March 28, 2025 • 55 mins
In this episode of The Articulate Fly, host Marvin Cash sits down with Drew Price, the outfitter behind Master Class Angling, to explore the unique fly fishing opportunities on Lake Champlain. Drew shares his journey from a young angler fishing with his grandfather to becoming a passionate guide chasing exotic species like bowfin and gar. He recounts the challenges and rewards of fly fishing for these lesser-known species, emphasizing the thrill of sight fishing and the intelligence of bowfin.
The conversation delves into the dynamic nature of Lake Champlain, where Drew explains how the lake's fluctuating water levels and diverse habitats create a unique fishing experience each year. He highlights the incredible variety of fish available, including smallmouth bass, lake trout and even freshwater drum, making Lake Champlain a hidden gem for anglers seeking adventure.
Drew also discusses the importance of adapting techniques and gear for different species, sharing insights on his preferred setups for bowfin. Additionally, he offers a glimpse into his guiding philosophy, focusing on education and the joy of sharing the beauty of Vermont's waters with clients. With a book on the horizon and a deep passion for fishing, Drew's enthusiasm is infectious, making this episode a must-listen for any fishing enthusiast.
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Helpful Episode Chapters
00:00 Introduction
12:52 Transitioning to a Unique Guiding Philosophy
18:38 Exploring Lake Champlain's Fishery
26:51 The Unique Challenges of Lake Fishing
36:59 The Fascinating World of Bowfin Fishing
42:12 Fishing for Bowfin: Techniques and Insights
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Hey, folks, it's Marvin Cash,the host of the Articulate Fly. On
this episode, we're joined byDrew Price, the man behind Masterclass
Angling. Drew shares hispassion for chasing exotic species
on the fly on his home watersof Lake Champlain. I think you're
really going to enjoy thisone, but before we get to the interview,
(00:22):
just a couple of housekeepingitems. If you like the podcast, please
tell a friend and subscribeand leave us a rating review in the
podcatcher of your choice. Itreally helps us out. And we recently
launched a new podcast calledthe Butcher Shop where the meat meets
the water. Each episodefocuses on a single pattern from
our Predator Fly angler tire.We take a deep dive into the genesis
(00:46):
of the pattern, its design,and how to fish it. Like the inventor.
We recently dropped ourinterview with Blaine Chocolate,
taking a deep dive into the Tbone. And our interviews with Tommy
lynch and Russ Madden aredropping soon. To make sure you don't
miss a single episode, be sureto subscribe in the podcatcher of
your choice. We will only bedistributing episodes on the Articulate
(01:06):
Fly for a limited time. Andfinally, a shout out to our sponsor.
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and chances are you're not theonly one at your local access point.
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(01:26):
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at maps.troutroutes.com now,on to our interview. Well, Drew,
(01:52):
welcome to the Articulate Fly.
Thank you for having me.
Yeah, looking forward to it.And we have a tradition on the Articulate
Fly. We like to ask all of ourguests to share their earliest fishing
memory.
Well, I can go back to, Ibelieve I was 7 years old fishing
with my grandfather. We wereon a little tiny trout stream in
(02:12):
Constable, New York, and hewas. He was walking behind me and
I had the rod over my shoulderand, and I stopped and he didn't.
And next thing I know is the.The worm hook is. Is hooked into
his shirt pocket and he lookedat me and he said, well, you just
caught yourself 175 poundsucker. That was my. That's my earliest
(02:38):
fishing memory. We didn't. Wedidn't catch many trout. I've subsequently
gotten Fish that, that thestream a fair amount and it's a fun
little stream. Mostly stockbrowns, but it was a, it was a great
memory of my grandfather.
Very, very neat. And so whendid you come to the dark side of
(02:58):
fly fishing?
When I was in college at SUNYPlattsburgh, I picked up fly fishing
in, I guess it was 1993, thefirst time I graduated from, from
college there. I graduated anart degree and I asked my parents
for a fly rod grad in Decemberand I went out and beat the snow
(03:20):
quite a bit with it and taughtmyself how to cast. And within, within
a month of having that, Ibought a fly tying kit and the two
kind of went hand in hand. Andthat next spring, very first fish
I got on the fly was a, was anice smallmouth bass out of the Saranac
(03:40):
river, probably about four,four and a half pounds. And definitely
developed a love of smallmouthat that, at that moment.
Very, very neat. And soobviously you've been in the game
for a long time. You know, whoare some of the folks that have mentored
you on your fly fishingjourney and what have they taught
you?
Well, you know, it's, it'sinteresting. So initially I really,
(04:05):
you know, I had a couple ofbuddies in college that, that I fly,
you know, that I fly fish witha little bit. But most of it, most
of my early fly fishingexperience was, was entirely on my
own. There weren't a lot ofpeople that I knew that, that really
(04:26):
fly fish seriously and, andwere interested in doing the kind
of fly fishing that I wantedto do. I've always had kind of like,
like what can I catch next?Attitude and so I would, I would
get out and chase whatever Icould find. You know, I, when I first
(04:52):
started fly fishing, I reallywanted to get into pike, you know,
catch pike on a fly, I wantedto get musky on a fly. You know,
all these warm water speciesthat, that, you know, in the, in
the early 90s, nobody wasreally talking about, nobody was
really chasing and, but thatwas what I wanted to do, you know,
(05:13):
like my first muskie on thefly was 95, right? And there was,
there was nobody talking aboutmuskies. There was nobody in my area
in northern New York doing it.So I didn't really have any mentors
and in a lot of ways I waskind of self taught. That has changed
in the past 10 years or sowhere I've really kind of come into
(05:36):
the industry more. And youknow, I, the people I really look
up to and, and I'll I'll hitup for advice. Are, are Tom Rosenbauer
and, and Blaine Chocolate.Are, are two people that, you know,
who I have a lot of respectfor and are willing to answer questions
(05:57):
for me and, and talk methrough things when I need help.
And that's been really, youknow, I couldn't ask for two people
to reach out to, you know.
Yeah, absolutely. And I thinkthe amazing thing too is, you know,
not only back in kind of themid-90s, you know, there was no information
(06:20):
for chasing these. We'll justcall them kind of alternative species
on the fly. But, but I mean,the gear wasn't there either, right?
I mean, and so no, you know,this isn't like, you just go to like
the catalog or the Internetand you get a muskie line, you get
a muskie rod, you get a muskiereel, you go buy muskie flies and
you go buy, you know, terminaltackle and you're done. I mean, it
(06:41):
was like you had to kind ofbuild it all.
Oh yeah. Oh yeah, no doubt.You know, my, my, my initial muskie
flies were basically just akind of a deceiver derivative that,
that I kind of made up myself,you know, with a lot of bucktail
(07:02):
and, and rabbit strip. And Iwas using the old Mustad 3366 hooks
and, and whatever hooks Icould find the wire. I, I had picked
up some single strand wiredown in Florida on a fishing trip
to the Everglades. I, youknow, I found it at, at this fishing
(07:24):
shop and I bought you know,like a couple of packages, like 30
foot rolls and that, you know,that was my pike and muskie leader.
You know, for pike. When I waspike fishing, I was just using a,
you know, a conventionaltackle leader, which really aren't
great, you know, when you'refishing on a fly, fishing with a
(07:46):
fly rod. And you know, backthen there were no, like none of
these, these awesome linesthat are out now that are, you know,
like two line weights heavierto really help you propel those big
flies. So, you know, and therods weren't, the rods weren't quite
right, you know, you know,back when I really got into it, it
(08:09):
was, you know, it was, Im6 waslike the hot thing. And you know,
I remember building a coupleof my, my own rods because I worked
for a hook and hack. They werebased in Plattsburgh for quite a
while and I worked for themfor a while and built my, you know,
(08:30):
an IM69 weight. And that wasmy, that was my go to musky rod for
for several years. Musky andpike rod for several years. And you
know, I just remember what abear that was, you know, like it
was so much more pleasant todo the stuff that I do with gear
(08:50):
that is intended to do what Ido, you know.
Yeah, absolutely. And so whendid you get the guide bug?
So I had, I've been flyfishing for about 15 years. I had
moved from northern New Yorkto Vermont and you know, I thought
(09:11):
about guiding here and there Iwas, I was kind of like, you know,
I don't know if I really havethe chops for it. I don't know if
I really have the know how andyou know, do I. Is this something
I really want to do? And thenI happened to see a local guide service
that was looking for people,looking to bring people on, on board.
I think it was an ad onCraigslist of all places. And I was
(09:35):
like, you know, what the heck,I'll do that. And I came on board
and you know, it was mostlyguiding trout and, and I was like,
hey guys, you know, I do allthis stuff with like bowfin and carp
and gar and pike and, andthey're like, you do what? And you
know, I was just like this,you know, I, I've got all these things
(09:55):
that I do. Is this somethingyou think people would be interested
in trying out? And they'relike, sure. And within a couple years,
about a third of the tripsthat we were running were the trips
that I brought to them. And Iquickly realized that, you know,
didn't really want to do oneon one trout trips anymore. And I
(10:17):
really wanted to focus in onthe kind of stuff I was more interested.
And I went out on my own.Started masterclass.
Yeah, got it. And so when was that?
That was in fall of 2010.
Got it. And you know, so youmentioned Tom and Blaine in terms
of fly fishing mentors. Youknow, I would imagine they've been
(10:39):
incredibly influential in yourguiding. But are there any other
folks in the guide space thathave kind of mentored you on your
journey?
You know, I've got some, some,some friends around here that, that
have, that have been pretty,pretty helpful. You know, there's,
there's Jesse Haller who worksfor Orvis now, was, was really great.
(11:07):
You know, we, we talk shops.There's definitely a group of guys
around here that I talk topretty routinely now. But you know,
stuff that I do isn't, youknow, it's, it's very non traditional,
especially for Vermont. Likethere, you know, when I, when I started
Bringing Bowen to the tablearound here. You know, I. When I
(11:32):
brought it up to the guideservice that I was originally with,
I was like, you know, there'sthese fish called bowfin in Lake
Champlain, and. And they alllooked at me and they're like, what.
What's a Bowen? You know, so Ididn't really, you know, like, I
kind of, you know, not tryingto put myself up on a pedestal, I.
