May 31, 2021 • 27 mins
This week, Cal talks about whale bag limits, finch smugglers, circle hooks, and stepping over the line.
Connect with Cal and MeatEater
MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube
Shop Cal's Week in Review Merch
Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
From Mediators World News headquarters in Bozeman, Montana. This is
Cal's we Can review, presented by Steel Steel products are
available only at authorized dealers. For more, go to Steel
Dealers dot com. Now here's your host, Ryan cal Callahan.
A four eight one ft Australian destroyer, which is a
(00:26):
class of warship designed to be fast and maneuverable in
order to defend larger ships against attack, pulled into San
Diego Harbor with not one but two endangered fin whales
attached to it, which is a limit of fin whales
in case you're interested. We'll get to that a little
bit later. One of the fin whales was sixty ft
(00:48):
in length and the other twenty five ft, which should
give you an idea of how much power these ships have.
Not exactly like moving around the lake where he can
feel every piece of water weed that gets up in
your trolling motor? Is it even? Still? I do find
it hard to believe that this warship couldn't feel the
(01:08):
drag and somehow dislodge these unfortunate whales at seat. The
mental picture of pulling into port with these hangers on
somehow brings to mind the scene from the dare I
say iconic National Lampoon's vacation with Chevy Chase and Beverly
D'Angelo when the highway patrolman pulls them over to notify them.
With the dog leash tied to the bumper, poor fella
(01:30):
probably tried to keep up for a while anyway, couldn't
have been a proud moment at the dock. Fin whales
are comprised of three subspecies that range in size as
adults from sixty five feet in length and fifty tons
in the Northern hemisphere to seventy feet in length and
seventy tons in the Southern hemisphere, which means that the
Australian destroyer was dragging somewhere in the neighborhood of seventy
(01:54):
tons of dead whale along with it. Fin whales are
the second largest mammal on the planet, behind the blue whale.
Here is a quote from American naturalist Roy Chapman Andrews
with his description pulled this from Wikipedia. The greyhound of
the sea, for its beautiful slender body, is built like
a racing yacht, and the animal can surpass the speed
(02:17):
of the fastest ocean steamship. Unfortunately, for the fin whales,
not an ocean steamship they had outrun, but a modern
destroyer speed does kill, but likely wasn't the whole story.
Sonar has been linked in some cases to disrupting whale's
ability to navigate. The Australian destroyer was taking part in
(02:38):
joint naval operations at the time, meaning heavy traffic and
heavy sonar use was happening. According to NOAH, of which
the U. S. Navy is a permit tee, commercial traffic
has killed thirty one whales in two thousand and eighteen,
whereas the Navy only killed two. However, the Navy is
(02:59):
at its bag limit for fin whales. I use bag
limit because Noah, as part of the permitting process, has
outlined a maximum amount of marine mammal kills the Navy
can chalk up in seven years of operating, and that
list certainly resembles the regulations for someone going fishing or
perhaps an upland bird hunter. This is from the Mercury
(03:21):
News with a little ad lib for me and the
current agreement with Noah. The Navy can take or has
a bag limit no more than three whales during a
seven year period and no more than two from a
certain species. The more a species population is endangered, the
lower the limit. For example, fin whales are limited at two,
(03:43):
humpback whales living near Hawaii are limited at two, gray
whales are limited at two sperm, and blue whales are
limited at one each. Sound familiar. Currently there is a
debate as to which country has to accept the fin
whales on whose whale kill quota? Do the Australians claim
the whales on their bag limit, or since the Australians
(04:05):
were taking part in the U. S. Navy operation, does
the US have to claim the two fin whales on
their quota. Again, the similarities to a hunting or fishing
trip argument are strong. This is like your buddy who
got two over zealous on shooting golden eyes one day
in the duck blind and wants to share at the
end of the day. I half expect to see the
(04:26):
next Associated Press report on this one with quotes from
Australia saying, look, US Navy, you may have bought the
gas when we stopped in Hawaii, but I bought the
snacks and they were good ones, or the US saying listen, Australia,
if you didn't intend to take the fin whales home
why did you come on this maneuver in the first place.
(04:47):
It's not our responsibility to have a spare eighty ton
cooler for you to borrow. But I mean, if you
have a problem like that, I mean we could just
step on side. We can figure it out. Man, There's
no problem. It's cool. It's cool. This week we've got
the Crime Desk, Big Fish Round Up, and so much more.
But first I'm gonna tell you about my week and
(05:09):
my week as well as this podcast, as you know,
is sponsored by Steel Power equipment maker the world's finest chainsaws.
I'm recording this from the way to sunny shoreline of
New Jersey, a state i've seen prior to now only
from the world famous New Jersey Turnpike. I've been chasing
stripers with Joe Surmelie, senior fishing editor at Meat Eater
(05:32):
and someone I have wanted to fish with for a
long time. We started out throwing paddle tail plastic chad
in Raritan Bay, then putting circle hooks into men haden
or bunka and freelining them. Freelining is what it sounds like.
No wait, just a hook in alive bunka and you
send them on their way to ideally for us, unfortunately
(05:54):
for them find a hungry striper. Circle hooks are a
great tool for catching fish unless you grew up with
jay hooks like I did. Jay hooks require a hook
set a swift jerk of the rod, typically in an
upward motion to set the hook in the fish's mouth.
