00:00:06 Speaker 1: I think it's crunken, steam crunk and steam crunk ron Stein or m Stein, I said, three quarters of your body will be flash and he said, and what is the allocation of water to those three quarters of my body? And before I was shown this modification, I was losing about the bites when I fished southwest. The follow up, Flawning and Boasting just tells me you actually don't have a brain cell in your head. Good morning, degenerate anglers, and welcome to Bend, the podcast that loves two stroke outboard fumes and the mildewy funk of live wells. I'm Joe Samli, I'm Miles Nulty, and I'm a dent. On board with this, I would be I realized neither of those smells are objectively pleasant, but both of them make me very happy. Yeah, dude, smell memory is a real thing. It is. It is, and and thank you for bringing that up because it lets me say some geeky shit I learned recently. The old factory bulb, which is the part of your brain that sends the smell, sends information straight to the hippocampus, the part of your brain that turns information into memory. Smells play a huge role in memory making, especially the long term memory. So this is weird, but I can actually recall the smells of fishing from thirty years ago, far better than arguably more important things like family members birthdays, which I'm terrible at remembering. I don't know why that is, but it's the smell thing. I can't smell birthdays, I can smell outboard vimes. Dude, No, I'm with you. And here's here's mine, right, my dad's old plan out tackle boxes, which as a kid like I I'd sneakily root around in all the time while he was had this weird man, it was almost like this fresh mulch slash sour milk smell. Do you know what I'm talking about? I wouldn't have described it that way, but yes, I think I know what's talking about. Yeah, I've I've smelled it many times and many other tackle boxes over the years. And usually happens, I guess when like wet lawers are put away or and and then that box isn't open again for a very long time. Someone once told me it has something to do with gases given off by the plastic lawers getting trapped in the box. But that could be totally inaccurate. I don't really know the cause, but it's a vivid smell. It's a vivid smell. I don't think it's it's rust. I would buy the plastic over the rust. And like, to me, there's also this undercurrent of of like power bait funk somewhere in there, because there was always an arrant piece of power bait that got stuck someplace in the box and left alone. Yes, but what I will say that was like this is pre power bait, so like this is like my dad's boxes going back to the early eighties before all that. So it's just like plugs and a couple bags of plastic worms. No, you're absolutely right, you precowerbated. It still had that very special I don't know what that smell comes from, but I know I know the smell of an old tackle box being open. That resonates me. And I appreciate the fact that we we share these things in common, and I'm gonna I'm gonna push a little further and just to see if we have something else in common. I'm gonna ask you a stupid question. And I realized before it even jump on me. I realized it's a stupid question because it doesn't have a definite answer, But I'm gonna ask you anyway because I think it's just something that we need to talk about. I'm just curious to get your perspective. Do you consider fishing to be more art or science? Oh? God, that that could not be more loaded. Um, I know, I I think I know where you're going with this. But before we go off on whatever tangent you have in mind, just brief brief pause to remind everyone that this podcast is geared up fishing, right, Yes, that it is. Uh and and I can honestly say that thirteen Fishing does a nice job of combining art and science into fishing here because it's both effective and works on the water, does what's gotta do, and it's a nice looking it's aesthetically pleasing gear. Totally totally this this past shad season. I actually leaned on their fate steel line of steelhead of rods hard during the shad run out here and Chad turn fast like steely, so that extra length and softness combats these maneuvers nicely. Yeah, you also got the extra length to work through the seams and have a little bit more ability to move that line in the river. They were there an excellent choice. Those do make very fine river steel heading rods, I can say. But I actually got the shad fish with you this season for the first time, and they worked beautifully. It was great. Those fish, dude, those fish pole. I was. I was impressed, yea impressed. We won't give we won't give too much away, okay, but just strong chance Miles was here to shoot an episode of B Side Fishing with me for season two and taste those shad that he once claimed this very show or delicious with no personal experience at all. Exactly. Yeah, So what was the verdict? You will you will have to wait and see oh so much. I want to stay here, but I'm not gonna give anything away. You will all just have to go and watch that episode when it comes out. Oh yeah, all will be revealed there. Anyway, we got sidetracked, so you asked me if I consider fishing more art or science, which is, as you said yourself, kind of a stupid question because it's both where are we going? Like, what are we really trying to get at here? That's that's fair. I left it open edited because I was I was hoping you just kind of pick up the ball and roll with it and start saying some things. But I'm I'm really curious to know like where you land in the spectrum of intuitive versus pattern based fishing, Right, I think I think that's really the more specifically what I'm trying to get it. I will I admit that that for myself, I'm more of a science guy kind of when it comes to how I approach fishing. The guy, Yeah, this is true. You know this. I have spreadsheets from every season that I guided, logging all kinds of different data, you know, weather, water temperature, angler skill, what we fish, what worked, what didn't, how the bite changed throughout the day. And I still use that information like if I'm if I'm gonna go fishing on Saturday, I'll go back through all those logs and I'll look at them and and think, all right, what's the water temperature, what's the weather, And I'll try and use those previous experiences that I documented to help decide where I'm gonna go and what I'm gonna use. Sure, Sure, And I appreciate that. And I because I've had so many false starts with journals. It's not even funny, right, But I guess the way I'd sum it up is fishing to me is more art. But you can't like reach Da Vinci status without the science, or some level of science. They have to go hand in hand. Like I know a lot of guys that just seem to have the touch, you know what I mean, the knack. We're just fishier. And none of them are keeping detailed logs. They just know how to work this lor that fly a certain way in this scenario. But none of that matters if you don't have some understanding of the science behind your target. And I don't I put myself into this category. I guess like I consider whether in Tampson all that, But usually when I pick a lor fly, it just feels right. Sometimes it is, sometimes it's not. But I tend to lean on my gut more than data I want. If I'm being honest, I've never been one of those guys that's just like inherently fishy, you know, like I'm I'm I consider myself a very good angler. I've try fished a lot, but I'm not one of those people that just like, oh it just it just comes to me. There's no right or wrong like you're you're you're in good standing either way. Like I'm not making fun of that, no, no, I know, I know, but it's it's it's a really it's a real thing within the fishing community. There are those people, and I'm not gonna lie. Part of me kind of hates them that they just they have this weird sixth sense where they're like, Oh, I'm gonna use this and it's gonna work, Like why did that work? And I've always wanted to be more that way. I wish I had more confidence in my intuition. It's not like I'm afraid to change up my program in the middle of the fissure but it's not working. It's not like I'm stuck on whatever preconceived idea I started with. But I usually do that based on