(11:52):
I just know the stuff that Ilike that I know the stuff that I
want to do, and I know how todo it. And I'm. I'm, you know, and
kind of a natural educator. Iworked in the education field for.
For 10 years. And I loveteaching people new things, and I
love teaching people about thelake that we're on and then the fish
(12:13):
that are here and how tocatch. And it just kind of came together
for me. I don't know that ifthat makes sense at all.
Yeah, it does. You know, andit's an interesting thing because,
I mean, I've. I've got. I'vebeen fortunate enough to know and
fish with a lot of guides,and, you know, it's kind of. And
(12:34):
you and I have talked aboutthis. I mean, it's kind of that secret
sauce, right, where, you know,like. Like, God nirvana is to fill
your calendar with people thatyou want to fish with that want to
fish the way you want to guide people.
Right, Right. Well, you know,actually, I actually have. I have
to take this back a little bitbecause I just remembered probably
(12:57):
one of the best pieces ofadvice that I ever got about guiding
was in 2012, and it was inAugust of 2012. And earlier that
year, I had filmed with RiverMonsters. They came to Vermont to
(13:19):
film an episode. It was justVampires of the Deep. They were chasing
after lamprey. And. And U.S.fish and Wildlife Service had. Had
recommended me because theywanted to try to put Jeremy on. Jeremy
Wade on. On some muskies. Andthey're like, the guy you got to
(13:39):
talk to is Drew Price. And,you know, and I talked to them and
I was like, you know, muskiesmay not be a great option, but bowfin
and Gar and there's a fewother things, and I'd be happy to
help you out with this. So Iwas like, I know all these waters
that you're on and. And endedup spending five days with them.
You. You barely even see me inthe episode. It's kind of. Kind of
(14:03):
funny. They. They're filmingthe back end of the canoe. Jeremy's
in the front of the canoe. I'min the middle, and the top third
of the screen is my butt, soyou really don't see me much in the
episode. But Jeremy came backto Vermont later that summer, and.
And he reached out to me, andhe said, you know, let's go fishing.
(14:25):
And we took him. I took himout, and at the end of the day, when
I was driving him back off inthe hotel, we're just sitting in
my truck in the parking lottalking. And he was telling me about
when he guided in the Amazon,and he said, you know what I did?
He said, I did what I wantedto do. I didn't let other people
(14:50):
create the expectations ofwhat they wanted my guide service
to be. He's like, I wanted myguide service to be this. He's like,
I went out and I fished forthe things that I wanted to fish
for, and people came to mebecause of the interest that I had
in those things. And he said.He said. He's like, I was booked
(15:14):
out two years in advance. He'slike, there is a waiting list. And
he's like, do what you want todo with your guide service. And that's
really. The first 10 years ofmy guide service, that's what I did.
And. And it's kind of still myattitude about it. Like, I. You know,
(15:37):
I could do trout trips. Idon't. For the most part, I'll do
some streamer trips for. For.For larger trout here and there,
or sight fishing for. For. Forlarge browns in the. In the fall,
but for the most part, I avoidthat. I have been very fortunate
that most of the people whocome to me want to do the things
(16:00):
that I do because they see theexcitement that I have for what it
is that I do. And. And, youknow, whether it's, you know, learning
how to catch both in a gar anda fly or. Or learning new techniques
on, you know, like, how to.How to. How to locate lake trout
(16:20):
and target lake trout with afly rod or going out and just like,
how many different species canwe get in a day on fly? And. And
I think a lot of people reallyappreciate that. And. And I've actually
found that I get a lot ofguides who come to me who want to
do something different. Right?Like, we've all chased trout. And,
(16:48):
you know, that's. That's onething that is like, you know, we.
Fly fishing is really a troutculture for the most part, but people
are starting to see, wow,there's. There's all these other
options out there. I mean,it's not really starting to see but
are you're starting to see itbecome more mainstream these days,
(17:10):
I think and you're seeingpeople like wow, this is, this is
really exciting. I can go outon the lake and I have an opportunity
to catch this ancientpredator. But then I can also use
like a three way rod and catchthese, these trophy beautiful panfish.
And you know I got a shot atcatching a channel catfish that I'm
(17:30):
sight fishing for or alongthose guard. I'm catching it with
a fly that I'm not using ahook. You know, it's and, and people
are like this is prettyamazing. And you know I see a lot
of, a lot of anglers getreally excited about that these days
(17:51):
and people are coming to mefor that and that excites me, you
know, like, you know, I thinkyou can hear in my voice like that
I find this stuff really funand, and not, not knowing exactly
what the day is going to bringwhen I get out in, in some of the
backwaters that I fish thatyou know, like dropping this rod
(18:15):
and grabbing another onebecause something just suddenly showed
up, you know, like work atpanfish and all of a sudden there's
a, there's a 30 inch bowfinthat comes right up to inspect the
boat, you know and, and youknow I love that stuff and, and I'm
finding more and more anglersare loving that kind of opportunity.
(18:38):
Very, very neat. And so youknow, you guide you know, Lake Champlain,
you know and for folks, I meanI'm, I'm a southerner, so not super
familiar.
Yep.
So can you kind of give uskind of a little bit of an overview
of the area and the fishery?
Sure, absolutely. So, so LakeChamplain is, is. It's bordered by
(19:01):
Vermont on the east side andNew York on the west side, the Adirondacks
on, on. On the New York sideand the Green Mountains on the, on
the Vermont side. And it goesnorth into Canada into Quebec. And
10% of the lake is inMissisquoi Bay, which is part of
which is in Canada. That's aplace I don't, I've never fished
(19:21):
in in the Canadian part andCanadian waters in Lake Champlain.
But the lake itself is 120miles long and it, you know in into
from Canada down pastWhitehall, New York. Both places
the U.S. navy. And it is 12miles wide at its widest point near
(19:42):
burlington. It's about 400ftdeep at its mean level which is about
96ft above sea level. It's gotabout 7 1/2 trillion gallons of water.
But I really like to think ofLake Champlain as a very dynamic
system because it, it's, it'sa, you know, a big catch basin right
(20:07):
for, for it's got a very largewatershed. And after the spring melt,
Lake Champlain typically willget to 99 to 100ft above sea level,
sometimes higher. We had thehighest lake level in 2011 of 103.3ft.
So tremendous amount of waterthere. And unlike, you know, Lake
(20:31):
Champlain is not like abathtub. So it doesn't just come
straight up when it comes out,it spreads out and it spreads out
into these, these largewetlands. We have these massive wetland
complexes in both New York andVermont. Vermont has a lot more than
New York. And you know, so youget these incredible opportunities
to fish flooded forests in thespringtime. And we have carp and
(20:55):
bowfin and, and pike and itlike literally in the trees. It's
pretty neat to be able to pushcoral through the trees and find
your, your target species. Butin, in, in this late summer, you
know, getting to September,even to October, the lake level can
(21:18):
drop down as low as 94 or even93ft. So you could have a 7 foot
lake level fluctuationthroughout the year. And if we have
like a big water event likewhen we had Hurricane Irene or we
had the big flood event twoyears ago, I mean, the lake level
(21:40):
came up two feet in, in twodays, which is just a massive volume
of water. So it's, it's areally dynamic system that can change
a lot. And every time, youknow, every year is new on, on the
lake. So when you get on thatlake, you'll have a general idea
(22:02):
where those, where the fishare. But you really have to kind
of relearn it every year,which I, you know, I, I find that
very exciting. I find thatreally interesting. You know, you
kind of got a differentplaying field every time you get
out there. You know, you don'tknow exactly where. You have an idea
(22:23):
what everything's going to beand how it's going to play out, but
you don't know ex. And in oneplace it fishes very well one year,
may not fish very well thenext year. So that's, that's kind
of a neat part of it. But wehave 88 different species in the
lake. Of that about 25 or 30are really available to, to, for
(22:47):
fly anglers to catch. We'vegot a lot of different panfish. We've
got, we've got some of theBest. Best bass fishing in the country.
Lake Champlain is rate thepast 30 years has been rated by Bassmasters
as one of the top five basslakes in the country primarily because
of smallmouth bass. The smallmouse fishery here is just absolutely
(23:09):
insane and I love chasing themin the lake. But what I find even
more fun is finding is chasingthem in the tributaries in the springtime
when they come into spawnbecause you go out with a five or
a six weight and you've got.You're basically fishing like you'd
(23:32):
be fishing for trout butyou're getting 2 to 5 pound smallmouth
instead which, which doesn'tsuck. We've got a lot of trout or
we've got a lot of. A lot oflake trout. Our lake trout fishery
is fantastic. They'reavailable in the early season and
(23:54):
in the late season. I kind ofcall them my shoulder season fish.
I so I'll start catching thosein in March and using floating lines
and intermediate lines andthey're available until the water
starts warming up to about 45degrees and they think stop, start
sinking down a little bit andyou can still get them on sinking
(24:15):
lines down to about 50ft andthen they'll show back up again starting
usually in October. October,November and December can be fantastic
months for chasing lakers on afly. We've got some great salmon
runs on the lake. We've gotlandlocked Atlantic salmon. We do
(24:37):
have some steelhead runs. I'vegot pike, pickerel and muskie. We
have hybrids of pike andpickerel which some people around
here will call pikerel.Really, really attractive fish. We've
got walleye, we've got bowfin.You know, I. I've got one client
(24:58):
who's got almost every IGFAtypic class record bowfin and most
of them have been caught onLake Champlain. So we have a lot
of bowfin, we've got long nosegar. We've got a great population
of carp. We get these greatsucker runs. I love catching suckers
(25:21):
on a fly. I actually the staterecord, the Vermont state record
for white sucker caught on afly which is a massive white sucker,
like 6.3 pounds or somethinglike that. Really big fish. Let me
see, what else do we have? Andwe got, we got just. There's so many
different opportunities whenyou go out there. And we've got freshwater
(25:47):
drum. I love, I love fishingthem. A lot of people around here
call them sheepshead. That'sone of the hardest fighting fish
on the lake. They're. They'rereally Challenging to sight fish
for, but you can also caststreamers for them. I get some, we
get some big ones up to around20 pounds. And, and that will just,
you know, that will bend youre way right down to the cork when
(26:13):
you're fighting one of thosethings. It's, it's, it's pretty awesome
fishery. I feel reallyfortunate to be here, and I feel
really fortunate to be, youknow, like one of the first people
who's really, you know,promoting Lake Champlain fly fishing.
