets of New Delhi, A half a pack of Winston's. Two girls you swear you've met before, but you can't remember if it was at Luke's or Owen's. Winter and Toledo. A tape measure your dad let you bar and you never gave back, sage brush fig palm trees at a t g I Friday's warez bottom misstake fries, A moped that will take you anywhere you want to go if you have the free map. Fear of garden sprinklers. Your therapist hasn't been able to resolve something kind of like a small carry on bag, only larger trout. Thank you. This next one was inspired by some min you know, yeah, complicated relationships, hanging out with Guy Richie and Madonna in the UK, filming snatch sucker fish, who are you calling sucker Fish? Broadcast bowners, spreading seed, subterminal lips, blowing botox bubbles, criminal car casting, contentious characters past that roach. Did you get it on a jayhook? No? No, we cannot adopt a welles catfish. They need to swim free, look like me. That was it? Uh so, yeah, I humbly thank you for listening. Never forget the words of the Immortal Fluid. They were here, and then they were going to go there, and then they went. I gotta say that that first poem wasn't bad. You think so? You think that was good? I mean, yeah, I don't know. I dig poetry when it's well done. You know, I can get down with some of that, like free association imagery he had going on there. In fact, you know what, I think we should do more poetry on the show. Maybe we should start a segment called Poems that Don't Suck? Can it? Can it be a high coup? I see? I like high coups. It's just like short and sweet, takes two seconds to read. I don't have to get lost in that, you know. Uh? And just you saying that for the kids paying attention. I fear that's a that's called foreshadowing. So if we do end up aaring more poetry, I'm gonna assume some listeners will love it, while others absolutely hate it and send us, you know, yet another slew of emails asking us to never do that again. Um, we'll see, I'd end up reading some Shell Silverstein. You know. Saddest thing I Alveray did see was a woodpecker pack under a plastic tree, looked at me and friends says he thinks and as sweet as he used to be. That's That's about where poetry stops for me. Man. Oh, Shell Silverstein was a genius, That's all I'm gonna say. And and I'll also admit the poetry is polarizing. Either you enjoy it or you just completely hate the whole idea of it. And for those of you in the latter camp, I blame your high school English teachers. But I'm gonna stick with the theme of polarized opinions here. It's time for fin clips, where we tell you everything you never wanted to know about a fish you may or may not have heard of. This week, Joe is gonna deep dive into a trout subspecies about which anglers are staunchly divided. Say the word tiger trout to a devout trout angler, and you often get one of two responses. Said angler is often enthralled by tiger trout, considering them a rare prize, if not somewhat of a badge of honor, to have plucked a tiger or two from local waters over the course of their fishing careers. Or you get disdain because it's believed that tigers are simply frankenstein hatcher recreations that don't really belong anywhere, and they're so ravenous and dumb that it takes no skill whatsoever to catch one. Both of these responses are fair and at least partial the accurate. A tiger trout is a hybrid. It's a cross between a brook trout and a brown trout, and the result of this genetic mashup is a fish with a deep brown or olive e back, fiery orange belly, and a body full of swirling gold striation marks that you guessed it look kind of like tiger stripes. And like all hybrids, including the tiger muskie, tiger trout are sterile. Many states include tigers in their trout stocking programs, as creating them in a hatchery is relatively easy. Now. According to my research, brown trout have eighty chromosomes and brook trout have eighty four. So in the process of tiger making, brown trout eggs are fertilized with brook trout mill and then heat shocked, which causes the creation of an extra set of chromosomes, thus increasing the survival rate of that batch of tigers from five percent all the way up to The final result is a trout that grows more quickly than other species, tends to be more aggressive than other species, and is generally heartier and more tolerant of environmental factors that regular old brooks, browns, and rainbows might not dig. So much that hardiness I've actually witnessed with my own eyes right. I live right on the Lower Delaware River, which creates the border between New Jersey and Pennsylvania. And while the upper reaches of this river, nearly three miles away, provide some of the best wild brown trout fishing in the country, the vast majority of the Delaware is far too warm to support trout. However, there are countless stock streams that drain into the main stem along those three hundred miles, so it's not super rare for a lucky smallmouth shad or striper angler to pull the occasional wayward trout from the low end, and guess what of the time when they do, it's a tiger. I've seen reports of tigers caught as far south as Philadelphia in the sludgy, cargo ship laden tidal water, which tells me, yeah, tigers are tougher than your average trout. While the vast majority of tiger trout the people catch ended up wherever they caught them because of this big science experiment, tiger trout do occur naturally in the wild, though it is incredibly rare, and since at least from what I gather, it mostly happens in small streams, you're not likely to stumble into a twenty pound thirteen announced tiger trout like Peter Friedland did on Lake Michigan in to claim the i g F a world record. In fact, I have a distinct recollection of a frame tiger trout photo hanging in a tiny fly shop on Slate Run in north central PA. It was only about six inches long, cradled lovingly in a pair of cupped hands, and the owner told me it's the only wild tiger he'd ever seen or heard of in all his years fishing. This famed wild trout stream. If, per chance, you happen to be one of those trout fishermen that make it a life goal to catch as many species of wild trout as possible, you can increase your odds of scratching off wild tiger trout by heading to Wisconsin. According to the innerwebs and I quote Whiskson currently has no stocking program for tiger trout, but the hybrids show up naturally in the States small streams, in particular