something that I see, like some evidence that that the bite might be shifting or or or something that's going on that keeps me in like maybe I should try this. But it's always based on theory and conjecture. I'm just not one of those people that has some random hair brained idea popping in my head out of nowhere and then and then that works. You see, every time I try and make that happen, Like I'm like, well, today I'm gonna be doing something that doesn't seem to make sense because it works for everybody else that does. I just get blanked and then I'm frustrated, and then I go back to what I think, based on evidence, what I think should be working. Yeah. Yeah, And in fairness, I end up there a lot too. But I find it more satisfying when the wild card produces. I mean, especially like on our real a tough shitty day, and when it happens, I suddenly could care less why you know what I mean, Like in in the spring as an example, like when the water is still cold, like I know I should be fishing a jerk bait for smallis, but in times of desperation, when when everything that should isn't isn't producing anything, like I've thrown on a jitterbug and just been like, I don't know why not nothing else has worked, and then like it gets trashed. And with stuff like that, I feel like I'm not going to figure out why and it may never happen again, so just enjoy it, like, don't analyze it. No, I don't know why it happened. I agree, I agree. That's what I'm saying, Like I I wish I had that. Well, I'm just gonna throwing the I've tried the jitterbug analogy and I end up being like, well that didn't work either, that was stupid, and that's usually doesn't. But every once in a while, it's like this water's thirty two degrees and he just came up and smoked that. That's. Nothing ever written in history about fishing says that should have happened. And your point is good, because you have to try those ideas for them to ever work. If you don't try them and you don't try them with confidence, they never work. And that is where I struggle. And for example, my father was the opposite of me. He was completely intuitive in the way that he approached fishing. That dude never read a fishing magazine or a book or a website in his life. Whatever decisions he made about what to fish or how to fish or wear to cat any fishing decision he ever made was never cluttered with any you know, like what you're supposed to do interference. He just didn't have any of that. He wasn't knowledgeable in the classic sense, and he wasn't actually a very good angler, but he caught bigger fish than me almost all the time, and to be to be I just want to tell everybody, I'm not saying anything that I wouldn't have and didn't say to his face, Like if you were here right now, I would I would say, like, Dad, by the time I was ten, I was a far better fisherman than you. But like the fact that I was more skillful and informed didn't matter. He still caught the biggest fish and it drove me nuts. Yeah. Well, I mean, I've been a better angler than my dad since I was born, I think. And he'll call me as soon as he hears this. As soon as he hears this, um, you know. And he hit the fire, no doubt, he nurtured the flame. But then I used that flame to burn the city down, and he was like, I can't keep up with this fire. It's just too much fire. That's that. That's another story for later. Anyway, We're gonna start things off today with the Smooth Moves about an unnamed famous person whose approach to fishing would most definitely skew towards the scientific approach. Why it is time again for smooth moves. You know the part of the show where we call up people who make their money taking other people fishing, and we get them to tell the stories of some of the most ridiculous things they've ever seen wall fishing with clients joining us today are good, good friend, Hilary Hutson, Hillary, how's it going, Hey, how's it going good? It's all about the stories, it is, and in that spirit, like the purpose of this segment is to bring everyone out there into that guy check for a little bit of those those complaining sessions. All right, So Hillary, with with that tea up, what did you bring for us today? Well, so many of us who guide in Montana end up taking celebrities. Um, you know, you get anything from like a pro football coach to an actress to you know whatever. At some level, it's going to be somebody who has all of the money and all of the fame and fortune and all of the power. It's like it's space time, continuum, vortex of weirdness and that that was this particular day. And it kind of starts what by they're so famous that we had three boats of security with this person. I'm not mentioning this person's name, but he was late and at the last second decided to switch from a fly fishing trip to a whitewater rafting trip. And um, so, like I said, they're late, real late. It was like seven pm in July. We're supposed to put on it like four or five. And yeah. So the first thing I say, because I've got some snacks. We're all waiting at the pud in and so I've got some snacks and so I say to you know, super famous, rich, powerful portions, are you hungry? And he is terror stricken in his face, like he goes white, like he's not sure, and he looks at one of his handlers and he says, am I hungry And they say no, and he looks at me. He goes, oh, yeah, we just ate. That's why we're late, right of course, of course it is. So so then um we start walking down to the raft and we go to to get in and I kind of say, okay, I kind of watch your stuff get in here. And he says, now, will I be splashed on this trip? And I said, well, yeah, it's so hopefully they've told you it's a white water rafting trip, so you're going to be splashed. And he says, well, what proportions of my body will be splashed? Okay, I gotta cut in because we I so badly want all you people to know who we're talking about when we promised not to do that. But this is just reaffirming that this person, as far as I'm concerned, is actually a robot. But also, but also let's keep in mind, like you don't get to the level that he's at without being some sort of superhumpan. So there you go. Um, and he says, what proportions of my body will be splashed? And I don't know why, how or why, I just like kept cool with that. But I said, three quarters of your body will be splashed, And he says, and what is the allocation of water to those three quarters? So I said, I said, I believe you will be evenly splashed along the left side of your body, since you're on the front left side, and I feel that you will be periodically splashed um on the right hand side of your body. And he nods like that's a normal, you know, totally normal. So we get on the boat and we go he's he's um great listener, like really like trying super hard the paddling like very much present and kind of there and is looking around at the beautiful surroundings here that we have in the crown of the continent. And so he says this is nice, and I say, well, isn't it amazing? I say, this is yours, This is your public lands. And I at this point see this opportunity because this is the kind of person. We want to understand that this is our shared environment. These are our public lands. Here we are two and a half million acres of wilderness between the Bob Martial Wilderness and the Great Bear Wilderness, Scapegoat Wilderness and Glacier National Park. Here we are. And I tell him this is your land. This is your land. And he sits up straight and looks over to one of the boats of his security and handlers and says, do I own this? And I'm thinking, oh goodness. I think he thinks he was, because I just told him this this is your land. You own this. I teld him that this is yours. He says, is this mine? He asked them, Is this mine? And I said, I said well, And they say and they're they're looking at each other like, I don't know, maybe it is maybe we bought this I'm not sure, and so I have to clarify. And we have a public lands lesson, and we talked about this, you know that, and I kind of even get into this is this is Native American land like and what I mean, this is like history lesson. We get super super deep in it. And it was remarkable to see somebody learn about their public lands like that. And he listened. Was