Latest / The Articulate Fly / S6, Ep 101: The Chocklett Factory: Fly Fishing Travels, Conservation and New Ventures

Transcript

S6, Ep 101: The Chocklett Factory: Fly Fishing Travels, Conservation and New Ventures · The Articulate Fly

• 0:03
  Marvin: Hey folks, it's Marvin Cash, the host of the Articulate Fly.
• 0:06
  Marvin: We're back with another chocolate factory with the man himself,
• 0:09
  Marvin: Blaine Chocolate. Blaine, how are you?
• 0:12
  Blane: I'm good, man. How are you doing?
• 0:13
  Marvin: I'm just trying to stay out of trouble. You know, it's kind of funny.
• 0:16
  Marvin: I don't think you've been in Blue Ridge for more than two weeks in the last three months.
• 0:20
  Blane: No, I haven't, man. I've been on the road literally since the middle of February.
• 0:25
  Blane: I bet I haven't been home. four weeks since February.
• 0:31
  Blane: It's been a long, long traveling year, but it's been great.
• 0:37
  Blane: It's been something I've needed to do with the whole chocolate factory and me
• 0:43
  Blane: not guiding as much anymore.
• 0:45
  Blane: It's freed me up to do a lot of the things I've been wanting to do.
• 0:49
  Blane: One, go visit friends I haven't seen or we've been talking about fishing together.
• 0:55
  Blane: One of those things is heading out west out to Washington and Oregon and got
• 1:00
  Blane: to see Dave McCoy and we did a muskie school out there.
• 1:04
  Blane: They have a really good tiger muskie fishery. So it was, you know,
• 1:09
  Blane: with everything going on with here, like I told you in the past,
• 1:14
  Blane: the fisheries are just changing and they're not what I grew up guiding on.
• 1:19
  Blane: And I made a decision early on in my fly fishing career back in the 90s that
• 1:27
  Blane: I was going to focus more on warm water fisheries.
• 1:31
  Blane: And unfortunately, the Upper Pacific Northwest, they're in a position where
• 1:37
  Blane: they're focusing on that now because their cold water fisheries are not doing well.
• 1:43
  Blane: And they're trying to make sure that they have a sustainable fishery in the
• 1:47
  Blane: future. So they're looking at starting to promote smallmouth bass.
• 1:51
  Blane: They're warm water fisheries there. and they said it'd be better to call than
• 1:56
  Blane: me because that's kind of been my bread and butter for my entire career.
• 2:00
  Blane: So it was really nice meeting people out there, finally getting up in that part
• 2:04
  Blane: of the world and fishing and seeing the tiger muskie fisheries that they have, which are fantastic.
• 2:10
  Blane: So anybody out there that's been wanting to go to the Pacific Northwest,
• 2:15
  Blane: I would highly recommend going and seeing.
• 2:17
  Blane: What they have to offer because there's a bunch of tiger muskies,
• 2:20
  Blane: He's beautiful, obviously proficient at the base of some of those beautiful
• 2:25
  Blane: mountains that they have out there and Mount Rainier and some of the other ones.
• 2:30
  Blane: And just, I don't think there's another place in the country you could see that
• 2:34
  Blane: kind of scenery. Pretty, pretty amazing.
• 2:37
  Blane: I got to Fish Oregon with a buddy there and did a shot demo and all that. And that was a good time.
• 2:45
  Blane: And I was down in Florida a couple times.
• 2:49
  Blane: Got to see Flip and we're doing a little short film. Well, it's not a short
• 2:53
  Blane: film. It's a pretty big, significant film on Lefty.
• 2:58
  Blane: And there's going to be more coming out on that. But Fly Fisherman and the company
• 3:02
  Blane: that owns Fly Fisherman is going to be putting that on.
• 3:08
  Blane: And Jay Nichols has all this video content that he did with Lefty.
• 3:15
  Blane: And of course, who better to narrate it and tell that story than Flip?
• 3:22
  Blane: So Jay and I went down there in March and spent a week with Flip and got a bunch
• 3:29
  Blane: of really good stuff there.
• 3:30
  Blane: So I'm excited about seeing that come to fruition because nobody deserves the
• 3:34
  Blane: recognition and to tell his story more than Lefty did.
• 3:39
  Blane: I mean, I think everybody that's in the fly community owes Lefty really everything
• 3:44
  Blane: that they've been able to do in this sport because Lefty was the beacon.
• 3:50
  Blane: It's like Flip says, Lefty was our internet before we had it,
• 3:55
  Blane: which I think is a really cool way to say who Lefty really was Because if he
• 4:02
  Blane: saw something, he was able to communicate it with people all over the world.
