NWT Pro Cody Northrop

Cody brings some great awareness to us all and we discuss the upcoming NWT event on Lake Sakakawea.

What is Reel Talk Fishing | With No Limits?

I'm Brian Bashore, Professional walleye angler and owner of The Walleye Guys Guide service. I am here to reel you in with captivating stories, expert tips, and interviews with some of the biggest names in the fishing community. So, sit back, relax, and let the drag scream!

Brian Bashore (00:02.294)
Hey folks, thanks for tuning into another episode of Real Talk. Fishing with no limits. Today we're heading back to my favorite place once again, is Lake Sakakawea. We're going to talk to NWT Pro Cody Northrup. So we got a little PSA coming from Cody, some stuff that isn't on our radar guys that we need to really be considering and thinking about more. Obviously going to talk about Lake Sakakawea. Talk about just some things that are going on up there and tournament fishing and

All the great things in the walleye world. This upcoming NWT is the last NWT of the season up at Lake Sakaka. It is going to be a good one. The bite is heating up. Um, AOI race is tight, tight, tight. Uh, and a lot of guys are shooting to make that top 40. So stay tuned. Cody is going to provide us with some good insight and I can guarantee you're going to learn a couple of things guys. So you're going to need to be paying close attention to this one. Cody won the last.

NWT up at the Sakakwea back in 2020 -2019. We've only been up there twice. So, guys got a place right there on the water, spends a ton of time on it, knows that place. We're to break it down a little more and all this just building up to this big Lake Sakakwea tournament. everybody's looking forward to getting out there. It's great fishing. So, stay tuned. We got NWT Pro Cody Northrop coming up next.

Brian Bashore (00:02.791)
Hey folks, thanks for tuning into this episode of Real Talk Fishing with No Limits. We are back in North Dakota heading to my favorite body of water with NWT Pro Cody Northrup up on Lake Sakakaweeta. Sakakaweeta? Sakakaweea? Let's just jump right into this thing, buddy. How you doing and how you feeling most important?

Cody Northrop (00:22.537)
Hey, not bad. Thanks for having me on. I I'm just hanging out at the cabin up here in Kakuya and doing a little R &R for last week after I got back from Mayo and all that stuff going on.

Slowly getting better every

Brian Bashore (00:36.179)
Well, you you just hit on Mayo and you know, we all fish, we love fishing. We're here to talk fishing, but more importantly, you know, I asked Cody how he's feeling folks and I'll let him divulge whatever info he wants to. But a little public service announcement on what's going on there with Cody and what the guys really kind of overlook and don't think

Cody Northrop (00:56.747)
Yeah, you know, was kind of a kind of out of the blue situation here, but I if you follow any of my social media pages or Facebook pages, I've been putting some updates on there just more from a like you said, you know, more from a educational standpoint because this is such a new thing to me. But I I ended up getting diagnosed with a form of cancer that was caused by what's called the HPV virus.

it's human papilloma virus and I didn't know a damn thing about it, you know, until this all started. it was really a quick deal. I happened to notice that I started to get a lump in my neck, you know, up in this area. actually I noticed it on my way out to Lake Erie tournament and didn't feel right. And called my fiance, came and said, Hey, this thing's getting bigger. We need to do something. So she set up an appointment for me and fast forward two months through all the testing and stuff. And I ended up electing to go to Mayo and.

That's where they told me I a lymph node in my neck that was positive for cancer from the biopsy. And then they also threw out the tests that they do there. They put you through the whole gamut. And it turned out to be a form of cancer that's caused by the HPV virus, which the tumor itself was actually in my tonsil area. So come to find out this thing is way more common than when you would, you

expected to be and and obviously Mayo is a machine man. You're in good hands when you're in that place and and they have all kinds of experience with this. So they gave me the download and and long story short a couple weeks later I went through surgery and they removed that that tumor section from my throat and then they also basically frankenstein sliced me from here to here and removed 28 lymph nodes out of my neck and ended up being two of them being positive.

Brian Bashore (02:49.137)
Ugh.

Cody Northrop (02:53.322)
So they were 100 % sure they got the cancer out of my throat. And then because there was two lymph nodes that were positive, it takes you into a different statistical category. If there was only one lymph node, I'd have been done. I'd be done with this thing and moving on. But since there's two lymph nodes, they recommend that you go through two weeks of low radiation treatment with a couple shots of chemo. And it's all really low dosage stuff. I mean, you don't lose your hearing like that, but

Statistically, it takes you from a 13 % chance of reoccurrence down to like a 4 % chance of reoccurrence. And this is based on all these years of testing that they have there. So I elected to do the two weeks. I mean, it's another two weeks and I don't want to have to go through all this again if it would come back. So that's what I'm going to do and which unfortunately is going to take me out of Lake Sakaka. have tournament coming up, but like you said, more important things in life.

You know, I've been putting this out there publicly just because I, it's, you know, there's some education stuff here with this and, and you start diving into the details and then listen to the doctors down there. And this is very way more common than what you thought. And, know, unfortunately, in man, the HPV virus, can't test for it. That's unfortunate parts. You don't know if you have it, you know, and it's like the

Brian Bashore (04:13.99)
Well, we pretty much all have it just like I said shingles it lives and all those cancer stuff lives in all of us just a matter of matter of when it you know, it's if or when it acts right and HPV I've heard about it and you just think women it's a Down south type thing right they have and they all have it and Any of us that are active one bit which way to go guys, know, we're gonna come in contact with

Cody Northrop (04:21.384)
Yeah. 100 % done.

Brian Bashore (04:42.494)
Like I said, it's undetected because in men it's usually in the lymph nodes and up in the jaw area. And lymph nodes are not something we want to mess with. We don't want anything spreading to lymph nodes.

Cody Northrop (04:50.439)
No, no, no. so, but yeah, you know, there's, you know, I'm not one to sit here and push vaccines on anybody that's between you and your doctor and your family choices. But I would highly suggest that if you have kids that you go talk to your doctors and, and, you know, do some research, search on a thing because there are vaccines out there for both men and women. I think they can, they can actually give the vaccine up to 45 years old now and it's effective. That's what I'm, what I'm hearing.

So again, you know, it's just more educational. Everybody has to make their own choices with their family, what they want to do, but it's important.

Brian Bashore (05:26.837)
It's not super common. mean, I'd be assuming we all have to ask for that vaccine or it's probably not even one they bring up. I

Cody Northrop (05:32.57)
Yeah, no. don't know, know, maybe women a little more common, but the men's side of it's probably newer, what people don't understand. But I would not want anybody to have to go through this. And I'm one of the lucky ones, you know, we caught this early and got in front of it. And there's a very high success rate with the surgery. you know, unfortunately, so many people have lost loved ones to this damn cancer stuff. But, know, I'm counting my blessings because we got in front of this thing really early.

Brian Bashore (06:02.547)
Yeah, we are thankful and I'm glad you're, you know, we put this off folks just a little bit, wanted Cody to get his voice full on and he sounds like normal Cody with the, I got you here with this deep groggy voice. He did defective that way. He's good to go and he looked good and hey, you're hanging out at Takakue at the cabin and little R and R hopefully you're able to just get out and fish. I mean, you got enough energy and feel good enough to do

Cody Northrop (06:26.339)
You know, my brother was up here with his girls the other day and he took me out with my boat here and kind of fished around for half a day or whatever. And I maybe I probably did over did a little bit. I got tired that night and there's some side effects to the surgery with nerves and muscles and stuff like that. So, but I felt great to get out on the boat. can tell you that I've been sitting around for too long.

Brian Bashore (06:47.625)
Well, hey, if get you in the boat, keep you out of the casinos over there. So, Hey, you're going to miss the NWT tournament, I said, but who, you know, no big deal. Last time we were there, go to Cody wanted, you know, and it's Kakaway is an awesome fishery and I'm sure we'll be back. And it's just in North Dakota in general has got a handful of great fisheries and pretty sure we're going to be coming back to North Dakota soon enough. So you'll get a little revenge and redemption.

Cody Northrop (06:50.744)
Yeah, right, You know me too well.

Cody Northrop (07:15.788)
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I should be. This is like said, two weeks starting here next month, next week in Mayo and I should be done and behind me it sounds like you got about a week of kind of feel kind of down and out after after radiation. But after that you're back

Brian Bashore (07:17.151)
But like I said, all the lives ahead and you'll be ready, probably, hopefully, good to go for Big Ten tournament in October.

Cody Northrop (07:38.606)
know, the most important thing, really drove the schedule was my daughter's getting married in August. So obviously that was the schedule driver on when to do the chemo and radiation. So, yeah, I'll be ready for Big Ten for sure. Can't miss that

Brian Bashore (07:51.413)
Is this the second daughter to get married?

Cody Northrop (07:57.953)
Yeah, yeah is. Yeah, a couple, two years ago, yeah.

Brian Bashore (08:01.279)
Two years ago, he missed tournament for that, didn't you? He did. I tell you he's missing this upcoming tournament because his stepdaughter is getting married as well on a Thursday. So you guys have got to work this out a little better with these girls. Yours was fine to his end August. So, so all right.

Cody Northrop (08:03.658)
I did, I did.

Brian Bashore (08:21.021)
the things that only happen once hopefully right so we don't want to miss those events you know these fishing tournaments are fishing tournaments and they happen all the time and like I said we got other ones coming up so from the years we just we have crap years of fishing or we just have things that line up kids graduations weddings you know family emergencies health personal you know situations and that's all right there's always next year there's always next time that's the good thing about fishing is it's it's here to stay it's not going away

Cody Northrop (08:24.854)
Right,

Cody Northrop (08:31.251)
Yeah, that's right.

