Episode 269 - Captain Erik Lennartz

Welcome to another informative episode of the Backlash Podcast featuring Captain Erik Lennertz who owns and operates Tactical Angling Guide Service. This episode is a treasure-trove of insights, valuable tips, and behind-the-scenes exploration into the world of fishing.

The discussion primarily revolves around maximizing fishing success under diverse circumstances - unpredictable spring weather, heavy winds, and varying water temperatures. Erik, with his years of experience and hands-on knowledge, explains how one can adapt, survive, and even thrive in such conditions by selecting the right lake, using a wind tamer line, and staying updated with weather forecasts.

Digging deeper into the fishing techniques and strategies, this episode highlights the importance of understanding spawning patterns and choosing the right bait for different fish. Erik shares some interesting anecdotes about his experiments with different baits and techniques in line with the unpredictability of the season and the fish.

Dive deeper into the thrilling world of bass fishing with our host and seasoned musky angler. This detailed exploration covers the usage of larger baits, the rewarding challenges that each season brings, and the impressive rise of female anglers in this sport.

In the final segment of the podcast, we talk about the increasing use of technology in fishing, specifically the role of forward-facing sonar, and the advantages of having a blend of traditional fishing skills and modern tools. From sharing personal favorites from the St. Croix musky rods lineup to a rapid-fire Q&A session on preferred fishing methods, this episode leaves no stone unturned.

Captain Erik Lennartz provides a unique blend of practical advice, personal experiences, and theoretical knowledge, making this episode a must for fishing enthusiasts and anyone interested in unlocking the secrets to the timeless charm of fishing.

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Music.

(00:06):
Welcome to another episode of Backlash Podcast on the eve of the southern,
not necessarily the eve, a couple eves we have to go yet before the southern
Wisconsin opener for muskies.
Actually, it's for all game fish in Wisconsin, but muskies in the southern zone.
It's everybody's, it's one of our favorite weekends, right?

(00:26):
We look forward to this one, the northern Wisconsin opener, the Minnesota opener, Canada.
Canada I mean in a month and a half everybody in
the muskie range will be happy we'll all be out there fishing all all
will be right with the world so this week we are
going to talk to Captain Eric Lennertz with Tactical Angling
and we're going to talk about southern Wisconsin because it's that

(00:47):
time it's been two years since we've talked to him and we literally almost
talked to him two years to the day and we're going to talk we're
going to break it down for you kind of what to expect on the
water for this weekend and so if if
you're getting out hopefully you'll be able to take a little something from this and
and apply it to your angling this weekend
and we we hope that everybody gets a great start to

(01:08):
their muskie season brad i don't know
that i'm actually going to get out for this muskie opener and that's okay because
i do actually think i will probably get out in the south at some point before
the northern season opens and that is a rarity for me i do not do that very
often well you're a busy man jeff so i i can kind of relate yeah you know it's one

(01:30):
of them things where I've actually had the invite a few times too,
to come to the Southern Wisconsin opener and I have yet to do it.
So it's a tough time of the year when you're a bait manufacturer, as you know, selling.
I'll get through some of that, and then I am going to finally head south.
I was going to earlier, and we got flooded out down south, so I still have not

(01:53):
casted at a muskie, but it'll happen here shortly.
Yeah, that's great. I'm looking forward to that. Make sure you tell your little
buddy that he has to catch a fish on a certain bait, Brad. You know what bait
I'm talking about, right?
I'm pretty sure he has, if I'm not mistaken. Are you sure?
I think so. So I know the very first time he put the bait in the water,

(02:15):
just to kind of look at it again, he had a fish literally the very first time
he set it in the water, like 10 feet from the boat and the fish came and swiped at it.
So I, I, I'm pretty sure he's caught on it, but I can't tell you for sure.
Like a 99%. The last time I had spoken to him or text with him,
I don't, I don't speak to too many people, but the last time I had text with

(02:36):
him, he told me that at most everything was
hanging shallow and he didn't have the shallow version of it
and so therefore he wasn't using it much
yet and so he's like i anticipate this changing
real soon so make sure when you get down there that's priority we have to get
that and if i don't care if he catches it first or you catch it first i just

(02:57):
need somebody to catch on it because it's it's it's something that you know
we've been teasing about this for a while some people may have a better idea about what's going
on here but we'll we'll let the cat out of the bag here shortly i need to get
some of the production baits in my hand and get them out fishing to guys and
now that muskie season is you know approaching we can get those out to people

(03:17):
and and get them fishing them so it's it's,
nothing i mean i don't want to say this is groundbreaking right brad but it's
definitely something that people wanted for about 20 years from what i understand
yeah for sure i think that it fills a gap that is probably well-needed.
Yeah. And so we will let you know that it will be exclusive to me and the manufacturer

(03:38):
and we will, we'll get you.
Don't worry. Well, we'll be doing details here.
You know, as soon as I feel like it's ready to go full on cat out of the bag,
watch our social media for teasers here in the next coming weeks,
as soon as people start getting them chewed on and it'll be a fun,
a fun new toy to play around with this season. That's for sure.

(03:59):
So is there a few people with them in their hands yet, Jeff,
or is it just Chase and I? No, it is just Chase and you and me.
Those are the only ones that have them. But other people should be getting them, I hope, fairly soon.
Like we have the ability to make production baits now, and I have,

(04:19):
I don't know how many of them I told them to make up to start with.
It must've been 60 and I got a list of a bunch of different,
you know, colors from people.
And so I'll, I know right now you guys are dealing with white.
And so hopefully you'll be able to, I'll be able to get you some more colors here too.
We'll be able to upgrade your color palette. I'm just not positive how fast
it'll, how fast that'll come.

(04:41):
But I mean, literally musky season starts like in five days,
three days from when people hear this.
And so I want to be able to get them into people's hands very soon.
It's, you know, we'll, we'll start teasing it more and we'll tell
you all the details on it very soon but it's just something that not quite there
yet we're not quite ready to spill all the beans i need brad or chase to catch
on it first and then i it then the cat will be out of the bag well we're throwing

(05:05):
the albino right but i mean it's white exactly.
Yeah well you gotta i mean you gotta make do
with if if color is your thing you're you get the absence
of color right or is that or is black the absence of color i
can't remember which one is what but anyways so i'm pretty good
with sharpie so we can make it whatever well when
when we got him from the guy that made him

(05:27):
that he had him laying on a bag that had a bunch of sharpie on it so they already
looked like crappie pattern ish kind of because because the you know the magic
marker wore off on half of them but it's cool there's yep there's a shallow
version of it and i will tell you it's the best shallow version of this particular
bait that you've ever seen so it'll be awesome,
But it'll be fun times. Anyways, Brad, I don't know what else you got going

(05:51):
on. What's going on in the Muskie Mayhem Tackle World?
Because I haven't, I really haven't talked to you that much. You went on vacation.
I got some pictures and looks like you had a good vacation. And then,
you know, you were radio silent and I had to text your wife today to find out
if you were alive to even do a podcast.
Well, unfortunately, when we take a vacation, we play catch up.
And so that's kind of been the gig. We got home late Tuesday night and just

(06:16):
went right to work, basically.
So that's what happens when you're a tackle manufacturer, I guess.
But playing a little catch-up, hence the reason you weren't able to get a hold of me as quick as normal.
And yeah, that's about it. We're just pumping out some orders.
You know, it's that time of the year for a lot of shops with the season just beginning.
They are in the need of bait at this point. So it's all good.

