EP 67: A Chesapeake Alarm and Some Spring Fishing with Thomas Arens

Raw sewage doesn’t stay “local.” When a major sewer line breaks on the Potomac River, the consequences travel downstream into the Chesapeake Bay, into the places we fish, crab, and launch our kayaks. We wanted a plain-spoken, real-world breakdown of what happened, why it took so long to address, and how something as unbelievable as using the C&O Canal as part of the workaround can even be considered a solution.

We’re joined by Thomas Ahrens from Fishing The DMV to walk through the timeline, the reporting gaps, and the bigger environmental chain reaction anglers should understand: nutrients, algae blooms, dissolved oxygen, and how the Chesapeake Bay dead zone can push fish and crabs into the wrong water at the wrong time. From there, we widen the lens to the “death by a thousand cuts” affecting the Bay, including sediment and high-flow events tied to the Conowingo Dam, runoff from lawns and new construction, and the uncomfortable reality that funding often shows up after disaster instead of before it.

Then we bring it back to why most of us showed up in the first place: fishing. We talk early-season targets, expo culture, what’s worth chasing this spring, why snakehead is underrated on the table, and why the Eastern Shore still feels like a last wild stretch for kayak anglers. We even hit kayak safety and the growing feeling that sharks are becoming part of the coastal equation.

If you care about Chesapeake Bay fishing, Potomac River water quality, and the future of East Coast fisheries, you’ll get a lot out of this one. Subscribe, share it with a fishing buddy, and leave a review telling us what local water issue you want us to dig into next.

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Transcript

Cold Open And What’s At Stake

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 0:00

Maybe it was bureaucracy or whatever, but it wasn't fixed. And it was pumping raw sewage at a it was, I think it was like over 300,000 gallons at that point from Monday to Saturday.

Sponsors And Local Support

Meet Thomas And Fishing The DMV

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 0:19

Hello and welcome back to the Fat Dad Fishing Show. I'm your host, Rich Natoli, back again with another show on a new topic for us. It kind of goes with a theme that's been popping up over the past few years, and it has to do with the health of the fisheries, the environment, the ecology, and uh, you know, not just about a specific species tonight, but about an entire region that affects most of the, well, I'm gonna just say everybody on the east coast of the U.S., whether or not you fish in uh the Chesapeake or not, it affects you. It affects the fish that you fish for. Uh so we're gonna we're gonna talk about that today. I have Thomas Ahrens coming on from Fishing the DMV podcast. If you haven't seen or listened to it, you're missing out. Uh so he's gonna be on in a couple minutes. I'm gonna run real quick through the uh the sponsors before we get to that, but we're we're gonna focus a little bit on just what has been happening to the Chesapeake, the pollution, the uh really the devastation that that happens to that fishery every single year, not just for fishing, but for crabbing as well. But then we're also gonna talk fishing because you know we can't go through an episode without talking about how to catch some fish in in a specific area. So really interested to hear what he has to say. And by the way, he covers fresh water as well. So uh it's not just a saltwater or brackish show tonight. We are we are open for all topics. And with that, let's jump into the sponsors. Number one is Great Bay Outfitters on Radio Road in Tuckerton, New Jersey. It's the kayak outfitter shop that I go to, it's the one that I use, it's the one that you should be using. It's one of the largest in the region, and it is by far the best in the region. I've been to many. And uh, Paul and his team do a great job, and they have on-the-water kayak trials. So, when people ask what kayaks should I get, it's really an involved conversation. Everybody always throws out whatever they own because they think they have the best. The answer is whichever one feels best to use, and the only way to figure it out is to get on the water. Paul can do that for you. So head on down there, set up a time with him, and you can get on Crescent Native Old Town. Get out there in the lagoon. He's got the powered versions, pedal, paddle, whatever you need. So check that out. Uh, Radio Road in Tuckerton, New Jersey. Then we have Quad State Tune. Kevin Driscoll is your contact with Quad State if you have a Toyota truck. We're talking the Tacoma Forerunner, Tundra, Lexus 460, 470, third gen Tacoma, especially, where it has those gear hunting issues or the gear seeking issues where it doesn't quite feel like it's in the right gear. He's got the tunes for your engine. It will improve the throttle response, the torque, and the horsepower. If you don't need it, he will tell you. If you do need it, he will tell you exactly what it'll do for you. You can reach him at 4463-35975. And then me for real estate, I cover. Well, that's my job. This is not my job. My job is selling real estate buying and selling on behalf of my clients in southeastern Pennsylvania, mainly residential. Do a little light commercial now and then. So if you need anything, or if you know anyone that needs any help, 267-270-1145. And I just want to say, you know me for fishing. I actually you could know me for real estate as well. I do have a very small real estate YouTube channel that I just started. You could look for that. It's Natoli Real Estate. So you could check that out. All right. We're gonna announce later in the show who's coming on next week, but we'll we'll worry about that later. I'm gonna bring on Thomas right now and welcome you to the show. It's good to see you, man.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 3:59

Thanks for having me. Excited to be here.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 4:01

Yeah, I I've been trying so hard to figure out who I could have come on to talk about what's happening in the Chesapeake. And for me, it all started when the latest sewage leak started. And it it like nobody's really covering it. And all these people were really loud about it, and I wanted to be loud about it, but I wanted to talk to somebody who maybe knew a little bit more or was a little bit more personally affected by it. And I couldn't get anyone to come on. They're like, uh, it's you know, it's my off season, and I'm just on the social media just keeping in touch with people. And I'm like, come on, and then I and then I was listening to your podcast and watch actually watching your YouTube channel, like, I bet you he'd come on. So thank you. Thank you for responding and coming on. I think it's a I think it's an important issue.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 4:51

It really is, and and it's not getting attention. The fact that my channel, I mean, I am not Mr. Beast with with what I have going on, but I was trending for a while because I was the only one that covered it for a hot minute was mind-blowing to me when it is it is a big deal, what what went what went down.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 5:09

Yeah, it's it's insanity and what and we'll get into it, but the entire we'll get into exactly what happened most recently, but I don't even think it's the most severe thing that's been going on, or even and will go on this year with the Chesapeake. And it's it's just a continuous one after the other series of ecological hits, and you're starting to see it in the fishery. You're still I mean the crabs, I mean everyone talks about the Maryland crabs. Well, those guys, I don't know how they make their living anymore because the these crabs are getting destroyed along with the the environment. But you know what, before we jump into that, why don't you tell everybody about fishing the DMV? So that everybody in case they're not familiar, so they know where to find you and everything.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 5:58