(26:33):
Very, very neat. And you'dmentioned earlier that you, you know,
you basically had to relearnthe lake every year. And, you know,
most of my guide guests are,you know, creek and river guides.
And so, you know, is that themain difference, you know, fishing
in a lake or is. Are thereother things that make the lake game
different?
Oh, there's, there's so manythings that make it different. I
(26:54):
mean, you know, you got todeal with boat traffic. You really
have to know how to play theweather. You know, like if you're.
I'm fishing in, in a towie onthis lake and this is, this is a
big lake. You know, it's a,it's a very large lake. And, you
(27:19):
know, if I am not paying closeattention to the weather, I could
be in deep trouble. You know,you really have to know what bays
are safe with the direction ofthe wind. You got to be really paying
attention to that windforecast, the weather forecast, and
then just paying attentionwhen you're on the water, because
(27:41):
things can go wrong very, veryquickly, you know, especially when
the water is cold. You know,when the, when the water is, is below
60 degrees, you know, that's,that's a dangerous place this is
now. And I, you know, I takesafety very seriously on the lake.
(28:03):
If it's a lake where thingscan change very dramatically very
quickly. I can remember oneday I was out with my Bowfin client,
Richard Hart, one of my Bowfinclients, and he's the guy who's got
all the IGFA records. And Richand I were. This is back when I was
(28:26):
guiding out of a canoe andRich and I were out in this backwater
and we had a light chop on thewater. It was maybe 3 or 4 inch chop.
And I just saw this dark cloudcoming across the lake and I was
like, rich, I'm reallyconcerned about that. And it started
getting in closer and the windstarted picking up and it went from
(28:46):
a 3 to 4 inch chop to a 3 to 4inch crashing waves. And we had a
mile and A half to paddle backto the launch. And that was one of
the most frightening momentsI've ever had on that lake. But it
went from, it went from zeroto 60 in, in under five minutes,
you know, so you really haveto keep your widget value on the
(29:10):
lake. And, you know, you kindof have to watch out for other boaters.
You got to watch out for otheranglers. We have a lot of bass tournaments
on this lake, and sometimesthey don't always respect the other
anglers who are not targetingbass. I've had them blow in front
of me a few times, but, youknow, it's, it's, it's a really different
(29:35):
environment. And you know,like, there, there are times you
can go into a place where youhave, you know, like, carp are notorious
for this. I can go into a baywhere I normally will find a lot
of carp. And, you know, theday before there was carp everywhere.
I go in there the next day,you. You can't find a fish. You can't,
(29:58):
like, no idea where they went.You know, like, they just disappeared
overnight. They may have goneinto deeper water. You know, something
may have happened that, youknow, big question mark and one I
have never figured out. Butit's, it's, it's a really, it could
(30:23):
be a very variable system. Andyou're also dealing with, especially
when you're dealing withcooler water fish or, or sold water
fish like the lake trout orpike. As that water warms up in the
lake, those fish start movingdeeper and they find, they move,
they start using differenthabitats than they were using earlier
(30:46):
in the season, and they willmove back to those habitats. So you
kind of have to know, youknow, that progression of where they're
going to head to and whenthey're going to head there. And
that's not something that youcan, you know, learn overnight. You,
you really have to spend a lotof time, you know, watching and observing
(31:08):
what's going on. And on a lakethis size, you know, like, I, I consider
myself a student of the lakebecause every time I get on that
lake, I learn something new. Ilearned something different that
I hadn't learned before. Itmight be a new location, it might
be a new way to fish.Different parts of the lake or for
(31:29):
different species are like,wow, I, I never realized these species
were, were utilizing thishabitat this time of the year. So
you really kind of, you know,when you're out there, being very
observant really pays off. Andbeing willing to talk to a lot of
other people and seeing whatthey're having for experiences. I
(31:50):
talk to a lot of conventionalanglers. I have a lot of friends
who are conventional anglers,and they'll tell me a lot of stuff.
They may be not. May not begoing after the species that I'm
going after, but they'll seethem. They'll be like, oh, yeah,
that bay over there is loadedwith carb. Okay, great, you know,
Or I've seen a lot of bowfinand X, Y or Z, and I'll go check
(32:11):
it out. And that can be reallyhelpful, you know. But the. The different
parts of the lake aredramatically different, too. Like
the broad lake that I'm nearhere, I'm in Charlotte, Vermont,
and the broad. This is asection of the lake we call the Broad
(32:31):
Lake. The Broad lake is, youknow, big and deep. You get down
to the. To the southern end ofthe lake in Orwell and the Whitehall
area down there. It's kind oflike more like a big muddy river.
So it's incredibly differentenvironment. Yeah, it's radically
(32:53):
different than streams and rivers.
Yeah, very, very interesting.And so, you know, you've got this
incredibly, you know, diverselake with all these different species.
Tell me a little bit about howyou, you know, map that to various
angling experiences atMasterclass Angling.
Well, you know, a lot of it isdepending on, you know, what. What
(33:15):
somebody wants to do or. Orthe time of the year. You know, I'll
get people who reach out tome, and they'll be like, hey, are.
Are you guiding right now?And. And, you know, if. If. If the
lake is open and I can get myboat out there, you know, generally
the answer is yes, as long asthe weather is conducive to get out
there, you know, and laketrout are a great option in the early
(33:38):
season. But, you know,sometimes people will come to me
and they'll be like, I reallywant to catch a bowfin or I really
want to catch a gar. And I'mlike, great, let's. Let's do it and
get out and teach them thetechniques that they need to be able
to catch those. But, you know,a lot of it is. It. I. I try to base
(33:59):
it on, you know, not only thetime of the year, but, you know,
what people want toexperience. And. And I'll be pretty
upfront with people like, youknow, here's what's. Here's what's
going on right now. Or, youknow, you want to catch pike. You
know, this is. We're right inthe middle. It's. It's August we're,
this is not the time to bechasing pike. If you really want
(34:21):
to come to see me and get intosome pike, your best bet is to hit
me up in late April or Mayinto June, and then again in like
October, November, even intoDecember. That's when we have good
chances at pike and sometrophy fish. Some trophy pike during
that, that time period, youknow, I, I kind of, you know, I use
(34:50):
the available resources forwhen they are coming to see me or
I let them know, like, hey,you know, you want to get both in
May through September is yourbest, best bet. So hit me up during
those, that time period, you know.
Yeah, it's, it's neat too,right? Cause I mean, you know, from
(35:11):
looking at your website anddoing research for the interview,
I mean, you've got, do youwant to wade? Do you want to sight
fish? Do you want to fish fromthe boat? It sounds like you kind
of offer it all.
I, I really do. You know, I,I've, I offer muskie trips in, in
muskie rivers in northern NewYork. I do walk and wait smallmouth
(35:32):
trips. Like I said, I, I willdo some trout trips here and there.
I, I know some great trophytrout streams in Vermont and in northern
New York. I've got, I've gotsome, you know, I spent a lot of
time in, in, in northern NewYork. That's where I grew up. I offer
landlocked salmon trips onLake Champlain tributaries and Lake
(35:54):
Metro, Magog tributaries,Clyde river, and you know, there's
steelhead opportunities onboth sides of the lake. You know,
that. And that's all walk andwade. So there's, you know, I love
having diversity like that atmy fingertips, you know, and I've
(36:17):
had people who, you know, I'vegot, I've got some clients lined
up in April that want to doone day a walk away trout fishing
and then they want to head outin the lake and see what they can
get. I'm stoked for that. Youknow, I love those challenges. I
(36:39):
love keeping things variableand really, you know, exploring the
diversity of fishingopportunities that we have in Vermont
and in northern New York, you know.
Yeah, it's neat too, right?Because I know you're particularly
proud of your bowfin fisheryand I was kind of curious, you know.
(36:59):
Yeah, obviously you're fishingfor all kinds of, you know, we'll
just call them fly fishingexotics, but, you know, but what
attracted you to start chasingbowfin on the fly?
Just to be blunt, they are thebiggest badasses out there. They're
really incredible fish. LikeI, there is no other fish that I've
(37:21):
encountered that will swim upto you and look you in the eyes.
They are, they're veryaggressive, they're very intelligent.
They're a native species.They're basically unchanged for the
past 300 million years. Youknow, they're not the same species
(37:41):
in the fossil record, but ifyou look at a fossil record, when
T. Rex is roaming the earth, afossil bowfin from when T. Rex is
roaming the earth, you cantell that it's a bowfin. And it looks
almost exactly at the bowfinwe got around here right now. It's
pretty amazing. I mean they,the males in the springtime have
(38:02):
incredible colors. Their finsget turquoise, they get an emerald
green color on their sides.Their bellies kind of get this, this
pumpkin yellow, orange. Andtheir eye spot, they've got this
orange eye spot that's almostglowing, it's so orange. And they
(38:23):
get incredibly territorial andaggressive when they're defending
their babies. I actually, Ihad one, I was in this backwater,
I was in a flooded forest andwe, we found this little male was
22 inches. I know because weended up catching this thing. But
(38:45):
it, it saw the nose of theboat come in and it literally jumped
out of the water and bit thebow in this boat. And you know, like
here's a 22 inch fish goingafter a 15 foot boat to defend its
babies. You know there's, thatis just really cool watching how
(39:08):
they stock their prey, howthey'll come in the dorsal fin. You
know, it, it just this, itundulates and, and you can really
tell a lot about how that fishis behaving and what it's thinking
by what that, what that dorsalfin is doing and the way they do
(39:31):
the smash and grab whenthey're, when they're in close because
it's, it. Bowfin fishing isalmost all sight fishing. It is,
it's not particularlydifficult fly fishing. It's really
dapping or, or jigging with afly rod. But you're hunting fish.
