823 | Erik Johnson on TroutRoutes – OnX Integration, Stream Gauges, Offline Maps, and E-Scouting for Anglers

Speaker 1 (00:02.062) Today’s guest has been leading the charge in digital mapping for trout anglers across the country. Eric Johnson of Trout Routes, now part of the Onyx family, is back to share the latest updates on how the platform is helping anglers discover water, stay safe, and plan trips with confidence. By the end of this episode, you’ll hear how Trout Routes has integrated Onyx cartography to highlight public access more clearly, why live stream gauges and trout lake data are changing the way anglers prepare for trips, and how new features like offline maps, custom markers, and Android iOS upgrades make it easier than ever to scout from home and navigate in the field. This is the Webfly Swing Podcast, where I show you the best places to travel to for fly fishing, how to find the best resources and tools to prepare for that big trip, and what you can do to give back to the fish species we all love. Eric Johnson is here to talk about the future of mapping and how trout routes is making access easier for anglers everywhere. Today we’re gonna talk about what’s upcoming next for Trout Routes, Eric’s own time fishing the Driftless area and why he’s been diving deeper into rowing and boats. We’re gonna talk about boats. You know I love a good boat chat today. All right, let’s hear it. Let’s get caught up with Eric. Here he is. You can find him at troutroutes.com. How’s it going, Eric? Hey Dave, I’m doing great, it’s great to be back. Speaker 1 (01:19.992) Yeah, great to have you on here. Definitely excited to talk about some of the updates. It’s been over a year now since you were on and we talked about some of the updates. We’ve had a number of guests and different listeners who’ve talked about trout routes, some of the features they love. And today we’re going to go into some what’s new kind of on trout routes. And maybe we’ll, we might recap and go back on some stuff too, but maybe give us, let’s start with an update first on, you know, how things are going over there. know trout routes by Onyx. It’s pretty exciting news with all that, the curb, but give people an update on that. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I can’t believe that it’s already been a year since we last chatted here on the podcast. So I’m really excited to be back. But it’s been a lot of fun for the Trout Routes team to get really integrated with some more of the folks over at ONNX. And it’s been a really exciting year for us. So I’m happy to be back and happy to talk through some of the recent updates that we made to the product over the last couple of months, really, especially over the last few weeks here at the end of summer. If you have poked around in the app recently at all, I’m sure you’ve noticed and recognized some of these changes, but we had an opportunity to connect Trout Routes and our development team with some of the folks on the OnX cartography team, which means that we were able to bring in some of the OnX iconography and make some subtle adjustments to the look and the feel of some things to really help the data stand out, to really accentuate some things for our anglers and our user base. And so I’m… Really looking forward to digging into a few of those here with you this morning. I think what I would maybe want to start out with would really just be some of the look and the feel adjustments that we made. As you know, when you open up the map, you can see all of those streamlines across the country, right? And it’s an awful lot of water to look at and try to make sense of. And so one of the first things that our development team really dug into was finding some ways to fine tune the way that we show where that public access is. So if you’re, if you remember, of course we have all of those access point icons to tell people exactly where the fishing access is, but they made some really interesting and unique changes to the way that those streamlines are drawn. So now when you look at any river or trout stream in the app, it’s really clear where the public water is flowing through public land boundaries. And the way they did that was by adjusting our color system a little bit, but really honing in on those public land stretches and highlighting them. Speaker 2 (03:41.61) in a pretty simple way to make it very obvious that if you’re looking at a section of water that flows through a green public land parcel, now you’ve got this really nice highlighted section to really call out that public water. Yep, that’s awesome. That’s huge. that is, and this is directly, you know, because of Onyx, this is allowing you guys to do some really cool stuff. Is that kind of what’s going on? Yeah, exactly. I ONNX has teams that really specialize in all areas of mapping and mapping technology, but it was really exciting for us to connect with this cartography team in particular because they are truly the experts in finding some ways to make some of the data stand out, to make the icons and all the access points and all the other data that we’ve incorporated into drought routes easier to navigate through and easier to understand. So not only do we change the way those streamlines are being mapped visually, but we’ve also adjusted the icons a little bit to really help people identify access points and other river information that they might be looking for. So you might notice that some of the icons have changed a little bit, but what that has allowed us to also do is pull us further into the Onyx ecosystem. So now if you’re familiar with say an Onyx hunt or Onyx backcountry or off-road, or even if you’ve poked around an Onyx fish, you’re going to notice some similarities. to help you understand all of that information. Speaker 1 (05:03.502) There you go. That’s awesome. Yeah. So that’s definitely a big part of it because that’s one of the first things you see in updating that is huge because you have public private. We’ve talked a lot about that. You know how critical that I’ve used that tons just knowing where you’re at. Right. That’s a big part of trout routes. What do you think. What are some other maybe give us a high level kind of just in general first for maybe people that didn’t hear the last kind of episode the features you think are the most popular and then talk more about some other updates you guys have going. Yeah, absolutely. So if you aren’t familiar with trout routes, what we’ve done is mapped trout streams and rivers across the country. I’m sure most of your audience is pretty well aware of what we’ve got going on. But if you’re kind of new to trout fishing or to fly fishing, we really try and help anglers find trout water across the country and then hone in on where the access is. So I would say our users are really dialed into those access point icons and then just being able to understand those public and private land boundaries, right? So they know Once they find an access point, they can get a very clear picture of how much of that section of water they can legally access via land, or if they are trying to understand where they might be able to connect some access points together. think using access points in tandem with our public land boundaries as well has been probably our key feature set. But one other thing that I think a lot of anglers are really starting to dig