Episode 229: The Truth About Blue Walleye (Fish Talk With The Doc)

This week on Outdoor Journal Radio, Ang and Pete are joined once again by Dr. Steven Cooke, the Fish Doc, to answer some of the strangest questions in fishing.

After a recent trip where the crew caught an unusually high number of blue walleye, the boys ask Dr. Cooke what actually causes a walleye to turn blue, whether blue walleye are a different species, and why many of them seem to look smaller, thinner, or less healthy than their yellow counterparts.

The conversation also dives into some of the weirdest behaviour anglers are now seeing with LiveScope, including suspended muskies pointing straight down, predator fish attacking bait balls, and whether fish can actually learn from pressure.

Plus, the guys talk about a massive Fraser River white sturgeon, blotchy bass, fish genetics, fish memory, carp lips in China, and why modern fishing technology is showing anglers things we may have never understood before.

If you’ve ever caught a blue walleye, seen something strange on your sonar, or wondered how smart fish really are, this episode is for you.

Subscribe for more fishing stories, conservation talk, outdoor news, and behind-the-scenes conversations from The Fish’n Canada Show and Outdoor Journal Radio.

Transcript

SPEAKER_04 0:22

This episode of Outdoor Journal Radio is brought to you in part by the Invasive Species Center, protecting Canada's land and water from invasive species. Freedom Cruise Canada, rent the boat, own the memories. And JMB Cycle a Marine, your home for all things power sports, boats, and equipment.

SPEAKER_00 0:43

And now, another exciting episode in the adventures of Outdoor Journal Radio.

SPEAKER_04 0:53

Thank you, thank you. Thank you. We're gonna need a new audience pretty soon. They're becoming too predictable.

SPEAKER_06 1:00

I wonder if you could run that backwards, Dean. Oh. Then we'd have a fool answer. We could fool Lance. He won't remember this for the next show. So you can me too, but my idea is gonna be.

SPEAKER_04 1:12

Welcome to the program, Outdoor Journal Radio, the podcast. I managed a little biola. He is Peter Bowman and the usual cast of characters, uh Nikki V over there and Dean Taylor. Nikki's been here a lot lately, eh? I know.

SPEAKER_03 1:25

I'm full-time now, P. Remember last time he said part-time? Not no more. I'll show you part-time. Not no more. Not the adjunct. Not no more. Not no more. Handomagazes.

SPEAKER_04 1:40

What do we got today? Oh, a little fish talk for you, kiddies, today. Oh, yeah. Dr. Stephen Cook will be joining us here shortly. Wow. Yep, Stevie Steve. In-house fish dock. And uh we got a whole plethora of questions, uh, don't we, Dean, to ask him? We do. From previous uh podcasts and stuff, right? We do, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 1:58

And he's uh he's been prepped so he's been prepped. Usually we can prep them.

SPEAKER_06 2:03

No, it's you got to.

SPEAKER_05 2:05

I'm sure we'll have some surprises. We we never go off script. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_06 2:09

We're off and off script no matter what.

SPEAKER_04 2:11

Uh, for those of you who don't know who uh Dr. Stephen Cook is, uh he is a biology professor at Carleton University, and he has published a lot of papers. Yeah, a lot of papers. Um peer-reviewed.

SPEAKER_03 2:24

Certainly does.

SPEAKER_04 2:26

Get out of here. I'm telling you. No, we're telling you. Uh chair of the board for of uh technical experts of the Great Lakes Fisheries Commission and fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, among other things. And that was all before breakfast. He did all those, and afterwards, you've got a whole bunch of other acclamations. Oh my god. What's happening in the speaking of adjunct? Uh, what's happening in the Fishing Canada store?

SPEAKER_03 2:49

I have good news.

SPEAKER_04 2:50

Oh, beautiful.

SPEAKER_03 2:51

Well, please. If you really loved us and have been on the store lately, you would see that.

SPEAKER_06 2:56

I loved us, yes, Peter.

SPEAKER_03 2:57

If you really loved us.

SPEAKER_06 2:59

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 2:59

Okay. Just want to make sure what you're phrasing here. Go ahead. If you really love slash loved us, okay have been on the store lately, you would see that there we pretty well sold the hats. Oh boy. Um, but good news, they're all back in stock. So including this one here, these ones, the tritone, beautiful. You know what? Let me get this, let me get this thing off and show you. I'm not seeing anything here. You're saying these. Wonderful tritone hat, okay. All three colors. Nice. They come signed if you want them signed. Nice. Um, I think they're pretty awesome. It's definitely the most comfortable hat we have. So if you they come autographed. If you don't want them autographed, let me know in the notes, in the order notes, and we'll make it cost you less blank hat or more. They cost you less or more with the autograph. Exactly. Cost you the same. Same.

SPEAKER_04 3:48

I would say if we just did all that. They're cheaper once we soil them.

SPEAKER_06 3:52

We put all kinds of stuff, ink on it, and that's not good. How popular is that hat, Nick? On uh uh all around. I could autograph, non-autograph, whatever. Is it a one of the up upper eichelon there?

SPEAKER_03 4:01

Well, it sells out every time we bring it in. Okay. Um, it's our classic colors. It's the red, the white, the black. It's a really nice hat. Let's get nothing too much. It is a nice hat. There's no doubt. And it's really comfortable, the meshed back, but I have some good news. We have a new and improved white trucker hat. No way. Well, you guys love the white trucker hat. You love the full white, the black and white. Yeah, yeah. So it's similar to this, except this is also a black bill. And the nice thing about it now is that it's the same hat, looks the same, but it's got a flex fit band in it. So snapback, mesh back, flex fit, white and black trucker hat.

SPEAKER_06 4:36

Wait a sec. You can't have is it a snapback and flex fit? Ah, baby.

SPEAKER_03 4:40

Yeah, they do both. It's some pretty cool shit. That's like that's beyond. And as far as I know, it's like the same price. So you should probably mouse you on over there, update your hat. You know, if you've been wearing it a lot, like Steve, for example, he goes through about 32 in a week.

SPEAKER_06 4:57

It's just opposite.

SPEAKER_03 4:58

But you have the city sweat. This is the hat for you.

SPEAKER_04 5:01

In all fairness to him, no. We all sweat in our hats.

SPEAKER_03 5:04

Okay, okay, no, we all do. Any hat he has a check. His shirt. His shirt. Okay, you see this the white, the white on this these UV shirts, okay? Like the one that you're wearing, the one that you're wearing, grandpa. His fish and candle logo turns orange. No, I know. Quickly. Quickly.

SPEAKER_06 5:23

It's a sick. He's got he's got some shit going on there. He's got special sweats.

SPEAKER_04 5:28

Oh, so you can make medical donations for him. Uh I spoke to him last night. Oh, what's Stevie doing? Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 5:32

Uh how's he doing out the up in the north country?

SPEAKER_04 5:34

He's uh down to his last two days. Oh. He'll be and then he'll be back. How many shirts did Stevie pack?

SPEAKER_07 5:41

He washes him in the crick every night. Come on.

SPEAKER_01 5:45

Love you, Stevie.

SPEAKER_06 5:46

That uh by the way, that hat, for people wondering, that that nice white mesh back hat that cools you down in the summer. So it's a perfect hat in the summertime, too. It really does help a lot. So sure.

SPEAKER_04 5:56

There you go. Okay. Uh thank you, uh uh adjunct store manager.

SPEAKER_06 6:01

Junk. It's not all junk, some good stuff in there.

SPEAKER_03 6:03

You know what? You know what? Thank you, Dean. Uh the disrespect as this company. Oh my god. It's unfathomable. Wow.

SPEAKER_06 6:12

Respect. Who did that, Nick? I don't know. Respect.

SPEAKER_03 6:16

What am I? Some sort of wordologist. No, I wanted to see how back you I don't know.

SPEAKER_06 6:21

I get no respect.

SPEAKER_03 6:22

Don't we gotta talk about season 40?

SPEAKER_04 6:24

Uh I was gonna get right into I was gonna get right into the show. Yeah. Uh listener feedback. Watch listener feedback, if we could. Uh, in response to uh uh Anja's episode at Blue Fox Camp. I remember that. That was years ago.

SPEAKER_06 6:40

Years ago, obviously that was. Yeah, a man that's what I mean, a person, is it a man or a woman? It doesn't matter. Watching YouTube.

SPEAKER_04 6:47

So war bird flyer F4U. Wow. F you too. Warbird Flyer F4U via YouTube. Yeah. Is that good or bad? It's good.

SPEAKER_06 6:59

It means that their the YouTube channel is active. They're going back years to get a uh right there. There's a pick of you. Look at that. Look at that handsome freaking thing there, eh? Oh, and the fish don't look bad. I knew I was waiting for that one. It's kind of a setup there. Threw one right at you.

SPEAKER_04 7:15

Uh Warbird Flyer F4U says, absolutely awesome brook trout fishing. Uh, they are my favorite. And and who wouldn't? I think the only people that would not agree with that would be people who have never gone brook trout fishing or spectral trout fishing. It's uh because it gets under your skin.

SPEAKER_06 7:31

Oh, it's a great uh great species of fish, iconic.

SPEAKER_04 7:35

He goes on to say, uh, I live in central New York and I go uh to the deep breaches of the Adrianac Adriondack Adirondack and Arondack. Yeah, we'll get it. Adder. Keep going. Adder. Adderboy. You brought her Adirondack. Yes. You brought Adder Mountains every year uh to catch a beautiful brook trout. Uh would love to go to some places like that to catch those real monsters.

