WEBVTT 00:04.810 --> 01:00.106 Hey, guys, just want to take a minute for our sponsor, j four flower horns. If you are sitting in front of your aquarium wondering why you're no longer enjoying it, well, number one, you may not see them, so clean the glass. But two, bring a piece of the extreme deer tank. Have some fun. Go to J. Four Flowerhorns.com. He not only has amazing awardwinning flower horns you can get nowhere else, but also extreme fish like Bashirs platinum Bashirs albino, arowana, even as Blue eye bristle knows placos, king Kong parrot, cyclists. What do you guys want? Go there. Go now. Find yourself some extreme for your tank and get 10% off while doing it. Go to J fourflowerhorns.com and use promo code aquarium Guys at checkout for 10% off your entire order. Also, to celebrate J Four and flowerhorns sponsoring the show, we've put out a little love. Go to our merch store. You'll see it in the show notes. It's the aquarium. 01:00.138 --> 01:00.334 Guys. 01:00.372 --> 02:32.342 Merch line. And we have added a new line of merch saying, I love cock. Now, cock kok is the ball on the front of a flowerhorn. So certainly check out the silly new merch line. Love for you to pick some up. It certainly helps the show and certainly at mention J four flowerhorn on social media. Just let him know that you love cop. Guys, keep the stories coming in. We want to do a user submitted story. Time for storytime four. Certainly send those in. You can send them the Acquiring Guys podcast website. At the bottom of the page you will find our contact method. You can email it to us. You could send it a text message, whatever is most comfortable for you. Hell, you could even send us an audio recording of you telling the story. But send those in and let's kick that podcast. Welcome to the aquarium, guys. Podcast. Jimmy, you're looking good. I know your diet, what it is, and how do you do it. You just keep on showing up, and you're not £500. 02:32.406 --> 02:37.610 I know I look pretty dang good for somebody who's got glasses on. You've got glasses? I don't. 02:37.690 --> 02:39.358 Oh, I work. I I can share. 02:39.444 --> 02:41.182 No, I wear contacts, and I look great. 02:41.236 --> 02:42.506 Well, I'm your host, rob's olsen. 02:42.538 --> 02:43.482 Hey, I'm Jim colby. 02:43.546 --> 02:58.430 And I'm Adam Ellen the shark. So today we are tickled pink. We have with us two specialists on a subject that I personally don't know a ton about, but I think is royally fascinating. We have Jenny Cruckenberg. Say hi, Jenny. 02:58.510 --> 02:58.994 Hello. 02:59.112 --> 03:01.250 And we have conrad schmidt. Say hello. 03:01.320 --> 03:01.806 Hi. 03:01.928 --> 03:15.862 These wonderful people have a fantastic story to tell us here soon about darter collecting and their work in nanfa, the North American native fishes association. Thanks again for coming on, guys, and taking the time. 03:15.916 --> 03:16.866 It's our pleasure. 03:16.978 --> 03:48.102 Well, before we get started, we always got to do some questions and news. We have a ton of questions that we need to go over. But I think that we get so many now, we're we're growing on a growth rate that we just need to do episodes of questions like we did before. I think an episode, it came out now 81, 82. We had a bunch of different questions to show you how far behind that we are recording these, these podcasts ahead of time. But that worked out really well. We had a lot of great feedback. We answered a lot of questions that people were messaging us about. So think we should save a bunch of those for future episodes. Jimmy yeah, perfect. 03:48.156 --> 03:56.822 So you guys have any questions out there, get them to us. If we don't know the answer, we're going to find somebody who does. We're not going to blow smoke in the air to tell you something that we don't know we're talking about. 03:56.876 --> 04:27.034 We are now expanding our Discord channel. Discord allows us to no longer have a camp of users, so we can have hundreds of live people that join us. So instead of doing it every Monday, we've been now scheduling content creators for different mondays. So certainly check our Discord, go to aquariumguyspodcast.com. You'll find a discord link. We're going to be posting up schedules showing when we're going to be doing those live streams. So certainly check it out. It'll be an easier way for you to schedule time to come see us live, ask questions and join the debauchery. 04:27.082 --> 05:05.662 And the other thing we're going to do is we're going to steal a great idea from Bob Ross, the famous painter from pbs station. And a lot of people don't realize that Bob Ross, when he did those paintings and did that little half hour spiel that he did on pbs, that he would go in to the recording studio and he would do a whole season in a couple of days and he would go from sun up to sundown. So now we're looking at possibly doing maybe two different segments in one day. So please check out our schedule. And we're hoping to get some more stuff. With everybody being so busy and COVID slowing down now and everybody's getting back to normal, we're trying to get some more people scheduled and whatnot. So just bear with us as we continue this process. 05:05.796 --> 05:11.866 So in the other news, we have had a bunch of people messaging us about bleaching their balls for the moss balls. 05:11.898 --> 05:12.954 Bleaching the moss balls. 05:13.002 --> 05:26.798 So we've had a bunch of different people send us pictures finding zebra muscles in their moss balls. And thank you for the information. They said we've been bleaching and destroying them so they don't get into our aquariums, much less any other lakes or streams. 05:26.894 --> 05:51.814 That's interesting because I went and checked all my moss balls and I honestly have a lot of them. I probably have over 100 and I did not find one. And I spent hours going through them and stuff. So it all depends on where you got them from, where the mossballs came from, what distributor and stuff. But I luckily didn't have any and stuff. But I quit selling them because I wholesale also. So I quit selling them just to not have any questions asked and stuff. But these are all in my personal tank with my shrimp. 05:51.862 --> 05:59.082 Excellent. conrad, Jenny, did you guys get any moss balls or have any issues with that in your area? I know you guys are in southern Minnesota. 05:59.146 --> 06:14.754 No, not recently. But we did make announcements on the Minnesota Aquarium society's website about watching for the moss balls and looking for the zebra mussels and how to destroy them properly and not cause problems. 06:14.872 --> 06:30.770 And I'm a co editor of the American currents published by the North American Native Fishes Association. We posted that same thing. I think there was mostly Oregon and some other places so that people wouldn't check their moss balls if they're using them because we do borrow a lot from tropical fish. 06:30.850 --> 06:49.210 What I found really amazing about zebra mussels, which we've dealt with here in Minnesota for a large long time already because they've been invasive species in our lakes up here. I did not realize that they could live in your septic and sewer and pipes and ruin your pipes in your house. So think what they could do out there in the wild. So yeah, you got to be very careful with these invasive species. 06:49.290 --> 06:56.222 Yeah, they're very prolific. Once you have infiltration of the little guys, they just multiply quickly and cover. 06:56.356 --> 07:23.586 So the other news that I have is there's a local zoo bias that is putting up a I try to do the math. You try to use those pond calculators. It's about an acre and a half pond with roughly 1000 koi. They're putting on a ten foot wide pier to the center and then crossing the entire pond. It's a pretty majestic thing. So I'd like to do a story on that. Get the zoo owner we had dusty on before. Get him back in here for a story and talk more about that. But I broke my finger. Jimmy. 07:23.618 --> 07:25.234 Well, I told you to quit picking your nose. 07:25.362 --> 07:28.306 You were on vacation. I had to break something for your sympathy. 07:28.338 --> 07:36.126 Yes, I was on vacation. My wife and and I went to Las Vegas. Neither one of us gamble. We went with another couple. There was four of us. We spent $3 on gambling. Lost it. 07:36.148 --> 07:37.594 And $3,000 on alcohol. 07:37.642 --> 07:56.614 No, it wasn't quite that much. But I tell you what, we went down there. Vegas is just starting to open up and we were lucky enough to get tickets to go see David copperfield the magician. Didn't realize that David copperfield is a billionaire. Does 15 shows a week in Las Vegas. Made a four billionaire. Yeah, with a B. Why would you be? 07:56.652 --> 08:00.002 If I was a billionaire, the last thing I would do is put on magic shows in Vegas. 