in the Driftless area. As brook trout populations have rebounded, incidences of tiger trout have improved from exceedingly rare too a bit better than rare. Now. As for their i'll eat anything that moves aggression, I've personally never witnessed that, though I've also never fished any lakes or rivers with an abundance of tigers. However, on my wall there's a beautiful wood carving of a fat twenty inch tiger with its full colors blazing, and to date it is the only trout I've ever had eat a mouse fly in broad daylight on my beloved Upper Delaware River. Now, maybe that was because I just paid like the perfect presentation man, or maybe it was the only trout in the run dumb and aggressive enough to make that move before nightfall. Frankly, I don't care. It was a fabulous take, akin to a great white smashing the seal. So I sit squarely in the tigers are super cool camp, and that mouse eater is definitely one of my most memorable catches. Still never caught a tiger trout show. I know why, right, Because you fish for wild trout and wild places like you, you don't view catching a giant orange rainbow trout that ten people are bombarding spinners and eggs and ship as like a rite of trout fishing passage. You know, nobody needs to supplement that Montana waters with freaks of nature to make people feel like they're trout stamp money is being west. But you don't even have a trout stamp. You know what a trout stamp? You know what a trout stamps. I know what a trout stamp is. I have purchased them elsewhere. But you know, like despite all of that, like it's not like I'm stuck up about it. I know that there's this holier than though attitude about wild trout, not wild trout, and I just don't buy into all that. I have no beef with palomino trout or tiger trout or any other weird fish at all. Like, I don't hold myself above it of those kinds of fishing. I'm down to do that. The problem is that there are just too many species and not enough time. There are so many interesting fish out there that I just I just want to harass for my own entertainment. Yeah, it's a constant problem. And like I could travel to chase new fish, or I could stay local and you know, spend less time on the road. Um. But the thing is, man, it's like we're just lucky to have options, and you have options to listeners. You could get your fish news from anywhere, but you choose to get it here at the number one source for fish news. And we appreciate that fish news that escalated quickly. Okay, so before we get in the news, this has kind of become our space for housekeeping. And uh, I think Myles and I have to say thank you to you guys, because due to your overwhelming supporting the awkward fishing photos Arena, we will not have to make fun of our own fishing photos for a good long while. We were worried what we started that out like just gonna be us making fun of each other in perpetuity. But no, you have given us a gold mine. Yes, and and and in collecting these and looking through the milk has been shot out of noses. Okay, And we love you guys for that, and just wanted to give you guys a heads up. It's starting. In just a few episodes down the road, we will press on with awkward moments in angling, fueled entirely by you guys. Okay. So now the big question, though, is is which one of you will be fan victim number one? And unfortunately, right now it's just too early to call it. We don't know. It's just too close, as we're apparently waiting on a few photos to come in from a handful of you that said you had shots incorporating full frontal nudity, friends crying hysterically in teletubby costumes. So we appreciate your patients. Just a few episodes down the road, we'll have our first fan winner selected. So that's housekeeping for this week. Anyway, onto the real news, and remember this is a competition. Miles and I do not know which news stories the other guy is bringing to the table um and at the end, our bent Pole analyst and audio engineer Phil will declare a winner in the race for fish News domination. The floor the podium is now going to Miles. I'm the leadoff man and uh and yep, I'm going I'm going full on fish geek here and the first one. Just just see where it gets me. But that's that's what I was feeling. And I know there there there are some salmon and steel head junkies listening to this and right now, as our our good buddy Scatch Johnson would say, they're in the depths of the Jones. I hope everybody's faring pretty well. As we get through. We should check him. We should check in with him because he said should be the wetta make sure he's still okay. I think he went up and smoke um, but we'll find him somewhere. So I'm gonna go full on Left Coast and Adremus with this story. First, I'm gonna give a little context for everybody who wasn't fully versed with the migration habits of Pacific Salman. It's steelhead of rainbow trout that migraine out of their natal rivers as smalt and live their adult lives in the Pacific Ocean, where they get way bigger and stronger than your your standard river rainbow. And that's why people love to fish for him so much. They return to spawn in those rivers and and sometimes take months swimming up hundreds of miles against the current to reach their spawning grounds. Right, so most people know that, but fewer people are aware that steelhead don't all migrate at the same time. There are two distinct runs of steelhead. One enters freshwater in the summer and one in winter. Steelhead are not the only salmon id with this dual migration pattern. Chinook also known as king salmon, do the same thing, with a spring run and a fall run in certain watersheds now back in biologists were able to isolate a genetic difference between the two populations of both steelhead and kings of variation in two genes, just two genes that determines of a fish migrates early or late. But they couldn't exactly figure out what the as genes did, all right, So they got like these two genes determined when you migrate, but they don't know why got it? Their hypothesis was that it had something to do with with metabolism or sexual maturation, because early runs are generally smaller and less sexually mature, while later runs are are usually much bigger and more mature. So now there's this new study that just came out focused exclusively on kings and and just recently published in the journal Science. But it totally disputes that hypothesis. This study found that those genes have nothing to do with