Bay Rats & Buoys

Red Hot Tuna Bite | Happy July 4th Weekend Special Guest Daniel from Ocean Devil

• Captain Gaige

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https://sandcitycharter.com/podcast/

SPEAKER_02

Hello, everyone, and welcome back to another episode of Bear Rats and Buoys. I'm your host, Captain Cage. This is episode 88, which also happens to be my number in ice hockey, sponsored in part by Cito Huntington. Are you a member? Visit Ceto.com and join today and JMC Food of East Northport and East Talk It. This episode is brought to you in part by Ocean Devil, and we are lucky enough to have Daniel on the call right now on the podcast in Dubai. This is going to be an epic episode, guys. You guys are absolutely going to love what we talk about. And stay tuned in because we're going to discuss a lot of great stuff. But we're going to start off with some tuna talk, Daniel, because yesterday's conversation, you've got an award-winning fish on your line that you create. And that is, to me, that was epic. Like seeing that little certificate that you held up in the call was just like, holy cow, that's real, you know, that's that's serious. You know what I mean? That's a big fish.

SPEAKER_01

Well, in the end of the day, that's what it's all about. I mean, people are just pushing the limits, and uh, we're trying to provide the equipment to uh make you make that extra distance, you know. Everything gets pushed to the limits once you get on those big fish. A lot of things can happen. The last thing you want is your tackle to fail. So uh we gotta put in uh that precision and accuracy to uh to deliver on uh and consistency and performance and uh take some time, but then things you know follow up and we start seeing results come in until the point of uh one of our guys, uh uh Cole shared with us that he landed a 272-pound yellow fentuna on our Silk Ocean FCMP P12, and this is uh an official uh state record out of Louisiana. Um so we were really blown away with that one. Uh very, very excited to get that news.

SPEAKER_02

And how about the red Cabrera? The picture of the 90-pound red Cabrera, that thing was huge, giant.

SPEAKER_01

Oh, that that was insane. That was insane. I that probably is a record, but I can't claim that one for mine. That one's not on not our tackle yet, but hopefully that. But I saw that picture and that was wild. Uh to be honest, I didn't even know that Louisiana gets those size of Kuberas, and that's out there on the oil rigs.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, that's incredible. Now, yesterday you also showed us something that was the it was unbelievable. When you saw the detail on those rods that you created, so you're not just in the braid and line and whatnot. You have a lot more. We go to your website, there's a ton of products there that people can check out. Customized rods, all kinds of great stuff. But yesterday's bad company, that rod, those stuff, those things that we saw yesterday blew me and Corey away. We were like, holy shit.

SPEAKER_01

Oh, yeah, the the collaboration that we got with um with uh bad company with uh Anthony. Uh so Anthony has um a foundation for um War Heroes on Water. That's what it's called. And it's such as you know, we discussed a bit about uh the program where it help helps to um uh recover from PTSD. Uh our warriors that go off season come back and they don't come 100% the same. So they need to get the best environment to get them you know back on their feet, whether it's family, energy, motivation, mental health, whatever that comes with it. So this is a foundation that's been put together by Anthony of Batco. And every year they put together in September a uh an auction to raise funds for this foundation. So we would like to uh we we we offer to chip in and provide three custom-made rods um in partnership with the Hunter, a local builder, based on the Diablo 150 uh casting the popping rods. Um and we made three of these rods.

SPEAKER_02

If you'd like, I can uh pull up uh Yeah, show them yeah, you want to show them? Go ahead.

SPEAKER_01

Here, let's uh let's look at uh uh this one, which was the first one with the uh beautiful carbon wrapping. So we had this again with the zoom, but let's try and see if it can pick it up.

SPEAKER_02

So yep, there it goes. A little closer to the a little closer to it, and it's easy. Yep, there you go.

SPEAKER_01

We can go like this, and we can see the detailing. This one is uh basically marbled pouring, it essentially makes this pattern that looks very much like a bowling ball, right? Looks very much uh marble-ish, and then we go all the way to the guide wrapping, and we can see also this is the uh war heroes on water logo, and this is the guide wrapping with carbon. So this is a very unique rod. Another one that we did um from the hunter, yeah. This is one of a kind. Yeah, yeah, yeah. This one is a one of a kind. This is also the Badco logo, and if we see here we have actual sand placed on the blank, and then epoxy down with this amazing art form to perform the ocean and uh you know all the ocean creatures, yeah. It's incredible detail, and it goes all the way into the guides where you can see you know the divers and the wrapping. Every time you look at this rod, you're gonna find something else. If you go all the way to this end, you can see like the little sea turtles and starfish. What are they gonna catch on that rod?

SPEAKER_02

What is that rod for?

SPEAKER_01

This rod is uh is the 150. So this one has been uh our our um leading blank for Louisiana uh yellow fintuna. Uh the reason it's the 150, I mean it's between the 150 and the 220, it's because you don't know what you're gonna catch. And you want a rod that's on one hand gonna be very pleasant and fun to work these fish of up to 100, 120 pounds, but then you don't want to be um you know undergunned if suddenly a 200-pounder comes in and you and you find yourself with a spaghetti rod and nothing has enough backbone to lift that fish as well. So this rod is kind of a combination of two. Uh the Diablo 150 delivers uh very strong castability with an 8.3 foot uh length. Uh it works poppers and stick baits all the way up to uh poppers are up to 150 grams and uh stick baits it can even range slightly over to 170. Um the rod itself is uh built to withstand um about 50 pounds of deadlift at 90 degrees. Right. Um it's a very, very, very strong rod, and it can cast a good range of lures for those types of fish. You're gonna have a lot of liveliness towards the tip. So if you catch uh uh, you know, that a hundred-pound fish, you're gonna curve and load up very comfortably. And then if you tackle that a 200-pound fish, you're still gonna have a lot of backbow through the mixed section of the rod, and that's just gonna put you in a very good, comfortable position to work the fish and pump it up.

SPEAKER_02

Is that a good rod for let's say just uh an example uh for like a Ron Z? Because here in Cape Cod, Phil at Goose Hummock was telling us that the Ron Z is like the go-to dead sticking bait that he'll put in, dead stick it, and let the waves, you know, just taking the boat up and down will move that lore in the water where the tuna come and absolutely crush it. And uh he was describing to us that whole process.

SPEAKER_01

Well, yeah, definitely. I mean, there's a wide variety of uh applications you can use the rod for. Uh, I mean, my my person, my personal preference, and this is what I built my uh my fishing uh career on uh is uh the casting element. For me, it's all about clearing as much distance and what we can get with the lure in the matters of action, and then obviously how you load up on a fish.

SPEAKER_02

Which is why the diameter of your line is skinnier, it's thinner, stronger, casts further. And me and Corey are putting this to the test right now. Your line is actually going on all of my San City Charter reels, and we will be putting it to the test this July 4th weekend here in our area. So we're hoping to have some results for you.

SPEAKER_01

Well, yeah, uh, I'm very happy to hear that you guys are choosing to work with uh Silk Ocean. I mean, me and Corey, uh, we know each other for a couple of years now. Corey has been fishing my line for I think, I think it's like three or even four, five years now almost. And uh, I mean, you don't stick to something that doesn't work, right?

