Hunting with a Fly #3 | Fly Fishing Barracuda on the Saltwater Flats with Vince Tobia

00;00;02;00 – 00;00;28;03 Rick This is Rick Kustich – author, guide and travel host. And you are tuned into the Hunting with the Fly podcast, where we dive deep into the strategy approach flies and culture surrounding the fly fishing pursuit of apex fish like Musky Pike trophy trout and saltwater predators pulling a fish at the top of the food chain requires the focus and commitment to understand the quarry’s habits going beyond simply casting and retrieving a fly. 00;00;28;19 – 00;00;39;06 Rick Each episode is geared towards information to improve your angling and enjoyment request. If it concerns big flies and aggressive eats, we have it covered here. On hunting with. 00;00;39;06 – 00;00;40;13 Vince The fly podcast. 00;00;40;29 – 00;01;03;05 Rick Please stay tuned. Welcome to The Hunting with the Fly podcast. I’m your host, Rick Kustich. In this episode we are going to the Salt and talking to Vince Tobia. Vince owns and operates Cattaraugus Creek Outfitters. He’s a guide, outfitter, travel host and accomplished angler. Thanks for being on the podcast, Vince. 00;01;03;16 – 00;01;04;12 Vince Thanks for having me. 00;01;05;01 – 00;01;11;28 Rick I think this will be an interesting conversation to talk about, kind of transitioning here to Salt and talking about Barracuda. 00;01;12;11 – 00;01;15;23 Vince Well, I love Barracuda and I’m always excited to talk about them. 00;01;16;08 – 00;01;31;17 Rick Why don’t we start out just a little bit? Talk about your operation, Cattaraugus Creek Outfitters and particularly let’s talk a little bit about, you know, your saltwater hosted travel trips and maybe some of the places you’ve been and where you know where you’re planning to go to. And just give us a little background. 00;01;31;27 – 00;01;54;19 Vince Yeah, sure. I started out guiding for Steelhead, of course, as you know, on Cattaraugus Creek and got well over 25 years ago. I took my first bone fishing trip and I was hooked. I just love the environment of the saltwater flats. It’s just a different kind of wilderness out there, as opposed to our, you know, rivers and mountains and streams. 00;01;54;20 – 00;02;18;10 Vince So I got hooked on that and I started going on trips, and then I started hosting trips and setting up trips for anglers, both, you know, guided trips and then even DIY bone fishing trips. And, you know, I really love the travel. Meeting the people in these great destinations. We do a lot in the Bahamas, mostly southern Bahamas. 00;02;19;01 – 00;02;37;02 Vince You know, we do stuff in Mexico. I’ve been to Little Roques and Christmas Island, of course, the Seychelles. There’s still a few places on my bucket list I’m working on. But like I say, mostly the Bahamas and Mexico. They’re the easiest to get to for us. But that’s kind of how it started. And I just got hooked. 00;02;37;02 – 00;02;54;29 Vince I love sight fishing and I love the hunt. You know, hunting, bonefish, hunting, barracuda permit tarpon. And again, for me, the visual aspect of it and the hunting and the sight fishing, seeing it all happen is really, really exciting for me. 00;02;55;08 – 00;03;17;08 Rick And I think that fits right in with with the podcast, too. The whole aspect of hunting, for sure. And I think, you know, we’ve talked about it. We fish, you know, just kind of disclosure. We’re good friends and fish together quite a bit. Yeah, You know, we fish for steelhead, we fish for Muskie together. And we’ve done a little bit, you know, on the saltwater. 00;03;17;19 – 00;03;26;27 Rick But do you feel like, you know, the barracuda that we’re going to. That’s what our conversation is going to center around today. I mean, do you think that it’s kind of an underappreciated species when it comes to. 00;03;27;10 – 00;03;55;02 Vince I definitely, definitely. I still have clients who come with me on trips and and they don’t even think about Barracuda. And I try and explain to them why they’re so awesome, but they’re like, No, I just want bonefish. I don’t want to worry about Barracuda. But I think they’re underappreciated. I think they’re slowly gaining a little notoriety. But these are fish that run like a bonefish and jump like a tarpon, and they can be over 50 inches. 00;03;55;03 – 00;04;18;11 Vince So they’re big and they’re just really exciting because, you know, all the fishing I do for them is safe fishing. So I’m waiting for bonefish. And, you know, I’m always prepared and we’ll get into that later, I think. But I don’t know. They’re so excited. I mean, you know, Bonefish are awesome, but Barracuda, you know, they jump as well. 00;04;18;11 – 00;04;23;16 Vince They run, they hit hard and they’re just really cool looking fish. 00;04;24;00 – 00;04;40;02 Rick I know you are. We’ll talk a little bit about that here in a second. But you know where I guess how did you I mean, what was the first step to you really developing this passion for Barracuda? I mean, do you remember a specific time where it kind of just really hit you that this is a cool fish to fish for? 00;04;40;09 – 00;05;05;10 Vince Well, I would always see them going fishing because they eat bonefish. So and we’re waiting in a flat that’s, you know, 16, 18 inches deep, sometimes even shallower, you know, on the edges where it’s maybe two feet or two and a half or three feet. You know, we’d always see these barracuda and, you know, I didn’t start fishing for them right away, but I decided to try try one time, of course. 00;05;05;10 – 00;05;28;15 Vince And of course, I knew they had teeth and I had to have a wire leader. But when I, you know, hook my first one on the fly, it was just incredible because, you know, they just the speed at which they closed on the fly and then the take is aggressive. And then the first run, they just scream, line out, you know, and your back. 00;05;28;15 – 00;05;53;26 Vince And if if they’re anything over 35 inches, they’re going into your backing within a few seconds and they like to jump now they want to jump ten times like a tarpon, but they’ll just a couple, two or three times, sometimes four. And it’s just super exciting, you know, And they make they take a great photograph, too. So I was hooked when I when I hooked my first fish and saw how they run and jump, I was like, this is awesome. 00;05;54;06 – 00;06;00;19 Vince I mean, they’re just a big predator and they’re just a lot of fun and I was hooked after that first one. 00;06;00;24 – 00;06;10;26 Rick Yeah, that’s awesome. And Barracuda seem fairly wide lead distributed as well. So, I mean, you, you find them pretty much everywhere that you fish for in the saltwater. 00;06;11;02 – 00;06;30;15 Vince They’re everywhere. Christmas Island, Seychelles, Mexico, Bahamas. Yeah, they’re everywhere. They’re everywhere in the tropical salt. And I’m not sure how far north they get, but I think they get up. I think they get pretty far north too, you know. But I’ve really only fished for them in the tropical areas. 00;06;30;27 – 00;06;33;14 Rick Are you seeing some along the beaches there in Florida, too? 00;06;33;28 – 00;06;56;21 Vince No, you know, not really. Not a lot. I’ve seen a couple small ones back up in the creeks where we fish. I hear there are big ones off the beach. I haven’t really encountered any, which is fine. I’m hunting Chinook and Tarpon and although if I saw one, sure, I actually I don’t even have any pre rig the flies with a wire in my pack because I just I’m not seeing them, which is fine. 00;06;56;23 – 00;07;00;23 Vince You know I get my my barracuda time in all winter in the Bahamas. 00;07;01;06 – 00;07;28;04 Rick So, you know we we have fished together for Muskie quite a bit. And obviously there’s some physical comparison there with Muskie and Barracuda. I mean, they have a similar shape, similar look, you know, mouth full of teeth. Although I think the Barracudas teeth are a little more formidable than my skis teeth. But what do you see, I guess, in some of these, you know, similarities, differences between Barracuda and Muskie? 00;07;28;15 – 00;07;52;16 Vince Yeah, like you said, they’re similar in shape, body shape, obviously a lot of teeth. You know, the Muskie teeth and Pike’s teeth are more they’re designed more, I think, to grab prey and hold it where it barracudas teeth. They’re designed to just shred stuff. I mean, I’ve seen Barracuda by a £3 bone fish in half. Yeah, in one bite. 00;07;53;02 – 00;07;53;27 Rick Yeah. That’s amazing. 