into more are going to be things like stream gauges and all of that live data that we’re pulling in from USGS and a few other stream gaged data sources from across the country to get an idea of what the water might be doing at any given time. So we actually are able to pull in historic data to give anglers an idea of some seasonal conditions or what some historic conditions might look like and then make sense of what the current conditions are. So they can get a sense of that water before they even step out of the truck or before they even leave their house and feel extra confident that the section of water that they’re headed to is going to fish away. Speaker 1 (07:00.59) Right, yeah, and definitely that’s another big one is the, maybe describe that a little bit. I’ve heard that, I haven’t used that as much as some of the other features, but this is where you can kind of look on trout routes and get a feel for what kind of water you’re gonna see, whether that’s like good fishing water with riffles, pools, is that kind of what we’re talking about here? I mean, you might be able to get a sense of that using some satellite imagery, which we’ve also incorporated. But what stream gauges are really going to allow you to do is see what the real time stream conditions are. And those icons are in blue, blue and white. And when you click on those icons, it will actually pull in that data into a chart so you can. interact with some of the historical data you can see, you know, up to the last year’s worth of stream flows, but you can really hone in on the last few days to see, you know, is the water level rising or is the water level falling? How might I change my tactics depending on what those current conditions are? And it’s really great too, because being able to interact, you know, with that data, I think allows you to wrap your head around, you know, what some of those numbers might mean. So it might, you might not be as familiar with, you know, CFS or stream flow necessarily. But if you can see what the last couple of days have been doing, we’re hoping that you’re able to get a sense of how the water might be behaving. So if there was a major rain event that came through, you might see that the water levels have risen in the last 24 hours. So maybe you would intuit that that water might be a little bit stained or cloudy, and I might want to either look for something else or I might want to change my tactics for how I would fish that section of water. That’s it. Okay. Yeah. And definitely that’s a big one because you, instead of having to go back in the old days, right? Where we’d think you go and get all your stream gauge data from multiple places and dig them up online. Now it’s all there, right? Trout routes has pretty much all the stream gauge data for, is it pretty much, how does that work? Is that every stream that has a USGS gauge? Speaker 2 (08:55.266) Yep, we’re pulling in every USGS stream gauge, but then there are a few other data sets that we pull in. know Colorado on the state level has a set of gauges that the state manages. So we found those data sets as well and we’ve plugged those in. So we try to find as much of this data as possible, but you’re right. It’s all coming directly from USGS. It’s all being pulled in in real time. And what makes it really useful is you’re absolutely right. In the old days, you would have had to go to the USGS website. search for a specific stream gauge to find that information. But now you can see where those gauges are on the river. And you can click through or click between different gauges to see, the gauge upstream similar to the gauge further downstream? how do I? It allows users to put some of those pieces together rather than having to click between a bunch of tabs on a web browser and really make it easy for you to interact with that information. Perfect, perfect. And a few other things I kind of going to note here is trout lakes. Is that something, is that a new feature that’s been out there? I’ve heard about that a little bit. Yeah. Trout lakes have been in trout routes for a little while, but that’s another great call out is if you click on your map filters menu, you can turn on the trout lakes feature and you’ll be able to see a blue dot on all of those lakes or an awful lot of trout lakes across the country that we’ve identified. So you can actually click on those icons and it’ll give you some more information about that particular trout lake. Okay, cool, and that’s one of things I’m excited for this week. I think it’s always cool I’m heading out. We haven’t done a ton of lake fishing, you know, of recent, you know, but we’re gonna be doing that. We’re heading out kind of to the areas that have some good lakes that I haven’t been to in a while. I’m excited about that, And I guess that’s the different, mean, lakes are a little bit different, right? Because they’re, for the most part, I mean, they’re still the public private, so you’ll still have those layers on there and all that. Speaker 2 (10:45.452) Yep, you’ll still see where those access points are. You’ll see a lot of boat launch information as well, which is especially useful for lake fishing. You know, you’re definitely taking a slightly different approach. If you’re fishing for trout on a lake, then you might on some moving water. But we think that those opportunities are just as important to be able to show off to people and hopefully encourage people to maybe try something new. If they might not have realized that maybe they’ve got a trout lake closer to them than they had originally thought. And now you’ve got another opportunity. to chase trout in maybe a slightly different way. Perfect. Perfect. And are you kind of a trout lake? Are you both stream? Do you kind of do it all out there? I mostly stick to streams. We don’t have a whole lot of lakes in my neck of the woods, but we’ve got an awful lot of trout streams. I’m up in the driftless in the upper Midwest. And so we are very fortunate to have an awful lot of opportunities to fish moving water. A lot of spring fed creeks and a lot of smaller water is kind of my kind of my bread and butter out here. And when it’s what I’ve been digging into this summer, but I’ve had higher Alpine trout lakes on my bucket list for a long time. And I know a lot of folks, especially out West really love to take advantage of that. Being able to find out where some of those higher elevation trout lakes are and plan some backpacking, hike in adventures to go chase trout in some other locations. Speaker 1 (12:03.982) That’s right. Yeah, that’s it. And that’s kind of the also goes in line with like the blue lining, right? You probably hear about that a little bit and trout rush would probably be pretty useful for that as well, right? You’re trying to find these streams. Um, and also the, we’ve talked about the trout challenges or the native, you know, the challenges around, is this a tool that probably would help that process? Yeah, absolutely. It’s actually quite easy for folks to identify blue lines in particular. You can actually toggle between the different classifications that we’ve used to describe trout streams and rivers across the country. And so by looking at those class three streams, depending on where you are in the country, and oftentimes a lot of those are going to be those true blue lines that may have different or may have