(06:40):
I mean, it's that time of year, Brad. It's not quite blade season yet, but it's getting there.
And you know, if you're looking for, if you're looking for baits,
you know, make sure you check out muskymayhemtackle.com, check out teamrhinooutdoors.com.
I know the new Savage Burbit Tube, that thing has been fairly hot for sales for the last week or so.

(07:01):
We have that. So go check that out. And I, if you pay attention to my Team Rhino
Outdoors, Musky Fishing Podcast, I did a one with Herbie And we're talking about
a new topwater option from Livingston lures called the big Mac.
I actually got a chance to play with that the other day. And that seems like
it's going to be, it's going to fill the niche in a few people's tackle boxes.
Hopefully we'll have that towards the end of May, early part of June.

(07:24):
So if you want, you can go on our website and sign up to get notified when that baby comes in.
I don't know. Oh, Sims. I had, I knew a new shirt from Sims.
I know that's not going to excite you, Brad, because you're looking for stuff from AFCO.
But if you want some Sims branded gear, we got a little bit of that.
And I got a new jacket and we still do have AFCO hoodies, Brad.
And actually those things have been solid. I still need to reorder a few more,

(07:45):
but check out team rhino outdoors.com.
And Brad, did I, it didn't cover it all. I didn't do the, uh,
big bladed flashabou, bucktail, the originators and all that fun stuff.
Why don't you handle that today?
I don't want, I don't want to do everything. thing i mean the conversation with eric
i pretty much handled it all so here you go do a little bit of work it's
no problem musky mayhem tackle.com yeah you

(08:07):
can check us out online like that and yes we
are the original big bladed lashaboo bait so pretty much anything kind of blade
style you can check it out at muskymayhemtackle.com and that'll be it let's
dial up our conversation we had with eric hopefully eric can you know key you
in to get you started a little bit on on,

(08:27):
you know, what he's been seeing on the water. He's been doing some multi-species fishing.
So I hope you be a little more successful if you're out chasing muskies this
weekend. So I'm going to go dial up that conversation right now.
All right. Our guest this week is Captain Eric Lennertz with Tactical Angling.
Eric, thank you very much for taking time out of your schedule.

(08:50):
I know that it's very busy with the Southern Wisconsin opener coming right up.
And then i mean you're still out there guiding every
day you did a double today so i appreciate you you
know coming on today and talking a little bit about what what to expect for
the southern wisconsin opener absolutely i'm happy to do it you know it's been
a weird year i mean it's we think we had some really warm temperatures in march

(09:13):
you know kind of spurred some early weed growth and kind of got things going
and then you know everybody was thinking okay we're rolling and right into early summer,
you know, and obviously we had some of the April, we had that April snowstorm,
and it's been so inconsistent,
you know, and I mean, I think, like I always say, you know, being out every
day this time of year, you get a really good idea of what's going on,

(09:36):
you know, and it's been an interesting year. Lots of ups and downs.
You know, some of the areas that historically I've seen really good weed growth
have been, you know, kind of somewhat bare this year. You know,
I think a lot of it is kind of sunlight focused.
Some of the bays that are getting a lot of light have good weed growth.
But there's areas that I haven't fished a ton in the past where I have found really good weeds.

(10:00):
So, you know, I think the name of the game is warm water.
What I've noticed a lot lately that's been kind of interesting is we've had
a lot of bigger wind days where it's blown 15 to 20 mile an hour.
And what that does is, you know, it's really concentrated, it's concentrated
some of our warmer water in areas that.
You maybe wouldn't normally find warm water. And then another thing it's done

(10:23):
in some of my backwater areas that I really like to fish in the spring,
it's pushed the warm water out of there.
So in areas that I've done really well in the past, early on in the spring.
Water's crystal clear, there's minimal weed growth, and, you know, and it's colder.
So it's been an interesting year. I mean, I've spent a lot of time on the bow
with the behemoths on scanning, you know, So kind of keep in here,

(10:47):
keeping your trolling motor on a higher speed and paying attention to what's going on that way.
Yeah. And when you mentioned the big wind, that is what I was going to talk
about a little bit was, was big wind because it's been windy.
I mean, it feels like every single day. It's like every, yeah, it's like every day.
Even this morning, you know, I walked out to the shop and it was mostly calm,

(11:08):
but it didn't take long and it was blowing again.
And over the weekend it was blowing and it's just been, you know,
major wind after major wind.
Let's talk about that for a second how do you even combat that
like what's the what's your best world or boat control i struggle
so i struggle a little bit when we've
got panfish trips and i actually know this is a musky show but you

(11:29):
know the the it's a little it can be a little challenging in the wind boat control
is not really an issue i mean i spend a lot of time at the council with you
know with my i-pilot controller in my hand and and i just you know If it's an
area that I know we've got a lot of good weeds, I just slow down.
And I guess what we like to do is if we're fishing good weeds for bass or panfish,

(11:52):
I spot lock it into the wind and we'll cast at the structure,
whatever it is, whether it's rock, wood, or weeds. And that seems to work really well.
I've noticed people struggle a little bit in heavy winds with braided line.
It can always be a concern with the wind knots and stuff like that.
And one thing that's kind of helpful to me is I've been using that Fins wind tamer line.

(12:16):
It's a little more rigid, and that's been good for dealing with some of those heavy wind days.
But another thing we've done is if, like Saturday, it blew 22 miles an hour,
I started earlier in the day than I normally would.
And usually I like to start a little bit later in April, just because once the
water warms up, those fish get a little more active.
Stuff starts moving around, panfish move around, and the bass follow them.

(12:41):
And I started a little earlier in the day and we just, it was,
it was too windy to do anything other than just hide out, you know?
So we had to find somewhat shoreline protected shoreline areas where we could just tuck away.
And I fished a lake that's got a lot of them. So, you know, it worked out and
we caught, we caught a pretty good number of fish.
I was actually kind of surprised because it had been a little slow in that week.

