Tom Rowland Podcast

Bill Oyster of Oyster Bamboo Fly Rods and Capt. Rhett Morris join me for a story about craftsmanship, business, and one very hard-earned permit.

Bill builds fly rods out of bamboo, a technology most anglers left behind decades ago. He had a four-year waiting list, but he was working until 3 AM seven days a week and realized he’d never make a middle-class income building rods. So he started teaching people to build their own. Today Oyster Bamboo runs 240 students a year through its classes, and the waitlist stretches two years out. Bill shares how one phone call from a determined wife led to his first student and why other rod makers warned him that teaching would put them all out of business. He also talks about building rods for President Carter and a royal wedding gift.

Rhett walked into Bill’s shop by accident in Blue Ridge, Georgia, and ended up building a 10-weight bamboo rod he named “The Permit.” He tells the story of the three years it took to land a permit on that rod and why it meant more than any fish he’s caught.

Learn more and get on the class waitlist at oysterbamboo.com

One company owned by Canada’s Cooke Inc. is catching about 70% of all the Atlantic menhaden that can legally be harvested. The fish we love to chase depend on that bait to survive: striped bass, tarpon, redfish, cobia, king mackerel, and bluefin tuna all rely on menhaden, and so do ospreys and whales.

I sat down with Chris Macaluso and Jaclyn Lunaas of the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership (TRCP) to find out how this works. They explain how Virginia ended up with 75% of the coast-wide quota, and how a leasing loophole lets a foreign-owned company fish under an American flag. We also cover the Louisiana bycatch study, which estimated that 140 to 160 million additional fish are killed in a single Gulf season, including about 30,000 redfish and 250,000 speckled trout.

We get into the science too. Regulators found that the Atlantic menhaden population had been overestimated by about 40%. The science called for a cut of more than 50%, but the commission took only a 20% cut for 2026. In the Gulf, Louisiana and Mississippi have no catch limits at all.

Most importantly, Chris and Jaclyn explain what you can do about it, even if you never catch a striped bass in your life.

Learn more and sign the petition: trcp.org/foragefishrecovery

Chapters

#menhaden #stripedbass #fishingconservation #tarpon #redfish #TomRowlandPodcast

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PLACEHOLD

Jere Hartman spent 19 years in the Army, including time as an Army Ranger, then went straight into the FBI's Terrorist Screening Center. Two years later he'd put on 50 pounds and was spending his nights sitting in the dark. So he walked into his performance review and resigned.

What came next was a six-month thru-hike of the Appalachian Trail (trail name: Clincher, and he'll tell you why). Ten years later, he answered a Facebook post in the Ranger community and signed on to row across the Pacific Ocean.

In this episode, Jere and I talk about:

Support Corsair Racing: https://corsairracing.org

This episode is brought to you by Star brite, makers of Salt Off and a full line of boat-care products, and a company that invests heavily in conservation. Check them out at https://www.starbrite.com

🎙 Subscribe to the Tom Rowland Podcast for more conversations with people doing extraordinary things.

#TomRowlandPodcast #OceanRowing #Veterans #AppalachianTrail #ArmyRanger #WorldsToughestRow #CrossFit

Captain Rhett Morris of morefishflorida.com has guided the greater Charlotte Harbor area for three decades — and he kept a catch log almost every day of it. That data now tells a story the numbers on Florida's coast are backing up: a steady, decades-long decline in snook, redfish, and trout that's accelerated since the mid-2000s.

In this episode, Rhett walks Tom through what his records reveal, what actually caused the collapse (the record-shattering 2018 red tide, the nitrogen overload, and the algae that smothered the seagrass), and why Hurricane Milton turned out to be one of the best things to happen to the fishery in years. Then he lays out his proposal: treat Charlotte Harbor as a test zone, change the redfish and snook slot limits, and let the fishery become its own hatchery. It's not a mandate — it's the start of a conversation, and it comes with a real economic case for why even the developers should care.

If it resonates, there's a petition at morefishflorida.com. As Rhett says, sharing it may matter even more than signing it.

👉 Sign & share the petition: https://morefishflorida.com

This episode is brought to you by Star brite — makers of Salt Off and a full line of boat-care products, and a company that puts real effort into conservation. Check them out.

CHAPTERS

#TomRowlandPodcast #Fishing #Snook #Redfish #CharlotteHarbor #Conservation #FloridaFishing

Red snapper season in the South Atlantic got shut down the night before it opened — and most anglers still don't really know why. In this one, I sit down with David Moss, Fisheries Project Manager for The Nature Conservancy, to break the whole thing down in plain English: what an EFP actually is, the lawsuit that closed the season, why managers and anglers see two completely different oceans, and the surprising reason keeping your spots secret might be the very thing costing you fishing days.

David's a Florida-born fisherman first and a fisheries guy second, and he makes the case for why the catch data you throw away — including the days you get skunked — is exactly what the fishery needs to open more seasons, not fewer.

We get into:

Get in touch or get involved:

Brought to you by Star brite — makers of Salt Off and a full line of boat care products, and a company doing real work in conservation. starbrite.com

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Everybody keeps asking me about red snapper — why they're everywhere and you can't keep them in one place, and nowhere to be found in another. So I brought on someone who lives on both sides of that fight.

Dylan Hubbard is VP of Hubbard's Marina in Madeira Beach — a fourth-generation, nearly 100-year-old operation — and he's also president of the Florida Guides Association, VP of the Charter Fisherman's Association, and chair of the Gulf Council Reef Fish Advisory Panel. He's one of the only guests we've had who's both a working charter operator and deeply embedded in the federal fisheries decision-making process. That combination makes this one of the clearest breakdowns of what's really happening with our fishery that I've heard.

In this conversation we get into:

"If you're not in the room, you're on the menu." If you care about the future of the fishery, this is the one to watch.

Connect with Dylan & Hubbard's Marina:

This episode is brought to you by Star Brite — makers of Salt Off and a full line of products to take care of your boat, and a company that gives back through conservation. Check them out.

Rich Hernandez can do 5,000 push-ups without ever touching his knees — and he's

Captain Brandon McGraw is a Space Coast fishing guide who runs Space Coast Sport Fishing out of the Melbourne area, working the Mosquito Lagoon, the Indian River, and Sebastian Inlet on Florida's east-central coast. A retired firefighter with 20 years at Orlando Fire Department, he now guides full time for redfish, seatrout, and some of the largest snook in Florida. In this episode he explains how the Mosquito Lagoon clawed back from its seagrass collapse, why the Sebastian area grows oversized snook, and the small details that decide light-tackle tournaments.