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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 (00:01.356)
Welcome back folks. Thanks for tuning into another episode of real talk fishing with no limits brought to you by Segar high performance braids and roughlin kennels, clean cut cutting boards. check them out at rufflin kennels.com and segar.com. Hey, we are it's ice fishing season still, you know, kind of getting in the lulls of it here. When you get into January and February and get a little, get a little tough out there, but we're going to talk to the guy who travels all over providing.
Hons of information for you out there on the wall I now at the you on the YouTube series. Mr Tom Bowley himself the YouTube sensation Tom's gonna come on and just tell us a little bit about Tom where'd he come from? How'd he get into this YouTube thing? Like she's been at like she's going ice and open water just learn a little bit more about Tom So we all watch him on the screen Let's listen to him and just kind of get to know a little backstory about mr. Tom Bowley. So stay tuned Tom's coming right up
Brian Bashore (00:00.067)
somebody who knows. Hey folks, thanks for tuning into another episode of Real Talk Fishin' with No Limits. Today we are joined by Mr. YouTube Sensation, the man that you all know of Mr. Tom Bowley. What is happening, sir? How's the ice fishing been going for you over there?
Tom Boley (00:19.374)
Appreciate it having me. I have not felt like a sensation the last few days on the ice. It's been more deflation than sensation, but full on ice fishing, running around, gunning. This is always the time of year for me where the bites start to get a little bit tough and just is what it is every winter about first, second week of January.
Brian Bashore (00:24.153)
you
Brian Bashore (00:37.793)
Yeah, we are getting into those. It's like the dog days of summer, right? It's that winter slump. It's cold. I would say it's cold, but I don't know how it was over there today, but it was like 50 degrees in South Dakota today.
Tom Boley (00:48.876)
Yeah, we had I was on Lake Superior. It felt like March 38 degrees. Sunny, light wind, unbelievable snow melting off the roof when I got home crazy.
Brian Bashore (00:58.925)
I don't know. It looks like we have some cold. I mean, we got plenty of cold snaps coming yet, but I don't know what, what is that all this up and down? Is that sort of effect in this bite? think I hear to kind of, haven't hardly been out at all myself over here. Cause I like to go in the river and there's guys last week out on their boats on the river. So as it just this 40, 50 degree days, and then we got negative 10, two days. And these fish are just like, what the hell.
Tom Boley (01:21.23)
Yeah, I don't know if it's that or just all the up and down fronts. Like where I've been fishing, it's like we get a foot of snow on Tuesday and then it turns to 40 degrees for five days. And then the next week we get huge snowstorms, six inches, eight inches, 10 inches for three days in a row. And then it rains for five days. So I don't know. I think it's just time of year, but I mean, yeah, fishing has been kind of all over the board from really good to I have no idea what I'm doing the last week, I'd say for me.
Brian Bashore (01:48.889)
Hey, we don't have any snow over here. It's all blown away. is bone dry. There's next to no snow or hasn't been any for several weeks. The ice where there is ice, it's, it's clean ice, but it's starting to, you know, it's, it's not getting any thicker hardly, but it just freezes at night and there's 40 feet degrees during the day. But same kind of thing. don't South Dakota, you know, you get a little further North up in the glacial lakes. Those guys are doing all right, but it's the dog days.
Minnesota guys seem to be doing okay, but I don't know. I would say it's just a little down from typical years, but doesn't worry that because we you got to have ice to you know to go ice fishing so.
Tom Boley (02:25.44)
It is part of the key to ice fishing, yeah. travel's been pretty easy this year. That's been good. We haven't had a ton of that snow stick around like we said, so that part hasn't been bad. Not a ton of slush anywhere I've been.
Brian Bashore (02:27.957)
It's
Brian Bashore (02:38.039)
There's a bright side to everything, right? It's I can get there real easy because it's dry and I'm not sliding all over or have to worry about that. And all the, all the crap you're right. have to wash your truck near as much. So that's, that's a bonus. So what, so for those that don't know, Tom Bolle, you can find them on YouTube. He's all over the place. You've been doing this for, I don't even know how long now with five, six years, at least on just the YouTube. You know, more than that.
Tom Boley (02:49.174)
Yeah. Yup.
Tom Boley (03:00.96)
Yeah, probably six, seven, eight, somewhere in there on and off when I kind of quit guiding probably around 2017 ish. and then, yeah, so pretty much since then just been full steam ahead on YouTube.
Brian Bashore (03:13.079)
Let's go back there. You kind of got, cut your teeth guiding, I think is kind of from what I understand, right? What, did all this get going? How did Tom Bowley come about?
Tom Boley (03:22.19)
Yeah, I always loved fishing from a super early age. I grew up in kind of an area Wisconsin. There's not a ton of water, I guess. As a kid, you're just like dreaming of the Northwoods all the time while I fish and muskie fish and doing all sorts things. Back then I loved muskie fishing and graduated high school, started moving up to Northern Wisconsin for the summers. And then I went to college for a year, realized that I needed to be fishing and dropped out of college and started guiding.
a bunch of tough years there. then, you know, kind of it was right when like fishing and social media and everything was like kind of just starting to go as fishermen were always behind the curve on like the social media side of things.
Brian Bashore (03:59.651)
We're way behind. Yeah, we are definitely behind.
Tom Boley (04:03.254)
So I was lucky. feel like I was one of the younger guys who like loved to fish every day, but also like not going to say knew how to do the social media stuff, but was willing to just do a ton of it. Started getting busy guiding.
Brian Bashore (04:14.195)
You got it. You got it. It clicked for you. You got it.
Tom Boley (04:17.462)
Yeah, I realized I needed to be doing it. So then just kind of started doing stuff every day and then guiding was going good and then started seeing people doing the YouTube stuff. It was like, man, I think I could maybe do that. And then I remember basically I quit guiding, which made way more money than YouTube did at this point when I quit the guiding. And I remember it was like something as small as I think it was under a hundred dollars a day when I started doing YouTube. And I was like, I'm just going to find a way to make this work. then
a bunch of years later, then I got lucky kind of with COVID and really quick growth right off the start. And then it kind of just kept going, I guess. So got lucky in a lot of ways, timing, and then a lot of hard work, obviously.
Brian Bashore (04:59.095)
Yeah, I would, would, the COVID thing set a lot of people up. I got, it just took off that much more because I was in South Dakota and we stayed open. So everybody had to come over and you went from doing, you know, a hundred and some trips a year to 200 trips a year. And now you get all those people come back, but it all boils down to, know, you took the initiative to do it and it's really, it's the hard work and the drive and sticking with it. So, I can't blame you for getting out of the guiding business years ago. That's a tough gig, man.
Tom Boley (05:25.464)
Yeah, I tip my hat to anybody who makes a career out of guiding. Cause man, is, it's every day. It's hard. And the ice fishing side of it too. mean, like where I live, have to, you know, ice fishing takes up six months of the schedule. So, you know, to really make a career out of it, you got to go ice and you got to go open water. And there's kind of not a whole lot of break in anywhere in between there. And my hat goes off to anybody that can make that a career. Cause it is a, it's a grinder.
Brian Bashore (05:50.529)
Yeah, that's why I like to get on the river. Cause it's about, we got a three month window of, you know, if we can get on the ice on the river, good. I'll take some people. Otherwise it's just open water, but it's a three month window. But podcast, YouTube content. mean, we all wear several hats to pay those bills, whether it three or six months.
Tom Boley (06:10.238)
and you have to now, even if you just do social media, there's little things I learn every year that make me a little bit more money here. You know, I think there's probably a lot of guides out there who maybe aren't doing it that benefit their business and make them a bunch more money. So.
Brian Bashore (06:25.837)
Yeah. I mean, it's, it's a hustle, but it's, mean, as a guide, you being a guy, do you know how much time that takes? And then to think, all right, now we're to get home or at night. got to do all this. Got to create this content, get this report out, call it, get the radio show calling in the morning. You maybe have a TV or something coming. Still got to keep, if you have other guides, everybody busy, and then you want to try to get out and film, you know, your own stuff. And, we all know how to sell filming, how fun that is to do and challenging.