SPEAKER_02

No, he's a big fan of it. In fact, I have him reeling in some big fish, some big striped bass on top water. And you could see your line getting peeled off in the drag on a de really decent sized fish. And uh he's he's used it for years, he loves it, and he's the reason that I'm making the change. And you know, me and you spoke about this. A lot of people get stuck in a rut with a brand that they use, and they don't want to step out of what we would call their comfort zone because they're comfortable with what they're using.

SPEAKER_01

We all know if if if there's something that we're all guilty of, especially in the world of fishing, is being hot-headed. We are all hot-headed. That's right. When it comes to what you know, what you've used, you know, your techniques, uh, where you want to go, especially if you're captaining your own boat. I mean, nobody's really gonna change your mind. And it doesn't matter what people know or how they do it, unless you see it, you experienced it, and you had it in your hands, you're not changing anything about the way you do things. If it if it catches, you do it. And uh in the end of the day, to take something so uh sensitive as a fishing line and try to get someone to shift towards something new, it's very hard. It's hard because you know, if someone had good success on something, it hasn't had to be perfect, but it's a reliable enough for them to feel you know confident in the in the item, then it's gonna be hard to shift. But once you learn about the advantages that you know technology brought in in the last few years, how we're able to reduce diameters, increase the braking strength, uh, deliver different kinds of feel and smoothness when guides leave when when line leaves the guides, um we we're changing the game. You know, there's two elements that we're looking at mainly and ocean in Ocean Devil when we develop the lines. How do we improve someone's jigging experience and how do we improve someone's casting experience? So when it comes to the jigging uh conversation that me and you just had, you know, not too long ago. I think it was yesterday when we were talking about how the diameter affects current and how much the line capacity depends on how deep you can fish and how how much you can deep fit, how you can fish deep, and then how much more line do you have to tackle big gain, you know? Right. You can work PE3 uh or PE2 that suddenly increases 200 meters on your rail, that opens up a new depth for you, and not only that it opens up a new depth for you, it it opens up uh the capability not to get spooled once you hook up to a depth that you're already accustomed to.

unknown

Right.

SPEAKER_01

So if you're narrowly fishing 300 feet uh and suddenly you're you're you're moving on to a braid that gave you more capacity, if you hooked something on the bottom and that thing took off, what's gonna stop him? The only thing that's gonna stop him is time, time and drag. If you don't have that availability to you, you're gonna get maxed out.

SPEAKER_02

Right. And yesterday you also, Daniel, you what impressed me the most now now, especially with the jigging, you know, how you described that the line would bow out and how your hookup ratio was a lot better with your line because it was more instant and taking up that space and time, like you're talking about. But the app, the widget that you had developed, that showed how much more line you can get on a reel and on the list. That was so cool. That really was.

SPEAKER_01

This is uh a freshly uh dropped item on our website. Anybody's welcome to use it, whether it's for sale coshin, or whatever other comparison you want to use it for. You go to oceandevil.com, you slick uh you click on products, then the drop-down menu is gonna come down. You're gonna see the option to go to the uh um Ocean Devil line calculator. So essentially, once you go into the line calculator, you're gonna be able to set a few parameters like the uh type of braid of hours, whether it's the jig in casting or the FCMP, and then you're gonna be able to choose the manufacturer of the rail, the model of the rail, what PE you're considering to put on your rail, and then you're gonna be able to see how much uh line you're gonna get on that rail, and also it's gonna give you a comparison to the top leading names that would be runner-ups to our brand, uh braid, and it's gonna tell you the capacity that you're gonna get uh in comparison to others. So, for an example, if we were looking at, let's say, the PE8 braid, and we're gonna try and spool a 18,000 Stella, because now this is great for you know top water tuna. Um, and then we're gonna go with Silk Ocean Braid, we're gonna put in those parameters and we're gonna get 400 meters of line. Whether if we go with competitors or a PE8, we're probably gonna be in the range of 320 to 300, depending on the manufacturer. So that's an extra 25% worth of line on your rail. This is, you know, if you're if you're targeting within these schools 100 pound right now, which is what's swimming around, uh, not talking about Cape Cod, but whatever swimming around the area. Uh so if you're targeting like fish that are 100 pounds right now and suddenly you come across a fish that's 200 pounds and you're not equipped with enough line, uh say goodbye to the fish. We've seen spooling occasions, you know, by abundance. Big fish take all the line, and you need that extra 25% to secure that fish. Um on top of that, if we're looking at the diameter comparison, so if we're delivering a P8 at 0.42 millimeters, and then we're looking at competitors that deliver P8 at 0.47 or 0.49, they're still at this 80 pound to 90 pound brake strength, where our 0.42 goes all the way up to 110 pounds, and this is in the standard cast rate. If we go to the FCMP with roughly about the same diameter, we're talking about 138 pounds at 0.42 millimeters. There is nothing like this on the market, there is nothing comparable to this diameter with the capacity that you'll get on a P8, which is equivalent to maybe some PE12s, even, uh, that you can get as much as you can get with SilicOcean. Um, so yeah, these these these developments have changed the game. And it's not only with tuna, you know, tuna tuna is gonna test you on the distance, and then it's like a marathon. But if we're looking even on the sprint game, which is more in the exotic locations around the world, sure. Papua New Guinea, Oman, uh Madagascar, you know, Panama, uh, Costa Rica, Panama, Socotra, you know, Yemen, all these places. I mean, if you go onto our Instagram and you can see what uh what our um uh network of you know people sharing their stuff. Collaborators, I mean, just just everyday customers purchased the braid and you know tested it against the elements. Uh we've see we see you know 120-pound GTs with uh the PE 10, and this is on the hardest of hardest kind of fishing. It's not like you know, when you're fishing at 3,000 feet of water, and you know, worst case the fish will go, we'll chase them down. No, if you don't put the brakes on these GTs, if you don't stop them from going down to the rack or the reef, that fish is gone. These guys, these fish are this these fish are sneaky, they're gonna go dive down, try to go around the reef and break you off. They know what's going on when you hook them up. The first thing is down, left, right, zigzag, break you off the reef. Now, if you don't have the stopping power, right. So we've seen the PE 10 stop giants, like you know, even 130 pound GTs, monsters that have been stopped on these uh on these braids. And uh people go, they they fish, and you know, overall the experience has been great.

SPEAKER_02

Now, in eight days from today, we have the largest uh uh tuna tournament going on here in the East Coast here in New York called the Montauk Canyon Challenge. Now, Chris Quary and his crew run an amazing tournament. Last year they had 84 boats, which I'd have to say like 90% of them are Vikings. I mean, these boats are they're badass. And the gear, these guys, every rod is a matching rod and reel setup. When they pull up to the dock to unload the fish, it's a spectacle. And the boats are incredible, the reels, the equipment. I can't wait to see. Because this year, Chris invited us to do all eight days there and be involved. And I can't wait to talk to the captains and really get dialed in on what gear, what line, all the stuff. This way, you know, your expertise coming to the table now and showing your product here to these guys. To me, that's the greatest thing because I want to see what they're using, what they're doing, and what's their opinion of something new that comes to a market that really can make a big difference, which is what you're doing, which is what I love. You know, I love it. That's what I love about Silk Ocean. I really do. I'm so happy Corey brought it to our our boat and our platform because it's definitely a game changer on our boat. I'll tell you that right now.