Yeah, if you guys don't know, fishing the DMV kind of started out kind of being a play on a name where if you grew up in northern Virginia, Maryland, you called that area the DMV, which is the DC, Maryland, Virginia tri-state area. And so I started out just covering fishing from about DC and everything that happened in Maryland, Virginia, and it slowly expanded to where it's Pennsylvania, the Chesapeake Bay, the Eastern Shore, all the way down to North Carolina. I'm on the uh freshwater advisory board for the state of Maryland, and I have like four or five really good friends that are in the Virginia Department of Wildlife Resources. And I think I've put out 600 episodes in four years, and we just keep cranking them out because I don't know how to stop.

unknown 6:40

Yeah.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 6:40

Yeah, it's it takes a lot though, man. It takes a lot to do that. I mean, I struggle, I I struggle to keep up and and do one a week.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 6:50

It is, it's an addiction, but it's also I like people, and there's so many fascinating stories that it's kind of like I think it culminated in me being able to break the Potomac sewage leak. Is there's so many small local stories that are fun that you won't hear on on a big stage, which is sad. Right.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 7:08

Yeah, and they're important because you know, like the Potomac Leak, I mean that that the impact of that is gonna be felt all not not just up where the leak was, but all the way down through the the mouth of the Chesapeake, all the way over into the Delaware River. It's gonna it's gonna make its way up the coast and all of that. Yeah, so anyone, if you're not following him, I would I would if you like this channel, you will you will love his. You know, I I would love to say that mine's better. It's not, it's not. You you gotta you gotta be following Thomas on his. It's just that just a wealth of information on and and yes, you have a lot of volume, but you can find whatever your niche is, it's being covered. And I I do appreciate that about your about what you do. I don't, I it's funny, people say, well, what what YouTube channels do you watch? You know, who do you follow for fishing? I follow like three people, and that's it, because I can't stand most of it. It's just like self-aggrandizing stuff, you know what I mean? It's all for clout, and yours definitely is not, and I really appreciate that. So I think you vibe well with with people that like this show as well. So people should be checking that out. I do want to mention, I'm gonna try to keep up with the chat. We have a we have a dual stream. I don't know if you're streaming to dual locations when you do it, but it it it comes out in both a vertical and horizontal format. So I can't see all the comments. I lose, I can see more in the stream yard platform than I can see in the YouTube on my left, but I I know I miss it every week, so we may be maybe get rid of it.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 8:43

I I wish StreamYards, I mean, even because I I you know, I as you do pay for you pay so much for StreamYards, and it doesn't bring comments over from like Instagram, you can't do anything to TikTok. Sometimes Facebook is hit or miss. It is it's frustrating when it feels like they're the only platform that's legitimate at this point.

Potomac Sewage Leak Timeline

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 9:01

Yeah, it I don't even know what to say. It all I know is that everybody's out trying to get our money and nothing is getting it that much. Oh, I have to say, StreamYard has gotten a lot better in the last year, but it's also very expensive. Yeah, very expensive to to run it. So yeah, so so let's jump in. Let's let's start first off. Let's talk about this Potomac sewage leak for those that are unaware of exactly what happened. How would you summarize it in the most graphic way possible?

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 9:31

A shit show. Yeah, do to them sh but yeah, it for for people that need context, because I if you guys haven't watched, I'll try to cliff note the the two episodes I did with the river keepers. I mean, where's my timeline I put up here? So Monday, January 19th, there's a pipe break, and that's what people thought. And it's common. It's common that it happens. It's common that it happens. The local, the local jurisdiction, basically, just so I don't I don't get in in trouble with it, basically said everything was fine. And I started to get messages through my because that's in my backyard, like, hey, did you hear about this break? Did you hear about this break? And then it's Tuesday, and it's Wednesday, and then Thursday morning, it was I had like 20 messages being like, I this pipe isn't fixed. And so I called up the river keepers, which guys, if you don't know, that's a whole other topic about how important the river keepers are. And I called up the Potomac chapter, and I was and I was like, Hey, what's going on with this? And he said, dude, it's it's it's not just a broken pipe, it is an artery that's gashed and it's pumping into the river. So I get him on the show and we discuss it further, that they never fixed the pipe. They either maybe it was bureaucracy or whatever, but it wasn't fixed, and it was pumping raw sewage at a it was, I think it was like over 300,000 gallons at that point from Monday to Saturday. Yep. And the context there, because you know, this was the biggest snowstorm to hit the east coast in the history of forever, allegedly. And so that was coming down Friday evening into Saturday morning while the pipe was busted, and so all these factors working together cut to Super Bowl Sunday when they get this semi-contained, and then because so many people flushed during Super Bowl Sunday, it blew out all of the pumps again. Now you might be like, well, then how would they contain this? Well, on the Potomac River, at the portion of the Potomac River, which is above DC, that this happened, there's this thing called the CNO Canal. It's a historic canal, George Washington put it in. It runs basically from Washington, D.C. all the way up towards Paw Paul. They had to use the historic canal as an open sewage system to where they pumped raw sewage into the canal and let it go down about a mile, maybe two miles, and then pump it back into Blue Plains. That was their system. And not to do the the the fear porn thing because it is raw sewage. I was I was a kid when there was the DuPont mercury spill on the Shenandoah River, killed 80% of all life on the river. That was that that was actually really bad. This is fecal matter and stuff, which which is a problem. I'm not saying that. And the fact that they never had a fail-safe in plan. This was the major artery for all sewage in Maryland to go to the plant, and there was no plan of if it breaks, what we do. That didn't exist, which is insanely wild to me. That an oil rig has some kind of plan. They made like three movies about it about what happens or what do you do. You didn't have a plan for this in 2026.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 12:41

How? Yeah, well, it's so the way I look at it is this you have contingency plans and disaster recovery plans for business. Because business is run by people that understand how to run things. Government and utilities are not necessarily business people, they're just people. Yeah, I so I wasn't surprised when I saw it, but I was getting surprised with how long it kept going. I mean, it got to the point where Trump had to jump in and do his his dirty tweeting, just saying, if you're not gonna fix it, we're I'm gonna send in the federal government to fix it, and then they fixed it. Right. Then they got then it at that point they got serious about it, but it was he had to threaten them in order, you know, because no nobody wants Trump to send anybody anywhere, apparently, at least of all Maryland. So, you know, I think that might have been a catalyst for something, but at least the reporting started to get better on it at that point. I think it ended about a week after that, if I'm not the reporting or the the disaster. The the I think it was like almost fully contained and fixed within a week or so after that, right?