SPEAKER_06 8:04

Yeah, you would like to go there. If you're a brook trout lover, then uh a nice little trip to Blue Fox would be in order for sure because they uh they have some some natural fish, but they at the time they had significant strain uh stalkers in there and mutants, they were so big. Oh my god. Hey, and these little we tiny lakes, getting like a six-pound brookie in a lake like that. Oh my god. It was a great show. And you got Lakers too, didn't you? Uh yes, a big Laker.

SPEAKER_04 8:33

One big Laker. I thought I I thought I hit the mother load of specs with that one. Oh my God. And of course, you're fishing out of small boats too, and light line, and and so that just all adds to the enjoyment.

SPEAKER_06 8:45

The trip in, too.

SPEAKER_04 8:46

The ATV and TV and those are definitely once-in-a-lifetime trips. They are.

SPEAKER_06 8:51

So it's such a cool feeling doing a trip like that. Uh uh, just to let everybody know, you go from the base camp, you get in this ATV, boats either on top of the ATV or you're there's boats at the lake, but you're just driving, you could be driving for 20 minutes through the bush, and it looks like hell. It's just like thick and thick, and then all of a sudden, you see this little glimpse of water in the horizon. You know, you go, Oh my god, is that our lake? They get closer and closer and they take you right down to the edge of the lake.

SPEAKER_04 9:14

The whole experience, so the whole camp. But my highlight there was when we first got there. That's still my highlight. Yeah, because when we got there, as we're, you know, getting all nicely sorted and getting in. What did I happen to notice? Uh, they were cleaning the outhouse.

SPEAKER_06 9:33

You see, it's a beautiful bright.

SPEAKER_04 9:35

But no, but that's that is one that to me was a beautiful and to a person like me, like that was worth the price of admission. They were actually, do you not remember that? No. Oh, yeah. They were actually in the process.

SPEAKER_06 9:47

There was a uh bunch of shower units. Is that the outhouse too? Is that all?

SPEAKER_04 9:51

Yeah, the outhouse is right next to they were in the process of cleaning those out. And I thought just for you. Just for you. And I thought, well, how wonderful is that? Just for you.

unknown 10:00

Yeah. I don't know.

SPEAKER_04 10:01

It was just for me, but a timing is everything in life. Ah, there you go. Uh, Warbird uh Flyer F for you.

SPEAKER_06 10:12

That's a great handle. Warbird Flyer F4U is a song in there for sure.

SPEAKER_04 10:16

You think?

SPEAKER_06 10:17

Oh God, that's great.

SPEAKER_04 10:18

F4U. Via YouTube. Thank you. Appreciate it. Now, this is not one of those ones that's uh up for anything, right? Uh no, the listener feedback is just a donation. Just a donation. Yeah. So who's donating? Who's donating to who?

SPEAKER_06 10:33

Our lovely audience donating their time. I like it when that happens. We've donated to them with the video, and then they donate back with the tonight. Oh, okay. And thank you for for going on our YouTube site and going back to the older shows. That's awesome. Thank you.

SPEAKER_04 10:44

So we don't hear much from the folks in New York, do we normally? This is kind of cool. Yeah, yeah. It's awesome. Um Conservation Corner, Mr. Bowman. Invasive carp.ca. Go there.

SPEAKER_06 10:57

Boom. Picture in your phone, on your boat, in your eyeglasses, and we have you know, you know what would be wonderful?

SPEAKER_04 11:04

If we could have we could we do.

SPEAKER_06 11:06

We can do that.

SPEAKER_04 11:07

Can we do that?

SPEAKER_06 11:07

I don't know.

SPEAKER_04 11:08

If we could have imagine if we could have a report on here from one of our listeners, fans, viewers, whatever we call them, to report in that they actually had cont made contact with one of these critters.

SPEAKER_06 11:25

We certainly could do that. I'm sure they could reach out to us. How would they get us, guys?

SPEAKER_05 11:28

Dean and Nick, how would they uh info at fish and canada.com or on any of our Instagram. That's how you get a hold of Nick.

SPEAKER_03 11:35

Basically, just uh uh if I don't you'll get an auto response if you message anytime before nine or after five. So, you know, if you get the autoresponse, I'll get back to you in a couple days because I'll have to go find it. If you get us within, you know, regular human hours, I'll pretty well see it same day.

SPEAKER_06 11:52

That'd be great. Yeah, if you could uh send us the pictures. I mean send it to the invasive car people, the MNR people too. But yeah, include us in the in that list. That's awesome. We'll talk about it on the show for sure. Oh my god. Guaranteed.

SPEAKER_04 12:04

In fact, you'll get on the show, I'll guarantee you.

SPEAKER_06 12:06

Hell yeah. Um but don't give us any fake news or anything. Don't pretend that you saw one dirty old draft, dirty old uh golden carp or whatever you call it. Mirror carp. Golden carp. Yeah, those golden things. Yeah, those? Yeah. A golden carp? Yeah. That's the hell is going on here. You know, common carp. Common carp. There you go.

SPEAKER_04 12:30

Yeah, that's fine.

SPEAKER_06 12:31

I was gonna say mirror or whatever.

SPEAKER_04 12:33

Moving on, uh, in the news brought to you by JB, your outdoor superstar. J and B, outdoor superstar. What do you mean? J and B cycle and marine.

SPEAKER_06 12:42

I gotcha. I gotcha.

SPEAKER_04 12:43

But you doesn't have to call me Mr. Right? I love that.

SPEAKER_06 12:48

You can call me J. And you can call me B. You can call me Cycle and you can call me Marine, but you doesn't have to call me J and B cycle marine.

SPEAKER_04 12:53

That's right. That's good. What a skit. Artie Lang.

SPEAKER_06 12:59

No. No. No. Oh, I can't remember who Artie. Artie.

SPEAKER_04 13:02

No, Artie Lang was uh No, uh yeah, I know, I know, I know, I know.

SPEAKER_06 13:06

Artie Ray J. Johnny Jr., but he used to call himself, but I don't know what was uh I can't remember the characters.

SPEAKER_04 13:11

Oh my god.

SPEAKER_06 13:12

That doesn't have to come McJo. Exactly.

SPEAKER_04 13:15

From Laughing, for those of you uh that might be of the vintage era. Let us know. What was his name? I thought it was Artie Johnson.

SPEAKER_06 13:24

Well, Artie Johnson was on Laughing, but I don't think that was just a Laughing skit. I think that was a all-rounder, was it?

SPEAKER_04 13:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 13:31

Maybe it was Artie then. If he was one of them.

SPEAKER_04 13:33

Yeah, for sure it was Artie. He was good on it. Oh, he was good on that show. Anyways, in the news, uh, record-breaking white sturgeon caught and released on the Fraser River. Whoa. Now that that in its own is no big deal because every day there seems to be a record-breaking sturgeon caught on the Fraser River. But this one was um length and girth and estimated weight, was officially declared as a new record for the Fraser River caught on a rod and reel. Now there have been bigger fish apparently caught um not by anglers, uh, by nets, etc. But this was the largest caught on rod and reel on record, currently on the Fraser River, and it was just short of 12 feet. Now it's 11 foot 8.2 inches. Long, but 60-inch curve. 60-inch curve. That's that round. That's not to me. To me, the big deal here is that for the number of years that we've known about Fraser River Sturgeon, and in fact fished for them on several occasions, there's always that guy who says, Yeah, I got a 12-footer last week. You know, they're like they're like 14-pound largemouth bass from Florida. Everybody seems to either catch one or hear about it or saw it done or whatever. But here's a case where it was documented and um it is 11.82. Yeah, that's that's that's a beast. Is massive. We've caught fish between seven and ten feet. And they're freaky. They're they're they're not to be believed. Yeah. For this uh fish to be brought in. That's crazy. Estimated weight, uh 1100 to 1200 pounds. That was a good one. That's bigger than the tuna we caught down east a few years ago. By quite a bit.

unknown 15:31

Wow.

SPEAKER_04 15:32

Crazy. By quite a bit.

SPEAKER_06 15:34

Crazy. I saw one once that was that size. It's bigger than the tuna by the size of the fish that we caught, we've caught down there. Two, three hundred pounders or more.

SPEAKER_04 15:43

That's insane. Anyways, uh, Kevin Estrata was the guide on this particular trip, and uh he is the founder of Sturgeon Slayers. Um, and he apparently the day before or the or the the group's previous outing, they had caught an 11 foot six-inch. So we're talking a couple inches shy of this one. They're doing pretty good.

SPEAKER_05 16:07

That was that was in 2021. Right. Good advanced.

SPEAKER_04 16:10

That was their previous trip right by this group.

SPEAKER_05 16:13

Okay, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 16:13

That's what I said, right? Or not?

SPEAKER_05 16:15

Well, you started with the day before, but you quickly the previous.

SPEAKER_04 16:18

I said the previous.

SPEAKER_05 16:20

It was a day before, yeah. Like a day before.

SPEAKER_04 16:22

A day before.

SPEAKER_06 16:23

It was how do you say it was 365 times four?

SPEAKER_04 16:26

Sometime before? No, a day before. Yeah, yeah. There was uh the same group got an 11 foot 6.5.

SPEAKER_06 16:35

Yeah, what are those days before? What are those days before?

SPEAKER_04 16:38

I just stopped reading this stuff if you keep if you keep bugging me about. Uh, anyways, uh very impressive. I'm I'm sure that there's uh stuff all over the internet about it. If you want to have a look at it.

SPEAKER_06 16:50

They didn't say if it was because I'm the reason I'm asking, because I saw a clip just yesterday or day before. Was it on off from a boat or was he on shore? Because I just saw a clip from a guy catching one on from shore. That was the most ridiculously sized shorefish I've ever seen in my life, a big white sturgeon, and it had to be the Fraser, obviously.

SPEAKER_05 17:10

Every certain photo I saw had a boat in it, but that doesn't mean they weren't like they usually got out, right?