Tom Boley (06:52.726)
Yeah, so isn't self filming the best? Sometimes I don't know if I'm filming or fishing half the days I go up, yeah, it's yeah, it's obviously making a living in the fishing industry is great. You get to do it. love every day. I always said, like, if I ever came to a point where it felt too much like work, too stressful, I'd just quit doing it and find something else to do. And obviously I still love fishing. So it's all full steam ahead for me.
Brian Bashore (07:14.585)
Yeah, it's hard to be right when it is hard and it's work. It's a challenge, but when you get to do what you love every day, I always tell people as a guy, I'm like, we're not, we're not getting rich. There's a reason you see a lot of 80 year old guides out there. It's necessity, but it's really because they love to do it. And you're like, what are you going do to retire? like, I'm going to go fishing. So that's what you do already. You're like, yeah, exactly. You know,
Tom Boley (07:37.078)
Yeah, I remember when I started doing the social media stuff, I do this obnoxious series called 365, which you could probably guess what this meant. Every single day I do like a fishing report or a tip or something. I remember it'd be like, you know, day 40 of one of these and you're like, man, I don't know how to talk about catching crappies through the ice for another day, you know, but yeah.
Brian Bashore (07:57.497)
And you're able to 365. you're set up. You're like, can't, I can't stop, you know.
Tom Boley (08:03.182)
Yeah, I won't be labeling any other video series 365 in the future, I don't think.
Brian Bashore (08:06.643)
Hey, but you got the hunt for the giant, think, isn't that what the, what are the labels you've been doing this, this past season? And those are awesome. I tell everybody a little bit about kind of what that series is.
Tom Boley (08:16.524)
Yeah, I appreciate it. So content for me, like I get kind of bored of just doing the same thing. Like kind of when I started doing YouTube, it was like the stuff I love, like three slip-bobber tips to catch more fish. Right. And I think for a while I was probably like the only YouTube guy, like younger guy who wasn't affiliated with maybe a TV show that was doing this like every day on YouTube. And, you know, I don't know how many three ways to catch walleyes on a slip-bobbers I've made in the last eight years, but we've pretty much reached the limit on that, that aspect of content. So.
The lucky part about my job is you can kind of like take a different angle at doing a similar thing and go make it new and exciting again. So we started this series this year called hunt for the one. Where basically I go to sometimes a big destination, a lake of the woods, a Missouri river system, this or whatever, or sometimes a bunch of small lakes in an area and just try to catch one basically 30 inch fish and basically stay there for as however many days it takes or.
until I'm just completely fried on it. that series was super fun. It kind of revitalized me. And even I think it made some of my other content more enjoyable for me to edit and maybe for viewers to watch. Cause it kind of brings back in, I don't watch a lot of fishing videos, but I watch a lot of hunting videos. And I loved watching hunting videos where it was like, maybe it wasn't a giant deer or something, but it was like on day 19 of a hunt where they, they punched the tag, right?
It was the story that built up this long grindy thing that led up to that moment. It's kind of similar thing that we're doing in fishing now, know, going out and hunting for one fish and kind of filming the whole process.
Brian Bashore (09:51.065)
30 inches aren't easy to come by. So I mean.
Tom Boley (09:54.41)
No, yeah, mean, there's, it's, yeah, there we film some that we never turned into videos. I still have them. don't, maybe we'll post them one day. I still think they're good, but yeah, I mean, it's, it's never a guarantee and, I think that's what kind of makes the show too. Cause you're kind of going out almost trying to do something borderline impossible, you know?
Brian Bashore (10:13.529)
Right. That anticipation buildup. I mean, I'm sure if you had a 29 inch routine of it, it would be okay with us viewers. You know, we were like, we still want to see it, but obviously you're picking destinations that have those or more of those. think I've watched the beta knock one green Bay is not too far from y'all, know, but people see it, you know, on the social and stuff. They're like, Oh, they went out and they cracked, you know, half a dozen of these 30 inches are out here on Lake Wahia right up in Bowbridge in the fall. These big fish coming. It's like, but they don't see that the guy was there for three days or
However, may long there, everybody has those epic days here and there. Um, but that's what I, that's what I like about your hunt for the one is that just like you said, it's, this isn't very easy folks. There's a whole lot of downtime. Just like tournament fishing. You don't get to see a whole lot of behind the scenes that make two or 11 golds putting that out. And that's great of all the effort and the swing and misses, you know, prior to getting that one.
Tom Boley (11:03.662)
Oh yeah. Yeah, and it's, we filmed ones where I caught a 31-inch on my first cast on one. And then we filmed ones where for five days, I never saw a fish over 26 and a half. So it, and I've never, you know, I'm not a tournament guy. So I never just went out like, man, I'm going to go try to crack just three giants today. You know what?
Granted, you fish enough, you kind of realize like, all right, this is a big fish thing. like content wise, no one's going out to film a TV show. Like I hope I get two bites today because you don't get a whole lot of TV shows doing that. So content wise, it's fun for me to do. I really enjoy those, making them anyways.
Brian Bashore (11:41.401)
Yeah. Then that probably, you know, makes it that much more exciting when you go out and do a regular, I catch 10, 15, 20 fish. You're like, Oh yeah. I forgot about how kind of fun this constant catching was, but those big, remember talking to Gary Parsons once and then he said, you know, what makes a great show is obviously we need to catch a few fish. You know, that makes a good show, but if we can catch the big fish, it makes a great show.
Tom Boley (12:07.161)
yeah.
Brian Bashore (12:08.025)
Yeah, it certainly doesn't hurt. People like to see those 28 to 30 inches come over the guttle, but as you know, they are hard to come by.
Tom Boley (12:16.502)
Yeah, I always think a good video needs a punchline. Like, and it doesn't always have to be a 30-incher. It could be like you go into a lake you've never been to before. You spend the first eight hours like struggling right at the end of the day, you tap into, you catch two fish, two average-sized walleyes. The next day you go out and you catch eight of them, know, average-sized walleyes on the new thing you found. Like there's the punchline, right? They need some like build, they need some up and down, storyline, plot, climax. Yup.
Brian Bashore (12:39.609)
it.
Yep. The beginning, middle and the end. So, but that is it. mean, and that happens more often than not. think people probably don't, maybe they do or don't realize what that is. You do fish all day and then it happens at the end of the day and now you're set up. All right. I figured it out. Now I'm like, tomorrow's going to be better. And sometimes tomorrow isn't better. It just is whatever. I watched your, um, what like was, uh, it's a table rock.
Tom Boley (13:07.318)
Yeah, down south.
Brian Bashore (13:08.525)
Yeah. And I was there like a week after a week before or something too. and I was going to write a book. So was like, Hey, there's walleye here and they've been doing all this stuff last year. So then you shot that. I'm like, awesome. Someone's someone's talking about it. cool place.
Tom Boley (13:24.47)
Yeah, I'm actually jacked to go back down there. My boat for this year, my new Warrior got done in record time this year. So I'm super excited. I'm going to go back down there for like a month, hopefully, and fish Table Rock, Bull Shoals. I mean, some other smaller ones. And because up here, I mean, the walleye is not there what it is here, obviously. You know, it's a bass fishing bycatch half the time. There's a few select guys on these places that actually target walleyes outside of like just dragging a bottom bouncer here or there.
Brian Bashore (13:37.429)
shows.
Tom Boley (13:53.358)
It's cool down there and there's nobody doing it in the spring. You know, you'll have some local guys that get out there when the fish are running up the rivers and stuff like that. But I think for most of the year, I mean, there's a lot of cool untouched. It'd be cool to see one of the big circuits go down, go back down there again. I think now with forward facing and everything.
Brian Bashore (14:08.185)
Yeah. I, uh, yeah, I there was talk about table rock coming up or both shows. So was there and I'm so I got a map and I even talked to the kid at the Marina who's from Minnesota. So he's like, oh yeah. You know, he knew all about the wall. And he's, I'm like, probably over. He's like, yep, this area. And which is, think is where you were at. And then a couple other ones. And he's like, yeah, there's one guy that kind of guides a little bit, but he said, there's, you know, they're, they're focusing on it. It's, coming. But I had a, another guy at a sports show booth was like a dog food sales rep next to me all weekend.