Circle hooks, however, are as they sound almost a circle
(06:16):
and lack the wide gap of a jay hook. A
hard setting motion will oftentimes only remove your hook from
the fish's mouth. Thirty plus years of setting the hook
on fish does not get erased easily, my friends. The
proper technique for hooking into a fish on a circle
hook is typically either winding down on them, which is
(06:38):
feeling the tug and instead of lifting the rod tips swiftly,
just reeling in line until the fish becomes taught, or
allowing the fish to fully take a bait when they
are at full gallop, which is a term seldom used
for fish. I'll admit, you tighten the drag down on them,
which will turn the hook into you know, ideally the
(06:59):
corner of the fish his mouth, and they will set themselves,
which kind of brings to mind the I don't know
if any of you delinquents ever watched some of those
YouTube videos of like the bike set up in the
bad neighborhood and it's got like a chunk of monofilament
on it, and thieves come up and steal the bike
and try to ride away, and then the line comes
taut and they go flying off the bike. It's kind
(07:20):
of like that maneuver anyway. Poppers. I love throwing topwater
poppers for anything that will eat them, and stripers are
notorious for eating poppers. Surface eating is extremely entertaining and
it's not always happening. There's way more eating going on
(07:41):
subsurface than on the surface, no matter what species you're after.
In order to see how we did, you're gonna have
to check out the newest season of Doss Boat. We're
filming now. We'll keep you posted when it releases. It's
gonna be great for those of you waiting. I will
write up a bunch of facts on bluefish and stripers
in the near future and how they're doing. But this
(08:04):
week I already have way too much to talk about,
so we're moving on to the big fish round up.
Tim Baker, originally of Lagrange, Wisconsin, caught fifteen different species
to start off that state's fishing season. In three days,
he had voted a muskie, the fish of ten thousand casts,
and a surprise sturgeon after that. The collecting was on
(08:26):
Northern Pike bofin Walleye. Pumpkin seed, bluegill, croppy, cart bullhead,
large mouth bass, small mouth bass, channel catfish, brown and
rip trout rounded out the list. I am willing to
bet Tim never had so much fun focusing on bullhead
or carp or even a pumpkin seed as he did
this week. Well done and a good reminder to the
(08:47):
rest of us that variety is the spice of life.
Sometimes that singular species focus can limit the fun, not
increase it. Next up here in the home state of Montana,
the large mouth bass record has been fishally broken. The
two and a half inch nine point five seven five
pound bass beat the twelve year standing record of eight
(09:11):
point eight pounds, not just by weight but by location
in my opinion anyway. The new record comes from the
Billings City Pond of Lake Elmo, a place we would
occasionally go as kids to dunk worms or grasshoppers and
swim in the overly worm overly green water. Never catching much.
Thank you to the new record holder, Brandon Right, for
(09:32):
keeping the big fish dreams of youth anglers alive. Important
to note that this was Brandon's first ever largemouth bass.
Probably no need to fish for more. Brandon. He dunked
a single worm after showing up the break of ten am,
then set his lawn chair up and proceeded to watch
TikTok videos until he felt a tug, which is one
(09:54):
way to do it. For the sake of the bass
masters tournaments, Let's hope this technique doesn't be I'm overly popular.
According to Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks, six new records
have been entered since August of possibly due to the
increase of participants and increase of overall fishing days related
to quarantine times. Chinook salmon, yellow bullhead, brown trout, walleye,
(10:17):
and smallmouth bass long no sucker are all new state records.
Chinook stand at thirty two point zero five pounds, small
mouth seven point eight four pounds, yellow bullhead fifteen and
a half inches one point nine one pounds, brown trout
thirty two point four two pounds. What's interesting about this
list is the species that likely caught your attention and
(10:41):
admittedly mine thirty two pound brown trout, thirty two pound chinook,
almost an eight pound small mouth, almost that trophy bass.
Robert Earle Keene always sings about. Even the walleye I'm
going to tell you about are considered non native species
in the state of Montana. I'd say considered because there
are some folks that think it would have behooved the
(11:03):
walleye to be called a native. The walleye cousin, the sauger,
is considered a native species. The robe of the argument
comes from the fact that the majority of the state
of Montana falls within the potential native range of walleye.
But all of the walleye data matches stocked or introduced
walleye strands, and we have not found any walleye DNA
(11:24):
or more specifically, walleye haplotypes that stand out as anything
different that would indicate a native species growing and evolving
in Montana waters. As for the wall i record, that
one just this week beats the fourteen year old record
of seventeen point seven five pounds that has stood since
(11:44):
two thousand seven, reportedly out of Holter Lake, just outside
of the state capital of Helena, Montana, a thirty two
point to five inch two inches in growth that's tape
around the belly, weighing in at eighteen point zero two pounds.
Is your new flaky white, kind of tasteless state record.
(12:05):
Of course, I'm picking on the die hard wiley anglers
out there because it's fun. Specifically, our own Seph Morris,
a k a. The flip Flop Flesher, is a good
example of these walleye types. We just spent two weeks
in Hawaii playing in the salt water, and all I
could talk about was the fact that walleye fishing is
still for him. After this record catch, recorded so close
(12:28):
to meat eater headquarters, it's safe to say old Seth
may not leave the state ever again. Out of the
same reservoir in the same week came another new record catch,
This one of a long nose sucker nineteen and a
half inches four point to one pounds beats the previous
month old record of three point four two pounds. Don't
let the name fool you, the long no sucker is
(12:50):
actually a really good looking fish. Next up New York
state angler twelve year old Finn and Murphy just one
fifteen thousand for catching twenty six pound chinook. Quick recap
on those numbers. Finning his twelve the fish is twenty
six and the prize of fifteen got it good. Every
year finning his dad and his friends participate in the
(13:12):
Spring Lake, Ontario County's Derby. Last year, Finn did not
get a chance to reel in a fish, so this
year he was at the front of the line, which
is really great etiquette for a sport fishing situation. The
official weight was twenty six pounds ten ounces. Finn made
by a new nerve gun, presents for his folks and
a new fishing pole for himself, which is pretty good.