body size or maturity. It seems like the only reason that early and late run fish look so different is just purely timing. The fish that stay in the ocean longer chowing and all the food just get bigger. It's that say, they probably have slightly different food sources, like, yeah, so it's it's just those variables. Yeah, this is what they're learning. Yeah, exactly. And this doesn't seem like much of an aha moment, right, It's like kind of a disappointment, And it's actually a really big disappointment for for some factions of the steelhead and salmon conservation community. While wild salmon and steelhead in general aren't doing that well, early run fish are declining much more dramatically than late run fish, and that's true for both kings and steelhead. Early run fish spend more time in rivers and tend to spawn higher upstream in the river systems. The more time that these fish spending rivers, the more vulnerable they are. They have to expend more energy, they have to get past more dams, avoid all those hordes of jerk off anglers like us, they've gotta deal with fluctuations in water levels and temperature, and beyond that, Damn's block some of those early run fish from reaching their traditional spawning grounds. So now they're hybridizing with late run fish and and that could be further contributing to their decline. So there's there's this little study right there's like, well, we figured out it's not what we thought it was, and that might be interesting to biologists, but it doesn't seem like it's going to help accomplish what some anglers have been hoping for, and that's to provide concrete evidence to advocate for managing summer and winter runs differently under federal law. There have been these these these certain factions that have been pushing for years to categorize both spring chinook and summer steelhead as endangered and they were kind of hoping that this might be the thing that helped get it there. But it doesn't look like this exact study is going to move that over the line. Depending on your perspective, you could think that's good or bad, you know. Every time. Again, Man, I can't stress enough like I am, I'm I'm not very well versed in this scene. I've only dabbled in it um but the complexities of the whole thing, like there's so much working against those fisheries. It is just one thing after another after another. And I've never fully understood that whole spring run far run thing because even though all those fish in the Great Lakes are fake, we'll just will just call it what it is. There's really no spring runs here, and it it all times out really, really well. So I guess you know what I'm really driving at is that as manufactured is what I know of steel heading is at least you can sort of count on it. To now have to worry about all these different runs and and what's mixing like, I don't know. Man, to me, it's just head spinning. And God bless all the guys who are who are into this, because to to follow along and have to play in this sort of orchestra of what is not turning out very well. I feel for those guys to have such a passion for a fish that that's it's just getting more and more difficult to catch. Yeah, I mean, it makes sense that you guys would only have one run. That the systems aren't that long. You're talking about fish over here that my grade so much further hundreds and hundreds of miles sometimes the summer unfish go before they reach spawning ground. So so it again theoretically makes sense that they would have to enter the systems early to make it to where they need to get to, Yeah, in order to pull that off in time. Right, So I find all of that fascinating just because it's fascinating. But the difficulty of trying to manage the same fish as two different populations and explain that to all the people who need to understand it in order to make that happen, that's really hard, right, Like, that's where the complexity of this comes into. Like you're managing steelhead, right, Well, no, but there are two different kinds of steelhead, and like you end up kind of seeming just like a wonkish idiot. And and because at the base layer level, people just like, are we saving the steelhead or not? What are we doing here? Right? Right? That that is the cut and dry answer, and then correct me if I'm wrong. And I don't really know how this factor is in. But now we have wild spring run, wild fall run, and then there's hatchery fish all mixed in with this two which are all the whole owned things a whole other thing. But here's I'm gonna end this point because I don't want to stay too long on this. That everything suggests that if we create the opportunity for these fish to spawn, they'll come back just fine. They're they're amazing, the resilient fish. Like if you give them the chance to do their thing, they're gonna do it and they'll be all right. We just need to like stop putting things in their way and and and not to get off on it. But just in your opinion, as you're more into this scene, is that an achievable thing this day and age, with all the dam is it achievable? It's achievable. But I don't know if if we're going to do what we have to do to get there. I don't know if there's the political will to do it, but we we can do it. We're not past the tipping point yet, but I don't know if there's a political will to do what has to be done. As with all things, we love hearing your opinions, so weigh in on it. Where you guys think we are on the West coast with steel Uh, you know, I will definitely no matter how much how much you guys struggle. Um, I call you guys a tribe the same way I call the east Side Steelhead dudes a tribe. And you know it's a it's a bad segue, but but tribalism is really the only thing I have to connect to my next story here, So we'll go from Steelhead tribes to a tribe that, um, I really can't stand kind of sort of. So I have a question for you. Do you know what salt life is? Oh? Yeah, see you do believe it? You know you see those stickers on cars in Montana like thing out here too great? They were, Okay they we're gonna be on the same page here, okay, So uh, for those you who don't know what that is, salt life is the epitome of a term people just love to throw around these days that being lifestyle brand. I hate hate lifestyle brand, and because it just means you don't make anything particularly useful or innovative. You just slap a logo on all kinds of cheap ship and sell it for more money sunglasses and