(13:02):
But I think if you don't use your electronics and your, your spot lock, you just got to hide out.
Well, I think moving into the weekend, I don't know if you've looked ahead to
that, but that looks like potential for more of the same on Saturday.
I saw, you know, gust to 40 miles an hour, you know, granted it's Monday night,
so it's, we still got plenty of time, but it looks like you,

(13:22):
you might have a little bit to deal with there for people that are heading out
for the opener. Yeah, yeah.
So I've seen what we've got here is I've seen a predicted southeast at like 10 to 15.
But I take everything that I see in the forecast this time of year with a complete
grain of salt. I mean, it changes everything.
I would say every couple of hours, it seems like, you know, there was days,

(13:45):
I mean, I guided last Friday and it was supposed to be a soaker and it did, it did blow.
But I mean, I was looking at canceling the trip because I figured,
you know, nobody wants to fish in pouring rain and wind.
So I figured, you know, if we can get rid of the rain, we'll still run it.
And the rain ended up holding off.
But the forecast is so inconsistent in the spring that I really don't pay a ton of attention to it.

(14:08):
They have been very spot on with the wind. but you
know anytime you're fishing a body of water especially a larger
body of water you know that you never know what
it's going to do with the rain it might it might push that front you
know a different direction or or whatever but you know i don't know what what
to make of it really as far as you know it's it's been inconsistent but i think

(14:29):
the best thing is just just keep checking it as as the week progresses yeah
and you know the one kind of unfortunate thing about the southern opener is
it's you know a lot of the lakes there are kind
of big and open, I think for the most part, obviously there's places you can hide,
but you know, like when you go up to Northern Wisconsin, there's umpteen million amount of lakes.
You can, you know, you just choose one that's a lot smaller or wind protected or, you know, whatever.

(14:53):
So there's a lot more options for you when you run into these conditions in
the Northern opener versus the South and the South you're, you're fairly limited
on the amount of lakes you can fish.
I agree. I agree. And I mean, you know, it's a little different.
I mean, when When we're, when we're, when I'm fishing with somebody that's incredibly
inexperienced and we're throwing, you know, light tungsten ice jigs and stuff like that.

(15:13):
I mean, wind really, really plays a factor.
I mean, if you're throwing bigger
musky baits, I don't think you need to worry about it quite as much.
I mean, I just, I wouldn't, I wouldn't pound baits into the wind.
I would find, I would try to find weeds or, or find a protected bay and set
yourself up to make a drift. You know, that would be, that would be my recommendation.

(15:34):
And so let's, we can't talk early season muskies without talking about spawning
fish. What do you think the, what's the prediction there? Are these muskies done?
I'm assuming they don't all do it at one time. So even if you think some are
done, there's probably some that still haven't. What, what are we looking like on that front?
You know, I, so I haven't seen any fish paired up when I've been out fishing.

(15:55):
I did stop by, you know, there's a Oconomowoc bridge.
You can always see the fish in the refuge. They're paired up if they're spawning.
And I saw two, you know, two paired up there on Saturday afternoon,
but I just stopped to look at, look at it while I was, while I was on my way home.
But I've seen some big fish, you know, kind of just solo fish,

(16:16):
you know, what seemed like really big kind of dormant females,
you know, just kind of laying on the sand and laying on the bottom with,
I haven't seen a ton with, with a lot of spotting marks on them.
You know, a lot of times you can kind of tell they're a little beat up and I
haven't noticed that this year. And I, other than that, I haven't really seen
a whole lot of fish paired up as far as water temperatures go.

(16:38):
Main lake stuff is in the low to mid fifties. We really had a spike after Saturdays,
you know, 77 degree day or whatever it was.
But a lot of these back days are, are, I've seen, I've seen water as high as today.
I had 61.9 was the highest I saw in some of the back days that are protected,
but, but most of the lake is in that 57 to 60 degree range. So,

(17:01):
you know, I can't really, I don't really know if they're, if they're done or not.
Like you said, you know, many of these fish spawn in waves, but you know,
it's, it's, that's kind of where we're at temperature wise.
So, you know, I wish I had more info on that, but that's, that's what I've noticed.
Well, like you were talking about, you know, kind of the up and down weather

(17:21):
that we've experienced throughout the course of the spring, you know,
like even the last show that we did in Wausau, I had a few people asking,
you know, like, well, how early is, how early is everything going to take place?
And, you know, how early is all this going to, you know, factor in or whatever?
And I'm like, well, I'm not going to get too caught up in it until I see what
happens in April, because I've seen it before where like April is literally

(17:41):
like 38 degrees every single day and it's mostly overcast.
Well, that doesn't do anything, you know, for water temperature.
So I'm like, we need to take a look and see what happens in April.
And obviously you saw it. I mean, we, we didn't see 38, but we saw,
you know, 30 to 70 to 30 to 70. I mean, it's, it's been a pretty tough spring
on the water so far, as far as, you know, that's concerned.

(18:04):
It's, it'll be interesting to see how, how things start out.
I know, I certainly don't think we're going to be nearly as far ahead as what
people anticipated when ice started coming out in early, early March.
Yeah, I agree with you. I mean, last Wednesday night, it got down to 28 degrees
here in Oconomowoc area where I'm from.
So, and I noticed, I mean, you know, as far as I can't say exactly what it's

(18:27):
doing to the muskies, I'm seeing it with the bass.
You know, they're pushing into the shallow bays and the panfish are pushing in and cruising around.
And then we get a cold, cold front like that. And it just, it totally derails
it. I mean, if I had to pick one thing that I just thought completely ruined
spring fishing, whether it's panfish or muskies, it doesn't seem to matter.
It's just a severe cold front in the spring. It's just awful.

(18:49):
But we've got consistent temps the whole week, it looks like.
I mean, I think it's supposed to be like high 60s or 70 on Saturday.
And then we've got a couple of warm days with sunshine predicted this week.
And I think if we have, we actually have those warm, sunny days,
that's going to accelerate things quite a bit.
Yeah, I agree. it'll it's you know something to note though like you know as
far as like time frame for spawning fish i had a customer email me yesterday

(19:14):
i believe in the the dnrs up in green bay tomorrow.
Pulling fish from the nets and so if i remember right compared to last year
and in quite a few years they were pulling nets like the week before the northern
opener so i'm thinking that you know those fish up in green bay are definitely
going to be in there earlier maybe they're not spawning But I'm assuming if they're taking,

(19:36):
you know, if they're, if they're taking, you know, eggs from the fish,
they're, they're ready to start dropping eggs there.
So everything's got to be a slightly ahead as far as the green Bay fish are
concerned, which, you know, for people that follow that. And I know you probably
jump up there a little bit.
It's likely not going to be, I'm thinking the Fox river is likely not going
to be super hot this year.

(19:58):
I'm just guessing. Well, I have a buddy that kind of checks that area out on
a regular, and I guess he did see some fish paired up that way.
So, you know, I mean, it's one of those things where...
You know, it's hard to say. It just depends what our weather does here.
But, you know, it's just another thing with that Fox River. It just gets so

(20:20):
much pressure, you know.
And, you know, pressure is at an all-time high.
You know, the other tributaries are always worth checking out as well.
You know, everybody seems to pile on top of one another in the Fox.
But you can spread out, you know, a little bit and, you know,
have success doing that as well. Sure.

