It's Nightside with Dan Ray on WBZY, Boston's news radio home.
Emma, thanks very much as we begin another week of Nightside. And was it cold this weekend? We'll talk about that a little later on. We'll also talk about the federal debt with Harvard University professor Jeff Myron. But first I like to introduce myself. I'm Dan Ray. I'm the host of Nightside and with us tonight, Rob Brooks. This being
the President's holiday. President's Day holiday used to be February twelfth for Lincoln and February twenty second for Washington, and they have now made it the the what the third Monday here February seventeenth, President's Day? With us, we have a producer in Rob's stead, Dan Cantano. So that's the team tonight, and of course you're going to join the team by joining us with phone calls, but only after
nine o'clock. We have four very interesting guests to talk about to talk with this first eight o'clock hour, and we're going to start off with a historian, J. L. Bell. A good evening, mister Bell, how are you this evening?
Very well?
Thank you?
Dan?
Good you might I call you JL for short by all.
Means already can call it John Heyl. It's also for telephone listeners.
All right, no problem me. The author of a book called The Road to Conquer It How four Stolen Cannon ignited the Revolutionary War, that was published in twenty sixteen but is still available, And that's the subject of our conversation tonight. Maybe what a lot of folks don't realize is that George Washington actually came to the Boston area, and I guess had a home or a headquarters in Cambridge that you know a lot more about than I do for sure, in the summer of seventeen seventy five.
And you're going to do a lecture about this, I believe, which we'll talk about a little bit later on March thirteenth in Cambridge. We got a little preview tonight from my audience. So Washington was here. He was the commander in chief of the Continental Army before the United States was the United States. Tell us about it, that's right.
He was chosen as the commander in chief, the General Lisim Hope or General of all Generals to lead the Continental Army as the Continental Congress took responsibility for the army around Boston from the New England state, so at osign colonies. At the time, it wasn't quite clear the colonies were still not fighting for independence that would come
in seventeen seventy six. But in seventeen seventy five they were trying to push the British Army out of Boston and therefore out of Massachusetts after the Battle of Lexington and conquered in April. George Washington shows up in July and he has suddenly this responsibility for this army of what he's been told, with twenty thousand men fighting against the Royal British Army.
Now, where did they expect the Royal British Army to go? I mean, they weren't going to go into the Atlantic Ocean. Wasn't in effect the war really almost technically and away at that point the Revolutionary War.
Oh, definitely, the war had definitely started, and well, the British Army was very strong that the British Navy was even stronger, and so they just wanted the soldiers and any of their supporters to get on ships and leaves. But it took nine months after George Washington arrived for them actually to do that.
So Washington arrives in July of seventeen seventy five sort of sets up shop in Cambridge. Is the facility, the building where he used I guess as his mobile headquarters. Is that still in existence today as it's been turned into a museum. I'm unfamiliar with it.
Yes, there are two houses in Cambridge that Washington used, one immediately after your arrived, at the very beginning of July July third. The second third is called the Wadsworth House, and it is part of Harvard the buildings or that define Harvard Yard. It's sort of built into the wall around Harvard Yard now. And he was there formerly a couple of weeks. That was the Harvard College President's house, and it turned out to be too small and probably too close to the men who were barracked in the
college dorms. So then he moved out about a mile away to a mansion that had been left behind by a Loyalist family who had moved into Boston. And this was a very large it was in fact the largest estate in Cambridge based on property taxes. It's the home of John and Elizabeth Vassal. They had moved out and he moved in and he stayed there for nine months, from the middle of July seventeen seventy five until the very beginning of April seventeen seventy six. So that was
where he stood. Later Martha joined him, and that's how he also had his office or meeting rooms there, and that's where he learned to be commander in chief.
And the decisive the decisive battle involved these four cannons, which I believe from my history I recall, were they not actually pulled down here from somewhere in Vermont to Dorchester Heights.
All right, we're talking about two sets of cannons here. The cannons that I wrote about in my book were cannons that were stolen out of armories in Boston back in September seventeen seventy four under the British control and moved out of town, smuggled out of town by the Patriots, smuggled out all the way to Conquered where the British found out about them and sent troops out. And that's
what happened in April seventeen seventy five. So the Patriots, the provincials, had had some cannon, but they realized over the course of seventeen thirty five they needed more, so George Washington sent Henry Knox from his the headquarters in Cambridge all the way up to late the forts along
Lake Champlain, Fort Tykwonderoga, Crown Point. Knox went up there, collected more cannon, larger cannon, more than fifty cannon, and moved them down from that area along the Hudson River and then across the Berkshires across Massachusetts to augment what was already around Boston. And that provided enough firepower to make the British decide, you know, we don't have to stay here, we could go to Well.