stickers and stuff. It's just like the new word for an apparel brand. Anyway, Salt Life sort of got out ahead of all that, okay, and they kicked off that brand long before all the other brands chasing their tail and success. And I've been told by numerous people in the know over the years that a huge chunk of Salt Life's business is just stickers. Okay, didn't make anything else they do, but okay, So if I pissed anybody off by saying this, I apologize, but I'm gonna tell it like it is. Salt Life stickers have sold so well and gotten so endy and are available in so many places that that what's kind of happened is they've almost become a mark of posers and not legit people who actually live the Salt life. Because if you really do live the Salt life, like you don't need to tell you're not gonna put a sticker on the truck that said salt Like, yeah, like, if you run ten charters a week and don't sleep and smell like clams all the time, like, you don't need that sticker. Okay, that that is just that is just your life. So basically nowadays, least out here, and I know in Florida, if you're a boat ram and dude pulls in with salt life all over his stuff, like, he's probably the one that's gonna put his truck in the water. You know, that's where it's become. For the record, I love a good sticker, Okay, I really do. But I think what happened there is when you can buy him in gas stations and souvenir stores and every tackle shop and maybe some walmarts, it's just hard to feel like you're wrapping something cool and niche anymore. And and like you said, I've seen those stickers in Ohio, Buffalo, Tennessee. It's like really so so okay, now here's where things are gonna get weird. So where is all this going? Why am I setting all this up? Here comes the night, Here comes the m night. Shamalan twist. Okay, I'm reading from a New York Post article here. A co founder of a popular Florida clothing brand has been charged with manslaughter and gun possession and the death of an eighteen year old woman found shot at a South Florida hotel. Michael Troy Huddo, fifty four, who co founded Salt Life Apparel in Jacksonville Beach with three friends in two thousand three, was arrested at a Jacksonville hospital. Why they added this, I don't know, but while wearing hospital scrubs and skid proof socks. Okay, so detail, but they put it in there right. So it says officers responded to the facility following the welfare check on Laura Grace Duncan at the Hilton Ocean Front Resort and Singer Island near Palm Beach, where the eighteen year old was found dead from a gunshot wound, and according to the story, she'd been missing since October twenty six. Now, to be clear, there's nothing funny about this, like that that is a that is a tragedy. But the story actually says it was Huddo who coined the term salt Life, and while he was one of the original founders, Huddo had not been part of the business since. Why because that was the year he and his original partners sold it for forty million dollars. I'm talking about Bobs. So like you had it all, bro, You made a goofy little catchphrase and some stickers and cashed in forty million dollars. Like what is wrong with you? Like that's the dream? And then and then you're like you're gonna commit manslaughter? So I mean again, like it's just like, I don't know how many of my friends sent me this link. They were like, dude, have you seen this? And it's like the Salt Life guy and I sent you. I mean, his mug shot is epic, like he looks like like a complete like like luned, like you'd see the dude slinging shrimp at a bait bar and outside Fort Myers. No, it's it's it's I mean, if you think of the archetype of Florida man, that's the photo. That's what it looks like. To me. It's it's it's sort of like that Nick Nulty mug shot, Yes, but transposed into a Florida man. I don't know, subscribe it. And the only thing I could say about about his photo is that. Obviously some of that forty mill went to Veneers because his teeth are beauty. His teeth are beautiful. The rest of him he just looks super strung out. So that's a tragic tale. Dude's gonna get Salt Life in prison. But um, I just wanted to use that line. That whole setup was just for that line, wasn't it. It's possible I was either gonna do that or or or fifties assault life one or the other. Um I can't not, so again, like it's there's not There's not really a lot to expand on there other than like, holy shit, the Salt Life guy like quite possibly murdered somebody. That's terrible. I'm gonna rinse that taste out of all of our mouths right now because I just can't. I can't handle that, and I want to. I want to end on a high note. So I'm bringing I'm bringing something kind of happy and positive here to end this after like the horrible date rape manslaughter story. That's just anyway, Okay, So don't you feel bad for telling the story. Every life is part of the fishing community. I'm not giving you a hard time. I just can't like I have the from that guy. He's terrible, that's all. So I just want to I want to I want to move on. Uh So my last one is yet another Australian fish news entrance, because frankly, let's just be honest, the Aussie's punch way above their weight in terms of interesting fish stories. Maybe just in all stories, but certainly in fish stories. And the more I hear from them, the more I'm like, if I was ever going to leave this country, Australia is like got like they got some cool ship going on. Agreed, And I'll apologize to to our Aussie listeners because you've all probably heard this one, but for everyone else, just enjoy. So the headline I found in the Catherine Times reads fisherman fights off croc to reel in ten thousand dollar barra. I mean, how how can you not read that story? Okay, how can you avoid it? They're just there's so many layers there. I can't wait to hear how it's a ten thousand dollar barra. But before I get into the physics of the story, I need to explain the million dollar fish competition. So in two thousand fifteen, the Northern Territory of Australia started a program to encourage sport fishing participation in tourism. Barra mundy are one of the top sport fish in all of Australia and the fish for which the Northern Territory is best known. The other species that this area is known for perhaps infamous for our saltwater crocodiles. All right, so more on that later. Keep keep that in mind. I mean this goes back to that that video, maybe that viral video that gator coming out