(20:42):
Well, let's talk a little bit about, you know, let's first off,
let's talk about new baits out of the box this year.
Is there anything that you saw? Cause I know you, you made it to a few shows.
I saw you in Milwaukee. I saw you in Wausau briefly.
You know, is there anything that you saw at these shows that make you think,
hmm, I need to have that this year?
Well, I'm kind of a, uh, I'm kind of a sucker for, uh, you know,

(21:04):
glide baits. There's so many different variations and there's so much stuff
that's just, you know, really, really unique.
And, you know, I'm kind of also a guy where if I see something that's,
you know, handcrafted, that's more, you know, not big box production line,
I, you know, I tend to jump on some of that stuff.

(21:26):
But, you know, I like, I mean, I saw a lot of cool stuff at Wausau.
I mean, it was an awesome show.
A lot of cool custom colors and stuff like that. That was actually my first time at the Wausau show.
I usually just work Milwaukee and been there and never ventured up that way.
But there's a lot of stuff that's cool.
I mean, Bill's, I like the drop belly slammers. It is a really cool glide bait

(21:48):
that's not a whole lot of money.
People kind of tend to, you know, I don't know if they just forgot about it
or what, but it's been around for a while.
But that's kind of a favorite of mine early on in the season. Yeah.
You know, some of the Chaos stuff, some of the smaller Chaos stuff I like.
The Conklin baits I thought were really cool. I don't know if you know Mike

(22:09):
Conklin, but he's got some really unique, you know, just, I like cool bait jobs and stuff like that.
You know, and some of those were really neat.
But other than that, I mean, you know, I like some of the basic stuff,
mantas, phantoms, you know, some of the smaller twitch baits and stuff like the 5-inch slammer.

(22:31):
Fatty minnow and then the regular five inch slammers is is
a favorite of mine in the spring we had a we had
a really rough we had kind of a grinder day i
think it was three openers ago and i had some customers come
up from chicago area and we had
like 40 mile an hour gusts i mean it was just it was just really
another big wind day that was tough to fish and we put

(22:53):
bills for we we trolled the slammer minnow
baits the five five inch and seven inch minnow baits and
we ended up putting a 42 in the
boat and we got another smaller one we never bumped and but it was cool it was
the first muskie for the guy so he was he was fired up but you know it was one
of those super windy days where it was just there was nothing you could do you

(23:13):
know other than I mean if you had inexperienced people they were not able to
cast in it you know but other than that.
Not nothing real in particular I mean I'm you know David and Goliath got some
cool stuff out he's got a new sharpshooter out that's kind of neat I haven't
had time to with it yet, but I've got a couple on order.
So they've been hard to get, but it's basically supposed to be.

(23:37):
You know, kind of a different take on a bucktail. I don't know if you've seen
those, but they're, they're cool.
I can't think of anything else. I mean, I, I don't know. I'm kind of one of
those guys where if I see it, put it to work and try it.
And if I have success with it, you know, then, then I like to promote it,
but I've got a lot of new oddball stuff that I've just got to kind of,
kind of put the, put through the paces and see where we end up.

(23:59):
So you're like a typical musky guy. You know, you, you buy a couple things,
you poke around a little bit.
If you like it then you need to buy like 12 of
them right is that that's how that works dude it's out
of control that's why we keep guys like you in business man i do
appreciate it you know it's very it's very kind of you all no man it's you know
how musky guys are i mean we're a little or musky gals i don't want to i don't

(24:22):
want to be one-sided here but you know it's like if if something works i mean
i don't know i probably have 150 of bill Bill Schwartz's slammer baits.
I mean, I've got tons of different Clyde baits, you know, I mean,
just all kinds of, all kinds of stuff.
I mean, I grew up running Bagley's in the summer on, on Pewaukee Lake.
They were, you know, a popular bait back then.

(24:43):
And I probably have one of the best Bagley collections here in the Midwest now,
you know, and a lot of them don't even get run.
It's just like anything else, you know, you, you have success with something, you buy a bunch of it.
The weird thing about it is like sometimes how cyclical things are down there,
you know, like for a while you talked about Bagley's and I think those,
I, from what I understand, they just became hard to get, right.

(25:04):
Is that kind of the deal with those?
So, well, they're, they're Balsa, you know, and guys, guys called them and stuff,
but I mean, they're both that are super chewed off that tend to always continue to run.
But, and then they, they, they changed the process on the way they built them. So.
Some of the later models, they, you know, like half of them were built on a
Friday. You know, the lips were glued and crooked and they never ran right. You couldn't tune them.

(25:27):
And, you know, those baits just, you know, never really got run.
And, you know, but those originals that are just, yeah, you couldn't get them anymore.
And, I mean, they're hand-painted, you know, balsa baits. You know,
they were just, basically, they
were just limited available and they just became more and more limited.
And I basically scoured eBay and anytime I'd see one, I had all kinds of alerts popped up.

(25:51):
Anytime I saw one, I, you know, I felt the need to buy it.
But, you know, a lot of, a lot of those are just, are just collector's items at this point.
I do run, I do run a lot of them, but I mean, I bet I probably have,
I probably have 150 of them, you know, and I've got some I run and some I don't.
But but there's just like anything else there's just a ton of different stuff
out there you know i mean as far as opening day baits i mean i kind of have

(26:15):
an idea what i'm gonna what i'm gonna throw.
But i probably will do a lot of switching i think on opening day i mean you
know i might make might make a small number of casts or something and just keep
keep switching it up until we figure out what the heck they want to eat is that
well let's talk about that that shift up or switch up you know You know,

(26:36):
that's one thing I talk about on this podcast all the time is like,
how long are you going to give a bait before you just say, yep,
that's not the one today.
Because it's so difficult in muskies to, to truly know whether or not you even
contacted a fish that day. Did a fish even see my bait? Did I even give it an opportunity?
You know, I have one, one friend of mine that Kyle that helps me at the shows.

(26:56):
He's a bait switcher. I mean, he'll literally switch baits every 15 minutes.
And I just, I kind of laugh because there's no way I would ever do that.
And i mean what what's your rule of thumb on that you know
if so if i have a lot of confidence in something and i
just and i just feel like and i just feel
like the fish aren't super active or we're not in a window or whatever
it may be i mean i'll keep pounding that bait but i make slight changes i mean

(27:19):
something as as little as just as you know for throwing blades a light a light
blade change uh you know maybe i maybe i throw something with a stagger blade
or a tattered blade or you know or just a slight color shift or something and
the little subtle changes make a big difference You know, early on in the year, like on opener,
I'm going to throw all sorts of stuff. I mean, I, you know, I probably will make...

(27:40):
30 casts with something and change it. And that's basically because I don't
have those fish figured out yet.
And, you know, I'm going to just keep rotating through stuff,
you know, and if it's, if it's a window, if we're in some sort of moon window
or something, I mean, I'm going to stick with what I think is going to make the most sense.
But when it's early on in the year and you don't have the fish pattern, I switch it up a lot.