The thing that was amazing about that is obviously you think I have thought about it a lot, but I want the audience. There were no trucks, there were no cars. How did they move these cannons? What did they have oxen or what sort of animals or was it just human hands that moved the cannons?
It was horses and UH and people, and it was also uh they benefited. We often talked about how awful it must have been in the winter. Well, yes it was pretty awful at times, but also they benefited from winter because they could use say the frozen lakes and move the cannon across the ice. They could use the snow snowy roads as long as they weren't too hilly. Uh. It was easier to move heavy things along uh, slippery roads than along you know, muddy roads. Uh so uh.
And it took h it took weeks and weeks for Henry Knox to make that trip. It was one of the big logistical operations of the first year of the war.
It's amazing to think how they even were able to do that, and then how they were what they how they fed these these troops and these horses, I mean, and army moves on its stomach whether they're pulling cannons or not. But when they're pulling cannons. Now, tell us about I do want to mention your presentation at the Washington's Headquarters, the National Historic Site in Cambridge, March thirteenth. Tell us about that.
Well, the mansion that General Washington used for most of his time in Boston is called is now the Longfellow House, Washington's Headquarters National Historic Site. It is part of the National Park Service, which means it belongs to all of us. And I am going to be speaking there around Evacuation Day, which is the anniversary of the day that the British left.
But this one, the Thursday nearest is the March thirteenth, And I'm going to be speaking about how the Continental Congress came to choose George Washington for this job, how they chose this Fortythter, Virginia Planter as the man who would lead the Continental army, almost all of which was New Englanders.
Well, they made a great choice, that's for sure, as history shows us. And maybe Providence had some and I'm not talking about Rhode Island here. Providence, a term that would have been used back then to refer to God Almighty, might have had some influence it. So how can folks. Is your event on the thirteenth open to the public? Should they go to your website to sign up get tickets? Tell us about that.
You can go to the National Park Longfellow House, Washington's headquarters National Historic Site website at NPS dot gov slash long and look at it at the events and yes, it will be on March thirteenth. You can sign up. It is free. It is going to be in the historic carriage house on that on that estate. So there is a limited number of seats, but we're also going to be taping it.
Give us, give us one more time the website a little more slowly so people can write it down. Is it?
Did you say you? Dot? NPS dot gov slash long l O NV for short for Longfellow.
Okay, NPS for National Park Service NPS dot gov slash long J L. Bell. Thank you very much for your time tonight. Fascinating story. I learned a lot. Thank you, Thank you, Dan, talk to you again, Thank you very much. When we get back, we're going to talk about something a little different, a little bit more modern, but just as I think inspiring, breathtaking, and that is the Arctic snowy owls that have been spending some time here on Duxbury Beach. We will talk with a specialist, a raptor
specialist from the Audubon Society, Norman Smith. Right after this break. My name is Dan Ray. This is Nightside. You're listening WBZ ten thirty am, Boston's news radio. We're at iHeartRadio station.
Now back to Dan Ray line from the Window World night Side Studios on WBZ News Radio.
I'm delighted to welcome Norman Smith. Mister Smith is with the Massachusetts Automan Society. He's a raptor specialist. I'm gonna talk talk about the Arctic snowy owl, mister Smith, Norman Smith, welcome to Nightside. How are you?
Thanks a lot?
Dan So a raptor specialist. I didn't even realize that snowy owls were raptors. I assume because they have big fangs, claws, talons. Is that is that what defines a raptor.
A raptor is a bird of prey, a bird that feeds on something else. And there are a bunch of hawks, eagles, and owls that make up the raptor group, and snowy owls or one of them.
Well, I have seen a snowy owl and they are with my own eyes, and they are an amazing species. Tell us how many are there? How do they get here? Tell us the whole story they've been wintering or at least one? How many of that? And we got three snowy owls that have come down. Is this a family of some sort that have traveled three thousand miles to get here? Tell us everything we can get in in a few minutes here because this is fascinating.