that crop coming out like dude, that made some rounds. So those things are huge and scary and they eat people. Yeah, yeah, Well, the million dollar Fish is a competition, is not a tournament. So it breaks down like this. At the start of the season, a set number of barramundy are captured, tagged and released across the five primary fishing regions of the Northern Territory. And there is a huge area. This is not just like your backyard. It's hundreds of miles, yes, hundreds of miles of water, I should say. The competition runs from the beginning of October through the end of March and anyone with the proper license can go out and try and catch one of these fish, there are different tags, and the different tags are worth different prizes. This year there are seven fish wearing million dollar tags, meaning if you catch a fish with one of those, you get a million bucks period. On top of that, on top of that, you couldn't do this here, like we kill each other over and all the fish will be dead. There are also a hundred fish out there worth ten grand each twenty charity fish that earned the angler bucks with additional charity and then five double tag bearra and on that. When the angler gets ten grand and they get to kick an additional five to a buddy, they know who's in need, which is you know, look wow. But and here's the thing. I'm probably just a cynical American, but I read this and I immediately assume there's there's some kind of seedy downside all this. It can't just be that up and up and and nice. And if there is, I wasn't able to find it, Like I I couldn't find it in the looking that I did. Seems like the tourism Bureau teamed up with a variety of sponsors to incentivize people to fish more. That's all there is to it. And I love it like I just I love the whole thing anyway. Brian Aaron's of Humpty Do Australia. I swear to god I didn't make that up. That's the town he's from. Was out fishing on October when he hooked a nice barra. As he was reeling it in, he noticed a six foot saltwater croc trailing his fish. He told The Times quote a croc seemed very interested in him and had a bit of a go at the fish. As I wound him in, I saw the croc on the surface chasing it Like I'm not sure, I'm not even pretending to do an accent, but like, how how flat and even of a quote? Is that? Right? So as he gets the fish close to the boat, Errand's sees the red tag indicating this just wasn't like a nice barra or any other nice bear he might want to catch the things. Yeah, and now, like the steakes have changed, I looked at a bunch of stories and there are no more details on exactly how he managed to get the fish into the boat all by himself without losing it or any digits to the croc. It just says like he was all by himself. He got it in and and the only quote I could find from Errand's about it simply said, quote, I was so excited when I saw the red tag, but trying to land it by myself was a bit of a challenge. I was glad I eventually got it in the boat, like a bit of a challenge. You got like a man eating crocodile coming straight at your boat as you're reeling this fishing, Like, oh, it was a bit of a challenge. It's all right, dude. To the Australians, man, they're just tougher than us. Sorry, how many it's on the news every week? Like alligator looked at me while I was railing in my lower big news in Florida. I ran away. They yeah, they ran away. Yeah exactly. It's different down there. I have no idea how how Brian Aaron's pulled that off. But he's now ten thousand bucks richer money, he says he's going to use to pay off the mortgage on his house, so good, good for him, good for him being responsible. If this was this was a competition here, some hill billy would win it and be like, I'm buying new Ranger and new boble home and like your house is collapsing, he's paying off his mortgage. That's terrific. Everything about this makes me feel like just just reinforces that Australia are are maybe more decent humans than we are. I don't know. That's that's terrific. And and oddly are our stories are actually a little bit linked here in a in a strange way. It's both fishing for money, um, though a very different different tackle on this. And I find this next story interesting because there's so much emphasis on invasive species these days, right, particularly like with snakeheads. Everybody wants those dead, right, And but one argument that snakehead lovers such as myself love to throw back is that in many cases, if the fish you want to save by killing all the snakeheads, I mean they're not native either, you know, established for a long time doesn't make them native. And let's be honest, large mouth, smallmouth, walleye, crop ease, they're all predators too, It's just that they weren't. You weren't around in the early days when they first got established to complain about the introduction hurting you know, true native chubbs or white fish or bofin or whatever was there, right, So you know what else is non native to this country and a hardcore predator are beloved brown trout, and the state of our Zona wants to see brown trout blood spilled so badly they're willing to pay anglers twenty five dollars a pop for every dead brownie that measures more than six inches in the Lee's Ferry stretch of the Colorado River. No way, so this is this is from a story in in the St. George News. Uh reading here. The National Park Service in Arizona Game and Fish Department are working with partners and seeking the public's help and addressing the threat of brown trout in the Colorado River. According to a joint press release, the National Park Service at Glen Canyon National Recreation Area will implement an incentivized harvest beginning November eleven. The pilot research program is intended to reduce the growing population of brown trout in the Colorado River below Glen Canyon Dam. The incentivized harvest will reward anglers twenty five smackers for each brown over six inches that is caught and removed from the river. Frankly, I'm surprised you didn't have this one, right, I didn't see that one. But I'm so excited about this story. Yeah, so okay. So the brown trout population in Lee's Ferry, it says, has steadily increased since as adults. Brown trout primarily feed duh on other fish, potentially threatening downstream native species. Now it goes without saying, if you're a trout dude in this area, you're probably like bro River's chicking out some sick brownies, like this is paradise