This week on Kentucky Afield...

Excitement and heartbreak were certainly the themes of our 2023 turkey season.

We'll show you how it all unfolded.

Next, Sadly, we recently lost the first host and creator of Kentucky Afield TV, Ron Rhody.

We'll take a step back in time and learn a little bit more about him.

Then, Pan fish are biting.

We're going to show you somewhere that you might just want to try.

It's all next on Kentucky Afield.

Hello and welcome to Kentucky Aield.

I'm your host, Chad Miles.

Join us as we journey the commonwealth in search of outdoor adventure.

This year for turkey season, I headed to the mountains of eastern Kentucky to chase gobblers with an old fishing buddy.

So top of the ridge, just beyond that is where the birds roosted last night.

So we're going to try to stay kind of to this side of the crest of hill so we don't get skylined.

Find us a place to set up.

Hopefully they'll fly down off the roost.

We█ll see.

Already heard a distant gobble right there.

They're there so let's get moving because we want to try to use that hillside to our advantage right?

Absolutely.

You think the birds are within 100 yards of us.

Right?

We█re actually walking kind of a little bit past them, right?

Yeah.

To find some cover.

Yeah.

They█re right there.

All right.

Let's try to find us a good spot to get a decoy set up, maybe too.

Man they█re really hammering we can hear gobbling right over ridge here.

They flew down off the roost and they█re fired up.

Oh we got a hen to our right.

Hen to our right coming up the hill, right to the decoys.

There he is.

There's the gobbler right there.

70 yards.

Looks like we've got another turkey over in the field.

But it's about 600 yards away and it looks like a hen.

But I█ ll tell you.

That's the third turkey we've seen in this field not counting the gobbler up on the top.

We've got birds talking to us, they█re close.

They just haven't closed the distance just yet.

So I was for sure that was going to happen.

Me too.

We had two gobblers right there.

We had one we could see that was almost in range and a hen luring it in.

Decoys, everything was perfect.

Then what happened?

Yeah.

I'd actually finally I saw that gobbler crest the ridge probably 55 yards, a little bit out of range.

I thought, no need to hurry the shot, let him come on in.

Thought we had a slam dunk didn█t we?

So you told me there's a ridge the other side of this hill.

Yeah.

A cliff.

Yeah.

It drops off the cliff.

Hopefully those birds didn't fly off the cliff if they did, you know it may be tomorrow before they work their way back up here.

Hopefully they're still up here on top.

I think we ease around here in the woods real easy and just kind of take our time.

We█ll try to make a move and just be as easy as we can because those birds might be right here.

Yeah.

I think maybe we get just to the other side of these big trees right here, some of these pines, maybe you can call again see if we can get them.

Maybe just ease right up here a few yards, set and do another call see what happens.

These three long beards had a couple of hens in front of them and they followed them around but they stopped and locked up and started strutting to our calling, now I believe they've lost their hens so they're really locked up now.

They don't know which direction to go.

They're coming closer.

I need to turn them to the right.

They were barely in range there for a second.

Didn't get a shot.

They were two or three beside each other right there.

Well, Chris, we have had an awesome first day of turkey hunting.

We've seen a lot of birds.

We've worked a lot of birds.

We just didn't close the deal.

But I am already looking forward to tomorrow morning.

Let's get them.

We got birds spread all over us.

Right here and right down there.

Multiple birds in each location.

There we go.

Yes.

Well, Chris, as with many early morning sits we were exactly where we thought we needed to be.

The birds just went a different direction.

Yep.

But the good thing for us today is that we've got multiple birds in different locations.

Let's pack it up and go look elsewhere.

All right, let's try it.

One way off.

Well, that's a pretty good ways away.

That's the closest bird to us.

I say we make a move along this fence line where we get some cover, and just cover some ground here and see what we can find.

There he is.

I see him.

Right on the other side of the creek about 70 yards.

I see him.

I missed that bird.

I never knew those birds were there.

I was sitting there watching these birds and they moved up and they got to where I couldn't see behind this tree and I saw it was coming this way.

So I was like, he█s going to show back up right here at 40 yards.

I'm getting ready to smoke it.

And all of a sudden, boom!

I thought you had a better angle.

I wasn't even looking up here.