remarkable that he listened. He listened, and I could tell he was like putting it somewhere. I don't know exactly where or if there's room up there for it, but it seemed that he was kind of filing in a way, UM, which I really appreciated. UM. And then I'll end by telling you that one of our other guides had an internship at NASA, his lifelong goal. He's this young kid, super young kid, internship at NASA. And uh, famous powerful person said well, I don't know, you can't. You shouldn't go work in the government. You gotta work for for private sector. You gotta work for the private sector. It got so tense that I said, oh, Kayden, this guy, and I'm like, oh bluddy, no, don't worry, no matter like how rich and famous and powerful, you get all roads lead back to glacier. You could just end up being a fishing bomb for the rest of your life. And rich, famous, powerful person looks at him and says, Cayden, don't listen to her. That's just her. You can be whatever you want to be you put your mind to it. I'm sorry, but to me, it feels mean that we're not telling people who that was about. No, we we promised I knew you're we're Beholden Sworen not to reveal the identity, and the person in question here could crush us, like he could erase us from the planet with one key stroke. So we're not taking that chance. Yeah, I know, I know, you're right, We'll drop it. I gotta say that, while I love that story and I found it fascinating portrait of a person whose brain just works differently than my own, it wasn't really a fishing story, Like he didn't never really go fishing. That's true, that's true, he was supposed to, but he changed it up. But Hillary is a fishing guide and that's the purpose of that segment. So I think it still fits kind of like the book that I'm about to describe this week, right, that's right. You've got a freaking philistine segment this week where you're going to try and convince all of us to read a book that has nothing to do with fishing at all. Good luck with that fist. It's a guy who doesn't care about books. Are interesting films and things that I'm quick disclaimer. Why Fish Don't Exist by Lulu Miller is not a book about fishing, but it is about fish kind of. It's also about the desperate impulse to identify patterns and impose order on the world around us. Our collective need to construct a coherent framework on the human experience so we can feel some sense of comfort in control. Anglers, like scientists, don't just want to know that something works. We want to know why. We need narratives based on our experience to explain natural phenomena and resist chaos. Anglers, in my experience, to test chaos, and in that way, at least, Lulu Miller is one of us. Miller's first page states quote, it's not if it's when chaos is the only sure thing in this world, the master that rules us all. My scientist father taught me early on that there is no escaping the second law of thermodynamics. Entropy is only growing. It can never be diminished, no matter what we do. Miller goes on to explain she was indoctrinated into this truth at the age of seven. Standing on a picturesque seaside doctoring a family vacation, she asked her father the meaning of life. He responded, nothing. Chaos, he informed her, was our only ruler. This massive swirl of dumb forces was what made us accidentally and would destroy us imminently. As special as you might feel, he told his young daughter, you are no different than an aunt. A bit bigger, maybe, but no more significant. Miller describes her father as quote a lively man who studies ions the particles that carry the electricity that powers all life, heartbeat, lightning, even thought itself. He doesn't use seatbelts or return addresses, drinks copious amounts of beer, and enters the water whenever possible with the belliest of flops. He seems to permit himself just one lie to constrain his otherwise voracious hedonism, to form a kind of moral code. While other people don't matter either, treat them like they do. What could be a grim reality has instead pumped his life full of vigor has made him live big and good. But that vacuous truth affected Miller differently than her father. For a smart child with an overactive mind who might skew toward narcissism, the terrifying truth of her own insignificance landed heavily, and it's ripples sculpted the trajectory of her life. This book traces the peaks and troughs of those ripples, and the unexpected people discoveries, tragedies, and joys to which their nihilistic force pushes the author. One of her primary discoveries is a man named David Starr Jordan's Jordan was arguably the most important theologist of all time. He and his crew discovered named and classified morph species than anyone else in history. He was the founding president of Stanford University. He was also a staunch and outspoken pacifist at a time when that wasn't really a thing, and a leading American proponent of the eugenics movement, but we'll get into that later. Miller was attracted to Jordan because, as she says, quote, it was his day job to fight chaos. He was a taxonomist, the kind of scientists charged with bringing order to the chaos of the earth by uncovering the shape of the Great Tree of life. His specialty was fish, and he spent his days sailing the globe in search of new species. He and his crew would eventually discover a full fifth of the fish known to man in his day. By the thousand, he reeled in new species, dreaming up names for them, punching those names into shiny tin tags. In Jordan's Miller hoped to discover the secret to finding peace in a world ruled by chaos, so she embarked on her own journey. Only, instead of discovering and cataloging the world's fish, she set out to learn everything she could about the man. Along the way, Miller's fascination and faith in Jordan becomes nearly title, sometimes flooding inland, other times receding to bear mud, like when she discovers his role in the American eugenics movement without getting too far afield here. Eugenics was a fringe belief coined in the late nineteenth century by a British scientist who theorized that the forces of evolution could be manipulated to select for a master race of humans. By breeding out traits he incorrectly believed to be associated with blood, poverty, criminality, illiteracy, feeble mindedness, promiscuity, and more. This grossly misguided concept gained traction in some circles of biological study and was one of the primary justifications for the Holocaust, as well as lots of other terrible atrocities. Point being, Jordan's association with this movement tarnished some of his shine in Miller's eyes. Worst of all, Jordan's suffered no repercussions for his vociferous championing of racist pseudoscience during his lifetime. He got off scot free. The legacy of his life's work cataloging so many of the world's fishes, however, was not so lucky. I'll let Miller take it from here on out. What David Starr Jordan's set in motion by practicing the art of taxonomy, by following Darwin's advice to sort creatures by evolutionary closeness, led to a fateful discovery in the es. Taxonomists realized that fish, as a legitimate category of creature do not exist. Birds exist, mammals exist, amphibians exist, but fish in particular do not exist down in the water. Beneath their costumes of scales exist all kinds of creatures. There are Sarcopterygii, the lungfish and the sealy cants are evolutionary cousins in a sense mermaids with lungs on top, tails on low, then across some huge evolutionary divide, or the actino terr g I, salmon, bass, trout, eels, gar Though they appear like twins of the sarcoptery g I, slimy and scaly and fishy as can be, on the inside, they are a world apart. Then you've got the sharks and rays, the conjrict these as they are called, a puzzling group in their smooth skin and voluptuous bodies. I always thought I recognized a closeness to mammals, but it turns out there even further from us than the scaly trout and eels, much older evolutionarily, the category fish hides all of this, hides nuance, discounts intelligence, It Jerrymander's close cousins away from us, creating a false sense of separation. To preserve our spot at the top of an imaginary ladder, Dude, quit with my head and everybody