And he fished bowl shoals forever, but he had switched over to wall over the last few years. And he's like, it's, good. It's getting real good. And they were catching, they knew where they were the pre-spawners and spawners were coming. And he's like, it's, there's a lot of people fishing them over on bowl shoals now, but that that's been around for a long time.
Tom Boley (14:55.63)
Yeah, think, you know, kind of quietly hear of like things that are, you know, like any fisherman does who's in the industry, you hear like, oh, this is going on here. This is going on here. And it's crazy how much like, you know, that kind of fish, it's just big reservoir fish. And so like how much of it's really pretty easily adaptable for anybody who's pretty good at that. And yeah, I just want to go back down and have a lot of time that just kind of like get my feet wet, try a bunch of different stuff I've wanted to try down there. And you know how it goes.
Brian Bashore (15:23.937)
Yep. Hit the Ozarks on your way back up. There's, there's, there's walleye over there and there are a lot of, you know, untouched, but like you said, there's always just those few locals that came from up here, move there, whatever the case was like, I'm going to find these, you know, and, and, and I got them and they keep it pretty tight lip. So, so that they're all theirs, but it's, it's the feeder creeks and all that. And think that's when most of them are targeted them in that early, early spring by window. Then they just assume they all go, you know, into the a foot abyss of those.
monster reservoirs down there, but the timber and the trees, mean, Table Rocks, a different places. It's just a beautiful place. If you all have never been there, just go check it out. mean, the water clarity is great. got all sorts. mean, it's, it's deep by mountain ravine type stuff, I guess you would call it, but it's just a really cool place.
Tom Boley (16:09.772)
Yeah, it's beautiful down there. I think there's probably a lot of cool summer bites. mean, late summer, I've heard of some cool stuff, but I think it's like 100 degrees and crazy amount of boats everywhere, So.
Brian Bashore (16:19.641)
Yeah. Yeah. Big bass fishing, a lot of shad when I was there, I was, could see them all, all the gizzard shad just off the docks. I'm like the in between all the slips are just cramp packed full. The guy that Marina, their kids are renting fishing poles and worms and just trying to, he's like, here he goes. This Bay is a complete waste of time right now. He's like, I'm like, I could see it. It's just a wall of bait. He's like, yeah, it's, it's no good. You got to get way out of here.
Tom Boley (16:41.42)
Yeah, that was my first spotted bass I ever caught down there this year, so that's a new species for me.
Brian Bashore (16:47.085)
spotted cool. Very cool. What other, so you got, you've been everywhere. You've done the open water. You've done the ice water. What have been some of the hot hottest, what's kind of the good ice bites you've been on this year or what's some of your favorite places to go?
Tom Boley (17:02.936)
Yeah, we've been in North Dakota, Minnesota. I fished Michigan this week and then Wisconsin on the ice. And the last, guess, since Thanksgiving, I've been driving around ice fishing. mean, North Dakota was good right off the bat. Normally fishing a lot of like shallow slough lakes. Normally I go up there first. It's just you get all that shallow water that freezes up quick and you can get on it.
Normally it's not a lot of pressure yet. So those fish are pretty relatively easy to catch. Then I always kind of start moving my way back into Northern Minnesota from there normally. So first half of December, really up until Christmas, I think I was in Northern Minnesota, fishing the leech, the Winnie, the Lake of the Woods, kind of a lot of the big stuff there. And those bites are always banging pretty much early ice. And from there, worked my way back into Northern Wisconsin, fishing a lot of the little lakes kind of around this area.
Northern Wisconsin that take a little bit longer to ice up. Just with the snow we had this year. And normally I always see a really good bite here early. And then the second it starts getting pressure, it really, really goes to like a basically a set lining bite in low light hours. And that bite was good. And then the, you know, it kind of started to slow down now we got 12, 14 inches ice a lot of places now. then this past week, drove up to the UP, filmed a camping video on the ice, caught some walleyes doing that. And then I, uh,
did some Lake Michigan fishing for walleyes and I caught one fish in three days. that's the up and down. That sounds like the up.
Brian Bashore (18:29.273)
I was like, my, it sounds like my ice fishing. Yep. The, uh, the ice camp, but I haven't done it. I've seen it you got the big Esquipo tent set up and it looks, yeah, like I could do it. I mean, I've done the sleeper shack stuff and, uh, but those, I mean, I have an uninsulated one and with the heater in there, I'm like, this is plenty hot. So, I mean, putting those big ones up and bring the propane tank and put the mats down. like, this would, this wouldn't be a problem at all. don't think ice camp.
Tom Boley (18:48.269)
Yeah.
Tom Boley (18:55.636)
Overall, it's not bad. It's not my preferred way to film a video because I hate massive commitments to one spot, which is what happens when you're ice camping. But overall, yeah, it's pretty comfortable in there, especially once you get the floor down. My biggest problem, just like when we used to go stay in ice shacks, you know, for a weekend or whatever, it feels like you're just trapped in a box for like 48 hours. And that's just a long time to be trapped in a box. But obviously, for a lot of the bites that we fish for the rest of the winter, I mean,
Arguably you're better off spending that 12 hours at night out there than you are the 12 hours during the day. So it kind of makes a good sense for some bites.
Brian Bashore (19:31.641)
Yeah, it's probably that time you're doing. I've talked to some of the guys up in the Northeast part of South Dakota and at the same time, it's getting to that tough time of year, but that's it. It's low light nighttime by, you know, set the dead sticks out in a way and just silence, you know, you don't need to ping it in the holes, the stomping around. Snow bear guys are getting, you know, the perch are a little different, but if they want to get those, those bigger wall as it's, tends to come off the dead sticks.
Tom Boley (19:55.79)
Yeah, a lot of set lining everywhere. I feel like I hate filming as much set line bites because it's like, oh, there's a fish over there. Let's go get the fish. I feel like it kind of makes like a lot of, there's no hook set, right? I you're just hand over fisting them if you're a tip-up fishing guy. But I mean, ultimately you got to catch them however you got to catch them. So was kind of contemplating this week, like, oh, what am going to film? I'm going to go somewhere I think I can jig them or am I going to go somewhere where it's set lining?
Brian Bashore (19:57.475)
or tip-ups.
Brian Bashore (20:05.227)
Right.
Brian Bashore (20:15.971)
Yep.
Tom Boley (20:23.534)
It's the up and down with content battle for what you want to film, I guess.
Brian Bashore (20:27.033)
But it keeps you on your toes. we, mean, the innovation in the fishing world, like I said, every year it's like, what, what are we going to do? How can I, what kind of new content obviously Ford facing Sonar came out. So it's like, Oh, okay. Now I got a whole new, you know, a genre that I can film. And you've been doing a ton of that and obviously new techniques, but the ice things kind of, I mean, besides starting to cut, you know, 300 foot paths in your ice, it's kind of like, I don't know what, what else I can do. I'm running out of options.
Tom Boley (20:54.958)
Yeah, the fact that you still just have to jig vertically down an eight inch ice hole is still the fact of ice fishing, right? So I always start out every seminar by saying ice fishing sucks. And I'm like, you can't make a cast, it takes you forever to move around and you have to carry a ton of stuff with you and it's always cold. yeah, forward facing obviously still plays a huge role, think more than anything for me, for like a lot of stuff I do, it's like where I set up, not based on seeing fish. think it's a lot more like.
Brian Bashore (21:01.507)
Right.
Brian Bashore (21:05.485)
Yep. Yep.
Tom Boley (21:24.718)
I want to be exactly in this pocket in a cabbage bed in the void pocket in the sand. You know, this is like where I want to be. And then I'll go there and spend, I might spend an hour trying to find like that kind of a spot and then set up, you know, and if you're driving the snowmobile around drilling holes, panning around in eight feet of water, like you're not going to see walleyes, you know, doing that until you actually get set up and using the forward facing just to set up on the spot on the spot and then hope to fish come back to you is 99 % of the time. think what I
Brian Bashore (21:50.874)
Right. Yep. I set up a couple of times that I went out right at sunset there tonight and I drilled a nice pot. It's like 40 yards away. I'm like, Ooh, there's a nice pot. I'm like, I don't, I don't, I don't dare drill again or move cause they're going to be gone. You know, and there were some other guys not too far away and they were, they were going to stay all night. So they were sitting tip ups all over. And then once I got sat up and I had to drill a couple more holes just to get my rods down. I looked around and they're gone. It's like seven and a half foot of water.