Ecological Fallout And Dead Zones

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 13:54

So that is what is your definition of fixed and contained? Because there are there are still numerous spills because they are backstopping it against a canal that was built during 1900s. Yeah, there's still leaks, they're still using it. They don't have it so they're fixed is contained in the canal, which was another issue that they're trying to fast track. Is at first they said they wouldn't have it fixed until September, which meant you would have two miles of raw sewage next to Washington, DC in the heat of the summer. Oh, lovely. And then people started thinking like, what about the bot flies and the mosquitoes? Is malaria gonna come back? What about the smell? Because depending on where the wind blows, like when the accident happened, you could it it caked your vehicle, it caked your clothes. It was not nice, and so I think that really expedited their their stress of trying to get it contained. But there is still sewage in the canal that now they're hoping now to have it done knock on wood by mid-April, late May, pumping the sewage completely out of the canal. What are the ecological effects of this? Who knows? Again, is it a is it Chernobyl is a nuclear spill? Absolutely not. Do we know how bad it's gonna be? I don't know, like, especially near DC. I I know I I've at least had the message like how far down is it gonna go to Quiet Creek, past Matwoman into Chesapeake Bay? Some of it will 100%. I'm not as worried that far down first as immediately around DC, how much of that stuff is gonna be sticking to the bottom? What happens if if you start digging to fix the Woodrow Wilson Bridge and you turn all that lovely stuff up in a couple of years?

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 15:28

Well, and then you know, there's there's really two things. There's the fact that it's it's literally Rawls, it's literally toilet to to Chesapeake or to Potomac, which is an issue. You know, whatever gets flushed is literally coming out as it was flushed. Yeah. But the other issue is it's putting a lot of biological matter into the water, and that's that it's a whole separate thing because now you start talking about algae blooms. Right. So as the water does heat up, you know, that's one of the biggest concerns with pollution that that's ongoing. Think about well, on top of what we already had with all the rain and all the snow and all the runoff, running off all the pesticides and everything. That those are some of the things that lead to the algae blooms that are going to happen in the Chesapeake, which ends up killing off the seagrass and and all that work that people have done to get the oysters back, the crabs. And it what it does is it then depresses the does the dissolved oxygen levels. So I think what is it? A striped bass needs what 50 milligrams per whatever per liter.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 16:35

About, yeah.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 16:36

Yeah, and they it pushes, and but once it hits two, it's it becomes lethal. So the dead zone, which has been shrinking in the chest. I don't know if people know this. There's a dead, there is an average dead zone in the Chesapeake because of dissolved oxygen levels, averages about what one and a third cubic cubic miles. And it's shrunk over recent years down to about a half of a cubic mile. But all it takes is for this oxygen level to drop again from algae blooms, and it's going to go right back up. And that just pushes all the fish into areas where they should not be.

Chesapeake Stressors Beyond Sewage

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 17:12

Yeah, and then you you compact with the climate change and stuff, because that's one thing. If you listen to some of the big striped bass studies Maryland's put out there and people up near your area where the water is warming. I mean, we have shrimp in the bay, like shrimping is becoming a thing finally. We have a great puppy drum and speck trout and and weak fish. There are tarpon that now live on the eastern shore tip of Virginia. They come every summer now. People, there's a biologist I talked to a month ago from North Carolina that thinks in the next 50 years we could see snook eventually up here if things continue. So it's a yes to this and also this, because I think what's fun when you talk to biologists in long form, it's like it's never one thing. There's never uh uh you point to just fix this, it's a death by a thousand cuts. And also, it is like herbicides. Like there are people that that spray near a quiet creek that they just they see the grass at their boat dock and they're like, ew, this is bad, and they start dumping stuff of on their dock. That's a problem because first off, that's illegal. Please don't do that. But how much of that stuff washes down and starts killing it? Or the blue cats. I I had on a biologist two last year, maybe it was two years ago, and they did a lot of uh dissections of young of year blue cats, and they found SAV in their system that they eat it. And so how much has that hurt it too? Like it's a lot of bad stuff that just it's one more thing, one more thing, and eventually the ecosystem buckles.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 18:36

Yeah, and and it's not so again, the the sewage thing was the thing that I you know kind of prompted me to say, well, we I should probably try to get an episode together. But there are a lot of things like think about you know, one of the biggest violators for for causing damage to the Chesapeake is the Conewingo Dam, which is just itself because the the the releases and the the high flow events they push all that sediment down. And then you get all that that turbulence in the water from from the the high the high flow events where they're releasing, and it just stirs all that water up, it drops the oxygen levels, it kills the grasses or at least stunts the grasses, so you don't have all that it it can kill the oysters, and you know, it that's one of the things, and that goes on constantly, you know, and and that's one thing that nobody really talks about, you know. But there there have been big events in what 2011, 18, and 19 where they just said, you know, it's the dam. The dam's the dam screwed us. All of us down south got screwed because of the dam. And you know, people don't people don't even realize that. You know, they they just accept it as a place where you can fish for striped bass.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 19:49

And and and kind of wink it is so fascinating because there are things that you can do, uh, but they don't want to do it because it costs money. Like I I've heard people on on both ends of the spectrum like, we should just remove the dam. It's like, well, that would create so many issues because if you remove that dam, there'd be a lot more sediment. That's that's that'd be just as expensive and all that stuff. But you could do different things to help aerate the water because there's a lot of there's a lot of lakes in the TVA system that do that, that aerate the water, because as you pull water from the lower piece of like Bugs Island and you dump that into gas, then if you didn't do something like that to aerate, you would just kill the lake down below. So there are different things in theory they could do, but again, it comes down to Benjamins who wants to flip the bill. And because that lake, and we'll just call it Conewingo Lake or uh reservoir, Maryland, Pennsylvania. There's that argument of who has to flip the bill for it because no one wants to do it, right? Which again, we come back to it, it's bureaucracy, baby, and no one wants to be the one holding the the purse.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 20:47

Yeah, and it's a big thing. I mean, the connewingo, just for full disclosure, it used to do a much better job at at the sediment clearing, but it it's it's all anymore. It's yeah, they they need to update it and they need to do all that stuff, and they they don't do any of it. And again, there are people that are gonna be listening to this show are like, yeah, but I love fishing there. Yeah, it's great, but it's it's not helping because the it's the sediment that's getting through there that's I mean, it's destroying everything. I mean, think about what the think about how all of this impacts the the flats. The flats used to be the place to go, not anymore.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 21:23

Why do you think it it was and and this usually comes down to it's it's the government, it just is. I I think it is if you look at the titles where it's like it's the Conewingo Dam's fault, it's an inanimate object. The issue is when it comes to budgeting, they keep kicking the can down the road. They the dam did work and did do its correction, it did do what it was supposed to, and then when it needed upkeep, it needed refurbing, it needed some stuff. They're like, you know what, that we don't want to do that. Let's just put that money somewhere else. And now they're going to be blaming the dam. This always comes down to either inept government or not using the budget. Bugs Island, I keep bringing that up because. I just recorded an episode earlier. That dam, that lake was built during D-Day. That's how old that lake is. It hasn't been upkept in about 50 years. That's an ecological problem that's going to happen when you have a dam that's damn near 100 years old that hasn't had a lot of work done to it. So a lot of our infrastructure, because there's no new lakes or dams being built, we are going to have a reckoning when it comes to a lot of this stuff because it's not going to live forever and definitely without us putting work into it.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 22:27

