Saltwater Edge Podcast

Bill Wetzel has guided the Montauk surf for over 25 years. He is one of the most requested anglers that you, the Saltwater Edge Podcast listeners, have ever asked for.

Not surprisingly, his live social posts that he records driving home after a night in the Montauk surf are a masterclass in the thought process of what makes great anglers great—traits like focus, observation, and a deep understanding of seasonal bait migrations and more. 

Bill has hosted the Surf Rats Ball Surf Fishing Tournament for over a decade. He has donated 100% of the proceeds to Kids Need More, a non-profit that is dedicated to enhancing the lives of children and their families who are coping with cancer and other life-threatening diseases. That’s an awesome display of compassion and commitment.

Learn more at Surf Rats Ball

Show Notes:

00:34 Introducing the Guest: A Surf Casting Legend
01:44 The Guest's Arrival and Initial Conversation
02:03 Discussing Fishing Tactics and Strategies
03:06 Understanding Bait Migrations and Fishing Seasons
05:00 The Art of Surf Fishing: Techniques and Tips
07:01 The Importance of Observation in Fishing
07:43 The Role of Bait in Fishing Success
10:05 The Intricacies of Fishing Locations and Conditions
12:41 The Importance of Focus and Observation in Fishing
15:19 Understanding and Navigating Fishing Structures
18:46 The Role of Passion and Preparation in Fishing Success
22:57 The Importance of Keeping a Fishing Log
37:51 Discussing the Magic Minutes Talk
37:58 Understanding the Importance of Wind and Tide in Fishing
38:34 The Art of Spotting and Breaking Down Fishing Locations
39:07 Balancing Fishing with Personal Life
40:21 The Intricacies of Fishing in Different Conditions
42:28 The Importance of Knowledge and Experience in Fishing
46:16 The Changing Landscape of Montauk
53:00 The Role of Equipment in Fishing
01:03:51 The Final Fishing Day Dream Scenario
01:06:57 The Impact of Surf Rats Ball on Kids with Cancer
01:09:01 Closing Remarks and Acknowledgements

Frank Goncalves has been immersed in saltwater fishing since childhood, growing up in the East Coast's largest fishing port of New Bedford, Massachusetts. This proximity to the salt, a lot of commitment, and his abundant creativity have produced a very talented surfcaster. Sure, there is "putting in the work," his effort is legendary, but many of us can stand on a rock. Frank Goncalves separates from the pack with his attention to detail and a creative mind that powers his day job as a graphic designer but is also critical to his surfcasting success. Frank, like all creators, operates with a set of facts, intuition, and a willingness to try things of which some don't work out, but the results in aggregate are quite impressive. 

Most of Ben Whalley’s very non-traditional youth was spent in Brazil. When he wasn’t breaking horses or working on the ranch, he was exploring the wilderness and waterways, searching for natural materials he could spin up to imitate local berries to catch Pacou.

About 20 years ago, he moved to Maine, where his obsession with wild salmonids and chasing stripers on the beautiful, expansive flats in the Gulf of Maine.

His saltwater flies are known for being functional and realistic, heavily influenced by the brilliance of Bob Popovic. 

In 2022, Ben decided to leave his career as an engineer to pursue his tying, teaching, and guiding full time.

Check out benwhalleyfishing.com to learn more.

Capt. Kyle is a fly fishing guide, lodge owner, writer, conservationist, and entrepreneur. Kyle’s passion for fly fishing runs deep, but his true passion is helping people and fighting to protect wild fish and wild places.

He guides for stripers on the flats in Maine and chases bonefish, permit and whatever else is on the flats in the Berry Islands, Bahamas. Like most of us Kyle is happy when there is a bend in the rod; but he gets truely excited by the anticipation of seeing a fish and making the cast that gets the eat in skinny water. 

Kyle’s guiding career includes extensive time in the western US chasing world-class trout, the vast marshlands of Argentina for Golden Dorado, and the diverse coast of New England for Striped Bass. Kyle has been lucky to travel the world exploring new fisheries and has spent extensive time on the Bahamian flats, living in South Andros managing a fly fishing lodge, and most recently launched Soul Fly Lodge, his first lodge operation.

Check out our Soul Fly Lodge Fly Shop if you are headed south.

Captain Connor MacLeod is one of the most in demand charter boat captains I know. From the on the water experience he creates that earns stellar reviews, to his monthly Fishing Forecast in On The Water magazine, to his highly effective line of tog jigs. Every thing is top notch. And to top it off, the RI State Record blackfish of 21.57 lbs caught on his boat in 2021!