(28:00):
You know, I'm not the guy that spends more, more, more of the day digging in
his tackle box and fishing, but I do think it's important to switch a lot.
And then, you know, again, I've got baits that I have, I have the utmost confidence
in, and if I'm dialed on something and they're just not eating it,
you know, I'll just say, look, keep throwing it, you know, and the more time
that baits in the water, the better chance you have of connecting with the fish.

(28:21):
I know back in the day when I always made sure that I made it out for the North
or for the Southern opener, I always used it as like spring training,
you know, I hadn't thrown baits in a long time.
So I'd just be rifling through everything that I bought that was new over the
winter. you know, I was a massive bait changer.
And of course I very rarely connected with a muskie on, uh, you know,

(28:42):
the opener, it was more just, I was just excited to be out there throwing muskie baits again.
And I think a lot of, I think a lot of anglers are, are just excited to be out
there throwing muskie baits again.
But I, you know, like I said, it was just spring training for me.
I was just firing off all these new baits that I bought.
Cause I was, man, I was probably some of my competitors.
I was probably their best customer back in the day. Like, I mean,

(29:03):
I would go to every show with, With more, more money than I ever told my wife that I went to with it.
And it was, it was a massive sickness.
In fact, I mean, that's, that's kind of how I ended up turning into a business,
but, uh, you know, so now I, now I rarely make it out for the Southern opener.
I had a few guys text me and they're like, Hey, are you going to make it out?
And I'm like, yeah, not really. If I'm going to, it'll be on Tuesday.

(29:26):
Cause you know, like you said, it's, you know, it's, you know,
my dad always just call like a new year's Eve amateur night at the bars,
you know? And that's kind of how the Southern opener is.
It's kind of amateur night that way as far as just the amount of people out.
That's why I don't guide it.
And I mean, if somebody really wanted to go and make a tradition of it,

(29:46):
I'd consider it. But I'm going to fish with Aaron.
Him and I always have a good time. And we fished last year. I think maybe the year before.
The last year I guided it was when we caught those fish with the guys from Chicago.
But but I like to take I like to jump into opener and and experiment and come up with a plan.
And, you know, I mean, I've always been transparent with customers.

(30:09):
If we do guide opener, it's like, hey, I can't I haven't fished for these things.
So I don't know. You know, everything is an educated guess at this point. So.
Which, you know, a lot of times we've been successful doing that.
But again, it's, it's a matter of, I like to have the fish a little more patterned
when I, when I jumped into it.
And, you know, and at least if you can spend a day or two or the weekend on
the water trying to pattern them, you can, you can, you got a lot more to work

(30:31):
with when you got customers in the boat.
Yeah, for sure. I mean, there's no doubt about that. It's, you know,
and every, every year is a new challenge.
What, you know, we haven't obviously had a lot of precipitate.
I mean, we've been starting to get some rain, but like overall throughout the
course of, you know, winter, we haven't had a lot of runoff.
Are you seeing lake levels down quite a bit in your area or how are we sitting there?

(30:53):
I actually noticed today the lake I was fishing was up a tiny bit,
you know, but we've had a lot of rain the past couple of days and there's an
inlet and outlet on the lake.
So, I mean, maybe it just hasn't all run down, you know, and drained out yet.
But, you know, I think levels are kind of about where they normally are.
I mean, you know, like you said, it hasn't been a year normally.
You get the stuff up north where you've got quite a bit of snow on the ground

(31:17):
and, you know, that all melts off in the spring and you get a ton of runoff
and higher water levels.
And it was a year where we had, I mean, if you were a snowmobiler,
you were super frustrated because we just didn't have a whole lot of snow,
you know. So, and that holds true.
I mean, we had one, you know, one significant snowstorm here,
but that holds true here.
So, I think water levels are kind of about where they normally are.

(31:38):
And I mean, there's rain kind of predicted all week, but who knows if we'll get it or not.
And, you know, I don't know how big of a role that's going to play as far as,
you know, the water levels go.
I wouldn't say that it's definitely not something that I base any of my plans
on as far as, you know, that goes, as long as I can get the boat in there.
I don't worry about, I don't worry about that. I mean, the muskies will figure

(31:58):
it out, right? They're not, they're not concerned about that type of stuff for us.
It's, it's all, it's all mind game stuff that we play around with.
In like like you said though for us we
only had a couple measurable snows we had one in it
was literally the weekend before the chicago show and if
we had had had the chicago show that weekend it
would have been disastrous we'd had nobody at that show and

(32:20):
then i think we had well maybe it was like the weekend after the
wasa show i think right around there or
that week of it we had another or the week after
maybe maybe it was the week after the week after that i
don't remember but we had a very large snow up here too
so but since then it seems like we've been getting
enough precipitation enough rain so hopefully things will

(32:41):
things will level out because it's been in my
area you know it's been it's been dry for a while i know brad you you was it
last year the year before that you guys were dealing with extreme drought uh
three years ago three seasons ago and by the i don't know the end of july first
couple weeks of august it was pretty ugly like getting your boat in the water.

(33:03):
That was the biggest factor for us.
I would say that, you know, we had a rain about a week ago and that kind of
brought the lake back up to where they were, say, pre-ice up this last fall.
And since then, we've had multiple inches of rain here the last three, four days.
So I haven't been down to check things out, but I can tell you my pond is back up to a better level.

(33:28):
So I do think it'll balance out.
You know, that's the one thing with Mother Nature. everybody kind
of panics and they don't relate to a
week can make a massive difference i don't care
if it's water temps or or water levels
it just it just takes one good rain or it
just takes you know a couple days of sun and it

(33:51):
balances back out but us as musky anglers
we're always concerned about weird stuff and it usually
just balances itself back out yeah i
agree with brad i mean that's one of those things where you know
you can't really now water level's a minimal thing
i mean i think you know you're gonna catch a hundred you're
gonna catch a hundred percent more fish if you get out there and go fish and

(34:12):
then you what if you sat on the couch so just get out there and do
it you know yeah brad you've
said that a bazillion times on the podcast can't catch them from the couch so
true it sounds like you you
tend to skew on the small side for the
the opener do you ever experiment with large
baits i have yeah i have you know

(34:35):
i think sometimes you know large bait it's it's an easy meal i don't shy away
from it i mean you know between the three of us i mean we all know and a majority
of musky anglers know that you know musky will if you're throwing them you know
small jerk bait or you know bait that's in the four to six inch range i mean I mean,
that's an easy meal, you know, for a muskie.

(34:57):
I mean, you know, and you know how big of meals they can eat.
You know, I mean, right now I'm catching bass on bigger baits,
you know. So it's like they're not hesitant.
You know, I think going with a larger bait, they'll eat it.
I mean, if you get it around a fish that's an opportunistic feeder,
that's hungry, that's, you know, the right scenario, I don't see why a big bait wouldn't work.