slightly less public access. and might be a little bit more challenging to get into, but we are still able to show you where those streams are and then where you’re going to be able to find access to them. So whether that’s a single access point, you know, much further downstream that you can get on that water and hike your way in, or if that might mean a few other access points further upstream, that’s a really easy way to do that. And just to explain how someone might find those as well, you again go back to that map filters. menu and toggle off gold medal class one and class two and then what you’ll be left with will be all of those class three streams across the country. All the class three, OK, yeah, and those are the ones that are the is that maybe describe that a little bit? The classification system, how you guys rank that or how that’s all ranked. Speaker 2 (13:31.286) Yeah, absolutely. So across the country, there are a number of different regional systems that state agencies might use or other groups might use to classify and identify drought water. And what we’ve done is taken those regional systems and rolled them into a single classification system that also takes into account the amount of public access, the amount of public water that you might be able to get on to make it easy for people to understand if you are looking at water that might be somewhat unfamiliar to you. to help you get a pretty clear sense of is this stream going to have a lot of trout? Is it going to have a lot of habitat? Or is it maybe going to have less access, maybe fewer trout, and it might be a little bit more challenging? And that is also called out on the map with that color coding system. So again, like I was mentioning at the top with the way that we’ve highlighted these streams for that public access, we’ve also highlighted them in different colors. So you can see between gold metal class one, gold metal, of course, is in a bright yellow. that would also take into account those blue ribbon streams. When you move it down into class one, you’re looking at bright green, class two is a light blue and class three is a dark blue. So it’s really easy to see at a high level, know, am I looking at water that’s going to have a lot of trout, a lot of access, or maybe it’ll have less access and maybe less trout, but a really easy way to get at a glance some of the differences in the trout water that exists across the country and then all those different access opportunities. Nice. Okay. And you know, there have been a ton of changing since onyx you guys joined forces. There’s been a lot of we’ve talked about it. Some of them today. What do you foresee? Do you kind of as you look out, you know, ahead, do you guys have some big things coming? You can kind of shed some light on or give us a quick update on Yeah, absolutely. So we’ve been talking a little bit more high level on some of the stylistic elements of the map that you’ll see whether you’re logging into the desktop platform or on your mobile device. But one other major update and major improvement that we’ve made just really in the last couple of weeks has brought our Android app really up to speed. And in the world of software development, developing products for Android versus iOS is challenging because they’re different platforms. Speaker 2 (15:43.61) And oftentimes, folks will really focus and hone in on the iOS platform and leave some of those other ones by the wayside. And we thought it was really important to make sure our Android users had access to the same clarity and the same level of detail that they were finding elsewhere. And so we made a massive upgrade into the Android product this year, which I’m very excited about. This is something that has been on our radar for a while. And we were really fortunate to be able to take advantage of some more development muscle. and our Android team did a fantastic job bringing trout routes on Android really up to speed. So if you’re an Android customer, you may have noticed that you’ll see some vast improvements, not only with the way that the map looks, but how you’re able to interact with all the information. So it’s much more in line with what we’ve had on our iOS platform. So we’re really excited about making that release. And that was a release that came out just in the last couple of weeks. So it’s still a little bit brand new. But if you haven’t jumped into the program for a little while, Android, would really encourage you to jump back in because I think you’ll be very impressed with those. Yeah, that is huge. I’m mostly in iOS, you know, in that world, but I know definitely Android. mean, it must be, is it an equal amount or what? Do you guys know how many people are Android versus iOS? Generally in the world of software, iOS tends to have a higher number of users. But we’ve always found, especially when we connect with anglers in person, that there’s quite a diversity in the different pieces of hardware that folks are using to access this information. So while it’s not split down the middle, we definitely have a lot of Android customers that we are happy to have in the platform. And we’re really happy to finally be able to give them some of that upgrade that they certainly deserve. Speaker 2 (17:32.332) What’s really nice actually about trout routes is you can access the program. You can access the tool on your mobile device, but you can also jump in on a desktop so you can see a larger map view, but you can also pull up trout routes on a tablet. And of course there are a number of different tablet styles out there that you could put the app on. But what makes it really cool is your trout routes account will travel with you no matter where you’re logging in. So if you open up the desktop view and you’re on your computer at home and you want to drop some maybe some custom markers for some access points that look really good or you want to highlight some sections of the stream. You can do that on your desktop and then when you open the app up on your mobile device, you’ll be able to see those notations as well. So all the information that you’re dropping in as a user will carry through no matter how you’re viewing the data, which is really interesting. And one thing I should call out too is we’re not using any of that information internally. So anything that a user will plug in stays private to their account. You’re not giving away any of your secret spots or anything, but it makes it really easy for you to customize your experience, take notes, add some waypoints for a really memorable catch or do some e-scouting that I know we’ll dig into down the road. But really exciting to be able to show off on Android and iOS, on desktop, on mobile. your account will truly travel with you no matter where you’re headed. That’s so cool. No, that’s huge to have because you can be on your bigger device and you can kind of plan things out and search and put placeholders and all that stuff. And then also the fact that it’s not public. Like anything you’re putting into this, you guys are not using. Nobody else is going to see these secret points or places you’re fishing, right? That’s the take. Speaker 2 (19:21.742) Yeah, exactly. mean, then that’s really important, especially for trout anglers. We want to make sure that the data that we’re presenting to you is the most accurate. All of the information