08:00.066 --> 08:26.202 Yeah. I tell you he, he made a 45 foot spaceship up here above our head that flew around the room and then threw over the stage and out the back. It was incredible. But we went to the Grand canyon. I can't remember what Indian reservation we went to but it's, it's the one where they have the glass walkway that's 5000ft over the edge of the rim. We got to see a couple get engaged out there but I was too busy peeing my pants pants to really care because it was scary. 5000ft glass floor, glass walls. 08:26.266 --> 08:27.422 That wasn't your cup of tea? 08:27.476 --> 08:27.790 No. 08:27.860 --> 08:30.602 Did you feel like you were in a giant people aquarium? 08:30.666 --> 08:30.926 I did. 08:30.948 --> 08:48.162 I feel like a big giant people aquarium and I thought to myself if I actually pee my pants it's going to hit this glass floor and everybody's going to see me. But no, I did make it through there and stuff but yeah, it was very, very intense and very much fun. We had a great time, behaved ourselves and it came back in one piece. Piece. So wonderful grateful. Well I can't wait to see you in October. 08:48.226 --> 08:48.358 Yeah. 08:48.364 --> 08:59.686 You're going on there in October aren't you Adam? Yeah. I'd highly recommend doing some of the shows on there. They're just starting to open up. Pen and teller, carrot Top, Chris Angel, the magician, Terry fader, all going to be going here the next 25 days. 08:59.788 --> 09:18.446 We've come full circle. It's been what, 18 months of COVID and now we're finally having to breathe a little bit after all of this. So raise a glass everyone. Jenny and conrad, again I can't thank you enough for coming on the podcast. We would love to start off with what brought you guys into the hobby before we get anything else so we know a little bit about you both. 09:18.548 --> 10:56.106 Sure, I'll go first. I met conrad in 1993. I had already had an interest in native fish and darters but it mainly stemmed from one of our speakers for the Minnesota Aquarium Society coming in and giving a talk on how they collected fish in places like madagascar or the Amazon, you know, how they used nets and they were sailing for fish. And some of us in our club decided, you know, we should go see what's out in our state, in our environment and we should try to use some of these same techniques. So in about 1991, I think the year was, there was a couple that I knew through the club that knew that we had to get permits to collect darters through the dnr and they proceeded to secure these permits and we were allowed to collect darters. Then the next year they didn't want to do it and I said, well we had so much fun we have to do this again. And they said, well Jenny, here's what you've got to do if you want to head this thing up, contact the dnr, get the permit, wrangle up the group, proceed to go. And so I did. So then I met conrad and he was giving me some information about different locations to collect different darters. We might want to look for things like that. And I was also going to conferences and meetings about aquaculture. I mean, I was kind of spreading my wings into different areas other than strictly tropical fish. 10:56.218 --> 11:02.218 So the darter collection just started off of a whim with talking with some people in association. 11:02.314 --> 11:43.450 Yes, I really wanted to try and see if we could do what they were doing, like down at the Amazon here. I wanted to try and I knew that for certain types of fish like darters, we needed to secure a permit. And my main thoughts about that was because there were some that were threatened or endangered or species of greatest conservation need or whatever. So that's why my consideration for getting the permit occurred to me. But there's nothing in the regulations that say I'll let conrad talk about this takeover. conrad what? 11:43.520 --> 11:44.022 Darters? 11:44.086 --> 11:46.138 Yes, specifically about darters. 11:46.234 --> 12:35.214 Well, darters are only found in the New World. There's things that are somewhat related in Europe, but they're not in the darter group. Darters, all of them have a double dorsal fin. They're related to the perch and sagar and walleye. And for those of you that know about the one invasive species from Europe, the rough, which is up in the Great Lakes, now, that's approach too, with one or two exceptions, they're usually indicators of very high water quality and habitat because they have certain specialties they need to carry out their life history. Or like rainbow darters, the gravel has to be nice and clean, otherwise eggs will fungus if they're not, if the gravel is all clogged with sand and everything. 12:35.332 --> 12:43.142 So conrad, before we get too deep into darter, specifically what brought you into was it with Jenny that you got into collecting? 12:43.226 --> 12:48.386 I'm going to blame Jenny because she always sidetracks me. What were we talking about? 12:48.568 --> 12:50.226 Go ahead, introduce yourself. 12:50.328 --> 14:38.740 Yeah, I started, let's see, age eleven, I got a ten gallon old metal frame aquarium from I think it was for Christmas or my birthday, I can't remember. And the first fish I got were coulis. And then of course, experimented live bears, tetras bars. But then I started to collect South American cyclists, usually the big predators, and then moved over to the River flakes. And then a friend of mine who was a member of this North American Native fishers Association, hey, you want to go out and collect some darters? I didn't know what the heck they were, and we went out and our first darters that I collected with him were Iowa darters. And the males are very beautiful and that started me getting interested in them. The other thing I did too, I met this guy, his brother owned a pet store in St. Paul and we worked together in the pet store for about eight years. But then I went on to school and decided to get to became a fish biologist, but not the gamefish variety. I always had an interest in the non game fish. Minnesota, for instance, has 164 species and 25 or 30 are gamefish. All the rest are non game fish. People don't understand that. They often ask, what is a minnow? What is a darter? They don't really know. anyways, that's how Jenny we started to connect at the first and only Nancy meeting North American native fish. And so they meeting in 1993 and then didn't see her for a while. And then also she's back doing hitting these darter hunts annually. And I had some places to expand where to look to get a bigger diversity of darters. And then she said one day, gee, could I come out and volunteer on your fish surveys? And I haven't been able to get rid of her ever since. 14:40.790 --> 14:42.998 So I feel like I feel the. 14:43.004 --> 14:43.922 Same way about Rob. 14:43.986 --> 14:44.694 Right. 14:44.892 --> 14:46.278 Can't get rid of you. 14:46.444 --> 14:48.002 It's like, could you check me for ticks? 14:48.066 --> 14:49.506 At least I don't make you itch. 14:49.538 --> 14:50.294 Like the other one. 14:50.332 --> 14:50.920 Yeah. 14:52.910 --> 15:26.830 I was going to say just getting peer pressured by friends, hey, why don't we collect wild species? And then going, you don't understand how Minnesota is for you listeners. Minnesota, like sketos, are so thick and vile, you breathe them in. So for these people to go out to these, like, wet areas, rivers to catch these fish, it takes real dedication. It's not like, oh, let's have a beautiful scenic place. No, these guys have to put, I don't know, £18 of deet on. They have to go through unkempt areas with ticks and then they have to set up this whole thing. 15:26.920 --> 15:29.080 I feel like everybody away. 15:30.170 --> 15:33.878 I'm playing devil's advocate here. All right, I think we should get. 15:33.884 --> 15:35.382 Deep Woods Off to sponsor this. 15:35.436 --> 15:52.782 Yes, deep Woods Off needs to sponsor this. Just insert the spray noise here. But it couldn't have been just the sake of a friend's peer pressure to you into it. You guys had to be naturalist of some sort. What is the career choice of both of you? 15:52.836 --> 16:06.580 Well, I worked for the Department of Natural Resources for 20 years and I was the only non game fish biologist for the entire department. And now I'm retired and I'm still doing it. Jenny is helping me still like she did before. 