Tom Boley (21:55.137)
you
Brian Bashore (22:19.917)
At three fish came through in the next three hours. That was it. All big, but didn't get any of them. like, and I kept panning. like, I don't know where they went, but there's other guys over here at 50 yards. There's another guys over here at 20, 30 yards. So I mean, they got to be somewhere in here, but I could hear these. I could see their little flash or tip ups go up once in while, but they, you know, they were like, it's a 12 inch shirt. I'm like, all right. They're not, they're not having much luck either, but they're also running all over and more people kept coming at night. And it's a shallow lake. I mean, you're six to eight foot.
Tom Boley (22:23.48)
Yeah.
Tom Boley (22:37.489)
yeah.
Brian Bashore (22:49.377)
And I'm like, there's, there's a reason nothing's moving right now. They're just clear eyes with no snow.
Tom Boley (22:53.484)
Yeah. Yeah. I used to be a maniac with drilling holes, like hundreds of holes a day running around, jigging. And obviously we caught fish, just, you know, looking at fish's reaction now, like when somebody walks on the ice, when a snowmobile pulls up, it's amazing you ever caught, and like crappies too, you know, like drilling on top of crappies. And how many times do we drop it down and they're right there. Grab a rod out, pan around 130 feet every direction. There's not a fish in sight. You know, it's amazing. We actually.
caught fish by drilling that many holes. you know, now more times than now, I do the same thing you do drill one hole, sit there for 10 minutes pan around while I'm jigging, maybe catch a fish, maybe see some way off in the distance or see nothing.
Brian Bashore (23:35.896)
Yep. Yeah. It's a, can get away with it on the river when it's frozen, the current they're moving and you know, and you're, you're, you're fishing 20 plus feet deep usually. So not, not that big a deal. And you know, whether it's clear or clear or snow, but the shallow water slews up here, it's definitely challenging. Then it's fishing pressure. talked to the guy that nor they're like, it's just, there's so much pressure. Everybody coming over from Minnesota and Iowa or places even, you know, Nebraska are coming up. Cause you don't have any ice and they're just hitting these up by water town and.
Gadget like it's just, there's so many people that it's, it's just a really, really, really tough bite, but we got good enough ice, but it's kind of coming to go. I've seen, haven't seen a ton of photos of things going through the ice yet, but I know that's a lack of, or maybe it is good ice. Cause we don't have any snow over here. don't know.
Tom Boley (24:20.47)
It seems like the ice I've been finding this year has been good ice almost everywhere, varying in thicknesses from zero to 20 inches, but it seems like the quality of ice has been good this year.
Brian Bashore (24:31.789)
Yeah, I think that's, that's probably the case so far. We'll see what happens come early March, if there still is some, and then how many guys keep risking it and pushing it to the limits and then start getting stuck out there. I've seen a of big fish coming out of Lake the woods yet. Usually this time it's, it's, like the woods, you're always going to catch a lot of fish, but it seemed like they may get a lot more, a lot more bigger ones coming out of there this year. So that's, that's good. mean, obviously you can't keep all those and that, and that's protected slot there, but it's fun when you can hook into those 25 plus inches at a place that.
Tom Boley (24:42.508)
Yeah.
Brian Bashore (25:01.475)
pretty well known for it. So.
Tom Boley (25:02.85)
Yeah, I that place is just a freak factory lately. You own a 25 plus inch fish and that like is unbelievable right now.
Brian Bashore (25:10.073)
Yeah. I mean, it's just fun. had Paul on here from Riverbend resort and tell people if you never, mean, it's, it's a destination place. haven't been to Lake the woods, whether you're going in the summer or in the winter, the ice fishing deal up there. I mean, it's really pretty inexpensive. If you want to go out and sit in one of those, any one of those resorts of shacks and stuff, bring your own gear, rent it from them. It's literally just a couple hundred bucks a day. And you got packages, you know, with lodging it, it's kind of hard beat. and.
It's really not a night bite out there. So you just get a fish all day, come into the, you know, whatever local bar restaurant, have your dinner, good night's sleep, go out, hit it again. And I mean, it's kind of hard to beat sitting in a 70 degree shack and just catching fish steady all day long. So.
Tom Boley (25:50.03)
Yeah, I always get asked that like, Hey, just getting a nice fish and where should I go to catch walleyes? And it's like, man, if, know, the bare minimum, you can jump on a road system, pay 20 bucks for access for your vehicle, bring your hub or fish right out of the truck and go bang on walleyes and saugers literally all day long.
Brian Bashore (26:06.359)
Yeah, yeah, it isn't, it doesn't seem to matter where he set up so much. I mean, it's obviously they're moving in better spots and stuff, but you're going to find them. They're just, like you said, you're going to catch them all, all day long. You've been all over this early size, this or this ice season. What's, what's been your top, top three destinations so far this year and what, what's been the best go to, get them.
Tom Boley (26:17.986)
Yep.
Tom Boley (26:29.082)
yeah, I mean, maybe Northern Wisconsin, the Northern Wisconsin stuff I've been doing. love, like quarter ounce flutter spoons, especially like I fish one a lot called an ice winder. that on weed edges, inside weed edges, outside weed edges. We used to fish, I used to fish way too deep for walleyes like all winter and a lot of our lakes that are super clear. And you think super clear.
You know, some of those fish are real deep still in the fall. Some other ones are shallow and it just seems like, and I don't know if, and I see it happen on some lakes where like we used to get in good deep water bites in the, in like right now. And it's like the fish just don't go there anymore. And a lot of our lakes are just rely on stocking. And I think there's like a change happening between the fish that were naturally reproducing there for however many years that kind of fizzled out. Now it's all stocked fish. For some reason, it seems like.
Our fish now just sit in less than 15 feet of water, like all winter long, and you can see the bottom in 12 feet of water. So that's a lot of what I've been doing. And then this time of year turns into a lot of set lines on those places. Minnesota, I was doing a lot of the very similar stuff when I was there. Like I love big lakes and then big like troughs in the weeds out there. That's like my go-to like early season thing now. Not to say you can't go out in deeper water and
pluck off like a ton of walleyes or whatever, but it seems like a lot of my bigger fish always come real shallow on those lakes. Um, and then you go to North Dakota where I was earlier this winter. It's like the same thing, you know, it's like fishing four to seven feet of water. And I look for just, you know, a lot of those slu is just some kind of hard bottom spot that comes somewhat out into the base and maybe six feet meets eight foot and there's gravel there off an old shoreline or whatever. That dirty water out there is obviously fun to do because it seems like you get.
especially early in the year. You get a little bit more of that daytime bite going and you can fish like aggressive stuff, really rip it around hard and get fish to react a lot more.
Brian Bashore (28:20.665)
I'm like, using the hyper rattles. mean, you're an ACME guy or they that kind of a go to.
Tom Boley (28:24.61)
Yep, Hyper Rattles. have one that a new blade bay called the Flash Shad. We use that one a lot out there in that dirty water. Yeah, that one. And then there's one new Moonshine spoon I've been using this year. It's a two-faced spoon. That spoon's been the money I advocated for years to get these small willow leaf blades on the back of all of our spoons and then up-sized trebles. Cause I always never thought you actually needed to run live bait in a lot of situations to catch walleyes. If you run that willow blade, it just kind of sits there and opens up as you bang it.
Brian Bashore (28:43.001)
Mm-hmm.
Tom Boley (28:53.331)
And so now a lot of our spoons come standard with that. Yeah, that's been one of my favorite spoons for sure this year.
Brian Bashore (28:59.821)
Perfect. That's why we got guys like you in the industry helping these tackle companies innovate. Here's what we need to add. Here's the little, you know, the, tweaks that that can, we can move on from a lot of the live bait. So I would like to see the tournament circuits do that here someday. There's always a place for it, but you know.
Tom Boley (29:14.958)
That'll be interesting.
Yeah, you think they will think they'll ever move away from live bait?
