Latest / Wired To Hunt Podcast / Ep. 1042: Foundations - How Whitetail Antlers Came To Be and Why We Love Them So Much

Transcript

Ep. 1042: Foundations - How Whitetail Antlers Came To Be and Why We Love Them So Much · Wired To Hunt Podcast

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt Foundations podcast, your guide
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: to the fundamentals of better deer hunting, presented by first Light,
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: creating proven versatile hunting apparel for the stand, saddle or blind.
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: First Light Go Farther, Stay Longer, and now your host
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: Tony Peterson.
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: Hey everyone, welcome to the Wired to Hunt Foundation's podcast,
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: which is brought to you by first Light. I'm your host,
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: Tony Peterson. In today's episode is all about all of
• 0:27
  Speaker 2: those bucks out there that are just starting to grow
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: their new sets of antlers and how amazing that really is,
• 0:33
  Speaker 2: and also why we just love antlers. I had two
• 0:42
  Speaker 2: experiences with antlers recently that reminded me how cool they
• 0:45
  Speaker 2: really are. One involved finding a shed from last season
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: on a little property I own, which is the first
• 0:51
  Speaker 2: antler I've ever found on any ground I've owned, which
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: covers a fifteen year time span now. The other was
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: a video of a young buck that already has a
• 0:59
  Speaker 2: tar get on his back from one of my daughters.
• 1:02
  Speaker 2: Antlers are just fascinating, and honestly, we kind of take
• 1:05
  Speaker 2: it for granted how they come to be and what
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: they really mean. That seems confusing, don't worry, because I'm
• 1:10
  Speaker 2: gonna break it down right now. I'm at the stage
• 1:17
  Speaker 2: of my hunting career where I'm just done with shoulder mounts.
• 1:20
  Speaker 2: For a long time, you know, having a set of
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: antlers on the wall meant a lot to me, and
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: having a buck dead that was worthy of a trip
• 1:26
  Speaker 2: to the tax at Ermis meant even more to me.
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: But at some point, about five or six years ago,
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: I just realized I don't need any more shoulder mounts.
• 1:34
  Speaker 2: The truth about it is that I kind of realized
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: no one really cares about them but me, and at
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: some point I'll be dead and no one will care
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: about them at all. I don't regret mounting deer in
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: the past, and still have plenty of antlers around that
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: remind me of some of my most exciting and rewarding
• 1:49
  Speaker 2: times in the outdoors. I'm just at the point now
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: where I'd rather take my tax at Army money and
• 1:53
  Speaker 2: dump it into my retirement accounts or use it to
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: take my daughter's fishing somewhere. I guess I'm more into
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: like experiences now.
• 2:00
  Speaker 3: That's just me.
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: I am still wildly interested in antlers in general. I
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: freaking love shed hunting, and I love hunting deer, and
• 2:08
  Speaker 2: I've never been pissed, not once in my life, to
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: see a buck of any size walking down the trail
• 2:14
  Speaker 2: toward me. I'm guessing you feel the same way if
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: you're devoting any of your time listening to me drone
• 2:18
  Speaker 2: on and on about deer. But do you really know
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: the story of antlers. It's pretty wild, and it starts
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: somewhere around twenty to twenty five million years ago when
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: the deer family Serve a Day appeared on the scene.
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: This was a time when new mammals started to replace
• 2:34
  Speaker 2: the ones that didn't quite survive the Oligasine epoch, and
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: newcomers besides the deer, ancestors to hit the landscape include
• 2:43
  Speaker 2: the first hyenas and the first weasels. It's pretty easy
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: to understand how evolution would eventually settle on large canine teeth,
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: for example, like you might find tucked inside of a
• 2:54
  Speaker 2: lion's mouth. And it's not really a stretch to think
• 2:57
  Speaker 2: about teeth becoming, you know, a bigigger and bigger weapon,
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: as well as some sort of defensive signal, which means,
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: you know, you can think about a walrus here.
• 3:07
  Speaker 3: But antlers, it's kind of an unusual one.