16:07.270 --> 16:28.422 I put in, I don't know, 200, 300 hours of volunteer time. And then I got hired as well. And during the winter months, I would scan documents. It was not the field season, but right now when it turns to spring and it gets warmer, we get very busy, him and I. 16:28.476 --> 17:02.174 So I have a couple of different ways to go with this. Question number one, we need to review back, right? Maybe not right now, but at least explain to the viewers all that goes into a darter catching event, because me playing devil's advocate, saying they're skidos, I feel like doesn't do it justice. I feel like there's quite a bit more positivity. So I wasn't trying to do a negative spin there, but I need to know how this goes. But more importantly, what projects are you working on using this hobby trait? I'm assuming you're doing work to conserve the areas, a species, what would be involved with this, what's the goal? 17:02.222 --> 19:27.378 My goal has always been to get people out, families, individuals, to help them see and appreciate our native world and the state that we live in. And the fishes that are under, there's not enough attention on them. I want people to see the variety of fish that are out there because people tend to know the game fish they don't know, like conrad was saying, what a darter is, what a date is, what a minnow. There's lots of different shiners and different types of minnows and things, and people don't really know or appreciate them. So when we go out collecting activity, I affectionately call them the darker hunt because we don't always know what we're going to find. So it's sort of like an Easter egg hunt. Then we put these fish into like a small viewing critter keeper type of tank, and all of a sudden people notice the differences and I say, look at the mouth, look at the fins, look from above, look from the side. I have them take in the qualities of the fish and then they go, oh, my gosh, these do look different. Or, I had no idea these fish were here. And some of our male fish, especially the darters family, the males are quite colorful. We have banded darters that have bright Kelly green striping. The rainbow darters, as conrad was talking about, they have the red and blue stripe on the males. The females have some color, but not as prevalent as males because it's kind of like bird species in the fish world. oftentimes the males have the most color. But I found that some species of darters, the lowly little Johnny darter, for instance, will guard its eggs just like a cichlid. And it will change from a very kind of inconspicuous light gray color to almost a charcoal gray, very, very dark, and will actually exhibit some of the same qualities as a cichlid where it's guarding its eggs. So it's funny to me because I was somebody who bapt a lot of fish, and to get the realization that some of the same techniques I was using for tetras could also work for spots and shiners, that was very rewarding and getting those eggs to hatch out. 19:27.544 --> 20:02.570 All right, so just from that little bit, I have a million questions. Number one, just to let the audience know, certainly look up. Even like the Iowa darter that you first mentioned, that conrad mentioned, is a breathtaking specimen. I looked it up. It's got these beautiful blue teal stripes, yellow on it. It's a gorgeous creature. So, name dropped throughout. Take a moment, pause the podcast and go look those up. They are really breathtaking. And frankly, I don't even know some of the species that you've listed, and I'm blown away just watching that. But you mentioned some methods that you had of catching them. 20:02.640 --> 20:26.146 Sure. We generally use dip nets, stains and spiked nets, things like that, for catching various native fish. When I go out on the dirt hunts and I take groups, we're generally using saints, and they have a fairly fine diameter mesh. Where do you get a sane net? You can get one at Walmart, any sort of sporting goods place. 20:26.248 --> 20:34.402 For those who are listening. Can you describe what a sane net is? Actually, each of those three nets would be fantastic if you could give a brief description. 20:34.466 --> 20:36.566 Okay, I'll let conrad dig in. 20:36.668 --> 21:49.120 I guess you could look at it as a bedsheet, but it has a coarser mesh. In Minnesota, the rules for collecting bait, they can be like an eight inch to three eight inch mesh and up to 25ft long and 4ft deep. And they usually have floats at the top and lead sinkers at the bottom to keep them near the bottom. And you just either go upstream, a lot of people go downstream. It's a lot easier than fighting the current and then steer into the shore and lift it up or alongside the lake. Same thing. Boat landings are wonderful places to catch a pile of fish. And let's see the dead or kick net. If you go online. There's one called the perfect dip net. I used to make my own. And then this person who is also a North American Native Fish Association member, mark binkley, I think his name is, he makes these perfect dip nets. And boy, for either scooping fish up or in a rifle, you put it down and just kick like one or 2ft in front of the net. Boy, does that ever get the darters in there. And so those are probably the two most common used on the darter hunt. We have on occasion since I have permits for it, I have a backpack electric shocker. And. 21:51.730 --> 21:52.800 You have what? 21:54.070 --> 21:56.610 Well, you've seen ghostbusters, haven't you? 21:56.680 --> 22:00.340 I have, and I do not want to be slime. That's jimmy's job. 22:01.910 --> 22:25.482 Well, the fish can't slim it, but not like that. So no. The electric fisher puts them a small amount of electrical current in the water. And what it does to the fish is it actually brings them to the metal power source and the person is waiting there to scoop them up with a net because it's called a condition called force swimming or taxes. And so the fish actually do come to you. 22:25.616 --> 22:28.762 So it's a lure. It's not something to knock them out. 22:28.896 --> 22:47.122 If you give it too much juice. It will. But for darters, because they either have very poor swim bladders or none at all, they sink. And so you don't want to knock them out. You want them to come up towards the surface where you can scoop. Otherwise they'll fall back into the crevices where we pulled them out of. 22:47.176 --> 22:52.514 I never knew you could attract fish with electric. I know you could knock them out, but putting a small current in there. 22:52.552 --> 22:58.918 Just phone holding a magnet like a tractor beam in Star Trek is what it is. 22:59.084 --> 23:00.246 Does it work for women? 23:00.348 --> 23:00.662 Yeah. 23:00.716 --> 23:02.754 I mean, hey, does this work for girls? 23:02.802 --> 23:16.214 Jimmy and I found a new product. Right now I'm just wondering then why did nikola Tesla why did nikola Tesla die alone? I mean, that's just not exactly somebody had a pet pig. 23:16.342 --> 23:21.414 Yeah. So how many times have you shocked your leg or shocked Jenny? truthfully? 23:21.462 --> 23:21.626 No. 23:21.648 --> 23:22.640 Don't lie to us. 23:23.010 --> 23:24.922 She says she's never been shocked. 23:24.986 --> 23:26.686 I've never been shocked. No. 23:26.788 --> 23:28.800 I've been shocked hundreds of times. 23:29.810 --> 23:30.990 I have two adult kids. 23:31.060 --> 23:50.840 It's a little annoying, but it's not at least with a little backpack you got a twelve volt battery. There's only so much that will do to you. But when I worked for the dnr, we would have these big gas generators on boats and stuff and that packed a little more of a wallet. But we never lost anybody yet. 23:52.650 --> 23:53.430 That's good. 23:53.500 --> 23:55.334 Cow yet is the key word. 23:55.452 --> 24:05.142 Yes. So where are you collecting? We've never really gone over where you're actually collecting. Are you collecting in a stream? In puddles and lakes? At the swimming pool down the street? 24:05.206 --> 24:09.194 Jenny makes a very diverse are you. 24:09.232 --> 24:12.346 Talking specifically about the darter hunts that I lead? 24:12.448 --> 24:13.100 Yeah. 24:13.790 --> 24:15.180 Where are you going right now? 24:16.690 --> 25:04.910 We generally take two to three outings per season and we could take more if I was allotted more darters to collect. But I generally ask for about 75 individual fish and so that allows me to go out two or three times depending on how many people show up to go out and how many fish people want. So sometimes we go down to the canon River and a nearby place is the Bell Creek. And then sometimes we go to the Little cannon River and again we get different individual fish from these places. The Bell Creek has a lot of really nice fantile darters and those don't have a lot of color, but they have some really nice bands. And again, the males are kind of attractive. In my opinion. 25:05.650 --> 25:09.418 The depth of the water isn't that deep. Then this is fairly shallow creek. 25:09.594 --> 25:27.780 Bell Creek is not very deep. The canon River can be formidable. I mean, it can be high flows, high flows, fast. I like to have the kids go upstream from the net because sometimes we have to catch them in the net. 25:28.390 --> 25:32.694 Do you guys drink a lot when you're doing this? I'm just kind of curious. You're shocking each other when there's kids. 25:32.732 --> 25:34.182 In the water, when there's no kids? 25:34.236 --> 25:35.320 When there's no kids. 25:36.650 --> 25:38.194 No alcohol on the garden. 25:38.242 --> 25:42.170 No, you can't dangerous. 