(13:35):
You know, if you're twelve years old and you got
a freezer full of salmon and fifteen thousand in your pocket,
wonder what that feels like. Next up, the US Fish
and Wildlife Service, conducting fishing surveys for Lake Sturgeon on
the Detroit River between St. Clair and Lake Erie, caught
a two forty pounds six ft ten inch four ft
around Lake Sturgeon in order to get that big US fish.
(13:57):
Wildlife Service speculates that the fish has been swimming since
at least nineteen twenty in the Detroit River. Which makes
me think of what this bottom feeding fish has consumed
in her long lifetime. Detroit grew from a population of
almost a million people in nineteen twenty, which again is
the general time of the sturgeon's birth, to almost two
(14:19):
million in nineteen fifty. These were the prime just dumping
in the river years, which makes me think that this
gal has an iron stomach. The largest lake sturgeon on
record is three pounds, and there are an estimated sixty
hundred lake sturgeon swimming in the Detroit River. This giant
female sturgeon was wade, measured, tagged, and released, Meaning your
(14:43):
odds of catching this same two forty pound taller than
you or most anyone you know fish is only one,
which oddly enough, is considered your chance of dying in
a car crash or from the flu if you fancy
yourself an angler. Right now you're thinking so, you're telling
me there's a chance. Next up, Chase Gibson out of
(15:07):
West Virginia with a new state record muskie. Chase beat
the two thousand seventeen muskie record of fifty three and
a half inches thirty four and a half pounds with
his fifty four inch thirty nine point six pound female
out of Brunsville Reservoir. Biologist Aaron Yeager showed up to
officially way the fish for Gibson and is equally happy
with the catch as it is a good marker of
(15:30):
fishery restoration efforts in the area. He notes that it's
possible that another angler could catch the released fish in
the fall and set a new new state record. Well,
let's hope for Gibson's sake that he can get a
respectable amount of time on the leaderboard. Congrats to the
fishery restoration and the big fish. That's it for the
(15:51):
big Fish round up. We're moving on. As you know,
it's never a dull moment. At the crime desk, a
Montana man was charged with a violation of Montana Code
annotated eighty seven Dash six Dash four one five, which
is hunting without landowner permission, a misdemeanor crime. The hunter
(16:14):
was also issued a warning for the same violation hunting
without landowner permission, as well as a warning for illegal
possession of wildlife. And that hunter was me if this
is shocking news to you, welcome to the club. On October.
I screwed up in a way. I just didn't think
(16:37):
it was possible. A shot of buck and doe antelope
on what I thought was BLM ground, but was actually
private ground belonging to a coal company. When I went
to retrieve those antelope, I crossed a set of railroad tracks.
Just to be clear about the situation, I was on
BLM attempting to shoot antelope on BLM, but what I
(16:58):
did was shoot across us the boundary onto the coal
company property. I was met at my vehicle by a
game warden who was on his way home for the night,
and shown the errors of my ways. My previous thoughts
of having a cold beer while skinning antelope turned to
thoughts of crawling into a hole and just dying real quick.
(17:19):
The warning hunting without land owner permission resulted from crossing
railroad tracks and not at a railroad crossing. The railroad
bed and right of way is private property no matter
where it is located or you come across it. The
only legal place to cross railroad tracks is at a
railroad crossing. In rural America, this easement is often, but
(17:44):
not always, where you can drive a vehicle across the
railroad tracks. In this case, once I crossed the railroad tracks.
I left BLM land and entered private land no excuses.
As I mentioned, I also received a warning for ill
legal possession of wildlife. I received this warning because once
(18:04):
I grabbed the antelope and tagged them, I possessed them
illegally because I did not have the landowner permission to
hunt on the property. Had I realized I was on
private land that I had just illegally hunted, I could
have avoided this warning by calling the game warden before
I touched the animals. The golden hunting rule is called
the game warden as soon as you know you've made
(18:26):
a mistake. Unfortunately, I didn't realize I'd made a mistake
until the warden met me at my car, which was
after I had the antelope in possession. Had I called
him before touching the animals, I would have still incurred
the charge of hunting without landowner permission, but avoided the
warning for illegal possession of wildlife. Not that things would
have been better for me, but I thought I would
(18:47):
have just explained that one to you. On top of
all that, the game warden also informed me that I
had not renewed my license plates on time, which I
believe is the only time throughout this entire pross that
I laughed, not because any of this is funny, but
because when you serve yourself a big poop sandwich, you
(19:07):
may as well have seconds. That October I entered a
guilty plea in open court for hunting without landowner permission.
I asked for a deferred sentence, which means that with
no further violations in six months, I could apply for
a dismissal of the charges, which the judge granted. I
was ordered to pay a fine of one five dollars
(19:28):
plus court fees of thirty five dollars, and the two
antelope were confiscated. To be clear, the seizure of the
antelope happened right away. I helped load them into the
warden's truck. Shooting something and not utilizing it or having
a say in how it is utilized by confiscation is,
as it turns out, a similar feeling to shooting a
(19:50):
bowl and recovering it. Only when the meat is ruined.
It does not feel good. Earlier this month I sent
in my petition and my guilty lee was withdrawn. The
judgment was vacated, the charge itself was dismissed. This is
the reason you have not heard this story until now.
