Matt: 0:01

Thank you for tuning in. This is going to be the very first episode of the redacted podcast. This is all new to us. This is something we just started doing a few months ago and putting the set together, building all this out the lighting, microphones, audio equipment, audio board and it's just my wife and I doing this and we're learning. I mean, we didn't know anything about podcasting or broadcasting or anything like that before, so it's new to us and hopefully the show gets better over time. Hopefully it's good now, but we're striving to get better over time and improve what we do.

Matt: 0:41

But we really needed to do this show. We just felt it was something that was lacking in the podcast interview world and you know we see it over and over again. I mean, I watch a lot of stuff. You see the same hundred or so people you know out of a country of 300, 350 million people. You see the same hundred people telling the same stories over and over and over again and they get to kind of have the monopoly on being the subject matter experts on stuff. So the point of this is that we could want to have real people, real people with real stories. You know not the celebrity scientist and the you know that influencer and this influencer. We wanted to hear real stories.

Matt: 1:33

Also, we bring our guests on anonymously, so that does a couple of things. It protects their reputation and their identity so that they can speak a little more freely, I guess, and be able to be more open about the particular subject that they're talking about. And these are stories we might not ordinarily hear if they had to put themselves publicly out there, share their identity. So it does that. And then the other part of it is they have nothing to gain from coming on here and interviewing besides the fact that they feel it's a story that they need to share, that it's something they would like to enlighten, you know, the viewers, the audience on, or something they want to get off their chest. So it offers that part of it because there's no motivation, there's no ulterior motive to it. They're just on here to share the story and I think that's really cool.

Matt: 2:33

So our guest today is a crab fisherman from Alaska. He's been doing it for 30 years. When we get guest on, we don't necessarily vet or fact check or censor what they're going to say, but we do verify that they are who they say they are basically. So you know we verify that he is a crab fisherman and he has this experience and he has basically the authority to speak about what he's going to tell us about today. So as you listen to the episode, it's a cool story and it's I guess it's an old story and part of the reason we even have this podcast it's the big guy versus the little guy and you'll see that as you, as the story kind of unfolds and you can draw your own conclusions on why things are the way they are or why the crab season has been shut down for a couple years. And you know, basically just listen and learn, and that's what we're here to do. So enjoy the episode and thanks for tuning in. Okay, thanks for tuning into the redacted podcast.

Matt: 4:20

We have our guest here today who's been so gracious to come under the guise of being anonymous. He's got a hell of a story to tell, really, really interesting. Behind the scenes back there we got Pamela, who's been sworn to secrecy. She's not going to say who you are, I'm not going to say who you are and we can talk freely. So how you doing? I'm good, I'm good. How are you? I'm doing good, man, good. So when you first kind of messaged us. You messaged us. So the idea is you've been a crab fisherman for a really long time? Yes, and the kind of headline or the subject line your message caught me. It's like there's a problem with king crab and snow crab and the government is basically messing with the numbers and the markets being manipulated, the catches being manipulated, and I felt that a little bit like when I saw that, because I do. I like to do low country boil, seafood boils, cook and king crab like I love it.

Matt: 5:34

And the price has just gotten outrageous. Like I don't know, has it tripled Even more?

Guest: 5:43

so yeah, you can pay. In Fort Lauderdale at a couple of restaurants they're paying $100 a leg Holy cow, a leg Holy cow. Yeah, so, but that's for you know, those really upper crust kind of people over there, yeah, yeah, but not just me throwing in a price. Yeah.

Matt: 6:04

No, that's not us. But that price is still just the market price of king crab is ridiculous.

Guest: 6:11

Yeah, it is, it is Well, it's because we haven't had the fishery for the last couple years and basically most of the crab is coming from Russia.

Matt: 6:23

So you were in Alaskan, so you were a crab fisherman in Alaska and that's kind of your experience. How long have you been doing that?

Guest: 6:35

Well, I moved up to Alaska in 1970 with my father. He was in the Air Force and graduated high school in 79 and started working on fishing boats and tug boats and that led me into the king crab fishery and the snow crab fishery out of Dutch Harbor. I started that in like 87-ish right there, right in that neighborhood and really liked it, enjoyed it and made some amazingly good money.

Matt: 7:11

Yeah, yeah, well, that's like kind of like people might recognize like Deadliest Catch and that's Dutch Harbor, isn't it? Yes?

Guest: 7:19

Correct yeah Okay, yep, yep, they do the Deadliest Catch there that actually has. Before that show came out, I would be in a bar drinking, and what do you do? And I'm like, oh well, I work in Alaska, I catch crab. I'm like, oh okay, yeah, show comes out. Same scenario. What do you do? Oh well, I catch, oh, like on the Deadliest Catch, yep, like that You're a fucking celebrity and then here it comes. Are you on the show? Like, have you seen me on the show? So no, I'm not on the show.

Matt: 7:55

So you didn't end up on the show, but I remember just when I spoke with you on the phone beforehand you mentioned something about like they, they kind of take the drama boats Correct for the show and then. But most of the fishermen are normal good operating.

Guest: 8:13

Yes, that's correct. Yeah, as was you know as with anything if you yeah, it's entertaining. You got to have that aspect of it.

Matt: 8:21

Yeah, so yeah, it's just a bunch of guys going out and catching crab with no problems isn't really entertaining.

Guest: 8:28

No, not at all.

Matt: 8:30

Right, yeah, like you'd see, like the Discovery crews and shit up there, like oh yeah, yeah, I know some of them yeah, personally.

Guest: 8:39

Yeah and I have worked on a couple of the boats. I worked on one of the camera boats, but they don't. They want you to sign a release. Okay, right, to work on the show. Yeah, I didn't want to sign it.

Guest: 8:54

So, okay, I, I, you know you're gonna take pictures of me and stuff. You need to pay me. That's how I see it. So Fuck it. You know, yeah, I mean it's just not right. You know, yeah, the owner gets the money. If you look at the boats, all the captains are owners of the boat. Okay, that's because they can make decisions right now about whatever is happening. Okay, right, you don't have to call somebody here.

Matt: 9:22

Yeah right.

Guest: 9:22

Yeah, the owner gets a certain amount of money Per season and if he's a good owner he'll kick down to the crew.

Matt: 9:32

That's for the show money.

Guest: 9:34

That's the show money. Okay, the crew gets like any other boat. They got their quota, their aficion, you know, and that's it. Yeah, they can get sponsors. If you notice, over the years They've all gotten maybe patches or yeah they can do that right, making their own little, trying to make their own money. Okay, right, yeah, yeah, so they. They dramatize a few things here and there, but, as we stated, you got to to keep it interesting. Yeah you know, they're all pretty good guys.

Matt: 10:06

Yeah, well, I need. If anything it brought awareness to one. Your job yeah and then a big way well, in, yeah, a good thing, I mean the, the awareness, I guess, is good, people know what you're doing and, yeah, yes, they understand it a little bit more even like in Europe, same thing.

Guest: 10:26

Oh, what do you do? I fish king crab. Oh, like deadly is catch. Yeah, like that. Yeah, you know there's a. There's some things that could do like. One of the things I don't see is I had a group of boats I fished with and so we Would mess with each other yeah, constantly, okay, and they don't do that very much, right, like, for instance, I'll haul your trap and tie a 20-foot piece of pipe on it with the line going through it. So when you put it in there and get it up, there's a pipe in your pots, 20, 20 feet down there in the water. You got to get the crane and it's a whole deal.

Matt: 11:09

Yeah, fucks you up a little, yeah, a little prank right.

Guest: 11:13

You haul the trap, you put the bridle on the other side. Yeah you weld the door shut, put zip ties on it. You know the at nighttime will drift. You're in the middle of the Bering Sea, so you just drift. Everybody goes to sleep. Yeah, aha, go over. And you'd throw mayonnaise and eggs and yogurt, you know whatever kind of old, rotten food.