Yeah, snowy owls are a bird that comes from the Arctic, breed in the Arctic tundra, and they come down here each winter, and the number of owls that comes down varies dramatically for me at a year, depending on different parameters such as food supply. When it's very difficult in the Arctic and there isn't much food, they move out, or if it's a tremendous amount of food and there's a lot of breeding going on, there's many more owls that can travel further south. So we have owls that
show up in Massachusetts. They generally come here and show up in November and stay till sometime in April, May, June, July. And during twenty thirteen we actually had two snowy owls that spent the year here, so it was the first resident snowy owls we have. They come down from the
Arctic and they love places like Logan Airport. And since nineteen eighty one, I've been capturing snowy owls at Logan Airport and then relocating them for the safety of the owls and the plains, and I bring the birds down at Duxbury Beach and this year I've actually captured thirteen snowy owls so far, and they've been hanging around Duxbury.
Beach, Okay. So the question is I know the answer is going to be very carefully, but it capture a snowy.
Owl, Well, we actually use what's called a bonet. It's like a hoop type net, and then we take an animal like a styling or a mouse and put in a little wire cage to protect it in the middle of this trap. And when the owl comes in, we actually manually trigger the trap with a string and a little fishing rod and we capture them, and then we put a band on them and we track the birds. We put satellite transmitters on these birds back in two thousand for the first time. It was the first time
wintering snowy owls have I had transmitters. It was done here in Massachusetts. We put them on and track these owls back to the Arctic for the first time to prove that these owls do make it back to the Arctic and they have viable breeders. We had one All of that in nine months. Travel seven four hundred and twenty six.
Miles talk about frequent flyer miles, so so you get a big trap, and I assume you have two porstions of the trap, one portion of the trap that you want the snowy owl to go in, and the other portion of the trap somewhat protected. Is what a mouse or something something like that?
Yes, yet exactly in a little wire cage. And then we trap them, you know, we capture them, and then you know, band them, way them, collect blood samples, collect parasites, and then you know, bring them down.
Let me ask you this, This is a dumb question. But I get paid a lot of money. Not I get paid a lot of money, get paid some money to ask dumb questions. Do the mice ever have like a heart attack when the owls to the age? They do they realize they're protected?
No?
I think they realized they're protected her. And not only that, but it's ones that I've used on a regular basis. So it's almost like they know the gig and how it works.
Okay, Well, if they know the gig, I'm okay with that. Okay, So now you got the snow How much is a snowy owl away from I haven't got as close as you out of them, but they look like they're pretty hefty.
They're a good size bird.
They can be about thirty two inches long, and they have about a six foot wingspan. And then the males are smaller than the females, like all the females are much larger. The males weigh about four pounds and the females weigh about six pounds.
That's all. I guess. It's all feathers and stuff, So yeah, I guess, but beautiful birds. Okay, so now you have relocated you said thirteen of them already this year out of Logan Airport. Why did they go to Logan Airport? Did they think they're on the flight pattern or something?
Well, Logan airport. You know, I've captured over nine hundred snowy owls that I relocated from Logan Airport. I've asked every single one and none have responded, so we really
don't know. But if you look at the airport, it actually has a wide open tundra habitat, you know, wide open grassland eighteen hundred acres that looks very much like the Arctic tundra, and it's surrounded on three sides by water, so there's lots of ducks and things to eat, so there's lots of food and it looks more like home to them than probably anyplace else around.
All Right, So you relo, how many snowy owls do you think are now hanging out in Massachusetts this month of February. We're in the middle of winter. It feels like the Arctic out there. I was out there today. I swear to God, I thought it was on the wrong side of the Arctic circle. How many snowy owls do we have hanging in our neighborhood?
Well, we probably had somewhere in the vicinity of twenty to twenty five snowy owls in the state. But one of the issues that's taken place in the last two weeks is bird flu has had a huge impact, especially on ducks and peace in southeastern Massachusetts. And because snowy owls eat a lot of waterfowl, they're very susceptible. And I've already picked up six snowy owls that we're having tested right now to see if they died from the bird flu. So fortunately some of these birds have succumbed
to this. This bird flu issue. It's something that started back over in China and the first time it showed up in New England was back in two thousand and two, and during that year it showed up in the waterfowl and one of the first birds again to get it was snowy owls.
