Episode 116 of the Tom Rowland Podcast is my conversation with Captain Matt Budd, a second-generation Jupiter, Florida fishing guide and commercial fisherman who runs the Jupiter Fishing Academy. Matt fishes both commercially and as a charter captain, and he has built a kids fishing camp that takes young anglers offshore and inshore to catch real fish. We talk about teaching the next generation, the flood of new guides on the water, and the right way and the wrong way to earn respect in a crowded fishery.
Watch on YouTube · Listen now · Apple Podcasts · Spotify
Matt Budd is a second-generation fishing guide and commercial fisherman based in Jupiter, Florida. He grew up on his father's boat, fishes both commercially and as a charter captain, and has a commanding understanding of his local fishery, the bait, and how the whole system works. He also founded and runs the Jupiter Fishing Academy, a hands-on fishing camp for kids.
The Jupiter Fishing Academy is a kids fishing camp Matt Budd created and runs out of Jupiter, Florida. He takes up to six kids at a time on half-day charters, splitting the week between inshore and offshore trips so the kids actually catch real fish. He teaches everything from rigging and reading the water to navigation, weather, and safety, not just the surface-level tips most charters cover.
Matt started the academy because, growing up as the son of a busy charter captain, he rarely got to fish on his dad's boat and wished a real kids camp had existed. He wanted to build the camp he never had, one where kids catch real fish from a boat instead of walking seawalls or public docks, and come away genuinely educated about fishing.
Matt believes it has become too simple to get a captain's license and start guiding, and that more time on the water and more qualification should be required first. He worries that when an area gets saturated with guides, the business spreads so thin that it becomes difficult for everyone. He acknowledges the other side of the argument, but he thinks new guides should put in the time before hanging out a shingle.
Matt and Tom agree that respect is earned by being mindful, keeping your distance, not crowding other captains' fish, and consistently putting clients on fish. The guides who come in respectful and let their reputation build are welcomed. The ones who bully their way onto established spots and ignore the unwritten boundaries are the ones who create resistance.
Tom Rowland Podcast Episode 116 with Matt Budd is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and YouTube. The video version is embedded at the top of this page.
I fished with Matt one time in the Jupiter Inlet and was very impressed. He made time for me and my son in a busy schedule, and on the way in he pulled up with a boatload of kids who had just caught huge fish and were on top of the world. That was the Jupiter Fishing Academy, and seeing it firsthand told me everything about the kind of captain Matt is. He has a deep understanding of his fishery, and he brought a few points of view to this conversation that pushed back on things I say all the time. I wanted that on tape.
Press play in the YouTube player at the top of this page to hear the whole conversation.
Most kids fishing camps walk children along a seawall or stick them on a public dock. Matt built something else. He takes up to six kids out on real half-day charters, inshore and offshore, and teaches them the full picture, from rigging and good areas to navigation and reading the afternoon thunderstorms. He fills those kids with the kind of information you would never bother sharing on a normal charter. Listen to how he runs it.
This is where Matt and I see things a little differently, and that is exactly why I wanted him on. He thinks it has gotten too simple to get a ticket and start guiding, and that a fishery can get saturated to the point where it hurts everyone. I tend to tell people to follow their passion and find a way. He makes a real case for the other side. Hear him lay it out in the episode.
When I started in Key West there were only a handful of guides, and anyone new was looked at with great scrutiny. There was almost a ritual of earning respect, introducing yourself, letting people know who you were. Matt and I talk about whether that ritual still exists now that there are a hundred and fifty guides where there used to be eighteen, and what separates the new captains who get welcomed from the ones who get frozen out. Press play in the YouTube player above.
Listen to the full conversation: Apple Podcasts · Spotify · or watch in the YouTube player at the top of this page.
What stuck with me after talking to Matt is that he is doing the quiet work of building the next generation of anglers while also thinking hard about the health of the profession itself. Those two things are connected. The kids he is training today are the captains and conservation-minded fishermen of tomorrow.
Matt and I do not agree on everything about guide qualifications, and that is fine. The conversation is better for it. Listen to the whole thing and decide where you land.
The Tom Rowland Podcast brings you long-form conversations with the most accomplished anglers, hunters, conservationists, and outdoor professionals in the game. Listen to every full-length Tom Rowland Podcast interview.
Matt Budd is a second-generation fishing guide and commercial fisherman based in Jupiter, Florida. He fishes both commercially and as a charter captain, and he is known for a deep, hands-on command of his local fishery. He founded the Jupiter Fishing Academy, a kids fishing camp that takes young anglers on real inshore and offshore charters and teaches them the full craft of fishing, from rigging and navigation to weather and on-the-water ethics.
Full transcript of the Tom Rowland Podcast, Episode 116 with Matt Budd.
Tom Rowland: I'm here with Matt Budd. Matt is a captain that I fished with one time and was very impressed. I was able to go fishing with you in the Jupiter Inlet. You made time for me and my son in your busy schedule, and something happened really cool on the way in. You were like, I've got something in the morning, I can't fish with you till the afternoon. We were coming through Jupiter and you pulled up with this boatload of kids. They got out of the boat and they were, I mean, on top of the world to say the least. Their parents came to pick them up. They all caught these huge fish. It was really cool. And then as we go out fishing, we start talking about that, and that's the Jupiter Fishing Academy, which is what you run, right?
Matt Budd: Yep. That's what it is.
Tom Rowland: So how did that start? What is the Jupiter Fishing Academy?
Matt Budd: First off, I want to thank you for having me, Tom. The Jupiter Fishing Academy is something that's been on my mind for a long time. Growing up, I'm a second generation captain. My dad was always busy, and I didn't get a lot of chances to fish on his boat. I said, I wish there was some kind of kids camp or some kind of way I could go fishing, because he was always booked and it was just hard for me to get out on the boat. I said, what if there was a kids camp that actually taught you these things and you got to catch real fish, rather than a kids camp where you walk around on seawalls or they let you fish off a public dock. So it's always been on my mind, and I guess about four years ago, I finally said, I'm going to try this. I didn't do a lot of advertising. I just kind of hand out flyers at local tackle shops, because I don't have a lot of room. What I do is I take up to six kids, and it's half day charters, and we do four half day charters during the week. I teach them everything from A to Z. When it comes to the river, we do two days inshore and two days offshore. We catch everything from snook and jacks in the river on topwater. I show them how to rig, I show them good areas, I show them navigation. I say, hey, look, the clouds are building up, it's getting late, afternoon thunderstorms in the summer. Whatever's in my head, I kind of give them the information, the kind of things you wouldn't normally talk to your charters about because it's just not worth mentioning. But I want to fill these kids with education. I want them to have knowledge and also safety. So it's just a little program I've designed where these kids that have a passion for fishing can really take advantage of it with my summer camp.
Tom Rowland: That's really cool. So do you think most of the kids that are coming, are they coming for a week? Are they coming for longer or shorter? What's the average, and are these local kids or vacation kids?