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: Luckily for us and the deer, some of the earliest
• 3:14
  Speaker 2: critters in the lineage had bony skull outgrowths. This is
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: important because evolution tends to work better when the only
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: change it needs just involves a structure that already exists,
• 3:25
  Speaker 2: instead of coming up with a whole new weapon system.
• 3:28
  Speaker 2: Over time, birds and animals and probably fish and who
• 3:31
  Speaker 2: knows what else often have ornamental appendages or plumages that
• 3:35
  Speaker 2: help with mate selection. This seems to be the primary
• 3:39
  Speaker 2: driver behind deer eventually growing larger and more branching sets
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: of bone on their foreheads, but being strapped with the
• 3:46
  Speaker 2: baddest weapons in the forest doesn't likely count as the
• 3:49
  Speaker 2: sole reason modern antlers came to be. We all know
• 3:53
  Speaker 2: males compete with other males for the ladies, and the
• 3:56
  Speaker 2: winners of fights just generally get to pass along their
• 3:59
  Speaker 2: genes more than the losers. That's evolution in a nutshell,
• 4:03
  Speaker 2: but it doesn't tell the whole story of antlers. The
• 4:06
  Speaker 2: bucks with big antlers, the one who meets the buck
• 4:09
  Speaker 2: with small antlers might never have to risk his eyesight
• 4:13
  Speaker 2: or his life to prove how bad as he is.
• 4:15
  Speaker 2: Think about it, if you had to duel with someone
• 4:18
  Speaker 2: you know, like an old timey duel. I don't know
• 4:20
  Speaker 2: why you would want to, but bear with me here.
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: If you were given a I don't know, let's say
• 4:24
  Speaker 2: a single shot thirty two caliber pistol and the dude
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: you were supposed to duel with was handed a semi
• 4:30
  Speaker 2: ato twelve gage stuff to the gills with tungsten turkey loads,
• 4:34
  Speaker 2: you might just decide to no show for the duel
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: that day. This is the goal with almost all species
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: out there, maybe all of them, you know, which is
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: to pass on your jeans a lot while having to
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: take on as little risk as possible. This has a
• 4:48
  Speaker 2: further advantage which is tied to something called the handicap principle. Essentially,
• 4:53
  Speaker 2: a big set of antlers comes with a large biological cost,
• 4:57
  Speaker 2: and all of those doze out there looking at at
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: Bucks all day to decide which ones to lock down with.
• 5:03
  Speaker 2: They see that giant set of antlers and realize that
• 5:06
  Speaker 2: that is a deer that has resources to spare. He's
• 5:11
  Speaker 2: doing so well that he can devote extra resources to
• 5:15
  Speaker 2: extravagant headgear. I mean, why do you think just about
• 5:20
  Speaker 2: every one of us wants to make more money and
• 5:21
  Speaker 2: a secretly kind of pissed when we meet someone who
• 5:24
  Speaker 2: has a huge property and awesome vehicles in a giant
• 5:26
  Speaker 2: house and seemingly unlimited funds. Or maybe a better way
• 5:29
  Speaker 2: to put this is, you know, we as a society
• 5:32
  Speaker 2: have kind of just decided all billionaires are evil, except
• 5:34
  Speaker 2: I guess Taylor Swift. But we don't talk about how
• 5:37
  Speaker 2: we'd all definitely not turned down a billion dollars if
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: it was offered to us, and yes, our lives would
• 5:43
  Speaker 2: change to resemble the upper class more than we'd care
• 5:45
  Speaker 2: to admit, because when you have crazy amount of resources,
• 5:48
  Speaker 2: we have a crazy amount of high value options in life. Now,
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: you could say that the buck equivalent of having you know, say,
• 5:56
  Speaker 2: one hundred billion dollars to your name, would be having
• 5:59
  Speaker 2: six hundred inches a bone on top of your head.
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: But those don't exist, and the closest we get are
• 6:04
  Speaker 2: farm deer that are not what nature intended and never.
• 6:07
  Speaker 3: Probably will be.
• 6:08
  Speaker 2: But real bucks don't get to that size, and that's
• 6:11
  Speaker 2: because natural selection and sexual selection pull in opposite directions.