SPEAKER_06 17:16

Yeah, but usually this guy was fighting it from shore. Hang on.

SPEAKER_04 17:18

Estratus uh served as the guide in both boats during the record setting uh catches.

SPEAKER_06 17:24

Both boats. Oh yeah, okay. Right?

SPEAKER_04 17:26

So yeah, because the day before he was in a boat. He was in a boat with that same group that caught the 11th.

SPEAKER_06 17:32

And they decided to change boats but keep the same guide. Exactly.

SPEAKER_04 17:35

What that tells me is that this uh uh Mr. Estrada knows a thing or two about big fish, and and boats.

SPEAKER_06 17:41

He has boats our motto of boats, you know, a whole fleet of uh battleships, and yeah, he's pretty good. I'm making a point. I'm trying to make a point. I'm working with you, Jimmy. Oh god Eric Estrada there. He's uh that's huge.

SPEAKER_04 17:57

That is absolutely if if uh if you've never been on a business end of a sturgeon, even a 200 pounder they piss you off.

SPEAKER_06 18:06

Your art bicep is blown out at the end of the fight. It's so it's so uh they are the toughest, one of the toughest, like strong. They're not fast, they're just strong and the current and the current, oh my everything is against you. Yeah, again you. I love that name, Sturgeon Slayers, by the way, boys. Uh uh that's just a great, uh such a good guideboat name, you know, or guiding company's name. I love it.

SPEAKER_04 18:30

Uh is that a guiding company or boat? Promotes the conservation focus uh angling fans. So it's a group of anglers that have gotten together, I guess.

SPEAKER_06 18:38

Yeah, probably slayer fans too.

SPEAKER_04 18:40

Well, I would think so. I would think so.

SPEAKER_06 18:41

I hope so.

SPEAKER_04 18:43

You know, very nice. Is that it, Dean, for that? Did you want us to do more? Or do we did we I think you butchered that up? You think we butchered it good enough for you? I'm sure uh Mr. Estrada will appreciate that.

SPEAKER_06 18:55

Yeah, like the shout-out. Sturge and Slayers, they love that. That's good. They did good.

SPEAKER_04 19:00

The fact that he was a guide on both those catches, uh uh that took six volumes, right?

SPEAKER_06 19:04

You want to you want to hire that guy if you can get him.

SPEAKER_04 19:06

Oh boy. If you can get them there's so many uh really good our good friend uh Vic uh Carroll, who used to be not only a guide, but he was kind of uh out of hope. Um was it mission? Mission mission DC. Yeah, mission. I think um used to run an outfit out out of there that was into sturgeon fishing. And man, I'll tell you, these guys know the stuff right?

SPEAKER_06 19:27

It was that back in the time.

SPEAKER_04 19:29

That was the very first time that we were uh exposed to side imaging. Do you remember that day?

SPEAKER_06 19:38

That's correct.

SPEAKER_04 19:39

Remember that day?

SPEAKER_06 19:39

I'm friggin' right, I remember that. Still, I can still close my eyes, I see it.

SPEAKER_04 19:43

Close your eyes. There it is. What do you see?

SPEAKER_06 19:46

I see uh you're sitting beside me. What do you see though?

SPEAKER_04 19:50

What do you see right now? Close your eyes, what do you see?

SPEAKER_06 19:54

I see dead people. I don't know. Oh, no, you can't ever see nothing, really.

SPEAKER_04 20:09

See, it's a little give me a little just in case. Thank you. Just in case it worked. If it didn't work, we'll cut it out and post, anyways. Uh yeah, leave that gold in there. Leave that gold in there, bye. Anyways, uh check it out. Do we have anything on the site? Is there anything that we can contribute? It'll be on the site.

SPEAKER_05 20:27

It'll be on the site if you want to see the pictures, if you want to know more.

SPEAKER_04 20:30

The most impressive part about that picture is that there were eight full-grown large Is that it? Yeah. This full picture. There's eight of them. And you see, they're not like shoulder to shoulder, right?

SPEAKER_06 20:43

No, and they're not little guys like me. Those are big boys.

SPEAKER_04 20:46

And there's still tail hanging out the other end.

SPEAKER_07 20:49

I love it.

SPEAKER_06 20:50

Look at the head of that freaking thing. That head is way wider than maybe two guys almost.

SPEAKER_04 20:56

Now, you know what uh surprised me as well is that um apparently they landed that in 45 minutes.

SPEAKER_06 21:03

Wow.

SPEAKER_04 21:04

Which I think is tons. One dude or tag team out?

SPEAKER_06 21:06

Oh, they must have tagged him. They had to tag team for that. They didn't really say there's no way one guy could pull out of 45. It took us 45 to get a 200 pounder. Exactly.

SPEAKER_04 21:14

We have four guys on it.

SPEAKER_06 21:15

Yeah. So no, no.

SPEAKER_04 21:18

Um, so that surprises me. But other than that, uh, Fraser River is alive and doing well. If you get a chance.

SPEAKER_06 21:24

I mean, it could be though that that fish is so old at that size. You know, she's had her run the whole course of life and she's getting close to exhausting out or whatever, and just 45 minutes of fight, and she just said, Okay, I'm out of here.

SPEAKER_04 21:38

You know, and and and and you know that there's bigger ones than that. Exactly.

SPEAKER_06 21:43

If that got caught, there's no doubt there's bigger ones than that.

SPEAKER_04 21:47

Speaking of big, I heard an interesting story report about that age and size that the reason That and this is totally unrelated. I don't even know why I'm bringing this up, but I just found it interesting.

SPEAKER_06 22:05

So that's what we do here, buddy.

SPEAKER_04 22:07

The question was given to somebody why don't traditionally Kawartha Lakes Muskies, in particular Lake Scoogog, for example, why do you not hear of or see 50 inchers or 50 pounders for that?

SPEAKER_06 22:25

Yeah, there's 50 inches, but there's gonna be a shed, right?

SPEAKER_04 22:27

Like that pen. Why are there no fifties coming out of places like that? So the question was asked of the people who would know. And they said, Well, uh, according to our studies, it takes 17 years or better for a muskie to reach that size. Okay. And in Lake Skugog and most of the Quarthas, the muskie only live to the age of 15. Now, how do you how do you answer what do you s when you what do you do with that information?

SPEAKER_06 23:08

I don't know. You you you threw right that last line was a uh the wrench that you threw in there, right? That was good.

SPEAKER_04 23:13

Well, I'm gonna that's a question that you don't even have, Dean, on your sheet here. I'm gonna ask uh Dr. Cook here in a few days.

SPEAKER_06 23:19

I would say uh uh for the let's say that so the 15-year-old, let's say he doesn't get 50 inches or 50 pounds, but maybe he gets 44 inches, right? And he could be 35, 40 pounds. I would say that they don't get that big. My guess only is because of the food base. I mean, yeah, there's perch, and yeah, there's walleye. Smallmouth bass. Smallmouth bass, but they're not they're not onto Cisco, they're not onto Tulibee, they're not onto these high fat content uh bait, right? Like that's that would be that would make sense. Maybe that's part of it, because that lake would definitely not have any of that, any of the above. But are you surprised?

SPEAKER_04 23:50

It has suckers, which might be a little better for them, but at that age, 15 being the max, I'm surprised that that's a musky.

SPEAKER_06 23:56

Yeah, there's a reason that maybe because of the shallow warm water. It's so warm every summer, right?

SPEAKER_04 24:01

But I do know somebody who does know.

SPEAKER_06 24:03

Okay, don't uh well you're gonna throw one at them.

SPEAKER_04 24:06

Unrehearsed.

SPEAKER_06 24:07

I love it. I love it.

SPEAKER_04 24:09

Uh where are we? Fan question of the week. Not to be confused with the previous uh from New York, the gentleman. That was a listener feedback.

SPEAKER_05 24:18

Well, what is the difference between that? Feedback is just a statement. This is a question. Come on. This is an actual statement. Well, you know that. I don't know that.

SPEAKER_04 24:25

Well, you know the difference between the two. No. Question and feedback. No, because both can be the same in a different scenario. Feedback. Feedback. For example, how the hell is it possible that, you know, I watched you on the show. That's a question.

SPEAKER_06 24:39

You're asking.

SPEAKER_04 24:41

How the hell is it possible I watch you on the show hauling in all these giant fish? And then when I really get told the whole story, those fish are only like 10 inches long. That's feedback, fan feedback. But it's also a question.

SPEAKER_06 24:59

True.

SPEAKER_04 25:00

There you go. So I'm not crazy today, right now.

SPEAKER_06 25:05

I don't like feedback in my guitar. I'm getting feedback right now, by the way. Are you? Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 25:09

Getting a little buzzing happening. It's affecting my feedback. It's affecting my performance.

SPEAKER_06 25:14

What were you doing before the show? Chase Rutledge via email. That's another great name. Wow, Chase Rutledge. He gets all the checks. That guy. That's a great name. Hey, ladies, Chase Rutledge here. Sounds made up. I don't care. That's a great name. I'm gonna give that my kids. I'm gonna change their name. If I have another kid, I guess I can't have another kid. That'd be a perfect one.

SPEAKER_04 25:36

Why not?

SPEAKER_06 25:36

Don't be so hard. Don't be so hard, yeah. You've got our towel tied off. That's okay. That could that can be undone.

SPEAKER_04 25:41

That stuff can come out.

SPEAKER_06 25:43

They touched it once, they ain't touching it again.

SPEAKER_04 25:45

That I believe.

SPEAKER_06 25:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 25:46

Hey guys, uh, I got a question I've been curious about for a while. Now that you've had a few years fishing with LiveScope, uh, have you ever seen anything on it that you just couldn't explain? Maybe a fish that looked way bigger than it should have been, something weird on the bottom, or just some strange behavior that caught you off guard. I feel like LiveScope has given anglers a whole new look at what's going on underwater, especially in remote lakes and rivers. With so many people using it these days, I'm surprised we don't hear more stories about unexpected things being discovered. Have you guys seen anything on the screen that made you stop and say, What the hell was that?