Matt Budd: It's all local kids. And what happens is, pretty much most of the time, the kids that come, they come every year. I've got kids that'll sign up for two or three weeks at a time, and I only run it four or five weeks out of the summer because I've got charters to fulfill. I've got to fish with my customers also, and that takes up half my day. But pretty much those kids tell their friends, and they tell their friends, and that's how it goes. I don't even advertise because I only have room for six kids. And it's a limited amount of time. So it's the same kids most of the time, over and over, until they get to the point where now I've had kids who were 12, and it's been four years, and now they're 16 and they're kind of too old. Like, I'm sorry, you're a little older than what I normally take. So you'd either have to book a charter, or they stick around.
Tom Rowland: Those kids are going to be getting their captain's license.
Matt Budd: I would imagine so. They seem pretty inspired, and they even ask to come donate their time and be a mate on the boat.
Tom Rowland: That's cool. That's really cool, because you always hear people say that you never fully understand something until you teach it to others. So in that situation where you're teaching these kids and then they turn and teach it to other kids, that's pretty cool if you can get that going.
Matt Budd: The thing about it is, we're educating the future of fishing, and we want them to see things the right way, I should say. I also want to get them off to a good start with everything, as far as just navigating the channel properly and giving people the respect they deserve.
Tom Rowland: That's what I was going to ask you. I was thinking, when you say getting people started the right way, etiquette is such an important thing. You went straight into it, like how to give people enough room, how to know what somebody's doing from a distance and be like, okay, well, if you go on this line, you're messing them all up. So is that something you're really paying attention to? Because in that Jupiter Inlet, there's not a lot of room. You could easily mess people up, right?
Matt Budd: Well, there's also only really one school of fish too, so it's kind of tight.
Tom Rowland: But there's also the fact that it's a navigable channel, and you've got to go in and out of there. So there's a real fine balance there, to giving somebody the room they need, but also you need to get in and out of there. Do you talk about that with the kids?
Matt Budd: Absolutely. Absolutely. I bring everything up. When I pull in there and I see there's two boats fishing the school fish, I'll say, you know what, let's go run down the beach and do something else for a little bit. They're like, what? Whoa, no, no, we want to catch snook. I'm like, listen, these guys were here first. They're fishing the school of fish. Honestly, if we pull up, we'll just be hindering what they're doing, getting in their way, and it'll make it difficult for everyone. So let's not crowd them. We'll go run down the beach, look for tarpon or whatever it is. That's just something I do. And they'll say, hey, look at all the boats down the beach over there, usually on a pod of bait or whatever they're doing, let's go down there. I'll say, no, we're going to go the opposite way. We don't want to be in the middle of that cluster of boats. Just try and let them know, you can do your own thing. You don't have to go chase other boats.
Tom Rowland: Boy, that is getting them off to the right start. That's cool, man. And then what about the bait catching? You're really good at catching bait. Are you bringing that in and teaching them how to throw the net and everything?
Matt Budd: Yeah. On the first day, I bring about six or seven six foot nets out and teach them about throwing the nets on the sandbar at low tide. Then, when we graduate the next day after we play around the river a little bit, we go out, we'll fish nearshore basically, and I'll teach them how to catch the croakers and the sand perch and everything like that for snook bait. And they'll watch me and say, hey, can I bring in that too? And I'll let them play around and throw the net on the beach. They watch me gather bait, and then on the second day we'll either sabiki up sardines or I'll just throw the net. But a lot of the time I'll sabiki them, better quality baits. And I'll say, alright, before you guys tie on sabikis, I'll make them do it themselves. And they get to deal with tangling up the sabiki and untangling it, and eventually it all gets there. But that's just something they have to know, and they've got to learn what it feels like getting that little jiggle of a bait on the sabiki and how to string them upright and take them off the hooks. So they pretty much get everything, the full experience.
Tom Rowland: Man, that's cool. That's really cool. Because I've had so many people send me emails, and they're like, hey, do you know any summer camps where kids go fishing? And it's really hard to find. You can find plenty of camps where fishing is an activity, but it's not the activity. It's not like, okay, these kids are going to come here and go away well on their way to being a competent angler, in whatever, freshwater, fly fishing, saltwater, inshore, offshore, whatever. So what you're doing, I thought that was really cool. As soon as we left, I was like, wow, man, that's cool. And even my son was there. He's like, I wish I had gone to a summer camp. It's like, you live at a summer camp for fishing.
Matt Budd: It's amazing. And last summer, we had a kid catch a 45 inch snook. And he went offshore the next day, and another kid who's 10 years old, for three and a half hours, fought over a 300 pound blue marlin.
Tom Rowland: Wow. Unbelievable. And so were you targeting marlin with these kids?
Matt Budd: We went offshore, got some threadfins, and we made a drift for sailfish or blackfins out in the deep. And his rod, it looked like a sail bite. I said, alright, it's in bait runner mode, go ahead and pick it up, and when you feel the weight come tight, the circle hook, and it came tight. I said, man, it kind of just looks weird. I was like, I don't know if a shark ate it or what, it just looked heavy. Then all of a sudden it started rising up. I'm like, you've got something really big, and I don't want to say what I think it is, but it's big. And all of a sudden it did kind of a greyhound jump, just did like a skip. I saw it out of the corner of my eye, and I go, that's something really big, it's a billfish. And they're asking me, what is it, what is it? I'm like, I don't want to say anything yet until it starts jumping. Then all of a sudden it started jumping, and they're like, what is that? I'm like, it's a marlin. And that's not common out here for us by any means, especially on a threadfin.
Tom Rowland: Wow. That's awesome, man. You know, I hadn't spent a lot of time in Jupiter before I came to see you. I fished with Ryan Nitz up there, and between those two or three times I've been there now, god, that place is amazing. Just the fishery that you have, inshore, offshore, the proximity to The Bahamas, the freshwater fishing. That's where you grew up, right? You grew up right in Jupiter?
Matt Budd: Yeah, that's where I grew up. I've been real fortunate.
Tom Rowland: That's got to be one of the most versatile fishing locations anywhere. Do you think so? Have you ever been anywhere that rivals it?
Matt Budd: It's tough. Our fishing's really good. I do see a lot of people catching fish all over the place now because of social media. But our fishing is really good. We have a great area for fishing year round. However, the one thing I could say is our river fishing in the winter really went to hell when the discharges started. I don't want to get into that subject, everyone knows about that. But we still have big snook. We don't have the numbers of snook we used to have in the backcountry in the wintertime. And that's what kind of deters me from fishing back there in the winter. That's really disappointing on that part. There's still plenty of fish, it's just a tougher fishery now.
Tom Rowland: Yeah. Do you feel like we're making progress toward any sort of solution there with the water quality? This year has been really big with the new governor, and a lot of the work that Captains for Clean Water and the other organizations have been doing. You're right there where you've actually seen it. This has definitely affected the numbers of the big snook back there. What's your forecast?