He also understands that while operating safely is a charter captain's primary job he recogmizes that creating memories keeps people coming back. Captain Connor Macleod has done plenty of repeat customers.

Learn more about Captain Connor and Tall Tailz Charters here

Today's guest is a passionate man. Whether it's paintball, capturing cool video, or hunting his beloved striped bass. He is all in.

Today's guest has been a steady supporter of catch and release recognizing some time ago that we need to release the breeders to have a sustainable fishery and the opportunity to share our joy with future generations.

He has also followed his passion in to product development and looking for better solutions for surfcasters. Check out Phase Gear

Please welcome from Comanche Surfcasting the Smiling Tan Man Pete Uchtig.

As an educator and an entrepreneur, Luyen Chou has done some remarkable things in his career, and since his teenage years he has always been a fisherman. When the opportunity presented itself to apply his unique skills to make a difference in his passion, he stepped up with his time and talent. Striped bass, false albacore, and redfish, and the people who chase them are just starting to realize the benefits Luyen and his app GotOne can have on our fisheries. The app will serve the angler in ways no other app does, and the anonomized (non-specific) data will be invaluable to fisheries managers. He is indeed the right guy at the right time.

Well done, my friend.

Captain Max Dispoto has already spent what might be a lifetime for most other anglers fishing the tuna grounds of Southern New England. He has a passion for the canyons as well as the "Midshore" fishery that has exploded this year due to the abundance of sand eels. 

Max is a member of the Shimano Saltwater Sportfishing Pro Staff. That's quite a recognition that he earned because he shares the same relentless drive and guy instincts that the very best Cpatains seem to share.

Even as a fairly late bloomer to the sport, Dustin Stevens undying desire to learn all things fishing has led him to become a multi-species and multi-technique angler. This curiosity has created an avid inshore fisherman with a passion for stripers, albies, tog, and sea bass

Dustin also has a unique business model here in the northeast in that he guides kayak fishermen. His focus is on both light tackle and bottom fishing so anglers often fish both styles on one charter. 

I'd be remiss if I didn't mention his charter business is in addition to being a husband, father and a good bit of travel as required by his profession in the airline industry. The dude is tireless.

Captain Diogo Godoi of Gorilla Tactics Sportfishing owns one of Cape Cod’s premier inshore light tackle charter operations; he specializes in bluefin tuna, striped bass, and false albacore, as well as a variety of other species. 

When you fish with Captain Diogo you realize he is experienced in a variety of light tackle techniques and will stick with it until you are tight. The SWE crew has fished with Diogo a number of times for jig and pop bluefin. Every time has been a great experience with plenty of shots and time spent learning something new if Plan A doesn't work out as planned.

This guy is all in!

Back in the day we was a hell of good lacrosse player.

As Editor of On The Water Jimmy has to fish a lot and fortunately for On The Water Magazine Jimmy is up to the challenge. All joking aside it's no small task to have the versatility and the expertise to teach others a stunning array of fishing techniques from center pinning for steelhead to deep dropping swordfish. Fact is Jimmy Fee is a talented and curious angler who might be the best guy for the job he has. Case in point a few years ago I heard of a whisper of a local squeteague bite and I was immediately excited up to catch one. So I go to Google to learn a bit about jigging and the first result was an article written by Jimmy only a few days prior. Further proof that he has his finger on the pulse of New England recreational fishing. Join us for a great chat with a great guy.

Captain Coral Rose Aiello has been fishing with her father, Joe since she was a child and became first mate on his charter boat the Coral Rose at 14. In the decade+ since then, she has come into her own as a fisherman, and she and Joe have developed a very unique working relationship as a father-daughter team.

Coral, aka “Professional Hooker” can be found and followed on Instagram @Professional.Hooker. Check out her YouTube channel where she often posts fishing videos. 

She holds her USCG 100-Ton Masters License. She is majoring in aquaculture & fisheries at the University of Rhode Island. As an avid conservationist, she is involved with Gray’s Fish tagging out of Florida and The American Littoral Society out of New Jersey.

Wikipedia says, "Bob Popovics is an American fly tier from New Jersey." That's like saying, "Bruce Springsteen is an American musician from New Jersey" Bob Pop and the Boss share modest Garden State beginnings and a passion and vision for their craft.