I wanted to close one chapter before opening another. The
(20:14):
seventy and fines and fees is about what I would
spend voluntarily on fuel and a long weekend of hunting.
The loss of the meat is the more serious of
the fines. To be clear, I hate that I screwed up.
I hate that this happened. I even hate that all
I can do is call it a mistake. There's nothing
and no one to point to other than myself. This
(20:35):
is definitely something that has helped me gain perspective on
all the wildlife crime reported here on the Weekend Review.
I learned through mistakes more than anything. I make plenty
and have learned lots. I hope by sharing this I
can help others avoid my mistakes. While I am, by
no means proud of this, I admit freely that up
(20:56):
until this incident, I had a very laws a fair
attitude about railroad tracks. I grew up crossing them without concern.
I learned to hunt in an area where at the
time it felt like it was impossible to hunt without
crossing the tracks sand's easement, But looking back, I know
that's not the case. The truth. You just can't hunt
(21:19):
as easily or as efficiently without crossing them or wherever
you want, which is just another example of the hard
way being the right way. Now. Despite what I just
said about rail company land, I have never had a
give no ships or disrespectful attitude about private property. We
(21:40):
have some ground in my family, and I have knocked
on plenty of doors to get access to private ground
in many states, with permission comes the responsibility of respecting
the boundaries of that land, sometimes even policing it, and
not screwing it up. This time, though, I did screw up,
which is why I decided on the side of the
(22:02):
road back in October of last year to declare my guilt,
take my just desserts, and talk about it here on
the podcast. Quick side note just desserts spelled with one
s is a phrase I have used in the past,
but looked up the definition of just now, and it
means the punishment that one deserves. It's a struggle to
(22:24):
find anything positive to come out of this situation. But
if I can impart something, it's this. Watch your railroad
tracks and right of ways. They're in the hunting regulations
for a reason. No matter how long you hunt, you
can still lose your situational awareness when you narrow down
your field of view to focus on the meat. Had
(22:46):
I shot on the right hand side of the group
of antelope versus the left hand side, I would have
had a buck and dough laid out on blm ground,
not private ground, which in this case would have limited
this list of screw ups, not erased them. Finally, you
won't have to worry about the boundary or property line
(23:08):
if you don't hunt on the boundary or property line.
I report on a lot of wildlife crime here on
the Weekend Review, some odd, some funny, some sad, some
very similar to my case. The hypocrisy here is not
lost on me. It's humiliating. There's a temptation inside of
(23:30):
me to just cover this up, to not be the
one who breaks my own story about my own fallibility.
But I feel that I owe something to you people.
I mean to you folks that trust me enough to
listen to me week in and week out, and you
folks that trust me enough to financially support this show.
I owe you an honest take on who I am,
(23:51):
and right here today, who I am is a guy
that's screwed up, So to all of you, I'm sorry,
Move and on. Thirty nine year old Kevin Mackenzie was
arrested last month at JFK Airport with thirty five chestnut
bellied seed finches nestled inside of hair curlers sewn into
(24:13):
his clothes. Mackenzie was not attempting to start a new
cuckoo clock hair do craze. He was smuggling this particular
kind of finch, known in Guyana as the Tawatawa, to
supply the fiercely competitive birds singing contests in Queens, New York,
specifically in phil Scooter Risutto Park in Richmond Hill, Queens,
(24:34):
where on the weekends you'll see crowds of Guyanese men
gathered around pairs of cloth covered bird cages mounted on
five foot polls. The covers come off, the finches see
each other and because their male, they will start singing
their territorial mating call, trying to establish dominance. The tawitawa
is particularly prized because it has an extremely well muscled synx.
(24:57):
The syrinx is the junction of the two bronch gel
tubes that connect the bird's lungs and throat. And it
controls the bursts of air that produced bird song. While
many bird species only have two muscle pairs at the syrinx,
the Tawatawa has up to nine, so they're distinctive and
very loud zert sound makes them truly amazing singers. So
(25:21):
back to the competition, two referees will count the number
of discrete rites in the first bird to fifty wins.
Tawitawa finches become increasingly valuable the more they win, sometimes
fetching up to eight grand for a top breeding male.
Wild Tawatawa from Guyana are thought to be the best birds,
(25:41):
and so smugglers like Mackenzie are caught every year in
violation of the Lacy Act, which bans the import of
and commerce in wildlife. US fish and wildlife worries specifically
about Guyanese finches spreading Newcastle disease, a virus that affects
the avian nervous system and can cause twitch sting of
the head and neck in domestic poultry and lead to paralysis.
(26:04):
Plus traffic in these birds is emptying Guyanese for us
of Tawitawa, a different but similar finch with an even
more muscular Syrinx has been extirpated from Guyana in the
past twenty years. The Tawatawa is heading in a similar direction.
So even though Finch singing battles in the park sound
(26:24):
like more interesting entertainment to me than American idol, I
tipped my hat to the customs official who spotted those
curlier bulges in Mackenzie's duds and wondered why his jacket
was going to zerad Rider. That's all I've got for
you this week. Thank you so much for listening. As
(26:44):
per usual, if you want to tell me how I'm doing,
what I'm messing up, and what's going on in your
neck the woods, right in to a s K C
A L. That's asked how at the Mediator dot com.
And remember to check out www dot steel Dealers dot
com s T I h L Dealers dot com to
find aiden well read, knowledgeable, super nice steel dealer near
(27:09):
you to help you with all of your chainsaw, trimmer
and snipper needs for the summer in the upcoming hunting season.
Thanks again, I'll talk to you next week.