25:42.590 --> 25:56.298 Yeah. We went up by duluth a few years ago, and we went white water rafting. And I've never done it before. And I was talking to the guy. I said, how's the river today? He goes, the river is angry. The river is angry. So you guys probably should stay away from the angry rivers. 25:56.394 --> 26:00.650 I feel like that guy was just trying to sell you up on the excitement. Like it's angry. 26:00.730 --> 26:02.586 Yeah, he was right. It was angry. 26:02.618 --> 26:05.470 The river was like, you got my $90. 26:05.540 --> 26:09.426 Now you're going to earn it angry. They had seven inches of rain two days before. 26:09.528 --> 26:10.446 Oh, it was angry. 26:10.478 --> 26:13.554 It was angry. River. Oh, boy. So you're out there picking these up. 26:13.672 --> 26:31.202 There's a way that you can check on river conditions. The usgs. Has gauges that they have in certain places on certain rivers. So you go to their site and you check the canon River and you can see what, the median? 26:31.266 --> 26:35.526 Well, yeah, within 4 hours, because they send everything to the Internet. 26:35.638 --> 28:13.386 Yeah, it's an instantaneous sort of reading within 4 hours. And you'll see a graph where they plot how the river has gone up and gone down. And when we get heavy rains one or two days later, places like the cannon can just be raging. And there's a tubing place right in Welsh. People go rafting and tubing all the time. There's canoe rentals and things like that. And they'll drop you off upstream in the cannon, and then you float your way back down. And it was heavily used last year because of COVID because people were looking for outdoor activities, and that was one that appealed to a lot of people. Another site we go to is Square Lake up north of stillwater. We go to Square Lake in Washington County. And again, collecting from a lake is different from a stream or a river. It's more I would call it more placid. Instead of letting the current wash the fish downstream or upstream into your net, you're basically just kind of corralling the fish and bringing the net towards the shoreline and pulling it up onto the shore and then checking what you got. And you've got to work fast. Try to keep the fish in the water as best you can. You don't really want to handle them too much. You want to be considerate that these fish are somewhat touchy. People think of fat head minnows and things like that, beat fish. But if they were considerate of these fish, they would give them a little more kindness, little love and care. Love and care. 28:13.488 --> 28:20.614 Right. You said you collect normally, like about 75. Is that what the dnr allows you? And what do you do with those fish that you're collecting? 28:20.742 --> 28:55.414 That's what I ask for on my permit. And that's what I feel is a good amount. I like people to go home happily with six or nine or four or whatever, like two pairs of this and two pairs of something else. So it adds up. And depending on how many people are going out, everybody goes home happy. I don't like to send people home without what they want. I try to make sure everybody gets a chance to pick their fish out and take turns and yeah, that's what I've always asked for, is like around 75. 28:55.532 --> 29:02.170 And so do these fish are taken home putting in the home aquarium? Are anybody having any luck with breeding them? 29:02.240 --> 29:40.774 Yes, we have had a few people breed them. But one thing about the permit, we're not supposed to sell the fish or barter them or release them to the wild. We're not to let them go from our tanks back into the wild. So once they go home with the people, what happens to them is up to them. But oftentimes, and this is an interesting point, oftentimes a minnow species will last longer in a person's aquarium than it would in the wild, because typically it would be eaten within one or two years. But in an aquarium, they might live four years or longer. 29:40.892 --> 29:46.310 Or longer, yeah, because the Walleys and stuff will just go after those things, like their lunch, which they actually are. 29:46.380 --> 30:01.866 So, yes, I'm assuming that you guys do this. You said to get families involved. So you do three, four trips a year and you select groups as it connections with the fish clubs that you're a part of. What's your target audience? 30:01.978 --> 30:52.966 Yes, it's definitely members of the two groups. The Minnesota Aquarium Society and the Narrative Fish group. The nanfa Group, north American Native fishes Association. So what I do at the beginning of the season, generally around January, I apply for the permit. If the permit is granted to me, then I had known that I have received the permit and we can go out again. So the word spreads. It was harder this year because everything was online. We were having zoom meetings and not getting together physically, but hopefully that's changing. But even last year when there was COVID raging, we did take a hunt, but we went out late in the year. We went out in September, and I kept hoping that things would improve, but until we get the vaccines, we just had to be patient. 30:53.078 --> 30:58.858 Now, when you get a permit from the dnr, how long is that permit good for? Is that good for one outing or is it good for a season? 30:58.954 --> 31:55.698 It's good for what I asked for. Like this year I, again in January, asked for it to go through September because I really didn't know when the vaccines were going to be rolled out. In January. They were talking about it, but I didn't know if it was going to happen or not. So I asked for my permit to be granted from the date of issuance through September, and that's what I got granted. Now, it just so happens that we have already taken our three different outings for this year and we've already collected the 75 darters that I'm allowed on the permit. So for this year it's over. But conrad was saying he has different permits and so he and I will continue to go out and do some of these other projects that we do. And again, he applies for permits. There's slightly different projects that we've been working on, but some of them we've been working on for ten or eleven years now. 31:55.784 --> 32:51.198 Yeah, like today we were out reintroducing sensitive. Well, let's see, what was that? That would be three minnow species. No, two mino species. And the banded kili fish. Today, many of the metro lakes went really south. I mean, they turned super utrophic back in. The many of the lakes that had these sensitive species, they died out of them. And now they've done some what they call lake shed restoration. And boy, they're incredible recovery, but the fish can't get back in there. So Jenny and I are feeding these lakes and we are having success. But there's only two of us in about 30 lakes we're trying to get to. So that's one thing. And the other one is I'm always looking for new records of rare fish. So I basically have two different permits for two different things. And it's usually these permits are for the open water field season. I don't go out in the wintertime. 32:51.374 --> 32:59.860 No. But when we work for the dnr, we did occasionally go out. We were neoprene waiters. It's too cold, we're getting too old. 33:00.570 --> 33:06.534 So is there a cost for these permits? I mean, can the average person ask for one of these permits or they better go off with a group? 33:06.652 --> 33:34.420 I don't think so. We have to juggle so much. Jenny has her affiliation with the Minnesota Aquarium Society, and I have been trying with three other authors to write The fishes of Minnesota. So that's the reason why I issued a permit. So I don't know if personally, I think, and this is my own, I'm not with the dnr anymore, so I don't have any say. I never did. 33:35.670 --> 33:37.118 Sounds like my first marriage. 33:37.214 --> 33:49.190 Yeah. You should just be able to buy fishing license and go out and collect non game fish for your aquarium. And of course now with Infested waters you'll have to follow some more rules. 33:49.530 --> 34:36.178 Right? That's a good point, conrad. So again, with the dnr's involvement, they issue me tags and so I have separate equipment and separate stains and separate minnow buckets and things like that. For when I'm in Infested waters with zebra mussels or eurasian water mill foil, I use different sets of equipment. And if I'm going from Square Lake, which is an uninfested body of water, down to the St. croix river where it's considered infested. I switch gear and I don't use that same gear and I always go from the uninfested water to the infested, not the other way around. Does that make sense? 34:36.264 --> 34:41.190 Yeah, that gives your equipment time to dry out from the infested lakes. 34:43.050 --> 35:07.726 I don't dry it out. I just use it only in infested waters. And then the clean equipment I use only in clean waters. And the dnr sort of spells out which places are infested. But I also have to look I have to look around and see what I'm seeing too. I wrap everything up in separate like tarps so that they're not commingling together. 