Yeah. Yeah. And I don't see that happening, at least at a state level. And I get it, right? And Maryland doesn't want to pay for it. I get it. Pennsylvania doesn't want to pay for it. I get it. Well, somebody's going to have to pay for it because it is, and it to me, it does make sense that it would be a federal project because the Chesapeake, as an example, is not just one state, two state. It's literally the entire it it feeds the entire ecosystem on the entire east coast of the United States, all the way up to Massachusetts. They're affected by the fish that come out of there, the Manhaden, all the way down into Florida, down into the Keys. You know, it's it seems to me like the the concern should be federal. And but again, do we really trust that they're going to do anything right? I I don't. Maybe they'll try.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 23:20

I mean, uh, you said it with the Manhaden. Like if you if you want to go full Epstein's Island, it's the Manhaden rabbit hole going down that thing with Omega 3. It's whose pockets getting lined. How is this still a thing? Is there a Canadian pharmaceutical company that's running all this stuff? How many congressmen senators are in the back pocket? I mean, you can go down a Reddit rabbit hole with that thing.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 23:41

Oh, yeah. And well, and it's pretty well documented. And, you know, every it's fun. I'm not in Maryland, so I'm not afraid of Omega. And this platform's not big enough to be afraid of them. I'll just tell you, I mean, you could see that I mean, there are facts. Like you could see whose pockets being lined, and it's everybody. I mean, and you you always hear, well, you know, Trump's going to do something. I'm not so sure that Trump's pockets are not being lined at this point because he backed off real quick once he made a quote unquote deal. I mean, the the amount of money that is coming from Omega is and and not just Omega, but Omega and the satellite companies associated with that industry is just insanity. And they can pretty well buy, and it's proven they can buy off anybody because everybody's been bought off.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 24:30

Yep. And and if you guys don't know, like I made the comparison on the show, it's not a one-for-one, but just think big pharma. Look at the virus of unspecified origins, if we could say that so we don't get dinged on YouTube. Look at how much money was made, and look at if they have to, they just they they'll they'll take and eat the penalty of a billion dollars because they made a trillion dollars. They don't care, and that's what you're dealing with with Omega. And as fun as it is in and morally to be virtuous, you've got to understand the evil that you're dealing with. And it'll take a bad thing happening, like the pipe breaking, for people to be like, oh, wait, there's a problem. It's like that's just human nature. Once there is that meme or that trending view of a pipe pumping raw sewage, then people will care. And it's sad, but that's just the what the reality is of being human.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 25:14

Yeah. Here's a here's a comment that's it's very hard to get funds for maintenance. It's much easier to get funds for emergencies. 100%, yeah. It's 100% true. It's sad, but it's true. But but I think the point that I'm trying to make is we have emergencies every year. They're just not talked about. You know, the runoff just from Pennsylvania, just Pennsylvania, the runoff when we have when we have a lot of rain and we have a lot of flooding, in and of itself, it creates huge algae blooms and fish kills because of people with that are getting non-natural lawn treatments. You know, and it's not just the farmers, it's it's it's it's actually more, I think, the suburban homeowners like myself, who are putting chemicals on their lawn and and it's just washing into the watersheds.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 26:09

The farmers will always be the blame. They're the thing you point at and say, this is the boogeyman. But if you talk to anybody, uh a river keeper, a waterkeeper organization, any any conservation organization, those farmers work their butts off for years because the stigma was on them to make agriculturally conservative uh movements with their property to make sure that they minimize runoff with how they farm. But if you get a new, if you if you run a uh let's say you're building houses and you're like, you know what, I could do all this, or I could cut a corner. You know, when you have new construction, it's crazy when you look at a satellite image of new construction and you look at the color of the water. You don't get that color from a farm. And the fertilizer that they're putting on farms is nowhere near the same amount of chemicals that go into new construction developments, let alone the sediment from all that up tiled earth that happens. Because that type of farming doesn't happen very much anymore. It used to, where you completely uproot all the soil. They're very good about that nowadays. But when you're building a new construction site, if you've ever seen one of those and it rains, that's all just raw sediment dumping into the water, let alone, you know, all the different types of uh fertilizer that's going into the system as well.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 27:18

Yeah, and that's the big thing, you know, the big thing that people don't think about is just the sediment because it pulls up, I mean, it can pull up heavy metals. You think about the coal, the the coal mines and the and the ash, you know, seeping into the water. I mean, all of that sediment, and then it brings in higher nitrogen levels, and it it all works to either create algae blooms or depress dissolved oxygen. And dissolved oxygen is is quite often the key to where you find fish. Can't find them if there's no dissolved oxygen.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 27:48

And then you have the war on SAV, which is something I cover with autism on my channel because well, submer the submerged aquatic vegetation, right? Yeah, because so you'll have like Eurasian milfoil or hydrilla, which basically will live anywhere. And a straight-line person be like, it's an invasive, you must get rid of it no matter what. On the flip side, it clears up the water, it does the job of straining and actually incorporating oxygen. And you get people like up in Connecticut where they're trying to make it law that all grasses are invasive and we need to spray all of it. Candlewood was a big story up there where they oversprayed, put too many grass carp. And then they tried to start doing this in tidal water, which got a lawsuit brought up because you're not supposed to put herbicide into a tidal or you know, an estuary. And and but again, the reason I incorporate that into the Chesapeake is it's culture. We understand that, and I would even could make an argument that maybe some invasives are are good, it's a necessary evil, especially if you don't have a good way to target them. Nuking the whole system doesn't is not the best thing. But Sarah, who's a stay-at-home mom, all she knows is grass bad. And so she will dump stuff on her dock because she's not educated enough to know, like, yes, this is bad, but it's at least filtering, it's protecting, it's oxygenating. And we don't educate people enough on this stuff to have those nuanced conversations.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 29:10

Right. And you could look at it, you could look at a lot of different things. There are certain species of carp which you know people don't like, you know, just to take fish and they're like, oh, kill them all. Well, actually, that carp's not doing anything. They all think that all the carp jump, you know, they're jumping out of the water, and then the other like snakeheads is a great example. Yeah, they're gonna destroy everything. Well, I I'm looking at local streams near me that have snakeheads in them, big ones, and man, tons of smallmouth. It's and more smallmouth than when I was little, you know. When I was a kid, I fished these same streams when I was a kid, and I'm catching, you know, more smallmouth now than I was back then. So I don't think that the snakehead that was caught at the same dam, you know, the week after really did anything because I I I'm still catching it. So I think it's a lot of you know, a lot of fantastic stories in the news, the fish that can crawl, you know, it can walk across land, it's so dangerous, and everyone's like, kill it, kill it, kill it. I think you get it the same type of you know mob mentality when it comes to some of these other things where it just doesn't really make sense.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 30:15

There is a tier list definitely about the worst of the worst versus that. And it's funny because I would not put snakeheads as number one. I think I think blue cats would definitely be a strong contender for what they've done. But yeah, the snakehead is is it's fascinating, man. Like I cover them so much on the channel because I mean in our area and and yours basically, it's it's got a cult following, it's it's the underground punk rock edgy thing to do. And right, I wish someone could write a small book about it because it's fascinating going from it's gonna eat your dogs and kill your children to it's the punk rock kayak thing to do, go catch a dragon in less than 20 years? That's a heck of a cycle for a story, right?