Unfortunately, I hate to say this, but it seems like whatever, it always starts in China. So I mean, that's that's that's a huge that's a huge issue. So so we've lost some snowy owls this year. When will they start to migrate back home, back north up to the Arctic circle.
Well, what the transmit is we put on the birds. We see the birds starting to leave the state sometime usually in March or April, and by the end of April they're usually on their way back.
To the Arctic to the breeding grounds.
Okay, so they hang through Saint Patrick's Day, which certainly is a wonderful, you know, festivity that that everybody had Saint Patrick's Day in Massachusetts. Everybody should experience it, and then they head back north. These are these are magnificent birds. Where can people go in your opinion, if between now and the middle of March they have the time, is Duxbury Beach the place to be.
Well, Duxbury Beach is certainly a good location of CM and one of the reasons we release them on Duxbury Beach is because they have a presence of ranges there that helped protect the owls and help you know, photographers and birders get a chance to see these birds and educate people about them. There's signage down there about snowy owls and where they come from. You can also go north on the north shore to a plumb Island or a Tallberry beach. That's that's a good location.
And we thought that.
These birds might live to be ten to twelve years old. However, five years ago I caught a snowy owl that I banned twenty four years ago, so you know, these birds can live to be at least twenty four and who knows how long they can live. The bird I caught was a bird that you wonder how many times did it come to Massachusetts during its lifetime. I doubt it was the two times I caught it when it was a young juvenile bird and when it was an adult.
So these birds, do you know, wander around and they're nomadic. They traveled tremendous distances for sure.
Too bad you couldn't have checked their passport. You could have figured it out, but Yeah. Look, I've really enjoyed this conversation. I learned more from you about snowy owls in about ten minutes than I ever imagined I would. How can folks get more information? Got a website we can push people too.
Yeah, if you go to mass Autumn on dot org and then click on snowy owls, we have a web page that talks about the snowy owl project that we have done. We started it back in nineteen eighty one capturing birds at Logan Airport. We were the first ones to actually capture and relocate birds at an airport rather than shooting them. And we've actually helped set up parameters so that other airports, you know, with the USDA, can actually capture and relocate these birds rather than shooting them
for the safety of the owls and the planes. You know, we do this work.
Norman Smith, this was a great segment. I really appreciate your time tonight, and I know my audience does as well. Thank you so much, my friend.
All Right, have a great day.
All right, we get back right after the news. At the bottom of the hour, are going to be talking with chef Laura Klin. She's an instructor at the Cambridge School of Culinary Arts and the owner of Well Seasoned Coaching, not Well Seasoned Cooking, Well Seasoned Coaching. We'll explain it all. Going to talk about the price of eggs, egg shortages, and some egg substance that might help you in your kitchen. Coming back on Night Side right after the break at the bottom of the hour of the WBZ Now it's
eight thirty two. News went a little long with that segment, but I enjoyed it.
Awaits Night Side with Dan Ray. I'MBZ Boston's news Radio.
Well Jonie's now is Chef Laura Kline. She's an instructor of the Cambridge School of Culinary Arts and owner of Well Seasoned Coaching, not Well Seasoned Cooking. Welcome, Chef Clin. How are you tonight?
I'm great. How are you doing, Dan?
I'm doing just great. Do you remember the faculty at the Chef Coaching program the Institute of Lifestyle Medicine at Harvard Medical School. That sounds really interesting. Tell us about Well Seasoned Coaching, and tell us about the Institute of Lifestyle Medicine, and then we're going to talk about the price of eggs.
Okay, sounds good. Yeah. Through the Chef Coaching Program through the Harvard School of Medicine, we teach allied health professionals like physicians, mostly how to teach their patients how to cook at home, because when you cook at home, you're going to cook healthier than eating out. Just the fact that you're cooking at home means that you're going to eat healthier and cook healthier.
Well, you know, it's funny because those of us who don't, who don't feel we're natural cooks, it's tough. What advice would you give to someone like me? I eat, you know, five nights a week. My wife is still at work, I'm at home. I want to try to eat healthy. I try as best I can, But more often than not, I'm having a can of you know, progressivele miniSTR own soup or turkey on dark rye. I'm not doing a lot of cooking. What can I do that's simple and
easy and really tasty. Sometimes I will go and buy some of the legal seafood dinners for want and yeah, thrill that in the oven. That's probably extented for cooking. Maybe you know it's probably not you know, high whole cuisine. Let's put it like that.