00;07;54;05 – 00;08;22;10 Vince And so they’re nasty, you know, they obviously they swallow what they attack, but they can literally cut stuff in half. Yeah. And he’d half of the fish so but they’re, they’re similar, you know, I can shape and size. Barracuda can get really big obviously as Muskie can. I think they’re both mostly ambush feeders as well. You know, they’re, you know, they’re not like a tuna or a jack that’s constantly moving around looking for food. 00;08;22;10 – 00;08;32;14 Vince I mean, obviously they do move around, but a lot of the time, I believe they’re waiting to ambush prey. Are you find that’s pretty true with Muskie a lot, too. 00;08;32;17 – 00;08;51;10 Rick Yeah. And I think opportunistic would be the thing. Yeah. You know that that I always think, you know, just looking for something that’s vulnerable. So I mean, you’re you’re finding I mean, and it seems that way. I mean, it’s been my experience. I mean, I fish for Barracuda a little bit, but on these saltwater trips, it does seem as though they’re just opportunistic. 00;08;51;10 – 00;08;59;05 Rick I mean, I don’t think there’s you know, they’re probably not keying in on one thing necessarily, but taking advantage of opportunities when they get them. 00;08;59;21 – 00;09;23;14 Vince Oh, for sure. For sure. I mean, I’ve seen them, you know, attack a school of on fish. And, you know, obviously they they like needle fish. There’s a lot of needle fish which are long and thin, you know, shad I mean I’ve had a meat jacks before, so they’re like a musky I think they’ll, you know, if they’re on the feed and there’s something in front of them that could be prey, they’re going to eat it. 00;09;23;22 – 00;09;37;25 Rick Yeah. Yeah. That’s what it seems like. So that’s what, you know, that’s basically what you’re trying to represent when you’re fishing for them. Just, yeah, give them something that’s going to, you know, look like a live look, like something that’s getting away from them. And that’s pretty much the approach. 00;09;38;05 – 00;09;57;04 Vince Yeah. Yeah. I use a lot of flies that might resemble a needle fish or a shad. There’s a lot of these Marra shad on the flats. They’re almost they’re not as long and thin as a bone fish or a needle fish. But I, you know, they’re, they don’t have a lot of real prickly spines and, you know, dorsal fin. 00;09;57;04 – 00;10;12;16 Vince So I think they can be eaten pretty easily by barracuda. They’re not that fast, you know, And there’s there’s quite a few of them. And they only get to be about 8 to 10 inches, really. A lot of them are smaller. So I think that’s a big source of prey as well for the barracuda. 00;10;13;04 – 00;10;21;05 Rick Well, let’s talk a little bit about how you rig events. You know, what’s your basic go to when it comes to rides, real slides? 00;10;21;25 – 00;10;44;00 Vince You know, I’ve caught them on eight weights, nine weights, ten weights. But if I’m carrying an extra rod or if I’m just have a rod rigged specifically for Barracuda, I like a nine weight, a nine weights good that you can cast the larger flies pretty well off, you know, a full floating line, a liter, you know, from, you know, 8 to 9 feet long. 00;10;44;21 – 00;11;17;02 Vince I like that liter taper down to about £30 tip it. I’ve got them on 12, I’ve got them on 16. And of course, you’ve got to have your wire in there. But I like to have £30 because with 12 or even 16 or even 20 sometimes when you strip set in that fish hits and is going the opposite direction at the exact time you’re strip setting they’ll pop £20 easily, you know, so you’ve got a little more of a cushion for a little bit of air there. 00;11;17;06 – 00;11;30;25 Rick Operator Error Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. Particularly I know again in my experience. So I mean, they grab a fly and they’re turning on it so fast. So it’s not just the weight of the fish, but also just the momentum of that fish going away from you. 00;11;31;07 – 00;12;02;06 Vince Yeah, Yeah. And you’re strip setting and you’re stripping that fly really, really fast. Generally we can get into that later too. But so I like to go down to about £30 and then I use £30 wire. You know, the real wire, the novel wire works great. I like to have at least 16 inches. I’ve used shorter sections before, but if that fish is coming hard at you and engulfs the whole fly, sometimes if you’re wires too short, it’ll cut you off because it’s the fly so deep in is is miles. 00;12;02;06 – 00;12;07;17 Vince So 16 inches is a good amount I think to cover that and £30 is fine. 00;12;07;28 – 00;12;16;23 Rick Yeah I think you’re like me. I mean you hate bustin fish off, you know, it’s, you know, so I mean it’s always better to be on the happy side than on the light side for sure. 00;12;16;23 – 00;12;30;23 Vince Yeah. Yeah. I think musky. You know, the same thing, right? They, they can come from behind and just engulf that fly and they keep moving toward you so they could really engulf it several inches or more into their throat. Yeah. 00;12;30;23 – 00;13;00;05 Rick And that’s how I am with Musky. It’s usually 16 to 18 inches on the wire. And maybe you can speak to this a little bit to benches. You know, when I have been waiting the flats a bit for, you know, both bones and then trying to be prepared for, for Barracuda, I’ve kind of gone two different ways and I got, I want to hear how, you know, you approach it, you know, either carrying a rig so that I can make a quick if I see a barracuda or make a quick change or carrying an extra rod. 00;13;00;05 – 00;13;08;01 Rick And how do you usually how do you usually approach it if you’re say, your ball fishing, but have your eyes open for for a barracuda? 00;13;08;11 – 00;13;33;25 Vince Yeah, I’ve done it both ways. I mean, for a lot of years I would just carry one rod and I would have flies, pre rigged barracuda flies and pre rigged on wire and on the end of the wire, I would just tie a perfection loop. So if I saw a barracuda, I would just cut my bonefish fly off and tie my tippet directly to that loop, you know? 00;13;33;26 – 00;13;56;27 Vince And for Bonefish now I use £16 tippet. You know, I used to use 12 a lot, but I’m finding that 16 is is fine. And they’re not really that typically, but so I would tie directly to that loop in the wire and then start casting. And I could I could do that within probably 20 seconds or, you know, 20 to 30 seconds at the most. 00;13;57;10 – 00;14;21;19 Vince So I’m ready to go if I see that fish, which is great. And that’s what I was carrying one rod. Now a lot of times if I really think I’m going to see a bunch of Barracuda because of the spot that I’m fishing, I will carry that extra rod rigged and ready to go. And I have a a Simms freestone fanny pack. 00;14;22;16 – 00;14;43;13 Vince I actually think they stopped making them all that that fanny pack. But it’s great because it had these two little like snaps on each side where you can put it. They works perfectly to hold an extra rod. You put the butt end in the bottom one and then you just the top one goes around the upper part of the cork and they hold the rod perfectly. 00;14;43;25 – 00;14;56;21 Vince You could tighten them, loosen them, you could change the angle of the rod. So it works really well. And, you know, pretty much if I’m in a spot where I think I’ll see a barracuda, I’ve got I’ve got that barracuda rod ready to go. 00;14;56;26 – 00;14;58;08 Rick So you’re carrying an extra rod? 00;14;58;14 – 00;15;03;03 Vince Yeah, I usually carry it extra. Now, if I’m in the boat, you have it rigged and ready to go. 00;15;03;06 – 00;15;04;21 Rick Course, Right? Exactly. 00;15;04;26 – 00;15;25;21 Vince But I also tell people when they’re in the boat, you can’t have it in the rod holder. When you’re fishing for Bonefish. Your partner’s got to be able to grab that rod quickly. So have it out of the rod holder, Out of the rod tubes that are built into the boat, have it out and ready to go, because a lot of times you don’t have you know, sometimes you have a lot of time, other times you don’t know. 00;15;25;21 – 00;15;38;20 Rick That makes a lot of sense. Yeah, I prefer, you know, the little bit I did this. You know, I do prefer carrying the extra rod. Just seems like it’s a little less nerve racking when you see one to not have to worry about tying the knot. 00;15;38;20 – 00;15;56;03 Vince But yeah, then you’ve got other problems because you’ve got your born that rod. You got to do something with it. I hate dropping it. I know some guys drop them in the water. I’m like, I don’t want to drop my rod in the water if I have to chase this fish or whatever. So I kind of, you know, take my barracuda rod out real that bonefish rod in. 00;15;56;03 – 00;16;09;01 Vince Real quickly, because, you know, you have 50, 60 feet a line out ready for a nice bonefish. And then I pop it in, you know, and secure it so that it takes about the same amount of time as if I was going to retire. 