Guest: 11:36

You got all on the boat and just yeah, and then take off and they know it had to be one of the five boats, but they don't know which one. Yeah right, so all that kind of stuff you know sounds like fun. It was fun, yeah, you know used to be the kind of job that you know as a blast, your comradery with the guys. You know we got some money too. All right, you know that's how it was and it's not like that now it's totally changed. As with many, Many industries throughout the United States, it's changed. You know they all they're trying to do it for the money and you can't do it for the money.

Matt: 12:13

You're gonna go home after a short amount of time they're trying to run it like a Like too corporate. Maybe is that. Is that what you're?

Guest: 12:22

well that I was talking more about Individuals, like guys that come, like the young guys that want to work, you know and come and it's not. The money's only gonna keep you there for a little while. You have to really get a love, enjoy it to do it, because it's brutal. Yeah, there's no doubt about it, it's brutal.

Matt: 12:42

You probably got to love your crew too. Like yeah, that bonding.

Guest: 12:46

Well, it takes a while to get it all figured out, right, yeah, it's a sport team. Yeah, right, it is really. It's the captain running with the guy on deck that's throwing the hook for the buoys. You know, you got a time it. You know the way you stack the traps and coming back, it's all a whole effort by a team. Yeah, you know, and that drama you don't want that. That's what you don't want.

Matt: 13:12

Yeah, right unless you're on a TV show, unless you're on TV show, right.

Guest: 13:17

But you know you want smooth, easy, happy, at good times, because you'll work 18, 20 hours a day, every day.

Matt: 13:25

Geez every day, and for how long are you?

Guest: 13:29

Typically out like.

Matt: 13:31

Is this for three weeks at a time, or two weeks or a month?

Guest: 13:34

Typically two weeks, three weeks. Right in there Back in the day right now those guys are ten days, fourteen days. You know fishin's good. Yeah, you know they're doing well now. They just had another season. They let us fish king crab. 2.1 million pounds is what they allotted for the crab fleet this year. Okay, after being closed for the last two years.

Matt: 14:00

Okay, well, we'll get to that, that's right.

Guest: 14:03

Yeah, so.

Matt: 14:07

So they. So, before we get to that part, maybe for people that don't know, and I don't understand a whole lot about it, how does um Crab fishing, just generally kind of work? I know you're putting traps down, but there's, there's certain depths you're trying to put them at and Certain species you're trying to catch, and or not species. But you know, male, female crabs Right, it's not aile crabs.

Guest: 14:38

Yeah, so typically, like Lobster crab all crab species they will move up into the shallows near shore, okay, and they will reproduce and then they will shed their shell and get a new shell, okay, right, and that's how they grow like a lot of people, like the soft blue crab Okay, I don't like it, but some people do, and that's what they're harvesting them at that time when they're shedding so they're harvesting, they just shed it.

Guest: 15:08

Okay, right, they just shed it. They get the new shell, but inside the meat isn't. You're not solid yet, yeah, so it takes about a month or so. Right in there, yeah, once they feel they're good enough, then they start marching back to the deep, okay, where they actually live. Okay, right, and you're trying to figure out where they're at in that Path, right, they do this in the summertime Up in the shallows, and then towards the end of the summer they start moving out, okay, and we typically fish all that in the winter time, all in Alaska.

Guest: 15:44

So, king crab season, king crab snow crab bear die and that's because the meat fill of the crab is really good.

Guest: 15:52

There's no issue at all. Okay, I'm sure you've had a crab. You cracked into it and like, oh, there's not much in here, little hollow, yeah right, it didn't have enough time to to grow out, so okay. And then so when you you set all the traps we typically use herring, ground herring or sardines or there's a few different things you can use. You also put a piece of hanging bait in there, like, say, a salmon head or some Cod heads or even a whole cod, okay, and set them out, and then You'll you'll do certain little patterns in the very beginning, hall them back and then you'll see what you got, and then you start fishing. Okay, after you you figure out what you see, you know in your gear, like these over here empty and these here are better, but these here are really good.

Guest: 16:42

So so we're gonna so now I'm gonna kind of concentrate right there in that area, okay, and work on them, and then you put some feeler traps outside that. So if they break and run on you, you see which direction they ran. Okay, right, because it's all about food source. Yeah there's as any animal.

Matt: 17:01

Yeah, they're chasing the food.

Guest: 17:03

They're chasing. As long as the food's good, they're there. Food runs out, they're looking so, but where'd they go? They go north, they go south, they go deeper, they go shallower, yeah, right. So you put out your feeler traps around. That gives you. You know nothing, nothing. Oh, right, here to the east. They ran. So they're going that way. Oh, you can keep up with them.

Guest: 17:23

Okay, right, get your gear in front of the movement, let them move through it until they find their new Spot that they're gonna settle down and work on this area. Okay, right, and so that's the the basis of it, right? And then, after you get situated, then you just haul gear, all haul, haul until the boats full, yeah, right. And then boats full, everybody's happy, steaming in, everybody sleeps. There was a vessel one year so. So typically it's probably at least a day, sometimes two, depending on where you're fishing, to get in, to make a delivery, okay, right. So, and now you've just worked all these long hours, everybody's tired. Yeah, might have been two weeks of some really hard work. Yeah, you're steaming in. So we had a vessel that they were steaming in.

Guest: 18:18

Everybody went to bed, skipper was driving the boat in and he went down to the, the freezer. He wanted to get a count on what bait was left so he could put his order in so when they delivered, right. So he went in the freezer to do this counting. Well, during the trip the inside plunger to get out of had broken and nobody fixed it. Okay, the door closed behind him. Now he's stuck in the freezer. The boat is steaming towards Dutch Harbor. The crew has been awake for two weeks. They are in zombie sleep.

Matt: 18:55

Oh right, there sleep, sleep.

Guest: 18:59

He banged and pounded, he wrapped plastic around his self with the food that was in there, you know, and yeah all this stuff. And he heard the back Hatch open and close. One of the guys decided to get up and, instead of going in the head, he went outside to take a pee on the back deck, okay. And he heard it and he started pounding and the guy was like what is that? What is that noise? And he figured and he went over there and opened it up and there was the frozen skipper, the frozen skipper.

Matt: 19:38

Yeah, yeah but he, it could have been over. That could have been a very bad, so it could have been over.

Guest: 19:43

Yeah, yeah Well it's funny, oh it's funny that they got him though.

Guest: 19:48

Yes, yes, yeah, at least he didn't dangerous job, I mean same boat few years later sank, all hands lost, including him, few years, like four years after that. That's horrible. Great boat, great skipper, good crew, everything. Don't know what happened. Boat went down. I was on scene probably five hours. There was three other boats. When I got there, there was nothing. There was no floating buoys, there was no oil slick, there was nothing. It just disappeared and he gave the lat la on or where he was, and we all came but yeah, yeah, there was nothing. I mean it was gone and this was a boat that was a hundred and sixty feet, geez it's not a small boat just down gone.

Guest: 20:36

He hailed and one of the boats was there within an hour and that everything was nothing too late. Not even the raft came up, like we have rafts that that deploy in an emergency that didn't even come, so Don't know what happened. Terrible, yeah, it's very dangerous.

Guest: 20:56

It's gotten better Because of the time frames, right, you don't have to take as much risk now, but it's definitely still dangerous and it's even getting, I will say, a little more dangerous because the excuse me, the, the older guys that work on deck, yeah, then know what's up, are getting out, and those are the ones that are teaching the young guys oh, dude, don't stand right there. Yeah, don't do that. Yeah, right, don't do this, don't do that. Yeah, you know, that's how you learn all that stuff, right.

Matt: 21:27

Yeah.

Guest: 21:28

And and so it's getting worse because the old guys are getting out and the young guys are don't know, and half of them don't even Really want to work.

Matt: 21:40

Really, yeah, that seems like. It seems like one of those jobs you almost don't have a choice, like if you sign up to do that, you know that's gonna be. Oh, those guys that quit hard-ass work.