I'm on the polling platform, Ihave my client in the front. And
(39:53):
you're looking for these fishand, and, and if the fish, you know,
bites the fly and gets off it,it's not gone. I've had them, I see
this all the time. They'll,they'll grab the fly, they'll feel
the hook, they'll shoot off,they'll turn around and they'll come
(40:15):
in from a different angle tofind out what that was. And you Get
a second shot at them. I meanthat really cool. I mean my, my very
first bowfin guidingexperience, I was in my canoe, we
were going through thisbackwater and these lily pads and
I hit a bowfin and the thingshot off and I washed it and turned
(40:39):
around and came back andlooked at the canoe to see what hit
it. My client got a fly infront of it. It grabbed it. He's
got it on and it circlesaround some lily stems, gets off.
He gets to fly out of the lilystems. The fish comes back and he
(41:00):
looks at the second time andit gets off a second time. Like what
other fish does anything likethat? You know, it's, they're really
cool and, and the, they'revery long lived and like I said,
they're really smart. Youknow, I, I will splash the water
(41:21):
and get them to come inbecause they're so curious and a
lot of people around herethink that, oh, you're splashing
the water and the bowfin comein. They're really dumb. It's the
opposite. They, they hear thatsplashing. They think something is
wounded and they want to comein to see if they have an opportunity
to eat something. That's, youknow, that curiosity is, is intelligence.
(41:45):
So these are an incrediblyintelligent fish and more than willing
to take a fly. But if youreally keep hitting the same area
again and again and again withthe same flies and the same techniques,
they pick up on it. They knowwhat's going on. So you have to vary
what you're doing, which to mekeeps things more exciting. You know,
(42:08):
I, I've, I've gone on recordsaying this before. I consider bowfin
the most American game fishout there because they are so unchanged
for so long. They're, they'reincredible. And if you've never fished
from both end, you really needto because it's a very, very cool
(42:31):
fish to, to target.
Yeah, that's very neat. And sotell me a little bit about kind of
like your rod reel line set upand then sounds like you got to kind
of change the fly situation upbecause they kind of get dialed in,
right?
They do, they do. So I, I'veused a lot of different rods. Seven
(42:52):
and eight weight tends to bethe, this, the sweet spot. I like
to use a stiffer rod. I think,you know, at this point the rod,
my go to rod right now is, isthe, the 8, 5, 7 weight helios. It's
a short, stiff rod and it, andit really gets the job done very
(43:15):
well. You can, you can crossthat fish's eyes with the hook set
line really isn't thatimportant. Any, any floating line
will do. The leader is veryshort. I usually just do a short,
like maybe a foot of or so oflike 20 pounds fluorocarbon. And
(43:39):
then I will tie off 16 poundto that, about three foot piece of
that. So you only have a likea four foot leader. You really don't
need a very long leader. Along leader is actually detrimental
to good presentation when,when you're, when you're doing the
style of fishing that I do forthese guys because you only have
(44:01):
a couple inches of fly lineout from your rod tip. You know,
like I said, you're reallydapping and, and to properly present
that fly and to be able to geta good hook set you actually have
to have the rod pretty muchperpendicular to the water, parallel
to the water. You want to havethat rod parallel or parallel to
the water because you're goingto set the hook kind of keeping the
(44:25):
rod flat and parallel to thewater. So you kind of got this, this
upward stroke. You don't wantto set back with your wrist. And
when you sit back with yourwrist it's a lot like trying to set
a hook into a concrete block.And I've had three rods that have
broken right in front of thegrip because of just, you know, the
(44:50):
way you're setting the hooklike that. As far as flies, I have
kind of a number of my ownpatterns that I use for them. They're,
they're for the most partfairly heavily weighted. They're
kind of really buggy,buggerish flies. I've got one I call
(45:12):
the Mr. Beauregard and I gotanother one I call Mr. Bo Squiggles.
I've also had very good luckwith crayfish patterns. Changer craws
are fantastic certain times ofthe year when they get really, when
the boat can get reallyfinicky in mid summer. I find that
the, the, the changer crosscan be more difficult to get a hook
(45:33):
set with. At that point youreally, you really want to have a
good, you want to get, youhave your better opportunities with
the changer cross earlier inthe season when they're really a
lot more aggressive withtheir, with their takes. But they
will, they will take carpflies they'll take, they'll take
(45:56):
almost anything to be veryhonest with you. But if you've got
the wrong hook, it gives thefishing advantage when you're fishing
with bow. Fishing for bowfin,a short shank heavy wire hook is
much more effective. Ingetting a hook set than a laundry
shank hook. And if you have alonger shank hook and you're playing
(46:20):
those fish, that, that hookacts more as a lever and their mouth
is just almost all bone andteeth. And if you have any kind of
lever like that and the waythese guys fight, they, they thrash
around a lot. A longer shankhook will work itself out a lot easier
than the, the short shankhooks. So it's, it's, it's a lot
(46:47):
of fun. I try to keep the, thefight pretty short and sweet, you
know, using really stoutleader. When, when somebody hooks
into one of these things, I, Icome flying down from the, the, the
pulling platform and grab anet and scoop them up as fast as
I can because if they get intothe weeds, they will break you off.
(47:07):
I carry a lot of, I carry alot of bowfin flies because there
are a lot of break offs.
Yeah. So it's not exactly theno changer left behind mentality.
No, no. I mean, you know,it's, it sucks to lose a changer
to these guys, but that, youknow, that's kind of part of the
process. Right. You know,it's, it does happen from time to
(47:29):
time. One thing that I, I willsay and, and I've heard people, you
know, say that when you'refishing bowfin, you got to use a,
you got to use a wire leader.And nothing is further from the truth.
Yes, they do have a mouthfulof teeth and you do not want to get
your, your fingers in there.They will shred you. However, their
(47:49):
teeth are conical teethsimilar to like what a walleye has.
They're not cutting teeth likea pike or a snakehead. So you don't
necessarily have to have wire.Well, you don't need wire. And actually
I think wire is, doesn't allowyou to give as good a presentation
(48:10):
as you will with justfluorocarbon. So, you know, wire
is not necessary for theirtype of teeth.
Got it. And so, you know,Drew, what's a day like, you know,
either waiting or on the boatwith you?
Well, you know, it reallydepends on what time of the year
(48:30):
it is. You know, with laketrout in the fall, it could start
at 3am going out and chasingthem for dawn hours using glow in
the dark flies in my boat. Youknow, it's, I'm really trying to
(48:51):
help people dial in their,their cast and presentation to the
fish that we are fishing for.I also like to make sure that, I
like to, I like to educatepeople about where they're at. You
know, Lake Champlain, not onlyis it an amazing place for, for fishing,
(49:12):
but it's, it's, it's anincredible place for, for U.S. history.
You know, we're. When I launchat Otter Creek, we go right by the
very spot where basically TheWar of 1812 was won. And most, you
know, we got tens of thousandsof people who go by that every, every
summer and have no idea that,you know, a one hour gun battle right
(49:36):
there is what changed thecourse of the war. So that's, that's
pretty cool to be able toshare that with people and also explain,
you know, the natural historyof the fish that we're going after
or other animals that we see.You know, it's a really neat place
and I love sharing my homewith other people. I also like to
(50:01):
have like plenty of goodsnacks. I work for a small business
that has some amazing sweets.Anytime anybody is going out with
me. I have these maple pecanbars which everybody seems to just
think is the cast Meow. Andthey're really good. They're incredibly
(50:27):
addictive, which can bedetrimental to my waistline at times.
But you know, it's, it'ssharing this incredible, the incredible
resource that's right herebetween New York and Vermont. You
(50:50):
know, this, this lake is, is.I love sharing this lake with people
because it is just, it's sucha great place.
Very, very neat. And rumor hasit that you, you might have a book
in the works.
I do. I will have a bookcoming out from Stackpole in September
(51:13):
called Favorite Fries forVermont where you will see some of
the offerings that I have. Butit's also kind of going to go through
some historic flies, but alsoflies from, from folks like Tom Rosenbauer
and a lot of other guides and,and anglers throughout the state.
(51:37):
Mostly trout flies, butthere's a lot of other good stuff
in there. And you'll see someof my, my, my bowfin flies and gar
flies and it, it'll be, it'llbe pretty neat to, to see my first
book being published.
Yeah, we'll have to bring youback. As we talked about before we
started recording, you can'tdo justice to the God experience.
(51:59):
And then the whole trauma ofwriting a book deserves its own entire
interview.
You got that right.
You got that right. Yeah. So Iknow the bucket that you fall into
because there are kind of twoflavors of ice cream there. They're
the people that love writingthe books. And then there are people
that are like, they did itonce. It almost killed them. And
(52:20):
they Never want to do it again.
Well, I, I would like theopportunity to do it again. I got,
I, I've got some other, someother ideas floating around, but
we'll see what happens withthis first one.
Very, very neat. And so, youknow, before I let you go this evening,
Drew, is there anything elseyou'd like to share with our listeners?
You know, just, you know, comeup and visit, Visit Vermont and check
(52:46):
out Lake Champlain. It's,it's, it's a really cool place. And,
uh, you'll really enjoy yourself.
Yeah. And so, you know, for,like. So I'm down in Charlotte, North
Carolina. If you're not kindof within a reasonable drive distance
of your neck of the woods,kind of, what's the, what's the best
way to get up there?
There's a, there's aninternational airport in Burlington.
(53:09):
That's, that's really yourbest bet. We're, you know, it's,
it's about a four and a half,five hour drive from New York City.
We're about three and a halfhours away from Boston, hour and
a half from Montreal. So it's,it's, it's not really too far from
a lot of stuff, but it's justfar enough away to, to make it a
little challenging to gethere. But there's a lot of, A lot
(53:30):
of great accommodations.There's a lot of things for families
to do here. You know,Burlington is a wonderful city. We
have great food culture here.If you like beer, you've really,
you know, you can't go wrongwith Vermont beer. It's a cool place.
And fall foliage in Vermontcan't be beat.
(53:56):
Yeah. And I've never found badbeer. So there you go. Right?
No, well, there you go. Imean, well, you know, we got helmet,
Heady Topper, and there's alot of other really good beers around,
too. So, you know, we, wedefinitely pride ourselves on, on
the microbrews here.
Yeah. And so, you know, if, iffolks want to learn more about Masterclass
(54:18):
Angling, you know, book a tripwith you. Follow your adventures
on the water. You know, whereshould they go?