I was looking down here in the bottom.

And Jamison said, Don't move.

And I couldn't tell what he said.

So I turned around to look at you to see what you were saying.

Because I have to see, you know, kind of see your mouth.

And when I turned to look at you, that bird was standing right here looking at me probably 45 yards away.

It was a poke.

Where was that from?

Was that behind that trailer?

That bird gobbled all the way over across the road, like 400 yards.

Holy cow.

They're coming across the yard.

Are you kidding me?

Them birds are going to come over here.

You heard why the chicken crossed the road?

We're about ready to find out why this turkey crossed the road.

This is comical he just come across the road.

This is epic He squeezed through that wove wire fence, He's already on the other side running at us.

Oh, man I hope they don't get in this brush.

Just barely out of range.

And they're getting around behind us.

He is right on the other side of this bush.

I will tell you what Chris, our first two days of turkey hunting here in Menifee county has not disappointed.

No.

I've never seen a turkey come as far as we had one come today.

And it made its way up the hill and it just happened to circle us and we never can get it to where we both have a bird in sights at the same time.

But their luck has to run out at some point in time and our luck has to get better.

I agree.

Let's get a good night's rest and get out here and get back at it in the morning.

Well we're out here on our third morning, we went ahead and put two hen decoys out and we've got I don't know how many birds sounds like about four birds that are gobbling right over this little ridge in the trees.

If they fly out and see these decoys and start making their way to us this could be really good.

The birds are down off the roost right now.

Gobbling every breath.

It's hard for me to tell in this open field how far away they are.

What your guess?

I'm going to say they█re about 125 out.

Oh, you think that's it?

Yeah.

They sound close.

I think they're coming high.

They're they are.

Coming up top.

Yeah I see them.

Chris, you got him?

Take him if you get a shot.

I can shoot him right now.

I think I got that one.

Well Chris, buddy, we got it done.

And I'll tell you, this was one of the most incredible turkey hunts I█ve ever been on.

Because I saw turkeys do things I've never seen to do before.

I've never seen them fly a road and travel 600 yards, run up the hill.

Yeah.

We had situations where we were trying to get doubles and just couldn't get it done.

And today these birds circled us as well.

Yep.

Soon as you shot I saw the bird I'm looking at jump up in the air and it comes up over the hill a little ways and stopped and turned around.

I'm like, okay, it's now or never.

Now or never.

You know what, going out with a good friend like yourself that we've had a lot of fun and get to come out and experience these last three days turkey hunting and it all end by getting two mature gobblers.

What a blessing.

What a blessing.

It█s been a great hunt.

Kentucky Afield first aired in 1953 with legendary TV host Ron Rhody.

Mr. Rhody sadly passed away this week at the age of 91.

We took a look back in our archives and found an unaired segment from 2008 where Tim Farmer took him fishing.

Tim how did you get into this?

You know, it's a long story, and that's what I'm going to ask you later too.

Well, Harry Tulson, what a wonderful guy he was.

Asked me if I would like to come to work for him because he thought that there was the opportunity to get some further exposure for Kentucky hunting and fishing on radio.

I mean, nobody was doing it was Harry's idea.

I was at I was a junior as a junior at UK as a matter of fact, you know, working at the local radio station, working on the newspaper, doing sports.

Did you know you were going to be in communications?

It was going to be in political science.

My dad was the newspaper, the editor of the paper in Frankfort, and he was the kind of newspaper editor who felt that if you want to learn journalism, I'll teach you, boy, don't go to journalism school.

So I didn't take journalism school into political science, but always with the intention of being a journalist.

But Harry called my my father died that my junior year in college, and it was necessary for me to stop playing around a lot and begin to make some contributions.

But in any event, Harry called me and asked if we want to get a radio show started.

Would you like to come and try to do it for us?

And he arranged it so that I could continue to go to school and work with the department and do the show.

And that's the way it happened.

After about a year of that, we started thinking about whether there'd be a possibility of television.

We decided to try it, put together a show for Wave television weekly, a half hour show, and we did live in studio.

So we were doing doing radio once a week and then the television with Wave once a week.

You had a pretty good job with Fish Wildlife.

It was the best job I ever had.

Okay.