00;16;09;02 – 00;16;10;10 Rick Yeah, that’s a good point. 00;16;10;14 – 00;16;26;16 Vince Yeah. A lot of times you have you have time to make the presentation. Sometimes you don’t. Sometimes you sneak right up on them or they come out of nowhere and they see you and they’re spooked. But it usually works pretty well carrying the extra rod. 00;16;26;21 – 00;16;35;04 Rick So I guess really the key thing there is to remain calm either way and try to get secured, get ready and, you know, make a good cast. 00;16;35;07 – 00;16;59;03 Vince Yeah, well, remain calm and and start moving because the movement is what will give you away. That’s the same with bone fishing. That’s, you know, barracuda. A lot of these saltwater fish that you’re fishing to, you know, by sight. They hear the movement, they hear you, and then they’ll see you. And a lot of times, you know, Barracuda can be pretty finicky at times. 00;16;59;22 – 00;17;15;24 Vince You know, there’s there’s all types of moods I’ve seen with with with Barracuda. But but definitely when you spot one stop, don’t make a lot of noise, you know, keep your feet steady and then make your, you know, change your rod, tie your fly and whatever you have to do to get ready. 00;17;16;07 – 00;17;23;05 Rick And you talked about flies a little bit advanced, but maybe just touch upon that a little bit more. You know, is there a particular color or size? 00;17;23;15 – 00;17;43;27 Vince Oh, I use a lot of like white and chartreuse, you know, kind of natural, kind of flashy, a bit not not overly flashy, but a little bit of flash. You know, maybe 5 to 6 inches. I’m not drawing, you know, ten inch musky flies. I mean, they would work for sure, but there are a lot harder to cast. 00;17;43;27 – 00;18;12;25 Vince Of course. So, you know, flies I mean, obviously think like big deceivers, you know. But I like stuff that has a little movement in the water as well. Like there’s a lot of flies out there that imitate needle fish and they’re just like a piece of Mylar tubing. I don’t know. I don’t like those. I don’t you know, they would probably work and I know they work, but I like something that moves a little bit in the water that that maybe has some natural fiber, you know, fibers and that sometimes rabbit. 00;18;13;20 – 00;18;16;26 Vince But not huge. 5 to 6 inches, maybe seven. 00;18;17;06 – 00;18;22;10 Rick That makes sense, though. I mean, you know, you got to make a quick cast. You know, you don’t want anything to when resistance. 00;18;22;16 – 00;18;47;27 Vince No. And there’s a lot of wind usually. Yeah. So and you’ve got to be a little bit precise with the cast because you’re not blind casting. So you’ve got to have a little bit of control. And you know, sometimes you want to get that fly. You don’t want to be under casting or casting too close to the fish because they can spook, you know, And I’m convinced they see those flies in the air if you’re down for sure. 00;18;48;09 – 00;18;48;14 Vince Well, that. 00;18;48;14 – 00;18;50;22 Rick Would make sense. See the flash go in through there. 00;18;51;01 – 00;19;15;03 Vince Oh, yeah. And I’m a big proponent, too, especially with some of these spooky saltwater fish of being cognizant of where the sun is. So if I if I see a fish ahead of me and the sun is, you know, to the right of that fish, I’m going to try and make a presentation to the left, because if I go between that fish in the sun, that line will cast a shadow. 00;19;15;13 – 00;19;35;25 Vince And interesting and I’ve been told this by permit guides, you know, you don’t want to cast between the fish in the sun because that shadow will spook the fish. And it’s a tiny, tiny shadow, but the water is crystal clear. It might only be two or three feet deep. Right. So, you know, and I’ve I’ve, I’m a believer in that. 00;19;35;25 – 00;19;42;09 Vince So I’ll if I can if I can cast to that opposite side where that shadow won’t go over the fish. That’s what I’m going to do. 00;19;42;22 – 00;19;57;19 Rick That’s interesting. Yeah. That’s a really good, good tip, Vince, for sure. And you can see that, you know, you can see like a just a quick even if it was just a fast shadow going across the fish, you know, you can see how that, you know, they’re so in tune with their environment that they could pick that up. 00;19;57;29 – 00;20;17;05 Vince And these saltwater fish have huge eyes. They can see in the water. I mean, far away. Yeah, I’ve seen could a turn and see a fly 25, 30 feet away and just zero in on that fly like, like they saw right next to them. Yeah. Yeah. That’s awesome. It’s so clear the water. 00;20;17;05 – 00;20;38;26 Rick But let’s switch gears a little bit and talk a little bit about strategy. And when you’re walking the flats, stock in the flats, kind of what you’re looking for in terms of from you know, I know you’re looking for bones. Usually, but are you still looking for, I guess, taking a different approach when it comes to Barracuda? Are you looking in different areas? 00;20;38;27 – 00;20;40;15 Rick I mean, what does that look like? 00;20;40;23 – 00;21;02;18 Vince Yeah, definitely. I mean, there are some areas where I’m fishing for bonefish and I’m in a foot of water, real skinny water. Generally. You’re not going to see a big barracuda in that skinny water. You’ll see small ones. But I usually don’t even mess with anything under 35 inches just because they ruin your flies, their teeth, they chew them up and your flies down. 00;21;02;18 – 00;21;29;10 Vince So if I’m in that real skinny water, then I’m not really looking for could I’m looking for bonefish. But when I’m on a deeper flat or an edge or especially these creek mouths, there’s a lot of they call them creeks in the Bahamas, but it’s really the tide going in and out. Well, that’s a huge spot for Barracuda to congregate and wait and ambush prey, especially on that falling tide. 00;21;30;00 – 00;21;50;07 Vince I feel that on that that low end or the falling tide, all that bait that went up in the creek to feed is coming out with the tide because it’s going to be dry to shallow in there. And those barracuda, especially if they haven’t eaten or eaten as much as they wanted to eat, they’re going to be at those mouths waiting. 00;21;50;19 – 00;22;13;14 Vince And, you know, the water is a little deeper. It might be two or three feet deep, maybe four feet coming off of this, you know, that shallow creek, all that water rushing out. And that’s a really good spot. And that low end of the tide is really good. Sometimes I almost feel like they they’re desperate, like they haven’t they haven’t eaten, they haven’t gotten all they’ve wanted to eat. 00;22;14;00 – 00;22;16;23 Vince And they can be really aggressive in that situation. 00;22;16;26 – 00;22;18;27 Rick They say probably no, that’s their chance. 00;22;18;27 – 00;22;32;20 Vince Yeah, yeah. Like the tide’s coming out, the baits moving now and a lot of a lot of saltwater fish really love that moving water, whether it’s moving in or moving out. But I like for Barracuda, I like when it’s moving out and getting on the low end. Yeah. 00;22;32;21 – 00;22;45;26 Rick I think, you know, it’s interesting because the last time that I did Saltwater Fish or Bonefish, I do remember that outgoing tide towards the end of the outgoing tide is when I would see more fish, more barracuda kind of cruising around, too. 00;22;46;04 – 00;23;10;15 Vince Yeah, you know. Yeah. Part of it is that obviously they’re baits coming out, but also you’ve got you’ve got less water so there’s less area where the barracuda can be like those could as well go up the creeks but then that water will come out, it’ll get too shallow and they’ll go out with it. So now you’ve got, you know, fish more concentrated because they’re not all spread out, spread out way up inside those creeks. 