is being curated and vetted by our internal teams so that you can have the utmost confidence that you are on public water and you’re headed in the right direction without having any concern that anything that you’re dropping in there is being seen by any other angler. Great. I recently got a new phone and I guess that’s something people go through, right? You get new phones and then when I was trying to log in, just recently I saw it has at the top Onyx or email or Google. That’s kind of the first header. so Onyx now, like if you had an Onyx account, you could actually log in through that or talk about what that is. Yeah, exactly. That’s allowing existing ONNX users to use that same login information to have an easy way to log in across platforms. Now, if you logged into Trout Routes with your ONNX account, it’s not automatically going to pull in any of your ONNX saved pins or saved data. There are some ways to do that. You can export that content out of those other platforms and then pull them into Trout Routes. So there is some functionality there, but we thought that was an easy way for existing customers. to have a more straightforward line into trout route. Yeah, that’s perfect. Okay, so we’ve hit on some, whole ton, I mean so far a ton of key features. Speaker 2 (20:48.33) Yeah, and I want to jump into one other major update that we made, which is to the stream card. So if you have listeners who are familiar with trout routes, you of course know that when you tap on a stream, we pull in a lot of information to help you understand where the access points are, where the nearest fly shops are. We touched on stream gauges already a little bit. We show you a list of what those stream gauges are on that particular section of water. And we actually made a pretty significant upgrade and update to the way that you can now see that information. So before we had some of that information split between different tabs that you had to click through. And now you can really just scroll through and see all that information. And what’s really cool, I think, about this update is it also allowed us an opportunity to help sort of make sense of some of that information. So if you’ve tapped on a stream, You used to also need to look at the entire length of the stream to know where those access points are. But now we can show you at a glance exactly how many access points there are going to be on that stream. And that shows up right at the top of that stream card. We pull in how many boat ramps or campgrounds, but then also how many miles of public shoreline you’re going to have access to. So it makes it really easy to see and to understand that if you are looking at a particular zoom level, if I tap on a stream, now I can very clearly understand how many miles of access I’ve got on that body of water. it’s a really, really great way for us to harness the power of that data and make it more interactive and easier to understand if you may be a little bit less familiar with having to check the legend in the bottom corner or having to count the number of access points. We try and pull all that in so at a glance, really it’s making it easier for you to understand. How much access do I have? Where is the access going to be? And how do I find out where it is, right? Speaker 1 (22:42.798) That’s so cool. No, that’s huge. maybe we can tee this up a little bit now and use an example of, you know, we’re getting ready to head out on the road. We’re going to be hitting probably a mix of things, you know, maybe some lakes, some streams, but there is one stream. I’m not going to announce any names, but it’s in remote, you know, it’s near, near Nevada. It’s near, you know, it’s kind of way out there. But so what would be, let’s say I’m getting ready for this thing, you know, this big trip. haven’t been to this stream. It’s a I don’t know much about it. How would I prepare to use trout routes to get ready for this? Yeah, totally. I want to ask you to name it on the air, but maybe you can drop it into the chat for me and we can look it up together later. Yeah, yeah, I will. that’s a great question. it’s really like that, I think, gets truly at the core of what trout routes does really well. So I would say if you are completely unfamiliar, the first thing you might do is just jump into the search box, search the name of that stream and find it on the map. So we make it really easy for you to find where these bodies of water are. And once you’ve figured out where you are, in trout routes, clicking on that stream, like I said, is going to pull up the stream card. And some of the first things that I might look for if I was exploring a brand new body of water would be, before I even truly dig into the stream card data, let’s just take a look at the high level view of the map. So I’m looking at the stream itself and I’m looking at the base map behind it. And I can see really clearly that that stream has, or maybe it doesn’t have a lot of green land. as the background. the green polygons within trout routes are all of those public land parcels. So it’s pretty easy to see where the public land is in relationship to that particular body of water. And then the other thing that I’m going to be looking for once I’ve tapped on the stream are going to be where those blue fishing access icons are. And that’s going to tell me exactly where I can legally access from the road or from the trail to get onto that water. Speaker 2 (24:43.522) Taking a look at the green polygons for public land, as well as those blue access point icons, are probably the first two things that I do. And I’ll even do this on water that I’m familiar with, because sometimes I might know exactly where my favorite access point is, but I might not realize that there’s an access point a quarter mile upstream that I haven’t explored. So it’s a really great way for you to understand where all the access is, of course, but then… how you might start planning out your approach. So if I’ve never fished it before, maybe taking a look at the distances between access points, or if I see a cluster of access points on a particular bend, maybe I’ll think I’ve got many opportunities to head over here. So maybe I’ll start on that section of water before I start branching out, if that makes sense. Right. Yeah, it does. OK, that’s perfect. So that’s that’s the star. So that’s a easy kind of getting into it, getting your bearings. What else would you be thinking about once you’ve got that first part taken care of maybe or on the stream or you’re getting close? What other things should we be thinking about? Yeah, and once I kind of have identified, you know, I’ve gotten my bearings, I know where I’m headed, I have an idea of where some access points are going to be, I might start digging into, you know, the actual streamline itself. So I really like to fish deeper pools and big bends of rivers. And so I start to look at the streamline itself to see where the river, you know, turns left and right, or maybe it has a couple of oxbow bends. And so I’ll start looking at the actual shape. to get a sense of some of the water that I know how to fish and how I end up eventually getting there once I’ve found those access points. taking a look at the shape of the river itself is a really helpful tool. And if I found some of those spots that look particularly good or I think they might fish really