else's head. If fish don't exist, then like, what the hell have I been out catching lately? If there are no fish, how can there be fishing? Were you listening, Joe? Did you listen to anything that I just said? Yes? Mostly yes? There. You're right. There are creatures that live in water and we catch them and call them fish. I'm not no one in fact is arguing the physical existence of bass or stripers, But the concept of fish, the way we look at fish as one singular and related type of life, is not supported by scientific evidence. It's I get it. It's a mind bender, and it poses some semantic problems for the term fishing, but that's not really the point. The point is that book changed the way that I think about fish, and and also eugenics. Yeah, I don't know, man, I I prefer to keep you genics out of my fishing. But hopefully one of us found a story this week that can change the way our listeners think about fish, which means it's time for fish news. Fish news that escalated quickly. Hey, so before we dive headlong into those current events, here's an important message in case you missed it in my social media or mediator social media this week. The final episode of season one of B Side Fishing drop this week, and it's sort of a I'll call it like a rap party bonus. We're giving one lucky winner every single thirteen fishing rod and reel that you saw me use in season one of B Side. That is correct, yes, but I want to clear I I gotta clear one point up there. It's don't think Joe's gonna just jam like of the actual beat up that he's destroyed and mail it to your house. Good point. We're we're kind of little rent on the show, but we're not that little Rent. No, you're actually gonna be getting like brand new, never used versions of all the rods and reels that were featured on camera. But it's new stuff, not instroid stuff. Indeed, indeed and all total. Right, that's about eleven smackers clams worth of tackle in one shot. Now in that mix will be their heaviest Omen green and prototype TX saltwater spinning rod and reel, which I used to smash those mahi's in episode one. You're gonna get an Omen black spinning rod and a smaller Prototype X. I use those to chase pickerel and a Krankenstein bait caster match with a big old concept a three low profile reel. Think it's getting here. I think it's kronken Stein, Crone or Ramstein. Yeah, uh, that's that One's that's the one. The kronken Stein was what you used in the final episode to hammer on the Delicious Dog, right, Yes, it was, and it was. It was actually a really perfect outfit for for light tackle talking because I was using jags and it it paired very well with talk jigs. However, I'm gonna go out on a limb and say, whoever wins that strong chance they're not going to be using it for talk just maybe you never know, but I doubt it. And that's okay because really what that outfit is is is killer for is swim baiting. Right, It's a great swim bait rod and a heavy crank baiting outfit, great for bass. I plan to use mine for snakehead frogging, and you could probably hurt you know, some pike or salmon with it too. It's it's a really good combo. I I used it for for pike, actually for swim baits and crank baits for pike, so I I can vouch for that. The question now, of course, is how do you win this glorious package of rods? And really it's good question. Head on over to the meat eater dot com slash fish and look for the pop up to enter and uh and be quick about it because you only have un till mail eleventh. That's four time runs out. Best of luck. I hope you win. And and that's I'm talking about the royal you, the editorial you. I just I just want a Bent listener to win. But that's that's what I want. But in the meantime, let's move on. Let's see who wins Fish News. Yes, let's and remember this is a fierce competition. Miles and I do not know which stories the other guy is bringing to the table. At the end, our audio engineer Phil will pick a winner. Assuming he's not out fly fishing for basking sharks in Guam. I know he takes one week a year off to do that. Anyway, it is your leadoff, my friend, get us roll in here, all right. I'm gonna start with a story that's still developing, but we have covered because it could impact one of the most popular fisheries in North America. It appears that the walleye population and Lake of the Woods may be in trouble. Earlier this week, the Canadian Broadcasting Company published an article reporting that the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry is concerned about the number of walleye they're finding in spring netting and creel surveys on on the Big l The potential bombshell in this, however, is m n RF's claim that recreational harvest on Lake of the Woods is above the level of sustainability. The ministry does note the commercial and subsistence harvests are also allowed on the lake. According to the CBC, m n RF is currently working with the Lake of the Woods Fisheries Advisory Council to develop a new recreational walleye management plan. The details of that plan have not been released, but could include altering bag and slot limits and changing the walleye season. The group is hoping to have new regulations in effect for January one next year. So that's what I found reported on the CBC, which is a source that I know and can kind of vouch for, But and an article in the local Ontario newspaper, The Canora Miner goes a little further. According to the Minor, Lake of the Woods is the most at risk inland fishery in Ontario, both in terms of likelihood of collapse and the resulting socioeconomic impact if the fishery does collapse. The Minor quotes m n RF as saying that the walleye population is approximately half of what is needed to sustainably support current levels of harvest, and that's a huge fish deficit. If you're familiar with Lake of the Woods, you you get why this is a big deal, right. Lake of the Woods is one of the premier walleye fishing lakes in the world, and it's a big uh and and people who the Upper Midwest are kind of insane when it comes to walleye. Lake of the Woods is super unique. It it straddles the US Canada border and a provincial border in Canada, so it's jointly managed by fisheries departments in Minnesota, Manitoba and Ontario. Manning any world class and extremely popular recreational harvest fishery is complicated and difficult, but trying to juggle that management between three different agencies makes a task even more complex. So far, Ontario is the only one of the three to publicly address this issue, despite the fact that they're all, you know, theoretically dealing with the same population of fish. In fact, Minnesota's dn R reports that the walleye population is just slightly below average and and that's an average day back. I'm just gonna I'm just gonna do it quick foreshadowing. We did not crossover on stories, but we came close. And my story it's we're gonna, we're gonna, we're gonna talk some walleyes today. Go on, this is so much wallet today, it's it's it's the it's the walleye time of year. Uh So, the Minnesota dna R site high harvest levels the past two years and weak recruitment from is factors for slightly lower levels of harvestable size walleye, but nothing reported by the Minnesota side comes close to the dire predictions from their counterparts on the northern border of the lake. This is all concerning from a fishery perspective, just for those of us who care about fish, but the real challenge here will be the economic variables. Walleye fishing on Lake of the Woods is like it's it's hard to overstate how popular it is and ice fishing in particular is like it's one of the places to go, and it gets more popular every year. On the Minnesota side alone, recreational anglers harvested over a half million pounds of walleye in in about three and a half million hours of fishing, though the numbers for out yet they're predicted to be significantly higher as more and more people got out fishing last year for the COVID thing. Though I couldn't find comprehensive figures for the economic value of of Lake of the Woods fishing, Ontario estimates that the province brings in a hundred and twelve million dollars from anglers, and I think it's safe to assume that Minnesota's numbers are comparable. Changes in