35:07.828 --> 36:05.114 Makes sense. We got to get a question what the impact of eurasian Millfoil is from one of our listeners live in the podcast. Again, if you guys want to join these live we're going to put the schedules up. They're no longer every Monday we're going to be scheduling them out. So go to Cornguyspodcast.com bottom of the website you'll find the link for discord. Come join. You get to ask questions right on the show. So again, the millfoil problem that we're having in Minnesota and many other states millfoil completely overtakes whole bodies of water. There's not a lot of space for fish to swim between. It completely overtakes every square inch and it's extremely invasive. It's extraordinarily hearty. It can survive through very extreme measures and it has completely choked out the whole bodies of water in Minnesota. So it's things that we got to certainly keep aware of. And because I think for a lot of people that are in the aquarium, hobby people are used to guppy grass. It's not far off. It doesn't have to be rooted. It's just if it touches water it'll grow and reproduce. 36:05.162 --> 36:15.454 Now I've got a quick question for conrad. Earlier you were saying that you guys go out and you seed the lakes with I think you said even kili fish. Correct. Where do you guys find where do you get your seed fish from? 36:15.592 --> 36:31.866 From lakes? Well the farthest we go out is 75 miles but we've been this spring mostly hitting one lake that's like 35 miles or so out of St. Paul. There still are some nice lakes not that far from the metro area. 36:32.048 --> 36:43.078 And for those of you listening, st. Paul is a sister city to Minneapolis in central Minnesota and stuff. But yeah, so when you get your seed fish you get those from the dnr, you get them from other lakes? 36:43.174 --> 37:02.674 No, we go out and sand them up or use the kick net and kick them up. There's nobody at the dnr that works on non game fish anymore. It's all game fish work now, research and management. So it's just basically Jenny and I now doing non game fish stuff. 37:02.872 --> 38:04.390 We're just kind of pursuing this because it's something we love doing and we're having success and we're having success and that's the thing, is we're looking to get these sensitive fish established in these cleaner lake and bodies of water. And if they do become established, the pca and the dnr does kind of quality assessment. And when they find these little sensitive species, they give it a better score. So this score is called the Index of biotic Integrity. ibi the index of biotic integrity. They're looking at fish communities. They're looking at plants. They're looking at how clear the water is. They use seki discs and things like that, and they're looking for water clarity. And once some of these metro lakes improved, the scores went higher because they were now able to support these sensitive species. 38:05.130 --> 39:24.734 This is beside myself. Wonderful. You started to do a podcast, and Jimmy and I purposely what we do is we get just information on the guests, the topic at hand, and we purposely go in more or less blind on a lot of these interviews on purpose because we don't want to have scripted questions for the guests. We don't want to try to go for some other topic that we somehow missed. We want to go as a lot of times we'll research, again, stuff that we don't know, but again, go as more or less blind as the viewer so we can ask appropriate questions. And I'm utterly beside myself. I've been going over the species that you guys have listed, and they're simply breathtaking. The work that you guys are doing, it's honestly and truly a wonderful labor of love. It just really inspires me. Being a fishkeeper. Everybody in the hobby, they have this, how do you say, Jimmy lull or dead space in their hobby from time to time. It's not that they get sick of it. They get burned out. And I got to say, I've been feeling a little recently burned out on some of the projects I'm doing. I'm doing some rare rice, fish, other projects. But just listening to this, I am just lit up and motivated. Man, if you guys it's inspiring. You guys can reintroduce species into a river, just two people having a passion for something. It just motivates that anybody could change the world however they see fit, one. 39:24.772 --> 39:25.838 Pond at a time. 39:26.004 --> 40:04.410 So let us be the first people to thank you for what you're doing in our southern Minnesota lakes and streams. This is a wonderful project, and we're going to have a bunch of follow up questions for you, but we got a bunch of people asking how they get started in other places. So Minnesota requires that, again, you go for these permits, it's probably going to be hard for other individuals to do this. And I have some ideas to go over with you and how other people in Minnesota can participate. But let's pretend they're in Iowa, South Dakota, some other state that has less requirements than they've already spoken through. dnr how would the listeners how would you recommend the listeners prepare and proceed with collecting wild native species like darters and killies. 40:04.490 --> 41:07.106 Oh man, that's something I wish nanpa North American Fisheries would pursue. But it's been kind of a hot potato issue. Wisconsin, we found out for our nanpa convention next year. We can't collect it all on the Wisconsin side because of their state regulations. Yes, mainly concerned about zebra muscle and sensation, but it's just so weird from state to state and basically we just keep coming back to the same people in dnr. We hope they never retire so they know who we are. They keep issuing. But it's really weird. Minnesota still has it that you can collect minnow species for bait under a fishing license with certain gears, and you have to bring your own water from home. You're not supposed to take lake or stream water anywhere because it might be infested with something. And so it's weird. In some states it's so loose you don't even need a fishing license. In other, right? 41:07.208 --> 42:03.870 Like Ohio, I think. Yeah, ohio is one that anybody can come into the state and collect just about anywhere there, and there's no restrictions on what you could take and how many and things like that. In our state it's a little more restrictive. But I have found that if you ask for something, they can either tell you yes or no. So for instance, if I was going to ask for 100 darters instead of 75, they could tell me yes or no and that would be fine. I would buy by that. I'm good to comply with what they need at the end of the season and for the next season, I give them an overview of what I've seen, which includes fish that I'm reporting about, not just the darters and who took what. But let's say at a certain location we got a bourbon or we got Northern Red Belly Date or something like that. It's not a darter, but I still tell them that that's what we sampled. 42:03.950 --> 42:13.442 So again, what would you recommend? That to get started in the area that they would find that legal and they did the homework. What would you recommend to bring and how would they proceed? 42:13.506 --> 44:34.514 Well, in Minnesota, because that's really the only thing. First of all, in different states you can always contact whatever fishing game or natural resources there's so many different names, and just ask them flat out, can I legally collect? You could do it to a legally collect for aquariums or kind of say, I want to collect bait, what are the rules? And you don't really know what to do with people that collect fish for aquariums. There's a disconnect there. And that's what I used to do when I used to travel around the midwest. I'd say, what are your rules for collecting bait fish? And they would give you the exact things and usually it was just buying a fishing license. And you could take like Minnesota, you can take twelve dozen minnows a day on your fishing license. I don't know who would want to take twelve dozen minnows and keep them alive. I would contact the state that you're in and first I think instead of saying you want to collect it for aquarium, say what are the rules for collecting bait? And then they would send you what gear like whether it's saints and the size of the seine or kick nets. Minute traps are often used a lot. You can buy those at boarding good stores and baby stores. So that type of gear is available. And then of course we go out there, we sane, we use the kick nets, we get the fish. We often put them in floating trolling buckets because that flow through circulation. You can keep a pile of fish. We probably had 100 fish in our trolling bucket today just letting it hang out in the lake there. We got it tethered on a leash. So that's how we keep the fish alive out there. Then we transport them in food coolers, I think I have a 48 quart cooler and that keeps the temperatures from rising