Guest: 21:51

Quit out two days, real quit. So now, oh, so a guy quits, all right, yeah. So I say okay. So we put 12,000 pounds on the boat. So far of crab. Okay, so this is you. You're getting your cruise share of 12,000 pounds. Okay, you're going to your room, right, your state room, and that's where you will stay.

Matt: 22:15

Okay, don't want to work. You don't want to work. We're not going back. You're still. I'm not going in. That's not going to happen. No, you're still in the fucking boat.

Guest: 22:22

Right, we're making money. I can't go in. That cost money. I had to spend a bunch of money just to get out here. Yeah, right, so no, so you're in your room. I usually leave you in there for the day. The next day I'll come and say all right, here's the deal. You can either stay in here or or you can cook for the guys and you can do some stuff and you can get out of your room. Yeah, by law, I can keep you in there. You quit? Yeah, so right. So they usually okay and they'll at least cook. Okay, I've never had nobody just say no, I'm just going to stay in my room all by myself. Yes, and I've had some extremely, I'll say, tough guys that thought they were bad and they probably were. Whatever streets they lived on, whatever they came from, they probably were a bad asses, okay, but this is a completely different game. Yeah, it's mental, it's physical, it's super, super hard. I mean it's 18 hours of physical labor every single day.

Matt: 23:29

Yeah, it's hard. Well, there's different kinds of tough.

Guest: 23:33

I mean yeah.

Matt: 23:34

Yeah, like I mean you hit that well and we had that when I was in the military. You had guys that were, you know, tough in their neighborhood or tough in sports. But then you get into these high stress, very dangerous situations and I've seen dudes just crumble yeah, and people you wouldn't expect yeah Like oh man, you know, this guy kind of walks the walk you know, or it seems and talks the talk, but does he really have what it takes and those environments I mean?

Matt: 24:09

I mean that's got to be similar to the military being on a boat like that yes. I to where it's. It's high stress and it's your team.

Guest: 24:17

And you're dependent on other people. You can't do it by yourself.

Matt: 24:20

For your life. Yes, not only for success, not only making money but that's I mean your. Your fucking life is on the line.

Guest: 24:28

I tell new guys all the time pay attention. There might be a moment that you tell this guy that's been doing it for 15 years hey, look out. Yeah, you might, you might, you don't know. Yeah, that's what's going on out there. Yeah, it's. It's you against mother nature. Yeah, it's a boat. You're in 30 foot seas. A crab pot weighs 1500 pounds, so you put that on the end of a crane.

Matt: 24:55

Right, just the physics of that yeah. That mass just swinging around.

Guest: 25:00

Yeah, so the crane. So you have to. When you're running the crane it the brakes won't. They'll stop it, but it's going to go 10 feet further before it catches Because of the roll of the boat. So you have to stop on the right roll to get it to stop. Stop Right, it's all a big timing thing. It's it's, it's it's. I loved it, I. I thought it was great, I was good at it, I enjoyed it. You know, like an adrenaline thing.

Guest: 25:33

Absolutely, yes, absolutely, yeah. There's all kinds of stuff, like when you get all the pots on the boat or traps on the boat, you got to chain them down. Well, some of the boats to hang over the side of the boat by two feet.

Matt: 25:46

I've seen that.

Guest: 25:47

I've seen that so you got to climb down the side of the traps and if you fall you're right in.

Matt: 25:53

You're in the drink, man.

Guest: 25:54

You're in. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I fell in, uh, in February fishing opies in the Bering Sea. Oh geez, I fell over the side of the boat. That just sounds cold as fuck it was. Um, I went in, flipped up, looked up at the boat and the first thing I said is, wow, this is really big. And then I said I'm drifting away. And then I said there's like not really anything to grab on to. Huh, I never thought about it, right, never thought about that. But I'm in the water. So, as this is all going through my head, my partner is on deck and he's got a face mask and he rips the face mask off and he looks at me and he goes you're in the water, like what are you doing Right?

Guest: 26:45

And then he reacted and they sent the hook down and I got right back on the boat, so luckily, luckily, it just sounds so like subtle, like your reaction, his reaction.

Matt: 26:56

Yeah Well, I feel like you'd be like freaking out like oh fuck, I'm off the boat, but you're just like man, this is a big boat.

Guest: 27:04

You gotta stay calm. Yeah, right, yeah. And I've been on probably. Well, let's see three fires and four sinkings. Okay, all saved, all managed to make it. I've only been on one boat that sank on me. It's a pretty good record. Pretty good record, right. But it's about being calm and guys that you think you can count on, like I knew one of the guys that worked with me. He was one of those halo guys, the high altitude, low entry guys. Those are some crazy gentlemen. That's crazy. That's a crazy gentleman, right, yeah, solid workers, solid deckhand, great guy. He was on a boat we had an emergency, frozen like a statue, him and another guy like a statue. I fixed what we had going on. It was a steering thing and a pump thing filling up a tank. Anyway, got it fixed, I got done. I'm like so what's?

Matt: 28:05

up what the fuck happened.

Guest: 28:06

Is the raft ready? Do we got blankets, flashlights, food, water? Are we ready to get off if we have to? Yeah, no, okay. So what do you think? See?

Matt: 28:19

frozen.

Guest: 28:20

Maybe next time, I hope. The one guy a different boat two years later, was the hero of the boat. He reacted, took control, made it happen.

Guest: 28:30

Boat completely sank, went down, flipped upside down. The line from the life raft started wrapping up in the propeller because the boat was still in gear motor running. Yeah, right, they're supposed to be. It's called a painter knife in the raft and you're able to cut free. Yeah, it wasn't in there. He chewed through the line and broke a tooth. No shit, yeah, half inch line. Chewed through that like a rat. Right, holy fuck, but God has done. Yeah, because it was winding them up into the propeller. Like well for, for, for, for right.

Matt: 29:10

Yeah.

Guest: 29:10

Yeah, yeah, but he made it happen. But some guys you can count on, some you can't. I've always had a very calm demeanor about me and all these different situations I've been in Just have a knack for it. However right, thank God.

Matt: 29:29

But it's. I don't think you could do it otherwise, absolutely not, it would. It would stress you the fuck out. Yes, like if you're high strung.

Guest: 29:38

Well, just being out there, yeah, right, you could let your mind run wild with what if, yeah, I mean, you're 300 miles offshore, what are you going to do? Yeah, nothing, freezing cold water. You against the elements? Yeah, you know, and as a young person, I yeah, bring it, let's do it, yeah, yeah, yeah, I got off on it. Yeah, I did it again. You know, it's confidence.

Matt: 30:03

Absolutely. Yeah, I've been there.

Guest: 30:05

Yeah, of course you have.

Matt: 30:06

Yeah, I have a feeling so, and I think part of what people miss maybe a little bit is you know you're out there, you're doing a job. It's dangerous as fuck, but I mean you're feeding people. This is putting food in people's mouths, and not only from what you're fishing, but I mean there's small businesses, there's people feeding their families off of this. That have been, and this is a way for them to make money. I mean it's, it's something that's very important.

Matt: 30:43

I mean, we look at it, as you know, maybe from the outside when we don't think about it, but like, kind of like a farmer or something like this is food, this is food. People need Same scenario. Yeah, and without people who are fishing, raising livestock raising crops. I mean, we'd fucking starve. We're in a world of hurt. Oh yeah, there's a lot of people to feed.

Guest: 31:08

Yeah, absolutely yeah. Well, that's that's why you have all aquaculture coming on strong. You know you've got mass production farms here already with pigs and cattle and chicken and they can't even keep up. Yep, you know, that was the whole eight billion people in the world mark and it's, in my opinion, it's because at eight billion, you are maintaining your food. Your food can't really grow anymore than it already is. It's maxed out, yeah, but people are gonna. So now you're gonna go the other way, right. You're gonna get more people and less food, and it's hard to fix that. They say by 2035 that half of the sea or the seafood will be derived from fish farms. Wow, right, so it's a big, it's, it's coming, right. I mean, people got to survive.