Yeah.
Well, well, at the Camber School, I teach a class on the Camber School of Clony Arts. We have a plant based series of cooking, and we teach people like basically how to cook with plant based proteins and make things that taste really delicious with like vegetables and whole grain. So my favorite is just like roasting some root vegetables like sweet potatoes and beets and carrots, and they get
really caramelized without putting any like fat on them. You just put a little like spray little oil on them, a little salt, roast, and then you can get some lentils or chickpeas and roast those at.
The same time.
Put them all on the sheet tray, toss them together, put them over some like brown rice or farrow, Drizzle a little tahini on there, and you've got like a dinner like all in one sheet tray. It's really easy and delicious.
Now, are these recipes avail to knuckleheads like I who would never try to buy a cooking book? You know, of five hundred or six hundred pages? Is there is there is there somewhere you can send you know, the Neanderthals such as me and others who are listening tonight.
Absolutely so.
We I have some some great recipes on a website called new cook dot org. It's like nucook dot org where we've got over three hundred recipes, a lot of plant based recipes and they're really simple and recordings. Do you see me teaching the classes and it'll teach you how to do it step by step and the recipes are there as well.
Yeah, great new cook but spelled in you like Northeastern University from uh. I guess you have your MBA from Northeastern University, but in you cook Seoka dot org. That's great. Now, tell us about the price of eggs. I know people are going into a panic over the price of eggs, and I understand that, but yeah, I can remember when
gas prices went through the roof. The good thing about eggs is that you might buy a cart in a week, or maybe a cart in every two weeks or whatever, but you know, and it's cost them a little extra money. And hopefully when of the Avian flew subsides, those egg prices will come back down. We talked last hour with an expert in the Snowy Owl and is saying that some of the snowy owls that had migrated here have
been victims of the bird flow sadly. But as I said, when gas prices went up, you were going from to something a gallon to four something a gallon, and when you were filling your car up it was ten twelve to fifteen fifteen gallons, which was a big hit financially. What can folks do if they really have trouble finding eggs? You said that there is some I guess, some alternatives, some egg substitutes that can help.
You know, absolutely, And it's interesting because there's a lot of reasons why people we might want to switch from eggs to like a plant based substitute. Like there's health reasons, there's allergies, and now there's the price, right, the price of eggs. So there are a lot of different substitutes that you can use for eggs, but it kind of depends on what you're substituting for, you know, because eggs provide different things when you're cooking and baking, Like they
can be a binder like to hold things together. They can provide levining, you know, like the helps cake rise. They can provide moisture, and also like the appearance. So it kind of depends on what you're trying to substitute for. So I'll give you an example. So when you're making like let's say you're making like a quick bread or muffins or cookies, and you want to get that like moisture in there, you can use pureade fruits, so like
for example, apple sauce or pumpkin pure. Yeah, that you use like a quarter of a cup, and that would substitute for one egg. And it has less fat and no cholesterol, and sometimes there's even some protein and like some kind of plant based substitutes. So in some cases it can be like a good healthy substitute as well.
Now, again I'm always looking for somewhere I can send people. Is that newcook dot org website also going to be helpful for egg substitutes as well?
Well, it's not going to say like exactly that you know what to substitute one for one. There are a lot of websites out there that can give you that information, Like the I like healthline dot org or healthline dot com. They have a lot of great information on nutrition. So that's one great resource.
Great. Now tell us about well Seasoned Coaching dot com. That's your website, correct or is that the school website?
No, that's me. That's me.
So so what.
Can people if they go to that website tell us what they get the benefits of checking out that website.
Yeah, so they can connect with me. So what I do is I work with people one on one and in groups, and I teach them. I combine coaching techniques, which is how to help meet people make behavior change with culinary skills, so teaching them like how to cook, how to cook healthy, but then also how to make those changes. Because you know, you can tell people how to do something, but let's you show them and teach them those techniques and help them make those changes so
that it becomes a habit. You're not going to actually incorporate them, like you were saying. You you know, when you get home at night and you just kind of grab for the you know, the quickest thing. That's kind of a habit, So you have to kind of change that behavior.
Right. Well, what I got excited about was when you talked about roasting or root vegetables and you talked about sweet potatoes and beats. There's no that that I love more in any form than beats. I think I must have some Russian in my background. I don't, but I love beats on salads. I just have a huge beat fan. So I'm going to check out your websites, and i'd really appreciate you taking the time with us tonight, because it's it's tough on radio to explain something like you
just explained so well. I want to say thank you so much.