00;23;10;27 – 00;23;19;21 Vince So it’s kind of a combination of, you know, increasing the odds there just because, you know, the fish can’t be up in those creeks. So they’re going to be on the outside now. 00;23;19;27 – 00;23;21;17 Rick Yeah, that makes a lot of sense, too. 00;23;21;26 – 00;23;39;05 Vince Yeah. So I’m I’m rig, you know, sometimes I’ll put the bonefish right away in those situations. Right. I’ve got some bones. Now. This is Barracuda time right now. I’ll switch rods and I’ll just carry the crude around because I’m like, I know I’m going to probably see one here. Yeah. So I do that. I do that quite often as well. 00;23;39;17 – 00;23;44;08 Rick Yeah, that’s interesting. Yeah, definitely. That’s the hunting time, that outgoing tide. Yeah, for sure. 00;23;44;08 – 00;23;51;03 Vince Yeah. And a nice thing is you can do that, You can be fishing for Bonefish one minute and Barracuda the next minute. It’s awesome. Yeah. 00;23;51;06 – 00;24;10;10 Rick Yeah, that is awesome. Do you at all fish like, blindly in some of the channels? I do remember, like, you know, a few times we would be in the boat. Maybe it would be between tides for Bonefish and we’d kind of just stop and, you know, those channels that kind of run between the flats and just kind of blind fish and some of those. 00;24;10;10 – 00;24;12;04 Rick And you’re able to get some fish doing that. 00;24;12;13 – 00;24;36;08 Vince Yeah, you can. You can certainly catch fish that way. I don’t do it a ton. A lot of times maybe I’ll see a barracuda and then I’ll lose them. He’ll go into the channel or a cloud will come over and I can’t see him. In that case, I’ll cast where I think that fish was going. And, you know, sometimes I might mess around if I’m at a really likely spot in that current’s really flowing out and it just looks really fishy. 00;24;36;08 – 00;25;03;00 Vince I’ll take some blind casts and it can work. There’s no question it could work. So I will do that occasionally, but not. Not a ton. I’m looking for, you know, I can usually find a barracuda, a bonefish, even one that tide’s kind of really low. There’s still usually a few bones hanging around on the edges trying to get some some a get a last meal so you can usually find something to catch the. 00;25;03;00 – 00;25;06;02 Vince But I’ll do a little bit of that blind casting sometimes. Yeah. 00;25;06;02 – 00;25;10;25 Rick And then along the beaches you find some like just beach fish and as well just. 00;25;10;26 – 00;25;29;20 Vince Yeah, yeah. You’ll find them along the beaches sometimes they’ll be cruising the beach. Maybe they’re going from, you know, one creek mouth to another. Sometimes they’ll just be waiting an ambush along the beach. But the beach is a great spot, a lot of fun. And, you know, you can walk up on the sand, you’re not walking in the water. 00;25;29;20 – 00;25;43;09 Vince You’re walking a little higher up. So you have a better vantage point. You could see farther. But yeah, some great, great fish have been caught along the beaches and that water is a little deeper. But again, it’s still usually under six feet. 00;25;43;19 – 00;25;50;11 Rick Yeah. And do you find them like cruising a little higher in the water column? Usually pretty easy to see off the beach or not always. 00;25;50;22 – 00;26;12;05 Vince Yeah. Yeah. If they’re moving, they’re usually cruising higher in the water column for sure. They’re not just swimming along the bottom like a bonefish would be, You know, if they’re waiting an ambush, sometimes they’re close to the bottom for sure. I like to find them waiting in ambush. That to me, an ideal situation for me would be waiting. 00;26;12;05 – 00;26;33;29 Vince And I see a fish, you know, 80 feet ahead of me. You know, maybe he’s facing in to the mouth of a creek. So he’s his. He’s facing away from me. So now I know he doesn’t see me at all, and he’s looking the other way so I can get a little closer. I might try and get within 50 feet of them slowly creep up on him. 00;26;34;03 – 00;26;59;25 Vince Within 50 feet of him. And if he’s 50 feet away, I’d like to cast maybe 60 feet, but I’d like to cast maybe 2015 to 20, even 25 feet to either side of him. Okay. You never want to cast right over the fish with a fly rod or even a spinning rod If that lure or fly is coming right at the fish, he’s going to spook. 00;27;00;10 – 00;27;22;23 Vince That applies to any fish. You know, £150 top and will spook on a three inch fly coming right at it. Plus, they could see your line and your leader. So off to the sides. And a lot of times, especially if the water is fairly calm, that fly will hit the water. They’ll hear that, they’ll hear the fly hit and they’ll turn. 00;27;22;23 – 00;27;36;02 Vince And then that first trip, they’re going to pick that fly up right away. So I think a good distance is 15 to 25 feet to either side. And again, if the sun’s a certain way, I’m going to get to that opposite side. 00;27;36;16 – 00;27;49;27 Rick So if the fish in this situation, fish are facing away from you, you are at 15 to 20 feet off to the side and you want it also 15 to 20 feet past the fish or isn’t. That is important. 00;27;50;10 – 00;28;15;20 Vince I like to do that, especially if I can make the distance because sometimes they don’t pick it up right away. They usually do, but they don’t. And you know, I’m stripping big long strips and we could talk about, you know, single hand or two handed strips. I generally don’t use the two handed. I don’t feel it’s necessary. But when that fly hits me, I start big long strips pretty fast. 00;28;15;20 – 00;28;38;11 Vince I mean, not like frantic fast, but pretty fast. Just keep it moving big, you know, 2 to 3 foot strips, keep it moving. And if I haven’t calves far enough, what happens is that fly the officials, turn and follow. And what by the time he’s kind of close, that flies already close to me. And, you know, you’ll be surprised. 00;28;38;11 – 00;28;53;12 Vince They they see your silhouette out there. And if they get too close, sometimes they spook. So by casting that extra distance, I feel I’ve got a couple extra strips in there where he’s not going to get too close to me. 00;28;53;22 – 00;29;03;11 Rick And that makes sense. I mean, obviously the further away, the more you know, more, I guess, longer the presentation is the more opportunity there is for the fish to fly. 00;29;03;20 – 00;29;22;18 Vince Yeah. Yeah. And you’d be surprised, you know, I know we talk about it with Muskie fishing when we’re especially on the Niagara River, it’s so clear those fish follow that fly. They start coming close to the boat. We see that they see us. There’s no question you’re. And you’re in a boat. You’re even higher. You’re such a big silhouette. 00;29;22;18 – 00;29;47;18 Vince And I think that spooks so many Muskie and the cutter are the same way. They they see that, they see me stripping and I’ve had tons of fish follow all my got almost to my rod tip and I’ve had them take it that close as well. But I’ve had a lot of them, you know, turn away and they’re like they see me, especially the bigger ones, the bigger they get for some reason, the smarter they get. 00;29;48;08 – 00;30;17;25 Vince And I’ve had a lot now when they turn away, you know, obviously we could see I could see everything. I could see their body language, which is really cool about sight fishing. I’ll I’ll still cast even as they’re swimming away. And it’s worked before. Yeah. Where I’ve enticed them to do it after they followed and turned away and sometimes they follow turn away and then they just kind of sit there like they’re kind of looking around and I’ll, I’ll take a couple more casts and even try and slap that fly. 00;30;17;25 – 00;30;45;17 Vince And sometimes I’ll cast. Maybe because they’re close, I might cast only 20, 30 feet and I’ll just use the rod to pull that fly really quickly to kind of get them riled up again. And sometimes that works. Sometimes they’ll come back and then I’ll then I’ll throw it back and do a couple of strips, take a couple of strips to see if I can entice them and sometimes if they don’t commit, I’ll cast to the opposite side of them like they’re facing to the left. 00;30;45;17 – 00;31;09;23 Vince I’ll cast to the right and make a lot of noise and they’ll turn and looking up. I don’t know, maybe they think it’s a different bait fish or something, right? But never give up on them. Yeah, that’s for sure. Never give up because I caught fish that have followed it two or three times, turned away, kind of seemed really uninterested and I’ve got them to to change their mind. 00;31;10;02 – 00;31;15;15 Rick And it’s just really kind of you feel like you can get them riled up a little bit by some of the techniques. 