and then the sloshing around in the car keeps it aerated. But if you stop you got to put air on them and then otherwise it's just like if you don't have a great temperature change you just acclimate them to your aquarium water and put them in. Many of the shiners will take flake food. The darters of course will like frozen food, but they adapt very well to captivity and they would seem to recognize you when you walk in the room, like tropical fish do. 44:34.552 --> 45:07.598 Yeah, I would highly recommend some darters for being very inquisitive. They sort of have like a prehensile head where they turn their head towards you and only their head to look at you. They don't swim very well. Like conrad was saying, some of the darters swim through the water column a lot better, but a lot of them stay down on the bottom. And that's kind of an appealing thing for some people because they want certain fish to be swimming through the water column and then some to stay on the bottom. And that's where the dart fish will be. 45:07.684 --> 46:30.166 So again, I'm getting a few questions from people on how do we circumvent this from a couple of people from Minnesota. Number one, if you want to do self collection there's really again, like they said, no way. These guys are the experts that have done this for years. You have to apply for a permit. But in the past what I have done with success and permission from the dnr is I contacted, I have quite a few contacts in the bait industry. We had hoot actually on one of our earlier podcasts and that gentleman used to do bait in Mass. So he would supply the wholesalers that supply the industrial bait businesses throughout Minnesota and he would catch hundreds of thousands of different minnows. He sell everything by the pound. It would just fill up back of trucks. And he had licenses to do all this. And what I used to do is I tell him I'd show him a picture, I was looking for some of the Northern Red Belly days and I gave him a picture and he's like, oh, we call those rainbow shiners. Well, he wasn't accustomed to using it for my purpose, but he said, oh, yeah, we trapped those all the time and sell them for bait. So he got me a bunch and sure enough, it was during spawning season. Some of the males were red, females were not. It was a wonderful experience to get that. If you have someone that has a bait license and that knows what they legally can and can't sell, they can tell you yes or no. So that is the only way that I know to have a legal method of circumventing this process. If you're looking for something specific, what. 46:30.188 --> 46:34.730 Was the other crazy thing that he'd catch and sell to the universities that they used? 46:34.880 --> 46:35.702 Mud puppies. 46:35.766 --> 46:36.422 Mud Puppies. 46:36.486 --> 46:49.614 So he would have special permits and this would go from year to year to catch trap mud puppies and some to universities for scientific purposes. Those salamanders type creature, they're just like a giant axolotl. They're like 1314 inches long. 46:49.652 --> 46:51.546 They're, they're big and they're ugly, they're. 46:51.658 --> 46:54.166 Beautiful, but, you know, to each zone. 46:54.218 --> 46:56.130 Looking like you big and ugly. 46:56.470 --> 47:43.406 Universities would use these as a barometer to see how farm country was being affected on pollutants for fertilizer, leaching a fertilizer. If there's any farm in the area that's using heavy fertilizers that are legal, by the way, this is not like farmers trying to dump chemicals that aren't licensed. The first creature that would show adverse reactions was mud puppies. They are extremely exhaust axolotls, extremely susceptible to any chemical harm. They just can't tolerate even the mildest doses. Even friends that breed axolotls, just a tiny bit of chlorine in the water without having any stabilizers and like three days of aeration, they'll just fall apart. So yeah, they would send those in and he'd have special licenses for that on certain years where dnr thought they had better numbers. 47:43.508 --> 47:55.134 But yeah, one of the locations that we go to, we do run into Mud puppies every once in a while. And it's kind of like you're saying it's a fish that only a mother could love. 47:55.272 --> 47:56.280 I knew it. 47:57.610 --> 48:50.358 But they're cool creatures. They're very shy and secretive. If you were to keep them in an aquarium, they're very shy. But I actually was helping somebody at the dnr to do muscle studies and he was using certain fish and certain mud puppies and things as hosts for the muscles to see. Which if you know anything about muscles, they need a host fish and they transfer what they call glukidia into the fish for a while. It irritates the fish's gills, but eventually the glokidia turn into tiny mussels and fall off of the fish. And mud puppies were one that he was using to experiment to see which muscles would use the mud puppy as a host. And they were extremely cool fish. I mean, not fish, but salamander like creatures. I don't know what to call them. 48:50.444 --> 48:52.390 Definitely aquatic amphibians. 48:53.050 --> 49:09.306 Yeah, salamander. So you never know on these dirty hunts what you're going to find, but it's a cool creature like that that people have never seen. They don't really know it's there. That's why I love doing this. I will do this as long as I'm able. 49:09.408 --> 49:48.070 Wonderful. And don't disregard going to your local, especially in Minnesota, going to your local bait store. Bait stores get their fat head minnows and you can ask them, hey, I'm an aquarium enthusiast and just want to see if there's anything that isn't a fat head that you'd like to sell. And they'll be absolutely. They'll scoop up what they have and show you what they have, and you might find three spine stickleback, you might find the red belly days. You never know what they'll find. And if they're not fat heads, they're more than happy to either give them to you or sell them to you for a nickel. The bait stores generally put other fish that isn't the intended target as potential pest, so they're happy that they're going to go away instead of being thrown out. 49:48.140 --> 49:53.718 There is one pet store as well as native fish, forest Lake pets. 49:53.814 --> 49:54.582 Forest Lake. 49:54.646 --> 49:55.770 Yeah, they're a good store. 49:55.840 --> 49:57.674 Yes, we spend a lot of time and a lot of money there. 49:57.712 --> 49:58.486 My poor paycheck. 49:58.518 --> 50:27.720 Yeah. Probably have the largest selection, which really isn't that big for native fish. And then there's this bottle bait. And what is that? fridley boy. They usually have sometimes ten different species of bait in there. And if you want to look at some native minnows once in a while, even a log perch, which is a darter, will show up once in a while on the bait. But, yeah, I've used bait stores many times, especially different parts of the state. You get different minnows showing up. 50:28.090 --> 50:43.166 Yeah. If you want to check out another cool darter, check out log perch. They get really big compared to other darters, but they're absolutely fantastic. And they just swim around in the water column a little bit more than some of the darters. 50:43.298 --> 50:56.270 So if I bring these home and I get them introduced into my aquarium and they're doing well, what is the care that they need? I heard you say earlier that a lot of the daughters like frozen food and some of the fat head minerals will take a flake and whatnot is there anything special care that they need? 50:56.340 --> 50:57.886 Like, temperature wise, even? 50:57.988 --> 52:08.290 No. People have a misconception that they need a chiller to keep them really cold, like a trout stream cold or something. And I say no, that's not required. But if you've got temperature differences in your fish room where your tanks on a higher level are warmer, then you've got a medium level and then you've got a lower level. I would definitely keep the darters and minnows on the lower level where it's a little bit cooler, but it's not necessary to have a chiller. And then as far as what you want to house the tank with, I would suggest a power filter or power head would be better than just a tiny sponge filter or something like that. But I've kept starters in lots of different conditions and it's not necessarily a firm, hard and fast rule, but again, you want to do water changes, keep their water clean, make sure they're eating well and check in on them. If they do get some kind of fungus or something, I'd use salt on them. They seem to tolerate that really well. But yeah, like I say, I've done very well with starters over the years. They're not that fussy. People think they're harder to keep than they are. 52:08.360 --> 52:22.198 How about aggression, for instance, if I want to introduce them to a because again, like you said, no heater necessary. So if I introduce them to some of them, like my White Cloud Mountain Minnows or rice fish, how would they do in those environments? Are they semi aggressive, a little more territorial? 