From Mediators World News headquarters in Bozeman, Montana. This is
Cal's we Can review, presented by Steel Steel products are
available only at authorized dealers. For more, go to Steel
Dealers dot com. Now here's your host, Ryan cal Callahan.
A four eight one ft Australian destroyer, which is a
(00:26):
class of warship designed to be fast and maneuverable in
order to defend larger ships against attack, pulled into San
Diego Harbor with not one but two endangered fin whales
attached to it, which is a limit of fin whales
in case you're interested. We'll get to that a little
bit later. One of the fin whales was sixty ft
(00:48):
in length and the other twenty five ft, which should
give you an idea of how much power these ships have.
Not exactly like moving around the lake where he can
feel every piece of water weed that gets up in
your trolling motor? Is it even? Still? I do find
it hard to believe that this warship couldn't feel the
(01:08):
drag and somehow dislodge these unfortunate whales at seat. The
mental picture of pulling into port with these hangers on
somehow brings to mind the scene from the dare I
say iconic National Lampoon's vacation with Chevy Chase and Beverly
D'Angelo when the highway patrolman pulls them over to notify them.
With the dog leash tied to the bumper, poor fella
(01:30):
probably tried to keep up for a while anyway, couldn't
have been a proud moment at the dock. Fin whales
are comprised of three subspecies that range in size as
adults from sixty five feet in length and fifty tons
in the Northern hemisphere to seventy feet in length and
seventy tons in the Southern hemisphere, which means that the
Australian destroyer was dragging somewhere in the neighborhood of seventy
(01:54):
tons of dead whale along with it. Fin whales are
the second largest mammal on the planet, behind the blue whale.
Here is a quote from American naturalist Roy Chapman Andrews
with his description pulled this from Wikipedia. The greyhound of
the sea, for its beautiful slender body, is built like
a racing yacht, and the animal can surpass the speed
(02:17):
of the fastest ocean steamship. Unfortunately, for the fin whales,
not an ocean steamship they had outrun, but a modern
destroyer speed does kill, but likely wasn't the whole story.
Sonar has been linked in some cases to disrupting whale's
ability to navigate. The Australian destroyer was taking part in
(02:38):
joint naval operations at the time, meaning heavy traffic and
heavy sonar use was happening. According to NOAH, of which
the U. S. Navy is a permit tee, commercial traffic
has killed thirty one whales in two thousand and eighteen,
whereas the Navy only killed two. However, the Navy is
(02:59):
at its bag limit for fin whales. I use bag
limit because Noah, as part of the permitting process, has
outlined a maximum amount of marine mammal kills the Navy
can chalk up in seven years of operating, and that
list certainly resembles the regulations for someone going fishing or
perhaps an upland bird hunter. This is from the Mercury
(03:21):
News with a little ad lib for me and the
current agreement with Noah. The Navy can take or has
a bag limit no more than three whales during a
seven year period and no more than two from a
certain species. The more a species population is endangered, the
lower the limit. For example, fin whales are limited at two,
(03:43):
humpback whales living near Hawaii are limited at two, gray
whales are limited at two sperm, and blue whales are
limited at one each. Sound familiar. Currently there is a
debate as to which country has to accept the fin
whales on whose whale kill quota? Do the Australians claim
the whales on their bag limit, or since the Australians
(04:05):
were taking part in the U. S. Navy operation, does
the US have to claim the two fin whales on
their quota. Again, the similarities to a hunting or fishing
trip argument are strong. This is like your buddy who
got two over zealous on shooting golden eyes one day
in the duck blind and wants to share at the
end of the day. I half expect to see the
(04:26):
next Associated Press report on this one with quotes from
Australia saying, look, US Navy, you may have bought the
gas when we stopped in Hawaii, but I bought the
snacks and they were good ones, or the US saying listen, Australia,
if you didn't intend to take the fin whales home
why did you come on this maneuver in the first place.
(04:47):
It's not our responsibility to have a spare eighty ton
cooler for you to borrow. But I mean, if you
have a problem like that, I mean we could just
step on side. We can figure it out. Man, There's
no problem. It's cool. It's cool. This week we've got
the Crime Desk, Big Fish Round Up, and so much more.
But first I'm gonna tell you about my week and
(05:09):
my week as well as this podcast, as you know,
is sponsored by Steel Power equipment maker the world's finest chainsaws.
I'm recording this from the way to sunny shoreline of
New Jersey, a state i've seen prior to now only
from the world famous New Jersey Turnpike. I've been chasing
stripers with Joe Surmelie, senior fishing editor at Meat Eater
(05:32):
and someone I have wanted to fish with for a
long time. We started out throwing paddle tail plastic chad
in Raritan Bay, then putting circle hooks into men haden
or bunka and freelining them. Freelining is what it sounds like.
No wait, just a hook in alive bunka and you
send them on their way to ideally for us, unfortunately
(05:54):
for them find a hungry striper. Circle hooks are a
great tool for catching fish unless you grew up with
jay hooks like I did. Jay hooks require a hook
set a swift jerk of the rod, typically in an
upward motion to set the hook in the fish's mouth.