SPEAKER_01

Well, I'm very, very happy to hear that. Very happy to hear that. And uh, I look forward to seeing you know more and more uh uses, uh use cases of the of the of the um of the braids uh you know being uh applied in other uh outfits. You know, I like to see them. I I see our braids going you know all across the world, even for deep drop applications just because of the low diameter. So people are taking the PE 10 to fill up those electric rails, to go all the way down to you know 700, 800, 1,000 feet of water to catch swords, even big eye tuna all over the world. And I mean, the more uses that we see it and the more advantages that it gives people to give them closer to get this fish of the lifetime. I mean, this just gets all the exciting juices in us going uh going crazy.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, I showed you a picture yesterday of my nephew caught a sailfish. He went from fish told me that was his first fish. First saw, first saltwater fish was a sailfish. I mean, what do you do after that? It's like, come on. Now he's gotta go for Marlin, he's gotta go for big tuna. I was like, get thirsty after that. So yeah, that was fun.

SPEAKER_01

So uh a very big uh move that's happening now with uh with uh Ocean Devil is uh the continuous of production with some innovative uh items at affordable prices. Uh the objective is you know that we we see a lot of manufacturers from all over the world. Obviously, some go to uh to Asia and some some other regions in order to try and cheapen up the price, but then you see that the prices still maintain a high price bracket, but nevertheless, the items are cheaply made and uh it's just not worth the buck. On the other hand, we do have items that are handcrafted and they're coming from you know the Japanese market, and these are you know pristine work, but then the price ticket to have something of this quality is just out of reach for a lot of anglers, you know. Um, so where I like to say that Ocean Devil positions itself is that we took um that pristine quality of build, and we are um we we we are a thin operation, you know, and we don't have too much of the expenses that other bigger brands have. So it allows us to maybe not run off to get the highest margin, but more than the affordable margins. And we like to do a lot of production to customers, and we don't go a lot through the uh wholesale side. So we are comfortable with the margins that we're making that allows us to keep the head upflow and continue to develop and to offer the products that we manufacture at affordable rates. Because if we take like uh you know from the tuna game, so we we've uh six months ago we introduced the Diablo 7-4 Beast third generation. Uh, this is pretty much one of the most craziest rods we've ever made. Wow. Um this rod has uh um a 60-bound test at 90 degrees. So what we know now as the term uh stand-up tuna rod. Uh essentially, straight up like a pole, fish diving down under the boat, and the rod takes the heat. So this rod, uh uh we we brought about 150 rods on the last batch, those cleared out in about one month. Um nice. The reason for that is because we were offering that rod a $580, and the next rod up that can do something like that is a Japanese manufacturer for $1,300.

SPEAKER_02

Right.

SPEAKER_01

So whether you look at the charter captains or your weekend fishermen, you know, in the end of the day, you need to justify what you're buying. And uh, whether it's for your uh charter or whether it's for your weekend use, you want to have something reliable, but you don't want to pay such a heavy ticket for it. Um, and we're happy that we've been able to provide you know the Diablo Beast, and this one was a great success in the last season in OBX. We've seen approximately 15 to 20 fish over 100 inch. We saw three fish over 110 inch, uh, countless fish under between the 70 and 80 range. Uh monster fish caught on this rod. We got amazing footage. You can anybody's welcome to go to our website, check up on the footage and on the page to see these rods. And I'm happy to say that these rods are coming back to market uh in two weeks. Nice. Yeah, they've been sold out for like three months, and uh we couldn't get our hands on them quicker, and you know it takes time to manufacture these. Um, so these rods are gonna be back and available two weeks. We still have The pre-order option available, uh, which is gonna be closed in the next I think week or so, and there is unfortunately because what we know in the world uh events, um fuel prices have gone up substantially, production prices have gone up uh with that, and the shipping prices has gone up with that.

SPEAKER_03

Sure.

SPEAKER_01

So, unfortunately, we're gonna have to have a price spike on those rods. So, if anybody wants to get on the Diablo rods before they reach, this is the time to get them. Um and after that, prices once they're delivered, price is gonna go higher. Um, in the pipeline for Ocean Devil, uh, we got a new Diablo rod that's coming out. Actually, you know what? How about I show you this rod? Because this rod, I don't think anybody's ever seen it. Nice would you like to get it right?

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, break it out. Let's go. Let me let me get this rod. All right, guys. So I'm on with Daniel from Ocean Devil. Silk Ocean is the braid, Diablo's the rods. He's got a whole bunch of stuff you could check out at oceandevil.com. And he's in Dubai right now, so it's evening time there. It's 10 a.m. here on the East Coast. Uh, I decided to do this one in the studio because it is 95 degrees out there, and to get a good quality call with Daniel, I'd rather be in the studio uh to show you guys all this great stuff that he has to show and offer from Ocean Devil. And here he is with the new Diablo.

SPEAKER_01

So um the range of Diablo started off with three rods. It started uh, sorry, actually with four rods or even five, that already two of them were discontinued in order to be improved in a new in a later stage. Uh, in between the rods that we manufacture, we had the the max 60 gram, which was 7.4 at the time, and then we had the max 100 grams, which was uh sorry, the first 60 the 60 gram rod was 7.6, which was called the Diablo Shallow Spirit. Then we had the 100 gram, uh, which was 7.4, and this is right now what I don't choose. It's gonna be his replacement. So in that 100 gram range, there's not much use for a 7.4 rod. That's why we took it to an 8.4 rod, and then we changed entirely the configuration of the rod in order to bring it to something as uh already familiar term on uh from Japan, which is kind of called uh the RG guide system. So um this is the brand new um Ocean Devil Reef Reaper. Oh, maybe I can take off that effect.

SPEAKER_02

There we go. There it is, and we'll see the rod nice and clear.

SPEAKER_01

There we go. Alright, so this one is the brand new Reef Reaper. It comes with a full set of RV titanium guides. It's a very light rod. It's 8-4, and it has a 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 8, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11 guide system, which is um addressing um stick bait fishing and soft plastic fishing directly. The thing the the element that happens with uh these this sequence of guides is um the extract of line through the guides essentially creates a twirl that shoots the line in a very, very accurate manner and more efficient for energy to the compression that's happening through the guides, it clears out better distance. Now that is one uh element. So this guy this rod is essentially gonna be one of the ultimate casting rods in the world. I think that people are gonna be able to clear more distance with this rod, pretty much with any other rod to this caddy. So if you're looking at the guys working off the jetties, guys working, this is an 8-4 rod, yeah. So you can work off the jetties, you can work off the piers, you can work off the boat, anywhere you want to be with this rod, it's gonna give you the advantage. If you thought that you saw a school of fish that you couldn't reach before, it's gonna get you there. This is gonna get you there. Nice. So um, then there is the other element of how this rod loads up. We all know when um when um rods load up, we see that there's normally, you know, the curve, the triangles that start to appear when a rod loads up. When you have close distance RV guides such as these, and then there's so many of them, you're gonna be as close to the blank as possible, and you're not gonna have sharp breakage. So you're gonna load up as uh smoothly and evenly across the blank than you would have done with uh seven guides. Gotcha. Okay. What this does in return, it gives you way more lifting power balanced across the rod. Your rod is gonna curve way more as uh as a half moon than in in like segments. Right, and increments. And increments. Um so yeah, this is the handle of the rod. It's a two-piece rod. And we have also the Fuji rail seat, a very nice finish here with the gimbal with uh half core gimbal. Very nice detailing.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, it's a beautiful rod.

SPEAKER_01

And yeah. So this one's gonna be also available in this drop in two weeks.

SPEAKER_02

I think it's already available. Pre-order those at oceandevil.com.