Matt: 32:10

You got to survive. So kind of then, on that note and I mean kind of the, the antithesis of what we're talking about here, what is the government doing with the snow crab and the king crab? I mean, considering that, you know, people need this food, people need this money. It's livelihoods. It's not only the people working on the boats. There's a lot of ancillary industries. There's a lot of ancillary small businesses, distributors. I mean there's people all the way down the line making money. So what was kind of your experience and your story from the beginning with how they're messing with the, basically the fishery?

Guest: 33:01

So so it's kind of like. It's kind of like blank mark coming into a town and forcing out, blank mark right, Coming in and forcing all the mom and pops out because they can't compete. Yeah, in Alaska you have Wendy's McDonald's. They all got boats, but they're not. They're not their boats, but they provide those fish sandwiches that everybody likes to eat. They're made right on board the boat. Sure, you're talking a 350 foot boat. It's got 50, 60 people on it.

Matt: 33:47

Yeah.

Guest: 33:47

And it's a big factory and it pumps out them fillets. Yeah Right, they are the real providers of the food. Okay Right, because of the amount that they provide, I mean they put some numbers in and that's like your, your Pollock, your white fish.

Matt: 34:05

Yes, right, that's what they're getting.

Guest: 34:06

And those are, that's the trawl fleet, the guys that drag the nets behind the boat. Okay, so those fisheries are the ones that really rule the whole fishery and how everything goes. And what I mean by that is is when they drag their net and they catch a bunch of other stuff besides Pollock, right, that's called bycatch, okay. Okay, the problem with it is it comes up all dead because it's been pulled through the ocean and the fish are backwards and they're all dead. So you got to give it all back to the earth, right? Okay, they have lobbyists in United States of America and Washington DC that say, hey, we need this and this for these boats to operate, meaning they want quota, they want bycatch quota.

Matt: 35:01

Right, they want it to be increased. They want it to be increased so that they have to operate? What happens when they reach their bycatch quota, they have to quit.

Guest: 35:11

Okay, they can't be out there anymore.

Matt: 35:13

So this keeps them on the water that keeps them on the water. The machine it keeps the machine running Right.

Guest: 35:22

So now they're given the bycatch numbers, each year the fisheries will do king crab, the king crab fishery. They come and they say, okay, we're going to do a survey. They're gonna hire two boats to go out and survey the stocks of who's doing the survey? This would be NOAA National Marine Fisheries Okay, right. Government entities Okay, right, that that govern those fisheries. Yeah, right, so they're gonna come and they're gonna do a survey.

Guest: 35:56

Now I Question why they do the survey, and the reason I question it is is because a vast majority of all the boats in Alaska commercial fishing, the hook boats, meaning the long line boats, the trap boats for crab and the trawlers all have an observer on board from the federal government. Okay, like a NOAA observer, a NOAA observer on the boat to collect data about what you're doing. Right, that's what they're on the boat for. On the big boats, they have two of them, jesus, right. So there's 24 hours. They monitor each other, but they collect all this data about what's going on. You know, yeah, like, like our king crab boat that say, okay, I'm the next trap that comes up, I want to survey it. So they all will stack it in the corner and they'll open it up and they'll go through the whole thing, measure it all, everything right, and then they stand there the rest of time and they look and you know they write stuff down about what we're doing all this information and they're marking where you're at your location.

Matt: 37:02

Yes, they have to have full access to that.

Guest: 37:05

Yes, Okay and some of them don't understand how that even works, right, like lat-lon. Yeah, okay, but so they? They get all this data and they send it in. Okay, that's a quite a bunch of data, every, every fucking boat every season right, not every boat. Well, it's like 80% or so. That's a lot of boats. You also have to be a marine biologist to be an observer. Okay, right, so you got a degree that you actually know what you're looking at. Okay, a.

Matt: 37:41

Lot of these people have to be like fresh out of college, though. Absolutely gonna save the world, because that's a Well that's a hard job for someone maybe older, with a family and kids, if you're gone and out a lot, not saying it's.

Guest: 37:56

It's not, but.

Matt: 37:57

I see a lot of young people being kind of Taking to that kind of job.

Guest: 38:03

I think, well, I think what happened is because I, because they're on the boat and they're part of your crew, you talk to them, right, yeah, yeah, what happened with a lot of them that I've met man marine biology that sounds like a really cool job. I want to do that. Yeah, they get the degree and when you get out of school, there's no jobs for a marine biologist who hires marine bar. Where's that at?

Matt: 38:30

Fishing boats in Alaska, so they created.

Guest: 38:33

In my opinion, they created a Way to employ all these young men and women. Okay, right, and give them a job, which is great, but the boat has to pay for it. I have to pay $400 a day for them to be on the boat. Geez, I have to pay for my own policeman.

Matt: 38:55

Okay, leave it up to the government to come up with something like that.

Guest: 38:58

So now we got all this data every year, going back like 15 years or something like that.

Matt: 39:04

Okay, so that would make sense. You, you paid, or I mean in an indirect way. The consumer paid mm-hmm for this data, right, and they're not using it?

Guest: 39:19

No, Well, I I can only assume, because I'm not in their yeah, you know arena. But they come along now every year and say, okay, well, we need to do an actual survey of the crab, we want to hire a couple of crab boats and we want to go out there and, you know, see for ourselves what's going on.

Matt: 39:41

So they're gonna hire you off season Yep to take them out with like a small crew? Yeah, and Just drop them in some spots. Drop some traps.

Guest: 39:54

Yes, so they, they get on the boat and you know we get them all squared away and everything these different Noah guys than the ones that are typically on board. Yes, these are actual scientists, not from no or from Noah. From now, these are trees older, maybe more Experienced knowledgeable.

Matt: 40:15

Yes, been doing it years and years with the agency. So they're bringing out. These are the big dogs, correct, and they want to come out, do the survey, they hire Somebody like you and then your bow to take them out, and then what happens?

Guest: 40:29

So they they get on board, we get them squared away. I know generally where they're gonna go. We untie, we leave like okay, where you guys want to go.

Matt: 40:37

What year is this, by the way?

Guest: 40:40

For me personally, I did that like in the specific one.

Guest: 40:43

Yeah, like in 94, 95. Okay, I did OP survey. Okay, okay, snow crab, okay okay. And they Give you the paper where we're gonna go. Okay, right, the lat lawn and everything like. All right, cool, yeah, let's get it up on the plot, or see where we're going. Get it up there, put the information in. I'm like, oh man, wow, that's not a good area at all. There's nothing there. Why are we gonna go there? Hey, you guys, come up here. Let me show you something. They come up like this is the plotter, this is the fishing grounds, right here, right, you guys want to go here? There's nothing there. I know I'm a fisherman, yeah, right, and nothing there. We need to go over here. This is where the crab are over here. Well, no, we need to go there. Well, that's a waste of time. Let's call somebody, let's get your boss on the phone, or whoever. Yeah, nope, they won't even do that. They won't. They will not vary from what they were told to do. So we head out, we set on their pain.

Matt: 41:50

They're, they're paying, they're paying for it. Take you out, so you're gonna go where they want to go ultimately, at the end, correct?

Guest: 41:56

because they don't want any input from Fishermen myself that do it for a living. Yeah right, two weeks, we're gonna do this for two weeks. I've been out Before on a three-week trip that I didn't catch one crab for three weeks, and I do it for a living. Okay, yeah, right, but you're a scientist, you know right where to go and what to do. You should be a fisherman, really, then, if you know you know if you know where they're at, okay, right.

Guest: 42:22

So we go out, we set them like they want, we haul them back and guess what? Nothing in them. Oh man, surprise, surprise, fisheries crashing. Oh man, what? What are we gonna do? Well, we should probably close it For the crab fishermen. Okay, we'll close it. I'm gonna close it for those trawler guys. Yeah, we're actually gonna let them catch a little more.