Circle hooks, however, are as they sound almost a circle
(06:16):
and lack the wide gap of a jay hook. A
hard setting motion will oftentimes only remove your hook from
the fish's mouth. Thirty plus years of setting the hook
on fish does not get erased easily, my friends. The
proper technique for hooking into a fish on a circle
hook is typically either winding down on them, which is
(06:38):
feeling the tug and instead of lifting the rod tips swiftly,
just reeling in line until the fish becomes taught, or
allowing the fish to fully take a bait when they
are at full gallop, which is a term seldom used
for fish. I'll admit, you tighten the drag down on them,
which will turn the hook into you know, ideally the
(06:59):
corner of the fish his mouth, and they will set themselves,
which kind of brings to mind the I don't know
if any of you delinquents ever watched some of those
YouTube videos of like the bike set up in the
bad neighborhood and it's got like a chunk of monofilament
on it, and thieves come up and steal the bike
and try to ride away, and then the line comes
taut and they go flying off the bike. It's kind
(07:20):
of like that maneuver anyway. Poppers. I love throwing topwater
poppers for anything that will eat them, and stripers are
notorious for eating poppers. Surface eating is extremely entertaining and
it's not always happening. There's way more eating going on
(07:41):
subsurface than on the surface, no matter what species you're after.
In order to see how we did, you're gonna have
to check out the newest season of Doss Boat. We're
filming now. We'll keep you posted when it releases. It's
gonna be great for those of you waiting. I will
write up a bunch of facts on bluefish and stripers
in the near future and how they're doing. But this
(08:04):
week I already have way too much to talk about,
so we're moving on to the big fish round up.
Tim Baker, originally of Lagrange, Wisconsin, caught fifteen different species
to start off that state's fishing season. In three days,
he had voted a muskie, the fish of ten thousand casts,
and a surprise sturgeon after that. The collecting was on
(08:26):
Northern Pike bofin Walleye. Pumpkin seed, bluegill, croppy, cart bullhead,
large mouth bass, small mouth bass, channel catfish, brown and
rip trout rounded out the list. I am willing to
bet Tim never had so much fun focusing on bullhead
or carp or even a pumpkin seed as he did
this week. Well done and a good reminder to the
(08:47):
rest of us that variety is the spice of life.
Sometimes that singular species focus can limit the fun, not
increase it. Next up here in the home state of Montana,
the large mouth bass record has been fishally broken. The
two and a half inch nine point five seven five
pound bass beat the twelve year standing record of eight
(09:11):
point eight pounds, not just by weight but by location
in my opinion anyway. The new record comes from the
Billings City Pond of Lake Elmo, a place we would
occasionally go as kids to dunk worms or grasshoppers and
swim in the overly worm overly green water. Never catching much.
Thank you to the new record holder, Brandon Right, for
(09:32):
keeping the big fish dreams of youth anglers alive. Important
to note that this was Brandon's first ever largemouth bass.
Probably no need to fish for more. Brandon. He dunked
a single worm after showing up the break of ten am,
then set his lawn chair up and proceeded to watch
TikTok videos until he felt a tug, which is one
(09:54):
way to do it. For the sake of the bass
masters tournaments, Let's hope this technique doesn't be I'm overly popular.
According to Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks, six new records
have been entered since August of possibly due to the
increase of participants and increase of overall fishing days related
to quarantine times. Chinook salmon, yellow bullhead, brown trout, walleye,
(10:17):
and smallmouth bass long no sucker are all new state records.
Chinook stand at thirty two point zero five pounds, small
mouth seven point eight four pounds, yellow bullhead fifteen and
a half inches one point nine one pounds, brown trout
thirty two point four two pounds. What's interesting about this
list is the species that likely caught your attention and
(10:41):
admittedly mine thirty two pound brown trout, thirty two pound chinook,
almost an eight pound small mouth, almost that trophy bass.
Robert Earle Keene always sings about. Even the walleye I'm
going to tell you about are considered non native species
in the state of Montana. I'd say considered because there
are some folks that think it would have behooved the
(11:03):
walleye to be called a native. The walleye cousin, the sauger,
is considered a native species. The robe of the argument
comes from the fact that the majority of the state
of Montana falls within the potential native range of walleye.
But all of the walleye data matches stocked or introduced
walleye strands, and we have not found any walleye DNA
(11:24):
or more specifically, walleye haplotypes that stand out as anything
different that would indicate a native species growing and evolving
in Montana waters. As for the wall i record, that
one just this week beats the fourteen year old record
of seventeen point seven five pounds that has stood since
(11:44):
two thousand seven, reportedly out of Holter Lake, just outside
of the state capital of Helena, Montana, a thirty two
point to five inch two inches in growth that's tape
around the belly, weighing in at eighteen point zero two pounds.
Is your new flaky white, kind of tasteless state record.
(12:05):
Of course, I'm picking on the die hard wiley anglers
out there because it's fun. Specifically, our own Seph Morris,
a k a. The flip Flop Flesher, is a good
example of these walleye types. We just spent two weeks
in Hawaii playing in the salt water, and all I
could talk about was the fact that walleye fishing is
still for him. After this record catch, recorded so close
(12:28):
to meat eater headquarters, it's safe to say old Seth
may not leave the state ever again. Out of the
same reservoir in the same week came another new record catch,
This one of a long nose sucker nineteen and a
half inches four point to one pounds beats the previous
month old record of three point four two pounds. Don't
let the name fool you, the long no sucker is
(12:50):
actually a really good looking fish. Next up New York
state angler twelve year old Finn and Murphy just one
fifteen thousand for catching twenty six pound chinook. Quick recap
on those numbers. Finning his twelve the fish is twenty
six and the prize of fifteen got it good. Every
year finning his dad and his friends participate in the
(13:12):
Spring Lake, Ontario County's Derby. Last year, Finn did not
get a chance to reel in a fish, so this
year he was at the front of the line, which
is really great etiquette for a sport fishing situation. The
official weight was twenty six pounds ten ounces. Finn made
by a new nerve gun, presents for his folks and
a new fishing pole for himself, which is pretty good.