SPEAKER_01

Uh yeah, yeah. They're there. Straight up to the website, and from the website, we go to uh the Diablo section and uh we can check it out over there.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, it's a great website, guys. I was over there yesterday, and uh you guys are probably saying to yourself, what the hell is Gage doing talking about all this tuna? Well, you know, Corey's been bit by the tuna bug for two years now. Last year he really got bit. And the reason I wasn't out there catching the tuna with Tori is because uh with Corey is I was busy as a commercial tow captain running a charter business, and it was very hard for me to find the time that when these guys decide there's weather to get out offshore, you got to be able to pick up and go and not have the next two days to worry about and schedule anything. And as a commercial tow captain, that wasn't the easiest thing in the world. So this year, what I did is I backed off my schedule of commercial tow captain so that I can now get out in July and get on the hot tuna bite here in New York. And uh it's just starting. And uh, we have some big news at San City that we will be breaking um as the season moves uh along here into season four for us for Bay Rats and Buoys, and as we grow uh the company San City Charter, because big things are happening. And uh I am very excited to say we are getting into the tuna bite. That's why we're on the phone here with Daniel in Dubai, showing you guys the best equipment that we can and that we've come across because we've been at the New York boat show. We've met some of the coolest brands and some of the coolest products that come across because people are at all these shows showing them off. We found people at the New Jersey Saltwater Expo at the New York Boat Show at the Javit Center. And Corey had met Daniel because of relationship building, and that's how it starts. I mean, you guys went out on a boat, you invited Corey out fishing, you know, you met him and you said you want to come out fishing the next day, and you guys went out with the book.

SPEAKER_01

That's what I was. Corey, Corey just needed a bit of line. He stopped by, he's like, Yeah, I don't know when I'm gonna fish, and I'm supposed to leave back to the U.S. And I'm like, come fish with me tomorrow. And Corey was he was like on the pier, I think 30 minutes in advance, just waiting there with his like either ice cooler, rods in hand, and whatever. He was just, let's go.

SPEAKER_02

Exactly, exactly. And uh yeah, he's hardcore about it. So there's no doubt that uh we're very excited about what's going on here. Now, you're coming to the states here in August sometime. So I said we're gonna try to hook up with Goose Hummock and Phil because you're gonna be up in Cape Cod.

SPEAKER_01

So the the for me, you know, uh I grew up in New York, a very big child uh in New York and in the States was a big part of my childhood. Uh, I've moved around all over the world. Now I'm situated in Dubai, but you know, my heart and soul is always in the U.S. And I'm uh looking to spend way more time. So right now, even our fulfillment is happening out of New Jersey. Right. So we've moved a really big chunk of the company to New Jersey, to the states. We want this to be, you know, I want people to be more familiarized with this as this is an American-owned brand. This brand is right uh coming home in a sense.

SPEAKER_02

Exactly. Yes. Bring it home, Daniel. Bring it home.

SPEAKER_01

Um, it's coming home, it's coming home. So um Ocean Devil wants to increase as much as presence in the U.S. I want to spend way more time in the U.S. Uh I've been, you know, there's great relationships with people from all over the world and uh across the U.S., whether it's from Florida, South Florida, Louisiana, all around New York, Jersey, Cape Cod, and then we got the people on the East Coast that uh down San Diego and such that people are fishing. Um sorry, the West Coast people are uh uh on the West Coast people are fishing down San Diego, and um uh they're using Silk Ocean for so many years. And I just want to you know get around and meet everybody and I want to fish with everybody, want to spend so much time on the water, get you know uh more personalized with and experiences with you know just so many people out there. Um particularly right now, we've seen a great, great, great increase in uh in uh in the support from fishermen around um uh the New York and New Jersey area, specifically from the last season. Um, and now that the products are also in the US uh physically, uh, it makes it so much easier to get that. You don't have to deal with customs, you don't need to deal with international shipping. So everything's all right. Right.

SPEAKER_02

You want it, you're gonna get it. It comes quickly. We ordered it. We ordered it and it came quickly right off the site. We we got it quickly.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, I mean, two days, I think it's which is what everybody wants these days.

SPEAKER_02

That's really what it is. People want a product, they want to get it in a couple of days, they don't want to wait weeks.

SPEAKER_01

It's like if you have a barbecue on Friday, you want you want your spatula ready before, you know.

SPEAKER_02

That that's right. Now, we're also happy to uh to let you know that we are introducing your product into stores into bait and tackle shops that you are not in right now, due to our relationships with the owners, that when we say, hey, we're using this product, you got to bring it to market, they're very happy to do that. They really are. So uh I mentioned it to an owner yesterday. That's awesome.

SPEAKER_01

And you know, I'm really looking forward to to putting this uh this in motion. Uh, we're already in a few shops in the area, which uh efficient uh customs, whether it's um the rail seat or it's um Bose Custom uh Rods out in Louisiana. There's a few you can go to our website to see the retailers that we work with. You can go over there and get your stuff spooled, and we're looking to get into more and more areas. You know, the U.S. is big, there's a big distance between a lot of shops, and there's a lot of places that we could be, and there's a lot of points that people take off in marinas to go on the water, and you want these products locally. You don't want to wait for them sometimes, even two days. You want to stop at the shop, get spooled, but and not only that, your rods.

SPEAKER_02

We'd love to get your rods into some of the places here like Montauk, because there's places here that people go in and they pick up tuna gear and they go out and they go fish and they can buy it right there on the spot. So we're gonna try to help you as much as we can.

SPEAKER_01

I'll be thrilled to have these rods in some tackle shops for people to come. You know, you don't have to buy them, but at least have come and have a feel for them, see how they bend, how they curve, how they feel at hand. I mean, if they don't convince you by the look and feel, once you get one of these rods on the water and you see what they do against the fish, I'll let the fishing do the talking.

SPEAKER_02

Well, Daniel, we're excited. We're actually gonna put your logo on our shirt when we get out to Montauk for the Montauk Canyon Challenge. So we know that people out in Montauk for this biggest tuna tournament that we have in New York, they have the Montauk Canyon Challenge, then they have the Hampton shootout. So we're gonna incorporate and collaborate with you and put your logo on everything that we do out there in Montauk so that people get to see this. I'll talk to all the captains. I'm gonna find out what they're using, and we're gonna see if we can get a few of these guys to bite and make the change and show us that they've made the change and give you a review on what they think about the product. And you that uh hands down goes further than any commercials or any advertising. The word of mouth is the best way.

SPEAKER_01

I mean, the end of the day, uh, we're we're very transparent. We have something that a lot of shops or brands don't do is that we put a third-party uh review um element on our website that we can't alter. So essentially, it's as genuine as can be. This is only from fishermen and experience while they're on the water. People go, we are using an app called Judge Me. Uh, it's a third-party review app. It's connected to our website. People come in, they fish, they get they use, they get usage of it, and they post. They post pictures, experiences, and we have five out of five ratings out of 60 or something reviews that everybody has used our lines. We can't, I mean, that's the only way for something to get traction to this level, and is by you know, proof is in the pudding.