I you know, I kept my wife kept insisting that all I did was hunt and fish, which is about what I did.

And it was the best job I ever had it truly, truly was.

But then I decided I needed to move on to other things and did.

I remember somewhere you said that your wife wouldn't eat.

Well she got tired of it.

If she ate fish and deer all time you would probably still be here.

It was rabbit and bass, that she got tired of eating rabbit and bass, and so we had to change for something else.

So where did you go from there?

Kaiser Aluminum and Chemical Corporation.

Big aluminum.

International aluminum producer joined them in Ravenswood, Virginia, where we had a very, very big plant.

Then we moved to New York and I ran the public relations operations in the East and then they moved me to the corporate headquarters.

And then from there?

They had the responsibility for Bank of America as public relations and advertising.

Did that for about ten years, decided to figure out how to do that, left there and formed my own consultancy, a public relations consultancy that focused principally on crisis management and damage control, and ran that pretty aggressively up until about last year.

Turn that off and have now moved on to Pinehurst, North Carolina to write the Great American Novel.

In your travels around the world do you missed Kentucky?

Tremendously.

I think the bluegrass area is one of the great places in the world.

I've had an opportunity to live in some very nice places in the east, just outside of New York City and in the San Francisco Bay Area.

But I don't think you can beat Kentucky, certainly the bluegrass.

We're living in Pinehurst now in North Carolina, but I still as a place to be, I prefer the bluegrass and I still think of Kentucky as home.

I'm I have family here.

I have a brother and two sisters, and I'm back, you know, a couple of times a year every year.

So do you miss the bass and rabbit for dinner?

Well, as a matter of fact, I do.

I have not had rabbit in ages.

I can imagine the excitement back when when this whole Kentucky Afield thing.

Do you know who came up with that title Kentucky Afield?

Well, you know, I thought I did, but I find over the course of my career that a lot of I thought they did.

Well, I started to say a lot of other people did as well.

But you never I think you're never quite sure about ideas because so many people contribute to them.

No question.

Best job I ever had enjoyed the people the most, and they really took full advantage of me.

I was at the time 20 or 21, you know.

But but we had been out doing a show on noodling and we were doing it in Anderson County and Harry liked to do it.

And Ed Adams, who was from there, like to do it JT Cox like to do it.

So all these guys were involved.

We've been doing that.

We finished up and it was late afternoon.

So we come back into this, their favorite restaurant in Lawrenceburg, to have a couple of beers and dinner.

So we have a little private room and the private room is just off the main dining room.

And there is a wall, you know, in the wall is this big.

It looks like a picture window.

But they they tell me it's a one way mirror.

And the people on the other side are looking in the mirror.

But the people in the room can look at and can't.

They can't be seen.

And they said, Well, I'll prove it to you, because I didn't believe it and they said, See that guy out here, this big, big guy having a couple of beers.

They said thumb your nose at him.

And I thought, Well, Jesus.

So I did that.

And then they had me do one or two other things like that.

And then all at once, the guy that I'd thumbed my nose at walked into a room and wanted to know what the heck I thought I was doing, but it wasn't a one way mirror.

It was a an open window.

Those guys were they were great.

Well, let's say we get back before we get rained on.

Deal.

Good meeting you.

Enjoyed it.

Thank you very much.

Enjoyed the enjoy the ride and the demonstration.

Best job you've ever had.

Best job I've ever had.

Helping to ensure a successful fish spawn is always top of mind for a fisheries biologist.

But how do you do that?

Well, let's head to western Kentucky and check in with Adam Martin and find out.

Today we're at the banks of Kentucky Lake and I'm here with Adam Martin and you're the sport fish biologist here in western Kentucky for the Department of Fish and Wildlife.

Tell me a little bit about the sport fish biologists.

What all species are you looking at?

So essentially, I manage the sport fish in the western 14 counties of Kentucky, primarily Kentucky and Barkley Lake.

So the overall goal is to have healthy fish populations and catchable fish populations so anglers can come down here and enjoy catching fish.

Absolutely.

Tell me a little bit about what you've been studying, because you've been specifically looking at nesting, and bedding fish.

Right?

Tell me a little bit about that.

So our most popular species on Kentucky Lake and Lake Barkley are your black bass.