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 30:53

Right. I haven't caught my first one yet.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 30:56

Oh, really?

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 30:57

Yeah, I haven't, I haven't. I've only tried a couple of times just walking. I haven't taken the kayak out for them yet, but I am planning on doing that this summer. I just have honestly have to find a place that doesn't quarantine kayaks that has them that's close to me. Because a lot of you know, some of the ones near here, you have to quarantine your kayaks, and they can't you can't leave because they're afraid of the mussels and everything like that. Oh, zebra mussels? Yep, yeah, they're afraid of all that stuff, so they don't want to contaminate the water.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 31:27

So which that that's a fascinating thing about I don't know, like Jurassic Park life finding a way where you know they didn't like zebra mussels, but the off effect is they filtered and cleaned out the water to where like the Great Lakes are cleaner than they ever been. Uh, Candlewood, I think, has them, and like that place is gin clear. So it's I'm not saying right or wrong, but it's interesting that nuanced thing of it it it finds a way because you get those in there, then all of a sudden the water gets cleaner, then all of a sudden the SAV comes back.

unknown 31:52

Right.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 31:53

Which is just it's fascinating how ecosystems try to self-heal themselves with stuff like that.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 31:57

Yeah, they do, and thank God, because we don't do a lot to help in a lot of cases, you know. You look at the the entire oyster effort in New York, they're the billion dollar or the billion, not billion dollar, the billion oyster project, where they want to put a billion oysters back in the water, and it's taking them forever, but it'll it'll correct itself.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 32:16

It will, and I think it's a it's good intentions, but it's bureaucracy. Like, wasn't there a bridge in California for animals that was trying to be built and it's like a trillion dollars now? And and it's like we could do that in a week, yeah. But we we have an organization down here like the CCA, uh Chesapeake uh Bay Association, our Chesapeake Conservation Association building artificial reefs for for oysters, and it was fun prepping for those episodes. And I went down a YouTube rabbit hole of like there's oyster pirates in Tangier and what it used to be, and it's like that is wild. I didn't know about this history from New York all the way through the Chesapeake Bay.

What Anglers Can Do Now

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 32:51

I I've been I've been reading a lot of Chesapeake Bay history over the past few years. It is amazing the stuff that this stuff learned about about the Chesapeake and the East Coast, you know, the eastern coast down there. It's the eastern shore. It's it's amazing. It's amazing the thing. Yeah, Tangier. I I spent a lot of time going down rabbit holes around Tangier. I was absolutely fascinated by it. Absolutely. Yeah, so all right. Well, so listen, we're about 35 minutes in. We've got to talk some fish. So look, let's just sum it up. I I think really the the the goal of this is people need to realize that there's a lot that's affecting negatively affecting the Chesapeake. It comes down to what are you putting on your lawn if you live in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Maryland, because it will end up there. It gets down to these dams and the funding for the dams. Conewingo is just a convenient one to bring up because it's big and it is a documented, a documented issue. Uh the algae blooms from all this biological material, but people need to know that you know the the the cost of these wonderful Maryland crabs have gone up because the dissolved oxygen levels have gone down and they've been pushed out of the deep water and into the shallow water. And the problem with that is they're not supposed to be in the shallow hot water, right? So it it stunts them, it kills the it kills the baby crabs, it impacts the spawn rates and the recruitment for striped bass. All of these things, and it all comes from things like the runoff, it comes from the sewers and this this these continuous Baltimore leaks that are going straight into the Chesapeake. You know, think about it and open up to it because it seems that fishermen don't get upset until it directly impacts them. But the problem is when you're talking about an ecosystem, is by the time you feel it, it's too late. And now now you're you've gone the way of the weak fish, and it's gonna take 20 years for you to claw it back, and and and a lot of luck goes into you being successful with that.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 35:05

Yeah, and I think context is always important because I I don't like to go super depressing and dour, especially with the world the way it is. But I I had one guy come on, he said something crazy, which is like the bay's not on fire anymore. And and he meant like back in the Nixon administration when when they put in all these laws, like you know, the Potomac would catch on fire. Yeah, high river would catch on fire. I think Delaware, the story was it it would flow the color of whatever they were painting the fire trucks upstream. And so if that was the worst it was ever, this is us on the uptick, and we're still not there yet. So just to get in context, we're going the right direction, but the point was we cratered so deep, you know, 30, 40 years ago, it's taken this long to claw back to where we are now.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 35:48

Yeah, I mean, you you can to bring it for a lot of my viewers, New Jersey Coast, you know, and I think uh Jim Hutchinson has brought this up before. It's not like the days where we had the plastic whistles, but it used to be just garbage, yeah, and needles and everything washing up on the beaches. That's not what it is anymore. But back when that started to happen, we also had a very vibrant Delaware Bay fishery for fluke, for striped bass, legendary fishing for striped bass out at the rifts, the Cape May rips, and that's all gone. And it's still gone, and it's because of what happened back then. And I think that's that's really my point. It is better. You can go fishing there again. You can't go for striped bass, but you can go fishing for fluke in the Delaware Bay again and have a good chance of getting some decent fish, but it's it's not it's it's still a very, very long road back to where it was in the early 80s and late 70s. We're nowhere near that point yet. We still have a long way to go.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 36:47

Yeah, but we're going in the right direction, and you just gotta keep chopping with it. That's the biggest thing. People just need to keep getting educated and keep, and especially if you're out there, take a video. I have so many people that said, Hey, listen, I saw this. Like, do you have proof? It's like, no, you just gotta take my word on it. It's like no one, that's not how this works in 2026. Everyone has an iPhone 19. Take a quick video if you see a leak or something dumping stuff, a video, and then you can send it to the proper authority so they can actually come take a look at it.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 37:14

Yeah, yeah. Or send it to me and I'll I'll put it out on a live stream. We'll we'll try to shame people into doing something about it. It's yeah, I agree. I agree. There is no excuse. Pics or it didn't happen, is pretty much the standard nowadays, and everybody should be. I mean, my mom, who's in her 70s, can take pictures on her phone. Not well, but she can take them. So I think everybody else can. So and I've seen all your fish pics too, everybody.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 37:42

Because it it's it we live in the real world, so let's be adults about it. The only thing they that people understand is lawsuits, and and when you're talking about big corporate America, it the only thing they're gonna feel is if you bring a lawsuit and you have proof to say, like, you did this thing, and these are the damages you did to the ecosystem. And as much as we want to do like a hashtag thing on on YouTube or TikTok, that's not what they're gonna feel. That's not the pain they're they're gonna feel. You need to hit them in their wallet.