Masterclassangling.com is mylanding page. But also I'm on Instagram
at Masterclass Angling. Allone word and. Yeah, give me a follow
and check out the adventuresthat I get into and that I get other
(54:40):
people into.
Yeah, very, very cool. I willdrop all that stuff in the show notes.
Fantastic.
Well, Drew, I reallyappreciate you spending some time
with me this evening. And, youknow, maybe around the 4th of July,
we I'll reach out again andwe'll get you on the calendar to
do a full blown interview onyour new book.
Thanks a million, Marvin. I'mlooking forward to getting you on
(55:02):
the water sometime as well.
Absolutely. Take care. Wellfolks, we hope you enjoyed the interview
as much as we enjoyed bringingit to you. Don't forget to check
out the links to all thisepisode's sponsors in the show notes.
Tight lines, everybody.
Hey, folks, it's Marvin Cash,the host of the Articulate Fly. On
this episode, we're joined byDrew Price, the man behind Masterclass
Angling. Drew shares hispassion for chasing exotic species
on the fly on his home watersof Lake Champlain. I think you're
really going to enjoy thisone, but before we get to the interview,
(00:22):
just a couple of housekeepingitems. If you like the podcast, please
tell a friend and subscribeand leave us a rating review in the
podcatcher of your choice. Itreally helps us out. And we recently
launched a new podcast calledthe Butcher Shop where the meat meets
the water. Each episodefocuses on a single pattern from
our Predator Fly angler tire.We take a deep dive into the genesis
(00:46):
of the pattern, its design,and how to fish it. Like the inventor.
We recently dropped ourinterview with Blaine Chocolate,
taking a deep dive into the Tbone. And our interviews with Tommy
lynch and Russ Madden aredropping soon. To make sure you don't
miss a single episode, be sureto subscribe in the podcatcher of
your choice. We will only bedistributing episodes on the Articulate
(01:06):
Fly for a limited time. Andfinally, a shout out to our sponsor.
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(01:26):
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All one word for 20% off ofyour Trout Routes Pro membership
at maps.troutroutes.com now,on to our interview. Well, Drew,
(01:52):
welcome to the Articulate Fly.
Thank you for having me.
Yeah, looking forward to it.And we have a tradition on the Articulate
Fly. We like to ask all of ourguests to share their earliest fishing
memory.
Well, I can go back to, Ibelieve I was 7 years old fishing
with my grandfather. We wereon a little tiny trout stream in
(02:12):
Constable, New York, and hewas. He was walking behind me and
I had the rod over my shoulderand, and I stopped and he didn't.
And next thing I know is the.The worm hook is. Is hooked into
his shirt pocket and he lookedat me and he said, well, you just
caught yourself 175 poundsucker. That was my. That's my earliest
(02:38):
fishing memory. We didn't. Wedidn't catch many trout. I've subsequently
gotten Fish that, that thestream a fair amount and it's a fun
little stream. Mostly stockbrowns, but it was a, it was a great
memory of my grandfather.
Very, very neat. And so whendid you come to the dark side of
(02:58):
fly fishing?
When I was in college at SUNYPlattsburgh, I picked up fly fishing
in, I guess it was 1993, thefirst time I graduated from, from
college there. I graduated anart degree and I asked my parents
for a fly rod grad in Decemberand I went out and beat the snow
(03:20):
quite a bit with it and taughtmyself how to cast. And within, within
a month of having that, Ibought a fly tying kit and the two
kind of went hand in hand. Andthat next spring, very first fish
I got on the fly was a, was anice smallmouth bass out of the Saranac
(03:40):
river, probably about four,four and a half pounds. And definitely
developed a love of smallmouthat that, at that moment.
Very, very neat. And soobviously you've been in the game
for a long time. You know, whoare some of the folks that have mentored
you on your fly fishingjourney and what have they taught
you?
Well, you know, it's, it'sinteresting. So initially I really,
(04:05):
you know, I had a couple ofbuddies in college that, that I fly,
you know, that I fly fish witha little bit. But most of it, most
of my early fly fishingexperience was, was entirely on my
own. There weren't a lot ofpeople that I knew that, that really
(04:26):
fly fish seriously and, andwere interested in doing the kind
of fly fishing that I wantedto do. I've always had kind of like,
like what can I catch next?Attitude and so I would, I would
get out and chase whatever Icould find. You know, I, when I first
(04:52):
started fly fishing, I reallywanted to get into pike, you know,
catch pike on a fly, I wantedto get musky on a fly. You know,
all these warm water speciesthat, that, you know, in the, in
the early 90s, nobody wasreally talking about, nobody was
really chasing and, but thatwas what I wanted to do, you know,
(05:13):
like my first muskie on thefly was 95, right? And there was,
there was nobody talking aboutmuskies. There was nobody in my area
in northern New York doing it.So I didn't really have any mentors
and in a lot of ways I waskind of self taught. That has changed
in the past 10 years or sowhere I've really kind of come into
(05:36):
the industry more. And youknow, I, the people I really look
up to and, and I'll I'll hitup for advice. Are, are Tom Rosenbauer
and, and Blaine Chocolate.Are, are two people that, you know,
who I have a lot of respectfor and are willing to answer questions
(05:57):
for me and, and talk methrough things when I need help.
And that's been really, youknow, I couldn't ask for two people
to reach out to, you know.
Yeah, absolutely. And I thinkthe amazing thing too is, you know,
not only back in kind of themid-90s, you know, there was no information
(06:20):
for chasing these. We'll justcall them kind of alternative species
on the fly. But, but I mean,the gear wasn't there either, right?
I mean, and so no, you know,this isn't like, you just go to like
the catalog or the Internetand you get a muskie line, you get
a muskie rod, you get a muskiereel, you go buy muskie flies and
you go buy, you know, terminaltackle and you're done. I mean, it
(06:41):
was like you had to kind ofbuild it all.
Oh yeah. Oh yeah, no doubt.You know, my, my, my initial muskie
flies were basically just akind of a deceiver derivative that,
that I kind of made up myself,you know, with a lot of bucktail
(07:02):
and, and rabbit strip. And Iwas using the old Mustad 3366 hooks
and, and whatever hooks Icould find the wire. I, I had picked
up some single strand wiredown in Florida on a fishing trip
to the Everglades. I, youknow, I found it at, at this fishing
(07:24):
shop and I bought you know,like a couple of packages, like 30
foot rolls and that, you know,that was my pike and muskie leader.
You know, for pike. When I waspike fishing, I was just using a,
you know, a conventionaltackle leader, which really aren't
great, you know, when you'refishing on a fly, fishing with a
(07:46):
fly rod. And you know, backthen there were no, like none of
these, these awesome linesthat are out now that are, you know,
like two line weights heavierto really help you propel those big
flies. So, you know, and therods weren't, the rods weren't quite
right, you know, you know,back when I really got into it, it
(08:09):
was, you know, it was, Im6 waslike the hot thing. And you know,
I remember building a coupleof my, my own rods because I worked
for a hook and hack. They werebased in Plattsburgh for quite a
while and I worked for themfor a while and built my, you know,
(08:30):
an IM69 weight. And that wasmy, that was my go to musky rod for
for several years. Musky andpike rod for several years. And you
know, I just remember what abear that was, you know, like it
was so much more pleasant todo the stuff that I do with gear
(08:50):
that is intended to do what Ido, you know.
Yeah, absolutely. And so whendid you get the guide bug?
So I had, I've been flyfishing for about 15 years. I had
moved from northern New Yorkto Vermont and you know, I thought
(09:11):
about guiding here and there Iwas, I was kind of like, you know,
I don't know if I really havethe chops for it. I don't know if
I really have the know how andyou know, do I. Is this something
I really want to do? And thenI happened to see a local guide service
that was looking for people,looking to bring people on, on board.
I think it was an ad onCraigslist of all places. And I was
(09:35):
like, you know, what the heck,I'll do that. And I came on board
and you know, it was mostlyguiding trout and, and I was like,
hey guys, you know, I do allthis stuff with like bowfin and carp
and gar and pike and, andthey're like, you do what? And you
know, I was just like this,you know, I, I've got all these things
(09:55):
that I do. Is this somethingyou think people would be interested
in trying out? And they'relike, sure. And within a couple years,
about a third of the tripsthat we were running were the trips
that I brought to them. And Iquickly realized that, you know,
didn't really want to do oneon one trout trips anymore. And I
(10:17):
really wanted to focus in onthe kind of stuff I was more interested.
And I went out on my own.Started masterclass.
Yeah, got it. And so when was that?
That was in fall of 2010.
Got it. And you know, so youmentioned Tom and Blaine in terms
of fly fishing mentors. Youknow, I would imagine they've been
(10:39):
incredibly influential in yourguiding. But are there any other
folks in the guide space thathave kind of mentored you on your
journey?
You know, I've got some, some,some friends around here that, that
have, that have been pretty,pretty helpful. You know, there's,
there's Jesse Haller who worksfor Orvis now, was, was really great.
(11:07):
You know, we, we talk shops.There's definitely a group of guys
around here that I talk topretty routinely now. But you know,
stuff that I do isn't, youknow, it's, it's very non traditional,
especially for Vermont. Likethere, you know, when I, when I started
Bringing Bowen to the tablearound here. You know, I. When I
(11:32):
brought it up to the guideservice that I was originally with,
I was like, you know, there'sthese fish called bowfin in Lake
Champlain, and. And they alllooked at me and they're like, what.
What's a Bowen? You know, so Ididn't really, you know, like, I
kind of, you know, not tryingto put myself up on a pedestal, I.
(11:52):
I just know the stuff that Ilike that I know the stuff that I
want to do, and I know how todo it. And I'm. I'm, you know, and
kind of a natural educator. Iworked in the education field for.
For 10 years. And I loveteaching people new things, and I
love teaching people about thelake that we're on and then the fish
(12:13):
that are here and how tocatch. And it just kind of came together
for me. I don't know that ifthat makes sense at all.
Yeah, it does. You know, andit's an interesting thing because,
I mean, I've. I've got. I'vebeen fortunate enough to know and
fish with a lot of guides,and, you know, it's kind of. And
(12:34):
you and I have talked aboutthis. I mean, it's kind of that secret
sauce, right, where, you know,like. Like, God nirvana is to fill
your calendar with people thatyou want to fish with that want to
fish the way you want to guide people.