well, I’m going to start dropping some access points in there. Sorry, not access points, but custom icons. So dropping pins and taking some notes or even just like Speaker 2 (26:43.384) changing the icon to something specific that I’ll recognize when I’m out in the wild, it’s going to help me remember that, yeah, when I was looking at this before, I saw this bend, I’ve marked it, and now I can really easily figure out how I can get there when I’m actually on the water. So that’s kind of the second thing that I’m doing is trying to understand the general shape and flow of the river or stream, and then dropping in a couple of those custom markers to see, you know, here are some things that I want to keep in mind. when I’m headed out there and to make sure that I don’t lose track of them when I’m looking at the map on my phone. Once I’ve done that, I think the next thing that I’ll try and do, especially when I start to get closer to actually venturing out, would be double checking those stream gauges. So taking a look at the trends of those flows and river heights to see what the river has been up to in the last week or so, it’s really helpful. But what’s also really great on that stream card that I mentioned earlier is you can actually see a list of all of those stream gauges under the stream flow header. So you can very easily see if that body of water has gauges on it and then what those live readings are right at a glance. Yep, right at a glance. That’s so perfect. that’s stream gauges. then you get on the stream. And I guess that’s the cool thing is now you’ve got all the before. You’ve done your research. You’ve got out there. Maybe you found a nearby fly shop. That’s another potential way to stop by before you get there. And then you get on the stream. And then when you’re on the stream, what is now you’re just accessing those pins you dropped and any other things once you’re there. Well, there’s actually one more thing that I’ll do before I head out to the stream and that’s to download that section of the river available offline. So oftentimes, and you know, honestly, some of the best trout fishing I think is, is well outside of cell coverage. There are, there are places where you aren’t going to be able to get any signal at all. And so I want to make sure that I have captured that data and I can see it on my mobile device when I’m out in the wild. So that would be the last thing that I’ll do is, is. Speaker 2 (28:48.002) identify that section that I’m headed to, download the map. And what’s great about downloading those offline maps is that it will also capture any of those custom markers that you’ve dropped. So you’ll be able to see any of those pins that you’ve highlighted. Maybe you’ve selected a couple of access points that you want to remember as well. Now, when I go out in the wild, I’m going to have all that data in my pocket so I can navigate really confidently. can know exactly where I’m headed to get to those access points. And then I can use that tool to get myself to all of those particular bends or corners or whatever I’ve already identified with those custom markers. Love it. No, that’s a great. I’m glad you remind us on that. So basically, can you do that when you go into your desktop? Is that the easiest way to do it? Download maps there and then they go to your phone. You’re going to want to do it on your phone to make sure that the data is captured on your mobile device, but it’s really easy to do that. And there are actually a couple of different ways you could download some offline maps. can actually download the entire stream or river if you wanted to capture the whole thing. And maybe you wanted to have access to more than just a smaller window. But you can also create a new offline map. And that’s using the Create tool that’s on the bottom of your screen and then tapping the Offline Maps button. And that will bring up a window. where you can then zoom in, zoom out, pan the map around a little bit to make sure that whatever is in that rectangle, you want to make sure you capture. And then it’s as easy as hitting Download, naming that offline map something unique if you’d like. So you can easily access it in your folder of offline maps. And then hit OK, and you’re good to go. Speaker 1 (30:23.648) Okay cool talk about the iOS update we talked about the Android was there a recent iOS or what was the most recent and and what what happened there any any new features or updates? Yeah, of course, iOS is going to have the same mapping updates that we have already touched on. So those subtle changes in icons, the way that the river is being highlighted, all of that’s going to show up on iOS as well. And really, the majority of those stream card updates are hitting iOS too. So it won’t be long until the same stream card view is going to hit Android. But the way that we’re pulling in info on the stream card on iOS is really the major update that we’ve made this summer. But again, As we have already kind of touched on making it easier to understand where the access is, how close it is to you, how many access points there are on that particular stretch is the big update there. OK. Cool, cool, yeah, I got that. So let’s talk really quickly about, so we’re kind of running out of this idea of, a new stream, you mentioned it, start with searching for the stream, getting the stream card, going with all the detail. You’re on the stream now. You’re utilizing some of those points and things like that. Is there anything else before we jump off to my next big question for you on kind of just using it on our example here? Yeah, I mean, I think one thing to call out is once you’ve got that offline map downloaded, you can then use that to navigate even if you are outside of cell coverage. using your GPS location on your phone is going to help you see that blue dot where you are on the map and get a really clear sense of as you approach some of those land boundaries or as you start hiking into those bends in the river that you’ve already marked yourself. Speaker 2 (32:06.92) Using your offline map to help you navigate is really easy. It’s as simple as making sure your GPS is turned on and using that familiar GPS dot to see where you are on the map is also going to be critical. So that would be one other thing that I’ll call out. But then too, as you’ve been using custom markers as your e-scouting in advance of your trip, you can also utilize those custom markers when you’re out on the water. So if you happen to come across another section of the river that looks especially good that you weren’t able to see while you were looking at the map on your desktop but now you’re in the wild and you’ve found a bend that is fishing really well or is definitely worth coming back to. You can continue to add those custom markers and save those particularly good spots for you to come back to later. And once you come back in the cell coverage all of that information will sync with your account so you won’t lose any of those waypoints. But that would be another thing that I would call out that’s really helpful in I like to use that not only to identify maybe some new bends or some new really good sections of water, but I also like to maybe log a catch. If I catch a really nice fish and I want to remember where I caught it, I’ll drop a marker and I’ll take a few notes. I could even upload a photo or