• 4:06
  Blane: And nobody did it better than he did.
• 4:09
  Blane: So I'm super excited about that one. So stay tuned for that.
• 4:12
  Blane: Hopefully that'll come out here in the next year or two.
• 4:16
  Marvin: Yeah, that's pretty neat. And then I know you've been doing some stuff with ASGA too.
• 4:21
  Blane: Yeah, so doing a lot with ASGA. Yeah, I just had a meeting with them here just
• 4:27
  Blane: before we got on here to do this.
• 4:29
  Blane: So this can lead into some stuff later, but the chocolate factory,
• 4:35
  Blane: we're going to do some stuff with ASGA, do some special runoffs of flies specific
• 4:41
  Blane: to help raise money for ASGA projects.
• 4:44
  Blane: And if you don't know who that is and what they do, it's American Saltwater
• 4:49
  Blane: Guides Association, and they're the ones that get the science for the policymakers
• 4:55
  Blane: to make sure our fisheries are healthy.
• 4:57
  Blane: So we're doing tagging programs and we're doing symposiums and we're getting
• 5:03
  Blane: ready to do one in September in Louisiana.
• 5:06
  Blane: They're doing one up in, I think, the weekend before.
• 5:12
  Blane: They're doing one up in Cape Cod for false albacore.
• 5:16
  Blane: And we found out so much research by...
• 5:19
  Blane: Getting funding and stuff we've put tags in them and pit tags and we were able
• 5:26
  Blane: to do some telemetry where we found out that uh false albacore are all connected
• 5:31
  Blane: the ones that are up in maine are.
• 5:34
  Blane: Uh the northeast are also the same fish that are in
• 5:37
  Blane: north carolina and florida and even into the gulf so we've
• 5:40
  Blane: tagged fish up in cape cod and they you
• 5:43
  Blane: know they'll go by buoys or wherever or get recaptured and
• 5:47
  Blane: we're finding the same fish in the gulf so for
• 5:51
  Blane: those that think that they were all separate fish or not and they've also done
• 5:54
  Blane: dna samples that shows that these fish are also connected that
• 5:57
  Blane: they're out they all have the same type of dna that means they all spawn in
• 6:00
  Blane: the same area which is very interesting and that's why.
• 6:03
  Blane: It's very important to have this this stuff
• 6:06
  Blane: done because false albacore as much fun
• 6:09
  Blane: as they are to fly anglers specifically they're looked
• 6:12
  Blane: at as trash fish in the conventional world and they
• 6:15
  Blane: don't have regulations on them anywhere so it's very important
• 6:18
  Blane: for us to make sure that these fish are protected um that
• 6:22
  Blane: we where we you know they're important to the pelagic
• 6:26
  Blane: fish marlin and and you know all the giant
• 6:28
  Blane: fish out there tunas they eat those and they
• 6:31
  Blane: need those fish to to survive so not only
• 6:34
  Blane: are they important to us as flying words but they're very important to
• 6:37
  Blane: the the giant predators out in the out in
• 6:40
  Blane: the big blue sea that uh predate on them so we
• 6:43
  Blane: got to make sure that that fishery stays healthy we're doing
• 6:45
  Blane: the same type of tagging program for cobia same tagging
• 6:49
  Blane: program for um for jacks jacks
• 6:52
  Blane: are not protected anywhere so we're trying to get um jacks new
• 6:55
  Blane: regulations on jacks all over the all over
• 6:58
  Blane: the north america from the gulf to the east
• 7:01
  Blane: coast and uh so we're getting ready to do a film on that we're doing a symposium
• 7:06
  Blane: in louisiana uh coming up mid to late september I'm also heading up to see my
• 7:12
  Blane: buddy Tim Adams that owns Oxbow Farms and they're doing an all species tournament
• 7:17
  Blane: up there and the funds go to.
• 7:21
  Blane: Asga um so it's a i've never
• 7:24
  Blane: been to maine so this will be my first trip up there see a
• 7:26
  Blane: bunch of buddies i'm looking forward to that that's mid
• 7:29
  Blane: september so i'm always on
• 7:32
  Blane: the move but i'm also heading out to uh um in october to see one of my dealers
• 7:39
  Blane: north 40 also house of flies they're they're putting on a dealer summit and
• 7:45
  Blane: they became one of the chocolate factory dealers uh this past summer and they've been really great.
• 7:50
  Blane: So my opportunity to meet all their employees and kind of teach their managers
• 7:57
  Blane: and stuff all about the Chakra factory and all about my flies and designs.