Matt: 42:48

Well, they have the lobbyist, they have the lobbyists?

Guest: 42:52

right yeah, they're the real meat and potatoes of the fishing industry, where the real food is Produced like crab, for instance. That's a high-end food. Your average person doesn't eat that.

Matt: 43:04

But you're feeding people, but you're still feeding your contributing the snow crab.

Guest: 43:08

However, every time you went to a Chinese buffet anywhere here in the United States, that's snow crab, yeah right. Yeah so yeah, you know, but that's the other one that's closed till now. They're saying they disappeared.

Matt: 43:21

The snow crab disappeared.

Guest: 43:23

Yeah, they. They're saying they're gone. They don't even know where they're at. How can that be? Oh, what do?

Matt: 43:29

you mean, they're there.

Guest: 43:30

They're there. Yeah, they again increased the bycatch limit For the trawl fleet. They got more snow crab to catch, so obviously you're dragging up snow crab off the bottom Wherever they're at. Again, you got an observer on that boat that's given the information back to the agency that, hey, these guys need More bycatch quota. We're gonna get shut down.

Matt: 43:56

So they're saying that there's no snow crab, correct? And at the same time, they're pulling up a shit ton of snow crab, so much so that they need their bycatch quota increased, correct? So there is snow crab, correct. Lots of them, correct, probably, more probably.

Guest: 44:20

Why? That's a great question. Why yeah?

Matt: 44:25

a great question. Well, the little guy is. I mean that's yeah, yeah, probably answer number one. Fuck the little guy, absolutely.

Guest: 44:35

The big corporation With the lobbyists, yeah, well, the more you force the little guy out right as within blank, won't Blank Mart? Right? Yeah, same up there. The more you force the little, the more the corporate votes get control and they get more quota. Okay, right, the whole thing's based on quota. Yeah, everybody's got their amount. They're allowed to catch.

Matt: 45:00

Yeah which you need some regulation on, it, right Well they did that to help.

Guest: 45:07

Well, the first thing they did was is they bought out Whoever wanted to be bought out in the crab fishing industry. The government said, hey, if you want out, we'll buy your boat, we'll give you top market value. You can still keep your boat, we'll buy it, but you can still keep it. But it can never be in any fishery In the world. That was one of the stipulations they made.

Matt: 45:31

What the hell are you gonna do with the boat?

Guest: 45:33

Research. You know you could do. There's a lot of things. They're awesome boats. It was stupid. They should say you can't crab fish with it, but you could do anything else because they're amazing boats, right? So, anyway, that was the first thing they did. So they did. Some of the guys got out and they reduced it down and it still wasn't enough. So then they said, okay, well, we're gonna do quotas now, right, we'll do quotas. So when they did the quotas, they gave it to owners and they gave it to captains and they even gave deckhand chairs. Okay, okay so it seemed pretty fair.

Guest: 46:09

But the captains and the deckhands got a pittance of quota, right Enough so that you can't fish it on your own. You have to pair it with somebody else because all the expenses involved, right. So now what happened? Is the owners that own the boat got quota. Oh, wow, hey, you know what I'm gonna do. I'm gonna lease the quota to myself. Ooh, I like that. I own a quota and I own the boat, but the boat can't fish without my quota. So what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna lease the quota to my own boat and take 60% off the top of the catch for myself. Geez, right, that's what happened.

Guest: 46:58

It's a lot of shit going on With the whole quota system, right? And it didn't help. Yeah, it was supposed to help, also with safety, because we, you know, before the Olympic system, go catch it, yee-haw, you know, in the bad weather. Well, now they said, okay, well, we'll do this and you can do. Sounds good. The fish houses turn around and say, okay, we're not taking any crab past this date, so you gotta go out and get it and get it in here. So it didn't accomplish what they wanted, right? No, it's still not. You're still fishing weather to get it done, because they're not gonna buy it after that date. Yeah, because they're gonna retool their factory and start doing codfish and they're not gonna do crab.

Matt: 47:41

Well, it makes sense, right, and it's one of those things that you know it sounds like a good idea. But if anyone actually thought it through and I mean just in general, the quota system or conservation of the fisheries, like it sounds like to the you know the layman that sounds like something that makes sense. It's like, okay, well, we wanna keep the fishery healthy.

Matt: 48:04

Right, yeah, we want to help people keep their jobs, we want people to make money, we wanna bring in food and you know, seems like a win-win for everybody. But when you hear things like there's no crab, increasing the bycatch, I mean that's crazy, because these big ships, the trawlers, bring in this bycatch. No, no, no, they're just chucking it. They're just chucking it, yeah, but I mean it comes in or it gets in their net Up onto the boat, yep, and this just gets chucked Right back over. Nobody uses it.

Guest: 48:41

Nobody eats the animal's dead, correct. It's just an entire waste, like major waste. We're talking millions and millions of pounds of waste. The only way I've ever come up to fix it is let's say you own one of the boats. We're gonna take your last 10 years of history and in the last 10 years you made $50 million a year with that boat. Okay, so that's your number. You're gonna leave and you're gonna keep every single thing you catch and you're gonna process it on your boat and when you reach $50 million, you're done, come in and tie up.

Matt: 49:22

It's over, that's kind of a common sense of purpose.

Guest: 49:25

It gets them out and back. Yeah, right.

Matt: 49:28

And then you're not wasting.

Guest: 49:29

Then you're not wasting, you're not destroying the fisheries. Yeah Right, because the way modern fishery is, not just with us here in the United States, but worldwide. It's pounded on constantly, and I mean constantly, with the exception of when, whatever species you're doing spawns. There's no fishing at that little time right there, that's it. Yeah, but the rest of the time right. I talked to these guys in Alaska that went up to some of the like gnome and kotspiew up where the villages are.

Matt: 50:05

Yeah.

Guest: 50:06

And they did core samples of outhouses. Right, you know, because that's what they got up there. You got outhouse, yeah, right, they got core samples of that. And they went like back a hundred years or some shit, and what they found was is okay, this tribe right now, or whoever's using this outlet, they've been eating halibut like for two years. Okay, now, that's done. Now we're gonna do codfish. No halibut anymore at all. None. All codfish. Okay, that's done. Now they switched to redfish, now they switched to crab. They had all these layers of how the natives ran their system. Yeah, because, if they, because they just go right there, they don't go away.

Matt: 50:50

Yeah, they're not going far, it's just right there.

Guest: 50:52

But if you overfish it and then switch, then you eliminate all of it eventually. So they had it figured out. They gave it time to rest Some rotation.

Matt: 51:02

Yes, Like rotating crops.

Guest: 51:04

So to speak right, which the big farmers don't do anymore either. So you know, give them them pesticides and all that fertilizer. But same concept, right? But that's what's going on worldwide. The fisheries are being pounded. You have technology now. You have machines now that'll tell you what fish it is, Not just that there's some fish on the screen. Yeah, that's Pollock, that's cod. It tells you.

Matt: 51:31

So you're scanning, yeah, the machine. From the surface and you can tell exactly what's there?

Guest: 51:36

Yeah, you know, before it was just colors. You know red and like this and you can see the fish, right, but you don't really know what they are. Yeah, right, but now they have technology that tells you what they are. Geez Right, and that's what's going on.

Matt: 51:52

The technology is we should be able to use that. Yeah, yeah, that should make things exponentially better, but it doesn't seem, because you're also fighting with this bureaucracy. Yeah, there's a bureaucracy to it, there's lobby money to it, and instead of using these things in a good way to help the fishery, to feed people, to keep the jobs up and to protect and conserve, you know, just kind of going by the wayside, yes, and almost like arbitrary policies, yes, don't work. So, specifically with the king crab, they shut the season down. What was it?

Guest: 52:41

It's been. This was the, would have been a third year and they let us fish this year, the prior two years, no, completely closed.

Matt: 52:50

No king crab At all In Alaskan waters, in Alaskan waters, correct.