• 6:18
  Speaker 2: Maybe the does would choose that six hundred inch buck
• 6:20
  Speaker 2: every time because well, maybe they're shallow and they can't
• 6:24
  Speaker 2: see the good characteristics of your average spike buck with
• 6:27
  Speaker 2: a great personality. But the truth is, evolution tends to
• 6:30
  Speaker 2: settle where the survival costs aren't totally out of balance
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: with reproductive benefits. In other words, at some point, antler's
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: got big enough to do all of the jobs necessary,
• 6:40
  Speaker 2: but not so big as to cause a higher likelihood
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: of death to the owner. If you can't run through
• 6:45
  Speaker 2: the woods or hold your head up for more than
• 6:47
  Speaker 2: a few minutes at a time because you have two
• 6:49
  Speaker 2: tree trunks sprouting from your noggin, the wolves and the
• 6:52
  Speaker 2: coyotes and whoever else are going to figure that out
• 6:55
  Speaker 2: real quickly, and they're going to eat you. Antlers are cool,
• 6:59
  Speaker 2: way beyond on what I've talked about so far, though,
• 7:02
  Speaker 2: as I mentioned in the intro, I recently found a
• 7:04
  Speaker 2: shed off a two year old buck in northern Wisconsin.
• 7:08
  Speaker 2: That part of the whole thing is fascinating too, and
• 7:11
  Speaker 2: it's what differentiates antlers from horns, which don't fall off
• 7:14
  Speaker 2: and regenerate every year. We all know that once the
• 7:16
  Speaker 2: rut winds down and the whole deer fervor grinds nearly
• 7:19
  Speaker 2: to a halt, that a buck's testosterone levels drop like
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: the temperature. In response to this, they develop specialized cells
• 7:27
  Speaker 2: that help dissolve the bone at the pedicle until both
• 7:31
  Speaker 2: sides fall off. Why might you ask, Well, antlers are
• 7:36
  Speaker 2: expensive to deer, a big buck, you know, run down
• 7:40
  Speaker 2: from the rut, and who doesn't really need to display
• 7:43
  Speaker 2: his male prowess any longer doesn't need to carry around
• 7:47
  Speaker 2: a bunch of extra weight on his head. It's kind
• 7:50
  Speaker 2: of as simple as that, and an easy way to
• 7:52
  Speaker 2: understand it for any of us.
• 7:54
  Speaker 3: Just carry around some extra weight. You don't have to
• 7:56
  Speaker 3: strap a.
• 7:57
  Speaker 2: Dumb belt to your forehead here to understand this, although
• 8:00
  Speaker 2: if you do, please send me photos of your attempts. Really,
• 8:03
  Speaker 2: just pick up something heavy and carry it around for
• 8:05
  Speaker 2: a while, and then maybe, I don't know, climb a
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: couple flights of stairs while carrying it, or go for
• 8:09
  Speaker 2: a long walk, hell, maybe a swim, maybe a run.
• 8:13
  Speaker 2: This is the thing that a lot of people don't
• 8:14
  Speaker 2: seem to understand that today about weight loss and the
• 8:17
  Speaker 2: general condition of our bodies, we think we all have
• 8:31
  Speaker 2: a pretty sweet beach body, except for maybe a few
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: extra stubborn pounds. But even fifteen extra pounds is a
• 8:37
  Speaker 2: lot when you make the decision to carry it around voluntarily.
• 8:42
  Speaker 2: And if you ever go to the gym and grab
• 8:43
  Speaker 2: like a forty five pound plate carry that sucker around,
• 8:46
  Speaker 2: you realize pretty quickly how much you don't want to
• 8:48
  Speaker 2: carry that kind of weight around.
• 8:50
  Speaker 3: When it's a part of your body.
• 8:52
  Speaker 2: You're going to do a lot of extra work while
• 8:54
  Speaker 2: doing the things you do every day, and that comes
• 8:57
  Speaker 2: at a cost of having to rest more, eat more,
• 9:00
  Speaker 2: and you know, just potential injury. It's really no different
• 9:04
  Speaker 2: for deer. But this discussion doesn't end when the antlers
• 9:07
  Speaker 2: hit the dirt, you know, and the turkeys start to gobble,
• 9:10
  Speaker 2: because those bucks need a new set of antlers, and
• 9:13
  Speaker 2: it doesn't take long before they start growing.