Matt Budd: As far as our area, we have the C-18 spillway, and that dumps in, but that doesn't come directly from Lake Okeechobee. We don't have direct Lake Okeechobee water, but we do have water that comes in that's high in phosphates and everything, because there is some agriculture land out there west of us. But for the most part, we don't have the damage that Stuart has. We don't get that green slime and everything, but the freshwater discharges do affect the estuaries back in Jonathan Dickinson, where I know you fished. And that's where a lot of our juvenile fish used to be in really high numbers. We used to go back there when I was a kid, and you'd see four or five guides lined up in one bend, and they'd be chumming and catch fifty, sixty, seventy snook on fly and light tackle back there. But they're all small fish, and those numbers of those juveniles just aren't there. I really have to believe it has something to do with the freshwater intrusion, and no more seagrass in the area also. So it's just, we're not on the level of damage of Stuart.
Tom Rowland: Yeah. On the one hand, that's really good. On the other hand, it's not great that you have any damage. And I guess that's one of the things I've seen with Captains for Clean Water is that they named themselves appropriately. It's Captains for Clean Water. It's not Captains to Stop Okeechobee Outflow or Captains for this one little area. In my talks with them, they see the vision that there are a lot of problems, and somebody needs to be watching out for people like you, people like me, people that live all over the state and are seeing issues and are not prepared to do what those guys have done. Like, go and sit in all these meetings and go through all the political navigation they've had to go through to get anything to happen. It's good to have people like that out there for sure.
Tom Rowland: So one of the things I wanted to ask you, you do not just charter fishing, but you're also a commercial fisherman still, right?
Matt Budd: Yeah. I commercial fish half the year doing either Spanish mackerel or kingfish, and that's what pays my bills half the year.
Tom Rowland: And so I noticed you've got a great Instagram, and I like to follow it because you're always showing just what you're doing. You're either snook fishing or whatever, but you're also working out, you're eating healthy, you're kind of living this lifestyle that's really cool, and you talk about it well on your Instagram. And one of the things I thought we might talk about here is, you eat a fair number of snook. You live in this epicenter of snook fishing, so obviously you have a lot of them. What's your feeling on keeping snook? Because they're obviously delicious. What's your feeling on keeping snook, at what time of the year, what size fish? What is the appropriate way, from your perspective, to manage that fishery, but also take what you need and release the rest?
Matt Budd: Well, I've got to say, I might eat one out of three snook that I catch. My mom lives up in Sebastian, and I give her a lot of fish. I fish up there a lot. I spend a lot of time with the guys up there fishing, and a lot of those fish go to my mom and family up there. But I do eat a good amount of fish. I mean, it's organic, free range fish. You can't buy that in the store if you want a good protein source. And the snook, they're pretty low in mercury, and you don't really have to worry about the things you do with, say, a slab of kingfish or swordfish. So that's the one thing I really like about snook. But then you take into account the fact that, yeah, those are your fish that are going to be 38 inch fish in a couple years, and those are good for business. And I have a lot of faith in FWC's programs. I worked with their programs when I was a kid. They had the tagging programs, and they used to give you a t-shirt if you caught a tagged snook, and I had so many t-shirts when I was a kid. Jim Whittington at FWC, he was always the researcher, and they were out there in the inlet tagging fish every day. And I have a lot of faith that they know what they're doing. And I'll probably keep twenty, thirty fish a season when I'm allowed to. I might eat 15 of those fish. But like I said, I have a lot of faith in what they do, and I believe they understand what they're doing. I am in no way a scientist, but I believe those big breeder fish are the ones that are going to spawn, and those are more important. And since we all know now with the slot rules and everything, those are protected fish. So I think everything's okay. As far as, there's one per person per day, that's not that damaging. And there's not a lot of people that really catch one every day.
Tom Rowland: Yeah. That's really good to hear, that you feel like that. Because sometimes the limits are really out of whack. And they were, on permit. And not necessarily on purpose, but you could have a head boat that could go out there, and it was like two per person per day or something. I can't remember what the limit was before they made a change. But basically everybody on that boat could catch two, and that's way too many. It's one thing if every boat has only two people on it, okay, I see that. But then sometimes there's a rule that slips through kind of like that. And it's like, well, we didn't think about a boat with 60 people coming out here and getting on a school of permit and everybody keeps two. And then rules get changed, and that definitely protects them. But occasionally you'll see that one rule. What's the limit on pompano?
Matt Budd: Pompano for me, because that's my commercial fish that I use to make a chunk of change every year, that's 250 per day.
Tom Rowland: Wow, a lot of fish.
Matt Budd: I don't even know what it is recreationally. Is it 10? No, it's six. Pretty sure it's six.
Tom Rowland: And you feel like that's also good numbers for the recreational anglers?
Matt Budd: I do. I do. And pompano has absolutely exploded in the last few years, and you'll notice it at the beach. When you go to the beach, there's guys lined up down the beach for miles. So yeah, there's a lot more pressure on pompano, and I think that six is a good number. But most of those guys are either retired or they're at the age where they can have a commercial license, the RS license, and they don't have to qualify because of their age, so they get that license. And now those guys are commercial fishing. So there's a lot of pressure on pompano these days, and this year was actually like the best year I've seen in a while, surprisingly.
Tom Rowland: That's cool. On your Instagram, man, it's pretty cool. I actually want to go fishing with you on a commercial trip rather than just on a recreation trip. It looks way more fun. Well, kind of. Anybody that's done some commercial fishing, or been on a boat that's doing commercial fishing, or has friends that are commercial fishermen, it's fun for a little while, and then it turns into work, because that's a paycheck. And you can't miss them, or everyone you miss, or your knot breaks, that's money, man.
Matt Budd: That's where the balance comes in for me. Everyone thinks being a guide is great. I could do that 300 days, three sixty five. It's tough. No matter what you do for work, you're going to eventually get to the point where you're like, I'm kind of getting burned out. And that's another beautiful thing about why I guide half the year and commercial half the year. Half the year, commercial fishing is rough. It's tough. You get beat up. Your hours are ridiculous. Sometimes the fish house pays you half of what you expect. But on the other end, you don't have to deal with clients. You don't have to deal with being social. You can just go out there by yourself and fish. And that's one of the things that's great for me. Half the year I get to do that, and half the year I can't wait to get away from the commercial scene, and I'm like, just get me out of here. I can't wait to work with people, have fun, watch people catch fish. So it kind of keeps everything interesting for me, and that's just part of my lifestyle. You've got to keep yourself happy if you want to continue living your way of life and being successful. And for me, that's what's worked.
Tom Rowland: That's so important, man. That's so important to keep it fresh in some way, shape, or form. A lot of people, they may work a long time, and then they may leave and go somewhere. Maybe they go to Montana, they go somewhere else for a short period of time or a month or two. They just kind of move and change it up, and I think that keeps people really fresh. Some people might fish out of the skiff for a certain part of the year, and then they might move to a bigger boat and fish offshore part of the year. I think that is enough to do it for some people. But it's just shaking it up, doing something different that keeps it exciting for you. Because you're right, man, guiding can be super fun, and it can be super easy. When the weather's nice and you've got a client, he's bringing you lunch, and he knows all about your family. You've been fishing with these people for years. That's fun. You're having a great time. But then there's lots of other days where you're earning it. You're earning every penny, because the weather's tough, you're dealing with new people. Same thing with commercial fishing. There's some days out there you got your limit in no time, and you're going back to the dock. You've got the rest of the day to do whatever, the fish house is paying great. I'm sure that's a fantastic day, but that's not the typical one. It can be rough and nasty. So I think it's cool that you're breaking it up like that.