So your large mouth, small mouth and spotted bass as well as crappie bluegill, red deer.

All of those species will make depression nests whenever they spawn in the springtime.

So you've seen them, you know, it█s a fish making a bed effectively.

So that kind of inspired a project.

Well, what can we do to improve the recruitment of our bass population.

When you say recruitment, what are you talking about?

Recruitment.

Essentially the numbers of small fish that are entering the lake.

Okay.

What you would do in a small pond is you would improve the spawning habitat.

So you might add in some rocky material if it was mud and switch things up like that.

Well, this obviously isn█t a pond, but the same principle should still apply.

You just have to do it a lot more.

So we've been experimenting with artificial spawning habitat.

So we're making artificial spawning beds out of concrete.

They're about 32 inches in diameter and they're bowl shaped and we have loose gravel in the bottom of them there, about 10 to 11 inches tall on the outside.

And we're placing those along the shoreline of Kentucky Lake and Lake Barkley in the hopes that fish will use them.

And it's largely been pretty successful so far.

When did this program start?

It actually started in early 2019, and we've been contemplating it and trying to figure out what to do since about 2018.

Okay.

So now the program has gotten going.

This is something you will continue for a period of time.

And there should be some learnings that come from this, right?

Sure.

We've got about 500 of these artificial spawning beds in the lake so far.

Okay.

And we've been surveying about 68 of them experimentally by doing snorkel surveys every week for the past two years.

Some of the sport fish that you manage spawn at different times.

Mm hmm.

So you build this perfect nest up there for a black bass species, and the bass come in and they spawn.

Then what happens?

So the bass will start spawning around 57 degrees, and they'll continue that activity until about 64, or 65 degrees.

After that, you see red ear move in, then you see bluegill, and then finally you see long ear sunfish move in.

Okay.

They're in there starting very early whenever the red ear are spawnin trying to eat eggs.

So if you're in an area and you're only catching sun fish, but it's still early, that's not necessarily a bad thing because they're there for a reason.

They're there on the nest of those other fish.

And you said they stay to the very end because they spawn last.

Exactly.

Yeah.

And while our usage rates were about 60% for black bass largemouth and smallmouth, our usage rates on the nest for sunfish was more like 96%.

Wow.

Pretty much every single nest you can count on there being a fish in.

The number of fry that are being introduced to the lake because of the spawning habitat.

We're talking hundreds of thousands, right?

Oh, easily.

A single red here will produce about 30,000 eggs.

Okay.

Now, survival rates are very low, less than 1%.

That's the same for every fish.

Yeah, but, you know, bluegill has even more eggs.

Even a bass will have 12,000.

The way that they defend their nests is very different by species.

And by the individual fish, too.

A lot of people think that redear are extremely skittish.

Like you have to sneak up there, cast from 40 feet away and don't splash is kind of a general thought process.

That's not what I've seen, you know, snorkeling on them.

If you're right there on their nest, they'll stand there and look at you.

Hold their grou A bluegill is much more skittish.

Okay.

They█ll leave, circle back.

A longear sunfish.

They tend to be pretty aggressive, too, so they'll stay right there and defend their nest.

Hopefully, we can figure out why certain nests are being used some are not, and then help that natural habitat.

So the bass have more options for spawning as well as bluegill and red ear and all those other species, correct?

Mm hmm.

Well, this is great information, and I'm really looking forward to seeing how the phone calls in the reports for catches correlate to the success of the spawns.

They match this data up in a couple of years, you know, this could be cutting edge stuff.

Yeah, we hope it helps.

Thank you so much.

No problem.

Now let's check in and see who else has been out having fun in this week's Ones That Didn't Get Away.

Kate Hackney went bow fishing targeting spawning carp at Lake Barkley.

Nice fish.

Here we have Cash Morrison with a nice large mouth bass caught from Dale Hollow Lake.

Nice job.

Here we have Chris Sorrel with a nice turkey.

Congratulations.

Summer break is right around the for our Kentucky school kids.

Make sure you make plans now to get them outdoors.

And remember, hunting and fishing on private property is a privilege.

Always ask permission and thank the landowner.

Until next week.

I'm your host, Chad Miles.

And I hope to see you in the woods or on the water.