Brian Bashore (08:53.077)
So that was Lake Sakakawea setting up. The Leebubble was on just a couple weeks ago. Sound like the water temps are still just low 60s. I know it was 100 degrees down here the last couple of days. I'm sure it a little warm up there. We gotta be just like, we're gonna hit this thing I think when it's just on fire.

Cody Northrop (09:09.252)
Yeah, you know, it's been a slow year, you know. I noticed we were out the other day and the water temps here right in the Pouch Point area where I'm at had hit right under 70s, so they're warming up. You know, we were in the high 90s for a couple days, high 80s for a week. Definitely starting to warm the water

yeah, it's going to be interesting. The lake's been slow. Like, like, like Livo said, you know, it took a while to get off. I everybody had eyes on that aim national championship here. And in the first part of June, when, when Eric won that boat and they timed that out perfect, they couldn't hit that bite any better. You know, that's normal first to June bite up there and it tapered off from there. So, I think, I think you're right. It's good. You know,

It's different today, it's different tomorrow, right? But I'm almost kind of glad I'm not fishing this one to be honest, the way this thing's setting up a little bit here. But yeah, warmer weather is definitely gonna help. I see we're gonna be up in the 80s this next week too, so that should get things going. But August 1st, that's getting right in the dog days of summer, kicking it off. You just don't know what's gonna

Brian Bashore (10:03.129)
Right.

Brian Bashore (10:20.019)
mean, there's.

Brian Bashore (10:25.71)
Right. mean, we got baitfish spawning or happening down here. I'm seeing plethora of little baitfish in this system. I got mayflies we're dealing with. Their walleye bite has been tough, but I'm going to head back down to the lakes today. There have been some big fish floating on the surface of dead. I'm pretty sure they're getting hit by boats because they're up on the surface eating these mayflies. We've got gazillion, not a lot of them, Clark skiers, tubers, jet skiers, wakeboard boats.

Cody Northrop (10:49.055)
Yeah.

Brian Bashore (10:52.341)
Guys are like, I just lack oxygen. I'm like, no, the water is pretty clean now after the flood stuff. I'm like, these fish are getting hit by boats. I've seen, saw one while I porpoised on the surface, you know, a week ago. Big one too. There's been a couple, like 25 inches that have been seen floating around along with some dead carp and stuff. I'm like, nah, the fish are there. You just got to figure it out. I don't know when to the mayflies or do you have mayflies or what's the baitfish? Is that probably August 1st or end August when that stuff hatches up there, your water?

We were at 80 degrees down here, so I don't know if your water temp even hits

Cody Northrop (11:24.962)
Yeah. Yeah, I think, you know, that's where they really start focusing on the shmelt populations more than anything around that timeframe. wherever the shmelt are at, that's where they're going to be at the main body of fish anyway, that main biomass.

You know, other than other factors, the water has been on the rise for for a month now and it's up. In a month time, I'm going to say I haven't looked at the official numbers, but just looking at the shorelines out here, I bet the water is up 10 feet a month. So, you know, whether they're holding water. Yeah, you know, 180 mile long reservoir with 10 feet of extra water, that's a lot of surface. That's a lot of acres for fish to disperse. And I think that's another thing. You know, locals here are all complaining that the bite's been off, but I think that's, you know,

Brian Bashore (11:53.833)
So we got some new areas.

Brian Bashore (12:02.345)
That's... Yeah.

Cody Northrop (12:10.608)
there just scatters the fish out more. doesn't concentrate them as much as low water here.

Brian Bashore (12:15.429)
So that's a good point. We brought that up on the Mississippi River when we showed up there. were like, ah, the bite was awesome Tuesday. And now you guys showed up and a bite's tough and you're hearing that from the locals. The locals are going, they're just fishing what they normally fish. Right. But now you got high water and we know we're out hunting. We're looking and like, I've been there. So I'm not, I'm not fishing memories or the local spots. I mean, I'm checking them out. I'll see if there's 20 boats there and I need to catch them under. I'm going to go see what's going on.

Cody Northrop (12:27.75)
Yeah.

Brian Bashore (12:41.685)
But we're looking at all these new and odd spots and it never fails. Somebody always finds them, you know, cause we're looking and, I think that's probably like you said, if there's a bunch of new water and the locals are like, it's tough. They're not putting that time, not all of them, but some of them also you're just going out to their regular day -to -day spots, dropping their bottom, bounce your cranks or jigs and moving through and going, ah, it's just off. They're just not biting. It is one thing if you're graphing them they're not going, you know, but when they're just not there, you got 10 foot of new water. That usually means.

Cody Northrop (12:46.611)
yeah, absolutely.

Cody Northrop (13:08.081)
Yeah.

Brian Bashore (13:10.517)
Those fish are going to be spread out all over. Right now I'm catching them five foot of water and 25 foot of

Cody Northrop (13:16.399)
Yeah, yeah, you know, and water rises correctly. know what that means. It's sweet clover and grass and all this other stuff and, and which just means more. That's where the bait fish are going to go. So.

Brian Bashore (13:28.969)
Yep. Yep. I mean, smelt are typically moving deep, you know, in the summer, right? They need that little colder water, but that's not the only way you fish in that place.

Cody Northrop (13:36.569)
No, no, the white bass and the perch and car and drum and you name it, you know, it's all here.

Brian Bashore (13:43.539)
Yep, and Walleye is about the top of the food chain over there next to those monster northern pike you got. So wherever the bait is, they're going. And you got some big pike in that place.

Cody Northrop (13:50.843)
Yeah. Yeah, yeah, my brother latched on to one. He said it was all a 45 inches the other day. He couldn't get it to the boat, but he said it a big one.

Brian Bashore (13:59.669)
Remember I caught back to back, way back in a bay. Like I think we were pulling number five flicker shads that first time up there. I didn't even know where we were at, but four foot of water burning these things and kind of whipping in circles with 12 foot rods and braid. Had a little number five flicker shads and got a couple 40 plus inch pike on them. Like I can't believe we got these things in, you know, even they didn't break or

Cody Northrop (14:17.743)
Yeah, yeah, they're gonna make a mess of things, but they're fun to catch.

Brian Bashore (14:25.493)
Yeah, they are. took them 12 foot rods and literally had it back all the way, almost back to the motor. I'm like, no, that's, that's not a tree. That's a pipe got one in and then the hamps with me dropped it in and five minutes later, boom, another one. was like, Oh mercy. We'll just put the boat neutral this time. So yeah, that place is awesome.

Cody Northrop (14:41.475)
Well, I

Well, I think, you know, there's two things with this tournament that number one always on Lake Skakauia or any of the Missouri River Reservoirs is the weather. Number one, what's a wind going to do? What's it going to allow you to do? Um, you know, last two times that NWT has been here, we haven't had a big blow and guys have been able to make the run. You know, I ran 50 plus miles when I won it, you know, and, uh, that's always a factor, whether you can do that or not. then secondly, you know, what's forward facing someone are going to do to change the glance, keep up here.

because that's historically that East End lake is a little bit tougher bite and the guy is going to be able to unlock that end of the lake even if there is a big blow with forward -facing sonar to me that those are two things.

Brian Bashore (15:29.139)
You only need five of them and we know they're down there. I mean, there's big fish all over this place. There's definitely some big fish on the East end, but yeah, we never really had a forward facing sonar heavy tournament. mean, there's local tournaments there. There's the Dakota walleye classic the week before, which Randy and I are coming up a couple of days early to fish. have the casino cup. Yep. I Hey, why not? What better way to pre -fish get an extra couple of days of pre -fishing than to fish a tournament. So, you know, it's fun. know, Chris's his brother is going to do it. So we're going

Cody Northrop (15:45.731)
Well, that's right, you are, yeah.

Cody Northrop (15:53.304)
Heck yeah.

Brian Bashore (15:57.769)
partner up with those guys and you're in that's restricted to that. that I think beacon onto these end down to not even into Douglas. So pretty small, small section, which basically we're just going to hopefully get at the most one day of pre -fishing on it. and sometimes that's better, right? Just show up and go where you, where do think they're going to be? Drive around until you find a pod and if scope ends the deal that that's all I got to do is find them and I guess convince them to talk them into giving

Cody Northrop (16:07.309)
Yeah.

Cody Northrop (16:24.291)
Yeah.

Brian Bashore (16:27.701)
The aim tournament obviously was forward -facing so it was huge and those were big bags. When you won it, what was it for? Upper 40s? 45, 48 pounds on two days?

Cody Northrop (16:34.105)
I had 52 pounds I believe yeah, okay

Brian Bashore (16:37.749)
Oh, that's a 50. Okay. The first year was 40 something. When do we want it? Okay. So 52. Yeah. That's right. You had like a 28 pound bag or

Cody Northrop (16:46.265)
Yeah, I got into that pot of fish on day two and ended up with 28 pounds,

Brian Bashore (16:51.509)
Yep. I wasn't too far from you. just being your partner and I were fishing pretty close to each other. I think I had 20, 22.

Cody Northrop (16:58.925)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, and had a little bit of windy too, which is always what you want on this lake, but not too much, but enough.