Tom Rowland: What did it look like? You said your dad was a guide too. So you're growing up. Now did he fish commercially or just guiding?
Matt Budd: He had the licenses with me growing up, before the economy really got bad. We never had a chance to fish together. He had a crazy business going on here in Jupiter, and then the economy kind of really took a crap. When was that, in the early two thousands or something? And it really slowed down a lot. His regulars weren't coming as regular. It just seemed like the money everybody had to throw around wasn't there. It slowed down for him, and he said, you know what, I've got these licenses, let's go kingfishing, let's go do this. And it got to the point where me and my dad are fishing together, and that's really what got me started in that. And he started getting to the point where he was getting burned out on it. He said, Matt, you're 15, 16, you want to take the boat alone and do it? And I said, yeah, I do. And so I started doing it on my own and working on my own in his boat when he didn't have charters. That's how he got me into that.
Tom Rowland: And so that would be almost like commercial kingfish, and then pompano and other things too? Or when you were young like that, did you focus on one?
Matt Budd: No. In the winter it was the Spanish mackerel, because we get a great run of Spanish mackerel right off St. Lucie there. As winter starts turning into spring, the pompano show up, cobia show up, and the kings start trickling in. And we get them in the winter too, the kings, but the live bait just isn't as plentiful as it should be here in the winter. It's just tough. You can get goggle-eyes, but you can't really find a lot of the baits we need unless you run around and really travel for it. So mackerel was the go-to thing. Spring came around, then you hit the kingfish.
Tom Rowland: Yeah. And man, what kind of feeling does that give you as a young man when you're single-handing a boat and bringing in your full limit? For a 16, 17 year old kid, that's got to feel pretty awesome.
Matt Budd: It is. And you know, people call me a sporty and whatnot, but my dad always taught me, use rod and reel. We don't need electric stuff, we don't need all that craziness. And that's just how I've always fished, and that's just something I've always instilled on other people that I've tried to. We don't need to throw cast nets and gill nets or whatnot. That's just something that I've felt was fair to the fish also. There is conservation in me even though I commercial fish, and that's just something I believe in. So we live bait and rod and reel those kingfish one at a time. And if they get away, so be it. But I just believe that's the right way to do it, and it's sustainable.
Tom Rowland: Yeah. That's cool. And so then how long did your dad stay with it? Does he still fish?
Matt Budd: He still guides. He currently has a really good deal going with one of the local marinas here, and he's their private guy. They have a really crazy boat rental business going, and they're just booming. And he runs all their charters for people who don't feel comfortable driving the boat and don't know how to fish and want the guy to go. So he's like their full time guy. So it works out great for him.
Tom Rowland: That's awesome. So one of the things we had kind of discussed a little bit leading up to this. So often you're seeing this, now there's a lot more boat manufacturers, some of the manufacturers are offering boats at less cost, the barrier for entry has kind of dropped. So there are a lot of new faces out there, some guides. How is it in your area as far as new people?
Matt Budd: Yeah. That's a topic that's definitely interesting. It can go in a lot of directions. But like I said, when we talked earlier about it, that's something that seems to be popping out more and more. And everybody has their own right to get a captain's license and become a fishing guide. I just believe there's qualifications that should be there before. It's just too simple. It's too simple to get that boat and get out there on the water. And, hey, I got my ticket, let's go. I kind of believe there should be more in place. It's too simple. That's just my belief. I mean, it sounds like maybe I'm biased because I've come from a family of fishing, but why doesn't Joe Schmo have that opportunity? And it's unfair for me to say that. But I just believe there should be more time put in. There should be more time on the water, more qualification. They're coming out of the woodwork. At a certain point, you saturate your area, and it's like, alright, well, you've spread out the business so much that it makes things difficult for everyone. Even though the guys that are established, they're going to have their regulars, and people are going to know their reputation, they're going to get the charters. It's just, when areas are saturated with guides, it just makes things very difficult for those guys that have been doing it.
Tom Rowland: Yeah. It definitely does. There's also the other side of the coin, that it self regulates at some point. You would think that it self regulates. There's only so many people that want to go fishing. But you're exactly right that when you have more and more people, sometimes it makes it difficult, because if there's only so much business, there's enough for so many people to make a living doing it. And then if that gets divided again, then nobody's doing that well. So I see that argument. But I also see the argument that there's only so many people that want to go fishing, and when they go fishing and everybody's full, everybody's full. I don't know what the solution is, because I'm one of those people that had no history of fishing in my family. None whatsoever. I had never been on a guided trip before. This was all foreign to me. It was something I really wanted to do and found a way to make it happen. Of course, when I found a way to make it happen, there weren't very many guides in Key West, and it wasn't a problem. Although anyone new was looked upon with great scrutiny. I don't see that happening as it used to. If, when there's only 18 guides and a new one shows up, everybody knows and nobody likes you. Nobody likes you. But when there's 150 guides and a new one shows up, hardly anybody even notices. And I think maybe that could be kind of an issue, because there was almost a ritual of earning respect, and letting people know who you were, and walking up and introducing yourself to someone. And I don't know that, when there's just more upon more upon more, I'm not sure that ritual is still as evident. What do you think?
Matt Budd: I think that as far as earning respect, like you said, I think that's an important thing. If you are the new guy, like I've seen many times, those guys will come in and they'll be very respectful. They'll keep their distance, they won't bug you, they won't try and get in on your school fish or anything like that. But then there's those other guys who just don't respect that. They don't have boundaries, they don't have those ethics. And those are the kind of guys that really ruffle my feathers personally. Those people that know me know that I'm not going to back down to that kind of thing or being bullied. And most people don't. Most guides on the water, they feel like they've spent years and they've earned their right to do what they do. So if a guide comes in and acts like that, that's what they're going to get. But there's those guys that are very respectful, and they catch fish, and they make charters happy, and you hear nothing but good things. And that's how they earn their respect from other guides, and I think that's an easier way in than coming in and being pushy and invading. You know what I mean? So there's different ways to do it.
Tom Rowland: Yeah. I don't know that the invading mentality is going to work, because fishing guides are pretty alpha. You have some kind of quiet fishing guides, but still, some of the quiet ones are some of the ones that are the most territorial. They go way out of their way not to mess anybody up. This is what would get me the most upset, is when I am really trying. See a boat in the distance? Okay, not going there. Plan B. Where is that? What is that? Like, that guy's fishing over there, I don't even want to go there. So let's go somewhere else. And you're really trying to not bother somebody. You see somebody fishing in a channel, and it's high tide, and you go way up on the flat to avoid the channel so that you're not messing him up. And you're doing everything that you could possibly do to have your day go the way you want it to, but you're also really looking out to try to stay out of everybody else's way. And I always thought, there's nothing that can ruin a charter faster than altercations on the water. Two guys yelling and screaming at each other. Nothing makes your customers more uncomfortable than that. So that was a major reason to avoid any altercation for me. My job is to show these people a good time. That's not showing them a good time. So it's probably better to even catch less fish and show them a good time than it is to shoehorn my way up in here, have everybody yell at me, have my customers be unhappy, and maybe you catch the fish that you were looking for, but maybe you don't. But in a group of fishing guides, man, there's a lot of alphas there. I think that when you start pushing against something like that, you're only going to have it pushed back at you. Like you're saying, you're not backing down. Other guides are not backing down. That doesn't seem to be the best approach to me as a new person coming into a new area.