SPEAKER_02

100%. Corey uses it, Corey catches fish with it. He hasn't broken off, he's landing them all, proves to us that the line was worthy of now using it on our charter business, uh, which is important.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, I'm more you know, right now in Jersey, we're working with Salt Silverback, we're working with a lot of other the big charters out there. We're working with Short Catch Fishing, we're working with in Bob Bob Hobie's been working. If anybody knows uh Louisiana Blue Water Sport Fishing, so Bob Hobie's pretty much one of the most exciting, uh you know, you can go fishing with a lot of people, right? But if someone brings adrenaline and you make the trip worthy, it's the captain. The captain's gonna put he's gonna get it's gonna be your hype man, the captain's gonna know your good your go-to guy, he's gonna be your experienced guy, he's gonna be your tackle guy. If a if a good captain does his job right, it's gonna amplify your experience on his boat. So, what I can say from knowing Bob Hovey and people who fished with Bob Hovey out of Louisiana, this guy, first of all, knows his fishing, second of all, he knows his boat. Third, he's one of the funnest guys to fish with.

SPEAKER_02

And you just the most important word, the funnest guy to fish with. And I'm gonna tell you, I'm not uh taking any credit here. On my boat, we have a ton of fun. Me and Corey absolutely have it, and people love to come fish with us, and you know why? Because they have so much fun when they do it. They even say at the end of the day, if we didn't catch any fish, we had an absolute blast. But the good news is they catch fish.

SPEAKER_01

You know, you know what I say. It's called it's it's called fishing, not catching. You know, you the you you can do everything right, and the bite's not on. Some some days we we can clear 200 miles out in Oman. When we fish out in Oman and we're chasing dolphins, so we're Oman fishing is very, very different than what you know. We're working with Intel, so we have satellite phones, right, and we're connected to all of these single engine. These this is wild, okay. In Oman, they have single engine uh commercial fishing boat for tuna with hand line, okay? Cool. They go between 100 to 200 miles a day to the middle of the ocean, like 70 miles out on a single engine, two, three guys, no bimini, no roof protection. They're covered up with rags or whatever for hand lining 200 uh pound yellow fins. These guys leave at 4 a.m. in order to clear that distance. We leave only at 8 and we meet at the same time. But with they have four hours, we do it in around one hour. Anyway, these guys go out early in the morning and they scatter around. They don't have any bird finders, no radars or anything. They're going by sight and smell. Listen, you can smell tuna. Tuna leaves a stink, yeah. So they're looking for uh dolphins all across um the uh Indian Ocean and between uh Oman and uh let's call it uh Sri Lanka, I would say is the next uh point. That's the that's the gap. And then they they go all around that area. So they go out at 4 a.m. and they start scouting. We come out at 8 a.m. and our captain, he's he he's so well uh connected, he takes out his sap phone, starts making phone calls to everybody on the water, all these local fishermen, and they tell them who spotted the tuna. So we would be rushing down with that intel to where the tuna is at and see these guys with the hand lines, and then suddenly we see like pods of dolphins. I don't know if you've ever fished with dolphins, but fishing with dolphins is one of the most unique experiences. So you'd see a pod of between 200 to 500 dolphins, okay? This is white water of back is of backs of dolphins just jumping. And the way that it works is that wherever the dolphins are heading, about 100 feet ahead of the pack of the dolphins, faster swimmers are the tuna. Okay. So if you see the dolphins heading in a direction and you manage to get to the top of the pack of dolphins, about a hundred feet further, that's where you want to position your lure because that's where all the tuna have been pushing the bait towards wow. And then what's gonna happen is that whether your popper is in that area, you're gonna see a frenzy come out of nowhere right in front of these pods of dolphins, and you're gonna chuck in your lure into that uh uh clear water right before the big, big pot of dolphins come, and that's where you're gonna get your stripe. Now, this is probably one of the most exciting running and gunning because you don't stop. It's not like you're running from frenzy to frenzy, you're you're you're you're chaperoning a 500 school of dolphin, yeah, uh, throughout the day.

SPEAKER_02

You know, that's incredible. Now we we have big pods of dolphin here where we me and Coryfish and we saw them blowing up on bluefish last year, and these eight, you know, these things are seven feet long, these dolphins are huge, and it was all moms and calves, and they were blowing up on fish. So we see them here. We just don't have the tuna 100 feet in front of them here where we fish in the sound. But yeah, so they are they're a spectacle to see for sure. And uh the fact that you get tuna on them is even more incredible. I know they look in Cape Cod, they look for the whales, and like you said, it's it it they can smell it. You know, when the whales are there, they know the tuna are not far behind because they're all feeding.

SPEAKER_01

No, no, you I I I I can I can testify. Tuna smell. The moment you come into a place where there's a lot of tuna, the water gets a bit more oily, okay, and and there's a stench of this oil in the air. Normally it's uh from from either they're you know, they're whether they're peeing or pooping or whatever in the water. And these are oils that come out. Normally, it's the poop and oil that come from the digested sardine. So when they're feeding on sardine, they stink up the water, which is um uh a whole different topic about talking about the flavor of tuna, uh depending on what to eat. So whether you're eating a squid fed tuna or you're eating a sardine fed tuna, you're gonna have two different types of meats. So this is a whole different conversation.

SPEAKER_02

That's where Matt from JMC Food, one of our sponsors, he was Matt was the grand prize sponsor for our uh striped bass tournament this past weekend. We had a two-day tournament. JMC Food is the grand prize sponsor. So uh the biggest fish this weekend measured to the fork was a 48-inch bass, and uh that was the grand prize winner. Matt had just sent me a truck because I said, Hey, you know, we got to get the grand prize money to the winners. And he said, I'm in the middle of doing, he said, No problem, swing by. And he goes, I'm in the middle of doing this. And he sends me a picture of a box truck loaded with dressed tuna. And so I said, Well, I wouldn't want to be the guy that has to fillet those things with a jigstore or however the hell you would do it, because there were so many of them. And he was like, No, we're looking to get rid of these whole, you know, but he would know what the meat, what they're eating, what the taste. I mean, he's like a guru when it comes to that stuff, and it's it's pretty incredible to hear both sides of that.

SPEAKER_01

This is also the big gap between farmed tuna and uh and uh and uh uh free range. Free range, right, right, right.

SPEAKER_02

Free range tuna. Yeah, they have a pretty big range too.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, so um if you go to the farm tuna, you're gonna see tunas that are being fed a lot of uh shrimp.

SPEAKER_03

Okay.

SPEAKER_01

They're being fed shrimp and sardine a mixture, and some tuna are getting more of uh whiter, uh orangey color uh due to eating krill or um a mixture of substances, you know, and they become sometimes even sweeter because of that.

SPEAKER_02

Right.

SPEAKER_01

So I'm assuming that the Louisiana tune is not gonna taste like the tune you out in the canyons eating different things in every region and whatever they fed on at the time is definitely gonna change whatever flavor coming out of this fish. Yes, there's also uh there's also a rare kind of uh swordfish that is an orange swordfish, which I'm pretty sure you're familiar with. It has an orange flesh, and this is because this uh swordfish only eats uh shrimp.

SPEAKER_02

Right, because people get swordfish steaks. Now, Corey caught a sword, uh, and I'm looking that's a nighttime thing out in the canyons. I'm looking to get onto a swordfish. I know somebody in my area that actually goes down. To Miami and runs a charter business for swordfish in December, which is what we're looking to do too with uh a different type of species. But he catches it on like a small steiger craft. He takes a steiger craft down like a 30 to 28-foot or a 30-foot stiger. He goes down to Florida, he goes, sits in Miami for a few months, and he takes people out sword fishing. And to me, that's crazy. You change it up from going on Long Island and you shoot down south and you do sword, and he specializes in that is really good at it. So it's kind of cool. Sword fish is a little, you know, it's different, you know, it's a different uh type of fishing.