Brian Bashore (17:04.821)
Yeah, I saved that spot for day two and I knew that wind was going to blow like that. But fortunately I was able to get out of there right at noon, right when it really started picking up. I'm like, all right, we're good. Let's go before it gets any worse. Cause it's like, like you said, a little over 50 miles, um, which theoretically nowadays is like, eh, whatever. It's not too bad. But if you got like four foot rollers, you're like, that 50 miles sucks. I would try to find something a little closer to home. I mean, we've seen guys doing an eerie with way worse winds and went way further.

Cody Northrop (17:29.624)
Okay.

Brian Bashore (17:34.099)
Day one at Green Bay with wins that we did not expect and guys going twice that far. think, you know, I changed the plan for a few guys, but still a few made that run and it takes a little bit of the fun out of it.

Cody Northrop (17:47.521)
Yeah. Yeah, I changed my plans. I chickened out. didn't make that 90 mile run on Green Bay on day one because of that reason. And plus I didn't want to beat myself up going into surgery in the two days, day two I made it. But yeah, yeah, definitely changes your plans. And then, know, very limited gas stops.

One, one gas stop, maybe two.

Brian Bashore (18:07.943)
Little Missouri still got one in

Cody Northrop (18:09.709)
Yeah, McKenzie Bay still has gas, yeah. And in inhales, that's it.

Brian Bashore (18:11.679)
So McKinsey Bay and Indian Hills.

That's it. Casino doesn't have gas. Of course you're going, that's 70 miles, 60, 65 miles prior to the casino.

Cody Northrop (18:23.481)
Yeah, that would be, yeah, 65, you know.

Brian Bashore (18:26.741)
mean, 90 miles to white earth, right? That's your next gas.

Cody Northrop (18:29.305)
Yeah, I think it's actually 100

Brian Bashore (18:31.775)
Yeah, it's a long, whatever it is, it's hell of a long ways. There's no reason to go that dang far. I there's fish and, I can't even think of all those bays. Douglas Bay, Snake Island, is that what that's

Cody Northrop (18:35.401)
Always.

Brian Bashore (18:50.719)
Hang on a second here. yep. And just said, code is recording, stop due to incoming call.

Cody Northrop (18:51.915)
Are you

Cody Northrop (18:57.548)
Yeah, had a phone call come in. about that. Yeah, Douglas B, you were saying.

Brian Bashore (19:04.617)
Yeah, that's the I mean, your governor's cap spent one there years and you know, and that's is that this weekend?

Cody Northrop (19:11.198)
It is this coming weekend and, you know, governor's cup has limited boundaries. So they, they, they go from the embankment and the dam over to, I think it's birth, birth old bay, which is halfway to the Bula probably Bula Bay. So it's not a very big area.

Brian Bashore (19:15.347)
has boundaries.

Brian Bashore (19:20.916)
Beacon.

Brian Bashore (19:27.935)
that's, okay, yeah, that's an eighth of the lake, basically, then,

Cody Northrop (19:32.204)
Yeah, it's not a very big area for 250 boats, but yeah, that's fine.

Brian Bashore (19:35.988)
Yeah, 2030, but that makes it easy. mean, in which a governor's cup, you know, kind of should be. want, obviously you want 250 boats, you want 200 of them to be local people coming out to support it. And you want, and you want to, know, if they got a 16, 18 foot tiller, you want them to be able to get in and have a chance. And if you open a light up, obviously you're going to get a bunch of other guys coming in. I see we got people flying into South Dakota's governor's cup this week. We have a boundary. It's a little bigger.

Saw a lot of the new names up there. think Owen just won the, Montana's governor's cup and, Joe and King were, were leading that day one. And you started to see a lot of new names on some of these local governor cup tournaments. And Hey, when you're trying to make a living fishing, you got to take the chase, the bigger checks. I think, you know, Scott Cahuilla is a bucket list for a lot of people, know, Fort Peck obviously is. that's, you know, you look at it and go, yeah, I think I kind of want to go there. I'm not a huge fan of the South Dakota's governor's cup, just cause.

Cody Northrop (20:16.362)
Okay.

Brian Bashore (20:30.101)
kill tournament, one over 20 type thing. Um, first round to go fish in the Nebraska's governor cup. And I think Montana went to a, uh, catch foot release format. So that's smart. Um, and that really makes it a whole, whole new game. South Dakota did that. That would be, that would be cool. Um, but there's a lot to be said for a weigh in, right? Scott is North Dakota kill tournaments too. can't remember.

Cody Northrop (20:53.9)
We have both so yeah, I think all the tournaments in Montana are catch record release I don't think they have any kill tournaments I may be wrong but from what I've understood it they're all catching release so North Dakota has a mixed bag obviously with aim here and then Van Hook classic tournament is is very similar to the Montana setup where they have way boats scattered and you can put three in it like

Brian Bashore (21:14.185)
That's right.

Cody Northrop (21:15.452)
put three in a live well and then you gotta go find a way you can get a measure and release and record it and which is kind of what Montana does to I think but somebody will correct me but if I'm wrong

Brian Bashore (21:24.693)
Yeah, that's what I think they used to do that. I think they went to the photo format this year. That's how they saw me on that could be wrong. Like I if we're wrong, put a comment in here below and let us know how they did it. but monster bags, 50, 60 pound bags out there with, mean, but it's Kakawaya is, uh, you know, they can do that too. Same with the WAHE. There is just a ton of monster fish being

Cody Northrop (21:29.797)
OK. OK.

Cody Northrop (21:49.352)
Yeah, yeah, I think, you know, between Oahe and Peck, man, you want to catch 30 inch fish. Those are two places to go. And right now anyway, but, Sakakawea, probably don't have the numbers of those big fish that those two reservoirs do. but yeah, you can, I heard a lot of 30 inch fish getting caught this summer so far up in our section of the lake anyway. Let's put it that way, but, cause that's where I spend all my time,

but I see a lot of pictures of 30 inches, a lot more than what I've seen in years past, so something's going on.

Brian Bashore (22:22.069)
Yeah, a lot of that's obviously our technology. are finding those, know, being able to target and find those fish more. think you've seen it everywhere. Tournament weights in general just haven't went up. So 52 pounds it was for you, you know, four years ago. And now 2020. So now is it going to take 55, 60 pounds? It was 80 pounds for the AIM tournament, but that's obviously a different format. And we only get five fish. So there's no playing. There's

Cody Northrop (22:35.303)
Yeah, 2020.

Brian Bashore (22:49.621)
Do I put this in the box or not? know when I'm up there and pass it was like a 22 -incher. There's no question about it. You know, I threw it in the box. You had one to play with, but a lot of that determines a practice, you know, what you're going. Hell, it may be tough and 18 -inchers may be like good enough. And everybody, some guys who are playing a little safer to stay in that top 40 in points.

Cody Northrop (23:11.273)
Yeah, this this lake is full of 18 23 inch fish right now, so There's gonna be a lot of those caught and yeah, are you gonna put it in the box or aren't you? know, that's that's a big with your five fish limit. So I'm pretty sure I'm going in the

Brian Bashore (23:25.781)
My plan is to not put it in the box. Yeah, I don't, I'm out of points and I'm not going to championship no matter what. So I'm not putting it in the box unless it's, it's a little bit bigger than that. So that's it. you don't do well, you don't do well, but it's Kakawea. I've had a pretty good run on that lake. Love it. Um, and it disfishes good all year. You know, like I said, 180 miles. It's the, there's plenty of fish from one end to the other, obviously sections of the lake.

Cody Northrop (23:47.45)
Yeah.

Brian Bashore (23:54.281)
perform better or show better at certain times of

Cody Northrop (23:57.256)
Yeah, the guys are gonna have fun. There's gonna be a lot of fish caught You know a lot of fish caught Even if the weather does turn a little bad it did still it's so full of fish and guys obviously coming to town are gonna unlock the secrets of this thing and and they're gonna Get through a lot of getting there gonna be a lot of fish caught and like I said, it's gonna come down to decisions

What are you going to put in the box? What are you here for? Are you here? There's going to be a lot of locals in this thing. So, you know, they're going to be going for the win. There's going to be, I don't know how many full -time guys are going to make it up here with the last tournament of year. You know, but how many guys are playing for points with it being the last tournament of the year that are, you know, trying to get in the championship. So a lot of, there's a lot of the mental game that goes with

Brian Bashore (24:46.035)
Are you hearing from a lot of locals? Are we looking at a lot of them jumping in? didn't expect numbers to be kind of low on this one. One tan being the high side.

Cody Northrop (24:55.235)
Yeah, I think I don't know how many full time guys are going to be coming, but I'm guessing you're going to get in that 20 to 30 local range. I'm just, know a lot of guys from my area that are going to be in it I don't, know, how many from the other parts of the state that are coming, I'm not sure,

Brian Bashore (25:12.117)
Yeah, you got Bismarck, Dickinson, Minot, doubles. We have, I think we're down to Gordon and Bala on the last one down to 70 something guys that have fished all four. Um, and we lost Ted and you're not going to fish this one. And like I said, there's a few others that are in that 50 to 60 to 70 points range. That may say, you know, I got to win this or get a top five to even have a chance to make it the championship. they, you know, if they live in Ohio.

Cody Northrop (25:14.581)
Why not?

Brian Bashore (25:42.37)
They're like, I'm good. Things aren't cheap right now.