Oh, you're welcome.
Well.
I hope that you get some great tips, and I hope that you start cooking more at home and you're going to be healthy or just put it's back to doing that now.
You're absolutely right. It takes a little extra time. Time is the one thing all of us don't have enough off. Most of us don't have enough money, but all of us don't have enough time. That clock keeps ticking on all of us. And healthy eating will extend the amount of time we have, for sure. Chef and Laura Klein. Her website is well seasoned coaching all one word dot com. Check it out. Thank you so much, Chef. I appreciate shat your time tonight.
Okay, you have a great night, Dan you too, Thanks again.
Thanks again. When we get back, we're going to talk about a ship. Talk with a ship captain. Captain his ship is called red Rum, and they go out in search of Atlantic bluefin tuna, high high pressure business. There's a new series that you may have seen him on called Harpoon Hunters, premiered on January twenty fourth. It's episodes
every Friday at nine on the Discovery Channel. And he also is very concerned about a foundation, his family foundation, which we'll talk about, the Dion Foundation for Children with rare diseases. He has two children and eleven year old son, a seven year old daughter diagnosed with a rare form of muscular dystrophe. We'll talk about it all with Joe Dion, Captain Joe Dion of the vessel red Rum. Right after the break here at night Side.
Now back to Dan Ray live from the Window World night Side Studios on WBZ News.
Radio with the letter be joined by Captain Joe Dion. He's the captain of a fishing vessel. I believe it's pronounced red Rum, not reed drum.
Right, Hey, yes, that's correct. It's called the red Rum like the shining.
No, okay, all right, And you now are participating in a new television program on the Discovery Channel, which premiered on January twenty fourth and is still airy new episodes every Friday at nine pm called Harpoon Hunters. You go out in I guess a fairly limited period of time fishing for a very valuable fish, the Atlantic bluefin tuna. Why is the fish so valuable and how tough are they to catch?
Yeh, Dan, thanks for having me on on tonight. Every summer off the coast of Cape Cod, giant bluef and tune and they're massive fish. They grow up to like fifteen hundred pounds show up in our waters. They're they're
super hard to catch. And we we use boats that are fabricated with a big long pulpit off the bottle of the boat and we actually spear them like like the old whalers in Nantucket and we hit him with a yeah, like what we did, and we hit him with a little bit of electricity and it and it kills the fish instantly so they don't suffer and it creates the best quality fish for the market.
So how close do you have to get to these fish? Is this is this a harpoon that you throw or that you shoot it? And what's the distance? How close. Do you got to get to these these animals?
Yeah, we we use, we use, we can. We're in the hour of the boat all day and we're looking for these fish swimming along at the surface. And when they're swimming, they create a little wake behind the fish, and for a trained eye you can see it. It's hard to notice if you're just driving along, but we're used to looking at him, so we sneak up behind the fish as this. You know, we kind of drive the boat the same direction as the fish are going behind them. And you know, the whole trick is when
to throw because they're freely swimming. They're not there's no fishing line attached to them like you see on others TV shows, And yeah, we have to. It's the whole trick is when to throw because you they'll be swimming along and you know, these big, massive fish can kick their tail twice and then we're going fifty miles an hour. So it's a it's a game on experienced patients.
And okay, so so okay, we know how how long, how far Tom Brady can throw a football. We know how accurately Dwight Evans used to fire a ball from from right field to third base. How far do you what's your range with this?
It's a twenty yeah. Yeah, So my feet are ten feet over the ocean, and I'm twenty feet extended in front of the boat, and I'm probably throwing another fifteen to twenty feet out. So it's it's probably thirty thirty by the time the harpoon leaves my hands. It's the fish is probably thirty thirty five feet away from me. Yeah, so it looks closer on the TV, but it's not.
Okay, So let me ask you just to give us a sense of how tough this is, and then we're going to move on and talk about the charity. You know Tom Brady and you know Patrick Mahomes. You know they'll have a a completion percentage of sometimes as high as seventy seventy two percent. What's your percentage? What? What? How many? What's the percentage of times you fill that harpoon? You hit gold?
It's tough.
All I can tell you is you remember the ones you miss more than the ones you hit. The ones that you miss onto you.