Brian Bashore (29:22.0)
Hmm. I mean, it's, it's going to take those companies to sponsor those circuits and, know, and give them the money. Cause they're always going to have it, but I wouldn't be surprised if another, I mean, a Ford facing so, maybe within five years with or without that sponsorship stuff. think there's a whole new generation of young tournament guys coming in, coming out of those high school college. I mean, Minnesota high school fish. It's huge. You know, and, and even, you know, and most of the guys are bass guys, but a of those are, you know, doing the walleye and the bass thing.
Tom Boley (29:26.371)
Yeah.
Brian Bashore (29:51.328)
and they know just as well. They're like, catch walleyes all day on plastics while I'm bass fishing. So there's no need for it. And far as scoping, yeah, the NWT is a big jig and crawler circuit, but I don't know. I mean, I jerk, demand jerk, shads, a ton, Ned rigs big time, you know, and I'd rather, I prefer to use the plastics personally. And I tend to catch bigger fish. You're seeing a lot of, a lot of guys, you know, go to that. So maybe five more years.
Tom Boley (30:17.058)
Yeah. Yeah. It's interesting how like the bass and walleye worlds now with LiveScope have, we're basically just all fishing the same baits now. You know, it's all, yeah.
Brian Bashore (30:25.305)
Right. Yeah. We've been taking minnows forever, now the bass guys, it's just like, just weren't able to, know, 2d, you could kind of hold it there, you know, but it's not the same as throwing it out there and working it back in him. mean, I don't know, life scope is pretty, it's pretty fun. So once you get it figured out, it's, it's a, it's a, it's game changer as a sports show this weekend. Um, this is a small one, but I had a guy come by and watch videos and stuff, asked a bunch of questions. And he went 15 minutes after he left, send me a Facebook message. Okay.
Tom Boley (30:33.794)
Yep.
Brian Bashore (30:54.937)
What live scope do we need to get? You know, what, what, should we get? We're, going to go. I'm like, it's an investment, but you know, they wants to put one in the, I'm like, you get a shuttle then if you want to put it in the boat and on ice. And here's a couple of different options, know, obviously you're to need to get a battery and blah, blah, blah. But he's like, cause he had his, I don't know, probably upper mid teenage boy with him. And I think it was like, dad, we all right. It's time to time to get with it.
Tom Boley (31:20.814)
Yeah, I mean, it's got to be one of the best things I think that ever happened to like content wise for walleye fishing, obviously, you know, I mean, we filmed a lot of Lindy rigging, dragging a leech or pulling a bottom bouncer, right? But nothing's as cool as watching a fish fly up, smash a bait that you're snapping around and you set the hook and it's a big fish. There's no button on the live scope yet that puts a fish in the live well either. Contrary to many opinions.
Brian Bashore (31:46.263)
Nope, Right.
Tom Boley (31:48.344)
There's been a lot of updates over the years, but that is not one of them. So I totally get that side of the argument too, but you know, I obviously I need the fish to do my job. I keep about three walleyes a year. Obviously there's some lakes we can keep them on and can't, but obviously with every, and I think the biggest thing has been just information sharing, you know, people like me, Facebook pages, this, this and that. mean, then five clicks, you could figure out how the bite is on Lake of the Woods this week, right? On Facebook. And yeah, so.
Brian Bashore (31:51.385)
Yep
Brian Bashore (32:15.041)
Yeah, it's not hard. The information's out there. If you would have spent a little time to look for it.
Tom Boley (32:19.98)
Yeah, but I always throw that in. mean, obviously catch release probably more important than ever, especially in my neck of the woods and all that good stuff. yeah.
Brian Bashore (32:25.335)
Yeah, for sure. I hear that from everybody. I had a wife, had a work holiday party and the guys are like, you guys probably eat fish all the time. You know, being a guy and I'm like, Jesus says she's like, Nope. He doesn't bring them home. I'm like, I don't, I need them in the lake for the clients. If there's no fish in the lake for clients, I don't have a job. So conservation is the, you know, upfront it's the four most, you know, biggest priority. And I'm like, I'll keep a couple early spring when it's real cold. When I leave Chamberlain for the year, I'm like, all right, I'm, I'm leaving tomorrow.
Tom Boley (32:34.638)
you
Brian Bashore (32:52.409)
keep a limit today, maybe today and tomorrow, keep four rayfish. That's it. Then that's it. And then I don't take any of them out of Yankton hardly. Oh, unless you got a deep hook one or something you need to, but I'm like, no, no, these are good. And then I really, if I do get to go ice fishing, those are the best tasting ones when you can get them out of that super cold water. It's like, all right, we'll just, but same thing, two, nine, 17 and 19. So that's a, that's a good meal. Like I don't, I don't need all of them. I don't need four. know, no one else is going to eat them. So.
Tom Boley (33:01.955)
Yep.
Tom Boley (33:07.896)
Mm-hmm.
Tom Boley (33:15.65)
Yeah.
Tom Boley (33:20.494)
Yeah, it's about like me. kept my first two fish of the season today, two coho salmon from Lake Superior. I like eating those or red meat a lot more than I like eating walleyes.
Brian Bashore (33:30.809)
Yeah. Yeah. Love some salmon. Love it. All right. You got open water. You've been all over doing that. I know I've seen you out here at shields, fishing the Chamberlain area, other spots. What, what's your go-to? Where are you going this spring? What's, what are you going to hit? What's your favorite spots?
Tom Boley (33:46.254)
Well, one that had dawned on me that I've been hearing for years that I've never fished is Bismarck in the spring. I've never been there. Almost made the drive a thousand times and then was snowing, it was windy, it was doing this. So this year when it's going, I'm going. So that's one that I'm really excited to do this year. The down south stuff, I've been excited for a while. Ever since I was down there last year for the first time, I've been really excited just to...
Brian Bashore (33:54.947)
me neither. Bucket list.
Tom Boley (34:13.836)
You know, I think a lot of guys on the ice that do what I do, probably, they stay out on the ice February, March, into April, even where I am. And they kind of bank content for next year's ice season. I try to go the other way where like I try to get into both the second I can, because it's way more, it's way more fun than ice fishing. And
Brian Bashore (34:27.782)
Yep. Right. Me too. Yeah. I've always, hopefully the end of February, you know, it's, it's back on the river.
Tom Boley (34:35.086)
That's always my hope too, either the Mississippi River Pool 4 or this year I'm going down south or whatever it is. yeah, so that's kind of some of the spring stuff I'm excited about. Then the normal stuff. I missed Fort Peck this year. I didn't end up going, so I got to get back there this year. then, I mean, there's a crazy part is, as you know, when you fish every day, the list of lakes you want to fish gets longer. It never really gets shorter. You'd think you'd like, you know, start weeding them out, but you just keep hearing of more places, going more places. And it's the ever growing list of lakes.
Brian Bashore (35:03.833)
Yeah, you're knocked off a couple of my bucket lists. There's Bismarck and Peck and I'm now I go buy it and I go to Skakui all the time and Peck's really not that much further. So it's like, you either come a couple of days early and hit one up. I mean, Bismarck is obviously an early spring thing and I just get too busy. NWT was supposed to go out of there a year ago and I was like, awesome. You know, now I'm forced to go. Can't wait. And then they shifted it to wherever we went. don't remember where, what we went. Miss, is that where we Mississippi River?
Tom Boley (35:27.936)
Yeah, was, No, it was, What's right above Francis' case. Not a Wahee, but... Like, Sharp. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Brian Bashore (35:35.337)
Lake Sharp. Yeah, that's right. With the lakes. Yep. Yep. Yeah, it was last year. That's right. Yeah. We're supposed to go to Bismarck and went to Lake Sharp. So, which is, there's a lot of fish there, but it's not a bit, it's not Bismarck.
Tom Boley (35:41.068)
Yeah.
It's not, they're not quite 14 pounds.
Brian Bashore (35:47.61)
No, not even close. So we are at a Mo bridge in May. So we'll see if some of those Bismarck fish have come down and it'll be interesting. It'll be fun. got so I see it behind you. We got the walleye. Now you got the app with the content educational stuff to everybody about that little bit. I've seen, think you just had a post a day even it popped up my throat. I'm like, oh, yeah, there it is.
Tom Boley (35:58.392)
Yeah, look.