SPEAKER_06 26:29

That's good. That's a good question.

SPEAKER_04 26:31

That's a great question. And I think even before answering, I don't know about you, but I'll give my my vote, and they need four votes for this to get these things. These email, there's no email, there's no uh oh, there's no there's no votes. You can't win nothing here. No, yeah.

SPEAKER_06 26:44

Why? Well, you wanted them to win, didn't you? Yeah, that's a great great name, great question.

SPEAKER_05 26:49

When the YouTube ones don't come in, I have to pull back in the archives. This was an old one, actually. Oh boy. All right, see? Yeah, I liked it.

SPEAKER_04 26:57

Yeah, that's okay. Uh answer that question. Well, uh, the first time I saw Live Scope, I saw I didn't see it myself, I saw uh a copy, I saw a a a um what do you call it? A video. Somebody showed me a video that they had captured, and it was a muskie, and I will never forget just how impressed I was that you could actually and the muskie was hovering and you could actually see the tail. You know those fish when they're in one position, they'll that tail will kind of do one of these. Yep. And I saw that on LiveScope, and I thought, no way.

SPEAKER_06 27:39

Yeah, this is fake for sure. No way. Yeah, exactly. I remember I think I remember that too. I think I remember that. Um, I don't I remember uh well, you and I both have experienced, and I really experienced a good one last year by myself out there, but is is predator fish busting into bait balls. That is one of the coolest things you you will never get tired of seeing that. Hopefully, maybe Dean and Nick you can get uh what I'm talking about. We'll talk about this and get it up there. Yeah, yeah. And this will put it in. Um this the last one I saw was a massive bait ball, thick as hell, and then all of a sudden it started to open up and it just started to be a black hole in this bait ball, and then all of a sudden, this unit and it was a pike appeared, and all of a sudden, it's just like it's the freakiest stuff you'll ever see. Um we've seen loons. It's not not weird, but it's like when you see a loon dive down, your tendency is to take your live scope and start looking for them, and you start watching them swim around through that. That's cool. And then the one thing I've really discovered that freaked me out, and I've told the boys about this before, is both Muskie and Pike, but especially Muskie, they literally Where's my pen?

SPEAKER_04 28:47

Here you can borrow mine if you're not.

SPEAKER_06 28:49

Muskie normally sitting in the watering column, suspended like that, or whatever. I've seen so many of them do this, pointing straight down a way up off the bottom. Like just like a stick floating or something, like a sinking or whatever. We're just looking like that, and I think what they're doing is they're looking at the bait right there, and they're just getting ready to go down and attack it, but they don't think they can't see it, they can't see down, right?

SPEAKER_04 29:09

So they do this. I could be mistaken, but I believe we've asked Dr. Cook about that, and he answered it. And uh lo and behold, who do you think is joining us right now? No. This episode is brought to you by Sale. Sale is proudly Canadian and stocked with over a hundred Canadian brands you know and love.

SPEAKER_06 29:27

From rods and reels to sonars to kayaks and every last lure you've seen on the Fishing Canada show. Sale has all the gear to get you on the water.

SPEAKER_04 29:35

Drop into one of 12 stores across Ontario and Quebec and talk to the real fishing specialist or gear up online anytime at Sale.ca. Sale, the ultimate destination for your outdoor adventures. All right, here he is, uh, Dr. Stephen Cook. Uh, thanks for joining us again.

SPEAKER_01 29:54

Hey, good to see both of you.

SPEAKER_04 29:56

You too, Stephen. By the way, you look lovely in that.

SPEAKER_06 29:58

Uh blue camo and the costa hat. Look at this guy, eh?

SPEAKER_01 30:04

I should be on the water, but instead, you know, you know, stay here. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 30:10

Um, we've got a bunch of stuff to go through, so let's uh let's start right. Well, first of all, did I hear correctly? You just came back from China?

SPEAKER_01 30:18

Yeah, so I'm physically in Ontario, but my head's still somewhere else. Yeah. Uh yeah, I spent yeah, I did 10 days there uh traveling around, visiting a bunch of sites uh up uh along the Yellow River, uh really, really famous water bright, the second biggest uh river in China. And uh you'd love this. One of the meals, I was served carp lips. What? And yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 30:45

Not not carp, but just the lips.

SPEAKER_01 30:48

Just the lips. So the the whole carp was there. So it came out on a platter. It was a yellow river carp. It's a delicacy in the in the Hunan province. And my host, so I'm sitting beside the host, um, and there's a lot of protocol in China. So I was the second most important guest. I I should say I'm thankful for that because the first or the most important guest, uh, they were served the fish eyes.

SPEAKER_06 31:11

Um, you you got it, you bonus out there, buddy.

SPEAKER_01 31:15

You're a lucky man on that one. Yeah, yeah. Um, because that individual is wise and it helped, you know, the idea that the eyes are symbolic of vision and and being able to sort of bring wisdom to see see things. Um, I was given the lips because of the idea of coming together. So, of course, lips come together, right? And we it was about us coming together to share and exchange knowledge about fish and uh the environment and big rivers and so on.

SPEAKER_04 31:47

So uh I'm curious, I'm curious how they broach that though. How did they say that, okay, you're the most important, you're second best? How did they uh how did you do that?

SPEAKER_01 31:59

You know based on where you are seated. Okay. Seating, you know, it's always a round table, and it's you know, the hosts sit opposite to each other, and then there's protocol based on where you're put. It's it's a big ordeal. Uh and so yeah, so you you know based on where you're sitting how important you are.

SPEAKER_04 32:17

All right, how were the carp lips?

SPEAKER_01 32:21

Uh yeah, so not surprising there wasn't a whole lot of meat on them. Uh, I think thankfully it was mostly symbolic. I chewed a little bit of uh, I don't know, deep fried stuff off the edges, and uh, you know, the the bones came out. So uh the carp itself, the actual, you know, the the meat was yummy. Was it uh so yeah, I I can't say that I've eaten a whole lot of carp here in North America, but uh uh it was prepared well and it was absolutely tasty.

SPEAKER_04 32:47

I keep saying we gotta try it sometime before you know, rather than just knock it, we it can't be that bad.

SPEAKER_01 32:53

Yep, agreed. Yeah, it's worth worth a try.

SPEAKER_06 32:56

Is it different? Like would their carp be different than ours? That yellow, what'd you call it, yellow river carp versus a golden carp here?

SPEAKER_01 33:04

Yeah, uh this one, yes, but the common carp are over there, and in some regions they're more prevalent, and that's what you'd be served there.

SPEAKER_06 33:11

So there's but no difference in taste that you would think or know of or heard of?

SPEAKER_01 33:15

Probably, probably not a whole lot. Okay, just like you know, most white fleshed fish are reasonably neutral, yeah, uh unless they're super greasy, super oily, which appropriately aren't. So interesting.

SPEAKER_04 33:30

Um, before we get to the main topic today, we want to talk to you about uh blue uh walleye, which we had uh encountered recently on a shoot. But before we get to that, just going off script a little bit, there's two things. Earlier on in the broad uh in the podcast today, uh, we were asked a question by a viewer, and um Pete made an observation. Uh, you don't need to know what the question was or whatever, but he made an observation that we, since the advent of live scope, we've seen some weird activities in fish behavior. And one of the things was um elongated fish like pike and musky, and this particular example was musky, how they sometimes will be sitting in a neutral position horizontally, and then all of a sudden they go heads down.

SPEAKER_06 34:18

Straight up and down. Straight up and down. I mean straight vertical.

SPEAKER_04 34:21

Any idea what that would be?

SPEAKER_01 34:24

No. And and I'll tell you why no. So immediately, you know, you start thinking about what can they sense? You know, is there something being emitted that they can feel? And the answer is is no. Uh, there's been a uh a wide body of research looking at the what fish can and can't detect. And there's no suggestion out there that uh any of any of the so-called fish finder technology we use uh is sent is something that fish can sense. Um, you know, my only thought is that it's it's learning that that noise, that trolling motor, now means something different. Before it meant, you know, you'd hear it and it would just go over top of you, and you just hear this fading noise now and again. Every once in a while you might get caught. But, you know, now not only is there a trolling motor, but there's these big chunks of wood with hooks on them or big rubber things that all of a sudden are in your face. And if you've been caught once or twice by them, maybe you start to associate things. Uh, fish do learn. Fish are not stupid. Um, you know, they don't remember things forever. Uh, and in fact, the carp we were just talking about seemed to have the longest memory of any fish that's been studied thus far, uh, somewhere in the neighborhood of uh, you know, maybe as much as a year. Uh, most other fish that have been studied, it's in the neighborhood of a couple weeks, maybe a couple months.

SPEAKER_06 35:51

Wow. Okay. Could it be, Steven? My theory was because these guys these muskie on this particular lake feed a lot on the bottom. What could they, because they can't see down, they're halfway down the column, eight, you know, eight feet above the bottom. Could they be using their eyes just watching, looking at it something and honing in on it to to smack down on it? Is that possible?

SPEAKER_01 36:11

Absolutely. Yeah, this may not have anything to do with the change in their behavior. It's simply you now can observe that.

SPEAKER_07 36:17

Right.