two if I want to include some of that information as well. So making sure that you’re remembering to use those custom markers is great because you can start developing this sort of fishing log of all of these really interesting spots that you’ve gone to. that make it really easy for you to come back to at a later date. Or even maybe you’re fishing right now, we’re heading into the end of the summer season, but I might want to come back to that spot in the spring. So I’ll jot down a couple of notes and I’ll remind myself, this spot was fishing well, but I think in the springtime, this is going to fish really well too. So I’ll drop a marker and I’ll have those spots to come back to later on. Yeah, that’s perfect. Yeah, I think that goes into the journaling, right? Which, you know, you’ve heard from a lot of people that that’s a big part of it, you know, keeping notes of what you’re doing out there, you know. Yeah, absolutely. That’s awesome. Speaker 2 (34:09.698) Yeah, I’m not particularly good about that either because I end up having so many different notebooks or little memo pads or things like that. So my fishing log is spread out all over the place when I’m trying to do it analog style. But it’s really nice to have a single source digitally that I can access no matter where I’m jumping into trout routes. So that’s definitely another great key component there of those custom markers. Yeah, that’s perfect. Well, if somebody is brand new to it, talk about what it, getting into it, the cost, the, can you get into it, the pro versus other versions. And I know there’s also, is there also a single state sort of subscription that changed there? is we also rolled out that single state option this summer as well. So if you are really only fishing in a single state in the country, you no longer need to purchase a subscription for the entire country. You can just grab the data for whatever state you’re in and whatever state you’re fishing the most. And those single state plans are $19.99, but it gives you access to all of the same data that you would have from our national subscription, our trout routes pro subscription at a lower cost. Now, if you are going to be doing a little bit of traveling, the cost for trout routes pro across the country is only $58.99. So I like to think of that as a fairly average trip for me to the fly shop if I’m picking up some flies and some tippets. So I think it’s fairly reasonable, especially if you are considering or if you do fish a few states throughout the season, to be able to have the amount of data and accuracy and the confidence to be able to find those access points no matter where you’re fishing. But that’s what our Trout Routes Pro plan looks like. It’s $58.99. But if you are new to Trout Routes, I would also encourage you just to check it out, because you can try Trout Routes for free for seven days to get a sense of the information, to maybe even check out some of your local spots to see what level of detail we have. And I think you’ll be impressed by how much information is truly in Trout Routes and how much information you have access to to help you find Speaker 2 (36:17.418) so many new opportunities. Yeah, yeah, no, and that’s totally I mean, $20, know, for and that’s for the year. Yeah, that’s for a year for a single state. exactly. I mean, that’s just, yeah, super, you know, super reasonable. And then the, you know, the six stars as well. I mean, that’s, we’re talking, you know, filling up your gas tank, you know, for one time is, know, you’re, you’re in that range and you get trout routes for a year or so. No, and I think that all the features, the cool thing about it is too, is that you guys are going to be rolling out new things probably that we haven’t even been talking about or thinking about here, like in the future. What do you see? must be pretty exciting being there that knowing and not even knowing what could come. you? Do you have a grass? that get you fired up knowing that you guys have a powerhouse that you’re working with? Speaker 2 (36:58.218) Yeah, absolutely. mean, ONNX has been at the forefront of mapping technology for years, decades really, and to now have some connectivity with some of these teams that are doing incredible work on the data analysis side, on the development side, on the cartography side. Getting these updates this summer has been really exciting for us because I think we’re really starting to see the potential and some of the long-term potential for where TrailRoutes is going to go. We’ve got an awful lot of ideas that we’re working toward and working through right now. I’m not going to give away any secrets, absolutely stay tuned. Yeah, there’s some really great things coming. And like I said, just even just this update from the last few weeks has been a major overhaul and a major improvement. And what I’m really excited about is allowing our teams to start plugging in and creating some new tools built off of the experience and, you know, the the pedigree of where ONNX has come over the last several years and being able to use some of that experience and some of that knowledge to improve the way that we’re showing off data, the way we’re pulling in new sources of information and helping people find much more access. Yeah, more access. What was it like on the team? when Trout Routes before, when you guys were in there, what was it? Just numbers of people. I mean, what was it, the Trout Routes team and then what was the Onyx team? Yeah, our original startup Trout Routes team was really just five full-time employees. So it was a very small group and we were working as fast as we can. And it was truly that startup, that fast and furious approach to trying to get as much incorporated into the product as possible and help spread the word to as many angles as we could. that was really exciting and a lot of fun. Speaker 2 (38:50.038) Now, of course, Onyx Maps as a parent company has over 400 employees. And like I’ve already mentioned, I mean, they have teams that specialize in cartography. They have teams that specialize in software development and data analysis. And one of the things that I’ve been, I think, most impressed by is before when we were still our small startup, we would have to try and tackle these new ideas and new projects pretty independently. and sort of work from the ground up. And now when we’ve got some ideas, we can more often than not take that idea to another team and say, we’re thinking about doing something like this. Have you experienced that before? Do you have any ideas? And that team will either point us to the expert or they will wrap their heads around it and help us approach these new challenges with so much more knowledge and experience to really accentuate the experience and trout routes and you know. take all of their data and their knowledge and their experience and help us find these really cool paths to success that I’ve been very, very pleased to be a part of. Nice. Well, I’m excited to see all the great stuff to come and a couple random ones. We’re gonna get out of here in a sec. Let’s do our, you know, kind of our Fly Shop Friday segment, which we love to do here. Give a shout out to the little cops. So before we get into our final random segment, give us a fly shop. I know we, I think he asked you on the last one, maybe what’s another shop you’ve been working with or you’ve