00;31;15;23 – 00;31;36;00 Vince Yeah, sometimes I mean, the moods and I think it’s I think it’s similar in musky fishing. I think the moods of the fish. I mean, I’ve cast too Barracuda where that flies hit the water. I barely got a strip in and that fish is attack the fly. He’s on it. And I’ve cast the other ones who just kind of come over to investigate. 00;31;36;00 – 00;31;55;20 Vince They follow it, you know, and they didn’t I know they didn’t see me, you know, because they weren’t spooked. They were facing away. And they just don’t seem like they want to commit. I think it’s just a lot of it is just the timing of it. Like a little bit of luck, maybe you’re on a hot fish and we see that muskie fishing. 00;31;55;25 – 00;32;15;26 Rick Absolutely. Yeah. I think I think a lot of it is timing. You know, if you have a fish that’s ready to feed, whatever that is, I mean, we we think of it in human terms as being hungry, but there’s something in that fish. It’s telling them it’s time to time to feed. They’re on a hair trigger. You put something in front of them and, you know, they just eat it without really thinking that much about it. 00;32;16;13 – 00;32;27;12 Rick Where it just seems like at other times they’re more in that neutral mode where, you know, you might be able to get them to eat. But yeah, they’re just not on that same, you know, hair trigger type of a an approach. 00;32;27;12 – 00;32;47;24 Vince So yeah, and I see the same thing with Barracuda. And the interesting thing is, you know, you’re fly fishing so you can see how they react to the fly. And I’ve, I’ve actually had fish that didn’t seem that interested and I’ll I’ll put that fly right on their nose real close. You know, there might be 20, 30 feet away. 00;32;47;24 – 00;32;59;06 Vince They followed it and I’ll let it kind of flutter down and then I’ll give it a little short, like three inch strip just like it’s kind of dangling in front of them. And I’ve caught them that way. 00;32;59;18 – 00;33;00;08 Rick Interesting. 00;33;00;29 – 00;33;11;09 Vince I’ve never tried. I don’t think a figure eight would work for a barracuda. I guess. From a boat. From a boat. It would work. Yeah, possibly. I’ve never tried that from a boat, though. That’d be interesting to try. Try that. 00;33;11;14 – 00;33;21;19 Rick Have you caught him loudly speeding the fly up near the boat? Like when they come in close, speeding it up with the ride? Tipper, Is that usually you don’t get that close? 00;33;22;01 – 00;33;43;21 Vince No, they usually. Well, we’ve caught them pretty close to the boat. I mean, we’ve caught them both side sometimes, but usually if they’re going to get it, they get it. It. If not, they see the boat, then they kind of turn off and move a little bit away from the boat. You know, they don’t usually hang around by the boat like a muskie. 00;33;44;09 – 00;33;59;29 Vince I’m plus, the water can be a little bit shallower, too. So and it’s so clear they they see us in that boat. So I have them. But I’m I’m going to I’m going to try that if I’m in deeper water. You know, the figure eight because it might it might. 00;33;59;29 – 00;34;05;20 Rick Work at least a speed up with the ride, you know, with the rod tip, you know, just speed nets lie up right at the end. 00;34;06;04 – 00;34;08;18 Vince Oh, yeah. I think it could be productive, too. Sure. 00;34;08;24 – 00;34;28;23 Rick When you have a fish, then then that’s kind of going, you know, in front of you, you know, left or right, right to left, kind of just, you know, moored at a 90 degree. Are you placing that fly in that same like 15 to 20 foot lead? How far do you want to lead fish and do you kind of pass do you want to catch passed its its path? 00;34;29;04 – 00;34;30;01 Rick How do you want to do that? 00;34;30;14 – 00;34;50;21 Vince Well, that’s where you got to be a little more careful, because if you cast past it, you know, then it’s going to look like that fish is the bait. Your is coming toward the fish. So you really got to be careful in that case, I’m probably going to cast in its path, you know, maybe 20 feet ahead of it, but in its path. 00;34;50;23 – 00;35;06;21 Vince I’m not going to cast too much past that fish because I feel he’s going to he’s going to see it like it’s coming toward him unless I unless I do it maybe 30 feet further. You know, you just got to be careful in that in that situation, that it doesn’t appear like it’s coming. 00;35;07;01 – 00;35;09;10 Rick So that it isn’t too convenient. Right? I mean, it. 00;35;09;17 – 00;35;29;16 Vince Can’t be too convenient like it’s coming right at I mean, we run into this on the beach with Snook. I mean, when I see a snook cruising a fairly decent speed, I’d rather run ahead, get in the water and have, like, a straight on cast so I can present that fly. And then when it gets close, start stripping it away like it’s moving away. 00;35;29;16 – 00;35;44;14 Vince So you got to be careful with those perpendicular presentations. But when you have a hungry barracuda, I sometimes it doesn’t matter. Yeah, yeah. You know, but I like I say, I try and get it ahead of that fish, but not, not beyond the fish. 00;35;44;23 – 00;36;09;15 Rick Yeah, that makes sense too. Like you said, that that creates a timing that would be a little bit more the, the that could work against you if you pass the fish this path too far. What do you think. I mean from a casting distance, I mean, just to give listeners an idea of, you know, what they would need to catch, they need to make in these situations, I mean, what’s your typical distance effort cast in 50, 60, 70 feet? 00;36;09;25 – 00;36;30;23 Vince Yeah, Really? Forehead Of 50 feet. 60 feet. I mean, a lot of the times it’s not a really far cast. And just like bone fishing, a lot of people think, oh, you got to cast 60, 70 feet, you know, 80 feet, you know, and but fishing, most of your presentations are 20 to 40 feet. Really, you get pretty close. 00;36;30;23 – 00;36;41;14 Vince You know, Barracuda 40 to 50 feet. You can get plenty of shots at Barracuda. And a lot of times it’s even less than that. And sometimes it can work. 00;36;41;26 – 00;36;56;01 Rick And what do you think the key to the casting, I mean, just you know, we’ve talked a little bit about casting a shadow. So I would think that getting your fly in the water quickly is important. You know, minimizing false casts. I mean, how do you what do you feel there? 00;36;56;11 – 00;37;16;07 Vince Definitely. You want to minimize false casts. You want to get the fly out quickly, especially if that fish is moving toward you. Obviously, the closer the fish comes to you or gets to you, the more likely that you could spook that fish that it’s going to be aware of your presence. So, you know, you want to get that fly out pretty quickly and start that strip. 00;37;16;07 – 00;37;36;16 Vince And I don’t like a heavy fly because I don’t want that fly to be, you know, on the bottom. I want that fly up near the surface. In fact, poppers can work really well. Interesting for Barracuda for a couple of reasons. One, the commotion they make, but the other the reason is like, if I see a fish coming, I can put that paper out there and let it sit. 00;37;36;26 – 00;37;56;17 Vince Right. Let it sit. That fish is coming. Let it sit. Now, when the fish gets close, I start popping it. I haven’t spooked it with the cast and the line overhead that flies waiting, you know, with a with a the streamer, if you let it sit, it’s going to sink to the bottom. You know, if there’s coral or if it’s sand, it wouldn’t be a problem. 00;37;56;17 – 00;38;12;02 Vince But so poppers can be really good. And that that popper called the nap. Okay. Not your average copper. It’s a real thin piece of foam and they’re pretty big and they cast the cast really well. They cast really well. 00;38;12;13 – 00;38;14;25 Rick And that’s got to be a fun way to get them on the surface. 