• 8:01
  Blane: And so they're more educated to their customer base out there.
• 8:05
  Blane: So yeah, it's definitely not letting the grass grow under my feet this year, you know.
• 8:12
  Marvin: Yeah, you may have platinum preferred status on Delta Airlines before it's all
• 8:17
  Marvin: said and done. And, you know, I know with all that travel, you've also got some
• 8:21
  Marvin: really cool announcements of some stuff that's coming out soon from the Chocolate Factory, too.
• 8:26
  Blane: Yeah, I do. I know a lot of my friends and followers know this,
• 8:32
  Blane: but there's a lot of people that don't realize.
• 8:34
  Blane: Last July, I left Lyman Fishing Company and started my own company called the Chocolate Factory.
• 8:41
  Blane: And it's been really an amazing experience to finally over 30 some years in
• 8:47
  Blane: the industry to be able to have my own company and have a factory and working
• 8:54
  Blane: directly with the people tying my
• 8:56
  Blane: flies to know that we all have the same vision and we all have the same,
• 9:00
  Blane: I guess, background where we understand what it takes to make these flies the way they should be.
• 9:09
  Blane: And integrity to make sure that we put out stuff that's my designs.
• 9:15
  Blane: I've fished it and know what it is and know how it's supposed to work and know
• 9:21
  Blane: what the fish want to see because we've done the research and we've fished it, we've lived it.
• 9:25
  Blane: And it's very important to me to make sure that the flies that I design hit
• 9:30
  Blane: the market the way that my clients get to see these flies work on a daily basis
• 9:36
  Blane: in my boat over the years.
• 9:37
  Blane: And uh so that that's been
• 9:40
  Blane: great and you know we're constantly tweaking things
• 9:44
  Blane: and things are coming and um we finally
• 9:47
  Blane: have the brushes getting ready to hit the market here in the next couple weeks
• 9:50
  Blane: um which has been a long time goal of mine too with uh for years i've been wanting
• 9:57
  Blane: to you know i've made my own brushes and stuff and it's just really nice to
• 10:01
  Blane: finally have that come um also through all the shank designs that I've created over the years.
• 10:07
  Blane: Um, they're finally going to come out the way I want them to be,
• 10:10
  Blane: to, um, and be tested, make sure they, they do what they're supposed to do. Um, and.
• 10:17
  Blane: Have the structure and and they're they're not going to be compromised in any
• 10:20
  Blane: way it's very important to make
• 10:21
  Blane: sure that happens too and um we want to we just want to make sure that,
• 10:26
  Blane: you know what we do is going to be top-notch and i think i think the end result
• 10:31
  Blane: and the people that's received and bought our flies so far are seeing that the
• 10:36
  Blane: quality is as good as it could ever be or as good as i could ever make them
• 10:40
  Blane: and you know there's been some hiccups down the you know,
• 10:43
  Blane: during this whole process, because again,
• 10:46
  Blane: I mean, we started this process late last summer.
• 10:49
  Blane: I mean, I think our first flosser delivered, you know, the very end of 2023, the beginning of 24.
• 10:57
  Blane: And, you know, it's, you know, the whole environment has been interesting.
• 11:03
  Blane: It's a learning curve. You know, I've never dealt with the whole manufacturing and stuff overseas.
• 11:09
  Blane: Overseas so um it's it's a time difference with me and my factory it's 12 hours so my meetings and,
• 11:17
  Blane: zoom meetings or whatnot are usually like four or five o'clock in the morning
• 11:21
  Blane: or 10 or 11 o'clock 12 o'clock at night you know so it's it's it's long days
• 11:26
  Blane: but it's it's worth it because we're all on the same page we all the same goals
• 11:31
  Blane: and we all all do what we do and um you know i was able.
• 11:36
  Blane: Uh you know working with this factory um we
• 11:40
  Blane: were able to you know give them fly rods from tfo and
• 11:43
  Blane: fly lines from sa and all of our tires
• 11:46
  Blane: fly or i've learned how to fly fish or catching fish on game changer flies over
• 11:51
  Blane: there and that's important to me you know it's a family and i've always been
• 11:55
  Blane: family oriented and i want every every company i work with i feel like we're
• 12:00
  Blane: family and that's It's not going to be any different with the chocolate factory
• 12:03
  Blane: and the chocolate factory dealers.
• 12:06
  Blane: So stay tuned for a lot more stuff that's coming down the pipe.
• 12:11
  Blane: I'm working on some VIP stuff with my customers. So stay tuned for that, too.