SPEAKER_01 36:17

Uh so that would be the, yeah, that would be the the other perspective is hey, we're seeing something we couldn't see before. Right. Um, our telemetry tags, some of them that have accelerometer sensors, are able to detect orientation. Okay. Um not surprisingly, most of what we get is the tailbeat backing going back and forth. And so it kind of swamps out some of those other axes. But uh, we go back and have a look. Uh Dr. Sean Lansman at Carlton and I have have looked at these kinds of things. Um, Skugog's not super deep. We've got data from the Rideau River where we use those things. Again, also not super deep. Uh, but yeah, you could imagine that uh an a muskie looking upright, or you know, positioned upright, looks like you know, a log floating by or macrophytes, and it's perfectly lined up to you know, smash a sucker swimming around the bottom.

SPEAKER_04 37:15

So yeah, yeah, yeah. Could be so for that matter. How do we know that he's face down and not tail down?

SPEAKER_06 37:21

Because because then uh through the beauty of live scope, you see him. He's not gonna, he doesn't go up. So he wouldn't be swimming backwards up, I don't think, right? He'd be swimming down. So you always almost always see them. Dean and I, remember, Dean, we looked at an aquarium with a pike in the aquarium, and that's what brought me on to this. We were watching this pike in an aquarium in a guy's house or whatever, and we needed one of these. And I said, Dean, that's it. That's this is a freaking thing that's doing the same thing. So maybe it's a an ESOX thing, I'm not sure, but uh I think it's a feeding position.

SPEAKER_04 37:48

So it could just be that we've never been able to observe this before. Yeah, for sure. And now all of a sudden it's a big deal.

SPEAKER_01 37:54

Yeah, cool. Uh you got me thinking, so thank you.

SPEAKER_04 37:57

Good answer. Now, here's one that that I'll throw at you. Um, just recently happened to me this two days ago, a good buddy of mine. Uh him and I have been talking about schugog and its muskie populations, and not just skugg, but the court is in general, with skug being at the head of the conversation, and that you know, you very seldom hear of a real giant, you know, a 50-pound plus muskie, and not very seldom, I don't think I've ever heard, and certainly he had not ever heard, of a 50-pounder coming out of out of skugg. So he did some investigating, he's in the business, so he did some investigating and he contacted somebody at MR and asked the question. And this is the answer he got, and this is what he relayed to me. He said that he was told that it takes approximately 17 or so years for a muskie in the coarthas to be able to achieve that size, that 50 magic 50 number. And he said the problem in particular with Skugog is that muskie on that body of water generally don't live beyond 15 years.

SPEAKER_01 39:11

Does that sound like there's constraints on uh that a water body will impose based on resources, uh, based on environmental conditions that can limit uh how long fish, you know, how long they live and and how much they they grow. Um so yeah, you know, theoretically, uh fish growth is sort of indeterminate, you know, you provide them by m with more food, they continue to to to grow in in mass and to some extent in in body length, which is different from us, right? You know, uh uh, you know, we could you know all eat Big Max uh forevermore and we would grow in one direction and it would not be in legs.

SPEAKER_06 39:58

I prove that fact, everybody just let you know I'm uh proof, living proof here.

SPEAKER_01 40:02

Yeah, yeah. So, you know, it's not a big water body. Um the other thing is, you know, you sort of need to ask, you know, why do fish grow big or need to grow big? And there's a trade-off between uh growing and reproduction. Um at some point, if you know, if you're the big dog there and you know, you don't need to be any bigger to, you know, to be competitive uh when it comes to reproduction. Uh, you know, you're you're one of the bigger fish, you know, you get all the ladies you want, or if you're uh a lady, there's plenty of males that are interested in you, then you can focus more on reproduction and less on uh somatic growth, that growth that just is body mass. So that may be part of it too. Um we also have pretty difficult winters. Um, a place like Skugog, my guess is there's a pretty big squeeze. Uh you've got a lot of vegetation in some years. You've got a lot of vegetation, pretty shallow. Uh you know, there there may not be a whole lot of water for them. So winter might be a little bit tough as well. Contrast that with something like the St. Lawrence or Georgian Bay, you just got more water, right? You know, more places to go to find good water all year round.

SPEAKER_04 41:20

Okay. That's so it is, it does sound like it could be plausible that that schugog muskie just don't live long enough to achieve that maximum 50 mark that we all, you know, as muskie anglers want to want to find, right?

SPEAKER_01 41:38

So it does or 42 inches is plenty fine to to you know, yeah make the you know, to be your best muskie, to live your best musky life. Right, yeah. Um in the St. Lawrence, if you're not that big, you might not have access to the same, you know, the the the mates you want. Right. Um, and it's all about trying to pass on your your genetics when you're a fish.

SPEAKER_04 42:02

Interesting. That's cool. Okay, that is well, those are two very good answers. We're gonna check those off in the plus side for you.

SPEAKER_06 42:09

No wonder he's got so many awards. Exactly. Just ask him anything.

SPEAKER_04 42:14

All right. Uh blue walleye. We uh Nick, Dean, and myself were recently on a shoot, and uh we were fishing this very isolated, remote school of walleye on a body of water that you know had very little access by most anglers, and they probably had never really seen baits before and all that stuff. And about 30%, maybe 35% of the fish that we caught were blue, and the others were normal. Yeah, and normally you see one or two blue that you know in a in a a day day's outing, but this was very abnormal in that they were very close in numbers. Why?

SPEAKER_01 43:00

Yeah, so really cool, fascinating. Love talking about blue walleye. Let's just remind folks that that you did not discover an uh an extinct species. Um, there were blue walleye in Lake Erie, the Niagara River, and Lake Ontario uh that went extinct. The last one was seen in 1965, and that was a true subspecies. It it's been determined to be genetically different than the normal walleye, you know, I don't maybe call it a yellow walleye, if you will. Um, what you're catching are fish that simply have not expressed uh the that have expressed a blue pigment uh that has sort of overridden the the yellow. So uh that's sort of masking that that yellow. Um and when you think about how fish get their color, so it starts with genetics. So you know, you're kind of delta delta hand, you know, if you're a bad. You know, this is the kind of color you generally have. But genetics are, you know, there's variation, right? So you're always going to have, you know, a walleye that's a little bit more blue, one that's a little less blue. Um, but then there's other things that can happen along the way. So for example, while a fish is developing, especially when they're they're little, if there's a big temperature change, for example, uh, that can induce changes in coloration that affect them throughout the rest of their lives. Um, and then of course, there's what you eat. So you can, uh, you know, if we just were gnawing on carrots all the time, uh, our skin would get oranger than than our skin's our skin already is. We spend a lot of time in the sun, boys. Uh, but uh, you know, we we would start to that those carotenoids would would really start to be um expressed in our in our skin. So so genetics sort of lay the foundation. Um, but when we're talking about something like blue walleye, when we know it's not a distinct species, what we're really talking is about genetic variation and specifically, really, it's a mutation. So that gene, which normally should be expressed, isn't uh, or sorry, the other way around. It's a gene that's being expressed that normally uh wouldn't be there. And so there's a lot of genes that, you know, genes are turned on, turned off uh during early, early development. And in this case, uh we end up with with blue walleye. Now the big question is why in that lake, right? Why why is it not just those one or two random ones? Right. Uh my guess is that there's uh a couple, uh there's relationships between those fish. They are reproducing, and that those genes are getting passed on at rates, that mutation is getting passed on at rates that are more frequent than in a normal water body. In due course, and I'm talking about, you know, you know, your grandchildren's grandchildren's grandchildren's grandchildren, you know, times a thousand, you could see speciation happening, you know, where those animals get distinct enough where the blue only spawn with the blue and the yellow only spawn with the yellow. Uh, but that takes an awful long time.

unknown 46:18

Wow.

SPEAKER_05 46:18

I had a question about that as well, because I noticed that they're always like very decrepit looking. They're never the healthiest ones in the bunch. Like they they're like like the the the spines in the dorsal are exposed a lot of the times and the fins are beat up. Is there like a disadvantage they're at for being that way, or what's like what's happening there?

SPEAKER_01 46:41

Yeah, you know, um species are fine-tuned by mother nature to be the best fit for their environment. And if you're a smurf running around, you know, uh in a in a where where humans are, you're gonna stand out. And a blue walleye presumably stands out. That might make it more difficult to eat food uh to collect food. Um uh you might be eating suboptimal food that has more parasites. Uh you know, you might be displaced. There's you know, all the yellow walleye are are sort of pushing you to the the edge. So there, or there could be other sort of cofactors. Maybe, you know, the ones that are blue happen to have some immune function issues or digestive issues that that are linked to uh that gene in some way. So there's there's a bunch of potential explanations, but that's fascinating. A fascinating observation.

SPEAKER_04 47:37

Yeah, they're they're all always uh emancipated, they're like the poor kids in the block, you know, they're they're skinnier. Uh certainly I would say 99.9% of the time they're smallish fish. I've never seen a blue that was, you know, that big stud. Now they may exist. You you could correct me on that, but all the blues that we've seen are generally smaller, they seem to be underfed, stunted, all that stuff. And you're saying that could be all part of the genetics.

SPEAKER_01 48:09

It could be, yeah. And just to emphasize that that color matters with where you live, uh, when you think about the state of Lake Erie in the 1950s, 1960s, it was pea soup. It was, you know, coming up, you know, coming close to being a dead lake. And you can imagine a blue walleye historically, you know, you know, crystal, you know, would have been blue is better for really clear waters, right? Um and uh that to be clear, that wasn't the only thing that wiped out blue walleye. Uh, but the state changed. Lake Erie changed completely. And thankfully, we've gone back to closer to what it used to be. Blue walleye would probably do just fine in in Lake Erie today, but they're they are they are sadly gone.

SPEAKER_06 48:56

Stephen you said there about going back a step about the feeding, and then they're they're skinny and they're maybe second in line for the food. Uh, do is there a sense of competition that the yellow walleye will outcompete the blue and there's kind of a battle for it or anything? Do they know you say they kind of know each other? Would they say, hey, I'm the king here and get the hell out of here?