SPEAKER_01

It's a different type of fishing, but it's uh it's still a very exciting one because this is you know still big game. Yes, uh it's deep drop, it's electric. So uh I would say that the biggest uh excitement out of sword fishing. I mean I know that the ocean is abundant with them, uh, but then you have like these jumbo sizes, yeah. Um, and you can get on to some pretty crazy size sword fish, and this changes everything, you know. They they they can give a really strong fight and they would fight all the way up to the top of the water. They're not gonna stop, like you know, if you got like a very nice, good-sized grouper, once you do 100 feet or or or 200 feet, that fish inflated with uh bow trauma, and he's floating all the way up, and it's like just a big heavy bag. Now, swordfish, they would give you the good fight all the way up. We've seen some really good um catches with uh uh the guys are using the Silic Ocean uh PE2, PE3, and they're going about 800 meters. What's 800 meters about 200 feet depth, uh 2000 feet, 2000 feet depth of water where they're dropping jigs of like two pound jigs all the way down there. It's crazy, yeah. And uh they're catching on slow pitch jigging uh these uh 100 pound, 200-pound swordfish uh on the jig, which is pretty pretty crazy.

SPEAKER_02

Corey hooked into a uh pretty big uh and they they call it a giant sword. They were saying it was close. It must have been now. Don't quote me on the weight, but I think uh off top of my head, I'd say like it was 180 or 170. It was close to 200. And he said when he got it up, the thing was barely hooked, that he couldn't believe that they actually landed it. And uh Corey hooked in at the night during the nighttime out in the canyons. He hooked into an ice, uh, an ice sword fish. Yeah, so I'm excited. I can't wait to get out there. The only tuna fishing I did was in Florida when I took my nieces and nephews out. Uh, I hooked into a black fin tuna, and at the time we were using goggleized bait. Uh, we had two lines out, kite fishing for sail fish, and we were dropping deeper for the uh black fin tuna. And I didn't realize at the time, you know, this thing, I'm hooked into this tuna, I'm fighting it. The mate's saying you're doing everything right with the rod, everything's fine, just keep doing what you're doing. And we made cool uh GoPro footage. We were having a ton, me and my nephews were having a ton uh nieces and nephews having a ton of fun. And when this thing came up, there we go, the captain and the and the mate were hooting and hollering that this thing is huge, that this is a big tuna. And I'm seeing like a 30-pound tuna, and I'm like, what are you talking about? That's that's I'm expecting like you know, something you know, crazy, you know, to be a tuna, like what you see on Wicked Tuna, like a 800-pound tuna. And I see this little 30-pound black, black fin tuna, and I was like, holy cow! So I didn't know the different sizes.

SPEAKER_01

Listen, you know, every time you change a position, you you understand that the uh uh the status quo of what's considered big changes from place to place, okay? Because even here in uh in Dubai, when we go out, there's uh an emirate called Fujira, which is again towards the Indian Ocean, and we can go for billfish over there, okay? Now we would go and we would catch long-tailed tuna, a 40-pound long-tail tuna, in order to rig it for Marlin.

SPEAKER_03

Okay.

SPEAKER_01

You know? That's the base. Wow. Wow. That's the bait.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah. That's my that's the bucket list. The bucket list is to catch a marlin and beat Michael Jordan in one of the tournaments. That's uh that's on my list of things to do. So I got a few more years to graduate to that. But Chris Squirry from the Monto Canyon Challenge was, you know, and this is something I found super interesting about the tuna fish and tuna fishing, is identifying the species. It is not always the easiest thing to do when it comes to the tuna. To the point where some he told me that one year they had to send a fish out for forensics to get an actual uh identification of which species of tuna this was. Well, that blows my mind.

SPEAKER_01

I'll tell you what, yellowfin tuna, yellowfin tuna is uh very distinctive. You have the the the the tentacles, and then you have the strip. I mean, yellowfin tuna is the elephant tuna, right? You can't really mess that one up. But what happens is that when you're looking at the bluefin species, they're going into like three or four species. You have the bluefin Atlantic, you have the big guy, you have um, I don't know, there's like two other species or something. Um, and these these do have, you know, first of all, they act very different, they swim in different waters. The big eye is a deep, it's it's it's a it's uh it's a deep drop fish. This is a fish that goes uh swims normally around uh I would say a thousand feet of water. That's that's the natural habitat you need to deep drop for a big eye tuna. Wow. But if you want to get a bluefin tuna, they're gonna be surface level, they're gonna be more pelagic. I mean, they're all pelagic, but this one's gonna be way more onto the surface level of the of the ocean. And then you have like the mix between the fish, and then you got like uh mixtures of by the way. I've seen a lot of inbred fish. You can see a skipjack mixed with a bonito. These are it looks very weird, right? Right. It's a different fish. You can you can see a elephant tuna that somehow made it into a school of uh blue fins and they made whatever kind of weird uh combination of tuna there. These things do happen, you know, it's nature, and we've seen things happen. So you can't be surprised, and I would definitely agree that you some some fish would be very confusing well between the species, you know.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, when I see them unload them on this boat, I mean you when you see this footage and you went to the website, so you saw what you know what was going on. They showed all the uh the fish getting unloaded, and it's just a spectacle to see the size of these fish that these guys are out catching. In that tournament, they have a 38-hour window that they have to pick to leave the dock, go out, fish, and come back within that 38-hour window for the tournament. The prize money they gave away last year was $1.1 million in prize money for the tournament.

SPEAKER_01

Does everything go on this? Uh I mean, you can catch in very whatever way you fit you see. You can troll for them, you can bait for them, or you can't.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, and there's different divisions. There's different divisions. So there's an outboard division, so they have different divisions for different boats, uh, which is pretty cool on the site. You can see the different how it varies. I didn't get too much into the details of it because I knew I wasn't entering the tournament, and that was last year. Things are changing, and I'm hoping to get more involved in the tournament um this year.

SPEAKER_01

Do you know how big the segment of the topwater is?

SPEAKER_02

I don't. I don't know how big I don't. I don't know the different variations of uh how they run the tournament.

SPEAKER_01

I would love to see how uh the topwater and I mean if you look between you know the west coast and the east coast fishing, this is like two different planets. I mean, the I'm way way more relatable to the east coast of fishing because these guys are doing a lot more with spinning rails, but then if you go to the west coast, they're gonna say, Oh, that's coffee grinders, right? And they don't support any of that. So for me, I mean I'm definitely more accustomed to the east coast kind of fishing, although uh the the more Japanese methods are started to drizzle down towards the west. Um, uh, but I would love to see you know a topwater uh a topwater competition that would kick off that would be mainly focused on topwater. Because this would definitely this is like for me, if you look at uh a team effort and in comparison, I mean it's it's always a team effort. You can't fish big game without collaboration with your team members, without your captain, the boat crew, and everything. But when it comes to landing giant fish, for me, the sport of it to do uh um uh uh uh I don't know what we'd say a 300-pound tuna solo, for me, this is like a life mission. I'm working towards my entire life to get to the point that I can land a 300-400-pound bluefin tuna single-handedly, rod and rail.

SPEAKER_02

And which which Stella Reel are you gonna put on there for that one? Which one do you need for that one?