Guest: 52:55

Zero, zero, wow, absolutely not. And you know that affects some of the boats. All they do is crab fish, that's it. They don't do other fisheries. You know, back in the 80s and early 90s you could switch from one to another, and all that right, yeah. But you got to have all the proper permits now and all that right.

Matt: 53:18

They make it next to impossible to To be able to switch and to be flexible.

Guest: 53:22

Yeah.

Matt: 53:23

Yeah.

Guest: 53:24

Really to make your operation survive. They make it difficult. You know what I mean. Yeah, they impose these rules, these regulations. You know the observers like 400 bucks, not just that, they want full internet access to do their reporting that they don't use. Okay, that's about three grand a month to have satellite internet, right? Geez, all the guys, the crew's happy because they're all online now too and stuff right. But that's a whole extra expense On top of everything else.

Matt: 53:59

These are small businesses.

Guest: 54:01

Yes, I mean crab boats are, yeah, crab boat, you bet, wow, you know. And the fuel's going up, bait goes up, food goes up. Right, the price you get for your product has pretty much maintained. It hasn't gone up, hasn't gone down, but it just kind of stayed. I mean we got for the last seven years 53 cents a pound of codfish, like across the board. That never went up, still hasn't gone up. But we're paying where we paid, 45, now you're paying 90 cents for bait. Yeah, and you know all about fuel, right?

Matt: 54:42

Yeah.

Guest: 54:43

Yeah, it's kind of expensive in Alaska. Oh yeah, right, yeah, even though it should be maybe a little cheaper. We got a lot of refineries up there and oil.

Matt: 54:56

That's a whole nother can of oil.

Guest: 54:57

That's a whole yeah.

Matt: 54:59

Yeah, yeah, seems a little fishy.

Guest: 55:02

Right.

Matt: 55:04

Yeah, to say the least. So in your experience fishing and I guess kind of the I guess the point of this or the future of this is, you know how does that kind of look? And for people that aren't involved in the industry and don't know a lot about the industry, it's important. I mean, it affects everyone at some point.

Matt: 55:31

I mean just farming, fishing, gathering food, getting the food that we eat. What does the future look like and what are maybe some common sense things, just from your experience, that could make this you know better for the environment, but also profitable and productive?

Guest: 55:56

Well, I hate to say it, but they got to get control of the trawlers, because the trawlers with the bycatch right and also you know how it works is as they drag a net behind the boat, right, but they drag these big pieces of steel in front of the net. Okay, because that's what guides the net. They're big rectangle pieces, they're kind of curved and they're always trying to go out, which opens the net right. So you can control that. So one of the tricks worldwide is they will run the doors those are called doors, those big steel pieces.

Guest: 56:37

They will run those down into the bottom ocean floor, right, just tearing up the bottom, even though they're not supposed to be doing that, just tearing up the bottom Right. And the reason they do it is because when you drag the doors through the bottom sediment, it stirs it up. Yeah, and now the fish are confused and don't know which way to run and they get a better chance of getting them in their net yeah Right, so productive to them More productive for them, right, but they are absolutely destroying the bottom right, Because all of the creatures that live on the bottom are around some kind of structure meaning rocks coral right.

Matt: 57:22

Shipwrecks what?

Guest: 57:23

else.

Matt: 57:23

That's where everything lives. Yeah, I mean most stuff in the ocean. Correct Right Lives on the bottom.

Guest: 57:28

Not much stuff here lives in the desert right. Exactly All the animals live in the forest and good areas, same on the ocean floor.

Matt: 57:35

Structure, structure, yeah.

Guest: 57:37

Right, yeah. So they're driving around destroying the structure because that's where all the fish are, okay, so they're trying to get trapped or whatever you're trying to go for, right, so they need to get them under control, which is going to be a difficult task, because they have power. Yeah, you know, yeah, they have power, and it's just getting worse and worse. With a mount, they just built another 385 foot ship, brand new one for Alaska. Geez, right, yeah. Trailer, yeah, trawler, yeah, yeah, geez, yeah, some of those guys half a mile wide than that. The opening is half mile, oh fuck.

Matt: 58:26

Right, yeah, that's just gobbling up everything.

Guest: 58:29

Everything right. But there are guys that don't, and there are good trawler men for sure. Yeah Right, that are true midwater trawler guys. There are good and everything right.

Matt: 58:43

Yeah.

Guest: 58:44

You know. But if you're out there and you've been doing it two weeks and you're not catching too much, then you're going to change your tactic because you need to make money. Yeah, that's the bottom line. So if you need to put the doors in the mud to make that happen, to put fish on the boat, you're going to do that. Yeah, that's just how it is.

Matt: 59:03

Well, and it's like, kind of, like you said, they're focusing so much on controlling all of these other small things with arbitrary regulations, but then they're not looking at the elephant in the room. Yeah, no, they're not. And I mean they have the ability to do it. Yes, but it's just like, once again, bureaucracy, arbitrary things that we're looking at here. They just don't give a fuck about. I mean, you'd think they would. That's the sales pitch.

Matt: 59:41

They don't give a fuck about the environment At the end of the day. It almost seems like that. It seems like because if they're going to let the trawlers do whatever the hell they want and then go after the little crab fisherman they don't give a fuck, right?

Guest: 59:58

Well, they know they can't go after the trawlers, assume they'll law your up, right? Some guy that owns a crab boat that's barely making it? You can't law your up. Yeah, he's broke, he's just going to give in. He's going to give in. He's got no choice. You can't fight that.

Matt: 1:00:14

Beaten up and the crab boats are probably not doing anywhere near the. I mean, is there a lot of bycatch with crab?

Guest: 1:00:22

No, no codfish, that's about it.

Matt: 1:00:26

Yeah.

Guest: 1:00:27

You know? No, it's probably one of the cleanest fisheries in the world because of how it's done in the trap right.

Matt: 1:00:35

Alaskan crab fishing yes, yeah.

Guest: 1:00:38

You do long line. I don't care where you long line anywhere in the world. If you put out 750,000 hooks but you're targeting swordfish well, I'm pretty sure you're going to catch a bunch of other stuff too.

Matt: 1:00:52

Yeah.

Guest: 1:00:52

There's just no way around it. Right and it's but in. But a vast majority of the fish you catch, you're they're alive, you're able to like, de-hook them and let them survive.

Matt: 1:01:04

Yeah.

Guest: 1:01:05

Some are dead, but the vast majority. But the trawl fishing, the way the trawl comes through the water and the fish all get stuffed in there, one after the other, into a net. They can't even move, yeah, and the only way a fish survives is for water to go in the mouth and out the gills, right. So if you're backwards in there, you're done, or sideways, or any of that, you're done Absolutely. And you know. And they bring it all up on deck and then they got. Well, they're called pews, they're like a broom handle with a pick, a steel pick, on the end of it, yeah, and they just flick off the stuff they don't want, shovel in the holes what they do want, that's it.

Matt: 1:01:47

Man, yeah, there's a lot going on there too, and I just I don't think people see it. No, absolutely, and it's like no, I don't know what the name of that documentary is. There's a documentary where they're talking about ocean plastics and ocean litter. Oh, yeah, yeah, and you know, we're doing stuff like paper straws which is what did they say? It was a 1,000th of a percent of what they find in this. What did they call that thing? The Pacific, yeah, the garbage patch. The Pacific garbage patch yeah.

Matt: 1:02:23

So they got this thing out there. It's filled up with just about everything else besides plastic straws, Correct. So you know, in these, I know a lot of countries in Asia are just dumping garbage yeah.

Guest: 1:02:40

We still do it here in New York City, yeah. All that they take barges out and dump it Just right into the ocean. Yeah, still today it's been done Really, yeah, yeah.

Matt: 1:02:51

And here we are with paper straws.

Guest: 1:02:52

So people are like you know, I've worked more than half my life on the water.

Matt: 1:02:56

Right.