Matt Budd: Yeah. And like you said, none of the customers want to see that happen on the charter. And if that happens on the charter, honestly, if your captain starts cursing and screaming, that's just unprofessional. You should never.
Tom Rowland: So unprofessional.
Matt Budd: That shouldn't happen. That shouldn't happen. If it happens, the smartest thing your guide can do is keep his mouth shut, deal with it later. With the customers on the boat, there's just no reason for any of that. I have never done anything like that with my customers on the boat, but I've had my customers yell at people. I've had my customers start screaming at people before who've made bad moves, and I'm like, whoa, okay, alright.
Tom Rowland: Yeah. You're going to see that guy at the dock. And unlike on social media, it may not go as well as you think it will. You're yelling at that guy, we're probably going to be at the dock at about the same time, so be ready for that.
Matt Budd: Yeah. Things are a little different in real life than they are on social.
Tom Rowland: Yeah, they sure are. But you're exactly right, there's no place for that on a charter. Guys yelling at one another on the water, that's a bad situation.
Matt Budd: Trip ruiner for the customer. The customer will remember that, and it's just not what they want on their day off relaxing with their family or catching fish.
Tom Rowland: So what do you think the solution is? When you're seeing new guides, or maybe even a situation like, have you ever had a situation where maybe it's somebody that you've been fishing with for a while and then they decide they're going to become a guide?
Matt Budd: Yeah. That's one of the other things that happens. You take someone on a few charters. They kind of ask a lot of questions, and you're used to questions and everything, but then they stop coming, they stop calling, and you start seeing them out on their boat. And then they start calling you and saying, hey, can I buy some bait off of you? And you're like, no, I'm not a bait guy. I'm a charter captain. I sell my bait to my customers who buy charters. Then it gets to the point where they go out and try and catch their own bait, and they haven't done the time, so they don't catch their own bait, then they go buy bait from a bait guy, which is fine. And then they start, like I've said, invading, coming closer and closer until it's the point where they're spooking the fish or they're invading your area and getting too close, and your customers don't like it because it's messing up their fishing. And then that's kind of an irritating thing. And at that point, they weren't even a guide yet. They're just fishing and trying to learn things on their own, which is just human nature. Monkey see, monkey do is what I call it. But it just gets to that point, and then they continue and they catch some fish. And then before you know it, they're posting up their picture of their captain's license, and that's just part of life. I mean, you show someone a great thing, they're going to want to do it.
Tom Rowland: Yeah. Well, of course they're going to want to do it, and they have every right to do it. And if somebody's listening to this conversation, it might be easy to think, wow, sour grapes, man. What are these guys talking about? Everybody's got a right to go do that. And I don't really think that's the conversation I intended on having, like, oh, there should be no new guides, there shouldn't be this. I think that we're both understanding that everybody's got the right to do that, but maybe there are better ways to do it than others. And, say for instance, that guy that we just discussed, that guy that is kind of a client, and then he turns into a guide. Great, man. That's awesome. I had that happen many times. And first of all, I'm thankful that guy came to me to give me the business to begin with, because I need all the charters I can get, right? And he was a cool guy, seemed great, enjoyed fishing with him. He says he's going to get his own boat. Okay, cool. That's cool. Maybe he even buys one of my old boats, which is even better, right? Okay, cool, I sold a boat, I sold it to this guy, he's a friend now, and everything's happening. It's really cool. And then it's kind of like there's two ways that can go from there. He can just kind of disappear, and you don't talk to him much anymore, and he just kind of shows up in all the same spots that you took him to. Or there's the guy that kind of calls up and says, hey man, I was thinking, I know it's the same tide as that place that you always went, I really don't want to get in your way, I know you've got charters and stuff, but I was thinking about fishing there. So if I see you there, I'll get out of the way. Oh, okay, cool man, well, I'm not going there tomorrow, I'm headed in a different direction. So you know what, I'll call you and find out how it was. So now you have another source of information, and it could be looked at as a good thing. And now you're kind of working together with somebody, and the guy is being very respectful and offering up, he's offering something. Like, hey, can I help you do something, you've helped me get into this. I mean, wouldn't you say that would maybe be a better way?
Matt Budd: Oh, absolutely.
Tom Rowland: The same guy is going to get into fishing. He wants to be a guide, he's going to get into being a guide. There's a couple of ways you can go about it. That's obviously a better way.
Matt Budd: He can play that card for sure. Yeah. And if he's a good guy, he's not going to, he's going to be respectful. And like the story you told, that's going to be a thing. But then, in the worst case scenario, things aren't going to be as pleasant. But for the most part, there's very few who go against the grain and don't go about it the way you said it in your story.
Tom Rowland: Very few. So when that happens, what ends up happening to that person?
Matt Budd: You're talking about when they go about it the wrong way.
Tom Rowland: When they're going about it the wrong way. Somebody doesn't do it that way.
Matt Budd: Nothing happens to them. They still get their charters, and they still take their charters, but they've got to understand what they're doing. And when they go to bed at night, they're doing it the wrong way. And I guess it all comes down to, like you said, Jupiter Fishing Academy, teaching them when they're young. That's an important thing, teaching kids while they're young. So then they understand these things, and they understand, on the water, giving everyone else space. And that's just, I don't know, everyone's got a different character in the end.
Tom Rowland: That's very true. But oftentimes that character can come out in different ways. I have this other kind of conversation going with another guy that wants to do a podcast on etiquette on tarpon fishing. So I was thinking about it, and I often do a lot of thinking while I'm working out or afterwards, and I was thinking, there's really two things that happen with etiquette on the water. You've got the guy that just doesn't know. He's just bumbling around, running over everybody's fish, getting too close to people, and he just doesn't know. And then you've got the other guy that absolutely knows, and he's doing it anyway. Now that is unacceptable. The guy that just doesn't know, he's unprepared, he just doesn't know. He's never fished for tarpon in this certain situation, or never fished in the Jupiter Inlet in this certain situation. He just thinks, oh, I'll just drift on by, or maybe.
Matt Budd: He's usually a really nice guy too. That's the thing. And so you can't really get too mad at him. You just want to educate him. And I've seen that so many times, and that's what you do, you just kind of try and put it as nicely as you can and say, you know, you ran over those fish, man, you spooked those fish. I didn't want to yell at you or anything, but I wanted to tell you now. And that's probably the way to do it, is to educate him in a nice way instead of freaking out on the water.
