 Lakeland Currents, your public affairs program for North Central Minnesota, produced by Lakeland PBS with host Ray Gildow. Production funding for Lakeland Currents is made possible by Bemidji Regional Airport, serving the region with daily flights to Minneapolis-Saint Paul International Airport. For information available at BemidjiAirport.org. Closed captioning for Lakeland Currents is sponsored by Niswa Tax Service, tax preparation for businesses and individuals, online at niswatex.com. Hello again everyone and welcome to Lakeland Currents. For tonight we have a special program. Every night we are on Currents at Special, but tonight's really a special program. Two friends of mine, to be honest we're all in some of the same industries, but the title of the program tonight is Women of the Outdoors. And it's something that's near and dear to my heart, and I'll tell you about that in a minute, but I want to introduce you to two young ladies who are very active in helping other people get involved in the outdoors. A lot of people know them from the fishing trade, but we're also, they are also involved in a lot of other aspects of the outdoors and hunting, and they do fishing things, and other things. They work with different groups helping them be exposed to the outdoors, and I think it's a pretty neat deal. To my immediate right is Nancy Kep, and for people in central Minnesota, the Kep name is pretty well known, because her uncle is Marv Kep, the Hall of Fame fisherman, the National Hall of Fame fisherman, I believe, and for sure the Minnesota Fishing Hall of Fame. And Nancy comes from Glenwood, Minnesota, and she and her husband have a store. What's the name of the store besides Kep's? It officially Kep's Glenwood Corner. And it's a very nice store where sometimes people drive off with the pumps, and sometimes they drive off with the hoses and break things off. It happens. And to her right is Mandy Urik, and if you watch Lakeland Public Television, if you watch Thursday Night News, you know that Mandy and I do fishing tips, and we've been doing that, now Mandy says we've been doing it for four years. Hopefully we've helped some of you learn how to catch a few fish. Nancy, let's start with you a little bit. You're not here because your uncle's famous. You're here because of the achievements that you have of yourself. And I just know from knowing your family how much time you spend helping other people. You do a great deal of things for kids, wounded warriors, all kinds of things. But talk about a little bit about your background. How did you get involved in the outdoor stuff? Well, I grew up in Clitherell, and we had a resort as growing up. So whenever I had a free moment and I had all my tours done, then I could take the boat out and go fishing. Was that on Clitherell Lake? It was actually Spitzer Lake. Okay. So I would just take the boat out and go fishing. And probably, I think we had that for like 10 years, 10, 12 years. And then my parents decided to build a gas station in Clitherell. And so we had that gas station called Caps there for 27 years they had it. And so I just, I was in the industry, I would go to all the tackle shows and trade shows with my parents. Then I got involved with the National Professional Anglers Association because they were doing, at that time, events for kids. And so one of my friends said you should join because they do all these different events with kids and you can put on clinics and get involved with the kids because they knew that's what I like to do. So I started there and it just kind of evolved into so much more. And not only is your uncle famous, but the cap name is famous in Minnesota because of the caps in Urbank, which would be your uncle. Correct. Which are one of the major suppliers of bait throughout Minnesota, still to this day. And how many uncles do you have that are in the business? In some form or another? Just one now. Just one left and then Marv. And you now live in Glenwood and you have, do you have two boys? Two boys. Evan's 17 and Ty's 11. And they are both active in the outdoors, I'm guessing. Evan is Ty, not so much. You have one that's into the computer stuff? Yes. Yeah. Well, that's not it. If his friends are fishing, he's all for it. But for me and him to go out, he would choose to stay home. Okay. Evan's the one that wakes me up at 5.30 when I see a relief in his six and say, Mom, let's go fishing. Now, Mandy, Mandy has been on our program before, about a few years ago. We don't remember exactly how long ago. But Mandy, talk a little bit about your background. Fairly similar actually to Nancy's, which is kind of scary. I grew up in North Dakota and we had a little resort on Devil's Lake. And so I'm the youngest of six kids, five older brothers, and I loved it. You know, my brothers didn't like it. It was work for them. And for me, it was fun. And every chance I got, I would, you know, somehow wheeze in my way into the boat with the clients. And they are all about it. I mean, who's going to say no to a six-year-old little girl who was begging to go fishing. And so, you know, I did that. Clean fish, you know, helped with everything. And then the lake rose, you know, and we lost our resort because of it, which was fine. But I went into the natural resource field with my education and ultimately with my career. But I was always stuck on that, the fishing side of it. And I did guide professionally for about 10 years on the hunting side out of Starbuck, Minnesota. I actually used to go to Nancy's store and get all my bait for fishing. It's crazy how intertwined it is before we are actually really intertwined in the industry