52:22.294 --> 52:37.278 No, because they're in a different part of the tank, for one thing, and they're not going to go up and gobble up rice Fish or White cloud. We've both kept some fish like that outdoors over the summer months. They've done really well. 52:37.364 --> 52:46.014 How about breeding? Do you guys have a lot of luck breeding? What's the requirements to inspire breeding? Is it your favorite playlist? Little marvin Gay. 52:46.062 --> 52:49.940 Maybe. Music? Yeah. 52:50.310 --> 52:51.602 Little Frank sinatra, maybe. 52:51.656 --> 52:53.570 Just in there. Aberrinatra. 52:56.390 --> 52:57.474 That sounds pretty good. 52:57.512 --> 53:25.350 No, I've had luck with Johnny Darters as conrad was seeing. Some of the darters have spawned, but the eggs fungus, so a little methylene blue, a little acroflavin, something like that. Not a lot, but just a little. I've also had success with slowly releasing some air onto the eggs just to keep them cleaner and that seems to help with spawning. 53:25.430 --> 53:33.450 So what are they spawn on? Are they just scatterers or are they actually looking for something like angel fish love heaters. We always make the joke that angel fish are horny for heaters. 53:33.530 --> 53:44.030 I find that they are adhesive, so they stick to things. The eggs stick. Some of the darters, not all of them, others are scatter, others are more like scatter. 53:44.110 --> 53:45.310 Like rainbow darters? 53:45.390 --> 53:50.998 Like rainbow darters. So they'll broadcast their eggs and then just kind of let them be. 53:51.084 --> 54:26.494 So another question that we have, not necessarily a question, it's a picture we got actually got from one of the listeners. It says, I don't know if Arizona or az, I'm assuming it's Arizona has any darters but we have this little endangered pup fish really underappreciated like darters and the picture that he has is just breathtaking it's this bright I don't know how do you say that? Just cobalt blue iridescent fish that's just so charming is there any particular species that you guys are just floored to find or is really endangered? Particularly Minnesota that on your hunts? 54:26.542 --> 54:57.210 Well, we don't have pump fish in minnesota, but I think the rainbow darter Is at the top. The orange spotted sunfish Is another one. Incredible colors in it. And then many others have, like, a northern red belly days. seasonally has color. But then the southern red belly days does have color throughout the year. And they make a great aquarium fish. That's actually one of the fish they get on. jenny's daughter hunts. Any other favorite colored up fish or unique fish that you can think of? 54:57.280 --> 55:48.678 No, but what we were talking about with the pupfish, Nancy, was granted a looksee on the devil's Hole, which, if anybody has ever heard about the devil's Hole pupfish, they keep them in a real secure area. The little spring that they're found in is the only one in the country. So they have camera 24 hours surveillance on the place and they won't let people disturb the fish. They even have underwater cameras, so they watch these little pupfish. And one time there was a disturbance like earthquake. An earthquake. And the fish were seen kind of rolling with the underwater current. And they were happy that they didn't somehow get impacted because there's only so many hundreds of these fish and that's it fluctuates. 55:48.774 --> 56:10.450 But no. Also their pupfish are endangered or threatened. I think one that isn't the Red River pupfish is still very common. And then one that people don't know that pupfish is the flagfish of Florida, which often shows up in the pet trade or nella, Florida. Beautiful fish, a lot of yellow. 56:10.790 --> 56:11.634 Very pretty. 56:11.752 --> 56:18.630 I love this meme that was posted. It says devil's Whole Pupfish, aka. The shelter in place, grandmaster. 56:19.290 --> 56:31.094 Yeah, that's a good way to describe it. But it's kind of cool that nanta was allowed to come near this place. Members were able to go and look. 56:31.132 --> 56:53.134 At the place they let in by the Park Service. Very humbling. But then they can't they got like a 25 foot chain link fence around it. But that doesn't stop some people getting in to go swimming because there isn't any water around. They think it makes a great swimming hole. So didn't they have and there's got. 56:53.172 --> 56:58.018 Arrested and he got like a major fine for messing with endangered species or something. 56:58.104 --> 57:23.914 I'm sure these people got fine for trespassing. I'm sure people have been whether it's fish or other endangered species, that can be a hefty fine. People have been fined for taking eagle feathers even though they didn't kill the eagle. But it's a part of what was endangered. I'm not even sure. What it is anymore. But yeah, the federal endangered and threatened species fines are hefty because you can face prison time with that too. 57:24.032 --> 57:54.674 And that's another good point about going out to collect your own fish. You don't want to go on private property unless you have permission from the property owners. You also want to stick to public assets access points rather than straying onto other people's property. But as long as you're entering into the water body from a public place, you can walk in the water. Just don't go up and get on the banks of somebody's private property. 57:54.792 --> 58:29.962 And Minnesota did a great job of doing some friendlier laws to try to help people that were outdoorsmen fishermen access bodies of water they gave in Minnesota, I believe it's 100ft variance. So even if it is a short distance on a private property to go across 100ft, they make that legal. But it's still ask permission. Why try to be indecent to someone else's private land? It's still nice to ask regardless if you have the right just to let people know why you're there. Plus, honestly, it's good PR if people know that you're trying to help species. 58:30.106 --> 58:31.054 Right thing to do, man. 58:31.092 --> 58:33.602 I mean, come on, use common sense. 58:33.656 --> 59:38.846 There it is. But sometimes landowners get really scared about what you're doing. For instance, when I was with the dnr, we went out looking for a federally endangered fish in Minnesota called the topeka shiner. And this little fish is just barely hanging on in the southwest corner of our state. It's highly endangered wherever it's located. And unfortunately, in that area, there's a lot of cow pastures. And so the water bodies are degraded and not very good. And so when we would tell people what we were doing, we would never tell them that we were specifically looking for a federally endangered fish because they would get upset about that. They would think we were going to somehow confiscate their land. And that wasn't our intentions at all. We were just looking for the presence of these fish. But we would say, we're going to go look at your fish community in your stream here. We would be careful about what we were saying so that we wouldn't upset the landowners. 59:38.958 --> 59:46.758 I mean, it makes sense. Their livelihood a lot of times is on those farms, and they don't want anybody threatening them, being able to put their crop in and out. So makes sense. 59:46.844 --> 59:56.774 Well, tell us you have to be sensitive to the people that you might be on their land. You have to be considerate. 59:56.822 --> 01:00:10.042 Well, while we're at it, I know we have so many more questions about Darters, and we could fill a couple of podcasts with this for sure. It's just a really untouched subject, a lot. And most corners are a hobby, but tell us more about nanfa. 01:00:10.106 --> 01:01:19.266 Well, nanpa is going to be 50 years old next year, 2022. The founder is now deceased, but he was originally from monticello, Minnesota. His name was John bondis and he just thought it would be a neat idea. He also had tropical fish when he was growing up, but he thought native fish were interesting too. So he managed to start a nationwide organization. And now, like I said, we're in our 49th year and still going strong. We've kind of changed from being just all hobbyists collecting native fish. We now have people that are micro fishing for making species list. We have snorkelers that go out and look for fish. So we're kind of branching out into different areas of interest. Now. A lot of people also photograph fish. If you go to the Nancy website, there's a gallery and you can go on there and look at Darters from all over North America. And so there's also a Nancy Forum if you have a question about collecting natives. So you can always put that post set up on the nantha Forum. 