Tom Rowland: Right. But it's hot, you're sweating, you hadn't caught any fish all morning. You finally got the situation you're looking for. It's about to happen, and here comes this guy and runs the whole situation. And there's a lot of emotions. Your clients are getting mad. This is a really important client. You really want to do a great job for this person. And for whatever reason, it's been a very difficult morning. And here it is, we finally got the setup, we're in the right place, the anchor held, the bait's alive, the fish are behind us, it's about to happen. And here comes so-and-so and just messes up the whole thing. Completely unintentional. There's a lot of emotions going on right there, and it's very easy to freak out on the water. But that's where it really boils down to good communication skills. You could yell at that guy and maybe create an enemy forever. Or you can let it go, call him up, explain the situation, be extremely patient, and it might have a totally different outcome. But boy, it's hard. That's a hard one.
Matt Budd: Yeah. It's always tough, especially for that nice guy who just doesn't know, like you said.
Tom Rowland: Yeah. But I can be a lot more patient with somebody that just doesn't know than somebody who absolutely knows and is coming in there anyway. And he's arrogant. There's no, where's the sign that it's your fishing spot? That's always a good one. Like, I didn't see the sign that says it's your spot. Oh, okay. Well, there's not one. Do you own the ocean? No, no, I don't. I don't, but I don't think you do either. And, maybe we could, can we just all get along, man? Sometimes that's what you want to say. But I don't like confrontation on the water. I don't like any of that stuff, so I typically just bail out. And on some of those bailouts, it's so tough. But like we talked about before, if you stick around and start arguing, it's only going to be a negative. So many times I have left what I thought was a really good situation only to find a better situation that in no way would I ever have found unless I had bailed out of that one, because I was at the place I wanted to be. During the tide, I wanted to be there. If it's like that, I'm going there every time. But then you're forced to leave and go and have to find something else, and maybe you end up doing the opposite. Like, instead of fishing for tailing fish, you're going looking at a channel on that same tide. And you're like, whoa, look what's here. I never would have found this. And, I don't know, it's all about patience.
Matt Budd: And that's where an experienced guide comes in. Because that new guy who really isn't experienced, who gets his captain's license, he catches some fish for his charters, he's going to sit at that spot all day. There's going to be your experienced guide who says, you know what, I'm shut out of this spot, I'm not going to intrude on everyone else, I'm going to go try and find something else. And he'll go save the day and make it happen.
Tom Rowland: That's the difference. And maybe in doing that, he learned something himself. Like, wow, I found a whole new spot. This opens up a whole new world. And then, just like you're talking about, the guy that doesn't know much, or the part time guide, or somebody that really doesn't have a lot of spots in their arsenal, they know that on an incoming tide, they've got to be here, and that's it. And don't know what else to do. Never found anything anywhere else. So today, I've got a paying customer, I'm going right to the meat, and I'm staying there no matter what. No matter who's there, no matter how tight I've got to get, no matter what etiquette I'm breaching, I'm staying there because that's my spot. That's what I know. And just like you're saying, the experienced guy is like, there are a lot of spots. And even if I need to go find something, let's look at this as an opportunity. Rarely do I get the opportunity to go explore on a charter. So here we go. We're shut out. We've got no option except explore. And usually that turns out better anyway. Even if you catch nothing, you're catching nothing on a beautiful day by yourself telling jokes to your clients, and everybody's happy, as opposed to sitting right next to five other boats yelling at one another.
Tom Rowland: So what about, you do a lot of freshwater fishing too, right?
Matt Budd: I love bass fishing. I love bass fishing with swimbaits. I like throwing big baits for big fish. That's just one of my passions. It's just another way for me to get out of the routine of saltwater fishing every single day.
Tom Rowland: Yeah. And when you're going bass fishing in your area, are you doing it on foot? Are you doing it in a boat mostly, or both? I know that you have a great opportunity to fish these little lakes where you are.
Matt Budd: It's unbelievable. South Florida is like all water. We've got canal systems, we've got golf courses, we have residential lakes that are unbelievable, that are fed by canal systems, that are fed by Lake Okeechobee. So you've got the shad, you've got the bait, you've got these fish that are getting big and fat, and it's just, South Florida is just an unbelievable place to bass fish. Then you can go further south, further than me, and catch the peacocks, the clowns, the snakeheads. It's just endless.
Tom Rowland: Yeah. That's super cool. And do you think that just a regular kind of guy, do you need a boat to be able to be successful in all that kind of fishing?
Matt Budd: No. No. I do 90% of my fishing on foot. You just have to be careful where you go. It's easy to get.
Tom Rowland: Because of trespassing or something.
Matt Budd: Yeah. But I've got customers that'll call me in, and they live in great golf communities or live in residential lakes with unbelievable ecosystems that are fed by reserves or just unbelievable good water systems. And they have such a healthy ecosystem going on, and they call me in and I get permission to fish these places. And some people might call it cheating, like catching fish in a barrel. But you still have to work for those fish. You still have to finesse them or do what you've got to do on the days they're not biting, but it's unbelievable when it's on. And I really enjoy just relaxing and catching bass.
Tom Rowland: I've got a soft spot in my heart for golf course ponds. I really enjoy that. And call it cheating, whatever. I like big, dumb fish that don't get fished too very often. That's my favorite. Absolutely my favorite. And you go to one of those golf course ponds, and I love to fly fish for the largemouth bass there and stand back. Like, you could stand back from the bank 40 or 50 feet and throw a long cast across the grass and just have the end of the fly line hit the bank and then the leader unroll, and you've got a little frog that just lands out there six or eight feet from the bank, and work it back to the bank. Oh my gosh. I've had some of the best, most fun days of fishing like that, because so many people go straight to the edge of the bank. And in certain times of the year, those big fish are right up on the edge of the bank. And god, if you can just, they even feel you walking up there. You can see it happen on a calm day. You start walking up there, they feel your footsteps, and you see these wakes moving off the bank. Like, whoa, man, there's some big fish there. I just love that, man. Just love it. And fly fishing is just a great way to do it, because you can cast from 50 feet back, or 40 feet, or 30 feet, well back from the bank to where they're not seeing you. That's so fun. And god, in South Florida, you've got the king daddy bass down there.
Matt Budd: Yeah. We've got the Everglades. There's just so many opportunities to fish. And I get on Google sometimes and I just do scouting. You pull up Google Maps and you turn on the satellite image and you just look around. And you do scouting and you find canals, you look out west to try and figure out where you can go, try some new areas, and it's unbelievable how you can find these little canal systems, or lakes, reservoirs, and you go there and sometimes it's just a home run.
Tom Rowland: Yeah. That's cool. And then for a kid, like a 16 year old kid that's got a driver's license and a car and a phone with Google Maps on it, man, that's like lifetimes of fishing.
Matt Budd: I didn't have that when I was 16.
Tom Rowland: No. Google Maps is unbelievable. That thing shows you everything. And for somebody that didn't grow up with an iPhone in their hand, I once found this aerial photo of the Marquesas. It was just like a little eight by ten photo, and it was a satellite photo. It looked just like what we have now, except probably less resolution. You couldn't see every leaf on the tree like you can on Google Maps or in some of these other aerial photos. But we had this, me and Simon Becker, we had this eight by ten picture taken from, I don't know if it was from an airplane, probably from an airplane. And somehow we got our hands on it. And we used to just pore over that picture, just looking at it, and that's the only picture we had. Everything else was charts. And I just remember, we would just look at that thing and look at that thing and look at that thing. Oh, look at this little hole right here. Look how this channel does this. We didn't know it did that. Look how this, and this is in a clearwater area. What you can find in the Everglades, and what you can find in the Ten Thousand Islands area right now by looking on Google Maps, it's unbelievable. It's such a huge, incredibly huge advantage. I get fascinated by just looking at all that stuff. Like you're talking about with all those lakes and stuff. You can do the same thing in every area. It's a huge advantage.