(13:35):
You know, if you're twelve years old and you got
a freezer full of salmon and fifteen thousand in your pocket,
wonder what that feels like. Next up, the US Fish
and Wildlife Service, conducting fishing surveys for Lake Sturgeon on
the Detroit River between St. Clair and Lake Erie, caught
a two forty pounds six ft ten inch four ft
around Lake Sturgeon in order to get that big US fish.
(13:57):
Wildlife Service speculates that the fish has been swimming since
at least nineteen twenty in the Detroit River. Which makes
me think of what this bottom feeding fish has consumed
in her long lifetime. Detroit grew from a population of
almost a million people in nineteen twenty, which again is
the general time of the sturgeon's birth, to almost two
(14:19):
million in nineteen fifty. These were the prime just dumping
in the river years, which makes me think that this
gal has an iron stomach. The largest lake sturgeon on
record is three pounds, and there are an estimated sixty
hundred lake sturgeon swimming in the Detroit River. This giant
female sturgeon was wade, measured, tagged, and released, Meaning your
(14:43):
odds of catching this same two forty pound taller than
you or most anyone you know fish is only one,
which oddly enough, is considered your chance of dying in
a car crash or from the flu if you fancy
yourself an angler. Right now you're thinking so, you're telling
me there's a chance. Next up, Chase Gibson out of
(15:07):
West Virginia with a new state record muskie. Chase beat
the two thousand seventeen muskie record of fifty three and
a half inches thirty four and a half pounds with
his fifty four inch thirty nine point six pound female
out of Brunsville Reservoir. Biologist Aaron Yeager showed up to
officially way the fish for Gibson and is equally happy
with the catch as it is a good marker of
(15:30):
fishery restoration efforts in the area. He notes that it's
possible that another angler could catch the released fish in
the fall and set a new new state record. Well,
let's hope for Gibson's sake that he can get a
respectable amount of time on the leaderboard. Congrats to the
fishery restoration and the big fish. That's it for the
(15:51):
big Fish round up. We're moving on. As you know,
it's never a dull moment. At the crime desk, a
Montana man was charged with a violation of Montana Code
annotated eighty seven Dash six Dash four one five, which
is hunting without landowner permission, a misdemeanor crime. The hunter
(16:14):
was also issued a warning for the same violation hunting
without landowner permission, as well as a warning for illegal
possession of wildlife. And that hunter was me if this
is shocking news to you, welcome to the club. On October.
I screwed up in a way. I just didn't think
(16:37):
it was possible. A shot of buck and doe antelope
on what I thought was BLM ground, but was actually
private ground belonging to a coal company. When I went
to retrieve those antelope, I crossed a set of railroad tracks.
Just to be clear about the situation, I was on
BLM attempting to shoot antelope on BLM, but what I
(16:58):
did was shoot across us the boundary onto the coal
company property. I was met at my vehicle by a
game warden who was on his way home for the night,
and shown the errors of my ways. My previous thoughts
of having a cold beer while skinning antelope turned to
thoughts of crawling into a hole and just dying real quick.
(17:19):
The warning hunting without land owner permission resulted from crossing
railroad tracks and not at a railroad crossing. The railroad
bed and right of way is private property no matter
where it is located or you come across it. The
only legal place to cross railroad tracks is at a
railroad crossing. In rural America, this easement is often, but
(17:44):
not always, where you can drive a vehicle across the
railroad tracks. In this case, once I crossed the railroad tracks.
I left BLM land and entered private land no excuses.
As I mentioned, I also received a warning for ill
legal possession of wildlife. I received this warning because once
(18:04):
I grabbed the antelope and tagged them, I possessed them
illegally because I did not have the landowner permission to
hunt on the property. Had I realized I was on
private land that I had just illegally hunted, I could
have avoided this warning by calling the game warden before
I touched the animals. The golden hunting rule is called
the game warden as soon as you know you've made
(18:26):
a mistake. Unfortunately, I didn't realize I'd made a mistake
until the warden met me at my car, which was
after I had the antelope in possession. Had I called
him before touching the animals, I would have still incurred
the charge of hunting without landowner permission, but avoided the
warning for illegal possession of wildlife. Not that things would
have been better for me, but I thought I would
(18:47):
have just explained that one to you. On top of
all that, the game warden also informed me that I
had not renewed my license plates on time, which I
believe is the only time throughout this entire pross that
I laughed, not because any of this is funny, but
because when you serve yourself a big poop sandwich, you
(19:07):
may as well have seconds. That October I entered a
guilty plea in open court for hunting without landowner permission.
I asked for a deferred sentence, which means that with
no further violations in six months, I could apply for
a dismissal of the charges, which the judge granted. I
was ordered to pay a fine of one five dollars
(19:28):
plus court fees of thirty five dollars, and the two
antelope were confiscated. To be clear, the seizure of the
antelope happened right away. I helped load them into the
warden's truck. Shooting something and not utilizing it or having
a say in how it is utilized by confiscation is,
as it turns out, a similar feeling to shooting a
(19:50):
bowl and recovering it. Only when the meat is ruined.
It does not feel good. Earlier this month I sent
in my petition and my guilty lee was withdrawn. The
judgment was vacated, the charge itself was dismissed. This is
the reason you have not heard this story until now.
I wanted to close one chapter before opening another. The
(20:14):
seventy and fines and fees is about what I would
spend voluntarily on fuel and a long weekend of hunting.
The loss of the meat is the more serious of
the fines. To be clear, I hate that I screwed up.