been connected with or maybe is close by your area that you’d give a shout out. Yeah, totally. think I called out a local shop last time, so I’m going to shout out one that’s a little bit further away from me this time. But I’m going to give a special shout out to the folks at Anglers All in Colorado. They’re in Denver in the Littleton area. They’ve got a fantastic new boathouse where they have all kinds of rafts and boats and additional gear. But that entire team has really adopted Trout Routes as a tool for them to help their customers find some new access. And they’ve been really great for us to work with because Speaker 2 (40:51.832) They’ve got some great experience and they cover a lot of water out west and to now have their support to help people find some new access and some new public water has been really special. And so if you’re in that area or if you’re heading out to Colorado, absolutely put those folks on your, on your list. They’re very knowledgeable. They’ve got a ton of experience and they know trout routes incredibly well. So they’re able to help you pick up some flies, pick up some new gear. and then absolutely points you in a couple of cool directions if you’re new to the area or if you’ve got some experience and they’re able to help you kind of dive into some new opportunities out there. And where is the anglers all at? What city are they in? They’ve got a shop in Denver and they’ve got a shop in Littleton, which is just a little bit south of the Denver Metro. And the Littleton shop is where their new boathouse extension is as well. And I’ve been to that shop a number of times in the last year. And they’ve got a great selection. And like I said, very knowledgeable staff and always willing to help out folks when they stop in. So anglers all in Colorado, make sure you check them out. That’s it. OK, good. Yeah, we’re going to be hitting Colorado with Landon Mayer and some folks here on listeners of the show. that’s going to be Perfect. We’ll have to stop by and check out. I love the boats. I’m about it. like I’m trying to think of my favorite thing. I love boats. That’s good. I love campers a little bit. I’m kind of more than a little bit. What’s your thing? So start the random saying, what’s your thing? Do you kind of geek out on anything specific? Do you have a you know, is there a gear type thing that you really know or geek out on? Speaker 2 (42:23.682) Yeah, I am just getting down the path of fishing more out of boats. Like I said earlier, we’ve got so much little spring fed creek water out here. So that’s usually my bread and butter. But when I have an opportunity to fish for trout out of a boat, it’s really fun because it’s such a different approach and it’s just a different way of experiencing water. And I think that’s a lot of fun. So I think that’s one thing that I’m diving into. I’ll give another quick shout out to the folks over at Watermaster. I’ve been fishing a little bit out of them. Bruin, which is a three man raft, but they’ve got some other great. It was the Bruin, yeah, be our UI in. And that’s been an amazing boat for me to sort of wrapping my head around learning to row and getting more familiar on the oars and then being able to bring some more folks out with us on the water has been a lot of fun. So I definitely check them out as well. That’s also another, you know, I think, cool segue into some late season fishing is is that. single person. Speaker 1 (43:01.656) Okay. Speaker 2 (43:21.358) Now’s a great opportunity to try something different. If you’ve been fishing a particular style throughout the season and you want to try something else, maybe consider picking up another piece of gear if you’re thinking about getting into some watercraft. It’s just another really fun way to expand your horizon and challenge yourself a little bit. Yeah, it is. No, I love it. I mean, rowing is something I always love. I love rowing. I love teaching people about rowing. What has been for you? What’s been the biggest challenge to picking it up? Or what would be your tip for somebody who’s new to rowing to get better at it? I would say be patient with yourself. It’s a skill that does take a bit of time and it can be little bit confusing. Some of the things and some of the techniques might be a little bit counterintuitive if you are just getting off the ground and just starting to figure it out. But one of the things that for me personally that I love about fly fishing is that every season is a new journey, a new experience, and a new opportunity to, like I said, expand those horizons. And so I think being patient with yourself and giving yourself a little bit of grace to make mistakes and enjoy the process along the way is going to help you in the long run. Yeah, that’s good advice. Yeah, because there will be for sure mistakes, right? Have you been in a situation yet where you’ve made a mistake that, you know, mean, there’s little mistakes and there’s small mistakes. I always think of the whitewater and I’m not sure if you’ve done much of that, but you get in whitewater and you have mistakes that you can make and be okay. And then sometimes those mistakes might make you end up upside down in the river. Have you been close to anything like that? Speaker 2 (44:56.768) I have been fortunate enough to not make any of those major mistakes, but I think there have certainly been some circumstances where I might have maybe been a little overconfident or took the wrong line and learned that, well, I should maybe consider a different line next time or something like that. yeah, for the most part, everything’s gone really well. like I said, we don’t have a ton of whitewater out in my neck of the woods, so I’ve had a chance to get out and just do some of that. some of those repetition practice trips and just work on some of the basics. Yep, nice. Okay, well we’ll be talking more about that in the future because I love talking rowing in boats so we’ll hit you up later on that. Yeah, definitely. Absolutely. So a couple of random ones and then we’ll let you get out of here. So one is like phone charging, right? So this obviously everybody’s got a phone in their pocket. It’s like just part of the, that’s why trout routes is so amazing, you know, is that it’s there. So why not use the app when you need it to help you out? But how do you, when you’re out in the field, did you, what’s your charging method if you’re on a longer trip? Do you have to deal with that much? That’s a good question. Here’s another quick feature plug that I think will tap into this. So I am almost always plugging my phone into my car when I’m driving around. But one of the things that helps me remember to do that is if your vehicle has CarPlay, you can actually pull up trout routes on the dash display. And so as long as I got my phone plugged in, I know it’s charging. But then I can also see where that trout water is as I’m driving around. So that’s kind of a neat little extra feature. But one other thing that I do travel with and this has been relatively new for me this year just as I’ve been traveling a bit more and have been spending a bit more time on the road is I do carry a charging brick with me just to be on the safe side and I’m forgetting the brand. I think a lot of those do pretty much the same thing and as long as you remember to charge it up before you go, I’m not particularly brand conscious