Guest: 1:02:56

Been out there and people are like well, what is the most prolific garbage? You see, number one, mylar balloons, really Number one, and I don't know if it's because they really they're flashy.

Matt: 1:03:13

Yeah, and you can, really you can wow. You know what is that?

Guest: 1:03:17

Because when you're out there, that's what you do. You're like going somewhere and you know what's that, let's go see, right. So you cruise over there and it's those balloons are by and by far the most trash I see.

Matt: 1:03:33

Well, those things are fucking indestructible too.

Guest: 1:03:36

Right and 99, they just let them go Like birthday balloons and stuff. Yeah, birthday anniversary, all that right, that's fucked up. Yeah, that's the number one, even more than plastic bottles.

Matt: 1:03:49

Really, yeah yep, just a ton of fucking Mylar balloons.

Guest: 1:03:52

Yes, but by and large in all of my travels everywhere it's like there's a little bit of garbage and nothing for miles and miles and then there's something. I've never seen a great Pacific garbage patch. I've been where they say it is and I didn't see it. I'm not saying it's not out there, but I didn't see it. Okay, so I don't know. But they're obviously doing good and I hope they keep up that good work. It definitely needs to be cleaned up for sure.

Matt: 1:04:26

Well, and I mean fishermen when you're talking about the water. I think, in just even my fishing my own recreational fishing and talking with fishermen and commercial fishermen. Like some, of the best stewards of the environment are the fishermen, or if you're talking about hunting, it's the hunters, because they're out there, they're relying on this in one way, shape or form. They're working in it all the time. They're seeing things firsthand. So if anyone wants it, well, taken care of, it should be done.

Guest: 1:05:03

And they know how it works. Exactly Right, that's the other part of it. Like, for instance, king crab, there is a size limit of what you're allowed to catch, and that is measured across the back of the crab and not including spines. Okay, so it has to be a certain width, okay, for?

Matt: 1:05:24

all the crab.

Guest: 1:05:25

Yeah, yeah. People say, oh, that's because that's what the market demands. No, the reason it's done is because in the life of a crab you're harvesting out a grandpa. That's out of the cycle.

Matt: 1:05:43

They're not making new crabs.

Guest: 1:05:45

They're not in that. They're not that young male over there doing their thing Eating grandpa crabs. Yeah we're eating grandpa, right, but that's the idea. You don't destroy the fishery, you're harvesting out something that will not affect that.

Matt: 1:05:59

That's a good thing.

Guest: 1:06:00

That's a great thing.

Matt: 1:06:01

Yeah.

Guest: 1:06:01

Right, that's a great thing.

Matt: 1:06:03

Yeah, huh.

Guest: 1:06:04

Yeah, you know, and when you do catch, like you know, crab with a bunch of eggs and females, you know, Get them back in, be nice, you know all that stuff right.

Matt: 1:06:14

You're taking good care of what is it's your future, your future, it's your future. Yes, and that's something I think everyone's gotta keep in mind.

Guest: 1:06:23

Absolutely yes.

Matt: 1:06:24

These guys out here, like if you had to get a message across I think that's part of it is these guys out here, like yourself, know what's going on and maybe we should be listening to them?

Guest: 1:06:37

More.

Matt: 1:06:38

People like yourself, Right, the people who are out there and the people who it affects, instead of you know, scientists or lobbyists, or and they don't seem to be really putting your voices out there no, not at all, and that's something I was excited to bring you on for, because I think that is important for other people to be able to hear. You know right from the horse's mouth, so to speak, what is going on with commercial fishing. Instead of you know newspaper articles and talking heads and people who just aren't involved in it?

Guest: 1:07:15

Yeah, because it's across the board. It's all the West Coast and the East Coast. It's the same government agencies monitoring all of that national marine fisheries or NOAA or some cases it's the state, but the state still coordinates with the feds right on what they're doing. Exactly Right, but it's the same everywhere. It's the fact that I don't understand what's wrong with saying, hey, we want to do a survey, we're going to hire you, please go find whatever we're trying to find. That's what you do. I'm not a scientist, I can't science.

Guest: 1:07:53

You can't science, I can't science okay, but you can fucking fish, but I can fucking fish, so why don't you hire me to go get what you want and let me do it the way I know how to do it, not the way you, as a scientist, want to do it. That don't work. If it worked, you'd be an awesome fisherman, right? If you could just zoom right out and land on them, wow.

Matt: 1:08:18

And then if we let people who are the experts do what they're the experts at, and if I think they so, basically, what you're trying to say is get more input too.

Guest: 1:08:29

Yes yes, yes actually all the input right? Yup, Because that's what I do. Yup, my whole life, or the vast majority of it, is catch grab. What's weird is in Russia we had scientists on the boat. Okay, they would come up and say big problem, and when they put the word big in front of problem, it's a big problem.

Matt: 1:08:54

We have big fucking problem.

Guest: 1:08:56

Yes, duh, duh, duh, yeah, duh, yeah. Yeah, I'm like all right, what's the problem? Like we catching no Sumpka, no females. Yeah, like, oh, I can't sell females, so I'm not catching females, I don't want females. Oh well, we need females. Okay, we can do that. So we stack 10 pots on the boat I drive over 20 miles, splash them in the water. Couple days late, come back full of female king crab. They're like perfect, everything good. Yeah, woo, fishery strong. So Russia gets it. Yeah, what the fuck is that they get it? They're like yeah, whatever, you know what you're doing, put us make it happen. Oh, right on.

Matt: 1:09:43

So these are like the Russian scientists. Are they Russian observers?

Guest: 1:09:47

Yeah, russian scientists. We didn't have observers. They have fish cops, right, but I'm in Russia, so the fish cops have already been paid off before they even get on the boat, before they even get on board. Okay, right, they get on board. They spend generally three to five days with the Russian captain. That's on there. They stay in his room. They get fucking hammered, right, he gets off the boat. He got a personal $5,000, new rain gear and probably, more than likely, he's gonna take one of the big tubs of ice cream. That's he's gonna take that too. That's yeah, fuck it. Ice cream is the one thing on every boat I've ever worked on anywhere in the world. Hey, I'm going to the store. Do you guys want anything? Ice cream, okay, gotcha. Anything else? Nope, you know, get whatever. It's fucking nice.

Guest: 1:10:50

Make sure you get some fucking ice cream, though, like they're on it, they love their I don't know.

Matt: 1:10:55

gotta have it gotta have it, but it was. It's kind of funny, like the. I mean, do the Russians almost seem to do it better, manage their fishery better?

Guest: 1:11:10

Yes, yes, okay, if you implemented their. It's crooked, If you implemented the way they do their scientific stuff here. Okay, yes, but you can manipulate that system big time. Yeah, right, so it's the same as us. The government says, hey, we're gonna allot, you know, 40 million pounds of king crab. If you want to buy it, you gotta come to Moscow and you gotta buy your share of the quota in cash. Oh, wow, so now that limits the players. Okay, right, yeah, now we're down to the oligarchs, because that's nobody else right, so they buy the quota right.

Guest: 1:11:52

The guy I worked for, the last guy. We started with one boat, built him up to 14 boats, four cargo ships and a tanker. Jesus, it's like a navy. And we did everything offshore, delivered the crab, everything off there. So the freighter would come in, you'd offload the crab, take all your supplies back. They would leave. The tanker would come in, tow, you float the fuel line back, fill you up with fuel and you're fishing, jesus, right.

Matt: 1:12:25

It's efficient.

Guest: 1:12:27

And very, very efficient. Right To run all that about 100 million to run all that, pay the crews, the fuel, all that about 100 million. The crab proceeds 800 million. So he's putting five to seven in his pocket. That is a fuck ton of money. The last guy was oil and gas and lumber. Before I even got involved he wanted to be a fisherman and or do the crab thing and my phone rang and he's like hey, you come here, maybe speak me and maybe we, because I worked on the Cam Chat, because side first right On the Alaska side.