Cody Northrop (25:44.16)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's it'll be fun. You know, like said, I'm sure wish I could fish it. It's gonna be a ton of fish caught and like the Sakaka wheel represent real well guys. They'll they'll they'll uncrack the code here and they'll get

Brian Bashore (26:02.279)
What do think what do you think far as bag weight and method? It's going to win this

Cody Northrop (26:10.242)
I don't think you can go against forward spacing so when our guys are too good at it, you know, and they're gonna catch I'm gonna take I'm gonna say 55 pounds, know, that's typically if you look at all the history of North Dakota tournaments, it's two day tournament it's Once in a while if their bite is right, you'll crack 60 pounds on that two -day year But I'm gonna say if you earn in that 25 to 27 pound range each day, you're probably gonna win

Brian Bashore (26:14.953)
agree.

Brian Bashore (26:21.269)
That's good.

Brian Bashore (26:38.101)
And that's, that's a big bag. That's five fish. mean, that's you have five, five pounders, but you're talking, you might crack a couple tans or some thirties, which those fish are fat. Those are healthy, very healthy fish. can smell it. I mean, their weights are considerably bigger than you may think. I remember catching 19 and a three quarter inch fish and they were like two point, just under three pounds. You know? Yeah. I'm like, no, throw that in the box. Keep that thing back when we, I think we can keep seven or something, you know, but after I could got.

Cody Northrop (26:46.965)
Yeah. All right.

Cody Northrop (26:51.678)
Yeah, they are a hundred percent.

Cody Northrop (26:59.36)
Yeah, they all look like footballs.

Brian Bashore (27:06.933)
Maybe it was eight we kept and they got two or three of those. And then there was like a 27, then a 25, then it's like, no more of those. No more 22 or bigger, you know, and that was all right. Next one. Last one was like a 23. I'm like, all right, go shoot a weight. It was a skinny 23 and a 19 three quarter might've been bigger, but you know that it, uh, that that comes into play. Like I said, it's, it's bettel and it's what do you keep? Um, and you've seen a lot more of that guys are weighing other fish. I weigh a lot of my practice in certain areas are going to weigh more than others.

Cody Northrop (27:15.838)
Yeah.

Cody Northrop (27:20.672)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know the pictures I've seen on the fish we've got there.

Brian Bashore (27:35.837)
Especially if you've got a pod that's and gorging on a smell pod versus ones that are eating some shad or something else, small perch, because it'll smell just fatty.

Cody Northrop (27:50.208)
the population is very healthy, which is normal here. And there's a bait out there, you can see it. You'll go through a mile, a pod long, a smelt on the screen. And out here, it's just crazy how much smelt is in the system yet.

Brian Bashore (28:03.829)
That makes it tough, when they got plenty to eat.

Cody Northrop (28:06.587)
Again, again,

Brian Bashore (28:09.013)
Crick chubs are always a big deal up there.

jigging wraps, all the glide baits work good. I mean, obviously different times of year, but I pretty much don't go to North Dakota without a few quick rigging up some quick chuff rods and some jigging wrap rods. Or the number two laying on the front of that boat ready to go.

Cody Northrop (28:24.229)
Buh

Cody Northrop (28:27.784)
You know, one of the knots of forward -facing sonar is the co -wing there in the back of the boat kind of just sits back there and does really well. Guess what? Not in this tournament. He's going to be busy, you know, with what you just said with the crick -chub stuff. But hey, if it catches you have one or two wave fish, great. You know, it's what they're supposed to

Brian Bashore (28:44.341)
You know what I love and Leo says he's been having to feed him some line on some of his when he's been out targeting bigger ones but my experience is kakua outside of October in the summer with the crick chub bite is there's no oh I gotta feed it lying in Minnesota and I gotta wait 90 seconds at the hook it's grab it and go because that thing is swallowed the whole chub no matter how big I mean just wham small mouth pike a walleye there just immediately it's gone.

Cody Northrop (29:06.236)
Yeah.

Yeah, when we were out the other day, my brother and his two girls were dragging crick trubs behind the boat and they were catching 16 inches on six inch long trubs with those things. yeah, you're hard for saying it right.

Brian Bashore (29:22.571)
man, it is fun. Have a lot of hooks because you're just going to be cutting a lot of line leaving those hooks because most of them I remember just looking at it going, yeah, I'm not going to try to kill that fish, just cut it and tie a new one on. So I always make my leaders a little extra long. So I have to keep retie a leader and I can just keep making it a little bit shorter. And just that reminds me, let me make a note, stop at chills today, pick up more hooks. Cause I leave the day and I don't even get back until.

Cody Northrop (29:30.419)
Yeah.

Yep.

Cody Northrop (29:37.07)
Yeah.

Cody Northrop (29:43.511)
Yeah.

Brian Bashore (29:52.031)
camp are all week guiding. so tournaments up. yeah. It's July was setting up like, and I talked to Leeville about something like, have very many trips on the book. then within the last week, full full months full full every day. and in August, started to fill up too, even though the bites been a little tough, like said, we got Mayflies and that can change just like that. That thing's over. It kind of lasts for a few months up here really, but it, you know, it's like fairly heavy right now. Once it kind of tapers down into a few spots that it's, it's not so bad.

Cody Northrop (29:53.672)
Amen.

Brian Bashore (30:24.713)
Mataukanskakwea tournaments on the different ends of the lake. Big 10. So that's one of my favorite tournaments. Yours. First weekend in October. Jeff runs a hell of a show up there. Hopefully we get it full. 100 boat max I believe, right? So I think we had that the first year and then we had COVID and then the last couple years was 60 and then back up to 80 last year when they took the river out of play. So basically have

Cody Northrop (30:39.821)
Yeah. Yep, yep, yep.

Brian Bashore (30:51.701)
So this is out of Wheeler's Center, Lousacar State Park for those that don't know. I don't know, we can go five miles upriver from there maybe is kind of the boundary. All right, and it sounds like your water's good. Now obviously that can change by then. But then Newtown Bridge is the boundary. So what is that, 40 miles? It's plenty, it's certainly plenty because most guys only practice for a day or two on it.

Cody Northrop (30:58.278)
Yeah, if the water really, if the water allows you, it's high enough.

Cody Northrop (31:08.921)
I think so. Yeah, I think so. Yeah.

Cody Northrop (31:15.47)
Yeah. Yeah, we got to, we got to put a plug in for that tournament. We got to get some more people signed up and fill that thing up. It's, is, it's so much fun, know, when that, that, like you said, Jeff Clark, he runs a couple of different tournaments out of that Williston area, one in the spring and then this big 10 in the fall. It's 30 grand to win it. I mean, you know,

Brian Bashore (31:33.333)
Yeah. Yeah. If we can fill it up with a hundred boats, a sturdy grant, a thousand dollar entry, a team format. if you know, 500 bucks for you and a buddy to day or, um, Friday, Saturday used to be Saturday, Sunday, moved to Friday, Saturday, I believe. Right. And, and it's great bunch of dudes. Um, obviously, you know, we stay with George up there. He's awesome. Awesome. Hoes fish the tournament. Just, it's just fun. It's great. Great people cranking, jigging. I've got them. Shiver meadow and jigging, rapping, crick chubs.

Cody Northrop (31:45.977)
Yeah, I think so.

Cody Northrop (31:50.779)
Yeah.

Brian Bashore (32:02.389)
control and jigging minnow. I mean, it's everything is in play jigging plastics. I mean, not a lot of Lunkers. You're not catching these. There's usually only a few big, big fish caught, but you know, it's that if you can get correct at 12 to 15 pounds a day, you can win

Cody Northrop (32:20.571)
It's just the natural migration, the fishery, you that's why that is. But how many fish were you catching in a day? know, 40 if you fish a day, you know, it's so much fun. the people up there in that end are so, of course, we call it North Dakota nice. But, know, those guys are so appreciative that we're in the area and they just welcoming with open arms. And yeah, it's great. The state park is a great facility there, you know, with the ramp and the amenities they have there.

Brian Bashore (32:26.697)
Yeah,

Brian Bashore (32:48.619)
He gets a ton of volunteers to help and makes that thing

Cody Northrop (32:50.489)
Lots of volunteers from the Williston area come in, fire department guys, local guys.

Brian Bashore (32:53.427)
Yep. Yeah, they fire department, I believe, hosts the dinner, help cooks it anyway and puts it on.

Cody Northrop (33:00.463)
Yeah, it's true community, you know, the whole community pitches in. So there, I don't know that I've ever seen a tournament that's so appreciative of the anglers to be honest with you.

Brian Bashore (33:05.129)
Yeah, that's it.

Brian Bashore (33:09.717)
Yeah, it is. It's, that's why I say it's one of my favorite, no matter how, mean, it's one of my favorites, but I've decent in it almost every year, except last year, but it's, it's really just, it's the people. It's such a good time. I keep coming like a day earlier and earlier every time. go like, just want to come fishing up there. You know, it's so good. And it's October. So I mean, I'm going to go up there and there was snow one year. Then one year we had 60, 70 degrees flat calm, most beautiful fall days ever for two days in a row. And then since then we've had wind and whatever, but you know,

Cody Northrop (33:39.012)
What it

Brian Bashore (33:39.305)
North Dakota, it's first week of October, just be prepared for anything. know, I mean, it's everybody, Jeff pretty much sends us and, know, it hasn't been so bad. can't go. It's just like, I got to slow down a little bit and you know, it can change obviously too. It could be calm when you take off and, it can turn and it's not like you just are fortunate enough to get a, you know, the wind that's on one side or the other. It's always tends to be running up or down the river, which, just builds it up and makes it worse, fires fish up.

Cody Northrop (33:53.044)
Yeah.