itself. And what were you guiding? What kind, what were you, pheasant hunting, duck hunting? Pretty much everything. I had really awesome cougar farms that's out of there. I got to travel a lot with some really special, special clients, big named people. South Carolina, turkey hunting, gator hunting around Minnesota. We did duck hunting, pheasant hunting, deer hunting, and goose hunting. Was that all in addition to your other job? Yeah. So you kind of worked around, because you are a biologist. Correct. And you're with the DNR. Yes. So you did that in addition to your regular job? Yes. Wow, that was pretty. It kept you busy, that's for sure. But as Nancy knows, if you like what you do, it's not really a second job. So. And now you live in the Brainerd area? I do. I've lived here 11 years now. And what's the magazine that named you one of the 17 most influential women of the outdoors? Wildlife Enthusiasts. Wildlife Enthusiasts. Congratulations. Thanks. That's an amazing honor. Was that, did you have any idea that was coming? I had absolutely no idea at all. They had literally contacted me the day that they were publishing it. And just, here you go. And I was kind of like, there's some pretty big names on this list from all over the world. So I'm not really sure. You know, the little North Dakota girl landed on the list, but I'm very happy to be there. That's very impressive. Well, I wanted to tell you that it's always been important to me to have women involved in the outdoors. My grandfather died pretty young on my mother's side. He was 52 years old. And my grandmother actually is the person that taught me how to duck hunt. And she taught me how to partridge hunt. So I would go duck hunting with my grandmother in Pine River, Minnesota. We'd go out in the dark and I could never shoot a duck unless it landed on the water because she wasn't a good shot and she knew I didn't know how to shoot. But that always has stuck with me that, you know, here's a grandmother that no one would ever dream would be out in a duck blind or walking through the woods partridge hunting with a 20 gauge shotgun. And I think it's just always been a part of my understanding that why should it just not, just not for men to do these sort of things. It's for women to do these sort of things also. And you are both very independent. And I need to tell the viewers the story about the first time we did a fishing segment, Mandy and I together. Mandy had this big truck and this big boat and there were a bunch of guys standing along the shore. And Nancy, you said you've had similar experiences as to do. And these guys, I could see them talking like, but it's just kind of know what she's doing. Better watch out. She's going to run over us or something. And she turned around and whipped in and back that truck in and jumped out and unhooked it. And these guys are going, wow, it's probably a better than any of those guys could do. And I have talked to women who are petrified to try to back a boat up because they are always in an area where there's people watching and they don't get an opportunity to go out and kind of practice to do that. And you guys are, you don't need help when you're doing that. You've got big boats, you just back them in, you unhook them and tie them up. And you've been doing it for so long. It comes natural to you. But you also are involved in a program to teach as women how to do that sort of thing. Who wants to start out talking about what that program is? I'll let Mandy start, because she was the one that I got the phone call from to ask if I wanted to do the event on Lake Minawaska for walleyes. So I'll let her start. Which by the way, I was super ecstatic. The boat program blended by lander is a coordinator for it. And it's actually the oldest and largest boat program in North America. We offer almost 150 different opportunities that can be from kayaking to birding to geocaching to fishing to archery hunting. It's called bull? Bull becoming an outdoor woman. B-O-W. Correct. And I think it was three or four years ago. Linda came to me and said, Hey, would you be interested in, I know you got a wide breadth of a background for natural resources you hunt and fished for teaching something. And I was like, Yeah, absolutely. And they didn't expect what we got, which was great. The very first session that I did was a bass and musky one. And we offered it at Cabela's. And we had room for 60 people. They were thinking maybe 30 people were going to show up, 90 people showed up. It was standing room only. And it's a two hour course. But what I did differently from the other courses was it was mandatory that you had to come for the hands on learning session. But then you were immediately paired with a guide and you got to go out and fishing and actually apply those skills that we just talked about. So you're using the tackle. You're using the rods. You're really applying those skills that you just took the time to learn. And it blew up. And all of a sudden we had this waiting list. And it was doing all these species. And I just finally had to go back to Linda. And I was like, We need some help. And I'm like, I got a gal in mind. I was like, I'm like, Let me give her a call and see if she'd be interested. And Linda didn't know Nancy at the time and was totally like, I trust you. You know, if you think that, you know, this is going to work. And obviously it's worked. It's worked out great. So I gave Nancy the call and I was like, Hey, I was like, I really need you to pick up this walleye session. What do you think about it? She didn't even box. She's like, Yep, I got it. So are you still doing that? Are you still