00;38;15;00 – 00;38;34;22 Vince Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It is fun. I mean, they crush it, and a lot of times I’ve went to poppers over streamers just because I feel that noise adds an extra level of excitement to the fish. It them riled up. Sure. You know, plus they can see, you know, they’re aware of it from a greater distance to now. 00;38;34;22 – 00;38;47;11 Rick It makes a lot of sense. And let’s just step back. You know, we talked about about retrieve a little bit, but maybe just talk about speed one hand versus to hand. You know, when you’re using, you know, one versus the other. 00;38;47;11 – 00;39;20;12 Vince Yeah, like I said, I generally use one hand retrieve. I feel that it’s fine. You know, I feel that I can I can get that fly moving big, long, steady strips, I mean, kind of musky fishing. We use kind of longer strips I think as well. Well, with a barracuda, it’s the same thing. And, you know, you don’t have to be frantic about it, but I like a nice long strip and I can do it pretty smoothly and quickly where there’s not a lot of jerkiness in that. 00;39;20;26 – 00;39;31;15 Vince But a two handed strip would work very well also, you know, but I don’t necessarily think it’s critical, at least for most of the fish that I’m fishing, too. Yeah. 00;39;31;15 – 00;39;43;23 Rick Is that something you’ll throw into the tool kit? Like I’d say you’ve had a fish show some interest but did neat I mean did try that is is a different look you know really speeding it up with the two hand. 00;39;43;29 – 00;40;11;09 Vince Yeah I might, I might do that if I have a fish that’s you know seems skeptical of my presentation, I might do that. A lot of it is just kind of maybe switching the side, you know, if that fish is interested, but he won’t commit. You know, I might do a couple of casts where I use the rod and just rip that fly across the surface because, you know, when a needle fish flees from a barracuda, he skims along the surface. 00;40;11;16 – 00;40;12;03 Rick Interesting. 00;40;12;06 – 00;40;29;06 Vince A lot of bait jump out in the water when they’re being chased by a barracuda. So I’ll do that with my fly. And a lot of times that will, you know, get that fish excited, maybe coming from a neutral. You know, he was kind of interested but not ready to commit That might fire him up a little bit. 00;40;29;21 – 00;40;38;15 Vince You know, that fish is fleeing like those needle fish constantly, you know, school of them fleeing from him. It works sometimes. It works. Yeah. 00;40;38;16 – 00;40;52;07 Rick Just the visual aspect of all this is just sounds, you know, so exciting. I mean, my experience been pretty limited. I know you’ve done so much of it and it just sounds to get me excited just talking about it, especially the visual part of it, you know? 00;40;52;18 – 00;41;11;29 Vince Yeah, well it’s a, it’s, it’s, it’s a lot of fun. The hunting, the visual part. And we sometimes have that muskie fishing, you know, we’ve had that where we’ve seen fish and we’ve casso those fish that we’ve seen, either they’re floating up near the surface or even even suspended down below, and we’ve drifted past them. We’re like, Oh, we got, we got it. 00;41;12;11 – 00;41;16;01 Vince We got to get that fish. We got to go back and go after that fish. Yeah. 00;41;16;04 – 00;41;18;23 Rick And sometimes we get a reaction, you know, it does work. 00;41;18;27 – 00;41;30;03 Vince Yeah. Yeah. And you know, got it. If you had it, if we had a poling platform on our boat, if you had one on here, boat on the river, you could probably sight fish for Muskie. Yeah. 00;41;30;09 – 00;41;37;18 Rick And we’ve done that a little bit early in the season but, but I’ll bet you, you know, some of those weedy flats, even later in the summer, we could do that. 00;41;37;29 – 00;41;41;18 Vince Oh, yeah. I mean, we’ve seen, we’ve seen fish in four. 00;41;41;26 – 00;41;44;18 Rick Four feet water right into the fall. Yeah. 00;41;44;26 – 00;41;45;06 Vince Yeah. 00;41;45;15 – 00;42;06;27 Rick For sure. We talked about it a little bit, but let’s, you know, kind of talk about, you know, starting the hook on these things and, you know, I know you’ve talked a little bit about the excitement of fighting one, but, you know, maybe get into the you know, maybe some of the strategy of fighting one and, you know think tricks and things like that you’ve done with the, you know, being successful in that end as well. 00;42;07;08 – 00;42;29;02 Vince Well, the nice thing about Barracuda, even big ones, they fight hard. They’ll run a couple of nice runs and usually they tire out pretty quickly, you know, 5 minutes, 10 minutes and you can get them in. But, you know, it’s all it’s stripped setting, right? So that fish comes to your fly, you know, don’t stop it. You got to keep stripping. 00;42;29;20 – 00;43;00;20 Vince Keep that line tight. And your rod tip should always be pointed right at the fly, you know. So you’re going to you’re going to he’s going to hit that fly. You’re going to get him in the strip and just set that hook. And, you know, hopefully he hits it and turns. You’re going to get the best hook set, You know, if he hits it and he keeps coming straight at you, a lot of times, you know, that fly would get tangled up in his teeth and you won’t get a good a good hook him because he has in turn, I think, a musket for muskets or. 00;43;00;20 – 00;43;01;21 Rick Yeah, very similar. 00;43;01;27 – 00;43;19;23 Vince Yeah. When they come at you and they keep coming towards you as they eat the fly, it’s hard to get that hook set. You got to strip even longer and faster. But when they turn, I think that’s when you get the best hook set. When they hit that fly and immediately turn, that’s when you can get a really good hook. 00;43;19;23 – 00;43;40;21 Vince So then you’ve got to be ready to clear the line. I mean, because, you know, within 3 seconds or less that fish is in your back and you might have 20, 30 feet of line or more kind of laying on the water. So, you know, that loose line is kind of in your, you know, your left hand, if you’re right handed caster, that loose line is there. 00;43;40;21 – 00;43;58;04 Vince And you you know, you got to kind of just let it go through your fingers. Don’t just let go of it. Those are the line goes everywhere that that line kind of go out through your fingers keeping your let your left hand away from the rob holding that line away. And then I like to have that real tilted a little. 00;43;58;04 – 00;44;20;29 Vince So the handles facing down now I’m a right hand retrieve and I castrate so it’s different but if you’re if you cast with your right hand and you real with your left hand, just tilt that down a little. So that line, if it does catch the real handle, it’s not going to it’ll fall right off because that that first those first couple of seconds are critical with clearing the line and that’s just about line control. 00;44;21;11 – 00;44;21;26 Vince You know. 00;44;22;06 – 00;44;36;14 Rick It makes a lot of sense, I mean, because that you really need to eliminate everything possible that that line could wrap around. And there’s no question that if you have your rod especially the really out turned in, I mean it definitely can create that one more thing it can wrap around for sure. 00;44;36;21 – 00;44;50;23 Vince Oh yeah. Yeah. And you know, if had it happen to me, it happens to everybody, you know, you just it happens so quickly, you’re excited and, you know, that line gets wrapped. He’s, you know, it’ll break, he’ll break that £30 test like nothing. 00;44;51;03 – 00;45;06;13 Rick Now and then talk about their speed. I mean, are they the fastest fish when you hook a barracuda? Is there anything else you’ve experienced that kind of starts, you know, that takes that loose line and gets into, you know, taking drag as fast as a barracuda? 00;45;06;19 – 00;45;36;06 Vince Well, they’re like a like a nice bonefish. I mean, they’re really fast. Bonefish are fast, Barracuda are fast. I mean, there’s faster fish in the ocean like a marlin or a wahoo or a sailfish. But, you know, when you’re on those flats, they can move and they jump and they’ll jump sometimes vertically like a like a tarpon. But I’ve seen the fish jump horizontally, especially if they’re in like five, six feet of water and they’ll clear 30 feet in the air. 00;45;36;24 – 00;45;59;22 Vince It’s unbelievable. Yeah, That’s how that just tells you how fast they’re going. They can literally jump and they break water. They don’t land until 20, 30 feet. Yeah, that’s incredible and incredible. And their energy and they keep moving. You know, they’re that’s when they land. After that job, they’re still moving. So it’s it’s really fun. I mean, it’s just it’s lighting. 