Cody Northrop (34:08.915)
Yeah Yeah, then you know that's the end of the year too so as far as door prizes people are giving away stuff because they don't want to you know last year I had this bro sent me a bunch of shirts I got everybody shirts Afco kicked in a whole bunch of gift cards that they sent up as the 15 gift cards Denali sent a bunch of rods up You know

Brian Bashore (34:15.507)
Yeah. yeah.

Cody Northrop (34:27.747)
all the other sponsors that were there giving away stuff. everybody walks out with something too, you know, at the rules meeting and with the prizes.

Brian Bashore (34:33.065)
Yeah, there was nobody went empty handed. I wanted to get a Norco portable charger and I did. thanks to, to well pro guys for donating those. like damn near everybody walked out. There was some kind of door prize and it's a steak and potato dinner. The rules meeting and a lot of those oil companies up there are jumping in and supporting this tournament. It's just, it's just fun. Like I said, it's great North Dakota. Nice. It's great people. And Jeff just, you

You get a lot of volunteers, Jim Carroll's emceed it for a few years. He's jumped in and started fishing it last year. I don't know he's going to fish it again. you know, that, you know, that just makes it that much better when you have a guy that, that gets it and knows the anglers and, you know, and ask the right questions. Cause you get a pretty good little turnout on the spectators that are watching it too, even though it's like it's raining half time we get done, but they're still hanging out.

Cody Northrop (35:17.181)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's a crowd. Yeah, you know, think Corey and Jim stayed with us in the house last year. think Corey Heisman, I think they're both fishing again this year, they told me so.

Brian Bashore (35:30.165)
Good. All right. Well, check it out. Go to their Facebook page. Big Lewis and Clark, Big 10 Showdown. That's Williston, North Dakota. Lewis and Clark is the state campground, not Lewis and Clark Lake where I got down here in Yankee South, could have been Lewis and Clark State Park out of Williston, North Dakota. But Big 10 Showdown has got a Facebook page. There's links to the registration on there. A thousand bucks team. Fill out a hundred boats at the $30 ,000 payout. Big 10, top 10. Get paid. That's it. And you got

Big fish and day money. mean, so it's, it could be well over 30 ,000. mean, you could be closer to 40

Cody Northrop (36:02.219)
Mm -hmm. That's right.

Right. Yeah, absolutely. I forgot about that part.

Brian Bashore (36:10.677)
Yeah, I mean, remember that was first time I ever got into the day money thing. I'm like, oh, and now they started doing that sear shorts. I'm like, yeah, we're getting in that. I'm like, because you can kind of get a little bonus or maybe you'd have a really good day and you get a day money the next day you suck and you don't, you know, whatever it can, it can bounce you out. I'm like, it's just bonus. You know, I don't think we even paid more into it or it wasn't, it wasn't much more. Big fish pot was probably like 50 bucks or something a day. Money was maybe 20 or something.

Cody Northrop (36:28.4)
Yes.

Cody Northrop (36:32.655)
No. Yeah.

Brian Bashore (36:38.547)
Yeah, awesome, awesome, just a good dude and they run one hell of a show. You got a sponsor and a boat wrap. know Scott's kid always talks about it. his kids. Cody's his favorite because he loves his boat wrap. So he looked it up and wanted to know all about it. Tell us, out there, listen about the Little Buddy Foundation.

Cody Northrop (37:00.091)
Yeah. So it, uh, it's a 501 nonprofit. Uh, one of my, one of my best friends, Greg Pruitt started this thing. And if you go on the, they have a a webpage and a Facebook page, you can go on either one and kind of look at the history there. But really it was kind of a Greg's way of giving back. He's been a, he's been a head basketball coach for many, many years. And, and if you follow South Dakota sports or national sports, um, you know, he, he,

He was his way of tributing coach Don Meyer. used to be the coach at national there in South Dakota at college. And he was at one point in time, Don Meyer was the, he was the winningest coach in NCAA until coach K took it away from him. anyway, but coach Meyer's deal was, you leave every day, you know, do something for somebody else. Or how does he put it?

A day that you don't do something for somebody else's waste of day, know, and that was kind of, he was kind of coach Pruitt's mentor. So when he passed away, he actually had a prosthetic leg and he called it his little buddy. And so after he passed away, coach Pruitt, you know, decided to start this foundation and that's what they do. They, they gift children in need of prosthetics and they have a spider web of.

You know, they're plugged into different providers and hospitals, insurance companies and all this new technology out there. And it's a national foundation. you know, it's a big thing is people don't want people to think it's just relative to North Dakota. It's not, this is a national program and there's a very short little acceptance thing they have to go through. They just basically send in a piece of paper and it gets them in the system. And it's just, that's not a matter of if they're going to get help, it's when, you know, and what they need.

They do a lot of different things. They can help with funding where insurance won't cover it for the families. They can actually get them plugged in with the doctors. They can get them plugged in with the right technology. And they gift these kids with prosthetics. And it's from, you know, we've helped from little infants all the way up into high school kids that are full -blown sports scholarship type of kids, you know, or just kids in general. So I

Cody Northrop (39:20.591)
I'd have to ask Greg, no, I lost track of the summer because I think they got three more kids in the program this summer. They might be up to 15 or 17 kids now in the last four or five years that they've helped. And yeah, and they're, like I said, they're plugged in the technology all over the world, you know, and it's pretty awesome what they do. And when you see these kids, you know, they're one of the girls actually from the, the Grenora area up there a couple of years ago, she was, she lost a family members in a car wreck and an arm and, and she,

Brian Bashore (39:31.061)
T 'la.

Cody Northrop (39:50.85)
They gave her a prosthetic arm and she ended up, think, going on to play for the National USA Olympics, you know, handicap team or whatever they call that, and volleyball. So with her arm, you know, just so, but two year olds all the way up, we've helped them all. So that's why I put it on there. It's just my way of giving back to, know, fishing has been so good to me all the years in the fishing community. And, you know, you look at ways you can give back and that's, that's really why I put it on my boat is to help spread that word.

Brian Bashore (40:20.295)
Yeah, it's that's a hell of an organization and prosthetics aren't cheap. No, and it's come a long ways. Like I said, the technology now is, mean, there's people out there fishing and don't have arms and legs because, you know, due to prosthetics and technical advances and yeah, that is super cool. I got that quote right here. You can't live a perfect day without doing something for someone who will never be able to repay you.

Cody Northrop (40:24.94)
No, no. Yeah.

Cody Northrop (40:46.219)
Yeah, yep. Right, yep. So yeah, we can, you know, if you have, if anybody knows anybody that's in need of help, just reach out to us. They can reach out to me. You can go right straight to the Little Buddy Foundation webpage, their Facebook page, you know, and there's many ways just get ahold of one of us and we'll get you in touch with the right people.

Brian Bashore (40:51.381)
That is pretty

Brian Bashore (41:04.999)
I will put a link below and here's a little buddy foundation .org. we'll put that on, on, I just said it here. So if you're listening, little buddy foundation .org, check it out. donate. Obviously everything is, is appreciated and needed and goes a long ways. And thanks to Cody for spreading the word on that and grab that boats traveling all over the country. I guarantee you when you drive down the highway, people are like, what the hell is that? there comes their phone and they're good. And you know, it brings in a few dollars. So.

Cody Northrop (41:08.)
look.

Cody Northrop (41:29.312)
Yeah.

First comment I get is, that's an awesome rap. Second comment I get is, what is Little Buddy Foundation?

Brian Bashore (41:34.217)
That is awesome.

Brian Bashore (41:38.773)
What is Little Buddy Foundation? You're like, well, let me tell you, look it up. No, and that's, know, know, 10 people looking up, maybe one donates. That's one more than, you know, there was before. So, uh, these things work that mobile marketing advertising is a great way to get the word out, folks. So if you're looking to, to jump on board with some of that, there's plenty of pros out there like myself and Cody that will certainly help you spread the word. And nonetheless, littlebuddyfoundation .org head over there

Cody Northrop (41:44.48)
the movie.

Cody Northrop (41:50.046)
Absolutely.

Brian Bashore (42:08.617)
help someone, you know, get mobile again and get out there. And it's amazing the Olympic stuff they have for these people. just, mean, they're, they're competing. There's, there's some people like in the running track right now that are just flat out hauling ass and beat the crap out of us with two maybe good legs we have, but we can't keep up with them.

Cody Northrop (42:11.7)
Yeah.

Cody Northrop (42:24.139)
Oh yeah, 100%. I know, I know, I know. Yeah, you know, the type of prosthetics they have now that are made special for things like that, you know, it's like, it's not very far from bionic people, you

Brian Bashore (42:39.413)
Yeah, I was going to say it's my people might start losing limbs on purpose just to get the advancement. It's going to be like a forward facing sonar prosthetics. You'd like, no, no, you can't. That's cheating. But I don't think it's going to go that far by all means. But yeah.

Cody Northrop (42:49.088)
Yeah.

There's one other thing too, Brian, I think they have a scholarship now with Little Buddy Foundation for kids going into college if they do have prosthetics or they have prosthetic arm that they can apply for too. So I almost forgot about that. don't want to forget about that. will remind me.