Bob Popovics pioneered using epoxy to create durability in saltwater flies as a solution to the regular shredding by bluefish of conventional flies. Bob also recognized that epoxy had the added side-effects of providing translucency and profile, facilitating the imitation of a wide variety of baitfish. In 1992 the Surf Candy series took the stale saltwater fly fishing market by storm. It was Bob Popovics "Born To Run" 

Many more innovations have followed since, including the Semper Fleye, Pop Lips, Bucktail Deceiver, Bulkhead, and Hollow Fleye, to name a few. 

Bob is happy to recognize the mentors who helped him along the way and is just as committed to passing the baton to the next generation as saltwater fly tying continues to get more creative.

Travis was introduced to guiding at a very young age by his Dad Harley, who is a veteran guide on South Andros. The story goes Travis would run back to the house when he saw his dad's skiff head out for the day and "borrow" his fly rod. The gig was up when Harley pointed out "those are not my wind knots!"

Since then, Travis has earned a reputation as one of the top flats guides around. He is based at Soul Fly Lodge in the Berry Islands, Bahamas. He is an enthusiastic hunter who has observed and researched the behaviors and habits of the species that live on the flats he calls home. He has a healthy passion/ obsession with permit that never seems to fade. He has become a tremendous flycaster and a talented teacher. Impressively quick to diagnose the needed tweak in the client's mechanics. A day on the water with Travis will create a memory for sure!

Travis is on Instagram @flats_phantom

Orlando Campos, otherwise known as NorCalKat respects the past and protects the future. He is first a fisherman who has the talents and skills to build plugs that are unique in their own way and made out of a need he has experienced.

Everything I know about woodworking comes from my fishing partner, Mike Fixter.  Without his generosity in fast-tracking me on the ins and outs of making a Striper Plug, I wouldn’t be where I am today.

I am a big advocate for having a good fishery for all.  Education is the key to teaching everyone good habits and techniques in fishing.  I am part of the Catch and Release Crew and always offer good information on how we can improve and influence others in a positive manner.  

Steve McKenna has probably spent more time in the Rhody surf than almost anyone. Since college, he has put in the time required to gain meaningful insights, all the while keeping an open mind to how things could be improved. He is well known for developing the way to rig a Sluggo to swim more like an eel, for example. Steve is a kind and generous fisherman who is grateful for the experiences the surf has provided.

Ed Mitchell has published four saltwater fly fishing books and written dozens of magazine articles. He was an early supporter of striped bass conservation and was very involved in Amendment 3 (we are on Amendment 7 now). 

Ed resides in Connecticut and regularly fishes in CT and South County in RI. He also spent fifteen June's on Martha's Vineyard. 

Hogy Lure Company was founded by Capt. Mike Hogan who designed and tweaked each product in the field. Capt. Mike has fished all over the country and has developed products and techniques along the way, all with big fish in mind.

The company was started in 2004 when Capt. Mike left his office job in Boston and moved back to Cape Cod in order to get closer to fishing. He began running inshore and offshore charters again, focusing on trophy class fishing. He doesn’t use live or dead bait, so he found himself needing baits for very specific situations to compete with live bait anglers. As a result, he saw a demand for large-style soft baits that mimicked the larger baits he was trying to imitate. Capt. Mike spent many months working on the special blend of soft plastic and finally came up with the current plastic blend that Hogy Lure Company uses today. He immediately saw how effective large soft baits were both inshore and off-shore. Never intending to bring the new lures to market, Capt. Mike used them on his charters and gave them to his friends who referred to them as “Hogy's”

Capt. Mike's first experience selling Hogy Lures was at a sportsman show in Massachusetts. He remembered the mountain of soft baits he had on the table at a time when he didn’t even have packaging. Much to his great pleasure, he sold out by early afternoon the first day. The same thing happened at the following show in Rhode Island. It was then that he knew he was on to something. In 2005, Hogy Lure Company was incorporated and later filed for a patent finally received in 2009.

Dave Anderson has many talents. He's a top Wiffle Ball talent, master plug builder, and very talented writer; but at the end of the day, he is a curious fisherman. Dave is always down to try something new and will forever be peeling the onion on his passion - surfcasting for striped bass.

He is currently the Editor of The Fisherman magazine and was previously the Editor of Surfcasters Journal.

Rene is the consumate Captian. He can catch fish with the best of them, but he also provides a safe and fun experience. In that order. Nobody puts in more prep time into each trip than Rene. He works hard, has a long list of proven spots and he'll give it to you straight. If it could happen on the water from finding a school of squeteague to mechanical problems he's thought of it and is prepared with the right lure, fly or boat part whatever the case may be. 

If you have fished with Rene you no doubt understand how deserving is of the Orvis 2020 Saltwater Guide of the Year honor.