Spring Fishing Targets And Expos

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 38:07

Yeah. Well, you know, that it's funny you mentioned that. So you we go back, you can look at the windmills off in New Jersey. Huge hashtag campaigns, but they were and it's great, but nobody did anything. I shouldn't say nobody, 99% of those people that were all up in arms about how they didn't want the windmills never showed up for a meeting, never did anything to help. There were just a few people that were at the core of it that really worked hard to try to stop it and work to file lawsuits and work to lobby at the highest levels of the government. But yeah, to your point, the hashtags are great if you just want to appeal to if you just want to, you know, virtue signal. But it there's got to be more to it. And the more evidence there is, the more likely that somebody's gonna pick that up and do something with it. It doesn't have to be you, but if you can feed the evidence to people, somebody will take it and do something with it. Amen. Yep, amen. All right, let's talk fishing. All right. Yeah, have you been out anytime recently?

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 39:08

I've been a little bit gearing up really for the uh the spring push here with everything. I'm gonna be doing a big old going to Fredericksburg, down to the Elizabeth River. We're gonna be going a bunch of places this year now that we're done with expo season.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 39:20

Yeah, oh yeah. Well, you're you're a pro, so you get you're all in the middle of that. I didn't go to I think I went to one show this year, and that's it. And I didn't You were lucky.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 39:31

I think I did six.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 39:32

I I have fun at them, but I only have fun if I meet up with people. I don't like just walking around by myself. I'm not that guy that goes up and likes, you know, I'm despite having a podcast, I'm not the extrovert that goes up and introduces myself to people. I'm just not. So unless people go, I feel very uncomfortable, you know, just walking around, just like, oh, I see that.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 39:58

Yeah, I I wish I was I was that way, but I am very much, yeah, I'm a talker, I'm a people person. So if you guys don't know, I basically live stream and do meet and greets at Expo. So we start in January and we just wrapped up uh here in like early March. And so now it's like taking a breather, pre-recording content, because I do mostly pre-recorded shows, getting that loaded up before I actually go out and have fun again. New Jersey Expo. I want to go to New Jersey. The uh Virginia Beach one I'm gonna put on the rotation for next year because that's a cool bay versus open water kind of different cultures kind of blend together, which is what's fun about expos, honestly. It's almost like a culture clash where you get everyone's different niche coming together for a weekend.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 40:37

So there's one actually Elle suggested in chat. I'm gonna throw it up there for you. Edison, New Jersey Expo. Ooh. So that's one that I did want to go to. There are two that I really always want to go to. There's the Oaks slash Philadelphia show, which is in Oaks, Pennsylvania. And I go to that because it's literally in my backyard. I I can be there in 15 minutes. And then there's Edison, which I really wanted to go to, but I hurt my back and I couldn't go. There's no way I could have walked around. I still can't. But that's one that I wish I had gone to. And I'll tell you, I'll tell you what. I I live vicariously through everybody, right? So if I can't hit the water or do something, I am just stalking their social media to see. And man, it looked like a great show. I didn't I didn't hear anything that wasn't positive about that show. And that was one that a few years ago I thought was iffy, but it's gotten better and better. And everything everybody I've talked to, not just people that were were there with a booth, just people going, they absolutely loved it. So it seems to me that I'm gonna I'm gonna be heading to Edison for the next one. And that's one that I would recommend that if you want to come north a bit, that would be one to go to.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 41:52

I just wrote it down on my little notepad here. I'll have to add that to the rotation.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 41:56

Yeah, it it's it's a it's got a good reputation. I don't think it's the absolute best venue, but it's a great show. And I think that's what says a lot about it. It's it's just a a great place. Great place to go.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 42:11

What would you consider your your primary species up there this time of year? Is it pickerel? Is it is it tog? Like what is it right now?

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 42:19

So I will tell you saltwater right now, it's striped bass because it just opened it just opened in the backwaters on the first of March. So the saltwater and the brackish, it's going to be striped bass followed by white perch. You got winter flounder, is it's a very niche species to target, but but the diehards are going to be all about the the winter flounder. As far as freshwater, it's really still, you know, where you're allowed to fish for them, it's trout. I mean, the trout fishing is is great in the early part of the year. Now you now you've got a lot of closings because they're starting to stock different areas. So you can't, you know, you can't fish certain stocked areas. But yeah, though, I mean, that's really what we've got going on. And then it'll it'll change over once fluke season opens around the beginning of May in most of the states. You know, you got Delaware, it's always open, but hell, if I lived in Delaware, I'd be fishing for them today. You know, I mean they're there, so so why not? But yeah, and but as you did mention pickerel, I have seen a lot of a lot of folks that I'm connected with catching some nice pickerel.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 43:34

It that is another tribe that's fun. I'm going to be doing a show on because for the my club member Patreon terminates I do, everyone wants pickerel as a side potfish. And I'm like, are pickerel big in Maryland? And there's and the amount of people they're like, oh dude, like it's a thing. Go to Jersey or Maryland. And again, because I you can't be a part of every tribe, you can't know every species, so it's fun that you get to learn about it. But yeah, like that's that's wild that you have this little frog. Just Chihuahua Pike, and it's so big in Maryland and New Jersey. And apparently, there's some places in Virginia that have some hot spots for them. So it's a who knew for me.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 44:09

