Bear Facts & Fish Tails Is No Longer On The Air!

[Shack]

Just called down to AM1500 and verified Mark & Larry are no longer on the air with AM1500 on Sunday evenings.

IMO it was one of the best radio shows running in the Metro area. I actually made time and purposely tune in to it. From the Griz to Woody up on Rainy, it was IMO a classic show.

Good luck too Larry "Bear" Bollig and Mark "Fish" Fisher.

Sundays on the ride home from upnorth will not be the same IMO! I hope someone else picks up the show.

[Spearing Machine]

That sucks!! That was always my entertainment every sunday for I have no idea how many years! I am almost in shock.

Any idea of why they halted the show?

[Shack]

I asked the gal why and she said she did not know. I would have to assume it has something with the SportsTalk and ESPN coming in. I am not sure if they where on yesterday or if yesterday was their last show?

[LMITOUT]

KTLK 100.3 FM also has an outdoors show. Maybe 1500 was losing listeners? Just as was said in the other thread, after dark it was impossible to pick up 1500 so about the only way I could listen to that show was online, which I did only once or twice. I'd guess they didn't have a lot of listeners out of the metro area when the days were short and the station went to low power when the show was on.

[Surreal Deal]

I too noticed that yesterday!! I was thinking if anything a "Sports" format would include more outdoors programming like In-fisherman radio or something.

That pretty well tears it for me. KSTP is now what WCCO was for me a few years ago - a necessary evil if I want to listen to the Twins.

[LwnmwnMan2]

I think what's happened with am1500 is along the lines of what happened with their home and garden show about a year or so ago.

Gertens came in and basically took over the Home and Garden show, which is now called, funny enough, "Gerten's Home and Garden Show".

They kicked off on of the hosts and brought in two of Gerten's employees.

I'm thinking that ESPN probably wanted a larger market share in this market, not wanting to play second fiddle to KFAN's local programming anymore and KSTP was willing to listen to offers.

KSTP probably looks at less local personalities and behind the scenes people to pay, and is basically letting ESPN run the show, bringing in more national advertising.

It wouldn't surprise me to find out that ESPN paid close to what KSTP was already getting in ad revenue, especially for the hours that they took over.

[titelines]

I too am saddened that the show will no longer be on. It was a ritual to listen to it coming back from the cabin every Sunday.

That being said, I kind of wondered to myself how it managed to stay on the air lately. With Larry up on Rainy every week, the technical problems seemed to mount substantially. Then Mark would be gone on one adventure or another, and no one would really fill in for him.

It also seemed that the same people called in every week (Tom N., Woody, Brother Butch, Griz etc.). I would count only one or two calls each week from "non-regulars", which made me wonder how many people were actually listening.

Lastly, it seemed like they were just kinda winging it every week, with not a lot of thought or prep going into the show.

It was also too bad that the show wasn't available on Podcast, so when the signal would inevitably be interrupted, I could at least listen to the show at some point during the week.

Don't get me wrong, I loved the show, and hopefully there will be some type of replacement for it. It seems that if they really want to be a "sports" station, they should devote a couple hours each week to the outdoors.

In the meantime, there is an outdoors show down the dial that airs twice each week and has, IMO, much more to offer than Bear Facts did.

[tsande00]

1500 continues it's downward spiral. They've now moved every show I like either completely off teh station or into time slots that don't work. It all started with Mischke being fired. I had hopes with Anderson coming on at 6 but now it seems he already got moved to the mornings!? Anways, I'm probably done listening to 1500. If I want sports I can listen to KFAN.

The only time I'll be on 1500 now is summer evenings on the boat trying to pick up a score between static noise.

[vikingmeatwad]

This is terrible that they canceled Bear Facts. In my opinion it was vastly better than the other shows as they offered a lot more information that I could actually use.

The other show seems to just go on trips and pump how amazing that area and resort are, just as the majority of the lame fishing tv shows.

I hope that the boys find another place to air the show!

And how long ago KTLK dropped Lesmeister's outdoors show as well which I liked too.

[vern]

I'll miss Bear Facts & Fish Tales too. Lesmeister's show is back on KTLK Sunday afternoons at 4:00.