Right, Right. Well, you know,actually, I actually have. I have
to take this back a little bitbecause I just remembered probably
(12:57):
one of the best pieces ofadvice that I ever got about guiding
was in 2012, and it was inAugust of 2012. And earlier that
year, I had filmed with RiverMonsters. They came to Vermont to
(13:19):
film an episode. It was justVampires of the Deep. They were chasing
after lamprey. And. And U.S.fish and Wildlife Service had. Had
recommended me because theywanted to try to put Jeremy on. Jeremy
Wade on. On some muskies. Andthey're like, the guy you got to
(13:39):
talk to is Drew Price. And,you know, and I talked to them and
I was like, you know, muskiesmay not be a great option, but bowfin
and Gar and there's a fewother things, and I'd be happy to
help you out with this. So Iwas like, I know all these waters
that you're on and. And endedup spending five days with them.
You. You barely even see me inthe episode. It's kind of. Kind of
(14:03):
funny. They. They're filmingthe back end of the canoe. Jeremy's
in the front of the canoe. I'min the middle, and the top third
of the screen is my butt, soyou really don't see me much in the
episode. But Jeremy came backto Vermont later that summer, and.
And he reached out to me, andhe said, you know, let's go fishing.
(14:25):
And we took him. I took himout, and at the end of the day, when
I was driving him back off inthe hotel, we're just sitting in
my truck in the parking lottalking. And he was telling me about
when he guided in the Amazon,and he said, you know what I did?
He said, I did what I wantedto do. I didn't let other people
(14:50):
create the expectations ofwhat they wanted my guide service
to be. He's like, I wanted myguide service to be this. He's like,
I went out and I fished forthe things that I wanted to fish
for, and people came to mebecause of the interest that I had
in those things. And he said.He said. He's like, I was booked
(15:14):
out two years in advance. He'slike, there is a waiting list. And
he's like, do what you want todo with your guide service. And that's
really. The first 10 years ofmy guide service, that's what I did.
And. And it's kind of still myattitude about it. Like, I. You know,
(15:37):
I could do trout trips. Idon't. For the most part, I'll do
some streamer trips for. For.For larger trout here and there,
or sight fishing for. For. Forlarge browns in the. In the fall,
but for the most part, I avoidthat. I have been very fortunate
that most of the people whocome to me want to do the things
(16:00):
that I do because they see theexcitement that I have for what it
is that I do. And. And, youknow, whether it's, you know, learning
how to catch both in a gar anda fly or. Or learning new techniques
on, you know, like, how to.How to. How to locate lake trout
(16:20):
and target lake trout with afly rod or going out and just like,
how many different species canwe get in a day on fly? And. And
I think a lot of people reallyappreciate that. And. And I've actually
found that I get a lot ofguides who come to me who want to
do something different. Right?Like, we've all chased trout. And,
(16:48):
you know, that's. That's onething that is like, you know, we.
Fly fishing is really a troutculture for the most part, but people
are starting to see, wow,there's. There's all these other
options out there. I mean,it's not really starting to see but
are you're starting to see itbecome more mainstream these days,
(17:10):
I think and you're seeingpeople like wow, this is, this is
really exciting. I can go outon the lake and I have an opportunity
to catch this ancientpredator. But then I can also use
like a three way rod and catchthese, these trophy beautiful panfish.
And you know I got a shot atcatching a channel catfish that I'm
(17:30):
sight fishing for or alongthose guard. I'm catching it with
a fly that I'm not using ahook. You know, it's and, and people
are like this is prettyamazing. And you know I see a lot
of, a lot of anglers getreally excited about that these days
(17:51):
and people are coming to mefor that and that excites me, you
know, like, you know, I thinkyou can hear in my voice like that
I find this stuff really funand, and not, not knowing exactly
what the day is going to bringwhen I get out in, in some of the
backwaters that I fish thatyou know, like dropping this rod
(18:15):
and grabbing another onebecause something just suddenly showed
up, you know, like work atpanfish and all of a sudden there's
a, there's a 30 inch bowfinthat comes right up to inspect the
boat, you know and, and youknow I love that stuff and, and I'm
finding more and more anglersare loving that kind of opportunity.
(18:38):
Very, very neat. And so youknow, you guide you know, Lake Champlain,
you know and for folks, I meanI'm, I'm a southerner, so not super
familiar.
Yep.
So can you kind of give uskind of a little bit of an overview
of the area and the fishery?
Sure, absolutely. So, so LakeChamplain is, is. It's bordered by
(19:01):
Vermont on the east side andNew York on the west side, the Adirondacks
on, on. On the New York sideand the Green Mountains on the, on
the Vermont side. And it goesnorth into Canada into Quebec. And
10% of the lake is inMissisquoi Bay, which is part of
which is in Canada. That's aplace I don't, I've never fished
(19:21):
in in the Canadian part andCanadian waters in Lake Champlain.
But the lake itself is 120miles long and it, you know in into
from Canada down pastWhitehall, New York. Both places
the U.S. navy. And it is 12miles wide at its widest point near
(19:42):
burlington. It's about 400ftdeep at its mean level which is about
96ft above sea level. It's gotabout 7 1/2 trillion gallons of water.
But I really like to think ofLake Champlain as a very dynamic
system because it, it's, it'sa, you know, a big catch basin right
(20:07):
for, for it's got a very largewatershed. And after the spring melt,
Lake Champlain typically willget to 99 to 100ft above sea level,
sometimes higher. We had thehighest lake level in 2011 of 103.3ft.
So tremendous amount of waterthere. And unlike, you know, Lake
(20:31):
Champlain is not like abathtub. So it doesn't just come
straight up when it comes out,it spreads out and it spreads out
into these, these largewetlands. We have these massive wetland
complexes in both New York andVermont. Vermont has a lot more than
New York. And you know, so youget these incredible opportunities
to fish flooded forests in thespringtime. And we have carp and
(20:55):
bowfin and, and pike and itlike literally in the trees. It's
pretty neat to be able to pushcoral through the trees and find
your, your target species. Butin, in, in this late summer, you
know, getting to September,even to October, the lake level can
(21:18):
drop down as low as 94 or even93ft. So you could have a 7 foot
lake level fluctuationthroughout the year. And if we have
like a big water event likewhen we had Hurricane Irene or we
had the big flood event twoyears ago, I mean, the lake level
(21:40):
came up two feet in, in twodays, which is just a massive volume
of water. So it's, it's areally dynamic system that can change
a lot. And every time, youknow, every year is new on, on the
lake. So when you get on thatlake, you'll have a general idea
(22:02):
where those, where the fishare. But you really have to kind
of relearn it every year,which I, you know, I, I find that
very exciting. I find thatreally interesting. You know, you
kind of got a differentplaying field every time you get
out there. You know, you don'tknow exactly where. You have an idea
(22:23):
what everything's going to beand how it's going to play out, but
you don't know ex. And in oneplace it fishes very well one year,
may not fish very well thenext year. So that's, that's kind
of a neat part of it. But wehave 88 different species in the
lake. Of that about 25 or 30are really available to, to, for
(22:47):
fly anglers to catch. We'vegot a lot of different panfish. We've
got, we've got some of theBest. Best bass fishing in the country.
Lake Champlain is rate thepast 30 years has been rated by Bassmasters
as one of the top five basslakes in the country primarily because
of smallmouth bass. The smallmouse fishery here is just absolutely
(23:09):
insane and I love chasing themin the lake. But what I find even
more fun is finding is chasingthem in the tributaries in the springtime
when they come into spawnbecause you go out with a five or
a six weight and you've got.You're basically fishing like you'd
(23:32):
be fishing for trout butyou're getting 2 to 5 pound smallmouth
instead which, which doesn'tsuck. We've got a lot of trout or
we've got a lot of. A lot oflake trout. Our lake trout fishery
is fantastic. They'reavailable in the early season and
(23:54):
in the late season. I kind ofcall them my shoulder season fish.
I so I'll start catching thosein in March and using floating lines
and intermediate lines andthey're available until the water
starts warming up to about 45degrees and they think stop, start
sinking down a little bit andyou can still get them on sinking
(24:15):
lines down to about 50ft andthen they'll show back up again starting
usually in October. October,November and December can be fantastic
months for chasing lakers on afly. We've got some great salmon
runs on the lake. We've gotlandlocked Atlantic salmon. We do
(24:37):
have some steelhead runs. I'vegot pike, pickerel and muskie. We
have hybrids of pike andpickerel which some people around
here will call pikerel.Really, really attractive fish. We've
got walleye, we've got bowfin.You know, I. I've got one client
(24:58):
who's got almost every IGFAtypic class record bowfin and most
of them have been caught onLake Champlain. So we have a lot
of bowfin, we've got long nosegar. We've got a great population
of carp. We get these greatsucker runs. I love catching suckers
(25:21):
on a fly. I actually the staterecord, the Vermont state record
for white sucker caught on afly which is a massive white sucker,
like 6.3 pounds or somethinglike that. Really big fish. Let me
see, what else do we have? Andwe got, we got just. There's so many
different opportunities whenyou go out there. And we've got freshwater
(25:47):
drum. I love, I love fishingthem. A lot of people around here
call them sheepshead. That'sone of the hardest fighting fish
on the lake. They're. They'rereally Challenging to sight fish
for, but you can also caststreamers for them. I get some, we
get some big ones up to around20 pounds. And, and that will just,
you know, that will bend youre way right down to the cork when
(26:13):
you're fighting one of thosethings. It's, it's, it's pretty awesome
fishery. I feel reallyfortunate to be here, and I feel
really fortunate to be, youknow, like one of the first people
who's really, you know,promoting Lake Champlain fly fishing.
(26:33):
Very, very neat. And you'dmentioned earlier that you, you know,
you basically had to relearnthe lake every year. And, you know,
most of my guide guests are,you know, creek and river guides.
And so, you know, is that themain difference, you know, fishing
in a lake or is. Are thereother things that make the lake game
different?
Oh, there's, there's so manythings that make it different. I
(26:54):
mean, you know, you got todeal with boat traffic. You really
have to know how to play theweather. You know, like if you're.