• 9:16
  Speaker 3: And this part's truly wild.
• 9:18
  Speaker 2: It all starts with the amount of daylight out there,
• 9:21
  Speaker 2: just like so many transitions in nature, you know, as
• 9:25
  Speaker 2: this sets off a hormonal shift in a buck's body,
• 9:28
  Speaker 2: and the very first thing to happen, you know, include
• 9:31
  Speaker 2: the formation of cartilage like tissue and blood vessels and
• 9:35
  Speaker 2: then stem cells which rapidly divide. This all happens at
• 9:39
  Speaker 2: the pedicles. What will eventually become bone doesn't start that way.
• 9:44
  Speaker 2: It's living tissue as the very first beginnings of antlers grow.
• 9:49
  Speaker 2: We all know they start out covered in velvet. But
• 9:52
  Speaker 2: what is velvet besides a cool, hairy like covering on
• 9:55
  Speaker 2: antlers that actually looks really sweet on a mount if
• 9:58
  Speaker 2: you're lucky enough to shoot one, you know, in the
• 9:59
  Speaker 2: earth season that hasn't stripped yet. Velvet is actually a
• 10:03
  Speaker 2: specialized kind of skin which contains a highly dense network
• 10:08
  Speaker 2: of blood vessels. It's covered in hair, and it's full
• 10:12
  Speaker 2: of nerves. What velvet does is a lot for starters.
• 10:17
  Speaker 2: It delivers oxygen to fuel all that rapid growth. It
• 10:21
  Speaker 2: also supplies minerals like calcium, protein, magnesium, and phosphorus, which
• 10:26
  Speaker 2: bucks get from crops forbes, lugumes, and well nearly any
• 10:30
  Speaker 2: kind of fresh vegetation. That last one is important because,
• 10:34
  Speaker 2: like I said, antlers are expensive to grow and the
• 10:37
  Speaker 2: only season when the nutrients are easily available, while the
• 10:39
  Speaker 2: opportunity to also be kind of lazy and not waste
• 10:42
  Speaker 2: a bunch of energy happens in the late spring and
• 10:46
  Speaker 2: throughout the summer. Velvet is essentially the supply line to
• 10:50
  Speaker 2: the antlers when they are in the growth stage, and
• 10:52
  Speaker 2: while most of us will never see it, velvet is
• 10:55
  Speaker 2: absolutely full of blood. This is because antlers demand a
• 10:59
  Speaker 2: lot and the delivery mechanism can't have any downtime. Researchers
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: have measured antler growth of up to three centimeters per day,
• 11:08
  Speaker 2: which might not sound like a lot, but it's pretty
• 11:10
  Speaker 2: hard to find a mammal that can grow bone faster.
• 11:13
  Speaker 2: The thing is, all of that summer growth happens just
• 11:17
  Speaker 2: crazy fast, But so does the moment bucks go from
• 11:20
  Speaker 2: velvet to truly hard antlered. I've hunted early season bucks
• 11:24
  Speaker 2: a whole bunch of different states where you have a
• 11:26
  Speaker 2: legitimate shot at killing a velvet deer, and it always
• 11:29
  Speaker 2: blows my mind how I can watch a buck in
• 11:31
  Speaker 2: the morning that is fully in velvet and then see
• 11:35
  Speaker 2: him in the evening and he'll be totally stripped. The
• 11:38
  Speaker 2: whole thing happens fast, and it basically involves the cartilage
• 11:42
  Speaker 2: framework that allows blood vessels to invade deeper tissues, and
• 11:46
  Speaker 2: then along the way, bone producing cells called osteoplasts deposit
• 11:51
  Speaker 2: minerals throughout the antlers, which is when calcium and phosphorus
• 11:54
  Speaker 2: harden the whole structure and dense bone replaces soft tissue.