on the charging front but I do think that’s really important. Speaker 2 (46:59.7) extra piece of gear, especially as we all have become more used to and reliant on our phones for navigation, and especially in a sense of wanting to be sure that you’ve got all of that data with you on trout routes, making sure your phone’s got enough batteries is absolutely key. That is key. Yeah, a couple of battery tips. are probably some people probably know this is obvious. But if you, you know, if you’re not using, example, your your phone’s off, you know, or if it’s on, you can turn it on to airplane mode. That will not allow the GPS and then trout routes obviously wouldn’t work with that for that period. But that would save them better if you want to save them battery for that time. And then also closing your apps. If you’ve got like 50 apps open, those are draining your battery. Yeah, totally. Little things like that are helpful. And provided you’ve got your offline map downloaded, you can turn off your cell or can turn on airplane mode and you can still see and access your trout routes data. you’ll still be able to navigate. As long as you’ve got it downloaded ahead of time, it’ll still show up for you. so you can still, so AirPlay mode, you still get the satellites. I believe so. could also toggle off your cellular signal. That’s right. Independently. Yeah. Right. So I know that that is something else that will start to interfere, especially if you are outside of cell service. Your phone is always trying to reconnect you and that can also start draining your battery pretty quickly. Speaker 1 (48:21.334) Okay, cool. Yeah, no, this is great. And I think that obviously there’s safety involved here too. think part of what you guys do is a safety thing too. know, I mean, this is safety from running into landowners on the wrong property, know, and then also safety from river gauges and stuff. Do you feel like trout routes is keeping folks safer out there? Is that something you guys talk about? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think there’s so much variety in trout water across the country and not all of it is going to be in environments that are particularly dangerous. But if you are inclined to explore and get off the beaten path, I think it’s incredibly important to make sure that you are prepared and you have those mapping and navigational resources sorted out ahead of time in case you run into some bad weather or you get disoriented or something. And like you said, I think also just making sure that you are not getting too close or you’re not crossing into private land accidentally is also key. there again, access to water is not the same across the country. And there are certainly some states that are quite a bit more rigid and protective of private land. So being able to see exactly where those boundaries are and feel absolutely confident that you are not only headed in the right direction, but you are fishing and exploring in areas that you legally have the opportunity to do is key. So yeah, I certainly think it’s not only important for your personal safety, but then also for your enjoyment. If you have all of that information in your pocket, I think you can head out into the wilderness and into the wild and not have that anxiety looming over you. You’ve got the data, you’ve got your maps, you know where you’re going, and you’re able to see where you are. And it kind of removes that from the equation, that anxiety anyway. It does. That’s cool. think I’ve always, one of the things I’ve never done fully is the, you mentioned Cartographer, but like the mapping, the compass map, it’s a good skill to have, right? It’s like a skill. And I recommend for sure anybody who wants to do it, it. I never have done it. I’ve always had, the phone has never knocked on what has never let me down. So I feel like, I don’t know, you know what mean? That’s been me. But are you a big safety? Have you done that sort of, you know? Speaker 2 (50:34.232) I yeah, and I would absolutely encourage everyone to learn a little bit about compass navigation. It’s a little bit more straightforward than I think people realize. it takes a little bit to understand how to use a compass and then how to use it with a map. But it’s a skill that could come in handy when you least expect it. yeah, I would definitely encourage it. It’s also kind of fun, too, to pull out the old compass and navigate. a little bit old school and sort of test yourself and you know, you can do it. I mean, that’s something that you can do in the backyard if you if you’re interested, you know, you could or find find some public land or even take something out with you when you’re on the stream next time and put yourself to the test. But especially if you are or if you know you’re headed somewhere for an extended period of time, making sure that you’ve got some of those backups on hand is certainly key. That’s it. Perfect. Okay, Eric, well, I think we can leave it there for today until the next one. I think we’re going to be doing some more stuff, getting kind of probably on video on the next one. So we’ll send everybody out to troutroutes.com if they have questions and appreciate all the update and really excited to keep in touch and all the good stuff you guys have coming. Yeah, absolutely. I appreciate the time here today. And yeah, I’m looking forward to digging into some of that e-scouting and some of those visuals that we’ll bring on next time. But if you are unfamiliar with Trout Routes, like you said, head over to troutroutes.com, but also keep in touch with us on our socials, just at Trout Routes, across platforms. And yeah, keep an eye out there. We always like to throw out updates and other exciting things that we’ve got going on. with the team and other opportunities out across the country as well. So check that out to keep in touch. And yeah, we’re looking forward to the next one. Sounds good, Dave. Thanks. Speaker 1 (52:16.546) Alright, we’ll see you then. Speaker 1 (52:20.728) There it is, you can find Eric right now if you go to troutroutes.com, you can connect with him at trout routes on social media. He’s always up for taking questions, answering anything that comes up, so check in right now. If you’re interested in getting a little promo and getting access to trout routes for a bonus through Wetflyswing Pro, you can do that right now. Just go to wetflieswing.com slash pro, sign up there, we’ll follow up with you and you can email me directly. Dave at WebflySwing.com and we’ll let you know how to get access to some good trout routes bonuses. We got a great next episode coming up. Craig Matthews is back. We’re gonna be talking Patagonia. They’ve got a new book, Him and Yvonne Chouinard. It’s all about simplicity and pheasant tales. So we’re gonna talk about that today. Stay tuned with the big episode. Craig Matthews is back and he always brings a good time. I want thank you for stopping in today and listening to the very end. Appreciate you and appreciate everything you are doing to support this podcast. I hope you’re having a great afternoon. Hope you’re having a great evening or if it’s morning. Hope you have a great day and look forward to catching up with you on that next episode. We’ll see you then. Thanks for listening to the WetFly Swing fly fishing show. For notes and links from this episode, visit wetflyswing.com.