Matt Budd: Yeah. I used to check it out and look at the reefs on the bank of The Bahamas there. When we go run across, I'd say, hey, I just found this new little rock that looks like it'd be really good, and you could see all that. And it's just such an incredible tool.
Tom Rowland: Yeah. It's awesome, man. That's cool. Hey, so one other thing I want to talk about. What's your road to fitness? Because when I follow you on the Instagram, I see, man, you're eating healthy, you're working out, you're doing all kinds of stuff. How long have you been on this road?
Matt Budd: Well, I've always tried to be fit and stay in shape and everything. I trained jiu-jitsu for like eight years, and my knees started getting messed up, everything started falling apart. I really love the jiu-jitsu. I love training mixed martial arts, but my body started falling apart. The last couple years here, I started going to the gym and lifting weights, and it just felt really good. And I feel like I've been strengthening all those areas. I throw the cast net all the time. Sometimes I throw a 32 pound net to catch sardines in 40 foot of water, and my rotator cuffs on my shoulders are just destroyed. And I'm 33 years old. So I started to really concentrate on strengthening my shoulders and my back, my lower back, all those areas that get stressed from fishing, from being on a boat all day and the pounding. Of course, I can't fix the compression that's put on my discs and everything, but I really just try and concentrate on working those areas that need improvement, strengthening around those areas that might be weak. So that's really what I did. I got a little overweight last year, and I started doing some research, and everyone's got their own opinions. I know you've talked to Lane about things before. He's real opinionated. He's got opinions. I don't know if he hates, but he's opinionated. So, should I say, I got into intermittent fasting. And some people frown upon it. Some people say it's a joke, and some people say it's just a way to get your deficit of calories, is all it is. And it was a system that worked good for me. And I lost 40 pounds and I felt great. I felt so concentrated, and I just felt better than I did when I woke up and ate a bunch of carbs.
Tom Rowland: What did it look like, your schedule when you're doing the intermittent fasting? How much time are you spending not eating? What was your schedule?
Matt Budd: So basically, it's skipping breakfast. It really wasn't as difficult as it sounds. I would get up, I'd go to work, I'd work all day, and I'd eat my lunch, should you call it, at 2 o'clock. I'd eat a salad, some chicken breast, and then I'd eat dinner again at six or seven. Then I'd be full, and I wouldn't eat again till the next day at 2 o'clock.
Tom Rowland: Yeah. I don't think you would find Lane having any problem with that. His thing is, everything he does is based in science. And he is a really smart guy, and he knows the science so well. But his thing is like, look, keto is not going to necessarily work unless you're in a calorie deficit. It's not the fact that you're not eating carbs. It's the fact that when you stop eating carbs, you have cut your calories down significantly, and that works really well for some people. I had a great conversation with him about that. And he's like, well, if keto works for you, great, it's keto, great, do that. And he is a really open person about whatever works, and a lot of different things are going to work for a lot of different people. But what he can't stand is when somebody just gets the science all wrong and is saying that keto is working for some reason that is just untrue. Like that it changes your hormones or something like that. And he's like, no, no, you're in a calorie deficit, and yeah, that's why you're losing weight. And when you're drinking a cup of coffee that has a half a stick of butter in it and five tablespoons of coconut oil, and it's a thousand calories, oh, that's fine if that's what you want to eat, but it's a thousand calories. So you need to be aware of that when you go to eat your all-bacon lunch that is 4,000 calories. Okay, now you've got 5,000 calories, and you're not doing anything to burn any. That's not.
Matt Budd: And I dabbled in the keto a little bit, but I didn't like the diet. It didn't agree with my body.
Tom Rowland: I dabbled in it too. I don't know, I'm fascinated with everything. Probably as fascinated as I am with so many things about fishing, I'm just fascinated with it. And I hear all the stuff about keto, I'm like, I wonder if that would work. So I try it for a month. I don't do anything for less than a month. If I decide I'm going to try something, I'll try it for a month and see how I feel. If it's good, I'll keep doing it. If it's not, I'll stop. If certain parts of it were good and other parts weren't, then I'll bring those into my daily routine. And if not, okay, cool, wasn't for me. It might work for other people, that's great, not for me. And I think I would have a hard time. I enjoy eating vegetables. I enjoy eating some carbs, and that is good. I just felt like I didn't think I was going to be able to stay on keto forever, where the plan that I do is more like portion control. People say watch your macros or whatever. Or other people are like the zone. So it's like 40% of your calories come from carbohydrates, 30 from protein, 30 from fat. Pretty simple. Balanced diet. And it doesn't matter what you eat, you just kind of try to eat in that ratio. And what I've learned about it so much is, half a piece of bread, you can eat a half a piece of bread, or you can eat a giant bowl of broccoli. If you're hungry, you can eat massive quantities of certain foods. And other foods, you have just a bite of it, and it's the same amount of calories or the same amount of carbohydrates. And I learned a lot about food, which ones to stay away from, which ones make me fat. Those are also the ones that I like the best. They're like cookie dough. I love cookie dough. I could eat cookie dough all day long every day and not eat anything else. That's probably my favorite food, cookie dough. It's not very good for you, but it's delicious. But anyway, how much time are you spending working out?
Matt Budd: So I always start out with cardio. I like to do thirty five minutes of cardio, and then I'll work out for an hour to an hour and a half. I work out intense. I don't just go there and not sweat. I work out with intensity. I don't take many breaks. That's just how I try and do everything in life. But you want to get out of there feeling that pump, and you want to feel good, and I get my heart going. And that's what I think is important when you work out, rather than those guys you see that are just kind of in there just to go to the gym, but they're not sweating.
Tom Rowland: Walking around drinking water?
Matt Budd: Reading newspapers. They're not sweating. I mean, I try and stay hydrated, but in between my sets, I don't have time to go get that water. I'm just super setting. I'm doing another set. I just want to keep it going. And I just like that.
Tom Rowland: What do you think this change in your eating and this alteration of the way that you're working out, how has it affected your fishing and your ability to go maybe more days in a row? What do you think it's done for you?
Matt Budd: You know, everybody's been on the boat, and they brought that big Publix sub, and they ate that sub. And after that, they just wanted to sit up on the front seat. You know what I'm talking about, right?
Tom Rowland: Oh, yeah.
Matt Budd: I try not to eat too much on the boat, because I feel that when you ingest those carbs or you eat a heavy meal, you start drinking beer, you're not the same you. You don't have that drive, you don't have that energy, you don't have that go. And I'll bring light, I'll bring some grilled chicken breast on the boat, and I feel great. I feel like I can go all day. My charter gets off and I'm like, alright, I'm ready to go to the gym now. It's all about diet. That's how you learn to feel good. You learn your body, your diet, and that's what's going to keep you going all day.