(35:18):
I tend to skew on the smaller side. And one of the reasons I do that is I think
I see more fish with the smaller baits, and it just gives me more feedback.
You know, the more fish I see, the more of an idea I have of what's going on,
what they're responding to, and what I can potentially throw to,
you know, get some action.
And I feel like with customers, you know, I'm always looking for more bites

(35:39):
because I feel like with musky fishing, I mean, if you work your butt off for
eight hours for one or two bites, you know, you want to, you want to,
the more, the more the merrier with that type of thing.
Because you want more of the experiences so that they can get better at setting
the hook and things like that.
So I would say, you know, I tend to err on the side of small dates,

(35:59):
but, you know, a lot of that's personal preference of just what I've historically done well with.
You said that you have been catching bass on larger baits. I don't bass fish hardly ever.
I want to because my 10-year-old son wants to get into it. What's a large,
what, you know, how long is a large bait for bass fishing?
Like five-inch jerkbaits, you know, big jerkbaits, five, you know,

(36:21):
and I mean, I try not to throw a ton of big jerkbaits and stuff because I don't,
I don't want to encounter muskies this time of year.
You know, I mean, the season's closed and, you know, now that we have the ability to
catch and release bass fish you know it's it's nice that we can go out
there i mean i don't keep bass in my boat anyways and and
all of our bass are catch and release you know to begin with but
it's nice to be able to go out there and and throw moving baits

(36:44):
rattle traps jerk baits channel baits spinner baits all that that moving stuff
because you know they'll they'll chase and eat this time of year which is a
fun way to catch them yeah you know we we talked about lots of different factors
like how is the bass fishing this season been compared to normal i mean if
we can kind of try to pull it into maybe what we can expect out of the muskie

(37:05):
season early on, how's, how's bass fishing been?
We've had, we've had kind of a grinder week last week was a little tough.
You know, I, I've, I've been walleye fishing the majority of April and I'm transferring
over to bass here. And it has been a little tough.
I mean, you know, part of that is, you know, I, I think I can go out and catch

(37:26):
them, but, you know, a lot of times some of the baits that we're throwing,
you know, I might get somebody in the boat that's maybe never casted before.
So it's like you've got to keep in mind that depending on, you know,
you fish with people of all skill levels.
So, you know, I know I can work a jerkbait very well.
You know, when I get somebody that's new to fishing in the boat,
it might take them an hour to get the hang of it. You know, and I work with them constantly.

(37:48):
But, I mean, it has been a little tough. I thought Saturday was going to be
a tougher day. Saturday they bit well.
I mean, we caught, you know, a handful of them. We had a couple of pike by mistake too.
Too, but it has been a little tough, and I attribute a lot of that to the temperature
swings and just, you know, a lot of the bays and stuff that have that warmer water,

(38:09):
that constant wind has been pushing stuff around, and it's been moving the panfish
around, and the bass are moving, and, you know, and they may move in.
I mean, you know, we see bass that are funneling into the bays when we get a
warm day, and then, you know, they kind of push off if you get one of those
nights like we had last week where it was 28 degrees, you know,
so it's fairly inconsistent.

(38:30):
Do you ever, I know, I know you're always busy guiding. So my guess is no,
but do you ever sneak down to like any of the Southern areas,
Illinois, Tennessee, Ohio, Indiana to do a little early season muskies or is that.
You don't, I, you know, it's, it's not that it's not on my list, but usually by the time.

(38:51):
I basically, I died up until December in most cases, you know,
last year was kind of the same program, you know, and, and even though we did
have a warmer year and I could have guided through December.
But, you know, I, by the time winter rolls around, I spend that time off season,
just revamping things and getting stuff ready.
And, and usually, you know, early on in the spring, March, I'll,

(39:14):
I'll do some brown trout stuff here in Milwaukee. That can be a lot of fun.
And then, you know, just kind of get ready for the season.
And I, you know, it's kind of on my list. I've traveled more as I've gotten older.
I've, I've been a little more open-minded about doing some
of that stuff but i'd love to make it down to cave at some point and fish
down that way and i just i just haven't had
the chance yeah looking at the results of the pmtt

(39:37):
from this past weekend it didn't seem like it was an overly
fantastic bite down there no and
yeah it looked tough it didn't look like it got better as
as it went on i don't know if maybe that you know again having
a warmer day uh you know might have might have
fired those fish up a little bit it right well you know
you were talking about how you thought saturday was going to be a bad day like it's

(39:59):
just cause to show you you know you got to get out there and and
you just fish them and you know have a positive attitude and get out and fish
and and try to put the plan together every every time you're on the water absolutely
yeah i told my customers on saturday it's a it's they're they're a regular group
of father daughter that come up and when i said you know it might be might be
a tough day but i said you're gonna catch more fish if you go than if you don't

(40:21):
and they said said, well, yeah,
we're just all about it. We had around 20 bass, and.
You know, they were, they were, they were fired up about it.
And that was cool. Cause the guy's daughter out fished them and,
you know, he got, they musky fished with me last year and we had,
I think we had two or three on and we only boated one of them our last day that
we fished last fall and he caught it.

(40:41):
So I know she was, you know, she's got musky envy a little bit.
So it was nice to see her, nice to see her do well, you know, on the bass. It was fun.
Yeah. That's awesome. I mean, it, it seems as though,
I mean, and I could be way off, you know, you early early
in the podcast you said something about guys and you corrected yourself
and you know added the females in there i'm guilty of that myself

(41:02):
because yeah it's just something you know like it's just the way you talk about
it right but it does seem as though there's more and more females getting into
fishing and that's fantastic to see i love to see it you know i've talked about
it many times on the podcast i have one daughter that's all about fishing especially muskies she She,
she's chomping to get back chasing them because she was left with a few,

(41:25):
you know, much like the client you just were speaking of.
She was left with some foul taste in her mouth for some fish that she lost.
So she's anxious to get back on the water. And, you know, she's talking to me
already about, you know, making sure she catches a muskie this year.
Cause last year she had plenty of opportunities, but it didn't really work out.
So it's just really cool to see, see that, you know, cause typically, obviously.

(41:46):
You know, the sport of angling is, is male dominant, but it,
it doesn't really need to be it's i mean from what i understand i
i don't have any you know i don't guide so i don't have
any like real world experience of my own but i
hear that the female anglers that are with the guides they tend to listen a
lot better they listen a lot better man i'll tell you what i mean you know being

(42:06):
that i fish for all sorts of different fish you know i get i get kids as young
as five six years old in the boat and the young girls are patient they listen you know They're just,
I mean, they really are set up to be better anglers.
You know, I mean, if they, you know, problem is with guys is we're impatient at times.
And I've learned to be patient because that's part of my business and my job.