Guest: 1:13:10

This is entirely on the other side, the Barence and I hadn't been over there yet, so my name got out there and I'm like, yeah, I'll come and sit down with you. We can talk about it and everything. I spent seven years with him. Liked him One of the only Russians I worked for that when you shook his hand and he said he would do it, he did it.

Matt: 1:13:31

He was honest, yeah right, that's a goddamn good thing.

Guest: 1:13:36

Yeah, yeah, he was good. I enjoyed all that over there in Russia. It was a blast.

Matt: 1:13:42

So, with all of this experience in fishing in Russia, fishing in Alaska for a lot of years, what do you think I mean to kind of round this all off, to finish this off? You're one of the old guys, the old veterans in it. What do you think the next few years are gonna look like for Alaskan king crab? I mean cause I want some. I don't wanna pay that much.

Guest: 1:14:14

Just my own selfish reasons. I hear you, it is good.

Matt: 1:14:18

What's your crystal ball say on it?

Guest: 1:14:20

I would say that we're still gonna struggle. They're still gonna low ball right. Even though those guys went out, most of them did 10 days. At the most came back in, caught their quota, done 10 days 10 days Geez.

Matt: 1:14:35

That's a whole Fisheries. Terrible, though right, it's horrible For a year. Yeah, that's it. That's their quota for a year, for the whole year 10 days, 10 days. That's incredible, right, yeah, you know you put and that's all that fucking boats used for.

Guest: 1:14:50

Yes, a handful, and some of the other ones do tendering, which is in the summertime you go and tender for the salmon fishery.

Guest: 1:14:59

Yeah yeah, right, you do that and that's gear and keep contract and it's usually three months, and then you crab fish and then that's it, right. But still, those boats, you're gonna put majority of them, you're gonna put at least 15,000 gallons of fuel on it to go do anything. Yeah, so 15 times five dollars, that's a lot, right, that's a lot of fucking gas. That's just to leave the dock to go do something, right, jesus, because your owner guy has to. That's got it up front. Yeah, you know, there's no like out bay later.

Guest: 1:15:32

Yeah, you know, putting $7,000 worth of food on there. Yeah, you know, for your crew for a three week trip. Yeah, you know, you got bait. You're gonna spend another 12,000 or so on bait and that's all right off the top that comes up.

Matt: 1:15:49

That's before you've made one.

Guest: 1:15:51

Food, fuel and bait and taxes, and if you got a lease fee, that comes off too.

Matt: 1:15:57

Right. So these guys struggle Absolutely and you don't. Without some big changes, you don't see it getting any better, Absolutely not.

Guest: 1:16:07

Nope, Nope. It's got to the point now that it it's having a hard time recovering.

Matt: 1:16:13

Yeah.

Guest: 1:16:14

You know, it's always been able to before recover and get better, right, cause it's all um sikflative, right? Everything in life is right. Most fish are. Most fish are six year cycle, seven year cycle. It's good. Three years later it's bad. Three years later it's good again, right, that's? You know.

Guest: 1:16:35

Crab or strong cod or down Cod or strong crab or down, yeah, right, so, but when you're not giving it the chance because other fisheries are involved in your fishery, that shouldn't be, yeah, you know, 10 days it's over. So now we have the entire rest of the year for the crab to recover? Yeah, well, that would be true, except for now we have the trawl fleet that's going to go in and mess with them, so they're not going to recover and they're not going to be strong because they're involved in areas they shouldn't even be in. Yeah, you know the whole thing. Like they have sea lion rookries in Alaska. Okay, so that is a designated spot.

Guest: 1:17:20

All the boats run with AIS, right, so the government follows all the boats. They can see them. They know instantly If you even swerve into the sun or into the rookery, right, like a little bit, yeah, and come out. $2,500 ticket immediately. Okay, jesus, right away. Yeah, the rookeries were designed to keep the trawlers from getting all the sea lions in the nets. There are no sea lions at any of the sea lion rookeries because sea lions, as with other animals, used to be a lot of feed here. Now there's not. Now they're about 40 miles over that way because that's where the food is, but those rookery still exist. We're still going to target boats that even venture in there. Yeah, they'll even give you shit.

Matt: 1:18:13

Just like arbitrary, yeah, once again, just another.

Guest: 1:18:16

Let's say you're on a small boat and weather comes up. You need to hide. Now it's behind a rookery. Oh, it doesn't matter, you're getting the ticket. That doesn't matter. Yeah, yeah, but it was for the safety of my crew and my vessel. I had no choice. Yeah, it doesn't matter, you're getting the ticket.

Matt: 1:18:33

Yeah, they don't care, they don't care, they don't care, they don't care.

Guest: 1:18:36

None of them care, like what is actually like the Nash Marine fisheries. What do they actually do for the fisherman? Exactly, they are against everything we do. They don't help you, they don't do any good at all. That.

Matt: 1:18:55

I see. Well, I'm not even helping the environment, no, in the process. Like you could see if there was another side to the. Okay, we have to be there for, I guess, the environment or the fishery, the physical fishery Right, and the fishermen are kind of the other side of this. So it's a balancing act, but it's not even that Right From what you're saying. It's just like arbitrary, kind of useless and not helping anybody out.

Guest: 1:19:26

And it's across the board, right Like we live here in Florida. Okay, yeah, have you ever? Can you buy lobster anywhere around here? No, we live in Florida. Why not? Right, I don't know why not. There's a huge, large, huge fishery in the Keys and Miami. Yeah, all goes to China. Really, red lobster gets theirs from Honduras.

Matt: 1:19:55

We don't buy our own lobster.

Guest: 1:19:56

We don't even buy our own stuff, and that's a problem, right? You're importing all these other places for money to be made by whoever, right? Yeah, but yet your own people are suffering because it's going somewhere else. Yeah, you know. And then it's just, it's not. The whole system is messed up. We should be able to get lobster anywhere in the state.

Matt: 1:20:28

Yeah, the prime location of it makes it really all ohh, it makes no senseっ for people who stehen by it.

Guest: 1:20:38

It's a realm of formalities. Yeah, they're having a lot of it, like you know when we gave you this thing AA-001, it's very, it's very beautiful. Oh, I don't know, like, saving too much is a dear, a fondek, you know? Yeah, everything is beautiful Outside the). It's like a bird Can make a bird have eggs from the palmない. A bird will make six eggs. What do you think they got? What do you think the boat?

Matt: 1:21:03

got Eight dollars. Eight dollars, okay, I was going for 20. Eight bucks.

Guest: 1:21:10

Geez, right. And then who gets it next? Then the cannery gets it right, or the fish house. Yeah, they bought it for eight. Now they sell it to Johnny Broker for like 10, 11. Okay, then Johnny Broker turns around and sells it to retail for 20, 30. That's the guy that makes the money. The broker, he's the one that makes the money. Yeah, and by the time it gets to the grocery store, it's been through three different hands to get there and that's why it's so high. Norwegian government does their own. So they work it backwards. They say, okay, codfish. End result is this price. How many people are involved? Four, this price divided by four. Yeah, that's what everybody gets Geez Simple.

Guest: 1:21:55

Yeah, works good, common sense.

Matt: 1:21:57

Yeah, common sense.

Guest: 1:21:59

What is that Common sense? We don't want to talk about it. I heard about that before.

Matt: 1:22:04

Yeah, long time ago. Yeah, I read about it in a book. My dad talked about it. Yeah, yeah, well, thanks for being one of the good ones. Yeah, I mean, you know the old veteran in it and thanks for coming on.

Guest: 1:22:19

Yeah, sure, thanks for talking about this, I enjoyed it.

Matt: 1:22:21

It's like I said I think it's something important and it's a story that needed to be heard, right, I agree. So thanks for coming on being anonymous. Okay, telling us the insides of it? Yeah, no worries, we appreciate it. And thanks for tuning in. Thanks for watching. Till next time, stay out of trouble, we'll see you in church.