SPEAKER_01

Uh that's a 30,000 Stella, and uh it's a PE14 line. Actually, we just developed a PE 14 line, which is gonna hit the market in a few days, and uh then it's uh a very specific rod. So we're also in order to achieve this, I designed a rod specifically for this, which uh we're gonna see it come to market probably around December. I'm happy to drop the name so people can follow, uh follow up on it. It's called it's gonna be the Diablo 7-1 redemption rod. Well, let's everybody everybody's coming to the redeem themselves after catching this fish, you know?

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, I love that. Well, you also brought up a good point here. So uh, and I'll mention this to Chris because they're like they are really dialed in on this. They're very good at what they do. Uh, they've been doing it for many years. Uh the tournament started out very small, that they took it over from somebody else. I think it started out with like 12 or 14 boats, and now they hit last year they hit 84. So when I talk to Chris about this, I am actually going to bring it up. But you know, this could be something that Ocean Devil, you know, starts here on the East Coast where we now have a top water tuna tournament, and uh, you know, we could make this happen. So it's broke here.

SPEAKER_01

Listen, just look at social media. Look at look at the traction, look how many people, how many charters are booked, whether it's Cape Cod, OBX, Jersey Shores, New York Shores, wherever people are fishing, we're talking about that. I would say more than a thousand boats that have been fishing topwater tuna on spinning gear the last uh the last the last season. And also something very interesting. Look at the ages. Okay, there's a younger crowd that has entered uh the big game space for top water. We're not you know, we're we're we're not talking about just like trolling and stuff like this with the family. We're talking about kids who are very fit, everybody's putting a lot of work into themselves in order to be able to catch these monster fish. People are taking this fishery as the sports side of it extremely, extremely um serious now. Yeah, and it's coming from from people aging, you know, all the way from uh 17 to the early 20s, that which is wasn't really the the case before. You would see people come into the sport mostly towards their 30s, right? And mostly after you're married, or this. But right now it's becoming way more popular for younger generations to come in. And I'm super excited about this. And obviously, we see social media is also responsible for a very big part of it, you know, the exposure, the excitement, and everything that comes along with it that people are intrigued to try. Um, so with that said, I think that we're only, I mean, there it's it's a very developed sport, but we are still at the beginning of uh what it can be as for a community now and how it can be whether competitive or what it can be um individually challenging, you know.

SPEAKER_02

Now talking about the ages, not to interrupt you, but talking about the ages, I want to stay on that age thing for a second because we had guys on the podcast, and they're gonna love this that I'm actually gonna plug them here. East End Anglers and Andrew and Ethan, great bunch of guys. They this is a young group of kids, and I'm calling them kids. Uh, they're not, they're, you know, but they're I don't know their exact age. But these guys are dialed in, and this is all they this is what they would aspire to do. Only fish for tuna and whatnot. I I know their dad has a bigger boat, they run a center console. Ethan's got a boat out of Jersey, they run out of Montauk and Shinnocock, and these kids are awesome at what they do. I love them. And uh, we've had them on the podcast. They've been to this studio where I'm sitting right now uh in the wintertime, and we recently collaborated with them. And we collaborate back and forth all the time. Now, when you're coming to the States, I will try to hook this up that maybe you can actually meet and maybe we could set it up where we could fish with the East End anglers so that you can get see what the East younger generation is doing here as you come back home to New York and we get you dialed in with Ocean Devil and see if we could turn them onto your product. You know what I mean? These are the this this is the generation that's gonna help make the change for something like that. But these kids are really awesome, they're great, and uh, they know I love them. I plug them all the time. I talk about the East End anglers, and I can't wait to fish with them.

SPEAKER_01

This is obvious when I'm coming to the States, I'm coming 100% to network, fish with people, get my rods in people's hands, get them to try it, see for themselves if it improves their fishing, if they if they if they like the designs, they like the uh the applications, and just you know, we're not pushing anything, anybody down their throat. Right. You want to fish it, fish it. The only thing the way you'll fish it is if you try it for yourself, and that's what we're trying to do.

SPEAKER_02

100%, which is why you're on the podcast here today. Now, Tuna Tom, I'm gonna mention two other people. Tuna Tom, he uh he was in my tournament last year. He was the first person, he won first fish, he was he caught the first fish in our tournament last year for the striped bass. I nicknamed him Tuna Tom. He's a local mechanic, is he owns a gas station in our area, has a small single engine boat. This guy runs out with gas cans, gets behind the dredgers, and he's out there catching tuna, which is hence why I nicknamed him tuna tom, with a single engine going out there and crushing it. He's so hardcore, and that is what I love about him. Now, a second person that everybody on the podcast knows, a good buddy of mine, just ran out, and I'm not gonna give you any locations, but he did just run out offshore on his single engine boat to go do topwater tuna, and he crushed it. And uh everybody knows Dave Flanagan from uh North Island Fly. I love Dave. I've known Dave for many, many years, uh, and he's one of the best fishermen in our area, but he got out and crushed it on topwater. And uh in our area, Daniel, he's like a local fly fishing charter. Very, very light tackle, everything's usually on the fly, and uh he's super dialed in. He knows, you know, he's really he's big on getting the alibies in our area, you know, the alibies and the banita and different uh pelagic species that come through. So it was cool to hear this week that they got out and did that. So that's what got me and Corey fired up. My boat is ready. I'm taking a single screw, I'm going the 30 or 40 miles out, and me and Corey are hooking into it to it on my boat.

SPEAKER_01

Oh, you guys are gonna get them. You guys are gonna get them good. I've seen them uh busting up uh on me on social media. People were catching a lot of fish from all areas. Um, but yeah, it sounds like uh it's gonna be a very exciting time to come to the States this August, and I'm very, very much looking forward to it to meeting everyone and to getting all this in motion. And um yeah, that's pretty much uh Daniel, Daniel.

SPEAKER_02

This was seriously, this was one of my favorite episodes because this really got you the stuff you talked about really got, you know. I'm out of my element as far as fishing for tuna. Okay, that's not something that I specialize in. It is something I'm getting into. I'm super excited. But what you bring to the table and what you explain to people here today, I hope they get to take a look at your website, check out your product, get as excited about it as Corey did, and we're excited for you to come to New York and get out and get fishing.

SPEAKER_01

A little, a little message. If anybody's listened to this podcast and he's considering to go and you know pick up a tuna set, and then he wants to challenge himself against like big tuna, and you know, back to that body that were you know, get standing in shape. I would suggest two things. Work your fingers, work strength on your fingers, and your lower back. These are the two things that are most likely to tap out before you know you're gonna be strong, you're gonna be deadlifting, your back is gonna be everything, you're gonna have really strong biceps, but you're gonna be very surprised once you're as as strong as you are, and then you try to grip a rod for more than five minutes. Oh my god, you don't understand how low of a grip power you have. So these are very strong things to take into consideration where you're about to go fish for really, really big fish. And uh then all the rest is uh between you and uh Mother Nature, and good luck, I guess.

SPEAKER_02

We had a professional baseball player on the boat, and uh he played here for the Long Island Ducks, he was second baseman. We hooked him into a 50-pound bass, and he was reeling in this 50-pound bass. And his story after this thing was landed and caught, when it came to the back of the boat, him and his dad and his brother were yelling, What the hell is that? They couldn't believe the size of this thing. And his story to to give you a synapses of what he said, he goes, My chest muscles were locking up, my back was tightening up, and this kid was a professional athlete. You know, he was you know, he was in great shape, and it doesn't matter who you are, if your muscles are not trained for fishing, you're gonna get your ass kicked. That fish is going to be a good thing.