• 12:17
  Blane: It's going to be a really interesting late to 2024 and really looking forward
• 12:23
  Blane: to 2025 with, you know, new flies that are coming out and stuff I've been testing.
• 12:29
  Blane: And I can't thank my small dealer network enough, like Mad River Outfitters,
• 12:34
  Blane: Schultz Outfitters, TCO, Saltwater Edge, Fishhawk, Feathercraft, Hatch.
• 12:41
  Blane: And we're going to add another flash up in Florida here soon.
• 12:45
  Blane: And, you know, like I said, we added the North 40 and house supplies earlier this summer.
• 12:52
  Blane: So it's it's uh it's growing man and it's uh as you know and you've kind of
• 12:57
  Blane: been with me through this whole process it's uh we've come a long ways in a
• 13:01
  Blane: very short period of time and uh couldn't be more excited about it you know
• 13:06
  Blane: i can control everything and i know what i'm doing is the way it should be done yeah.
• 13:12
  Marvin: It's got to be you know helpful to you know not only are the people tying your
• 13:15
  Marvin: flies kind of fishing and learning to fish but the people that own that company
• 13:18
  Marvin: are fishermen And that's got to really help the design process.
• 13:23
  Blane: Oh, it's everything. If you don't fish, you don't know what the fly should do.
• 13:28
  Blane: You don't know how it should act.
• 13:30
  Blane: So how are you going to have any input on if it's right or wrong?
• 13:35
  Blane: So you can't. So you have to have people that know what they're doing to put
• 13:39
  Blane: out the product that needs to be put out, period.
• 13:42
  Blane: And that's why I'm very happy with where I am right now. And it's going to just get better and better.
• 13:48
  Marvin: Yeah, that's really neat. And so folks, remember, if you've seen Blaine's social
• 13:52
  Marvin: media where he talks about, are you fishing real chocolate?
• 13:54
  Marvin: You know, the only place to get those flies are from Blaine's,
• 13:57
  Marvin: uh, online store or from those, you know, handful of dealers he mentioned.
• 14:01
  Marvin: So, you know, check those out and, you know, it's funny, um,
• 14:04
  Marvin: you know, you're, uh, you're running around.
• 14:06
  Marvin: I know you've got some upcoming events, uh, in schools and stuff sliding into 2024, 2025.
• 14:13
  Blane: Yeah, I do. Um, and I hope I didn't want to leave any of my dealers out.
• 14:17
  Blane: I I think I missed in the fishhawk.
• 14:19
  Blane: I hope I did. Make it sure I did. I didn't want to leave anybody out.
• 14:22
  Blane: But, yeah, so we are doing some classes. Mad River, we're doing our second muskie
• 14:29
  Blane: class coming up here, I think, beginning or middle of the winter in 2025.
• 14:36
  Blane: So I'm really looking forward to that.
• 14:39
  Blane: Got a great place here in Roanoke, Virginia, that we're going to be doing a
• 14:42
  Blane: big mansion where everybody's going to be able to stay and we're going to do
• 14:46
  Blane: the class. And then we're going to end up doing a couple of days guided trips with that.
• 14:52
  Blane: And it's just going to be a great experience for everybody because I'm going
• 14:55
  Blane: to give them my 30 years to.
• 14:57
  Blane: Knowing what to do when and how um choosing the right lines for the right situations right flies,
• 15:03
  Blane: uh seasonal changes everything you know what muskies want how how they live
• 15:08
  Blane: where they are all those things we're gonna do that and it's gonna be a i think
• 15:12
  Blane: it's gonna be a great experience you know you can't control the weather can't
• 15:16
  Blane: control the water but what you can do is control,
• 15:18
  Blane: your knowledge and and how you treat the people that come and make sure we have
• 15:23
  Blane: a good time and And just hopefully when they leave, they feel like that they've
• 15:27
  Blane: learned a whole lot about a fish, a fish of 10,000 casts.
• 15:31
  Blane: And I feel like I've got a lot to offer in that. And I look forward to working
• 15:36
  Blane: with Mad River in the future.
• 15:37
  Blane: And we're also working with Virginia Trophy Guides, and they're helping out
• 15:42
  Blane: with it as the guides for the other couple days, along with myself.
• 15:47
  Blane: So I think it you know if you're looking
• 15:50
  Blane: for a for a I guess something to do this winter and looking for a challenge
• 15:56
  Blane: and looking to try to catch a fish of a lifetime you know I think this would
• 16:01
  Blane: be a great opportunity to see what it's all about because if you can learn musty
• 16:06
  Blane: fish and there's not a fish in anywhere,
• 16:08
  Blane: in the world that you can't catch that's honestly believe that because these
• 16:12
  Blane: fish that they are super demanding, as you know, Marvin,
• 16:17
  Blane: not only mentally, but physically.