Brian Bashore (43:11.657)
Nope, that's important because opportunities, I got a son going into second year of college and he gets a fair amount of scholarships, but looking around and trying to find all those other ones that not everybody's applying for, little things that you do qualify for. I know I got one because I was going into fisheries and, you know, and it was only so many counties were offered this if the individual was going into natural resources type things. I was going into fisheries. So got the Bass Club scholarship. Probably the only guy in the whole.

or four county area that was good to apply for, but hey, 500 bucks, 1500 bucks, a few thousand dollars here and there. My son got some, or stepson got some of those. You know, I put them in for CB scholarships, being that I'm a veteran in a CB. So it's got a special, you know, for children of CBs has their own scholarship funds. And that's just, you know, kind of like it. So they're trying to help you out where you can. Cause obviously you've, you know, you've lost things that have made life a little more challenging.

Cody Northrop (43:48.489)
Here.

Brian Bashore (44:10.143)
College isn't cheap, man. Not at all.

Cody Northrop (44:12.474)
No, Yes, another opportunity for those kids.

Brian Bashore (44:16.949)
Yep. It's not getting any cheaper by all means. So little buddy foundation .org check it out. Big 10 showdown Lewis and Clark. Check it out. We got NWT, Lake Skakowia coming up here in just literally a week and a half. So two weeks, right? August 1st, August 2nd. We're already in middle of July. So I think I'm leaving next Wednesday to go to Wallet Classic, NWT and then the Casino Cup tournament is that following Saturday. I

Cody Northrop (44:35.816)
Yeah.

Brian Bashore (44:46.229)
The place is getting, I think, Leeville touched on that and then there's like the next 10 days there's like four more tournaments on it.

Cody Northrop (44:52.777)
the

Brian Bashore (45:00.509)
Right.

Brian Bashore (45:04.977)
we'll go there. There's no limits on her, Cody. We're going there. You brought it up.

Cody Northrop (45:11.589)
Yeah, but anyway, yeah, so yeah, there's a lot of tournaments on the water, but again, it's a big reservoir. These fish are used to it. It's not gonna impact the fish.

Brian Bashore (45:17.8)
It's healthy.

Brian Bashore (45:23.349)
No, it's a healthy, same with Lake Hawaii. There's a Whitlock tournament this week. I've got the governor's cup coming up. think there's 200 teams in that. Um, but you know, like you just mentioned, we were on such a fishing tournaments were on such a hold outside of the kind of the local stuff in North Dakota for the last few years. Gates are open. I know everybody's been, been held back and wanting to come up there. But like I said, with the new formats that people are, we do it on league night here on the lake. We're doing the catch photo release thing.

Cody Northrop (45:49.991)
Okay.

Brian Bashore (45:53.077)
Obviously I don't want to take any fish out of my guided fishery. So, uh, but the guys are like, yeah, this is great. You know, especially if your partner doesn't show up and you only got one guy, well, you, your limits for fish, you know, but you need a five fish bag. Well, if you're just catch foot and release, no biggie. then obviously it doesn't matter what you can't, you don't have to worry about keeping the right fish. You just snap that photo on the board, trophy shot, throw it back at it. Literally takes 20 seconds, you know, at the most. And then you're off and running.

I had a little selfie cam walked in to a grip on my boat so the partner does show up like, you don't even have to stop fishing, I got it. Boom, boom, toss that fish back. So it's not, you know, it's hot out, don't fish in the live well all day. This is good, it's good for it and still the conservation, some of those fish need taken out of those places once in a while too, so.

Cody Northrop (46:45.561)
Yeah, you know, and I fished aim for a number of years. I was kind of wanting to launch and things to get me up to where I'm at today, but I love the format, you know, and I don't know why North Dakota aim struggles to get its feet underneath it. I always has. I don't know if you, it's just a thing where, you know, North Dakota people, it's hard to teach us old dogs, new tricks or what it is, you know, we just change. anyway, I don't know why aim won't take off more up here, but it's, it's a head scratcher. But anyway, I love the format, you know, and I'd like to

A lot more of it. I 100 % respect Montana for going to catch and release tournaments over there and then look at the results they're seeing because of it. You know, I think that definitely contributes to it with what they're doing and see results in the catches. You know, when you got a hundred pound bags coming in for two days, two day tournament.

Brian Bashore (47:32.789)
Yeah, you know, I always thought there's a lot to be said about a way to bring it in live fish and Randy and I talked about this all the time and I'm like, yeah, you know, and bass had went back to those formats. Uh, MLF tried it out for a year and because it is, it's cool. Um, you know, but you got like for context is where it's a big bass. can't bring them. They made them do that. They can only bring in one over 24 inches or something, which is a monster bass and out of the whatever 90 anglers, you know, I think 10 or something brought those big bass.

But they take them immediately and test them and do stuff with them because they, you know, they help create that monster bass fishery. But you look at the aim tournaments and the governor's cup. Now, grant these are some bigger tournaments. The graja shootout, I think is, was that way now too, that these weigh -ins were packed. There was still a ton of people there and they had the photos and they do the way like aim a couple hours after the event. So they have time to go through, verify all the photos and then make the little, you know, when you come up on stage, they can put your photo up.

Cody Northrop (48:16.002)
Mm -hmm.

Brian Bashore (48:29.299)
Because the reality is how many times are you pulling fish out of the bag when you go across stage and going holding them

Cody Northrop (48:36.481)
Yeah, exactly.

Brian Bashore (48:38.405)
Right. Not very, very low. Jeff has been doing a little better at that kind of going, this guy's got a monster bag. Hey, show the crowd, you know, one or two of those. But before it really just get them, get them out of here super quick. it's like, well, if I'm just bringing them to weigh them in and nobody gets, I mean, you can go snap the photo behind the, the curtain quick, you know, and we got those to share, which are nice. And they do a pretty good job of getting those in that boat quick and back, but I'm sure there's still a mortality rate. It's you take anything out of its element. You're going to, you're going to lose some.

Like I said, these fisheries are healthy.

Cody Northrop (49:10.729)
Yeah, 100%. But yeah, I don't know, you know, it's

I don't know where it goes from here, yeah, you know, we had that little law there with North Dakota where they put that regulation in place, the Game and Fish did, which allowed, basically it was a detour from any large type of tournaments come in where they had to give a certain percentage of proceeds, of entry fees, just to get a permit to fish in the lake. And we ended up having to take that to legislature to get that changed. And you know, there's a whole lot of people to thank.

here locally and nationally that helped with that, you know, and to get that changed. Eventually they did, thankfully, for all involved, but it wasn't an easy situation.

Brian Bashore (49:58.375)
Not only did it get changed, it got changed and it was better before what it was previously. I think it was basically about five grand to get a tournament permit. Now that you picked your conservation project, basically ran by the North Dakota Game Fish and Parks to assign that money to could be a boat dock or a kids fishing clinic or something like that. then pretty good chance that money was funded that way. but now I think tournament.

fees are down to 250 bucks, something like that. I think they got rid of the conservation part of it. And, but yeah, that put everybody out. But what they did was change it to where it was going to be 10 % of the total purse was going to be your new fee, right? So you're talking like a 20, $30 ,000, you know, tournament permit fee, which I just got a bunch for our league and through South Dakota, they're free. You just go online and fill out the form and you know, least 30 day advance.

Cody Northrop (50:40.775)
Yeah. Yeah.

Brian Bashore (50:56.373)
You know, a week or two later, you get an email with here's your permit. You know, as as it meets all the requirements, there's not 40 permits going on, you know, that day. They try to manage the amount of tournaments on that body water that way. And there's a way for them to do that is by putting in a permit. And if you have under 19 boats, you don't need a permit or under 40 people, you know, those kind of deals. And that's what's the hope going to the Devil's Lake last year is the championship's only 40. We're good to go. We don't need to permit anyway.

But you got you and, man, I'm drawing blank on a bunch of names, but, that helped with getting a lot of that stuff passed. Johnny candle, Zach Axman, Olson, Jeremy, Jeremy Olson, whole bunch of guys, NPA, Congressional Sports Foundation helped on some of the national stuff and email campaigns and getting words out, but nothing.

Cody Northrop (51:38.778)
Olsen, Eric, yep, yep, Jeremy Olsen.

Brian Bashore (51:52.329)
gets done unless the locals. You and all those guys in North Dakota are the loudest voices and the ones that the legislators really listen

Cody Northrop (51:59.666)
Yeah, I won't take credit for anything. didn't do much, but there was a lot of people that did. And you know, it's hard to name them all. There's so many people involved and there was, know there was a couple of Western legislatures that got behind it too over here. I know one of them from the Watford city area. was state Senator. He was, he was a pretty vocal behind the scenes with it to help and I'll put a, but yeah, I, I didn't, I don't deserve any credit. I didn't do much, but there's a lot of people that did. So South Dakota definitely benefited. Yeah.

Brian Bashore (52:25.425)
Susie Devils Lake tourism. Yeah. Yeah. We, we, everybody came here for a while on the tournament scales and now we're all going back North Dakota. we'll be back here, but I have a feeling we might, we might be back in North Dakota before we get back here. I have a, just, I don't know, I have a feeling. So fishing, fishing is good up there. don't have party fishing is not a, is allowed down here. So there's another good reason to come here. I want to think it was tourism Susie at a Devils Lake and then, I'm drawing a blank, buddy.

Cody Northrop (52:30.043)
Yeah.

Brian Bashore (52:53.597)
ethanol used to have the corn ethanol, but wrap up there. What text his name? Jr. Jr. Carter, right? Yeah. Yeah. I know he did a lot of that. So thanks and shout out to all of you guys and gals that helped get that push through. were heading back to North Dakota, Lake Scott. We had a few weeks because because of it and people have never been there. I got to love it and they're on. I want to come back because it's one of the best places in the country.