I'm fishing in, in a towie onthis lake and this is, this is a
big lake. You know, it's a,it's a very large lake. And, you
(27:19):
know, if I am not paying closeattention to the weather, I could
be in deep trouble. You know,you really have to know what bays
are safe with the direction ofthe wind. You got to be really paying
attention to that windforecast, the weather forecast, and
then just paying attentionwhen you're on the water, because
(27:41):
things can go wrong very, veryquickly, you know, especially when
the water is cold. You know,when the, when the water is, is below
60 degrees, you know, that's,that's a dangerous place this is
now. And I, you know, I takesafety very seriously on the lake.
(28:03):
If it's a lake where thingscan change very dramatically very
quickly. I can remember oneday I was out with my Bowfin client,
Richard Hart, one of my Bowfinclients, and he's the guy who's got
all the IGFA records. And Richand I were. This is back when I was
(28:26):
guiding out of a canoe andRich and I were out in this backwater
and we had a light chop on thewater. It was maybe 3 or 4 inch chop.
And I just saw this dark cloudcoming across the lake and I was
like, rich, I'm reallyconcerned about that. And it started
getting in closer and the windstarted picking up and it went from
(28:46):
a 3 to 4 inch chop to a 3 to 4inch crashing waves. And we had a
mile and A half to paddle backto the launch. And that was one of
the most frightening momentsI've ever had on that lake. But it
went from, it went from zeroto 60 in, in under five minutes,
you know, so you really haveto keep your widget value on the
(29:10):
lake. And, you know, you kindof have to watch out for other boaters.
You got to watch out for otheranglers. We have a lot of bass tournaments
on this lake, and sometimesthey don't always respect the other
anglers who are not targetingbass. I've had them blow in front
of me a few times, but, youknow, it's, it's, it's a really different
(29:35):
environment. And you know,like, there, there are times you
can go into a place where youhave, you know, like, carp are notorious
for this. I can go into a baywhere I normally will find a lot
of carp. And, you know, theday before there was carp everywhere.
I go in there the next day,you. You can't find a fish. You can't,
(29:58):
like, no idea where they went.You know, like, they just disappeared
overnight. They may have goneinto deeper water. You know, something
may have happened that, youknow, big question mark and one I
have never figured out. Butit's, it's, it's a really, it could
(30:23):
be a very variable system. Andyou're also dealing with, especially
when you're dealing withcooler water fish or, or sold water
fish like the lake trout orpike. As that water warms up in the
lake, those fish start movingdeeper and they find, they move,
they start using differenthabitats than they were using earlier
(30:46):
in the season, and they willmove back to those habitats. So you
kind of have to know, youknow, that progression of where they're
going to head to and whenthey're going to head there. And
that's not something that youcan, you know, learn overnight. You,
you really have to spend a lotof time, you know, watching and observing
(31:08):
what's going on. And on a lakethis size, you know, like, I, I consider
myself a student of the lakebecause every time I get on that
lake, I learn something new. Ilearned something different that
I hadn't learned before. Itmight be a new location, it might
be a new way to fish.Different parts of the lake or for
(31:29):
different species are like,wow, I, I never realized these species
were, were utilizing thishabitat this time of the year. So
you really kind of, you know,when you're out there, being very
observant really pays off. Andbeing willing to talk to a lot of
other people and seeing whatthey're having for experiences. I
(31:50):
talk to a lot of conventionalanglers. I have a lot of friends
who are conventional anglers,and they'll tell me a lot of stuff.
They may be not. May not begoing after the species that I'm
going after, but they'll seethem. They'll be like, oh, yeah,
that bay over there is loadedwith carb. Okay, great, you know,
Or I've seen a lot of bowfinand X, Y or Z, and I'll go check
(32:11):
it out. And that can be reallyhelpful, you know. But the. The different
parts of the lake aredramatically different, too. Like
the broad lake that I'm nearhere, I'm in Charlotte, Vermont,
and the broad. This is asection of the lake we call the Broad
(32:31):
Lake. The Broad lake is, youknow, big and deep. You get down
to the. To the southern end ofthe lake in Orwell and the Whitehall
area down there. It's kind oflike more like a big muddy river.
So it's incredibly differentenvironment. Yeah, it's radically
(32:53):
different than streams and rivers.
Yeah, very, very interesting.And so, you know, you've got this
incredibly, you know, diverselake with all these different species.
Tell me a little bit about howyou, you know, map that to various
angling experiences atMasterclass Angling.
Well, you know, a lot of it isdepending on, you know, what. What
(33:15):
somebody wants to do or. Orthe time of the year. You know, I'll
get people who reach out tome, and they'll be like, hey, are.
Are you guiding right now?And. And, you know, if. If. If the
lake is open and I can get myboat out there, you know, generally
the answer is yes, as long asthe weather is conducive to get out
there, you know, and laketrout are a great option in the early
(33:38):
season. But, you know,sometimes people will come to me
and they'll be like, I reallywant to catch a bowfin or I really
want to catch a gar. And I'mlike, great, let's. Let's do it and
get out and teach them thetechniques that they need to be able
to catch those. But, you know,a lot of it is. It. I. I try to base
(33:59):
it on, you know, not only thetime of the year, but, you know,
what people want toexperience. And. And I'll be pretty
upfront with people like, youknow, here's what's. Here's what's
going on right now. Or, youknow, you want to catch pike. You
know, this is. We're right inthe middle. It's. It's August we're,
this is not the time to bechasing pike. If you really want
(34:21):
to come to see me and get intosome pike, your best bet is to hit
me up in late April or Mayinto June, and then again in like
October, November, even intoDecember. That's when we have good
chances at pike and sometrophy fish. Some trophy pike during
that, that time period, youknow, I, I kind of, you know, I use
(34:50):
the available resources forwhen they are coming to see me or
I let them know, like, hey,you know, you want to get both in
May through September is yourbest, best bet. So hit me up during
those, that time period, you know.
Yeah, it's, it's neat too,right? Cause I mean, you know, from
(35:11):
looking at your website anddoing research for the interview,
I mean, you've got, do youwant to wade? Do you want to sight
fish? Do you want to fish fromthe boat? It sounds like you kind
of offer it all.
I, I really do. You know, I,I've, I offer muskie trips in, in
muskie rivers in northern NewYork. I do walk and wait smallmouth
(35:32):
trips. Like I said, I, I willdo some trout trips here and there.
I, I know some great trophytrout streams in Vermont and in northern
New York. I've got, I've gotsome, you know, I spent a lot of
time in, in, in northern NewYork. That's where I grew up. I offer
landlocked salmon trips onLake Champlain tributaries and Lake
(35:54):
Metro, Magog tributaries,Clyde river, and you know, there's
steelhead opportunities onboth sides of the lake. You know,
that. And that's all walk andwade. So there's, you know, I love
having diversity like that atmy fingertips, you know, and I've
(36:17):
had people who, you know, I'vegot, I've got some clients lined
up in April that want to doone day a walk away trout fishing
and then they want to head outin the lake and see what they can
get. I'm stoked for that. Youknow, I love those challenges. I
(36:39):
love keeping things variableand really, you know, exploring the
diversity of fishingopportunities that we have in Vermont
and in northern New York, you know.
Yeah, it's neat too, right?Because I know you're particularly
proud of your bowfin fisheryand I was kind of curious, you know.
(36:59):
Yeah, obviously you're fishingfor all kinds of, you know, we'll
just call them fly fishingexotics, but, you know, but what
attracted you to start chasingbowfin on the fly?
Just to be blunt, they are thebiggest badasses out there. They're
really incredible fish. LikeI, there is no other fish that I've
(37:21):
encountered that will swim upto you and look you in the eyes.
They are, they're veryaggressive, they're very intelligent.
They're a native species.They're basically unchanged for the
past 300 million years. Youknow, they're not the same species
(37:41):
in the fossil record, but ifyou look at a fossil record, when
T. Rex is roaming the earth, afossil bowfin from when T. Rex is
roaming the earth, you cantell that it's a bowfin. And it looks
almost exactly at the bowfinwe got around here right now. It's
pretty amazing. I mean they,the males in the springtime have
(38:02):
incredible colors. Their finsget turquoise, they get an emerald
green color on their sides.Their bellies kind of get this, this
pumpkin yellow, orange. Andtheir eye spot, they've got this
orange eye spot that's almostglowing, it's so orange. And they
(38:23):
get incredibly territorial andaggressive when they're defending
their babies. I actually, Ihad one, I was in this backwater,
I was in a flooded forest andwe, we found this little male was
22 inches. I know because weended up catching this thing. But
(38:45):
it, it saw the nose of theboat come in and it literally jumped
out of the water and bit thebow in this boat. And you know, like
here's a 22 inch fish goingafter a 15 foot boat to defend its
babies. You know there's, thatis just really cool watching how
(39:08):
they stock their prey, howthey'll come in the dorsal fin. You
know, it, it just this, itundulates and, and you can really
tell a lot about how that fishis behaving and what it's thinking
by what that, what that dorsalfin is doing and the way they do
(39:31):
the smash and grab whenthey're, when they're in close because
it's, it. Bowfin fishing isalmost all sight fishing. It is,
it's not particularlydifficult fly fishing. It's really
dapping or, or jigging with afly rod. But you're hunting fish.
I'm on the polling platform, Ihave my client in the front. And
(39:53):
you're looking for these fishand, and, and if the fish, you know,
bites the fly and gets off it,it's not gone. I've had them, I see
this all the time. They'll,they'll grab the fly, they'll feel
the hook, they'll shoot off,they'll turn around and they'll come
(40:15):
in from a different angle tofind out what that was. And you Get
a second shot at them. I meanthat really cool. I mean my, my very
first bowfin guidingexperience, I was in my canoe, we
were going through thisbackwater and these lily pads and
I hit a bowfin and the thingshot off and I washed it and turned
(40:39):
around and came back andlooked at the canoe to see what hit
it. My client got a fly infront of it. It grabbed it. He's
got it on and it circlesaround some lily stems, gets off.