Yeah, it's I so I've never caught a pickerel, never tried, but it is it is a big fish to target, especially I would say, especially in New Jersey. Some really nice ones that I'm seeing getting pulled out of New Jersey, too. Yeah, it's not my thing. I'd like to go for them at some point, but I kind of got my focus for this year. And pickerel's not on it. What's your top four that you want to get? Well, so for freshwater, I'm definitely it's definitely snake heads, but that's not going to be like my core thing. I definitely want to gain some experience doing that. I want to go largemouth and small mouth. Smallmouth is the most fun, but I I've never really targeted largemouth. So I want to do that. So really it's it's the and trout. Trout is going to be the big one for the year for me. So the summer I won't be catching a ton of them, but I'm also going to be doing salt water mostly in the summer. So it kind of kind of fits into my calendar. Yeah, but for me, it's going to be fluke. Fluke is number one. They're so boring to reel in, but I love just trying to hook the big ones, you know. I I like the hunt. Striped ass. I'm not doing any right now. I just physically can't. So maybe that'll be a fall thing for me. And I'm going to try again to get into Sheep's head. I'm going to try again. I just can't. I just, it's just not my type of fishing. So Todd is always there. I you know what? I can't stand so where I fish in the tidal waters, it's really strong currents. You're up against structure. So you're typically up against a bridge, a bridge piling, and you're just vertical fishing and just sitting and waiting. And you and these guys that go out there that I fish with, they're like, Oh, you want to go? I'm like, sure. And we'll show up, and I'm done in an hour. And they're on the same piling. I'm like, oh my God, how do you guys like? I can't do it. So I just I just reel it up and start fishing for fluke or something. I can't do it. It's so much work just to stay on those pilings and everything.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 46:11

So especially if you don't have like a motor or something. That it's got to be a nightmare for the guys that pedal or paddle.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 46:17

Yeah, so paddling, it can be okay. You just kind of if you can get the current right and the rudder right, you just very slow pedal straight into it and you fish right off the bow. But you know what, it takes it takes just one little turn, and all of a sudden the current hits you and you're swinging and you're you're spinning out of there. So I just don't, it's just not my favorite thing to do. I'd much rather be fishing for tog. Much rather be fishing for togg than than sheep's head. So I shouldn't say that because our our main sponsor, Great Bay Outfitters, that's that's uh the owner's favorite fish to go for.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 46:53

I always make fun of it, but which which do you think eats better? Tog or sheep's head?

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 47:01

You mean as far as the fight? No, it's uh taste better. Oh, taste better. I've never had I've I it's gotta be Tog. It's gotta be Tog. Yeah. I've never had I like I haven't had a lot of sheep's head. I think I've just like tasted it a couple times. I love I uh Tog is my favorite fish of all. So I put that above everything.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 47:23

I think Tog is probably is gonna probably do it for me, but by a hair, because I really do now. I think snakehead is probably my number three, probably never had a snakehead, dude. Okay, yeah, that's gotta be your number one then. Snakehead is insanely good, yeah. And it's a freshwater fish, and it tastes like a saltwater fish. It's really weird how good it is. It shouldn't be as good as it is.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 47:44

Well, if I can find an area that I trust to eat out of, I'll I'll have one this year then. But I a lot of the streams up here, I wouldn't I wouldn't eat anything out of them, you know. I mean, they're pretty pretty bad. Pretty bad in my area.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 48:01

And and this is the interesting about the snakehead, is they breathe air. Yeah. So that's why they don't get polluted, is they live in cruddy places, but they they don't have the issue like a catfish tastes like where it comes from because it filter feeds and stuff. Snakehead, they did studies because I'm friends with Odin Krook who ran the snakehead task force when it started. If if they put a glass piece on the top of the of the aquarium so the snakehead can't breathe, it'll drown. And it's just a fascinating thing about that creature. But I think that's kind of one is why it hides in sneaky places, because it can survive places other animals can't.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 48:39

Okay. I didn't realize that it it'll drown. That's why they get that's why they gulp air, they kiss air. I didn't know they had to. Jesus. I didn't that that's why they can crawl on land. Yeah, well, no, I know that they can. I didn't know that they had to. You know what I mean? I I didn't know that they had to. I just thought that uh for survival they could.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 49:02

That's interesting. And also think about what the hardest conditions to catch them in is in choppy water because it's harder for them to breathe, so they kind of look around. That makes sense. It's it's just it's it's uh five, yeah. Uh that fancy word I cannot say in chat. I'm sorry, I'm not good with with the King's English, let alone Italian. Labyrinthian breathers, yes, that that word. Labyrinth.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 49:27

Elle's a teacher. She's actually, I'll say right now, she's coming on next week, everybody. We're gonna talk winter flounder. So here's a question: how do you prepare the snakehead?

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 49:38

Oh, I mean, you gotta go fish tacos, dice them up, put them in a marinade. I eat and a little bit of old bay for my Marylanders. I'm sorry. Then I have a pickled onion recipe. I go pickled onions, pickled jalapeno, toast the tortilla of your choice and when you're gonna do corn or flour, and then yeah, just blacken them real quick and then throw them on there. The best. Because it's it's a very it's a very it's a very white, thick meat. So dicing it's very easy. I've heard some people do like ceviche if you're kind of into that, but it's it's not my not my vibe.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 50:11

Not mine either. My brother, he's in the chat. That's his vibe. It's not mine. I I love the the black and fish tacos, definitely. Definitely. I I haven't had it with snakehead though. So so what what are you gonna be targeting over the next next two months? If you could do anything.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 50:29

Oh my goodness, if I could do anything, I would go down to the eastern shore. I'm hopefully gonna do a month-long sabbatical this summer, and I'm gonna hit the eastern shore. The eastern shore from really Assetague down is the last wild west place on the East Coast. There's like five people that live there.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 50:50

And so you want to know something funny? My wife and I are looking at that area to buy a house and move. Really? Yes, for that very reason. So keep going. I want to hear what you have to say.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 50:59

I just keep talking to more and more salt guys, and and the way they talk about this is almost like in tales of like what what what people first saw in like the African Sahara, and they bring back these these like like acres upon acres of eelgrass beds, and there's like you won't see a person, and every species is there, whether it's trout, reds, maybe a silver king or two, sharks, everything's there, and there's nobody. It is it's so weird that that area next to from New Jersey, Baltimore, DC, Philly, all these hubs, Norfolk, the biggest military base on the planet for the Navy, and then you have this little sliver of a peninsula, and there's like five people that live on it. Yeah, so I really want to check out that place. I have not caught a redfish or a speck from a kayak. I've caught I've caught I caught one that was the size of my arm. I'm not counting that as a red. I really want to go toe-to-toe with that. I've caught so many striper as a kid, and and that, and that's fun, but the light tackle version of things where you're getting pulled around on a kayak is addicting, and I really want to experience that in the bay.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 52:02

Yeah. Well, well, have you thought about Kip to Peak? Ooh, I have not. I would I would think about that. I mean, you've got the you're you're close enough to the to the bridge where you're gonna have a lot of actually cobia there too. You pick up cobia at Kip to Peak.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 52:19

I don't know how those people do that. Like those people that catch Marlin out of a kayak. Like I am I'm crazy, but like there there is an extent there with that stuff that just gets wild sometimes.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 52:29

Yeah, I I've got some friends that live in in Florida and they're out there, you know, pulling in sailfish on their kayaks and they pedal out to them because it's close enough, you know. It's like it's like if you go to the outer banks and you go out for you know big game fishing. It's like yeah, it was a it was 30-minute steam, you know. New Jersey is like four hours, five hours.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 52:50

And and it's also I I know it doesn't happen a lot, but the the shark epidemic is in these places where like, dude, like I don't want to be out in a kayak in some of those places. I had somebody on a year ago and he had the back end of his kayak smoked by a bull shark. And it's like, dude, no, check, please. I'm not hell no, I'm not gonna deal with possibly dealing with that.