SPEAKER_01

It's a different part of your body that hasn't been tested before. It's a whole different type of resilience and endurance test, it's completely different. Um, but um, you know, it's it what makes it more challenging. And that's why I love it. Because even as an individual angler, whether you have a team behind you, once it's you against the fish, you're gonna push your body to the limits. There, people don't give this uh enough uh emphasis into how much important it is to be in shape when you're going fishing for big game. And this is a very, very critical element of succeeding to land a big fish, especially if you want to do it solo. I mean, obviously, there's no shame in uh giving out the rod, but if you want to challenge yourself and this is something that you inspire to do individually, yeah, definitely gonna push your body to the to the limits of going against these fish and uh the right equipment. I mean, we've seen you know, throughout history, we've seen uh uh very, very, very good rods, rods that don't break, you know. Uh right. Let's let's even uh name a brand, you know, black hole. Black hole made really made really nice blanks. Yeah, um, but black hole with time, they kind of um they they gave the power that our blank would need, but then the question is is how does it load up? So uh if it even if it's a very sturdy and reliable rod, you wouldn't be able to fish that rod single-handedly because it would probably break your body. It's a very stiff, strong rod, but the question is how does it load up? Uh, I have great respect for those rods, they're pioneers in what they do. Uh, but uh I believe that you know each company does things a bit differently. And where we come in and we do things you know to try and outperform others is that we allow it to be an individual sport. We allow the rod to load up to a point that relieves that pressure from lower back, relieves that pressure from uh uh uh fatigue in segments of the body that people don't uh normally because you know, even developing the Diablo series, that was two years on the water with fish. Right, you know, right? You need to fish two years the same blank in order to understand what's the weaknesses and how it delivers power to your body. So taking these elements, uh and taking these factors into play, right? Uh this is very critical information to know when you're going on for the fish. You know? Yeah, it's bad enough you gotta put that you gotta put that strain on your body.

SPEAKER_02

You don't want your equipment to fail. It's bad enough your your body's getting your butt kicked. You don't want your equipment to get its butt kicked. So the fact that you put all this expertise into making the rod better so that it's better on the person as they're catching the fish, that's where the evolution of the products are going. It really is.

SPEAKER_01

People were looking at, you know, I heard a I heard a really good uh saying just the other day from uh Jamie Tria. I don't know if you know Jamie Tria. He's out in Gibraltar, he's a very advocate, tuna fisherman, and he was uh he was talking about how many of the rods are uh demonstrated in workshop environments where you see somebody taking a big keg, connecting a line to it, and then deadlifting it and showing it. Oh, look at the the rod curves. Okay, right. The rod has a coil when people work with carp uh with um carbon fiber, there is a coil in the rod, it works like a spring, okay? Some rods don't spring, they don't coil the same way as others. They it's like it's like a shock absorber. A lot of rods cannot absorb shock as much as others. So you would find that working with some rods, it's gonna deliver way more fatigue to you faster rather than a rod that can bend and can fatigue the fish without you needing to pump it. The rod has to lift and have this curve of coil in order to lift the fish's head instead of you needing to use your physical power to pull the fish every time. Right. You understand what I'm saying? So when you're sitting down on a fish for 45 minutes, or you can be on a fish sometimes for three hours. Yeah? If you want to be on a fish for three hours, the rod needs to work for you. The rod has to help you lift the fish's head. In the end of the day, the fish never stops swimming, it's gonna do those barrels, whether it's goes into the pinwheel, gonna yeah, it's gonna pinwheel. 300 feet below until it's going up. The reason it's pinwheeling is because it's trying to dive down. The only thing that you're essentially doing is lifting up the head. Lifting the head up. Supposing that you get a fish's head from this shape to this shape, he's gonna keep on swimming and he's swimming himself up. Okay?

SPEAKER_02

Right.

SPEAKER_01

Your objective is to lift the head. If your rod is not helping you lift the fish's head, you're done.

SPEAKER_02

You're done. I love it. This was epic, Daniel. I can't thank you enough uh for taking the time out to jump on bay rats and buoys.

SPEAKER_01

Thank you guys. Oh, and by the way, we forgot to mention something very important. Go ahead. And we should maybe put this uh in a few parts of this video so people get it maybe a bit early on.

SPEAKER_02

Yep.

SPEAKER_01

We're giving out 10% discount uh for all uh the listeners here onto the podcast on Ocean Devil. If you guys want to try out our braids, rods, or whatever tackle that you see on our website, manufactured by Ocean Devil, we welcome you with uh the discount code Bay Rats10. Yep. You go to Ocean Devil, you go to check out, you're gonna have your little uh uh discount code area right before you check out. You put Bay Rats 10, and you're gonna get 10% off on any order, any uh item in your basket in order to try out um our tackle.

SPEAKER_02

And we're grateful, and the listeners are grateful, and we appreciate you doing that. And uh we'll put that on the social media too, and I'll also put that into the beginning of the podcast so that people can hear and see. We'll put it on the screen and whatnot. So I'll promote it a little bit more than just here at the end, like we're just talking about it. So uh we'll put that code up and let everybody know about it. And we'll pump it out on social media. You know, we're we're building up the tuna crowd here and whatnot. So they got to understand that your line is not just for the tuna because we're using it on our charter business here on the North Shore of Long Island where we fish for everything.

SPEAKER_01

Yep, goes all the way up to PE 14. We're covering all ranges of fishing from your light game, ultralight, slow pitch, fast jig, top water casting. We have three types of lines and uh various uh options of rods and additional. We got some uh harnesses that we we have. We have the candy roll lure bag, which is one of the most uh sell products that we have. It's an amazing lure bag that washes down, and you can put over 40 poppers into it. Uh, and then it rolls up very nicely. I love those things on our website. Yep. Um, and we invite everybody to come and check it out. And uh on this note, I would like to say, Gage, thank you so much. Corey, thank you for putting all of us together. Gage, thank you for hosting me on this uh awesome platform. I hope it only grows and brings the community stronger together. And um, I look forward to August uh meeting everybody in person and getting uh to go fish out together. And uh yeah, thank you. Thank you for having me.

SPEAKER_02

Uh, you're super welcome. Everybody head over to oceandevil.com. That's the website to go. You saw the Bay Rats 10 is gonna be the code to type in there to get yourself a discount. Thanks to Daniel. We appreciate you coming on, guys. Episode 88, another one in the books. I'm in the studio. It's too hot to be outside on the boat right now. But Daniel, thanks. Thank you so much. We can't wait to fish with you when you come up here. We're gonna have some good stuff planned for you. And uh hopefully we'll get a Diablo out there and get it on a nice tuna. Uh, but thanks for joining us. Appreciate you so much, guys.

SPEAKER_01

Thank you very much.

SPEAKER_02

Take care. Captain Gage and Daniel, sign it off. Go ahead. Go ahead.

SPEAKER_01

All right, happy 4th of July. 250 years. That's a great native.

SPEAKER_02

That's it. I have a bucket on my boat that says 250 in red, white, and blue. I even put red and blue lights on in the studio here today for uh the uh 250 year celebration of Independence Day. Captain Gage and Daniel sign it off, guys. Over and out.

SPEAKER_00

Uh welcome to this episode of Big Rats and Blue East and Charter.com or follow CaptainGage.com or dot com dot com.