involved with that program? Both of you still are. And is it seasonal? Is there a certain time of the year that you offer these courses? Or how do people find out about it? I do mine in June. It's the second week in June is when I've been doing mine. This will be my third year doing it. And you do that in Glenwood? In Glenwood. Yep. So the women's day at Peter's Resort or last year they stayed at Hunts Resort to resorts on Minawaska. And then I do like a Friday night meet and greet. And I take them around the lake. We have a little night cruise. And then Saturday morning, we do training sessions, just basically about walleyes. You start from the ground and work their way up to about everything from understanding their habitat to basically fishing them. Tackle. Go through the tackle. But best practices are different methods, different types of season, what to use for spring, summer, fall. You know, just go through all of that with the women. And then in the afternoons, we take them out fishing. So what's the range of age that are involved usually? I've had my youngest, I guess, was probably 17. A mother and daughter came last year. And then the oldest is, I want to say she was close to 70 this year. I had a gal that she was pushing 80. And then she came to the hands-on bath session and in between coming to the actual guide session, she had fallen and broken her arm in two places. And she came and she was like, I don't think I'm going to miss this, do you? Yeah. But that's the great thing about it. There is no age limit to get out and do these things and learn new skills. So when do you do your program, Mandy? Whenever I can fit it in. I've done stuff in the spring and I've done stuff in the fall. It just depends on the species. And obviously I've got work. I've got 30 plus tournaments a year. We got to squeeze in all our other stuff. So mine's limited. The ours are because we're hands-on and on the water. But the bow program itself is a full calendar year. There's programs going on year-round. And how do people find out about that? Can they go to a website for the DNR, for the BOW program? Absolutely. They can just google it and there's a whole calendar on there right now. Facebook page. They have just designated for Minnesota. And how many other women are doing what you two are doing? Are there quite a few around the state doing it? The volunteering or the... The actual class, the classes that you're doing that you volunteer to teach. I think we're it. Really? Because you two are the main two people doing it. And I'm sure that if we had time we could expand and do more of it and help them out more. But I mean it just, like Mandy said, you got 30 tournaments a year. You got, we have jobs, a family. And you have tournament fish too, don't you? Yes. And you teach the ladies how to back a boat up and that sort of thing at that class? Or not so much? I guess I don't personally teach them. I have a slide that kind of shows them how to do it properly. But I don't physically take them out and show them. I just give them pointers like, you know, go to a park one day or go someplace where they can practice where it doesn't have to be an actual access. I'm sure if we actually offered a class on itself we would have people there definitely. I mean if you did, it would be a good idea actually between backing and running boats. With a difference between a tiller boat and a wheel boat, I'm sure our class would be full. Because I know a lot of women that I've talked to are embarrassed to go try to do it at a public landing because they're afraid people are watching and will make fun of them. Because it takes a while to get the hang of it. That's very interesting. So it's called BOBOW. And it can be seen on the website from the DNR. And next spring, I'm guessing you guys are next summer. We'll be doing a couple classes again. What else, what else are you both involved in? Do you do anything else together that's, well, let's talk a little bit about your tournament fishing. You're both tournament fishermen. And Mandy, you said you do about 30 a year. Correct. And how about you Nancy? Oh, I maybe do six. I got kids. And are they multi-species or I know Mandy's focus, I think it does multi-species too, but a lot more on the bass side than on walleyes. I'm a lot more on the walleyes side. You are. And where are you usually doing it? In what area? Let's see. Outer Tail Lake. I went up to Pakegama this year, did a tournament up there. Reno, did a tournament on Reno, Minwasca. And how about you Mandy? Where do you go? I'm all over the place. I just got back from Canada. So I was up there for seven days. It was a three day derby, 150 boats. So I could be here around the Midwest, up in Canada, wherever it takes me. Wow. That's a lot of tournaments. And when you are tournament fishing, are you usually with an amateur or do you take a partner? I normally have a partner. If my son Evan can do it, he's usually my partner. I have a lot of good times in the boat. Otherwise, just a friend, whoever, whether it's another girl or a gentleman. How about you Mandy? Both. It just depends. I fish four different series. So each series is different. Two of them, it's a partner series. So I have a partner actually for each one, a different partner for each one of those. But if it's an MFBA or one of those, and it's a Pro-AM system, where you're linked with a co-angler amateur. How many women do you see in these tournaments? Not a lot on my side. No, I don't either. Actually, on the bass side, I've seen it grow 10-fold from 10 years ago, where I started. The only other gal at that time was Janet Parker. She was kind of my