Cody Northrop (52:57.532)
dear.

Cody Northrop (53:14.779)
Yeah, absolutely. A lot of people deserve credit for that. We need to thank them

Brian Bashore (53:20.913)
What tournaments fishing in general we talked about catch format release what else do think we can do? What do you see the stuff moving in the future? Good, bad, ugly?

Cody Northrop (53:32.334)
Yo, I don't know, you know, the, the, everything's at such a state of change right now. And, know, good or bad, everybody has their opinions. And I, I'm not a fan of where we're going with national wildlife tour right now. Number one, you have reduced pay spots, you know, obviously with all these things have been talked about and I just don't know what the longevity of it looks like here, but, you know, that the party fishing limits now. And it's like, I got to drive, you

Brian Bashore (53:38.751)
That's

Cody Northrop (54:01.979)
12 hours to Green Bay to catch three fish. know, and turns out the bite was, you were lucky to catch three fish anyway, but normal.

Brian Bashore (54:09.341)
Right. I was like, this is one time we're not gonna complain about that leading up to it. Then everybody was like, man, I'm glad it's only three fish.

Cody Northrop (54:16.313)
Yeah, yeah, so that was a little bit different situation, but just things like that. It's kind of a, it's different than what we're used to. Let's put it that way. it's, again, it's hard to accept change.

Brian Bashore (54:27.891)
Yeah, I change is always a challenge. I've heard some things. I got a little inside scoop on things. I think things are going to turn for the better. lot of this is based on our economy. You know, it's these tournaments are not cheap. It's not cheap to run. you know, and obviously everybody wants more payouts. Well, more payout that's gotta come from somewhere by outside of just raising entry fees. And there's a point where you're raising too much. People are like, well, that doesn't, doesn't really work

But if you can get these non endemic sponsors really on board, but there's gotta be value. So that comes from the anglers and the organization, know, just like we just shared a buddy foundation, there needs to be more of that per anglers need to disc, and they are helping new generation are coming in and you know, getting on board with this stuff and the technology, the resources are there like podcasts and social media, your YouTubes, you know, to spread the word out there and get these, get the non endemic people.

Cody Northrop (55:14.009)
Okay.

Brian Bashore (55:23.985)
recognized for their support because that's really where how it used to be years ago when the payouts were huge that's where that money was coming from wasn't coming from you know rapala and other big fishing names they're pretty they're spread out and there are you know st croix and seaguar all these they're supporting all these circuits but there's so many and all the anglers you know if you get a big tire company a big manufacturing type place that that's where it come

You know, they know what their bottom line is and that's going to be all based on the economic outcome. So I guess we'll see how the world changes, you know, right? Come November, if things are for the better or for the worse, well, or the same, right?

Cody Northrop (56:05.002)
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, right. Yeah, and you know it's hard.

Brian Bashore (56:07.647)
That's a whole nother rabbit hole to go down. All right, man.

Cody Northrop (56:14.776)
You know, obviously the competitive nature in me is what I love to compete at this level. But if a guy wasn't, you know, if we had half a brain and we took a look at things from a financial standpoint, we're us North Dakota guys are crazy for leaving this state. You know, if you want to fish tournaments, because there's a lot of money to be won in this day with all the tournaments, you got the casino cup series, you know what? You've got the governor's cup, the DWC. What is the payout for DWC now? Is it 18 grand to win?

Brian Bashore (56:31.188)
video.

Brian Bashore (56:35.997)
your cups.

Brian Bashore (56:43.165)
16 or 18, I think it went up they said it was the highest pout they ever had. I'm gonna guess like 180 boats or something I think

Cody Northrop (56:48.439)
Yeah, right, right. Odds are up there. so you got that you got the, you know, the aim one or, you know, the big 10, 30 grand to win it. There's all these little local tournaments that are up in that five grand range to win them and stuff like

Brian Bashore (56:54.357)
Big 10.

Brian Bashore (57:01.205)
Casino cups are like 12 or 15 now, aren't they?

Cody Northrop (57:04.247)
I for sure there can't I think the championship if you're for a wise is it it's it might even be 20 grand I can't remember no I I'd have to look at it again

Brian Bashore (57:12.469)
I think they're at least 12. They used to be, they were all 10. I know then they went up to 12. I mean, it's a three, you can have three guys, but you're still catching the same, bringing in five. And if you're in South Dakota, you still only have two over 20, or maybe you could have three. You're still in weighing in two over 20, but the third guy, you at least could have three and then you can pick your best two. So there's a divan. That's why I'm fishing. It's one of our travel coasts. Him as buddy fish it. Well, I'm already there and they always fish it with two and you realize, Hey, we need.

Cody Northrop (57:18.422)
Yeah, I know.

Cody Northrop (57:25.707)
Yeah.

Cody Northrop (57:31.871)
Sure.

Brian Bashore (57:42.249)
We better take advantage of this third guy. Now, granted he got costs and winnings to split that way, but also like, John, I'm already here with the boat. It's like, yeah, well, we'll just sign you up as our third and then you don't have to bring their boat up or anything. And plus he's going to be there all week fishing. So it should be pretty spot on. But that one's, and David T, we are boundaries one end of lake, the other. Got a wildlife classics that bottom eighth of it. then,

CINO Cup is I think, goes out of

Cody Northrop (58:16.211)
Yep, casino cups out of new time. I don't think there are any boundaries in that one. It's whatever your field tank limit is, which we all usually use in Chicago.

Brian Bashore (58:19.113)
Nothin' about it, it just goes out of Newtown, so... Right, yeah,

Brian Bashore (58:28.265)
DL. Yep, indeed. That's the Missouri River for you. Not a lot of options, but a lot of long runs. No, the things we do for a fish. Right. We never claim to be the smartest people. We just claim to be the most passionate about fishing people. That's it, right?

Cody Northrop (58:34.303)
Yep. I know. I know.

Cody Northrop (58:40.637)
No.

Yeah. Yeah. It's like I just said here, I drive 18 hours to go fish Lake Erie. I don't have to go about two hours away to fish five tournaments in two months, you know, crazy. Yeah. Yeah.

Brian Bashore (58:54.293)
Right. With over $200 ,000 on the line throughout the year at least. So, yep. Yep. Nope. There's, there's a lot of guys jumping in a lot more of those local things just cause they're at home and they're less to get in and the payouts are good. And I mean, we, we don't have the team format, which is, know, why a lot of us do the WT stuff, but there's a lot to be safe for the team format as well. It's kind of nice to have a guy with you and you're both in it, but it's easier to make decisions by yourself on where you're to go and what you're to do. Then it's really hard to find a partner.

where you're both just in sync. One's always like, I'm gonna do this and you're gonna go here and I'm gonna do

Cody Northrop (59:26.237)
Yeah.

Cody Northrop (59:31.866)
Yeah, and once you do it, it's hard to go back to fishing with partners again because you're so used to making decisions yourself and we're just wired that way. But some of these local tournaments are definitely profiting from the NWT this year. Now, DWC is picking up a bunch of entries because of it. I know guys are fishing it. Casino Cup on the backside. A lot of guys are sticking around to fish the Casino Cup, so that'll be full.

Brian Bashore (59:39.007)
See you.

Brian Bashore (59:49.033)
Yep. Yep.

Brian Bashore (59:54.794)
Here.

Cody Northrop (59:56.38)
So that definitely helped those numbers out that way.

Brian Bashore (59:59.561)
Yeah. So if they think these termists don't bring revenue to the communities, think again, there's going to be a half million dollar infusion between Garrison and Van Hook, know, and Malua or however you pronounce it. I mean, a week, Mula, know, within a week and those, those are small, small towns, small communities. mean, that Dairy Queen of Garrison better be ready because this guy, I know I'm going almost every night where...

Cody Northrop (01:00:04.422)
Absolutely.

Brian Bashore (01:00:28.457)
Literally stay in, we got a house. Thank you so much, Eric and George for hooking us up with this guy and it's right across from the boat ramp. It's actually the other boat ramp on the other side of the bay, the real steep one. It's that house. So we can actually just use that boat ramp and slide over versus driving like eight miles around.

Cody Northrop (01:00:36.665)
owner

Cody Northrop (01:00:40.102)
Yep, not good.

Cody Northrop (01:00:47.322)
Got the best house in the lake then.

Brian Bashore (01:00:49.223)
Yeah, he's like, I don't know that'll work. I'm like, that sounds like it'll work perfect. I don't have to sit in line in the morning or nothing. Just go pick it, go hang around the dock. I'm like, yeah, yep, yep. We'll just dump in right here and drive. He's like, it's like a half mile across the bay. I'm like, I think we can manage that half gallon of gas. We'll be all right. If for making a run right, I need gas, you need gas regardless of a half gallon or not. So, but sitting in that line in the morning kind of can suck sometimes.

Cody Northrop (01:00:52.676)
Heck yeah. Yeah. Yeah, meet me at the house.

Cody Northrop (01:01:08.315)
Yeah.

Brian Bashore (01:01:13.947)
anxious right and if I recall garrison hopefully I got some new lights there but it was really dark before it's big but it's going to get slick and it was just kind of hard to see so if you're using a boat ramp and it's early in the morning folks turn your headlights off so the guy back down front you can see

Cody Northrop (01:01:19.056)
Especially the ramp like Garrison where it's four or five wide and there's a lot of air plates down there.