SPEAKER_01 49:16

Or yeah, it it may so that can happen. You know, literally a fish could look at you. So, for example, they assess symmetry when they're trying to figure out who they're gonna spawn with. You know, a more symmetrical individual is an indication of good genes. So if you look different and I want to spawn with the best possible, you know, mate, um, color would be something else you would look at. And a blue wouldn't be giving off that, you know, classic walleye vibe uh that tells you that, hey, you're healthy and have good genes. You've you clearly have a mutation. So uh yeah, so in in short, yes, but there may just be other things. Because you're blue, you are unable to forage in the same areas, forage as effectively because you stand out. They can see, you know, the fish can see you coming, the prey, uh, and escape. So you spend a lot of time chasing food that you never catch, or you're being chased by predators. Maybe, you know, a blue fish in the given water body you're in stands out more. So the osprey are always trying to whack them. And because of that, they have to stay deeper and can't get as good a food. So there's a bunch of ways that you can get to being kind of a skinny blue walleye.

SPEAKER_04 50:35

I had a weird thought just now, and uh forgive me because that's the way my brain works. But if I'm a walleye and looking to mate, right, and you said that you know, maybe maybe they're looking at the blue as maybe less desirable than than their other counterparts. How the hell do I know that I'm not a blue walleye? Good point. You know what I mean? I've always said the same thing. It's not like I could look in the mirror every day and say, my God, that's a beautiful golden view.

SPEAKER_06 51:03

I have just like how's a dog knows another dog? It could be anything, they've never seen himself. I guess I say that all the time.

SPEAKER_01 51:10

Yeah, you are you are right. And so there are there will be blue walleye that are actively trying to choose a yellow walleye because again, that's what they're sort of programmed to do, and perhaps, you know, you know, not able to look in the mirror and realize. Yeah, also fascinating. But their mate may look at they may do the choosing for you. Okay, you're blue, you don't know you're blue, I know you're blue, so I'm moving on to my yellow friend over here.

SPEAKER_04 51:37

Yeah, wow, that is pretty awesome. I mean, blue is just one that we we're talking about because it we just recently ran into it, but there's all kinds of little mutations that we often look, and you know, as TV anglers, or I think the phrase that's overused by us so many times is my goodness, that's a that's a real healthy fish, which we really don't know if it's healthier now. We look at it, it looks nice and we call it healthy, but there's always little mutations on fish. I don't think I I can honestly say that very seldom do we encounter pristine, perfect. Although we did up at Boshain uh two weeks ago, that one smallmouth that uh Rich caught.

SPEAKER_06 52:16

Yeah, that was the it was the like that was the epitome of all smallmouths, cultured.

SPEAKER_04 52:21

It was a perfect smallmouth, but otherwise, they've always got little, you know, little mutations going on. Is that all genetics? Is that disease?

SPEAKER_01 52:29

It's just genetics, and as do you know, I've got hammer toes, you know, my you know, one over. That's a genetic uh you know mutation, you know. You can have, you know, uh, and that's what makes us all interesting, unique, different. Uh, and yeah, it's it's not just for for humans, uh, it's also in the the fish world. And of course, many of those mutations in the wild end up disappearing because, you know, if you're a larvae and have two heads, that's a mutation. Uh, you're probably not gonna last very long. On occasion, one might get get a little lucky and so on, but uh mother nature tends to wipe out those mutations unless they're advantageous. If it becomes advantageous, then those things start to you know become more common, and that's how you can change evolutionary change.

SPEAKER_04 53:19

We we never look at fish like that, right? We never look at them through that lens. We always we forget that they are individuals. You know, a walleye that we we're looking at right now is a one of one, but we don't think of it that way, right?

SPEAKER_06 53:34

It's it's part of a we Do you remember that bass hands that we caught in Mexico that time? Oh my god. The body was like this, Stephen, and then and then it went straight down, and then there and the tail came out that way. It was an S. I'm sure it was an S. Maybe something broken at his young, but it was a mutation with that fish. You know, it was a couple pounds of whatever we caught it, and it was still healthy and eating and all that stuff. It was just some of the stuff you see out there is crazy. I wanted to ask a question. Maybe you guys might know this by on your trip with uh with Connor, your guide. So blue walleye and walleye are all considered the same fish. So you could catch blue walleye and keep them in your limit? Is that all yes, yeah?

SPEAKER_01 54:09

Yep, same, same species, same Latin by binomial. Uh, they are one and the same. You can't double down and say, I've got right, you know, I've got my limit of yellows and my limit of blues.

SPEAKER_04 54:20

But but but but you said that there is a distinct blue walleye. But they're extinct. They're extinct, all extinct everywhere.

SPEAKER_01 54:28

There's none left on the planet. Correct. You can go see them pickled at the Royal Ontario Museum. Yeah. Wow.

SPEAKER_06 54:34

He likes going to the museum pickled, like a lot of times he goes there pickled, and every now and then he's sober. But it'll go most I like the way you said that, Stephen. You know him well. That's interesting. Okay. Yeah, good. And I'm assuming very quickly now. I'm assuming have you ever heard of anybody that's eaten blue walleye? It does taste exactly the same.

SPEAKER_04 54:55

Uh, somebody would kill a blue walleye?

SPEAKER_06 54:58

They're in the limit, right? So I got a feeling that I guarantee you people are killing them if it's if it's legal. Wow. You know that, right? We wouldn't, I don't think we would, but yeah.

SPEAKER_01 55:07

They shouldn't taste any differently theoretically, right? Based based on that uh that pigment, pigment-related mutation alone. Right. Uh, but they might taste differently if they are eating different things because they're less efficient or being shunned, as we discussed, or what you know. So there could be other reasons why uh there not it's not the pigment alone, it's what the pigment then leads to.

SPEAKER_04 55:36

So we can completely dispel the notion, because that's the one I've been using, the excuse I've been using, whatever anybody asks me. We can completely dispel the notion that a blue walleye is not a byproduct, directly a byproduct of what it's eating today. In other words, it's eating something that is giving it that blue blue snails or something like that. Something like that. So that's completely off the table from this day forward.

SPEAKER_01 56:03

Yeah, uh there's no doubt that by eating select certain food items, you can slightly change your color. Uh, but you know, again, if we ate a lot of carrots, we would still not look like umpa loompas, right? We're not, you know, it's not, you know, or Tigger the Tiger, you know, like there's there's limits with how much you can push these things. So yeah.

SPEAKER_04 56:24

Okay. Okay. Interesting. Finally, um, I want to talk to you about sturgeon.

SPEAKER_06 56:29

Oh, wait, wait, I've got one more for them. Oh, okay. Uh have we got time? Yeah, we got a little bit of time. Um blotchy blotchy bass, blotchy black blotches, melanosis, whatever you want to call it. That's totally different than a blue walleye, right? These are black spots, uh black blotches, not spots, but blotches on a bass. Explain that quickly if you can.

SPEAKER_01 56:48

Yeah, that's actually caused by a virus. And to be clear, it's a virus that only affects fish. It doesn't affect humans. So if you eat a blotchy bass or touch a blotchy bass, uh, you're not going to get blotchy. Um, and what's interesting is we do other than making the fish blotchy, and some of the blotches are just tiny little dots, in other cases, they're really large swaths of the fish painted painted black, and it's really a vivid black. Uh, but the reality is there's we really don't know what it means for fish health. So it's one of those things, yeah, the bass are blotchy, um, and they don't look like mother, you know, how they've sort of, you know, how they're, you know, again, through evolutionary time, they've been locally adapted to be this is the ideal color pattern, you know, to live under lily pads and and whack frogs uh without being seen. Uh, you know, there's that side of the equation, but there's no evidence that those fish are less healthy. They don't seem to be uh, you know, in a more disease state, other than that one, the virus that affects pigmentation and only pigmentation. So yeah, it's kind of a bit of a an interesting one. There's some um uh there's really cool angler-related studies that people can get involved with, where if you catch a blotchy bass, you can take a picture and submit it to uh a database and they will track where they are and how prevalent they are. I think it's mostly in the US. I don't know of uh those efforts in in Canada, but yeah, it's one people are keeping an eye on, but it seems to be yeah, it not at this point not having uh uh any major ecological effects that would drive populations up right now.

SPEAKER_06 58:32

Dino, you can put a couple, I got some images of them, and I'll put them, we'll have them running here too.

SPEAKER_04 58:35

Could you uh couldn't they spread uh this amongst themselves?

SPEAKER_06 58:39

Wow, yes they can.

SPEAKER_01 58:41

Yeah, yeah, and among water bodies.

SPEAKER_06 58:44

Okay, here's one for you now, Steven. Can it go away uh eventually or come go away and come back, go away and come back, or is it there permanently for that fish's life?

SPEAKER_01 58:54

My understanding is it's permanent. Uh there's no vaccine that I'm aware of, nor are there any treatments. So you can't, you know, there is a range of pharmaceuticals that a veterinarian can prescribe for sick fish. Uh, this is a sickness or an ailment for which uh there is nothing that I'm aware of. Wow.

SPEAKER_04 59:12

That's interesting. See, now in theory, in theory, that should that fish with those black blotches should have a difficult time perpetuating its genes because I can see where a selective female, if this is a male, selective female is trying to make up her mind, and this guy's all blotchy, and that guy's not, and he's gone.