Tom Boley (36:10.19)
Yeah. So while I now it's kind of like, it's almost like the backside library of walleye fishing information from my YouTube. So obviously we film YouTube, but you know, six, seven, 800 videos. I don't know how many of them we have now, but a lot of times we might be out fishing and we're like, Oh man, this is the connecting piece. This is the, this is the spot we're catching the fish on, right? I'll do a really in-depth breakdown, side imaging, forward facing, map out the fish, show the GPS, upload it to the walleye now app. So you can go on the walleye now app.
Basically select the time of year. So if we're going spring walleye fishing, you know, maybe out by you you'd select springtime Based on water temps and then you'd select a reservoir system for fishing like the Missouri River system And then it'll pull up basically just a pile locations presentations situational tips and then destinations So there's about 400 exclusive videos on there and we keep just feeding more and more in like we just uploaded to this week
from the ice and yeah, it's kind of just a really, if you're someone who wants to get into walleye fishing or maybe you're making a summertime trip to here and you're like, I know what baitsy we want to use, but what kind of spots and not just like, oh, try deep points in 16 to 22 feet of water. You know, this is like a side imaging drive through. Here's the mud. Here's where it comes up on the sand. Here's the rock where we're catching the fish. This is what the fish look like. If you're going to troll it, this is how to look at it. If you're going to pitch baits on it, you know, this is how you want to run the spot. So
Brian Bashore (37:20.921)
All
Tom Boley (37:34.296)
It's kind of that next level of content for a lot of people, you know, it's not something that might be for everybody, but if you're someone who's really wants to nerd out on Walleye Fish and like, like I do, it's, you know, it's kind of, it's kind of that backend library.
Brian Bashore (37:47.61)
It sounds like a cheat code to me, man. all the answers are there. I think everybody needs to subscribe to the wall and get in on it. It's a, you're right. There isn't that much in depth. mean, there's a few TV shows out there and they do great. And there's obviously a good handful of, you know, of, YouTube shows as well as the TV shows, but that you're taking it to a whole nother level, which I assume it's a subscription, you know, whatever the case is, which is, and then there's been some others out there. And I think I came here with that organization was it came out. was a NPA partner, but.
Basically you could provide that type of detailed information and people could just pull it and buy it from you. But it was like one tip, you know, one spot they could buy waypoint stuff. And I was like, this seems like, I don't know, I don't think this is going to work out very good. Your system with the app, with all the people that that's the way to do it.
Tom Boley (38:32.11)
Yeah. And we wanted to pull out the like, Oh, what lake are you on? You know, like we do destination stuff like Mille Lacs or maybe it's like O'ahu or whatever, but you want to, out of respect for the fish, we don't want anything about like, Hey, if you're coming to this small lake, it's loaded with walleyes and go do this right now. You know, the goal with it is to be like, okay, it's summertime. He's running a deep point pattern. This is what I should look for. I should be able to translate this to my body of water. But kind of the thing we noticed with the app more than anything is I'm going to ask you a question on what, if you're like on a
Brian Bashore (38:36.163)
Right.
Tom Boley (39:00.918)
lead corn bite, let's say, and you're looking at fish on side imaging up in a flat, what's the number one thing people want you to show them? Is it?
Brian Bashore (39:08.249)
What, like what the fish look like on the side image? Oh, nonstop. Like what, is that? What are you looking at? And I'm like, these little white lines, these little streaks. I mean, I've said images. love my bird side images always on, but I'm like, that's walleye. That's, that's a battle fish. Obviously, you know, those are drummer. See all these big round blobs and then explain the shadow in the distance. it's, yeah, they're like, I got this, but I don't know what I'm looking at. And it's always, what is, what is this? What am I looking at?
Tom Boley (39:10.858)
Yeah, do they ask that all the time?
Yeah.
Tom Boley (39:24.675)
Yeah.
Tom Boley (39:31.042)
Yep.
Tom Boley (39:35.874)
Yeah, that's the exact same thing. Because we, I mean, obviously as a guide, we got that question every single day, five different times. So a lot of the content on Walleye now, it might be a nine minute drive through of a spot where 80 % of it is just looking at a weed edge, know, and no fish or bluegills on a weed edge. And then you're like, right there. It's five walleyes tucked into this zoom in. I think people just, you know, obviously they don't get to fish every day. We're lucky that we get to, but, and get all that screen time. But yeah, I mean, that's.
Brian Bashore (39:41.153)
Every day, every single day.
Tom Boley (40:03.746)
Basically what we just tried to do is give people as much screen time in their phone as possible.
Brian Bashore (40:07.769)
Yeah, I've, uh, you know, a few guys have, you know, jumped in their boat for a small fee and set up their electronics. But I always tell them, I'm like the hardest part. I'm like, leave the sleepier when they just get it, when they just get their side image or even nowadays, you know, their lives go like to sleep the poles in the truck. Cause you're just going to want to go fishing. I'm guilty as it has all L but go up by the day and we go by a bridge where you know, their structure and drive around it and start looking at your set up your side image and you're pinging out. You know what it is? Cause you can see it coming out of the water or a tree.
So you can start to understand what it is. then obviously it, mean, fish, they got to kind of figure out, but like you said, there's enough information out there now. I think you should build a, you know, to get that type of thing dialed in, but they're just, yeah, they're just usually amazed by it. How, you know, how good it is. And like I said, it's every, every day, how many different people in the boat or, you come here and look at this, you know, and it gets like, told you dad, this is what we have to do or we have to get, you know, I love the one there. How come you're just got so many different colors on it. I had the map up cause I had auto chart live to all the river.
Tom Boley (40:59.832)
You
Tom Boley (41:03.937)
Yeah.
Brian Bashore (41:06.777)
stuff. So it's all different. like, well, this is, yeah, this is a little different than what you're going to see. Cause I have it on auto chart. And he's like, Oh, okay. I'm like, but you can do, so I show them shallow water highlights and then how to, you know, highlight a certain depth. And, I think it's, you know, I always said there's more technologies and you know, these smartphones than there was in a first space shuttle. what do you, what 20 % of the, those are graphs get used by the general public that they don't even know all the features and.
Tom Boley (41:06.883)
Yep.
Tom Boley (41:25.262)
yeah.
Brian Bashore (41:36.045)
things it can do.
Tom Boley (41:37.358)
Oh yeah, mean, it's, it's, we're super lucky. Obviously we get to stare at him every day. And one of the things we always got was, um, how come mine doesn't show that, you know? It's like, well, you still, you still have to be around the fish, obviously to see what you want to see. But, and there's, there's no replacement for just driving around the lake. And like you said, a hundred percent true that, you know, if, if you bring a rod with you, don't make it very far, you know, that first school, that first school of fish gets pitched on. So.
Brian Bashore (41:49.305)
Yep.
Brian Bashore (42:03.021)
Yep. Yep. Yep. I'm like, Mark them come go get your stuff later. He'll come back to it. but buddy, he's probably listening to this and I'll hear it my call. won't say his name, but he had, Hey, jump on my boat. I'm not, can't, I'm not seeing nothing. I'm not seeing nothing. It's not working on my, he just switched from like La Rance or had a, had a bird in a new boat and he just wouldn't seen it. And I've got in and it just took, I'm like, there's a huge pot of fish right out in front of the boat ramp. I'm like, we're going to drop it in and we're going to go out.
60 yards and it should just be a wall. And there's nothing there. And I'm looking at it and I'm like, I'm gonna go to settings, doot doot. Now that transducers on. So there you go. It was like, bam. He's like, what'd do? I'm like, turn the transducer on. That was it. That's all you had to do. Yeah. You weren't reading the, you weren't reading the right one there. You're reading what it wasn't even hooked up anymore or whatever. He's like, son of a gun. I'm like, yeah. He's like, wow, look at all those fish. I'm like, yep. You're dropping your lead and start.
Tom Boley (42:40.654)
Hahaha.
Tom Boley (42:45.74)
helps. We gotta be, gotta be pinging.
Brian Bashore (42:59.917)
crank it along here, you're probably going to catch some. So, master electronics, you become a master angler. It's that simple. The live scope, same type of deal. A little tricky to, takes, you know, I might lose some Clark Lake, told the story, you know, a hundred times that the rivers are tough. You've been on the Mississippi and you're scoping and there's so many fish, you know, and I think it's always, what's, what am I looking at? What's a walleye? And there's times it's like, yeah, they're, they're in there, you know, but it's, and I think it just takes literally thousands of hours.