• 11:59
  Speaker 2: And when that's complete, which up here where I live,
• 12:02
  Speaker 2: and very likely where you live. Happens in about the
• 12:04
  Speaker 2: first ten days of September. The buck strip off their
• 12:07
  Speaker 2: velvet and they revealed their new headgear. Now, that's perfect
• 12:10
  Speaker 2: world stuff, which doesn't always exist in nature. Antler growth
• 12:13
  Speaker 2: isn't always a resounding success, and it can vary a
• 12:16
  Speaker 2: hell of a lot due to a variety of reasons.
• 12:19
  Speaker 2: An injury to a deer's pedicle can cause this. Now
• 12:22
  Speaker 2: you don't see this very often, but once in a
• 12:24
  Speaker 2: while you'll see a buck that has an antler that just,
• 12:27
  Speaker 2: you know, colors way outside the lines. I missed a
• 12:30
  Speaker 2: buck like this one time on some public land here
• 12:32
  Speaker 2: in the Twin Cities. He was a deer that had
• 12:35
  Speaker 2: a nice four point side, but the other side his
• 12:38
  Speaker 2: main beam drooped all the way down and kind of
• 12:40
  Speaker 2: looped around his chin. Now, if you look at an
• 12:43
  Speaker 2: old school NFL helmet, or you know, a more modern
• 12:47
  Speaker 2: NFL Kickers helmet, you can kind of get the gist
• 12:50
  Speaker 2: of what I mean. He wasn't a giant, but when
• 12:53
  Speaker 2: he walked out and I saw what he was working with,
• 12:56
  Speaker 2: I immediately shot right over his back. Antlers can also
• 13:00
  Speaker 2: get pretty wonky if they get injured during the growth stage.
• 13:04
  Speaker 2: I don't know if this is true, and it could
• 13:06
  Speaker 2: be due to factors like heat or maybe bugs, but
• 13:08
  Speaker 2: I often see bucks betting in the summer in grassy
• 13:11
  Speaker 2: swales in places that you just don't really expect them.
• 13:14
  Speaker 2: A lot of times I wonder if that's a protective
• 13:16
  Speaker 2: measure when their antlers are particularly prone to injury. Now,
• 13:20
  Speaker 2: hormonal abnormalities are another contributor to antlers not doing what
• 13:24
  Speaker 2: we expect them to do. We forget this about animals
• 13:28
  Speaker 2: in general, but a lot of the weird shit humans
• 13:31
  Speaker 2: have wrong with them can also be found in nature too,
• 13:34
  Speaker 2: we just aren't aware of it. This is also kind
• 13:37
  Speaker 2: of tied to the idea that we can age dear
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: on the hoof by just looking at them, which drives
• 13:41
  Speaker 2: me crazy. We just don't consider the array of genetics
• 13:44
  Speaker 2: responsible for body shape and size and really only think
• 13:47
  Speaker 2: about genetics and how they relate to antlers. But deer
• 13:50
  Speaker 2: bodies outside and inside are wildly variable, and sometimes those
• 13:55
  Speaker 2: variables aren't great for signaling proper growth of new antlers.
• 14:00
  Speaker 2: Nutritional stress is another one. Where I hunt in northern Wisconsin,
• 14:04
  Speaker 2: the big bucks are as big as the big bucks
• 14:06
  Speaker 2: get pretty much anywhere, but the young bucks are often
• 14:09
  Speaker 2: a hell of a lot smaller than they are in
• 14:11
  Speaker 2: southern Minnesota, or in Iowa, or in Illinois, or in Kansas.
• 14:14
  Speaker 3: Or Missouri, or take your pick.
• 14:16
  Speaker 2: Long winners, shorter growing seasons, less agriculture. All that stuff
• 14:21
  Speaker 2: works in concert to produce smaller antlers and the deer
• 14:23
  Speaker 2: that are least likely to have access to any of
• 14:26
  Speaker 2: the good resources. I remember seeing one of my uncle's
• 14:29
  Speaker 2: trophy rooms when I was growing up. It was just
• 14:31
  Speaker 2: amazed that's how small a lot of the bucks were.
• 14:34
  Speaker 2: But that was because I only had access to southern
• 14:37
  Speaker 2: Minnesota deer and had never spent any real time around
• 14:40
  Speaker 2: the deer that could have walked to Canada within a
• 14:42
  Speaker 2: day or two and not hardly even stressed about it.