SPEAKER_06 59:37

I'll tell you, they do spawn because uh I got one on the Duck Islands, and it was a male on a bed right in the spawning time, and it was like a five or six pounder. So he was guarding somebody's fry, maybe it was somebody else's, but that one definitely got chosen. And I I think we could show that fish actually, that actual fish, and it had blotches. Oh my god, totally. It looks like paint, like anybody's never seen it. It's the freakiest dark black, like you can't paint a darker black on something, and it's just sometimes it's just like a puzzle on his body, all over the face and the lips and everything. It's crazy, it's insane. But it's cool, very cool looking, actually.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:11

But yeah, yeah, it's it's it's termed the uh and I think you used you know, melanosis is another word for it, but it's hyperpigmentation, so it's not like the virus is you know, it's not you're not seeing the virus, the virus causes hyper pigmentation, just an increased expression of black pigment that overwhelms the fish in unpredictable regions and ways. So, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:38

Wow, very cool. Um, very cool. All right, so recently we were in a jurisdiction. Well, before I even tell you what that were ask you this question, uh, I'm sure you're aware of the fact that uh recently uh uh a 12-foot sturgeon was caught on the Fraser River, eleven 11.85, and and estimated to be 11 to 1200 pounds was caught on a rod and reel, which is the first time ever recorded. We've all seen giant fish out there, and we've all all said, Yeah, yeah, I got a 10-footer yesterday, but you know, very seldom are they true tens even. This is a true 12-foot fish. How impressive is that?

SPEAKER_01 1:01:18

Yeah, I mean, yeah, it's it's amazing. These are prehistoric beasts. Uh, it's so cool to know that those animals are still out there. Yeah, um, and I, you know, I I think it's also, you know, you think of the Fraser relative to the Columbia. Uh, the main stem Fraser has no dams. Uh, and we are so, so lucky for that. Uh there's a couple dams on tributaries here and there, but as as big watersheds go, we've done a decent job of protecting it. Uh, as you know, there's a lot of uh guiding effort and uh it's mostly mostly guides that that target target these things. Um and they're part of a big tagging program. So every time they catch one, uh they scan it to see if it has um a microchip in it, just like your cat or dog would. And if it does, they write down the information and it goes in the database. They can look it up and say, oh, we caught that fish six years ago, two years ago, and a week and a half ago. And here's how much it's growing over time. Um and if it doesn't have a tag, a microchip, one gets inserted and it enters the database and starts to be tracked. And they've got incredible recaptures, they've got individuals that have been captured over and over and over again. And I know we've talked about catch and release mortality in in previous shows. These, despite being a species that's you know not doing well overall across its range more broadly, they are really quite robust to catch and release angling. Uh they are do quite well at recovering from the exercise. Uh, there's um, you know, they're they're just pretty bulletproof in terms of uh how we interact with them directly. The reason why sturgeon are generally doing poorly across the range is because of fragmentation from dams. So, which is, you know, uh in the Fraser, again, thankfully, things are pretty good relative to elsewhere.

SPEAKER_04 1:03:18

And this fish was not previously tagged. That's the other amazing part about it, right? Yeah. Which is kind of cool now, thinking that there is a 12-footer that's got a tag on it. How old would that fish be, Steven? Any idea?

SPEAKER_01 1:03:30

Oh God, it it could be well over a hundred years. It could be oh my god. Like it would exceed anything we have in terms of trying to put it on, you know, a growth trajectory.

SPEAKER_04 1:03:44

Is there any other program in the country that you know of as as vast as that one? Because I remember a few years ago we were out there fishing uh the Fraser. Um, and I remember our guide telling us that they had 2,800 live tags at that particular time on the Fraser, and that was years ago. So that number could be three or four thousand live tags floating around. Is there anything else even close to that anywhere in this country?

SPEAKER_01 1:04:14

Not with those electronic tags that allow that, like that's a permanent microchip for life. Uh, you know, I put tags in the back of bass that, you know, if you call this number, they don't last forever. Um, this is, you know, nor do they get recaptured as uh and and in a dedicated as a way. I don't think there's a uh a guide boat operating on the Fraser that doesn't have one of those uh tagging setups and that's been trained in in how to do that. Um and this is, you know, uh uh the Sturgeon Foundation, Rick Hansen, uh a bunch of the you know, the the guide associations uh are all super key to doing that. And it's the only way to get data. Uh you know, there's there's no good scientific way to figure out how many of these are out there, uh how well they're doing, how big they're growing. Uh it would be exceedingly expensive. Uh it would be deemed a boondoggle by taxpayers. Yeah. So it's a perfect way for anglers to step up and deliver uh really important information.

SPEAKER_04 1:05:18

Is it viable to think that well, of course, the answer to that's gonna be no, because one of the things that makes that program work is the longevity of these animals because they will live for eons. I was gonna say, why are if it's so successful, which it obviously is in terms of collecting data, why don't we do more of it in freshwater um environments for walleye, for bass, for muskie? Muskie would be a good one. I can't. Right. I would think how come there's not uh similar programs for those species?

SPEAKER_01 1:05:47

Yeah, they I would say on occasion there are, but they're very short lived because they're dependent on funding. Uh this sturgeon, in you know, there's a whole society uh You know, a society that people are members of that do fundraisers, that have staff, uh, they have an executive director, they have fundraising staff, uh, they have science capacity to do that kind of work. And so when you've got somebody always waving the flag saying, hey, this is important, let's not forget about these sturgeon, and they're iconic, the money keeps coming. And so you can sustain a program like that longer term. You also need to. Sturgeon demand that because they're so long-lived. You couldn't do a two or three-year study. They'd be gone. And that's, you know, that's usually what I get at. I get money in like two or three year chunks, the duration of a grad student. And so we do whatever we got the money to do, and then we're forced to move on to something else. Not because we want to, but because the the well dried up and we're we have to do something different. So I think that's really what's unique about this. Muskie's Canada has done some long-term tagging. Uh, that's probably the next best example that I can point to in Canada.

SPEAKER_06 1:07:00

I was gonna say the Muskie fraternity would be the one that would be able to do it in freshwater, because between Muskie's Canada and Muskie anglers are so passionate, they they would give their time, their money, they would do it, you know, but still, it'd probably be a tough hill to climb to get it going.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:14

That brings us to my final question. If sturgeon are for the most part off limits to anglers in this country, with the exception of a well, the Fraser River that we're just talking about being one, um, what designates that? Because we found a stretch of river in the Timmins area that we were all surprised to find out that in fact you can angle for sturgeon. White sturgeon, I think it was, or or was it not sure.

SPEAKER_06 1:07:41

It was Lake Sturgeon, I think it's Lake Sturgeon.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:42

It would be Lake Sturgeon in Ontario, yeah, a very limited area.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:46

Why?

SPEAKER_01 1:07:47

Yeah, um, it it so there are provincial regulations and federal regulations. Um, it's uh in Ontario, it's the uh Species at Risk Act, the Ontario Species at Risk Act, which has gone through a bunch of changes lately. It's it's not nearly as strong today as it was, you know, six months ago. Um, but uh yeah, that those things tend to dictate provincial regulations, what you can do, where you can can do them. Um so yeah, uh there are locally abundant populations. And so when we say something's endangered, uh, you know, CARP are endangered. CARP are on the IUCN Red List, you know, the global database for things that are not doing well. It's because they are not doing well in their native range.

SPEAKER_04 1:08:38

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:39

They are doing just fine in the St. Lawrence, in the Rideau, in the Hudson, you know. Right. Um, so it all is about how are they doing in their their native range? Um, so yeah, the other thing is there's always when it comes to wreck fishing, there's always concern um for mortality. And as we study the various species, and so our lab's done work on several different species, sturgeon species here in Canada now, and found them to be really quite robust, the same as as white sturgeon. Um, as long as people aren't harvesting them, uh, you know, uh a catch and release for a lake sturgeon is not a big deal. That said, one needs to follow the law, and the law in most places uh right now is is you can't target them. Um if you catch one, you need to release it uh as quick as reasonably possible. Um yeah, we use gill nets to sample sturgeon because they are that robust. Um if a pike or a bass or a trout ends up in a gill net, they're dead in minutes. Uh they have no scales left, they're in really rough shape. Uh um a sturgeon hits a gill net, they roll in it, they get tangled. Uh, and even if they can't open their gills very much, they still survive. They're very they're quite hypoxia tolerant. So they're beastly. And that goes, let's then go back to it. So, what has led to the current state of affairs? Why are these populations um not doing well? Two things historic overfishing. So there would have been, for example, in the Laurentian Great Lakes, there would have been commercial fisheries that targeted those those fish. Um, and they were so abundant back in the day, they were used for lamp oil, right? It's not like, you know, yeah, they were they were just you know that abundant. Um, and habitat. And so there's that fragmentation piece, habitat loss. Um, you know, we've you know, they they tend to spawn in very repeatedly in very distinct areas. And if you don't know where those are, you know, oh, there we're gonna put the marina there, or we're gonna put uh, you know, some kind of we're gonna run a pipeline there, whatever the case may be. So through time, we've slowly knocked down the population with overfishing and damaged the habitat. So it's really hard for those, you know, for the adults that are out there to find good places to spawn, and then their babies have to survive and live for years until, you know, you know, a lake sturgeon that's two or three feet long probably still isn't in spawning mode yet, uh, even though it might be 10, 12 years old. So it takes time for them to mature. Uh so yeah, they're they're just a species that's some are a group of fishes, they're somewhat damned by their life history.

SPEAKER_04 1:11:36

Uh that they as far as we know, there's only two, three areas in Canada where you can still angle for surgeon, and one on the west coast, one on the east coast, and this one that we just discovered in uh the Timmins area of Ontario.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:51

Yeah, I'm gonna look up the Timmins one. I was unaware of that. That's fascinating. Uh, I'm interested in how they're skirting around the species at risk act in Ontario.

SPEAKER_04 1:12:01

We thought when we were encouraged to fish for them, which we never did, we thought, oh, wait a minute, I don't know. That sounds like yeah, somebody doesn't know what they're but no, this was coming right from the local authorities that that you know it's it's it's part of the sport fishing uh fraternity.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:17

So but I just I wonder if they're stalked. Do you know if they're stocked?