• 16:19
  Blane: So musty fishing's not for the faint of heart, that's for sure.
• 16:23
  Marvin: Yeah, I would agree with that. And where can folks find more information on
• 16:28
  Marvin: the classes and all that kind of good stuff?
• 16:30
  Blane: Yeah, they could pay attention to my social network, Virginia Trophy Guide's
• 16:35
  Blane: social network, obviously Mad River's.
• 16:38
  Blane: They can find everything on their website and their social media pages,
• 16:41
  Blane: Facebook and Instagram.
• 16:44
  Blane: And Mad River also has an unbelievable YouTube page, too, that they do a really
• 16:51
  Blane: good job on, Brian Fleshing.
• 16:54
  Blane: So Mad River Outfitters definitely want to go check that out.
• 16:58
  Blane: And I'm also working on Smallmouth School for the spring with another good buddy
• 17:04
  Blane: of mine, Schultz Outfitters.
• 17:05
  Blane: So pay attention to that in the future. We're kind of working out the details.
• 17:09
  Blane: So hopefully we can make that happen here early spring.
• 17:12
  Blane: And yeah, you know, Smallmouth Bass has been a big part of my life too.
• 17:17
  Blane: And I think, you know, Schultz, he's obviously the Smallmouth guy up in the Midwest.
• 17:22
  Blane: And that's what he's known for. He's a good buddy and a very good dealer at the chocolate factory.
• 17:28
  Blane: So if we can make this work out, I think it'll be a really good treat because
• 17:32
  Blane: smallmouth bass are one of the best game fish there is that we have in this country.
• 17:39
  Blane: And they're readily available to a lot of people in this country.
• 17:42
  Blane: So I think there's a lot of opportunities there.
• 17:47
  Blane: And specifically, we've targeted the biggest of the big. So that's what this
• 17:52
  Blane: class is going to be focused on is learning and understanding big,
• 17:57
  Blane: smallmouth bass and how to target them throughout the seasons.
• 18:01
  Blane: So stay tuned for that one. We've got a little bit of a time crunch.
• 18:05
  Blane: I'm trying to figure out the site dates with Schultz and my schedules and Virginia
• 18:10
  Blane: Trophy schedules, but we're going to make that happen, pretty sure.
• 18:13
  Marvin: Very, very cool. So with all this running around, have you been able to get
• 18:17
  Marvin: any Traeger and Corona drinking in? No.
• 18:21
  Blane: Okay. Yeah. Yeah, I have, you know, I've, uh, a big thing I've been doing,
• 18:26
  Blane: uh, kind of my home away from home is, um, here in Virginia,
• 18:30
  Blane: it's the Virginia coast.
• 18:31
  Blane: And I was able to do some tagging for Cobia, um, and doing some triggering and
• 18:36
  Blane: some, uh, Chesapeake Bay, uh, blue crabs and doing crab picking and crab cakes.
• 18:44
  Blane: That's been a lot of fun, but yeah, here this next
• 18:47
  Blane: couple of weeks i'm spending things tight because
• 18:51
  Blane: i'm working closely with the factory and
• 18:54
  Blane: coming out with the new products and designs and
• 18:57
  Blane: all that kind of stuff so i'm staying here definitely
• 19:00
  Blane: gonna be now the football season's coming
• 19:03
  Blane: in looking forward to um the opening
• 19:06
  Blane: weekend of college football again i definitely barbecue
• 19:09
  Blane: all day and probably toss the plows with
• 19:12
  Blane: tyler and you know the next day we're probably going to go do a float for the
• 19:17
  Blane: small amount uh while we can still get them on top here so we're looking forward
• 19:22
  Blane: to doing some hanging out with family for a while for sure and then i hit the
• 19:27
  Blane: road again uh pretty hard here in about a couple weeks so,
• 19:31
  Blane: um yeah you know it's all about family time and uh chilling and grilling you know yeah it sounds.
• 19:37
  Marvin: Like uh probably barbecue wings corona and virginia tech football right.
• 19:40
  Blane: Yeah yeah for sure Sure. That's the plan.
• 19:45
  Marvin: Yeah. Well, listen, folks, as I always say, yote yourself to get out there and
• 19:49
  Marvin: catch a few. Tight lines, everybody. Tight lines, Blaine.
• 19:53
  Blane: Thanks. You too.