Tom Rowland: What about the strengthening and the ability to feel better? You're talking about your shoulders and your lower back. A lot of guys that throw the net a lot suffer from like frozen shoulder or some sort of shoulder issue. Has what you're doing gotten you more mobility in the shoulder? Are you able to throw the net better?
Matt Budd: Yeah. I feel like I can pick up that 32 pound net, and I could hook that thing a mile now. I feel great. When it comes to getting in the kingfish bite and we're doing drifts and catching thirty, forty fish on the deck, I feel great. When you're in shape and you're eating the right food, you're not going to stop. You're just going to keep going and going and going. And I used to, my back would start hurting, and you need to take a break. But now that I feel like I've kind of trained those areas and conditioned them, I feel like I can go a lot harder than I used to. It definitely makes a difference, rather than eating the wrong foods, going home and sitting on the couch. It's made a big turn on my life as far as that part. The working out and trying to strengthen those areas that are under stress each day has really made a huge improvement in my fishing and my durability and just the amount of time I can spend on the water before I'm fatigued.
Tom Rowland: How much do you think, the older I get, you're a lot younger than me, I'm 50, but the older I get, it seems like even though the workouts have become more and more physical that I'm doing, the benefit is more and more mental. And especially when you're fishing all the time, or you're in a job that is mentally stressful. What do you think about the difference between the mental and the physical on the workouts? Are you seeing advantages mentally?
Matt Budd: Yeah. Absolutely. Mentally is part of the reason I go to the gym, not to look good, not to have muscles. But mentally, you're having a bad day, you had a rough day on the water, you're tired, you want to go home and go to sleep, but you go to the gym. You get out of the gym, and you feel great. It's so good for your head to just do that. To clear your head. You can think about a lot while you're working out. Like you said, you usually think up ideas, but it's just a really important time for me. I know you can relate to it.
Tom Rowland: Yeah. A lot of people talk about meditation and how important it is. I always thought running, or doing some kind of extended thing, repetitive, walking can do it. Running definitely does it for me. A long row, some kind of a long bike, that's where I get my best thinking for sure. And I can go, sometimes you don't even know that it happens, but if I go out for a run and I've got a lot of things on my mind, I come back. And sometime in that day, it's not like all of a sudden this light bulb goes off. Sometimes that happens. But it's kind of like I just had a different way of processing whatever the issue was, and an answer just kind of materializes. And I can tell, I'm thinking differently because of the run, or because of the time that I was able to spend away from the phone, away from anyone else, not talking to anyone, just out there. I call it moving meditation, the running. And the working out can be the same, but it seems to me like there's certain things that are better for it than others, as far as the thinking goes. Like long runs, long hikes, long walks, long rows, something like that does it for me.
Matt Budd: Yeah. I feel the same way.
Tom Rowland: That's cool, man. Well, I love to see people turn around like that and get back on the train. That's awesome. You're doing a great job with it.
Tom Rowland: Okay. Well, you got anything else you want to talk about?
Matt Budd: Some of the topics you might not want to hear. I'm just kidding.
Tom Rowland: I do. We can talk about anything.
Matt Budd: That's up to you, Tom.
Tom Rowland: It's all yours, man. Go for it. Where do you want to take it?
Matt Budd: You know, we kind of touched into that I was catching pompano. That's a really neat thing. And if you want to, I can tell you about the rigging and what we use and how we catch them.
Tom Rowland: I'll tell you what, let's do that on a How-To Tuesday right after this, and we'll share it with everybody.
Matt Budd: Awesome.
Tom Rowland: Okay. Well, listen, Matt. I've got to come down there and go fishing with you again. I really enjoyed spending some time with you. You're a great person to spend the day with. You know a tremendous amount about your fishery and the bait. I learned a lot about bait, how you're catching bait, what baits are the best for the fish that you're going after. In the case of what we were doing, we were snook fishing. But yeah, I learned a lot, and I really enjoyed it. So I'd love to come back down there and do that again with you. If somebody else wants to do that with you, let them know how they get in touch with you.
Matt Budd: They can get a hold of me on either my website, jupiterfishingacademy.com, or my Instagram, Captain Matt Budd, or Facebook, Matt Budd. Those are probably the best, easy ways, and then they can see what's going on. I keep up to date with my Instagram, as you see. I'm constantly posting stories and keeping everybody in the loop of what I'm doing or what's going on.
Tom Rowland: You've been doing a lot of YouTube videos too.
Matt Budd: Yeah. Actually, I forgot about that. I've been trying to get into the YouTube world. It's a great thing. That's a whole other topic right there. It's something that I feel can help expand my business and educate people a little bit. But not only that, people are making a lot of money on YouTube these days, and that's another whole other topic. Like I said, it's unbelievable.
Tom Rowland: Well, never in my life have I seen so many successful YouTubers in such a small area. I didn't realize how many people were from Jupiter, or the Jupiter area. In your area, you've got Deer Meat For Dinner. You've got Paul Cofaro. Who else? Blacktip H is nearby. Those are like three of the biggest YouTubers on YouTube, not to mention just outdoors, hunting and fishing. There's probably more. What about Catch Em All? Catch Em All, another huge one.
Matt Budd: He's one of my good friends.
Tom Rowland: Man, he's huge. So much is going on there. It's crazy. Why do you think it is that there's so many successful YouTubers there?
Matt Budd: I guess it's because of the fishing. Well, Paul and Catch Em All, they've got their own category, and it's that whole pond craziness, the kids are in love.
Tom Rowland: It's crazy. And those guys have, like Paul Cofaro, I've got to get him on the show. I really want to. He's just created this thing. Not only did YouTubing not exist a few years ago, but now he's like making a living feeding fish and building aquariums and having ponds. And people are crazy for it. And he's got this awesome personality that really suits itself to that medium. Very interesting to see how that's going. Very interesting.
Matt Budd: Yeah. They've evolved that. A lot of those guys started out fishing, but then they got into that whole pond and aquaculture almost, because they're raising fish. They have stories and names for their fish, and that's kind of really intriguing to a lot of people. So that's definitely been very good on their part. But then you've got Blacktip. Josh is a serious fishing channel. He's very dedicated to what he does, and I have a lot of respect for him for that, because he never deviates his way, and he always fishes, and he catches fish.
Tom Rowland: Yeah. That's cool with him. I had him on the podcast. It was cool to see how he started and built that. A guy that I don't even think owns a boat today. So there's a guy that didn't own a boat, got so many things working against him, and is able to create this life. It's really cool. That's a subject for another day, I guess. We'll talk about all the YouTube stuff, and the pompano fishing. But, well, cool, Matt. Appreciate you getting on here with me, and we'll do another one. We'll do another one when I come see you, and we catch more of those big snook. And I'd like to see what you do offshore too. I've never fished offshore with you. That'd be fun.
Matt Budd: That'd be fun. That'd be fun.
Tom Rowland: But anyway, man, thanks for doing it. And for everybody else, we'll see you next week.
Subscribe to get the latest episodes, show notes, and exclusive content delivered straight to your inbox.