SPEAKER_04 1:12:21

That's a great question. I don't know. Great question. But apparently apparently there's an abundance of them. Like they're they're they're very popular game fish. They're not gonna be able to do that.

SPEAKER_06 1:12:32

They were stocked if that's the case.

SPEAKER_04 1:12:33

But it's part of a river system.

SPEAKER_06 1:12:34

How do you stock a river system? Yeah, maybe there's dams on that.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:37

They do it for sturgeon, yeah. Really? There's uh it's usually the hydropower utilities. So, for example, Manitoba Hydro has a sturgeon hatchery uh for to compensate for their the consequences of the fragmentation and habitat loss. Right. And so they do a lot of stalking. Uh, there's a ton of stalking that happens for white sturgeon on the Columbia, uh the upper Columbia, in uh in Revel Stoke area, uh down through the U.S. border, and the yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:07

Um, so I wonder if that's not the same case on the St. John down east, because it's right at the dam that they're fishing uh a lot of these things, right?

SPEAKER_06 1:13:15

Yeah, but we never heard of that though. No, no, I never heard that it was they don't give a shit to it.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:22

Sounds that way.

SPEAKER_06 1:13:23

What about what about on the St. Lawrence? Does OPG have they got any uh restocking on the St. Lawrence River at all?

SPEAKER_01 1:13:29

For not to my knowledge for Lake Sturgeon, but I could be mistaken. They work with the eels.

SPEAKER_06 1:13:35

Uh they work with American eels, but there's a lot of eel work.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:39

Uh um sturgeon are are important there. They're they're important to the indigenous communities uh as as well. Yeah, but I'm not off the top of my head, I'm not aware of any specific stalking or or you know, there's the odd habitat restoration project there, but uh yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:54

There's some big sturgeon on that body of water.

SPEAKER_06 1:13:57

We we did a we did a trip one day. Imagine I were pre-fishing for a tournament and we dropped uh an aqua view camera down and we were looking at it down, and you won't bel you would not believe the sight when you see one of those big sturgeons come and look right at your camera, right? And you're like, what the hell is that thing? It was and it was big like for for here, it was five, six footer, you know.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:16

It was like the uh scene, the opening scene of uh uh Star Wars where that big uh mothership, the Empire comes cruise, and it just never it keeps going and it never stops.

SPEAKER_06 1:14:27

All those little five-pound small look like little minions there again.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:32

But that'd be fun. That would be a great fishery, but obviously uh off limits to all of us. Quebec can do it, and yet Quebec Quebec fishes there's another one in Canada.

SPEAKER_06 1:14:42

Yeah, that's right on St. Lawrence.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:44

So anyways, uh that's life, I guess. It sucks to live here, maybe. I don't know. I don't know what to tell you. If you're a sturgeon fan, that sucks to live here. You need to go west, east, or or Quebec or somewhere in between. Yeah. Uh Steven, any uh uh okay, so you're just back from China where you uh ate carplips. Anything to match that uh coming up the rest of the year?

SPEAKER_01 1:15:07

Oh boy, uh yeah, I'm a homebody for the next few weeks. Uh good to get out in the field, uh check in on all the students, spend time with my family. And uh yeah, I'm on the water tomorrow. We're tagging fish in uh uh in eastern Ontario. So yeah, doing our thing. Good, beautiful.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:24

Uh, my friend, thank you so much for taking the time to join us again and uh be safe out there. And when we have when we have questions that need answers, you're the man. You're the man for you the man, buddy. You demand. I love it.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:36

I'm looking forward to the next time.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:38

Thank you, my friend. Uh, Dr. Stephen Cook, the fish doc, here on Outdoor Journal Radio. The podcast would be great if we get them on every every and then they wouldn't need us, though. Really, think about it. Let's not give anybody any ideas because then you and I are gonna just take up and do it. Fascinating. That uh hopefully that now dispels all of the rumors that we have been spreading regarding blue walleye. Blue packerel. Yeah, I know Dean and Nick were uh in I think in Nick's case it was the first time we'd ever seen one. Um how do you feel about the answer, boys? I yeah, I've still like I don't know.

SPEAKER_05 1:16:19

I th I I have to think there's like still stuff we don't know about them because they are they look like how would you know that none of them are are a different species in a sense or something?

SPEAKER_02 1:16:31

I just it's it's not it le it still leaves a lot to be desired.

SPEAKER_04 1:16:35

Well, I didn't ask him because he's the doc, and I'm not god forbid, am I gonna but how do we know that they're not genetically different?

SPEAKER_05 1:16:45

Yeah, like are we still testing these fish? Like, yeah, you should have asked him that.

SPEAKER_04 1:16:49

Sometimes you don't want to push the envelope, you know. He's nice enough to give us his time, but I don't want to run him out of town. But how do we have to do that? How do they know that the last living genetically uh imprinted blue walleye died on Lake Erie? Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 1:17:06

Well, there has to be a genetic difference between that blue walleye, the real blue walleye, and this pigmented blue walleye. It is to be a difference.

SPEAKER_05 1:17:16

Like speciation where they're starting to separate. Because if there are that many in there and they're spawning together like over and over and over, eventually you do get a new species. So maybe there is because it's uh it's also uniquely, at least I think in those concentrations, an eastern Ontario, Western Quebec thing.

SPEAKER_06 1:17:35

That seems to be where I've seen them up north.

SPEAKER_05 1:17:38

I've seen them up there, but the Sudbury area. But the um well, that's kind of easy. That's where we're talking about. Like the amount that are in that area just seem like there's something to it.

SPEAKER_04 1:17:47

And I also would question that particular pod of fish that we were fishing, that that pod of fish is not exposed to the you know, masses. I don't imagine there's many boats, especially you know, a week or two after we left there, because the water levels would be so far down that you couldn't get a boat up to those areas. I I like why how do we know that that's not a genetically like that could be they those things that's where they live and they're genetically.

SPEAKER_06 1:18:21

So you know, different is when we when I said that Sudbury area, it's funny because every other lake that we fished in that area, there was none in, but one lake had the blue wall in it. Just one lake, you know what I mean? So there was no there was no such a thing in any of the other lake lakes around there. So why?

SPEAKER_05 1:18:38

I don't know. It's weird with stuff like that too, because I know when we were in uh foliette, they had the albino moose on display. Yeah, but that's very common up there, is the albino moose. And then there's other areas where it's a completely unheard of. So it's it's it is kind of strange that there I feel like there's something people might not know about these things. Oh, I think there's a thing or two people don't know.

SPEAKER_04 1:19:01

What I do know though is it's time to run. Holy mackerel, where has this uh time gone? Um this is gonna be one of our longest. Did we the longest up there? Did we put a code out? Do we need to put a code out for anything? I feel like we're missing a code or something, don't think the store manager used blue before.

SPEAKER_03 1:19:21

We did use blue last week.

SPEAKER_05 1:19:23

Oh sturgeon? Talked a lot of sturgeon.

SPEAKER_03 1:19:27

The talk love was sturgeon. Cook? But like uh C O K E. Ooh, that would be that would be tricky.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:36

Would we do that? Would we do that? You just did Boshane recently, okay? Like come on.

SPEAKER_03 1:19:42

We didn't even give the spelling on that one. All right. Let's do uh let's do cook with an E. Cook with an E. Cook, but no doctor. Yeah, no doctor, just C O O K E.

SPEAKER_04 1:19:52

That's it. That are it. That are it, folks.

SPEAKER_06 1:19:55

And we gotta stop doing this at the end of the show, though, because people are gonna just fast forward to the end of the show. Well, maybe we're gonna start doing that.

SPEAKER_04 1:20:02

Well, those same people will leave. If you do it at the front, they're just gonna tune in for the goodies and they're gonna go aware.

SPEAKER_06 1:20:06

They're gonna have to at least we're gonna not kind of put it at the front either. We're gonna stick it in there nicely. Or move it. Stick it in there nicely, in other words, yeah. Or move it around. Move it around. That's what I mean. That's what I'm saying. We're gonna place it. I think we gotta do that from now on. You know the only problem with that?

SPEAKER_04 1:20:22

You and I are gonna forget that.

SPEAKER_06 1:20:23

Well, that's why we have a team here. These are our bosses here. They're gonna run the okay, guys. How about uh it's time for a code?

SPEAKER_04 1:20:31

All right, we'll let you guys, uh Dean and Nick, you decide moving forward on the podcast. You decide where we're gonna give the code.

SPEAKER_02 1:20:40

I'll just start jumping in.

SPEAKER_04 1:20:41

And it'll be in different places, different time, whatever you choose is.

SPEAKER_03 1:20:45

Don't get mad at me when I just barred you. Uh, because because people are taking advantage of us. Would we do that?

SPEAKER_06 1:20:52

No, we're good. We're good with it. We asked him to do it. So we have to suck it up.

SPEAKER_03 1:20:55

Just remember that you asked me to do it. Well, that's that's you know that's the problem. We need you need to remember past today about I'm gonna be coming in here. Hi five. I like people who forget. Where's Jeff? What's Mr. Cundit got to say? Yeah, the bunch of bows.

SPEAKER_04 1:21:09

That's right. You got that right. All right, kiddies, we gotta run on behalf of the entire team. Uh, Nikki V, uh Mr. Dean Taylor, he's Peter Bowman, I'm Angela Bioles. Thanks for joining us. We'll catch you next time. This episode of Outdoor Journal Radio has been brought to you in part by the Invasive Species Center, protecting Canada's land and water from invasive species. Freedom Cruise Canada, rent the boat, own the memories. And JMB Cycle a Marine, your home for all things power sports, boats, and equipment.