Tom Boley (43:02.51)
Yep.
Brian Bashore (43:29.561)
maybe hundreds of staring at that till you figure out the walleye. So I think to me it's more of the behavior of the fish that I can like, that's a walleye, you the way it's acting.
Tom Boley (43:39.406)
Yeah, or what they're set up on or, you know, things like that. Yeah. And it even seems like there's obviously a difference like lake to lake. seems like, you know, like a lot of lakes with different type of bottom composition, the fish relate to it differently. And you're like, you know, I made a trip to Iowa this year and, uh, or past open water season and the fish, hundreds of lakes that are 3000 acres. And I fish shallow sand everywhere. You could fish shallow, shallow sand for walleyes. For some reason I was on this lake and like,
Brian Bashore (43:41.369)
All right.
Brian Bashore (43:46.736)
yeah.
Tom Boley (44:06.382)
Are these walleyes? Like these dudes are not graphing like walleyes and started pitching at them and all walleyes, know, which obviously, and then normally once you connect the dots, you know, it makes the rest of the trip a lot easier once you're like, okay, this is what they're relating to. This is what they look like, you know. And then, yeah, but obviously screen time plays a big role too.
Brian Bashore (44:13.401)
I'll realize.
Brian Bashore (44:19.043)
What?
Brian Bashore (44:26.937)
Yeah. And does vary so much from Lake to Lake, even on the Missouri river. I'll get up Francis case and summertime. A lot of these are super suspended and really makes them easy to scope. But I come down river and lose a cart, which is a lot shallower Lake still, you know, 30 feet, 25, 30 feet. They don't suspend. mean, they do eat and you can, but majority of the time those fish are on the bottom, but you're up here 50 miles away and you're fishing a 40, 50 feet catching fish 10 to 20 feet down and come over here. All right. Well, it's not that deep 30, 40 feet.
fish are all in six or eight foot of water, but if they are not 25 to 35, most times they're on the bottom and there's a giant pile of catfish and drum eating the exact same thing. And I've had, I mean, I've had a day where I'm like, that's a walleye. If you can just get that beat to not get attacked by a little catfish or get in, know, and we'd catch something. then of course you're to catch three drum in the process. Oh, very tricky.
Tom Boley (45:04.93)
Mm-hmm.
Tom Boley (45:18.892)
Yeah, yeah rivers are still the great equalizer of technology in a lot of ways it seems like, but that's kind of what makes them fun to fish too.
Brian Bashore (45:22.745)
Mm-hmm.
Brian Bashore (45:27.001)
But you're right. The live scope makes for great shows. Great. I, know, a lot of the best people watching the lead series hate it. I'm like, you've always been watching the back of these guys head, whether they're looking down or whether they're casting regardless. So I don't, I don't understand what the, you know, the confusion is about it. And I think now where they do the split screen stuff from like, now you get to see what they're actually throwing at. So that to me is kind of cool. Um, I have a seminar this Saturday in Nebraska and it's on, you know, jigging up trophy walleyes, but I added at the end of it. All right.
We're going to cover a little bit of live scope because we can't talk about jigging without live scope, but I one clip in it, you know, where I'm where you get to see the bait. And it's I got a video of the fish is following it right through and boom. And it's my whole point of the seminar part of that aspect is being able to size those fish. I'm like, this is what at 18 to 19 inch what I looks like, you know, a lot of live scope, you know, it's with the grid and what have you.
Tom Boley (46:18.828)
Yeah.
Tom Boley (46:22.254)
Yeah. And he can dive as deep into, know, it's crazy how deep you can go now. And, know, obviously you guys are some of the best. You guys are always trying to size fish tournament fishing and everything like that. Where me, I see a big, big blob I'm casting. you know, if I think it's, if I think it's a walleye, but yeah, it's a, we film one kind of like goof off video every year. It's some people tell it's a joke. Most people tell it's joke right away, but I always film one where it's like this year I filmed it where it's like I
Brian Bashore (46:36.095)
ahead.
Tom Boley (46:50.03)
Oh no, my forward facing is broken. It's not working. Like how are we going to catch fish today? Yeah. I went to the back of the boat and just sharpshooted every fish with side imaging like we have for, you know, two decades. it's like, it's to, you know, obviously forward facing has its benefits, but we've been sharpshooting walleyes for, you know, 15 years now.
Brian Bashore (46:53.593)
What do I gotta do, right?
Brian Bashore (47:00.301)
Yep. Forever.
Brian Bashore (47:09.175)
Yup. I, during this boat show or travel, whatever, I was like this last week and I have a TV and it's just playing some of my YouTube videos and other ones just for fishing videos, right? Draws them in a little bit. And I'm looking at one and it, and it's video I did. I'm even talking to it going, I don't, I'm on Francis case. I'm like, I'm not even using a live scope because I, there I can see them on side image and I'm just, and I'm pitching shallow. like, you just, don't get sucked into this thing when there's a hundred fish over here cast just get.
Tom Boley (47:34.887)
Yeah. Yep.
Brian Bashore (47:36.954)
Get your bait in there like you used to, and you may get them on every cast. And I see that a lot in like Chamberlain, guys that will try to fish some of the areas, the shallower stuff that I do is now they're locked in our lives, live scope and they're chasing that one fish around. like, you just went by hundreds and hundreds of fish. I'm like, put that thing away and just cast to start old school that you're going to catch more fish. Now, if you're trying to find a bigger one in size wise for tournament, that's a whole little bit of a different story. And I did some of that in those tournaments there last year.
Tom Boley (47:51.106)
Yep.
Brian Bashore (48:03.545)
But put the guy in the back boats. It's got just our cast and we still got to get under us, you know, and then once but the scope was or crack crack crack crack. I'm like, it's a numbers game there. You know, we're to catch a bunch and but we want those 18 and a half 19 and a half pre-spotter. So look up from the screen and go old school works.
Tom Boley (48:07.576)
Yep.
Tom Boley (48:17.239)
Yeah.
Yeah, side imaging still obviously probably one of the most valuable things you got in your boat every day.
Brian Bashore (48:24.473)
Yeah, I absolutely love it. And you run, you're all birds, I believe. Right. So the new Explorer units, they're so crystal clear. It's, and I love being able to put that side image gauge out there. You know, you can set it so can tell where you're going. That that's very, very slick feature and not having to buy the map chips for everywhere is awesome too. Especially for a guy like you traveling all over the place. You already have them all. You have all the cards, but you know, now you don't have to keep switching them around and what have you. that's very.
Tom Boley (48:36.035)
Yeah.
Tom Boley (48:42.722)
Yeah.
Tom Boley (48:47.566)
Oh yeah. And they networked to the other units now. That was huge. They used to run two map chips for every region, which was a lot of chips, obviously. yeah, my favorite thing probably on the new units is honestly just the app, the One Boat Network app. don't know if you played with it much, but for me, like I got graphs on the snowmobile, ice fishing, carry around graphs.
Brian Bashore (48:53.037)
Yeah, yeah.
Brian Bashore (48:56.984)
Yeah.
Yeah, there are 140 bucks a piece.
Tom Boley (49:12.482)
graphs on my little bow, graphs on my big bow, and now I can manage all the waypoints like in Bluetooth, all of them right through the phone. And that's like, that's been like one of the nicer parts of the new graphs, in my opinion.
Brian Bashore (49:23.097)
Yeah. mean, technology isn't all bad. So when it works, it's phenomenal. But like I said, when it doesn't work, oh, my life's go don't work. What do I do? You'll figure it out. Right. Put it back on the trailer. going home. I've seen people do it. I just don't get it. I'm like, you know, but we've been doing it so long and it kind of like you said, if there's a big blob, I'll throw it. I think, and I always recommend it people that are just starting out with your live scope. Throw it everything.
Tom Boley (49:28.545)
Absolutely.
Yeah, on the trailer. Yeah.
Brian Bashore (49:50.234)
Until you just figure out how to track your bait and how the fit, know, you'll just learn how fish react and then you'll start catching those fishing. like, okay, I keep throwing at these things and they're all sheephead or they're all catfish. then, Oh, I threw it that as a wall. I meant, you know, after years, maybe of doing it, I think that's really just the best way to, learn it and figure it out. You got Tom when university and you can get on your, these resources, which I recommend everybody get do all of them, especially in the winter. If you got downtime.