01:01:19.378 --> 01:01:22.262 And there's a great publication that this. 01:01:22.316 --> 01:02:46.274 Gentleman co edit, american Currency, which we are very proud of. It's come a long way in 50 years. And there are always articles about collecting, keeping microfishing. We'll put a fish in focus which gives a little bit about very brief information, kind of bulleted information of a certain species. We have a rifle section that talks about conservation issues with different species. Nancy News, which talks about these projects. This lady next to me, her daughter Hunt, gets listed in the nantha News very often for how many people are showing up and how well received it is by the people. That's the one thing. I'm kind of the taxonomous. I'm the one to say, no, you can't take that fish, you can take that one. But it's Jenny. And boy, the people that come, they thank her up and down. They are so appreciative for the experience. And it's really fun to see families out there enjoying this. But then sometimes the adults act like kids, too. That's fun to see also the way they get into the stream and they're just splashing around like little kids. But yeah, nanta, we've got several interests now, and our American Currency is a quarterly magazine. We finally went to Full Color about five years ago, so you were pretty proud of it. 01:02:46.472 --> 01:03:05.014 There's also a group of individuals that do something in the river called the roughish roundup, and they're looking primarily for buffalo and white soccer and red horse and things like that. So there's different groups within nanpa, but all of them are active in their. 01:03:05.052 --> 01:03:10.614 Own way.com, is their own, right? 01:03:10.732 --> 01:03:11.702 Yeah, exactly. 01:03:11.836 --> 01:03:17.226 So if our listeners want to get involved, how do they contact you guys? Do you have a website? Do you have information? 01:03:17.328 --> 01:03:55.654 Yeah, just go to Napa.org and you'll see all the information. And of course, we would love to have members join us, but like I said, even if you just want to check out the information. Definitely check out the Nancy Gallery and like I said, go on the forum, see what people are talking about. Roughfish.com is another one that not so much collecting fish because they do release they're kind of like lifelifters too, like birders are. They release most of the fish they get, but everybody has their own little interest in the things they pursue. Like we can say about tropical fish, someone like discus for some reason. 01:03:55.852 --> 01:04:04.474 Oh, that was me. Yeah, I got into for a while and I went a little bit crazy with this, but it was fun. 01:04:04.592 --> 01:04:07.034 Oh, it's a good way to get rid of $1,000, isn't it? 01:04:07.072 --> 01:04:18.400 Yeah, exactly. But I mean, I have never done the amount of water changes and I was changing water like a banchie. That's crazy. 01:04:19.330 --> 01:04:26.500 Well, I love that when you guys go out and do these collections that jenny's Good Cop and conrad's Bad Cop. 01:04:27.190 --> 01:04:28.514 You got to help police each other. 01:04:28.552 --> 01:04:29.380 That's right. 01:04:30.550 --> 01:04:38.360 John Q. Public comes along, sort of point them towards her. She knows how to handle the people. 01:04:40.010 --> 01:04:41.560 Then you lay the hammer down. 01:04:42.250 --> 01:04:44.198 Then I lay the hammer down. 01:04:44.364 --> 01:04:45.782 We make a good team. 01:04:45.916 --> 01:05:23.586 Well, guys, go to Nanfa.org. It's Nanfa.org. Certainly. Check it out. You can make a donation. They have a little bit of merch on there as well. But more importantly, become a member. Join this club of unique individuals that really have discovered a natural wonder in our lakes and streams. And if you think for a minute that our native fish aren't as beautiful as some of the tropical fish that we have, think again. Google some of the species you've heard in the podcast. And a special thanks to Matt pedersen for getting us in touch with you guys. I understand that Matt actually went on one of these events with you. Is that correct? 01:05:23.688 --> 01:05:29.718 Yes, that's correct. And he was with us about three or four years ago as well. 01:05:29.804 --> 01:05:54.846 Well, certainly. Check out Amazon Us magazine, coral reef, or, excuse me, coral magazine. My apologies. And hopefully we'll get a big article with beautiful pictures on this subject right in the magazine. But again, is there any way that, you know, we're going to have people that are going to message? How can people support you? How can people help carry your specific mission on? Guys, is there anything that you need from the public? 01:05:54.948 --> 01:05:56.446 Well, that is nice to ask. 01:05:56.548 --> 01:06:28.802 Yeah, that's nice, but no, we're good. It's kind of a low budget sort of thing. We don't operate with a big budget, but it's fascinating work. And whether we're looking for long yard sunfish or whatever we're targeting, like I say, it's always like you never know if we'll find them or not. Sometimes you'll find them at night and not during the day. It's just a fun activity. It's very rewarding. 01:06:28.946 --> 01:06:37.798 Probably the most important question that we didn't ask, and I'm going to ask because I know it's on everybody's lips. Have you seen Bigfoot out there? Is bigfoot alive in Ohio. 01:06:37.974 --> 01:06:39.580 Yeah, he was there. 01:06:40.030 --> 01:06:40.780 Thanks. 01:06:41.950 --> 01:06:43.420 I just think that's big red. 01:06:44.910 --> 01:06:51.166 When I used to do a lot more nocturnal surveys, there were a lot of sounds out there. I didn't know what was making those sounds. 01:06:51.268 --> 01:06:54.186 Taco Bell. You guys stopped the taco Bell beforehand. 01:06:54.298 --> 01:06:55.278 That was the sound out in the. 01:06:55.284 --> 01:06:57.018 Woods and it's thoroughly gurgling. 01:06:57.194 --> 01:06:58.690 Somebody's tell me gurgling. 01:07:01.510 --> 01:07:06.350 Well, Jenny conrad, thanks so much for coming on. And do you have any last notes for listeners? 01:07:06.430 --> 01:07:09.826 Come join us in 2022 in winona, Minnesota. 01:07:09.938 --> 01:07:11.400 Tell us about that real quick. 01:07:13.450 --> 01:07:32.218 We're firming up details. We don't have everything all firmed up yet, but we're probably going to have the convention at St. Mary's University. And will that be staying in dorm rooms? Staying in dorm rooms. And we're going to try to feed up her banquet. We're going to try to feed a wall line meal fish. 01:07:32.394 --> 01:07:43.582 Yeah, because darters are too hard related to darters. Darters are too hard to fill a that's. Why is that a two day event? Three day event. 01:07:43.716 --> 01:07:59.106 Well, it's actually like a four day but it's kind of like Thursday to short day. Then we have a full day of presentations covering the topics that members are interested in and we have two days of field trips where people go out and collect their fish that they want to bring home. 01:07:59.208 --> 01:08:00.358 That sounds like fun. 01:08:00.444 --> 01:08:01.254 It's fun. 01:08:01.372 --> 01:08:04.178 Well, we better be there. Jimmy will beat us up with Steve. 01:08:04.194 --> 01:08:07.350 I am not sharing a room with you, I tell you that. Mr. taco Bell. 01:08:07.850 --> 01:08:08.946 I'll bring some beetles. 01:08:08.978 --> 01:08:14.074 I don't want to stay in the dorm when donna has many fine hotels too. 01:08:14.272 --> 01:08:17.818 Hey, we can finally get that holiday in Express you've been talking about for years. 01:08:17.984 --> 01:08:21.782 I'm going to stay at conrad's house. I don't know about you dude. 01:08:21.846 --> 01:08:28.490 Jimmy, yes, you can stay at my house. Hey, there is half an hour away. There you go, winning. 01:08:29.090 --> 01:08:30.942 It's all about us. Rob, it is. 01:08:30.996 --> 01:08:33.754 You're in the garage. I'm in the garage with the taco. 01:08:33.802 --> 01:08:35.950 Bell with the door open. 01:08:36.020 --> 01:08:49.538 Well, conrad, Jenny, thanks again and for those listening again, go to nanfa.org. You'll see it in the show notes on the bottom of the website. And special thanks to Matt pederson from Amazon, Us and Coral magazine. Until next time, adios. 01:08:49.634 --> 01:08:50.198 Thank you. 01:08:50.284 --> 01:08:51.400 Yes, thank you. 01:08:55.450 --> 01:09:08.358 Thanks guys for listening to podcast. Please go to your favorite place where podcasts are found, whether it be spotify, itunes, stitcher, wherever they can be found, like subscribe. And make sure you get push notifications directly to your phone so you don't miss great content like this. 01:09:08.444 --> 01:09:14.590 That's called a homeless person trying to wash your windshield as you come up to the aquarium. You just run their ass over. 01:09:14.660 --> 01:09:15.754 I work for the aquarium. 01:09:15.802 --> 01:09:16.666 Scorch. squish, squirt. 01:09:16.698 --> 01:09:18.122 You can never trust the ukrainians. 01:09:18.186 --> 01:09:18.654 Oh, yeah. 01:09:18.692 --> 01:09:19.806 Let's make them mad now. 01:09:19.828 --> 01:09:21.580 Adam just sitting there I've been really trying.