00;46;00;02 – 00;46;19;18 Rick And it’s awesome. So and, you know, as far as landing on vents, I mean, I know you’ve mentioned that, you know, they kind of tire out. You know, once they abuse their, you know, certain repertoire of tricks, you know, jump and running, you know, you try to tell them why. Why do you you know, obviously, you got to be very, very careful with their teeth. 00;46;19;18 – 00;46;21;08 Rick I mean, what’s your approach there? 00;46;21;20 – 00;46;47;10 Vince Yeah, just like a musky You’ve got to be careful handling them. If I’m waiting, I’m going to land them in shallow water, ideally like a foot of water. And when you get them in, they’ll turn on their side, tire them out, you get them in, they’ll turn on their side and then I usually grab that tail. They have a really good tail where you can tell them kind of like a muskie or a salmon, and they’ll hold them. 00;46;47;10 – 00;47;11;28 Vince So I might I might tell them with my left hand. And now, depending on where that fly is, you’ve got to decide how you’re going to get that fly at. Now, if they’re hooked on the outside of the jaw, you know, or that the shank of that hook is exposed, I’ll just use my hand to get it out, you know, holding that fish with my left hand by its tail. 00;47;12;15 – 00;47;37;29 Vince And I’ll be very careful with my hand and pull it out. But I would recommend using a pliers along those players to do that. And I carry one with me. Now, if that fly is really deep in that fish is throat, I’ll cut the line. I think that the fish will dislodge that hook after a while. And I had one experience where I didn’t do that. 00;47;38;16 – 00;47;44;26 Vince I got a little too cocky with it, with it, and it didn’t turn out so well. 00;47;45;06 – 00;47;50;19 Rick Yeah, I think I remember that you’re lucky to have a surgeon on on your trip with you, I think. Right. 00;47;50;27 – 00;48;10;09 Vince Yeah. Yeah. We were coming back from dinner. We passed this little canal that has a lot of fish, so someone would always bring a rod with them. So we’re coming back, and there’s a big barracuda in there. And one of the guys said, I want to catch it. So he, he he cast. He caught the fish. Great fight. 00;48;10;10 – 00;48;28;23 Vince It was a big fish. It was probably close to 50 inches and we landed it. But the fly was pretty deep in that fish his throat. And I’m like, Well, do you want to keep it? Because Bahamians love to eat Barracuda. So they would love it. If you bring a barracuda back for them. He’s like, Nah, I don’t want to keep it. 00;48;29;01 – 00;48;48;13 Vince I don’t want to keep it. I’m like, All right, but let’s try and get this thing out, this fly out. And we had a pretty long needle nose pliers as well to get it out. But so he had the fish behind the head with one hand and I grabbed it. Its tail with the other hand. So he had a pretty good grip on it. 00;48;48;13 – 00;49;09;11 Vince And I’m like, I can almost get that. And the mouth was wide open, big mouth, so I could fit around my hand there. And I kind of went in a little too far and that fish just kind of bucked real like, you know, almost like a kick. And the tooth caught me right in the thumb, the top of my thumb. 00;49;09;28 – 00;49;28;15 Vince I barely felt it, but then it just started bleeding, you know, And whatever we you know, I wrapped it in my shirt, stopped the bleeding, and we got back to the cottage, which was close. And one of the guys, Dr. Neal Rogers, was with us. He’s a really, really good guy, good fisherman. And he’s like, Let me look at that. 00;49;28;26 – 00;49;51;12 Vince And he is like, We should probably put a few stitches in that. I don’t know. I’ll like, okay, whatever. So he got some vodka and disinfected it and then he, we basically numbed it up with some ice. Yeah. And it worked really well in about 20 seconds he had a few stitches in it and it was good to go. 00;49;51;24 – 00;49;53;01 Rick Yeah, that’s a great story. 00;49;53;09 – 00;50;15;24 Vince Yeah. I mean, it was good, but it was it was a mistake on my part. You know, I got a little too lax with that because their teeth are just razor sharp and luckily there were no tendons cut because it could have been a lot worse. So if if that fly is in the mouth, cut the line, that fish will dislodge that fly most likely. 00;50;16;04 – 00;50;34;13 Rick And that’s I mean, that’s a cautionary tale for sure. Yeah. You know, I mean, you just definitely, you know, you on it could be very dangerous. I know the with whiskey, we carry those. Really. I have a real long nosed pair of pliers. That would probably be a good thing to do, you know, Good thing to have if you’re seriously Barracuda fishing. 00;50;34;24 – 00;50;39;08 Vince Yeah, they would be good. They might be a little tricky to carry in the pack, but. 00;50;39;08 – 00;50;40;08 Rick Yeah, that’s the only thing. 00;50;40;11 – 00;50;44;14 Vince Yeah. Yeah. Now, if you’re on a boat with a guide, let the guide handle it. Yeah. 00;50;44;27 – 00;50;48;13 Rick Are you going bar or barbed hooks? For the most part. 00;50;49;02 – 00;51;08;01 Vince They have small barbs, you know, the hooks have small barbs. We’re not. We’re not going bar with you, but you could. You could. I think just having a large enough hook, a big hook is key because there’s a lot of those teeth. You know, you got to get around those teeth. Plus, parts of their jaw are pretty pretty hard, too. 00;51;08;18 – 00;51;26;22 Vince I’m not quite as hard as a harpoons jaw, but I feel a lot of times I grab that fly and it gets mashed around in their teeth and, you know, you have that fish fight, but it’s really not in the in the flesh. It’s more just kind of entangled in their teeth. So a lot of times they’ll spit that hook. 00;51;27;25 – 00;51;33;18 Vince And I think a larger gap, the hook will be good, like a three out, you know, a big, big gap on that hook. 00;51;33;28 – 00;51;43;11 Rick Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah. I’m a big proponent of big gap hawks and big fish. You know, I just think even just for getting some of the material out of the way and everything, it. 00;51;43;11 – 00;51;43;22 Vince Just. 00;51;44;14 – 00;51;45;23 Rick Just makes a lot of sense. 00;51;46;05 – 00;52;12;16 Vince So yeah. So you get those fish in the shallows. They generally, once they’re exhausted, they don’t flop around much. They pretty much lay there again. You just got to be careful removing that, moving that hook. The other thing to be mindful I know this sounds crazy, but you want to get that fish in a foot of water. You don’t want to landed in two feet or three feet of water. 00;52;12;16 – 00;52;37;08 Vince A couple of reasons. One, you know, if it hasn’t turned on its side, it could still kick and kind of go towards you. I mean, so technically it could hit your leg. But the other thing is I’ve had 40 plus inch barracuda eaten by sharks. Sharks, they sense that that fish is in distress and even three foot sharks will eat a four foot barracuda. 00;52;37;14 – 00;53;00;14 Vince Yeah, if he’s in danger and they think he’s dying, they’ll come and get him. So you want to land that fish in shallow water where those sharks can’t come around because they’re not after you? But sometimes in these remote Bahamian islands, the sharks are aggressive, They’re not scared of you. They sense a meal. They’re going to come and eat that fish right next to you. 00;53;00;20 – 00;53;02;22 Rick Yeah. Yeah. You could get caught even if they did. 00;53;02;22 – 00;53;03;24 Vince Yeah. You don’t want to get you. 00;53;03;27 – 00;53;06;12 Rick You could get caught in the collateral damage. 