(42:29):
But, you know, the young girls just, they listen really well.
I mean, there's a lot of women in the sport that are really good at it.
And I don't think it needs to be entirely male focused.
You know, it's cool that, like I said, when I say guys, I mean people in general,
just kind of the way I thought. But there's a ton of women that do it.
You know, I mean, my my fiance, for example, I mean, she loves to fish.

(42:49):
She doesn't get to go with me as much as she used to.
But, you know, she's she's she's caught some some great fish over the past decade
or so with me. So it's cool. It's really cool.
Well, I think getting kids involved earlier, too, is really important. You know, I agree. Yeah.
Well, you know, like we were talking about before we started recording,
my friend, mutual friend between me and Brad, Bill Buechner,

(43:11):
stopped by and his son was there.
And his son, you know, would have him literally, you know, get dropped off.
You know, Bill would drop him off in the boat during the summertime and he would
go to work and then he would come back and pick his kid up.
And so, you know, he's a 14 year old kid. He can, has all the proper stuff he
needs to operate the boat.
And he's literally out there just fishing away for hours and hours.

(43:34):
And, you know, Bill's like, I mean, the amount of experience he's getting by
just being on the water is, it's awesome, you know?
And, you know, I kind of look back to like Larry Dahlberg talking about last
week, how he's like two, two days over the weekend or whatever,
potential for eight to 16 hours on a weekend just isn't enough, you know?
It's like, and it's, I mean, it's, it's a crazy thing how addicted and how,

(43:56):
you know, driven people can be when it comes to fishing in general.
And Bill's son isn't necessarily about muskies. He's about all fish, but.
Yeah, same. Yep. But it's, it's awesome.
I grew up that way. I mean, I had a, you know, I lived on Pewaukee Lake as a
young kid and, you know, we didn't, I didn't have top of the line equipment
or anything, but I mean, I got a, you know, I learned very quickly how expensive St.

(44:20):
Croix rods were because I broke one of my dad's and I'll never hear the end
of it, you know, but, but I mean,
yeah, I had all the basics to get out there and get out on the water.
And, you know, I had a 12-foot boat, and I had to basically carry an ice cream
pail around and bail the water out of it as I was fishing.
And, you know, it leaked, and I was never able to go further than a couple hundred

(44:41):
yards from the dock when I was a young kid. But I got out there, and I got fishing.
And you just, you learn a lot of valuable lessons on the water.
You know, that's why I'm such, that's why I do what I do for a living because
I'm an advocate for conservation and proper handling and catch and release and
just teaching people a way to do things and creating memories on the water.
And I think if you start doing that at an early age, you know,

(45:02):
you'll have a much better foundation as you get older, you know,
and you can teach it, teach other people.
Well, let's go down the conservation side of things.
It seems like we want to talk about forward-facing sonar enough.
Is that something that you use and, you know, what's your thoughts on it?
Do you think it's detrimental to fisheries? I'm not trying to put you on the spot.
I'm happy to talk about it, man. I am, you know, it's such a hot topic and I

(45:26):
mean, I'm, I'm pretty neutral, you know, on a lot of stuff.
I mean, I pretty much just try to fly under the radar and do my thing,
but I'll tell you what, I mean, I think, I think I don't go out on the lake
to play a video game, but I do like forward facing sonar.
I think it's a valuable tool. it helps me locate fish and
there's times where i really like it you know if we're fishing deep water bluegills in

(45:47):
the summer and you know we're following a school
around and you know there's been plenty of times i always
work at the council and i watch my electronics and
we're using it and i'll say well are you on the bottom you know
to a customer and they'll say yeah and i'll say well open your bale and
i'll watch his bait fall down to the bottom and then you'll watch the fish
swim over and eat it and people get a kick out of that

(46:07):
and that's a lot of fun but with that being said we don't
we also don't over harvest bluegills you know i mean i've been
i've been voting for 10 fish for quite a while now because i think you know
you can combat the forward-facing sonar thing with just using proper conservation
proper you know keeping the right amount of fish and you know selective harvest
i you know i think with the musky thing it's it's kind of a hot topic because.

(46:31):
You know there's people that go out they stare at the screen and you know they
find a big fish you you know, hanging in the sand or something,
and they cast at it until they fish it off and it eats. And that's something I don't do.
I like it because I use it to locate fish.
But again, I don't necessarily sit there and stare at it.
It's just there's certain times that I like to use it, you know,

(46:51):
and then there's other times where I don't, you know, I mean,
if I'm out and I'm casting a big giant weed flat for muskies,
I'm not staring at the sonar.
But it's a tool that I I think as a full-time guide, it's important to have,
I like to have all of the technology available to me.
And if somebody's paying me to go out fishing, I like to be able to show them
that there's fish there and they don't always necessarily cooperate,

(47:12):
but it's neat to be able to kind of, you know, show people that what we're looking
at or what we're concentrating on.
And my thought on forward-facing sonar, you know, with limits and stuff like
that, I don't necessarily think it should be banned.
That's my personal opinion, but I just think people need to do better at how they use it.
We've talked about that numerous times on this podcast about,

(47:35):
I mean, Brad, you can go down the road if you want. I mean, it comes with great
responsibility, right?
Yeah, I mean, that's the bottom line, right? And I think Eric just said that,
you know, the bottom line is if you use it as a tool.
With Larry last week, we talked about how it's dumbing down the anglers.
I mean, there's still a lot to be said about time on the water and how you utilize

(48:00):
your time on that water. and staring at a screen is not necessarily the best
method at the end of the day.
If you want to be a good and small around angler, that's just the bottom line.
Agreed. There's still a lot to be said about putting a stepladder in your boat,
Brad, and watching with your parapolarized sunglasses what's going on ahead
of you, right? I mean, I heard that last week.

(48:21):
Well, there's no doubt about that either. I mean, years ago when we were doing
videos, it's kind of funny that Larry brought that up. And I built this stand
that was four feet high that we had in the boat for my cameraman.
And he was pointing out fish when we weren't seeing them, you know.
So it can be utilized as another tool as well. There's no question about that.