management could help maintain that wallet popular, but would most certainly hurt fishing related businesses, which, at least on the Canadian side, have already taken a major hit from the travel restrictions. Things get even more sticky if regulations get tighter in Canadian waters, but not on the U. S side, where anglers are currently allowed four walleye per day. Now, Minnesota has historically shown a willingness to tighten restrictions when walleye population struggle. The famed Malax, once the premier walleye harvest fishery in the state, now has strict regulations and harvest caps, allowing anglers just one fish per day in a very narrow slot, and they close down all walleye harvest once a predetermined threshold is reached, which sometimes happens even before open water fishing begins. Though Minnesota DNR has imposed these kinds of draconian restrictions in the past, they might be wary of doing it again. Aggressive management on Malas has maintained the trophy walleye fishery, but the limited ability to keep fish drove many walleye anglers elsewhere and has harmed local businesses, And the result of that has been a whole lot of anger and frustration aimed at the DNR. So this is one of those stories we're gonna keep an eye on. It's it's almost impossible to overstate Minnesotan's passion for catching and eating wallet. I cannot express what a big deal that is. And to be fair, it's not just Minnesota, but like all over the Upper Midwest, in parts of Canada, it's like a religion out there. I personally don't get it. I don't get I'll say it again, I don't understand the wallab session while I while I'm fishing, usually it's usually trolling or jigging. Not always, but usually trolling or jigging, And I consider those to be some of the most boring ways that you can fish. Uh, while I like, they don't bite that well there, it's usually like a timid bite. And they don't fight. They don't fight, they don't. I would fish smallmouth over Wiley every single thousand, million d percent every time. And finally, I'm gonna say one more thing here, and this is what's gonna get me some hate mail. While I are not as good to eat as people make them, not to be said that the pike taste just as good as while I and perch er better. There, I said it, That's what I think. But I'm alone in this. I'm in a small minority, and I get how important these fish are. Okay, well, so I'm gonna we're gonna reserve banter because I Am not kidding you. Man, Like, for a second I thought we crossed over, but we didn't. But my first story is gonna go it's just hand in glove with this, like it's almost like a continuation of this. UM and I just kicked back and and remind everybody. We recently had j Siemens on the show for Smooth Moves, and uh, you know, Jay lives in Ontario, and during that conversation we also touched on our lack of ability right now as US residents to visit Canada to go fish due to covid um. A matter of fact, the province of Ontario where Jay lives, just recently got thrown into a very very strict lockdown because it seems the covids are flaring like a pack of hemorrhoids up there. And not only are Americans still not allowed to visit, you can't even cross province borders within Canada right now. So if you live in Quebec, you can't go to Ontario. UM. And we've we've certainly touched on how these restrictions are hurting Canadian fishing operations, but what I've never considered was the impact this border closure could have on US fisheries, not until I found this story on the website of Minnesota's Twin Cities Pioneer Press. Now you just talked about Lake of the Woods. It's neighbor like they're practically touching. Is Lake Vermillion? Okay, way way up at the Tippity top of Minnesota, real close to the border. Um And according to this story, all the folks, and there are lots and lots of them that made an annual trek to Canada to fish, are trying to maintain that Northwoods experience despite those border closures and inability to visit their you know, favorite Canadian lodge. So what's the next best thing? Fishing and staying at US lakes that are as far north and close to the border as possible. Right, So, the lodges and motels and such around Lake for Million have seen such an uptick and visitors since the pandemics started that people in the community are genuinely concerned that that lake is going to get over fished in particularly the wall Eyes, because like we just talked about, that tends to be the draw. That's what people hop the border for fill those coolers, right, But with the border closed now, the pressure is not being evenly distributed throughout all these different lakes people will travel to. And keep in mind this this is just about Vermillion. You just talked about Lake of the Woods. I'm sure this is happening in other lakes across the country. So the current walleye limit at Vermilion is four walleyes under twenty inches and one over twenty six inches per day. Those are the state rags and it doesn't appear that Minnesota's Department of Natural Resources is going to change that. And I have a better perspective on that now because you mentioned that they were with Malax. They were sort of like, oh, man, maybe we shouldn't have done that, Like like there's some hesitancy. I mean, it's a that's a whole we could do a whole fish news on that. Man, it's exactly a deep dark tale. But there are some piste off people right right. It's it's very twisted. But but right now um D n R is not not looking to change that. But the Vermilion Lake Association is stepping up to thwart possible long term impacts, and they've created a coalition of fishing guides, resort owners, local businesses, and even the local le Jibway tribe to ask anglers to keep only two walleyes per day instead of the legal limit of four. Now, this is voluntary of course, right, Um, they're they're trying to convince englers to keep only two walleyes between twelve and eighteen inches, no trophies, five crop eas instead of legal ten, and also not to keep any bass or muskies at all. And the Lake Association has been passing out hundreds of laminated cards all over the area hoping it will get anglers to adopt these voluntary bag limits. Now, again, tying back to your story, man, this could be a hard road for multiple reasons, one being that the high walleye bag limits have been touted for years by these resorts and businesses. People want to go there because they can keep a lot of walleyes, so this was a huge selling point, and it's it's it's not easy to change minds. But again, to go back to Minnesota d n R, Right, they're not really fully on the side of this coalition. And here's a quote from the story. Et Everts Tower, Area Fisheries supervisor for the Minnesota d n R said the agency supports the effort to release more fish, but she said the lake's walleye population is not in any immediate danger even with more anglers catching more fish. Test netting in recent years shows the lake's walleye population to be robust, She noted. She says, yes, we're seeing more pressure on Lake Familion, but the walleye fish remains very healthy. We believe it could sustain a higher harvest for a few years without any issues. But we're never going to disagree with someone releasing a fish if they want. So. Again, you're saying Ontario looking at Lake in the Woods is like who whoa, whoa whoa, whoa, whoa whoa big problem here. It's Minnesota going, I don't really problem. So they're saying the same thing on Vermillion, which is like the next door neighbor of Lake of the Woods, right, So, I mean it's a great experiment in terms of self regulation. Um, you know, and the way I see it, I'm sure you too cutting back a bit until things on the COVID front and the visitors normalize even more. It's not gonna hurt certainly can't hurt anything. But I mean, I hate to say it. I don't. I don't put that much faith in tourist anglers. I just don't. I see this here with strypers, you know, like these guys complain we need to protect him, we need to protect him, but then they take their boat's limit because it's like, well this is my one trippy year, Like, yeah, we should protect these but like I'm just coming out twice a year, like I'm not. I'm keeping it's it's it's the same thing as that. It's like, well, no, no, we