inspiration. She filmed some TV shows with Steve Panaz, and she was actually fishing the bass FLW series as a pro. Then I got into it, and I didn't really see anybody else. Michaela Anderson, who's just been a little phenom. I've fished against her since she was in high school, and she's a hack of a stick. But clubs have helped. The high school fishing team is definitely helping on average though, and maybe see three or four other gals on a main series circuit. Well, let's just talk about you brought up the high school fishing teams. That's a really big movement. It's pretty exciting. That's crazy. And I know you both have been involved with it at some level, haven't you? I know Nancy, you're very involved down there. Talk a little bit about it, because I'm doing a show later, probably in November, about the Brainerd High School fishing team. But what is it? What's going on there? Well, I guess I didn't really get asked to do it. I just kind of suggested it to our athletic coordinator that we have at school. And I said, you know, this is what I'm thinking. And he's like, well, we don't have the funding for you to do this program. He's like, because you're a coach, and you need to be making excellent amount of dollars. And that's not why I'm here. I'll volunteer my time to start a fishing program in school. And he evolved from there. I went to the superintendent. He likes what I do with the kids in the Monaco program for the fifth graders. So he's like, yep, do whatever you need to do, Nancy, and just send me the stuff. And so we kicked it off, ended up with 22 kids for our first year. And you have girls? Yes, I have one girl. That's the fastest growing movement I think in high schools after the trap shooting teams. I think Brainerd has the second largest fishing team. I think Minnetonka has the number one team in the state. A great opportunity for kids who don't get to go fishing. Otherwise, maybe they don't have parents that have boats. Mandy, have you worked with the Brainerd team at all? I've worked with them a little bit. I actually mentor a couple of the kids. So on a regular series, I've had Will, now this is his fifth year with me. So I've had him since he was actually smaller than me. Now I have to look up to him, which is nice. And it helped him more on the sponsorship side. When we were first getting going, I worked with 13, which was one of my sponsors, to help sponsor the team, to be able to get the kids good quality rods at a price that everybody could afford. And that's, I think the great thing about that is there is a sponsorship. I know there's more than one organization that they belong to. Bass is one, but not the only organization. And these kids get opportunities to get tackled that they maybe couldn't afford to have otherwise. They learn techniques. They go to different lakes. And I think almost every weekend during the course of the season, they can be in a tournament if they want to be, can't they? Absolutely. That's just a great program. And I think there's a number of women in the Brainerd program, or girls, I should say, high school girls. That's just a, that's a great thing to see. And they also started this year, it was called the Heart of the Lakes fishing tournament, where it was like different sections of the Tri-County Cooperative in the western section of Minnesota, where it was actually four different groups of schools got together one night during the month, and they all fished against each other. For people in your area, is there a way that they could get a hold of anyone in the program? Do they have a website down there, or? I know they have a Facebook page. I'm not sure if they have a website yet. But they could get you through your Facebook page. Absolutely, yeah. Or the Alexandria coaches, or Fergus Falls, Detroit Lakes, Brethren Ridge. And I know it's growing. More and more people are getting involved. Even if it's, I think I talked to some coaches at the Northwest Sports Show, there were only four or five kids in the, in the first program, but it's a start. It's a way to start getting kids going there. You know, and not all kids are athletes. Right. And that's something to, you know, where I see a lot of kids coming into Glenwood to fish on our high school team that, you know, they're not the star athlete. And this isn't out for them. This is something they can do, and they can excel at it. How about the wounded warriors and the veterans programs? You've both been active in that, I know. Talk, talk a little bit about what you do there, both of you. Well, I'm on the board for fishing with vets. So we do a lot with veterans and taking them on trips. We have, I think, at least five trips every, during the summer that we take them on. Now we've started doing some ice fishing trips and just to get the veterans out on the water, give them the opportunity just to relax, have fun, just kind of let go and not have all the other pressures in the world that are, are bothering them. Are there any special requirements that they have to be veterans of an era or anything? No. Just if they're a military vet? Yeah. I've been honored now to fish with a gentleman named Dale for twice now. He's a 91-year-old World War II veteran. Wow. Great, super guy, great guy. So this is... And are you a multi-species fishing when you do it with those guys? Well, it depends. Sometimes we're just walleye, sometimes it's multi-species. How about you, Mandy? You've done some work with those groups, too, haven't you? Yeah, I like that. I do the one at Camp Ripley, and that's a really awesome event. There's a lot of vets that come for that, and it is, every year I look forward to it, because