And so so once the fish, once you hit the fish, the fish is dead instantaneously.
Yeah. If we send uh electric is an electric charge that goes down through a zappora cable. Yeah, and then it and it goes into the dark and uh and it creates Actually, it's the most sustainable way. So these groups of these fish, maybe twenty or thirty fish in a group, and we catch one at a time, and these same groups of fish can swim across the Atlantic Ocean and then other boats harvest the whole entire schools.
So we're trying, we're trying to teach you in and bring everyone awareness and show them that it's a real sustainable way of catching these these fish than harvests.
Okay, so distance a couple of other quick questions here, so you yeah, it's a it's a it's what is it a month long period when when these these fish are are available.
Yeah, so it's the quota stots June first, and we have about fifty to seventy metric tons dependent upon the year if they give us any reserve, and that coal to get filled up within six or seven weeks. So it's really a true derby fishery. If you're not catching someone else's yep, you really got it. You can't miss any opportunities.
Okay, Now, in addition to doing that and that this is your livelihood. Correct.
Yeah, well yeah, it's it's it's it's it's.
Yes, Yeah, I mean this is a livelihood. Now you're doing this thing Harpoon Hunters on the Discovery Channel, which I'm sure some of our viewers, if some of our listeners going to go want to watch on Friday nights, which is fine. But you also have the d On Foundation for Children with Great Diseases. You have two children who suffer from limb girdle muscularistrophy. Two c. How can people help this foundation? Your foundation? How can they get
more information on it? I don't expect you can spend a lot of time talking about it, but you know, peak people's interests. There are a lot of great charities, and this sounds like another great charity.
Yeah, totally.
So two of my three children got diagnosed with limb girdle muscular distrophy a couple of years back. It's a super rare form of muscular dystrophy and it basically wastes your muscles and it eventually affects the hot and breathing muscles.
So's it was the worst day of my life finding this out and my wife and I dropped what we were doing when we start at the foundation because the prevalence is so small and there's other big, great organizations, but we wanted to focus directly on limb girdles type two CE because we didn't feel it was a big enough group just focusing on that specific subtype. So we've started to raise money. We've raised a good amount and we're funding the first ever clinical trial down in Gainesville, Florida.
So you can check us out on the dyonfund dot org. I mean, you know, we're not expecting everyone to donate one hundred and two hundred dollars, but even five or ten dollars means a lot to my family. And it's the Beyonfund dot org. Check us out. You can just follow us on Instagram and uh Facebook, is this if I.
If I could ask just real quickly, Joe, is this a childhood disease or could this strike people at any age?
Yeah?
So they were born with it, and you know, Peter grew out, he walked at a normal age, and then when he was around eight years old, he stopped. You know, he wasn't keeping up with his friends as much. My wife, being a nurse, he noticed it, and she she said, Joe, it might be something serious. So she took him in and got a blood draw and then you know, everything went everything.
How many kiddos every year are impacted by this? How rare is this?
The prevalence of this is we say between five hundred and one thousand between the United States and Europe, So it's super rare. And if there was a bigger, bigger disease you'd have, it would be a lot easier to raise funding, you know, because it's based on numbers. So it's give us the.
Website so people can get perhaps pop open their checkbooks, give us the website web time.
Thank you. It's thedon fund dot org and don.
Spelled d i o n, so the d i o n fund dot org. Joe, congratulations on your success with the Discovery Channel and hopefully we'll have a similar success with this rare form of musculatitions.
Thank you, and thanks for bringing it up in the show. You know it's it's it's Friday nights at nine o'clock on the Discovery Channel. You can stream it on HBO Max. But it's super cool, like the group of guys that are all fishing, are all great guys, and it's it's a competition. It gets heated out there in the water, for sure.
Let me ask you, can you catch you prior episodes? Can you google and get the prior episodes on TV? I'm on the air on Friday nights, every Monday, every weeknight from me to midnight.
I want to see the show, Yeah, for sure, so you can check it out HBO, Mexican zoom it. Yeah.
Best best of luck with fishing, and best of luck with helping your children and other children around the country. Thank you so much for joining us tonight. We'll keep in touch.
Thank you for having me, sir.
You're welcome, Joe. When we get back, we're going to talk about the federal debt. You're going to have an economics lesson from a Harvard economics professor, Jeff Myron coming back on Night's side.