If you're not educated or trying to figure this stuff out and nerd out like you and I and many others do that you're, know, it's there for you if you want it, all the information is available.
Tom Boley (50:30.636)
Yeah, there's never been more information available on in fishing now, just cool part about it.
Brian Bashore (50:36.153)
It's good. mean, maybe it's overwhelming. It's probably overwhelming. I imagine for some people getting in, but I don't know I was a kid and I had all this stuff, I would, you know, you wouldn't see me playing a video game. mean, I got up early Saturday morning to watch fishing shows, but I got a friend that's got like a, I think he's 10, 11 years old in Florida. His kid is a bass junkie fishes two or three tournaments a week. If he can, I mean, he's damn near takes him out of school. Maybe it's got third there a day in one. I think.
He got a four pounder. So Eric, why for listening to dudes, a little hammer. came up here and he, put him on the front and said, you're good. He, I watched, he just, ran the boat, ran the life scope. So took him up with the wall. I caught a 10 pound cat and then he was out. We went over and started chasing some bass around. I'm like, he's good. Good to go. But he says, yeah, he don't watch cartoons. He's, he's glued to YouTube, educate himself goes there and they're in Florida. on, there's literally a league night every single night of the week. So they jump into like two or three of these a week.
Tom Boley (51:13.422)
That's awesome.
Brian Bashore (51:32.729)
You know, yeah, he could.
Tom Boley (51:33.032)
Yeah, that's super cool with how much is out there now.
Brian Bashore (51:37.21)
Yeah, it's fun. It's a good problem that the kids dad has. I'm like, you're fine. You'll never have another dollar left over to buy booze or anything when he grows up. yeah, but he's going to have more baits than he knows what to do with. So what we'll wrap this up. You got to, I'm sure you got videos to edit from just getting back from the lake. So let's, mean, you're always fishing has been as slow as mine. got nothing to edit. So good and bad. What,
Tom Boley (51:46.85)
That's for sure.
Tom Boley (51:50.753)
Yep. Yep.
Brian Bashore (52:05.441)
You leave a little tip and nugget with these listeners and to help them on there. Maybe they want to become a YouTube sensation like you. What do you, what's the best tips or just fishing tips in general form?
Tom Boley (52:17.186)
yeah, we get a lot, always get a lot of questions. Just, Hey, I want to start a YouTube. want to do this. You know, how do I make a living in the fishing industry? And I'm not wanting to know everything or half everything on how to get into it. But, one thing I got lucky with, which is the only real thing I can say is, very enthusiastic about what I do. Obviously I still love to fish and I love to be out there. And I love, I always wanted to make the fish and show like I wanted to watch, which is how are you doing it? Where are you doing it? How, know, what are you doing?
So it was always very information based. obviously as anglers making a living in the world, know, sponsorships are a big thing. And one thing that worked really well for me was not even trying to, you know, the best way you can sell a bait or a shirt or a boat or whatever it is, is to, you know, teach people how to fish. You know, if you show them how to fish and they have confidence in what they're doing and you have confidence in the stuff you're using, it's going to, it's going to work tenfold for the companies that you get lucky enough to work with. So.
That's one that I always got lucky with. then the other one is, and this might be a dumb one, but I try not to focus too much on numbers. Like what specific thing gets me a lot of views or what, you know, what's the algorithm for this? You know, I try to go out and do the things I like to do. And that makes me more enthusiastic about doing it. You know, it's hard to go film that thing that you just have not been excited to film, right? Or, you know, it's hard to go guide that bite that you know is going to be a grinder that day. And it's just going to be tough.
going and doing the things you like to do at times a year you like to do it. think it makes the content better ultimately and not get too tied up in like, I'm looking at my YouTube algorithm and I should be filming this right now. Those things never seem to go good with me. from the business side, that's always two things I like to throw in. So maybe there's some young anglers watching who can relate.
Brian Bashore (54:03.563)
Yeah. I mean, everybody wants that viral or the next hit, but I don't see those virals are usually go viral. Weren't intended to. When you try it, you can tell at a display in your algorithm. I mean, I have a small digital media company, so I study and try to keep up on the stuff. It changes so damn fast. And I mean, daily, it'll just drive you nuts. Like you're doing it right. Just go do what you love to do. It shows, it comes through on this end of the viewer and
Tom Boley (54:10.925)
Yep.
Brian Bashore (54:30.869)
It'll, hit or miss whatever the case is, but sometimes some of these videos, I bet you've had old ones at all sudden. Bam. You know, they, they blew up. Right. Cause the time or whatever the case was now that's the hot topic, right? That everybody wants to go see and he's been Ned rigging. He has been doing this for years people. And now that's old video is going to come up. I've been pulling Tokyo rigs with swim baits on it for a while, but, you didn't know about that. yeah. Wait, that video has been out for three years. yeah. These things were re hit. That is good stuff. And yeah.
Tom Boley (54:39.43)
yeah.
Tom Boley (54:55.659)
Yep.
Constant circle, circle of content.
Brian Bashore (55:01.453)
Yep. Every, every green, every green marketing, I believe we call that type of stuff. Yeah. It's a hustle. You're doing it. You're crushing it. We'll put some links here below. I believe we can get the link to the wall and now app down here. We'll link it over to the YouTube page. If you, if you haven't, where can they find you at pretty much? You you tell them better than I can.
Tom Boley (55:06.658)
Help.
Tom Boley (55:19.788)
Yeah, you can find me on Facebook, Tom Bully Fishing, Instagram, Tom Bully Fishing, or YouTube, just Tom Bully, my name. And if you have any questions, you can always shoot us a message through Wallet Now app, which is available on Google Play and the App Store. So a lot of spots there and, you know, you can find TomBullyFishing.com, which will have all of it, plus our little clothing company. So plenty of ways to reach out and we're always posting new content.
Brian Bashore (55:43.684)
There you go folks, download the app, support your local anglers that are educating you and making you better anglers all year round. And I want to see more short hairs on in the boat and on the ice. got, I got one now. I lost one a year ago, but from short hair guy to short hair guy, that's where all the energy comes from. Cause when you have a dog with that much energy, the odor gets a little bit of energy too.
Tom Boley (56:05.282)
Which is surprising because neither of us have probably slept a full night of sleep since we got them.
Brian Bashore (56:09.485)
Yep. Yep. Yep. This is the one I, my, what I have left here. He's eight and a half. He is weird. Cause my older one that passed away last year, which was his uncle never, never stopped. And he was 10 and can get cancer. And this one is eight, eight and a half now he loves to sleep. mean, he's like hugger and I want to just lay down and cuddle until you move. Right. Or he thinks, or they know your clothes when you're putting on like.
Tom Boley (56:31.394)
Yep.
Brian Bashore (56:35.681)
You got your fish clothes or whatever. If you've been going hunting when I, I'm going bird hunting and I grabbed that pair of pants or those BAM, the energy level just went up 10 full, you know, he knows I'm going to go to the gym. He just kind of looks at me like, whatever. I don't, know that outfit. I'm not going, you know, but it's just amazing how, how smart they are. But yeah, for people who don't have. Yep.
Tom Boley (56:43.779)
Yep.
Tom Boley (56:52.942)
Yeah, for mine it's the dog vest, blaze orange dog vest. When that gets moved, it's chaos. yeah.
Brian Bashore (56:59.609)
It's running around or you grab the collar, they're just going nuts. It's hilarious. So, but I love them. If you don't have short hairs folks, you're missing out. are one of the best breeds out there. Really good family dog, but first couple of years is going to kind of challenge you. So for sure.
Tom Boley (57:04.92)
Yep.
Tom Boley (57:14.99)
Absolutely. Well, appreciate it, sir.
Brian Bashore (57:18.201)
You bet. Thank you at all. You listening. Thank you for following along. can download this on Apple, Spotify, Google, Amazon, all those podcasts, cast platforms. And you can watch us over on the wall. guys YouTube page or Facebook page and check in and check out the links below to Tom Bowley's pages and get yourself the wall. now app downloaded and stay safe and we'll see you on the ice.