you just... I've had some special requests where the same guys want, you know, to get the same guide over and over again, and the last guys that I had, I had two of them in there just a hoot, and I had them in my basketball, and it was a little bit rough, and we were out on the lax, and they're like, we want to go for a boat ride. I'm like, I'm looking at these, and they're both in there, you know, it's 170 and 180, and I'm thinking, okay, we'll go for a little boat ride, you know, so I put it down and go into our fishing spot and... And how fast did your boat go? We might have been doing mid-60s. And you know the speed limit is? We get there, and I get everything set up, and I had a really good, actually, small-ball spot going for big smallies, and we sat on it for 15 minutes, and it was as fast as we could catch them, and they both looked at me, all right, let's go walleye fishing. And I'm like, hey, that's cool. We picked up and went over to the other side of the lake and walleye fish, but just listening to those guys tell those stories is truly amazing. Now, you both do other things besides fishing. Mandy, you just got through with an exciting hunt, maybe talk a little bit about that. When I'm not in tournament England, I do like to ice fish, and I do hunt. I actually, after 10 years of chasing the big black bear, I finally got my black bear, but it's just one of those things, the outdoors, it doesn't matter if it's fishing. Just talk about that bear. That was just a week ago or so. Correct. And tell us a little bit about how that happened. I've been baiting, obviously, since it started, and baits were getting hit right away, and then nothing, and acorns are dropping, weather's warm, and so I stopped baiting, went to Canada for my tournament, came home, the weather snapped, we got that cold snap, and started baiting, put the cameras back out, and bear started hitting it, and I had two of them, both big ones, so I let the bait sit, and I didn't refill them the night before, and then I baited it in the morning, and I sat all day long, and at four o'clock came a perfect heart shot, dropped them right there. It was a bore, wasn't it? Yeah, a big male. How much did it weigh? I don't know. It broke the scale at camp, so. Wow, it was a beautiful animal. I don't know if you sent a picture of that in for our discussion today or not. I think it did. Yeah, so that's a nice animal. Do you bear hunter? I know you do. Everybody in a kept family, do you? Right. Yeah, I went bear hunting once, and then after I seen it all skinned out, I decided that maybe bear hunting's not quite my thing, so have it one sense, but yes, enjoy deer hunting, duck hunting, goose hunting, pheasant hunting, enjoy it all. And you both do that? You both do all of those hunting? Ice fishing. When do you work? When do you guys work? Everybody says that. But that's the amazing thing about both of you is that, because you are truly women of the outdoors. You are outdoor enthusiast, and you are good at what you do. And if people wanted to learn how to do some of the things that you do, obviously, you're so busy, you don't have time to spend a lot of time with a lot of people. How else could they learn how to get into doing some of these things, besides the program you talked about? Is there any other way that you would recommend, if there are women watching today that would like to learn how to go deer hunting, and they don't maybe have guys they hunt with, how would they get started? How would you recommend? Well, I know there's a big group of women that do a lot of fishing stuff together, women anglers of Minnesota. They are huge into fishing, and they're kind of trying to expand a different variety of things, but if you want to get involved in fishing, that's a great place to start, is to become a member of that. Hunting, is there anything hunting? When you served as a guide down in Starbucks, did they do any training programs there, or little falls that the hunting arranged? Mostly you got to know what you're doing and you walk into those places, and oh yeah. Correct, yeah. You got to go to the bull program, they teach it all. So that really is the foundation for people, and I would guess if there were more and more people signing up, they would probably find, they would, I don't know if they'd find two more like YouTube, there aren't two more like YouTube. We actually have really good archery instructors and turkey instructors, women instructors for the bull program that do that, that are phenomenal. Great. So Nancy, tell us how people can get a hold of you. You can get a hold of me on my Facebook pages under Nancy Kep or our website. K-O-E-P for people that don't know how to spell Kep. It's actually under Nancy Ann Kep. I don't know how I got that on there, but otherwise I have a web page for my store, which is Kepspate.com. You can go on there and send an email to me and I can answer any questions for you. Mandy, how do we get a hold of you? Look me up on Facebook, Instagram, find me on my website. Just drop me an email. And it's U-H-R-I-C-H. Correct. Eurek. Yes. And Mandy has a very professional looking web page done by some very good photographers, right? Yes, I've been very, very lucky. It's very, very well done. Well, thank you both for appearing on the show and I think you're both to be commended for the tremendous amount of volunteerism that you do. It's, you're really mentors to a lot of ladies and I hope they continue to take advantage of that. Thank you. Thank you. You bet. You've been watching Lakeland Currents where we're talking about what you're talking about. I'm Ray Gildow, so long until next time.