right. Likewise, if if you're a trout bum there or elsewhere, especially if you think your game is just so dialed, perhaps you're thinking about renting an airbnb out there for the next few months and raking in a cool you know, fift k flexing your streamer skills. You know what I mean, Ship, I might, I might pull an extended I might pull an extended leave from meat eat and get on this brown trout gold rush, you know what I mean. Anyway, to get back to the story, the gold of program is to determine if an incentivized harvest can help manage and reduce the number of brown trout in the Colorado River between Glen Cany, Damn and the mouth of the Pariah River. The initial research into the u SO of this tool is designed to last three to four years, at which time the program will be evaluated for its effectiveness. There is no limit on the number of brown trout that can be retained and turned in for reward within this program. And uh it links you to guidelines which are pretty simple. You basically just have to have a valid Arizona license. Uh, you do have to fish barbarous hooks because this part of the river, um, he's already a Blue ribbon section. And just to paint a clearer picture, okay, the abridge version of miles you might be able to add to this. This is more your neck of the woods. Prior to the Glen Canyon Dam being built in sixty three, this part of the river was muddy and pretty warm and only had native species like chubb minnows and pike minnows and such. Damn goes in water spilling over is cleaner and colder, and overtime this stretch is groomed into a blue ribbon wild rainbow trout fishery. So what's happening now, despite early shocking efforts to stop this, is that the browns and the trips downstream of this section are expanding in the Colorado River at a fast rate. Um Now, in most places right where you fish, there's harmony. Best rivers in the world have both species. But here our beloved browns are are being called out for being too bullish, too aggressive, and detriment to the ecosystem. And I just find this interesting and kind of like a hand to like the snakehead crew, because just this past summer there was a kerfuffle over snakeheads in the Upper Delaware River where I live. That everyone is now wheried is gonna kill all the brown trout? Ironic, is it not? But my biggest takeaway from this whole thing, like when you look at other invasives, it's like, hey, snakehead states, you want to pay me for you know, in every other frog truker twenty five bones per dead dragon. That dude that might make a dent in the population, that might actually flip some catch and release dudes and turn them into snake killers. Because way I see it, everyone generally loves a good brown trout, but Arizona is confident that despite that, folks will kill them for profit. So how many how many people out there hate snakeheads. You could probably offer half that price and people will jump. Here's what I said. I don't think it's gonna work. I hope it does, but on these really, you don't think it's gonna work. They've been trying the same thing in Idaho for however many years, trying to get rid of the rainbows in the South Fork because okay, they're a major problem with the cutthroats there, and it has not worked. So I'm skeptical that it's gonna work in these fairy because it's similar like fly fishing culture fish there on the Colorado. Yeah, in this in this stretch they're talking about. No, I've floated the Grand Canyon and I've fished through there, and I think it's one of the coolest fisheries anywhere. But it's also completely screwed up, like the Damn's have messed it up. We've killed most native It was suckers, chubs, and pike minows. That's all it was there, and and we've pretty much gotten rid of all of them, but there are a few hanging on for dear life. Well, I still think it's interesting, and I hope it's just like that. It's just like the dig of like you know, these fish are killing Harvey took our rather fish. Dude, they're trying to kill some browns out there, and brown are like so American, but they're not over here German brown trout. So that's gonna be maybe a little little point to fight over. And uh, speaking of points to fight over, as soon as we hear from Phil On who has one news this week, our friend river Horse is going to come in for some sage Lee wisdom. He's gonna go down swinging. You might throw hands, You never know, you never know how it's gonna go. Listen. I haven't been on a plane for almost a year now, and Miles, when you were talking about Australia, that just really sounded great. I mean, I'd love to get on a trans Pacific flight, get cozy in a middle seat. I miss it, I really do. There four Miles, you're the winner this week again. Does my criteria make any sense? No? But you know what does make sense my lifestyle brand. For only thirty you can get your own own Audio Eternity sticker. That's right. It says Audio Eternity in comic sands, bright highlighter yellow text on a beige background. You can stick it wherever you want. It looks terrible, It just it looks hideous. Hey, now this is rehearse with some Sage Lee wisdom. Let's talk about the old desktop, the brawl on the playground. Yes, once, long ago, even this peaceful, angelic, poetry loving Texas tree hugger, fly fishing hippie had it out. This is a story about why it always pays to keep your cool, and it's also about a giant cat who could open up an a one certified can of what pass It's called the Paw. In college up in the Midwest, we had a shitty band. It was mainly an excuse to rent a giant house, drink a ton of beer, and dream of groupies. There were a few inherited cats and dogs living with us, and the most infamous of them all was a feline named the Paw. He was roughly the size of a sheep unsheared. Whenever we put some grub into the food bowls, the Paw would start eating. If any other cat, dog, or human crossed the threshold into the kitchen, the Paw would raise his left mit into the air, hold it unwaveringly and wait until the fool backed the hell out of there lest the paw open up a jumbo can of war pass. This happened about once a month and never failed to whip us all into a frenzy. W of course, inspired more beer drinking and philosophizing. We wrote essays on the paw, put a frame black and white, eight by ten of them in the bathroom, and we all wish we were that definitive of a badass. We weren't. He was an unlikely hero, although we knew deep down that in real life we can't just