He gets to fly out of the lilystems. The fish comes back and he
(41:00):
looks at the second time andit gets off a second time. Like what
other fish does anything likethat? You know, it's, they're really
cool and, and the, they'revery long lived and like I said,
they're really smart. Youknow, I, I will splash the water
(41:21):
and get them to come inbecause they're so curious and a
lot of people around herethink that, oh, you're splashing
the water and the bowfin comein. They're really dumb. It's the
opposite. They, they hear thatsplashing. They think something is
wounded and they want to comein to see if they have an opportunity
to eat something. That's, youknow, that curiosity is, is intelligence.
(41:45):
So these are an incrediblyintelligent fish and more than willing
to take a fly. But if youreally keep hitting the same area
again and again and again withthe same flies and the same techniques,
they pick up on it. They knowwhat's going on. So you have to vary
what you're doing, which to mekeeps things more exciting. You know,
(42:08):
I, I've, I've gone on recordsaying this before. I consider bowfin
the most American game fishout there because they are so unchanged
for so long. They're, they'reincredible. And if you've never fished
from both end, you really needto because it's a very, very cool
(42:31):
fish to, to target.
Yeah, that's very neat. And sotell me a little bit about kind of
like your rod reel line set upand then sounds like you got to kind
of change the fly situation upbecause they kind of get dialed in,
right?
They do, they do. So I, I'veused a lot of different rods. Seven
(42:52):
and eight weight tends to bethe, this, the sweet spot. I like
to use a stiffer rod. I think,you know, at this point the rod,
my go to rod right now is, isthe, the 8, 5, 7 weight helios. It's
a short, stiff rod and it, andit really gets the job done very
(43:15):
well. You can, you can crossthat fish's eyes with the hook set
line really isn't thatimportant. Any, any floating line
will do. The leader is veryshort. I usually just do a short,
like maybe a foot of or so oflike 20 pounds fluorocarbon. And
(43:39):
then I will tie off 16 poundto that, about three foot piece of
that. So you only have a likea four foot leader. You really don't
need a very long leader. Along leader is actually detrimental
to good presentation when,when you're, when you're doing the
style of fishing that I do forthese guys because you only have
(44:01):
a couple inches of fly lineout from your rod tip. You know,
like I said, you're reallydapping and, and to properly present
that fly and to be able to geta good hook set you actually have
to have the rod pretty muchperpendicular to the water, parallel
to the water. You want to havethat rod parallel or parallel to
the water because you're goingto set the hook kind of keeping the
(44:25):
rod flat and parallel to thewater. So you kind of got this, this
upward stroke. You don't wantto set back with your wrist. And
when you sit back with yourwrist it's a lot like trying to set
a hook into a concrete block.And I've had three rods that have
broken right in front of thegrip because of just, you know, the
(44:50):
way you're setting the hooklike that. As far as flies, I have
kind of a number of my ownpatterns that I use for them. They're,
they're for the most partfairly heavily weighted. They're
kind of really buggy,buggerish flies. I've got one I call
(45:12):
the Mr. Beauregard and I gotanother one I call Mr. Bo Squiggles.
I've also had very good luckwith crayfish patterns. Changer craws
are fantastic certain times ofthe year when they get really, when
the boat can get reallyfinicky in mid summer. I find that
the, the, the changer crosscan be more difficult to get a hook
(45:33):
set with. At that point youreally, you really want to have a
good, you want to get, youhave your better opportunities with
the changer cross earlier inthe season when they're really a
lot more aggressive withtheir, with their takes. But they
will, they will take carpflies they'll take, they'll take
(45:56):
almost anything to be veryhonest with you. But if you've got
the wrong hook, it gives thefishing advantage when you're fishing
with bow. Fishing for bowfin,a short shank heavy wire hook is
much more effective. Ingetting a hook set than a laundry
shank hook. And if you have alonger shank hook and you're playing
(46:20):
those fish, that, that hookacts more as a lever and their mouth
is just almost all bone andteeth. And if you have any kind of
lever like that and the waythese guys fight, they, they thrash
around a lot. A longer shankhook will work itself out a lot easier
than the, the short shankhooks. So it's, it's, it's a lot
(46:47):
of fun. I try to keep the, thefight pretty short and sweet, you
know, using really stoutleader. When, when somebody hooks
into one of these things, I, Icome flying down from the, the, the
pulling platform and grab anet and scoop them up as fast as
I can because if they get intothe weeds, they will break you off.
(47:07):
I carry a lot of, I carry alot of bowfin flies because there
are a lot of break offs.
Yeah. So it's not exactly theno changer left behind mentality.
No, no. I mean, you know,it's, it sucks to lose a changer
to these guys, but that, youknow, that's kind of part of the
process. Right. You know,it's, it does happen from time to
(47:29):
time. One thing that I, I willsay and, and I've heard people, you
know, say that when you'refishing bowfin, you got to use a,
you got to use a wire leader.And nothing is further from the truth.
Yes, they do have a mouthfulof teeth and you do not want to get
your, your fingers in there.They will shred you. However, their
(47:49):
teeth are conical teethsimilar to like what a walleye has.
They're not cutting teeth likea pike or a snakehead. So you don't
necessarily have to have wire.Well, you don't need wire. And actually
I think wire is, doesn't allowyou to give as good a presentation
(48:10):
as you will with justfluorocarbon. So, you know, wire
is not necessary for theirtype of teeth.
Got it. And so, you know,Drew, what's a day like, you know,
either waiting or on the boatwith you?
Well, you know, it reallydepends on what time of the year
(48:30):
it is. You know, with laketrout in the fall, it could start
at 3am going out and chasingthem for dawn hours using glow in
the dark flies in my boat. Youknow, it's, I'm really trying to
(48:51):
help people dial in their,their cast and presentation to the
fish that we are fishing for.I also like to make sure that, I
like to, I like to educatepeople about where they're at. You
know, Lake Champlain, not onlyis it an amazing place for, for fishing,
(49:12):
but it's, it's, it's anincredible place for, for U.S. history.
You know, we're. When I launchat Otter Creek, we go right by the
very spot where basically TheWar of 1812 was won. And most, you
know, we got tens of thousandsof people who go by that every, every
summer and have no idea that,you know, a one hour gun battle right
(49:36):
there is what changed thecourse of the war. So that's, that's
pretty cool to be able toshare that with people and also explain,
you know, the natural historyof the fish that we're going after
or other animals that we see.You know, it's a really neat place
and I love sharing my homewith other people. I also like to
(50:01):
have like plenty of goodsnacks. I work for a small business
that has some amazing sweets.Anytime anybody is going out with
me. I have these maple pecanbars which everybody seems to just
think is the cast Meow. Andthey're really good. They're incredibly
(50:27):
addictive, which can bedetrimental to my waistline at times.
But you know, it's, it'ssharing this incredible, the incredible
resource that's right herebetween New York and Vermont. You
(50:50):
know, this, this lake is, is.I love sharing this lake with people
because it is just, it's sucha great place.
Very, very neat. And rumor hasit that you, you might have a book
in the works.
I do. I will have a bookcoming out from Stackpole in September
(51:13):
called Favorite Fries forVermont where you will see some of
the offerings that I have. Butit's also kind of going to go through
some historic flies, but alsoflies from, from folks like Tom Rosenbauer
and a lot of other guides and,and anglers throughout the state.
(51:37):
Mostly trout flies, butthere's a lot of other good stuff
in there. And you'll see someof my, my, my bowfin flies and gar
flies and it, it'll be, it'llbe pretty neat to, to see my first
book being published.
Yeah, we'll have to bring youback. As we talked about before we
started recording, you can'tdo justice to the God experience.
(51:59):
And then the whole trauma ofwriting a book deserves its own entire
interview.
You got that right.
You got that right. Yeah. So Iknow the bucket that you fall into
because there are kind of twoflavors of ice cream there. They're
the people that love writingthe books. And then there are people
that are like, they did itonce. It almost killed them. And
(52:20):
they Never want to do it again.
Well, I, I would like theopportunity to do it again. I got,
I, I've got some other, someother ideas floating around, but
we'll see what happens withthis first one.
Very, very neat. And so, youknow, before I let you go this evening,
Drew, is there anything elseyou'd like to share with our listeners?
You know, just, you know, comeup and visit, Visit Vermont and check
(52:46):
out Lake Champlain. It's,it's, it's a really cool place. And,
uh, you'll really enjoy yourself.
Yeah. And so, you know, for,like. So I'm down in Charlotte, North
Carolina. If you're not kindof within a reasonable drive distance
of your neck of the woods,kind of, what's the, what's the best
way to get up there?
There's a, there's aninternational airport in Burlington.
(53:09):
That's, that's really yourbest bet. We're, you know, it's,
it's about a four and a half,five hour drive from New York City.
We're about three and a halfhours away from Boston, hour and
a half from Montreal. So it's,it's, it's not really too far from
a lot of stuff, but it's justfar enough away to, to make it a
little challenging to gethere. But there's a lot of, A lot
(53:30):
of great accommodations.There's a lot of things for families
to do here. You know,Burlington is a wonderful city. We
have great food culture here.If you like beer, you've really,
you know, you can't go wrongwith Vermont beer. It's a cool place.
And fall foliage in Vermontcan't be beat.
(53:56):
Yeah. And I've never found badbeer. So there you go. Right?
No, well, there you go. Imean, well, you know, we got helmet,
Heady Topper, and there's alot of other really good beers around,
too. So, you know, we, wedefinitely pride ourselves on, on
the microbrews here.
Yeah. And so, you know, if, iffolks want to learn more about Masterclass
(54:18):
Angling, you know, book a tripwith you. Follow your adventures
on the water. You know, whereshould they go?
Masterclassangling.com is mylanding page. But also I'm on Instagram
at Masterclass Angling. Allone word and. Yeah, give me a follow
and check out the adventuresthat I get into and that I get other
(54:40):
people into.
Yeah, very, very cool. I willdrop all that stuff in the show notes.
Fantastic.
Well, Drew, I reallyappreciate you spending some time
with me this evening. And, youknow, maybe around the 4th of July,
we I'll reach out again andwe'll get you on the calendar to
do a full blown interview onyour new book.
Thanks a million, Marvin. I'mlooking forward to getting you on
(55:02):
the water sometime as well.
Absolutely. Take care. Wellfolks, we hope you enjoyed the interview
as much as we enjoyed bringingit to you. Don't forget to check
out the links to all thisepisode's sponsors in the show notes.
Tight lines, everybody.
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