Sharks, Safety, And Wrap-Up

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 53:06

I'm I'm trying to get a mothership trip going where we do go off for tuna and for Mahi and everything, you know, go like 40, 50 miles offshore. But that's a mothership trip, so you have a big boat within a mile or two of you. So if anything goes sideways, you're just on your radio like help. Yeah, that's that's smart, and they're coming to get you, you know. That's that's a whole different thing. Yeah, yeah, I I always get nervous when I see these guys getting chased by sharks and the the sharks hitting them. There was a there was a guy, I don't remember who it was, uh fishing in Florida, and he kept he for some reason he insisted on trying to land this shark that was as big as his kayak. And it didn't make any sense to me, and it and it kept hitting the kayak and knocking it sideways. I'm like, just cut the freaking line, it's only three feet away from you. Cut the line, and he wouldn't cut it, and it almost dumped him twice. And somebody on a boat came over and it's like, yo, dude, you just stop. You can't keep fighting that thing, but it was as big as his kayaks, it was probably a 10 to 12 footer.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 54:09

Yeah, he's fishing it, and that's a whole other bag of worms they go down as there is a shark epidemic, there 100% is at least in over the United States waters that will at some point have to be addressed. I mean, I know y'all have white pointers now coming down from the main area more, and we have a seal population sprouting up. I it's a in North Carolina, and so that's gonna bring down some white pointers and some bigger ones, and and it's just it's a when you're catching great whites from Floridian beaches, there's this is a sign that there's something wrong with the ecosystem necessarily, that you could have too many apex predators potentially, but yeah.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 54:46

Well, you can't well, a whole different topic. You can't all the sea mammals are protected, they're exploding. So, I mean they they've got their food source there, you know, and the the seals come into these harbors and they they hang out on the beaches, and it's just gonna bring the sharks in.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 55:03

Yeah, and I I just I couldn't I used to go swimming out way far off the beach when I was a kid. If I had it, like I would not let my kid do anything like that anymore. It's just it's a different world now with some of that stuff. Like I used to wade fish in in the Florida where you tie the kayak behind you and just wade in waste deep water. Nowadays, I would no way in hell I would do that. Oh, really?

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 55:25

Well, in the Everglades, I I probably wouldn't. I I still like to go offshore.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 55:30

I I just have the theme song in the back of my head now. I've I've had enough run-ins with them, it's like I just uh not worth throwing those dice on the table.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 55:38

Yeah, I tend to, you know, I tend to use a stringer, so I've got bleeding fish over the side too. So I have a few videos of me pulling them. I and I forget about it. I'm like, you know, it's only going to take like two or three minutes for it to bleed out. I'll throw it in the cooler. Next thing I know, it's 40 minutes later, and a shark's coming at me. I'm like, ah, at least it's a small one. You know, I've never had a really big shark come after it.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 55:59

But what is big though for you?

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 56:01

Like, I think the biggest one was maybe five feet. That is a big animal. Well, yeah, but I mean, you look at it, its mouth is, you know, it's not gonna, it's not gonna do anything to the kayak. It's not big enough to to tip me. Oh, you're a kayak? Okay, you're not waiting. Gotcha, gotcha, gotcha. No, no, no, no, not waiting.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 56:16

No, you're very nonchalant about that.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 56:18

No, the only time so the only time I had an issue wading with sharks was in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. I was wade fishing with my buddy Brad, and we were out past the breakers, and it was like neck deep, and we're just rods over our heads, but we had we had fish on stringers that were hanging off of our necks, and some sharks came in. We're like, oh damn, and they're behind us now, and we're like, we gotta we gotta move because they're you know, so we had to let the fish go off the stringers and weren't gonna drag them in with us, but there were there were a lot of them, and they were they were you know, they were plus six feet swimming around. They're probably just you know, brown sharks weren't gonna do anything to us, but it scared the hell out of us. Yeah, yeah. So I I've never done that again. No, no, thanks. Nope. No. Well, listen, hey, I want to thank you for coming on. I appreciate it. It's a great topic for people to be aware of. It's great that we got to talk a little fishing too. Um, everybody, make sure if you are not following fishing the DMV yet, uh, I'm telling you right now, you're gonna love it. It's just great information, great episodes, very entertaining, uh, and it's professionally done, which is which is nice. And it's not, as I said at the beginning, it's not, hey, look at me type of fishing channel. It's not about you, it's about the content. And uh I appreciate that. I think it's great and something that I I hope to be able to pull off over the long term with this channel. So uh thanks, thanks again for coming on.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 57:50

Nah, you're well, thank you so much for having me, man. Yeah, keep chopping wood of the YouTube algorithm, and you're gonna get there because you gotta go niche because it's sad that nationally people don't care about our area, which which sucks, but there's so many opportunities all up and down the east coast, and and the and the niches are so cool. I didn't know there were trout and smallmouth in New Jersey. You know, it's not just dead bodies and corporate stuff, like so it's so cool that there's so many neat things in this whole area.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 58:16

Yeah, it's I mean, people people like to say Florida is where all the East Coast fishing is. It's not, and you know, New Jersey and New York are just underrated uh as just as examples. And uh man, you just take you can you could do an entire summer road trip just fishing the mid-Atlantic and never get bored and just have stories and just great fish and great times throughout the entire area, and uh people just don't get it. That's why um I don't know if you ever watch uh Nikonashevsky, his show. Uh he he just focuses on this this area almost almost exclusively. He'll he'll do his trips outside of the area, but um you you watch that and uh you know calls it the underground. Well, it is because nobody knows about it, but you should. If you're if you're not from this area, you don't know about it, but you're missing out. You're definitely missing out.

Thomas Arens- Fishing the DMV 59:09

You are so guys, if you aren't, subscribe to his channel too, to learn everything about what's going on in the Jersey area.

Rich Natoli - Fat Dad Fishing 59:14

Yeah, great. Well, thank you again for coming on, everyone. We will be back next week. Heaven and L is going to be on. We're gonna talk winter flounder and other things as we always do when L is on the stream. So thanks everyone for tuning in. And uh, if the weather is getting a little bit better, I always look out the window when I do that. It's pitch black, you can't tell, but the weather's getting a little better than it was. So if you're able to get out there, get on the water, get some pipelines.