gotta we gotta come up with good management solutions, but not not near me, so I don't don't make it effect me and my experience exactly exactly, you know. So, um, I'm glad you did that story because I meant listening to that, it's like, man, there's a lot of similarities, a lot of interesting connections here going on between these two. You've got one that they're saying, you know, whistle blowing, saying the wal Eyes are like really really down, and then you've got concerned citizens saying we don't want our Walleyes to be down in d n R. Going no, no, no no, they're fine. You could totally whack them for a few more years, it won't matter. I'm gonna I'm gonna tell a little story, a quick story here that maybe we'll it won't solve this problem, but but just something for people to chew on to follow up on my claim about the palatability of Wales. So when we were filming uh last season of DOS Boat, we went up to Red Lake, which is another very famous Minnesota walleye fishery, and we targeted eater size meaning smaller sized UH freshwater drum and all the local walley angers were like, those things are gross. They're slimy bastards. That's where we got the title for that episode, slimy bastards, because literally that's what they call them. So this didn't make the episode because we just did it kind of on our own. But we had our our our resident culinary expert, Daniel Pruett, fry up a chunk of walleye, a chunk of croppy, and a chunk of freshwater, jump seasoned and cooked exactly the same. And I did a blind taste test with three local hardcore walleye guys who were convinced they hated drum. They all in a blind taste test drum is their favorite of the three croppy second, I swear to God that happened, and then they all assume that their favorite was the walleye. Of course they did, so I'm I'm saying this is a small again, small sample, not a lot of evidence, but there is I have some evidence to suggest that the love for Walleye is as much cultural and nostalgic as it is actual. Yeah, fair, fair, So there you go a lot a lot of walleye talk this week. I'm gonna hit some wallete here again, bringing on, We're gonna, we're gonna talk wise, that's not all I'm gonna talking about. I don't know what's going on. Maybe it's like we've been talking about this combination more people getting out fishing and and the fact that, unlike what we were saying, some some fisheries are in really good shape right now. But there are a lot of state records getting broken this spring, and like so many that I just I really took notes. So I'm gonna do a quick big fish rundown because records records montage, Yeah, records montage, because you know there are there are a lot of them, and who doesn't want to talk about big fish. So first again, sticking with walleye, North Dakota has a new state record, and I'm gonna butcher some words in this one, so just everybody deal with it. Jared Shipkowski, he's not Polish, landed a thirty three in sixteen pounds landed the thirty three in sixteen pounds six ounce walleye trolling crank bits on a Missouri River reservoir called Lake Owahie. I think it's a hell of a fish. But Shipkowski didn't break some long standing record because the previous record got set just three years ago. In fact, the Missouri river system, unlike Lake of the Woods, seems to be producing an incredibly healthy walleye population these days. Before the state high mark for while I had stood since nineteen fifty nine, But in the past four years at least six fish over fifteen pounds have been caught. So the state went sixty years without seeing a fifteen pounder and now they're coming at least one every single year, and that to me is a sign of of super successful management. So, uh, if you completely disagree with me and and you love while, I maybe go to North Dakota instead of Lake of the Woods. Just thought, next, we're gonna we're gonna cross one border to the west into my home state of Montana and Montesa, not really known for large mouth bass. I saw this, I was thinking, man, they have them there. Uh, we're more of a cold water fishery destination. But Brandon Wright set a new state record this month with a twenty two and a half inch nine and a half pound large from a Treasure State lake. I realized, a fish that size is like standard for warmer parts of the country. But that's a big, preciously big northern large mouth. That's yeah. I was gonna say, no, you're wrong about that, dude. Nine is big. I don't care where you know, but I mean if you're in Florida, like, it's big, but it's not. It's not newsworthy. It's just big. But and and like to give you guys a sense of how rare large mouth fishing is out here. That was the first large mouth bass Right had ever caught in his life. And he caught it on a worm. So I'm guessing. I'm guessing homeboy was targeting walley like he was just dunt get a worm, hoping to get some walleye and he just ran into the state record green bass. Uh. Forming over to Missouri. It's a good year for car Devil and Rich caught a new record spotted gar, weighing in at ten pounds nine ounces back in February, and the last month, Anthony Sure set the new benchmark for long nosegar in the state at thirty two pounds ten ounces. There's a there's a warming angle to this fish. Sure had a good friend pass away recently and that friend's wife called Sure to break the news and asked him to go out that day and catch a fish and his friend's memory. Sure and his girlfriend were croppy fishing when they saw this monster car and they actually managed to catch it. He's now going to mount the fish in honor of his deceased fishing buddy, which awesome. That's a story. Yeah, finally, this one isn't actually a technical state record, but it's a hell of a fish and a good story. A US Fish and Wildlife Service sampling crew caught a two hundred and forty pound lake sturgeon that stretched to nearly seven feet in length and four feet in girth. The fish was caught in the Detroit River, a notoriously noxious waterway that's still still somehow maintains a relatively strong annual spawning around a sturgeon. This particular fish is estimated to be over a hundred years old, which means it this fish has personally seen the progression of that river from a relatively pristine waterway to an industrial cesspool to its more recent rebound in the wake of the Clean Water Act. That fish has seen some ship literally and yeah. Also, until reading this story, I didn't realize that the Fish Wildlife Service sampled sturgeon by catching them on rod and reel. That's how they sample it, meaning that those fisheries texts literally get paid to go fishing for sturgeon. I'm sure they don't much, but still, like, that's a sweet gig. That's a b side, dude, Detroit River sturgeon. I gotta hook up with them. How do I have a volunteer on that boat? Guys, if you're listening, you know where to find this um. The thing I found most impressive of that was, I'm sorry to say it, but just the Detroit River part. It's like, really, man, like that's I've seen the Detroit River and I know it's better than it used to be, but it's like, man, that fish, like you said, has a hundred year old fish. It has seen the everything dirtiest of the dirt in that river. So very impressive. Is that all your records that's it. That was it. That was wrapped it up with a sturgeon. Good. Let's jump from fish records to criminal records. Oh banger, right there, right there, when at least expect it. Um, So I actually scrubbed a story I had ready to go to quickly sub this in and I have listener Justin. It's either Dare or day or I don't know to thank for it, um. And a few of you guys actually tipped me off to this last weekend, but Justin was first, so he's he's getting the shout out. So. I don't know if you saw this, but there is a viral photo making the rounds on social of some clown in Florida bear hugging a juvenile tiger shark lifting it out of the water, and the setting appears to be in Yeah, so the setting appears to be in in one of Florida's freshwater spring rivers, you know what I'm talking about. Like, it's very narrow and shallow, crystal clear um. And in the background of this our families swimming and tubing and paddling, and the kid holding it looks exactly like Jeff Spicoli. And I