(48:43):
Is it practical to the normal angler? Probably not.
But you could go out there and do that and start learning some things.
You know, where are these fish going? What are they doing? Why are they there?
So, yeah, Larry brought up a valid point in that.
You know, Eric, one thing you
mentioned was you learned at a young age how expensive St. Croix rods are.
I know that you're, I mean, cause I see you at the shows, you work out of the

(49:05):
St. Croix booth. So obviously you have an affiliation with them.
If you had to pick two musky rods out of the St. Croix lineup,
which two are you going to pick? Yeah.
Well, that's, so that's a loaded question, buddy. Cause I got a whole bunch
of them here in my garage, you know, I, a favorite of mine.
So I, I, I liked the blue ox for handling big baits. I think it's,

(49:27):
I think it's really, really an awesome rod.
What I did was I switched over to the legend tournament style with the grass panel.
And speaking of controversial subjects, you know, that was another one.
People didn't like the grass panel at first, but I get
a lot of people with small hands and i get a lot of people that you
know that that that are kind of new to to casting

(49:47):
any type of i mean i i've eliminated bait casting reels
for many of my guiding other than some of our live
bait setups and our musky reels because i feel like the the brakes on you know
the musky reels allow you to really really dial them in and and and work with
somebody and teach them how to cast them properly but that that that graft handle
man has been awesome and i i had one rod i I had a sling blade that had that handle,

(50:12):
and I ended up, I got rid of all my other.
Musky rods, and I converted everything over to St.
Croix Legend Tournament musky rods because I like the handle so much.
And I got a lot of good feedback.
You know, if you got somebody that, you know, was newer to it,
and you got a bite at close to the boat or something, they were able to gain
a lot more leverage on that fish.
And another thing that's really nice is, you know, I mean, I think we put ourselves

(50:34):
through a lot of abuse when we musky fish. And it's like, you know,
you're casting for hours and hours on end.
And one thing that, that handle allows me to do is it allows me to keep my wrist
straight, so, you know, you, you, you don't have your wrist cocked at a weird angle.
And I think that helps a lot with people with, you know, wrist pain,
elbow pain, stuff like that, some of that carpal tunnel stuff that you get.

(50:54):
That's just my experience from using them back to your question.
If I were to pick two, I would say the blue ox and the, um,
blade master two okay so you picked the
uh two most popular models i would say like those those
have been the ones that have hardest to keep in stock and i love
them brad i think the phone handles nice too oh
yeah yeah definitely brad i think you'd probably agree with us that you those

(51:17):
would probably be i mean we're not well i'm not i'm not special enough to play
around with anything new so you get to play around with some new stuff before
it's available but of the stuff that's available you would probably land on
those two rods as well wouldn't you brad yeah absolutely I mean,
there's no question about it, but those are probably the two most popular at this point.
And it gets the job done for all different types of baits. And I think that's

(51:40):
probably where you're going with that as well, Eric.
And then talking about the raft, I mean, you hit it on the head, right?
It's funny how many people got in the boat and they're like, I don't want to use that.
You know, they're like, I'm not going to use it. and you give it to them in
15 minutes, half hour, 10 casts, just depends on the individual.

(52:02):
As soon as they're done handling the draft, it's all done. They're going to
go buy a rod immediately.
And I think, you know, again, we're a bunch of stubborn old monkey anglers that
choose to think what we want to think.
And ultimately, I mean, don't be afraid to try some of those new stuff.
It can really, really change your life.

(52:23):
I agree a hundred percent. I mean, I think, you know, as we get older,
it's like, you gotta be open-minded.
I tell my customers that all the time. I mean, one of the things I love about
fishing is, is there's not, there's not one day I go to the lake and I say to
myself, I'm not going to learn anything today.
I mean, you learn every day, no matter how much, you know, you learn every day.
I can't argue with you one bit. I mean, that's how it is. And you should,

(52:45):
I mean, that should be the goal to learn every day as well.
You know, not only do you, but that should be the, that should be the plan,
right? Right. Try to learn something new. Yep. Yep.
Absolutely, man. I mean, I try to, I try to poke around at either new spots
or new baits or new something every time I'm on the water.
I sometimes get stuck into chasing around lakes just to play with different

(53:07):
lakes. Cause I, I still like to do that.
It's still fun to do, but you know, there's times that I should just stick to,
you know, Larry talked about it last week, actually, like as a newer musky angler,
just stick to to one lake, learn it to the, learn it seasonal, seasonably,
you know, or seasonally to the best of your abilities and, and you'll come out
a better angler, you know, for it.

(53:27):
And so it's, you know, like I said, fishing is whatever you make of it.
Right. I mean, I think that's ultimately what it comes down to.
I think a lot of times, you know, people are, feel like they're in competition
with everybody else, whereas you'd, you'd enjoy the sport probably more if you
just took it for whatever, whatever you want it to be, you know?
I agree. I think, you know, we need to do better as anglers.
I mean, just be courteous, you know, to, to other people on the water,

(53:51):
give people room, you know, I mean, etiquette goes a long way.
I mean, you know, if I see somebody in a kayak or fishing from shore,
I try to move out of their way.
It just, it's just a little respect, a little courtesy. It really goes a long way.
All right, Eric, we have not played five questions in all of this year.
I'm thinking, I can't remember the last time we did it. So I have a list of

(54:12):
questions i'll just pick a few of them here and let's go with we got to talk
about the moon is the moon a big deal or is it not a big deal huge all right
well then we'll stick with the moon and we'll go full moon or new moon and which
one are you going to choose to fish under,
uh is there an all of the above honestly

(54:36):
if i had to pick one i mean probably full
moon okay let's go with bulldogs versus medusas which one you prefer medusas
all right that's interesting i like i like both i like both i just i'm i'm just
for whatever reason i just you made me pick one so i think i'm going medusa So sure.

(55:00):
All right. Then let's go high speed reels versus low speed reels.
Which one are you going to pick? High speed. All right.
And then let's talk a little bit about leaders. You're going to go with a fluorocarbon
leader or a solid steel leader.
Solid, solid steel. In most cases, I use floor a little bit,
but mainly, mainly solid steel or solid strand steel, depending on what we're doing. Yep.

(55:25):
All right, Eric. Well, that's it. Five questions. Easy done.
Let's talk a little bit about your availability for this season.
If somebody hears the podcast and they think, man, this Eric guy is really knowledgeable.
I need to get in the boat with him.
Do they, do you have availability? And if so, how do they get in touch with you?
Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. You can either contact me direct.

(55:46):
I have a website that's tacticalangling.com.
Another option is you can give me a phone call at 262-227-3093,
or there's a contact tab on my website and you can reach out directly that way.
And I guess the calendar is kind of starting to fill up. I think last time we
spoke, I had gotten engaged.

(56:07):
Now I'm getting married in September. So that's taking a little bit off the September calendar.
But other than that, I've got some, I've got some available dates and hoping
to have another really good year.
And you know, whether somebody wants to go out for panfish or muskies, I'm happy to talk trips.
All right, Eric. Well, once again, I want to thank you for taking time out during
this busy time, especially like I said, right before the muskie opener,

(56:29):
but I know you're on the water all the time anyways, and I hope that you have
yourself a tremendous start to the muskie season, but overall,
I hope you have a great season and I hope many of our listeners take advantage
of the Southern opener in Wisconsin this weekend.
I know everybody is anxiously awaiting the, uh, arrival of the Northern opener
and the Minnesota opener and the Canada opener.

(56:51):
And you know what? They're all going to be here very soon, but until then,
I hope everybody gets some time on the water this weekend.
And I want to thank you all for listening to our podcast and we will be back
with a new episode again next week, Wednesday.
So have a good weekend on the water and good luck fishing.
Thanks. Thanks, buddy. I appreciate it.
Music.