I hate that this happened. I even hate that all
I can do is call it a mistake. There's nothing
and no one to point to other than myself. This
(20:35):
is definitely something that has helped me gain perspective on
all the wildlife crime reported here on the Weekend Review.
I learned through mistakes more than anything. I make plenty
and have learned lots. I hope by sharing this I
can help others avoid my mistakes. While I am, by
no means proud of this, I admit freely that up
(20:56):
until this incident, I had a very laws a fair
attitude about railroad tracks. I grew up crossing them without concern.
I learned to hunt in an area where at the
time it felt like it was impossible to hunt without
crossing the tracks sand's easement, But looking back, I know
that's not the case. The truth. You just can't hunt
(21:19):
as easily or as efficiently without crossing them or wherever
you want, which is just another example of the hard
way being the right way. Now. Despite what I just
said about rail company land, I have never had a
give no ships or disrespectful attitude about private property. We
(21:40):
have some ground in my family, and I have knocked
on plenty of doors to get access to private ground
in many states, with permission comes the responsibility of respecting
the boundaries of that land, sometimes even policing it, and
not screwing it up. This time, though, I did screw up,
which is why I decided on the side of the
(22:02):
road back in October of last year to declare my guilt,
take my just desserts, and talk about it here on
the podcast. Quick side note just desserts spelled with one
s is a phrase I have used in the past,
but looked up the definition of just now, and it
means the punishment that one deserves. It's a struggle to
(22:24):
find anything positive to come out of this situation. But
if I can impart something, it's this. Watch your railroad
tracks and right of ways. They're in the hunting regulations
for a reason. No matter how long you hunt, you
can still lose your situational awareness when you narrow down
your field of view to focus on the meat. Had
(22:46):
I shot on the right hand side of the group
of antelope versus the left hand side, I would have
had a buck and dough laid out on blm ground,
not private ground, which in this case would have limited
this list of screw ups, not erased them. Finally, you
won't have to worry about the boundary or property line
(23:08):
if you don't hunt on the boundary or property line.
I report on a lot of wildlife crime here on
the Weekend Review, some odd, some funny, some sad, some
very similar to my case. The hypocrisy here is not
lost on me. It's humiliating. There's a temptation inside of
(23:30):
me to just cover this up, to not be the
one who breaks my own story about my own fallibility.
But I feel that I owe something to you people.
I mean to you folks that trust me enough to
listen to me week in and week out, and you
folks that trust me enough to financially support this show.
I owe you an honest take on who I am,
(23:51):
and right here today, who I am is a guy
that's screwed up, So to all of you, I'm sorry,
Move and on. Thirty nine year old Kevin Mackenzie was
arrested last month at JFK Airport with thirty five chestnut
bellied seed finches nestled inside of hair curlers sewn into
(24:13):
his clothes. Mackenzie was not attempting to start a new
cuckoo clock hair do craze. He was smuggling this particular
kind of finch, known in Guyana as the Tawatawa, to
supply the fiercely competitive birds singing contests in Queens, New York,
specifically in phil Scooter Risutto Park in Richmond Hill, Queens,
(24:34):
where on the weekends you'll see crowds of Guyanese men
gathered around pairs of cloth covered bird cages mounted on
five foot polls. The covers come off, the finches see
each other and because their male, they will start singing
their territorial mating call, trying to establish dominance. The tawitawa
is particularly prized because it has an extremely well muscled synx.
(24:57):
The syrinx is the junction of the two bronch gel
tubes that connect the bird's lungs and throat. And it
controls the bursts of air that produced bird song. While
many bird species only have two muscle pairs at the syrinx,
the Tawatawa has up to nine, so they're distinctive and
very loud zert sound makes them truly amazing singers. So
(25:21):
back to the competition, two referees will count the number
of discrete rites in the first bird to fifty wins.
Tawitawa finches become increasingly valuable the more they win, sometimes
fetching up to eight grand for a top breeding male.
Wild Tawatawa from Guyana are thought to be the best birds,
(25:41):
and so smugglers like Mackenzie are caught every year in
violation of the Lacy Act, which bans the import of
and commerce in wildlife. US fish and wildlife worries specifically
about Guyanese finches spreading Newcastle disease, a virus that affects
the avian nervous system and can cause twitch sting of
the head and neck in domestic poultry and lead to paralysis.
(26:04):
Plus traffic in these birds is emptying Guyanese for us
of Tawitawa, a different but similar finch with an even
more muscular Syrinx has been extirpated from Guyana in the
past twenty years. The Tawatawa is heading in a similar direction.
So even though Finch singing battles in the park sound
(26:24):
like more interesting entertainment to me than American idol, I
tipped my hat to the customs official who spotted those
curlier bulges in Mackenzie's duds and wondered why his jacket
was going to zerad Rider. That's all I've got for
you this week. Thank you so much for listening. As
(26:44):
per usual, if you want to tell me how I'm doing,
what I'm messing up, and what's going on in your
neck the woods, right in to a s K C
A L. That's asked how at the Mediator dot com.
And remember to check out www dot steel Dealers dot
com s T I h L Dealers dot com to
find aiden well read, knowledgeable, super nice steel dealer near
(27:09):
you to help you with all of your chainsaw, trimmer
and snipper needs for the summer in the upcoming hunting season.
Thanks again, I'll talk to you next week.
Popular Podcasts
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
The Nikki Glaser Podcast
Every week comedian and infamous roaster Nikki Glaser provides a fun, fast-paced, and brutally honest look into current pop-culture and her own personal life.