feel like this is now the second or third time I've said someone from a Florida story looks like Jeff Spicoli on bent It's irrelevant. So obviously, at first glance, you're wondering, did this tiger shark swim up this river where it may have injured these folks recreating? But nay, look closely at the dead or very near dead tiger shark and it's got a rope around its tail. Now. When Justin first sent this, he only had a few social media post to forward. I think it just happened last Saturday evening. Um. This was in the Chazahowitska River on Florida's West coast, locally known as the Chaz and the posts he sent were from onlookers describing the scene, and what they said was a larger boat, which can be seen in other photos that eventually surfaced motored up the river dragging this barely alive tiger shark on a rope, and some people, including Spaccoli here, jumped at the chance to pose with it, but most people were like kind of piste off and a little bit horrified and started calling f w C real fast. So what I don't know is exactly how far away. These yahoo's with the shark had had to go to bring it to where these photos were taken. But regardless, what I had initially told Justin was to let me know if this becomes sort of real news, Like right now it's just social media chatter, but perhaps this will develop further. And sure enough, a couple of days later, Justin hits me back with a link to Fox News Tampa and it's game on. Okay. So, according to the story, witnesses say that they saw this crew of ass hats capture the shark. I don't I don't again, I don't know where who saw them captured or where. It doesn't say exactly where that was. And then they dragged it to this section of the river with the spring where people swim, and an onlooker quoted in the piece says, people were tormenting the shark and you using it as a photo prop. And this is directly from the story. Several concerned citizens called the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission it's illegal to harvest tiger sharks in Florida waterways. F w C says it is aware of the incident and is investigating. Then late less Monday, the agency noted issued two notices to appear to the individuals allegedly involved, though they did not publicly identify them, and another news story that followed up said they're going to be charged with taking a prohibited species out of the water, and they have court dates, per Fox News, and will be facing second degree misdemeaners. And really, there's not much to say about this other than this is just like asshole behavior, right, Like, even if you found the shark dead, which I doubt, it's still a species you can't meddle with. And for the life of me, like in this day and age, I cannot figure out why people do ship like that, like knowing it could end up on the internet, or maybe even in this is hoping it ends up on the internet, and then you expect absolutely no consequences. And this isn't the first time that that's something like this with sharks has happened. Do you remember there was a video from Florida, oh Man four or five years ago dudes dragging a shark backward behind a boat, running it wide open, right. Um, it made its round, Yeah, it was all over. The internet made its rounds. They all got nailed as they should have um, but I just I just can't get my head around doing these things videoing it or or taking a shark to a spot loaded with people who all have phones with cameras and just saying it's all in good fun. This will be fine, like the axelon or one thing. But the follow up flawning and boasting just tells me you actually don't have a brain cell in your head. So you know, I mean, look, there's not much to say on this. I think you come. This is why shark fishing and Florida both get a bad rap. Yes, because there's some very response sable son responsible and there are so many stewards of the resource and great anglers in Florida, but you don't hear much about them, you hear about this kind of this ship. Yeah, exactly exactly. I'm I'm I have very good friends down there who do the land based shark fishing thing very responsibly. You know, they leave no footprint, leave no trash, they do it at night, they don't do it on public beaches. But it's it's this kind of stuff that ruins the reputation. You know that that shark fishing has left that it's hanging on too, so we'll see more might develop there. But justin I do appreciate that um as promised. Man, you sent the newspiece and I made it news. So we'll see what Phil has to say about all this, see where his heart lies in this whole deal. He's got a tough one to figure out this week. I don't don't. He does, he does, and he does. And then when we're done with that, we're gonna we're gonna have a tackle hack from our bud, Mike. I canelli that will help you stick more walleyes or perhaps a state record. Guys, you called it already. This one was neck and neck, and I think I'm just going to give the week to Joe because I don't think he's wanting a while and I feel kind of bad for him. So Joe, you're the winner. The walleye is kind of a funny fish because I don't even think I had heard of a walleye until I met my wife, who is from Minnesota, and to her, the walleye was seemingly the only fish that existed. I mean, this isn't going anywhere. I don't really have a point or a joke here. I just had that one single thought about Walleye. How are you guys, You guys doing good kids, good kids, healthy, awesome, glad to hear it. I'm getting coming from inside the city. Hi the flood. It's time now for our very regular and unexpectedly useful segment Tackle Hacks, where we ask talented people for legitimate fishing information instead of peppering them with stupid questions or asking them to make fun of their friends and clients. Today we have the one and only Mike I can tell you with us. So put down your Nintendo switch, grab a pen, and take some notes. Mike. Appreciate you being here again, man, Always a pleasure. Thanks guys. Yeah, So I know you do a lot of this kind of thing on your own channels, Like I don't know. It seems like every time I check in there, I you have some kind of a tip or suggestion, and I look at it and I wonder, like, damn, why have I never thought of that? You're just You're just a font of fishing info. So, without further ado, please lay a bit of that on us and the listeners. Sure, yeah, and I do love it. I've loved this aspect of fishing since I was a kid. You know, you're always trying to find a build a better mouse trap, find something that will catch more fish. There's a lot. I couldn't think of a good one that would be really, really good until I dumbed it down. And I want to give you a real easy one that has put so many more fish in my out, especially when we're talking about bass fishing with soft plastics. It's a modification that you can make to any brand of hook you're using on yourself plastics. You could make the modification on around bend an extra wide gap, a straight shank, a flipping hook doesn't matter, so style a hook um, none of that matters. And the tips easy. It's bending the point of the hook off of the eye of the hook. It's off setting the point from the eye of the hook, you know. And and before I was showing this modification, I was losing about of the bites when I fish soft plastics. Right, whether it's a worm, a soft stick, bait, a lizard or tube didn't matter. I wouldn't lose about of the bites. I'd get the bite, i'd set the hook, I'd come back empty. And you know, when I started making this model, vacation. It changed that ratio and now I miss very few bites. And it's simple by by taking the point of the hook off of the eye. When you have that forward pull pressure, that pull point and you and you set the hook instead of the point of the hook being straight in line with where you're tying it, it's offset. I like to call it about three degrees. Doesn't have to be perfect. Three degrees set off to the right or left. It doesn't matter if you you bend left or right. But when you offset it from the eye the hook and you apply that upward pressure sideward pressure, it makes that hook go in easier and more of a positive hook up. A positive hook set right, you get more meat is what happens. So the easiest way to do it is get your pliers, get