00;53;06;21 – 00;53;36;16 Vince Yeah. Yeah. And there’s another cautionary tale when bone fishing. A lot of times, if I’m going to land a nice bone fish or even a small bone fish, I don’t want to land that bone fish in the deep water because unless you’re very aware of your surroundings, because I’ve had clients that I’ve been fishing with a hook, a bone fish, you know, they’ve got their rod up, the fish is ready to come in, the rods high and angled back to bring that bone fish in so they can grab it. 00;53;36;28 – 00;53;56;11 Vince And they’re just about to grab that bone fish and all of a sudden a huge barracuda comes in and literally gets at Bonefish four feet from them. And, you know, if they been grabbing that bonefish and that would’ve came right at that exact second, they’d have been in the emergency room. Yeah. 00;53;56;26 – 00;54;08;22 Rick Yeah. Really good tips events for sure. I mean, I think that’s the one thing you got to remember. You’re out there. It’s a you know, you’re in their environment. It’s a wild area and you have to be always cognizant of that. 00;54;09;02 – 00;54;27;28 Vince Yeah, Everything eats everything in the ocean. The cooties are a high on the food chain. Yeah, but it’s not like in freshwater where the mighty nothing is eating almost exactly. Yeah. Stuff will eat barracuda. Yeah. And sometimes even in three or four feet of water, you can see a67 foot shark. You know. 00;54;28;01 – 00;54;28;19 Rick Exactly. 00;54;28;29 – 00;54;41;28 Vince The great thing is the water is so clear. You see the sharks from far away. So, you know, you’re aware. You should be aware that there’s one around. Get out of that water. Get into shallow water where the fish is going to come. 00;54;42;05 – 00;55;00;21 Rick I remember that one time we were on Eleuthera and we were. We were I don’t know if you remember it, but we were waiting at one flat and an outgoing tide or no on an incoming tide. So it was was going up. And I remember a bull shower, probably five, six feet kind of went in between and the shoreline. 00;55;01;12 – 00;55;04;15 Rick And I always remember that as. And it wasn’t far away either. 00;55;04;25 – 00;55;22;10 Vince Yeah, you got to watch it. There’s a lot of, you know, the Bahamas, Mexico, a lot of sharks, especially in the Bahamas. There’s a ton of sharks. And they’re looking for an easy meal and a bonefish that’s hooked or a barracuda that’s hooked. That’s an easy meal because they can’t they can’t catch a bonefish. They can’t catch a barracuda. 00;55;22;10 – 00;55;39;16 Vince Right. You know, unless it’s being slowed down and tired out by the angler. So, yeah, it’s kind of cool. It adds to your kind of the mystique of the whole thing. You know, you got to you got to be aware of so many things and. Those saltwater flats. 00;55;39;26 – 00;55;42;04 Rick Definitely adds to the excitement for sure. 00;55;42;15 – 00;56;03;19 Vince But a lot of people are scared. Not a lot of people, but some people are scared. Oh, I don’t want to be walking in water with sharks, but they’re really not after you. Sometimes they’ll come close. Out of curiosity, I just stomp my feet real hard and the sharks usually take off. You know, I’ve never been in a situation where I thought the shark wants to bite me. 00;56;03;29 – 00;56;08;00 Vince You know, they’re thereafter smaller prey and injured prey. 00;56;08;00 – 00;56;11;10 Rick All good things do definitely keep in mind Marine out there, you know? 00;56;11;18 – 00;56;12;10 Vince Yeah, for sure. 00;56;12;26 – 00;56;26;10 Rick Well, this has been great, then. I mean, yeah, I think both in terms of some great information and and I think anybody that’s listening couldn’t help but being extremely excited about going after Barracuda the next time they’re in the saltwater. 00;56;26;23 – 00;56;50;09 Vince Yeah, there’s so much fun. They can be challenging but they can be easy sometimes It just it’s just you’ve got to be ready for them and they’re so much fun to catch. They take great photographs too, because they’re big. They’ve got really cool teeth, you know, they’re silvery with black spots and they’re they’re just they’re they’re a fun predator to target on a fly. 00;56;50;09 – 00;56;50;17 Vince Right. 00;56;51;00 – 00;56;58;29 Rick And you get some great photos. I mean, talk maybe about that for a couple seconds. A lot a lot of those are self taken, I think with your GoPro. 00;56;59;10 – 00;57;34;19 Vince Yeah, a lot of times I’m fishing by myself or I’m far away from my partner and I carry a GoPro that’s on a small foldable tripod and I just carry it right in my my pack. You could even put it, I could even put it in my pants pocket and if I get a fish that I want a picture of toward the end of the flight, I’ll pull out that camera, you know, while I’m holding the rod with one hand and use my other hand to pull out that camera, I can kind of open up the tripod pretty easily, and then I’ll set it in shallow water. 00;57;35;04 – 00;57;55;04 Vince It can go on up to probably six, eight inches of water or on a rock or on the shore. And I just click a button, the button on the top of the GoPro, and it starts recording automatically. So I don’t ever have to take that fish out of the water. It’s great for the fish. And I just get in position. 00;57;55;29 – 00;58;21;10 Vince All that fish, it’s recording the whole time and you get, you get some action where the fish is. You’re fighting the fish with a rod, then you’re unhooking it. You hold it up quickly for a few seconds, you know, angle it right, and you can release it. It’s really, really good for the fish. The fish doesn’t have to come out of the water except, you know, for a few seconds when I lift it, you know, to show to the camera. 00;58;21;26 – 00;58;27;23 Vince And it’s worked really well for me. And I could pull stills, you know, pull still pictures right off of that, that video. 00;58;28;01 – 00;58;33;12 Rick Yeah, I know you’ve you’ve definitely had some great photography of those particularly or some of the bigger fish that you’ve got. 00;58;33;26 – 00;58;55;07 Vince Thank you. Yet it’s nice and and I feel that you know I’ll use it for lots of different fish bonefish, a snook, even sometimes steelhead back home and it’s just nice because that fish doesn’t ever have to come out of the water other than for, you know, 5 to 10 seconds to lift it, put it back down. Yep. 00;58;55;20 – 00;59;16;06 Vince Yeah, that’s perfect. Good for the fish. I don’t ever like to bring fish up on the sand, the dry sand or the dry land in a freshwater river. The fish is always in the water, except for a real brief moment when I may lift it just to hold it and then put it right back down. Let it go. 00;59;16;15 – 00;59;17;08 Vince That perfect. 00;59;17;08 – 00;59;38;28 Rick Perfect. While we wrap things up here, Ben, let’s just the last thing. Maybe just go over how people can get a hold of you if their interested in some of your hosted travel, you know, with learning more about, you know, that part of it, why you do go in after Bonefish, going after Barracuda, maybe you can just tell the listeners how they can get all of you. 00;59;39;12 – 01;00;05;08 Vince Well, I love to talk about fishing, Bonefish, Barracuda, Steelhead, anything really, anything that you can catch on a fly. My website is at Cattaraugus Creek Outfitters dot com or CCL fishing dot com. They can they can reach out to me there they can reach out to me on Instagram. That’s cool. Fly fishing. I’m happy to talk anytime. 01;00;05;21 – 01;00;24;07 Rick Sounds great. Yeah, we’ll get that information in the notes for the show as well so you can get a hold of Vince. My you. I’ve known Vince for many, many years. We fished together. He’s great guy, great person to fish with. So if you’re interested in saltwater adventures, I mean, definitely get all of them. 01;00;24;07 – 01;00;29;25 Vince Well, thank you, Rick. Thanks for having me. It was great talking with you. And we got to get out fishing soon. 01;00;30;09 – 01;00;47;13 Rick We will, Vince, for sure. And thank you for being and thank you for taking the time. Some great information here. I think, like I said, people will be very excited about, you know, their saltwater adventure and very excited about pursuing Barracuda. And you give them some really good information to do that. 01;00;47;13 – 01;00;57;15 Vince So, yeah, you’re welcome. And if you haven’t fish for Barracuda, do it. If you’re fishing in the salt, have a rod ready. Go. You’re going to love them. If you’ve never call when you’re going to love them. 01;00;57;20 – 01;01;01;02 Rick I think that’s the perfect way to end it here. So thanks, Vince. 01;01;01;12 – 01;01;04;25 Vince Thank you, Rick. Take care. 01;01;04;25 – 01;01;28;18 Rick Thank you for listening to The Hunting with the Fly podcast. For more information, please go to my website. Rick Custard qcom or follow me on Instagram at Rick Hostage. Please tune in each month as we talk to expert fly anglers about the pursuit of Apex fish species and remember to always enjoy the hunt.