• 14:46
  Speaker 2: A healthy deer is a deer with a variety of
• 14:49
  Speaker 2: good nutritional options, and those are the deer that can
• 14:52
  Speaker 2: devote more resources to growing headgear. It's one of the
• 14:56
  Speaker 2: reasons so many of the big time TV hunters have
• 14:58
  Speaker 2: really tightly managed its properties. It's not just to keep
• 15:02
  Speaker 2: big bucks around and keep other people out, but to
• 15:05
  Speaker 2: keep as many bucks around as long as possible and
• 15:08
  Speaker 2: give them all as stress free of a life as possible.
• 15:12
  Speaker 2: Stress just doesn't favor giant antlers, and if that stress
• 15:15
  Speaker 2: involves not getting a whole lot to eat, it only
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: gets worse. This is sort of an abstract concept because
• 15:21
  Speaker 2: we can't see it happen in real time, kind of
• 15:23
  Speaker 2: like evolution. But one thing that has been absolutely fascinating
• 15:27
  Speaker 2: to me about where I live is that the last
• 15:29
  Speaker 2: three winners have been very mild. Our turkeys have been
• 15:32
  Speaker 2: consistently heavy the last couple springs, our baths seem to
• 15:36
  Speaker 2: be heavier, and the deer seem to be doing just
• 15:38
  Speaker 2: fine with antlers, even in the areas I hunt where
• 15:40
  Speaker 2: I might run into more wolves than white tails.
• 15:43
  Speaker 3: I don't know.
• 15:44
  Speaker 2: I just think, honestly, antlers are cool, and we aren't
• 15:47
  Speaker 2: the only people to believe that. For tens of thousands
• 15:50
  Speaker 2: of years, humans have used antlers in architecture, art, rituals.
• 15:54
  Speaker 2: Antlers have been involved in human culture for a long
• 15:58
  Speaker 2: long time and have often been viewed as a status
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: of hunting success or fertility, a connection to the spiritual world.
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: They're sometimes used as a symbol of strengths. Headdresses with
• 16:11
  Speaker 2: antlers on them have been found dating back to at
• 16:14
  Speaker 2: least eleven thousand years ago. Cave art often depicts antlered
• 16:18
  Speaker 2: animals with highly exaggerated headgear, and often part human part
• 16:24
  Speaker 2: animal depictions where antlers are very prominent. Siberian and Eurasian
• 16:28
  Speaker 2: cultures use them in ceremonies and shamanic traditions. Indigenous North
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: American cultures use them as tools, decorative objects, and more.
• 16:37
  Speaker 2: We've been displaying antlers and ogling over them for a
• 16:40
  Speaker 2: long time and probably will for a hell of a
• 16:43
  Speaker 2: lot longer. At least I hope we do, because I
• 16:46
  Speaker 2: think that even though we've sort of fetishized Big Bucks
• 16:49
  Speaker 2: to the point where it's gotten a little weird out there,
• 16:52
  Speaker 2: the truth is that a lot of us are connected
• 16:54
  Speaker 2: to antlers and the animals that grow them, not just
• 16:57
  Speaker 2: because we like having something to do during a couple
• 16:59
  Speaker 2: of week in DS in September and October, November December,
• 17:03
  Speaker 2: but because they represent something pretty amazing in nature and
• 17:06
  Speaker 2: are in some ways a tether from our modern selves
• 17:11
  Speaker 2: to those that walk the land. Long before it would
• 17:14
  Speaker 2: become a pastime to hunt, but was instead one of
• 17:17
  Speaker 2: the primary ways to not only see another sunset, but
• 17:21
  Speaker 2: to get the opportunity to pass on our genes as well.
• 17:25
  Speaker 2: That's it for this week. I'm Tony Peterson. This has
• 17:27
  Speaker 2: been the Wire to Hunt Foundations podcast. Thank you so
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: much for listening. If you need some more hunting content,
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  Speaker 2: just tons of new content. Go check it out at the
• 17:51
  Speaker 2: mediator dot com and once again, thank you for your support.