your needle nose, grab the point of the hook, but not on the point itself, but where the hook bends up to the point, grab it with the needle nos and just turn it. Have to write three degrees. That simple little modification has put so many more fish in the boat. For me. It's one me tournaments. Um. It goes from being you know, seventy five in a day to to pent in a day, from hooks to landing hook ups to landing fish. So turn the point off of the ie the hook when you're fishing soft plastics. It's it's an amazing tip and it makes it makes me feel like slightly dumb because as a saltwater guy, I'm very familiar with non you know, offset hooks for Yet do I ever make that tweak when I'm fishing freshwater? No, I have not, And why see, I've done it, but I've never done it with soft plastics, and so I'm definitely gonna start doing that now that that absolutely makes sense. Why wouldn't that make sense? The offset works, It ups your hooks at ratio and so many other places. Why wouldn't it work here. It's a good one. It's helped me catch a lot more fish. And I got to work with v m C, and all of v MC hooks that are approved have the three degree offset right out of the pack, which is nice too nice. Well, I'm gonna go pick up a pack of those right about now and try that out. I hope you guys will do the same. But remember, like I was saying, you could just retro fit the hooks that you already have, you don't have to buy new stuff. So we love that kind of hack. This is exactly you know. We're gonna lose our reputation as being a totally useless fishing podcast to keep doing stuff like this. But I very much appreciate you coming on and sharing that little nugget with us. Thanks a lot. I take care man, Thanks guys. Come on, man, We're not a completely useless fishing podcast. Not completely. That was kind of harsh. It was. It was your right, but we we let off the show with a story about a guide trip that had no fishing, and then reviewed a book by an author who may never have fished a day in her life. So well, I agree that this podcast is far from useless. I think it's safe to say that our insight, it's extend beyond the confines of fishing. Yeah, that's fair. But also, come on, that was a legitimately useful tackle hack. I just will add one caveat Okay, if you is this is a great tip, but if you partake in a fishery that requires circle hooks when hocking bait, just check your legs before you bend them out, because sometimes inline in that scenario is law. Otherwise, killer tip, that's a good call. That's a good call, and it's it's timely because some of those legs are going in now and changing. So yeah, heads up on that one for those of you fish circle hooks and bait. But in most situations, I think we can agree ikes tackle hack is a good call and we are grateful to him for sharing it. So thanks, like, and I believe you were about to give us a suggestion for a particular lure. You might use that hack on the next time you go fishing. And also when you consider to be one of your your hail mary try it Outbates, Well, that's not allowed enough. Are you in a blade baits? For as long as I can remember, blade baits are just something I've kind of had kicking around. There's probably one buried under all the jerk baits and one of my jerk bait trays right now. There could be one hanging out with my chatter baits or jigs. Honestly, I can't remember the last time I threw one, because for me, a blade bait has always been a hail mary lure. Now, listen, I understand that some of you are upset right now and I never said a blade bait wasn't productive. I never said it didn't catch fish. I'm well aware of its potency, having interviewed dozens of guides over the years that practically live and die by the things, but most of them are Walleye guys, which I am not, so that's one less use I personally have for blade bits. I'm also fully aware that they crush on ice out small amounts on many northern lakes, but once again, I don't do much ice out smally fishing on lakes. Blade baits, like the Cicada, blade Runner and steel Chad, we're simply not staples and the fishing scenes where I grew up, But I always wanted them to be my secret weapon because they are, after all, elegantly simplistic and definitely classic to the best of my research. It all started with the head and sonar, which the company introduced in nineteen fifty nine. Blade bait designs vary slightly, but they all share characteristics of the O G sonar. In essence, the lure is nothing more than a small cigar shaped hunk of lead with a huge metal shark fan on its back viewed from the side. However, these two elements give the lure the profile of a bait fish like shad. There's a double hook at the tip of the fin, which is technically the tail of the bait, and another double hook hanging under that lead belly. On the central spine of the fin are three to five line tie eyes that slightly altered the lure's action depending on which one you tie off to. Blade baits are extremely versatile because they can be fished vertically or horizontally, and they were really one of the first subs faceloors that leaned into a fish's attraction to sound and ability to home in on vibration with their lateral lines. Now, no matter how you present a blade bait, it will shimmy back and forth like a rattlesnake's tail. The faster you jigger reel, the more pronounced the ripping, zipping vibrations it emits. This is why blade baits are so potent on the ice and right after ice out, because they can be gently finessed around sluggish fish, but it's often that short, abrupt zip off the bottom that gets a frosty Otherwise lockjawed bass or pike or walleye to take a swing Knowing all of this about blade baits, I've tried to make them work for me over the years, mostly in some of the deep dark holes on local smallmouth rivers, and I think another part of the reason why I never have more than one on me is because nine times out of ten, when I do try to properly fish one in those deep dark holes, I lose it. In my experience, heavy blade baits and rocky rivers don't play very well together. Blade baits, at least my blade baits have zero ability to deflect off hardcover like a square bill, or slip between the boulders like a fluke. They just wedge like a doorstop. I break them off and go back to fishing, something I have more confidence in. But then on very rare occasions, a blade bait can do no wrong for me. That's mostly in high dirty water situations. It's usually a last ditch effort, after working through the arsenal and being at my wits end, that I'll spy that lonely blade bait and say, oh, what the hell. Instead of letting it fall, I just hawked the thing out there a mile and reel it back at lightning speed. And this doesn't work all the time, but I've turned around a few bronze less days doing this for the magic to happen. However, I'm convinced I have to rediscover the blade bait every single time. I swear if I go out and tie it on right away trying to recreate that success, it fails. I have to go through my entire bag first, at least ten casts per lure, and then maybe the blade can save the day. That's about all we have in this week's tour through the Fishing Museum, but we sincerely hope that you enjoyed the still life portrait Hillary Hutchinson painted of a man too smart to know if he's hungry or if he personally owns the Bob Marshall Wilderness, the postmodern film of a lungfish morphing into a black Angus burger, the Greco Roman statue of Mike and Elly triumphantly bending fish hooks to his iron will, And a blade bait that's not really on the cutting edge, but you should probably still have a couple. And if all of that was just a little too strange for you, right us and let us know at bent at the meat Eator dot com. Also if you haven't already, go to the meat Eator dot com back slash phish and sign up for our fishing weekly newsletter. You'll get an email every Tuesday straight from me, updating you on all the art and science we pour into our fishing shows, articles and news coverage, plus all write up weekly suggestions on what you should be listening to, watching and reading. Then, over time I'll start telling you what to wear as well, so you're just clones of mem

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