Brian Bashore (01:01:33.213)
You know, yeah, awesome park, huge park, lot of huge boat ramp is great. But man, turn your lights off, folks, that help everybody out with boat ramp. Obviously, if it's early in the morning. All right, let's wrap this up, Cody. Any nugget to leave for our listeners out there on their life journeys? I know you had to be fishing.

Cody Northrop (01:01:52.304)
Well, let's back up two seconds. So I started fishing 30 some years ago on Lake Sakakawea. When I was a kid, we drove up here all the time. My grandpa, my dad, short fishing, it's all we did. They never even knew what a boat was. And once I got old enough, bought a first boat. But I've been fishing tournaments up here for 30 years on this lake. And I was kind of a late bloomer, let's put it that way. I was busy raising kids, working in an oil field, working a lot over time. I didn't have time

pursue my dream and it was almost my dream to fish at this level and I was in Bismarck during the PWT days and watching the weigh -ins and all that stuff along with everybody else. Man, I want to be one of those guys and it just took me a while to get there just because of life situations. But once I started out with AIM, Chris Johnson and I kind of fished AIM together and that's how you and I met.

when they were here in 17, I signed up as a co -engler with Chris, because I didn't have time to sign up as a pro. And we were kind of staying with you guys at the house there, and you and Ted and Randy. And so that was my first experience with the NWT was, and I ended up meeting Tom Keenan. I drew Tom Keenan day one and John Gilman day two. Those two pretty good draws, you know, and John and I hit it off. And as John does, a lot of people kind of took me under his wing. And that's kind of really what got me started with the whole thing.

Brian Bashore (01:03:05.129)
Yep.

Cody Northrop (01:03:14.944)
and anyway, meeting some people and got in Mosquito that way. obviously my, you know, your, you know, how you represent yourself plays into that, you know, because these people, when you're looking for sponsors, they will research your background and they will ask people about you. And so you gotta, you gotta hold yourself with some high integrity. And, but that's how I got started, you know, and I think my first pro tournament I fished with you guys and devils like you

Chris and I fished with you and Randy and Teddy over in Devils. That was in 18, I believe. That was my first, no, we didn't, No, no, I think we all sucked. But that was my first time as a pro. And then in 19, I actually traveled with John as a co -engler for the entire tour just to see if it something I wanted to do. And learned a lot, of course, with John. And I wish he was still fishing with us. And that's when I met Dean and Josh Hippas. And then eventually I,

Brian Bashore (01:03:48.403)
Yeah, I don't think any of us did very good, did we?

Cody Northrop (01:04:12.94)
got into it in 2020 when I won in Sakakawea, that's when I won full time doing the full circuit or tried to do the full circuit, but I had a wedding get in the way. you know, that's where I got with my current team with Dean and Josh Hippos was with this time and Dusty and now of course, of course, has jumped in with us last few years. anyway, that's how I got started. So I guess what I'm trying to say is, is, you know, it doesn't matter where you're at in life. If you have a dream, follow it, you know.

Set yourself up for success. It's a lot around the people you hang out with, how you hold yourself, what kind of you have. Don't be afraid to put yourself out there. If it's a dream and it's something you want to do, it'll happen.

Brian Bashore (01:04:54.357)
You couldn't have, you nailed that on the head. You want to be successful, you hang around successful people. So courts has obviously got a history of a Dean's like the top money winner on green Bay's been doing it for a long time. And you know, ball up three fish with you guys. These guys know the industry. They know the in and outs of it. And, it showed cause you, you, you've won. Yeah. What'd you get third to Chamberlain? think a couple of years ago or second or third and you're too.

Cody Northrop (01:05:08.821)
Baby? Baby?

Cody Northrop (01:05:16.907)
Dustin won it, took third, Dean took fourth.

Brian Bashore (01:05:20.159)
Yeah, so your team crushed it there. It's just you're hanging around great people. They're all good guys. All successful at not just fishing, but what you guys do off the water.

Cody Northrop (01:05:30.485)
Yeah, a hundred percent. And, and you know, and it's pretty cool. You know, I definitely want to give kudos to those guys because everything I've been going through here lately and you really, you don't even know who's in your corner until you go through things like this, what I'm going through. But you know, my fishing family, man, those guys are like my second family. They, they've been my number one supporters and can't think them enough. You know, other than my, my immediate family and friends and coworkers have been so supportive of me, but,

you know, our fishing family, it's truly a second family. It really is, you we hang out with these guys and you and Randy have been together forever, know, and Ted and, so you know what I'm talking about, but it's, I can bounce anything off those guys, 100 % supportive of anything, you know, it's pretty cool, so.

Brian Bashore (01:06:13.075)
Yep. think Randy called while we were talking. So it's that odd that we don't talk a couple, three times a week. it is. It's your family way of family. Cause you spent a lot of time with these guys, you know, and you got these long road trips. I mean, you're probably on the phone. Like we are just talking about stuff, kind of game planning and you know, or, talk to this guy, this, you just, all sorts of theories are going to your head, you know, and you're, mean, we already have a whole week figured out, okay, I'm going to go here. You're going to go there. I got eight hours of drive. So you're just like,

Cody Northrop (01:06:16.603)
Okay.

Brian Bashore (01:06:41.449)
Let's just talk about it, right? And figure it out and stuff like that. it's just, they're there. They're a great group of guys on and off the water. Obviously, you know, when Jeff starts saying boat one, you know, it's a, it's a whole new ball game at that point, right? We, we don't have to be friends for the next eight hours, but we are so, you know, but we still are, but now we're competing. So, every one of us wants to, you know, to beat the other guy, but we're also happy as hell, you

Cody Northrop (01:06:42.867)
Yeah.

Cody Northrop (01:06:55.753)
Yeah, we still are.

Brian Bashore (01:07:11.315)
When that guy does well, know when you, when you won the championship, I was pretty stoked for it. I made sure I got some photos and put stuff up like, Hey, if I can't win it, I'm damn glad he did. you know, it was a, it's awesome when your, when your buddies does toss them when you do well, that's the best feeling. if, if you can't win it, you hope someone close to you does. Right. So, good times. And I mean, I owe a lot to you for my first time up there. showed me a little you and Chris obviously.

Cody Northrop (01:07:15.399)
Yeah, you were.

Cody Northrop (01:07:20.359)
Yeah, I appreciate that. I remember that you were too.

Cody Northrop (01:07:29.981)
Yeah, absolutely.

Brian Bashore (01:07:38.663)
knew that place way better than we did. And you sent me a one direction and I checked it out and went, that was a good idea, Cody. was like fourth. Yeah. Just by a hundredth of an ounce too. then, Teddy didn't, nobody else, I couldn't see a boat as far as I went. And you know, it was a plan B C spot, but you know, by day two you go, I think that might be a little better than plan A. we can give it a little bit more time. And it's the river. Those fish are there one day and gone the next, but then all of a they're, they're not there one day.

Cody Northrop (01:07:44.913)
Yeah, then you end up like in Ork or something. Yeah,

Cody Northrop (01:08:01.255)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We're done. Let's go back.

Brian Bashore (01:08:08.213)
bigger fish move in the next. So I literally stopped there just to break up my drive and went, I think I'm gonna stay here little longer. An hour and a half later, I was like, I'm not staying longer because we're done. We're done. Let's go weigh in. You know, there's 22, 23 pounds, whatever it was. So yeah, good time. That really got my itch for that lake and just love it. And like I said, the people met you and Chris and Devin and just a, just a handful of just awesome people up there.

Can't wait to get up there. I'm sure I'll see you at the way and you're gonna be around if you want a boat ride and fill up to it. Give me a shout, jump in. I'm sure you'll probably be jumping with Dean and those guys for a day or two and when you'll be laid up, won't you?

Cody Northrop (01:08:48.545)
unfortunately, I'll still be in Mayo going through treatment at the time. But I'll be.

Brian Bashore (01:08:50.687)
he'll be a male that week. So, all right. Well, we'll all be praying for you and we hope that Cody's got a sense of big fish vibes and, and, and go in that direction.

Cody Northrop (01:08:58.955)
Yeah, yeah, I wish I was there with you guys, but God had different plans.

Brian Bashore (01:09:03.955)
Yeah, well, you'll be texting. Yep. That's all right. We'll follow those plans. And like I said, we'll be praying for a speedy recovery and glad you're doing well. And, you know, just keep that fight going and let's kick this Cantor's ass and, we'll see you. We'll be fishing with you in October. So looking forward to that as always.

Cody Northrop (01:09:22.235)
yeah, it's going to take a little more than this to take my ordinary ass out here, so.

Brian Bashore (01:09:27.271)
Yeah, you are an honorary ask Cody's a tough dude. So the same kind of knock him down. I know that I know that sure. So, all right. Well, thanks Cody for, you know, joining us today. And like I said, we're praying for you a speedy recovery. you're a tough dude. I think he's gonna, you're going to win this battle and thank you all for tuning in. Follow along on Cody's journeys. Go check him out at Cody North through a fishing. I believe it's your Facebook page and, you know,

Cody Northrop (01:09:50.756)
That's great.

Brian Bashore (01:09:52.681)
Buddy little buddy foundation org go check out Lewis and Clark Big Ten showdown sign up if you're in the Montana South Dakota North Dakota area you got to jump in let's fill that tournament up it is an absolute blast you'll have fun and you will be back so that is all folks we will stay safe and we will see you on the water very very soon

Cody Northrop (01:10:15.334)
Thanks, Brian.