go around beating the crap out of each other when we feel like it. Decades later, I found myself on a crowded jetty. I wouldn't have been there anywhere else with another fisherman even remotely around, except for the rumor that there had been a slew of forty pound redfish running it all month. I ambled down a quarter mile in partial shock at how jam packed in bizarre the whole scene was, but eventually found the last hundred yards is so empty the tin way was lined up. I pull out of Thermisis Salvadoran coffee, poured a warm slug into the screw top cup and begin finding a casting groove with a butter smooth line and a crab pattern. Then it all went to hell. What I thought was a seagull dive bombing the left side of my shoulder turned out to be a bait chucker, standing less than a couple of inches from my elbow, firing a grenade of a sinker with a dead shrimp attached to it for good measure. This is my spot, he said, grinning from ear to ear. I just lost a good one here day ago. We all have interfuses of differing lengths. I would offer that these are in direct correlation to what our temperature is at the very moment that ship hits the fan, for example, how about a flat tire? How we respond is inherently relative to that fuse. Are we already on thin ice? And laid his all to work out on the town for a heavy romantic evening. When the steering wheel begins to buck wildly, or maybe we've got seven bucks left in our bank account, or maybe seven dam making it either a gut shot, nutshot, or not even something we feel. I've read some million books, and early on I went wild for the nature loving pacifists from Emerson to the row and even Gandhi. These are my people. Regardless I've known there is a time and place to drop the hammer I've always known as silver back guerrilla is waiting in the wings of any red blooded soul. But what came out of my mouth surprised even me. You spineless dinghis We're gonna flip a coin, and there are two options. If you don't haul ass right now, I will raise you above my head and toss you into the water. For chum, I said, My friends are right over there, he countered, backing up. Great, that's more, Chum, I added. He bailed. I kept fishing for a while, but I felt so disappointed. The mojo was gone from the air, and I wasn't enjoying it a bit. Once that happens, it's the point in o return. You might as well roll out that man. I'd have to walk past my new body and his friends on the way out, and it would most likely be interesting. But to health it, let's dance, I thought. Having chased waves around the world for years to surf, I've seen the often brutal, dark side of territorialism. The strangest and most memorable was watching a surfer actually bite the fins off a non local surfboard, but where he held him under water while and sent him to the beach. This is roughly the equivalent of chewing through a graphite fly rod bone eppetite. We all know violence is both pathetic and comedic at its core. There is no place for it on the water. What can I say? My switch was flipped thanks to the perceived lack of etiquette that with more than a hundred yards of open space, this guy ran down and jacked in next to me. He didn't materialize until I had been there while whether it was his favorite spot or not. On the way past his friends on the jetty ready for more amusement, and looking them all in the eyes as I walked through, one of them spoke, our friend is a pot licker, he said, looking at the offender. Yes he is. I agreed and kept on going while they all aft. The tension was gone. I loaded the truck and drove three hours to a lonely and desolate stretch of river where I could get back to the reason I fish. But I thought about it for much of the way. I've certainly learned a few things about myself since that debacle years ago. Regardless of the pause, take no prisoner's example. In the end, we all know that anger is ugly no matter where it happens. And when it happens to a fisherman, the old adage always seems to ring true. An angry man can't catch fish. It's such a goofball situation like this, Lord forbid happens again, all act differently. I'm pretty sure. Probably there you have it. That's our sagely wisdom story time. If today's Kittykat tale had a DJ soundtrack, we might be listening to Let Love Rule, or even perhaps try a little tenderness. And what do you need to know from all of this? That this world needs us to take care of each other and be there for each other now more than ever. And if you ever want to be alone for some solitude and water, all you have to do is put your boots on the ground and head in deep to wilderness. It's out there for you. Oh did you feel that I just wrapped my arms around you and gave you a big old bear hug. I love you so much. Let's fish now. I know river Horse to be more of a lover than a fighter, but I think those dudes were wise to step off there. I think I think they made the right choice. For sure. Man, he's got he's got at David Carradine Yoda kind of vibe, you know what I mean. He's one of those that you could just see. It takes a lot to push him to the edge, but God help you if you get him there and nudge him off of it. I don't want to see that. And here's what I love about the story that he told though, Like we've all been there, We've all found ourselves in an overcrowded fishing situation that just brings out the worst in us, and it ends up leading to some kind of confrontation, right and and no matter how that confrontation goes for me, anyway, my my fishing days ruined. I've never I've never had an altercation on the water and thought, well, I'm really glad that happened. I'm glad that's how my day went like that. It just it never goes that way. I'm always I'm always unhappy afterwards. I don't I don't think I've ever said I'm really glad that happened. But I I disagree slightly because around here like where I'm from the Northeast, if you let a confrontation ruin your day within certain circles and I'm talking to use surf guys and salmon guys, right, you have a lot of ruined days, you know what I mean. Like Northeasterners are just schooled in the art of rising up the group, you know what I mean, Like before you walk out onto a crowd of jetty or even like down south, like a pier in Florida, I know, the peer guys, some of those dudes you try and get a read on who's already out there, and you're often like, Okay, don't be near that guy, that guy or that guy. You've got to be a bit of a profiler, you know. That's roll. I just don't. I just don't find myself in those scenes. Maybe that's I just don't have enough exposure. I guess no, because you live in big sky country, and the whole idea is like big sky, big country, Like there's a lot of we can all go hang out and there's lots of room, but like we're we're just right up each other's ass here. No matter what you do, whether you're looking for fish or you know, a bar that's not crowded. We just right up each other's ass. Anyway, I said, you gotta be a profiler. And speaking of profiles, Miles is going to give us one in this week's end of the Line segment about a lore. And there are many of lors like this that it face value. You'd think that's that's an ugly, dumb lore like no way that catches fish, But this one has been catching muskies since before most of you were twinkle in your daddy's eye. Well that's not allowed enough, Burke. Seems like more and more anglers realize how addictive muskie fishing can be every year, which I support because the more people we have obsessing over muskies, the more voices we have calling out for robust management. Musky waters maybe more crowded than they used to be, but there are also more muskies than a generation ago. I'll take that trade off. The more people target muskies today, the zeal these fish inspire isn't new. In eight a guy by the name of Frank Suet came into this world, and before his death his name would become recognizable to just about every serious musky angler. Frank grew up in Antigo, a railroad town in north central Wisconsin. Frank's folks owned a tavern. The catter to railroad workers, and Frank made friends with many of them will work in the bar. In his early twenties, he started hitching rides north on the rail cars to fish Pelican Lake, and that's where he discovered muskie back Then, muskie fishing involved trolling live suckers. When a fish picked up the bait and angler would have to wait, sometimes more than a half hour before setting the hook. Frank was enamored with the fish, but unenthusiastic about the fishing, it was inefficient and kind of boring. In addition to working at his family tavern, Frank also owned a trout hatchery and spent a lot of time observing fish. As soon as a trout showed signs of weakness, bigger fish would take advantage of that weakness and go after that. Frank studied the body language of the fish that got attacked and learned the behavioral cues that triggered the predatory response. His takeaway was that a wounded fish would begin floating up towards the surface, but then erratically dive back down. A couple of feet before starting to float back up again. Frank figured a lure that dove and rose like a wounded trout might also interest muskies, and if he could hang three troubles off it, he could set the hook as soon as a fish struck, So he started carving chunks a cedar with a pen knife. On one of his early prototypes, his knife slipped, hacking off the tail. Frank, being the type to conjure opportunity from setback, experimented with riveting in a stainless steel tale, which ultimately became the signature attribute of his namesake bait, the suic Musky Thriller, arguably the first musky jerk bait. Frank started testing his new lure on Pelican Lakes sometime in the mid nineteen thirties. People sometimes call musky jerk bait rods pool cues as a joke, but back then they actually retrofitted pool cues like real pool cues, with real seats and guides to use his musky rods. The rigidity of those billiard sticks worked well for Frank's bait, and it showed immediate success. Legend has it that Frank caught thirty musky in thirty days, and the words started to spread about a secret lure. Not everyone was pleased, though, A group of locals got together and drafted a petition to the Wisconsin Conservation Department calling for him to be banned. It read, Gentlemen, we the undersigned hereby petition your honorable body and the Honorable Governor of the State of Wisconsin, to hereby issue in order to prohibit Frank suek of the City of Antigo, County of Langdale, State of Wisconsin, from fishing or taking fish in Pelican Lake, located in Oneida County, until such time whereby other fishermen are able to catch fish out of the above mentioned lake. We hereby do this in the interest of muskies at large. The petition was meant as a joke, but it's still garnered sixty signatures and at least one person took it seriously, vowing to refuse to pay his taxes until Frank was barred from fishing Pelican Lake. By this point, Frank had inherited his family's tavern in Antigo. He changed the name to Sue's Muskie Bar, and it became the nucleus for muskie culture in Wisconsin. Boast in the largest collection of musky heads and mounts in the world. The Suet Muski Thriller went into commercial production nearly eighty years later. Suet Lure Manufacturing still produces them. The company remains in the family and their lures are still made in Antigo, Wisconsin. Over the past couple of decades, musky lure design has come a very long way. You can find bits. There are a lot less work to fish in Sue's demand. Less skill, require far less maintenance and tuning, look more natural and realistic, and are more versatile. But I will never go musky fishing without a suwek in the boat, and I will rarely spend a full day chasing muskies without at least tying one on. So that's all we have you guys on this week's episode. But if this were a Sports Center Top Plays recap, you'd see Paul McClain scribbling mediocre poetry in a composition boat, a carved trout hanging on my wall. That's either a freak of nature or a freak of science. And our boy river Horse almost curve of stomping a bunch of dudes over a red fish spot. And for some reason we still get to call this a fishing podcast. If you want to hear more or less of any of these kinds of things, let us know. Send emails to Bent at the meat eater dot com and I promise that either Joe or I will read them and do our best to respond. Yep, give us a fishing report from your area, send us some photos. We love hearing from you guys. You know, and stay safe out there this week. If you're fishing the jetties or salmon river, wear cleats so you don't fall because it's cold out there now. Also wear breasts knuckles so you win. And if you're creeping around the woods fishing creeks, streams, lakes, or ponds, maybe consider wearing an orange hat, or just do what I do and sing grow Him at the top of your lungs.

Save this episode