Latest / The MeatEater Podcast / Ep. 266: Crying Wolf
Transcript
- 0:08Speaker 1: This is me Eater podcast coming at you shirtless, severely
- 0:13Speaker 1: bug bitten in my case underwear. Listening to Hunt podcast,
- 0:18Speaker 1: you can't predict anything presented by on X. Hunt creators
- 0:22Speaker 1: are the most comprehensive digital mapping system for hunters. Download
- 0:26Speaker 1: the Hunt app from the iTunes or Google play store.
- 0:29Speaker 1: Nor where you stand with on X. All right, everybody,
- 0:36Speaker 1: joannest there's a note from your honest in the notes
- 0:41Speaker 1: says a note, can we please introduce all guests at
- 0:44Speaker 1: the beginning of the podcast? This is Ben Janni's for years,
- 0:51Speaker 1: for years. All that man wants Yanni. I like to
- 0:58Speaker 1: have the suspense. I don't introduce him because I like
- 1:01Speaker 1: to create a suspense because I think a lot of
- 1:03Speaker 1: people just listen because they're like one of Brody's there, right, Okay, Well,
- 1:10Speaker 1: I just want you to know that, uh, there's another
- 1:14Speaker 1: man sort of sitting on my shoulders that's talking to
- 1:17Speaker 1: my ear all the time as you're not introducing the guests,
- 1:22Speaker 1: and you can probably guess who that is. It's the
- 1:24Speaker 1: same man that thinks you should not heat birthing tubs
- 1:30Speaker 1: with su vied devices. Correct your father? Correct? Do you
- 1:38Speaker 1: like in movies? Do you like if if you're watching
- 1:41Speaker 1: the movie, do you want to know right when the
- 1:43Speaker 1: movie starts, what's gonna happen? No, yeah, I can tell
- 1:48Speaker 1: you who would though. It would be my kids. We've
- 1:50Speaker 1: recently started to introduce them to uh The Star Wars,
- 1:55Speaker 1: and so we watched four or five six over the
- 1:57Speaker 1: last two weeks. And they cannot take it if they
- 2:01Speaker 1: get that feeling of anticipation, just a little teeny teeny bit.
- 2:05Speaker 1: They cannot stand it that they know something is about
- 2:08Speaker 1: to happen and they don't know what it is. When
- 2:13Speaker 1: you know, after we met, you know, the after we met.
- 2:18Speaker 1: I don't know if he talks about this though. Anyways.
- 2:20Speaker 1: I was watching the Where the Red Fern Grows and
- 2:24Speaker 1: then uh Old Yeller with my kids, and before we
- 2:28Speaker 1: got into it, I told him, listen, these dogs. You know,
- 2:33Speaker 1: the dog dies in the end, right. I just want
- 2:36Speaker 1: you to know this up top, so because I knew
- 2:39Speaker 1: that'd be upsetting to him. So watching the movie, they're
- 2:43Speaker 1: just enthralled. They love those movies. They get to the
- 2:47Speaker 1: end and I'm thinking, well, now that they're sucked into
- 2:50Speaker 1: the plot, they will, you know, stick it out now
- 2:55Speaker 1: that they know because they're sold you know, engrossed in
- 2:57Speaker 1: the story, but it gets up where you kind of
- 3:00Speaker 1: smell what's gonna happen, that the dog is gonna die,
- 3:05Speaker 1: and they just they want to turn it off and
- 3:09Speaker 1: walk out of the room. That I thought for sure
- 3:14Speaker 1: they would be like, wow, what the hell, it's tough
- 3:15Speaker 1: it out, But now they're like, oh, really he's gonna
- 3:17Speaker 1: die now, Okay, click done. I don't think they want
- 3:21Speaker 1: to deal with the emotional trauma. I'll tell you right now,
- 3:24Speaker 1: I'm right there with him. Now. When when when my
- 3:27Speaker 1: kid senses something coming up on a movie he doesn't
- 3:29Speaker 1: want to watch, He plugs his ears and runs out
- 3:31Speaker 1: of the room. No, he doesn't want you to want
- 3:34Speaker 1: to hear it, see it nothing. He's like, my god,
- 3:38Speaker 1: Luke Skywalker is gonna keep his arm in my mind.
- 3:41Speaker 1: And the old yellow dog. Uh okay, Yanni introduced everybody.
- 3:45Speaker 1: Then since since you know the give us this one
- 3:49Speaker 1: goes out with Yanni's dad. Oh jeez, all right, who
- 3:54Speaker 1: all do we have here? Brody Anderson? Years ago in
- 4:00Speaker 1: old Colorado, it's maybe twenty years ago, dude, it's twenty
- 4:04Speaker 1: I got news for you, Halen from the Great State
- 4:06Speaker 1: of Pennsylvania, Brodie. Understand, all right, you know I'm dealing cards.
- 4:13Speaker 1: I'm just gonna pretend like John is uh right here
- 4:16Speaker 1: on my right hand side, so I'm gonna continue to
- 4:18Speaker 1: deal cards. They're Stephen Ronnella at the head of the table,
- 4:24Speaker 1: Ryan Callahan's yellow, Karin Snyder Schneider, Schneider, I am a Schneider,
- 4:34Speaker 1: you like the al right, uh Phil or lovely podcast engineer.
- 4:39Speaker 1: And then the esteemed author John MoU Allen, who we
- 4:44Speaker 1: had on I guess three years ago or so to
- 4:47Speaker 1: discuss his book The Wild Ones. Yes, nailed it was Bay.
- 4:54Speaker 1: We're gonna discuss Oh no, let's not tell him what
- 4:56Speaker 1: which book we're gonna discuss. Do like a little suspense
- 5:00Speaker 1: a little bit. It just Yanni's dad wants to know
- 5:02Speaker 1: who's there, but he doesn't want to know. Why are
- 5:05Speaker 1: we leaving out the mystery guests for now? Yeah, all right,
- 5:09Speaker 1: just to keep yann his dad at the edge and see,
- 5:13Speaker 1: just just keep him irritated so there is a little
- 5:16Speaker 1: surprise for people coming later on. I just got home
- 5:20Speaker 1: last night from Mexico. We went down for spring break.
- 5:24Speaker 1: We go every year we go to Yeah, I guess
- 5:27Speaker 1: I could say every year now because for a lot
- 5:28Speaker 1: of years we've done this. We go down to East Cape,
- 5:31Speaker 1: so southern Baja Peninsula and fish and just sit on
- 5:35Speaker 1: the beach and stuff. It was fun. But I almost
- 5:38Speaker 1: got I'm almost not here. The reason I bring this
- 5:41Speaker 1: up because you now, right, you have to show that
- 5:45Speaker 1: you haven't had COVID to get on a plane. And
- 5:49Speaker 1: they got this big testing facility set up at the
- 5:51Speaker 1: airport Baha. It's like a big tent. You get results
- 5:54Speaker 1: in thirty minutes. Uh. The tricky part is, you know
- 5:59Speaker 1: there's false positives and stuff from the thing. So it's
- 6:02Speaker 1: little unnerving. If you have a family of five, like you're,
- 6:05Speaker 1: you feel like you're rolling the damn dice. Yeah, and
- 6:07Speaker 1: you and you've had it, Well, that's the trouble. So
- 6:10Speaker 1: I had my my paperwork from the health department, the
- 6:12Speaker 1: county Health department, and I had my paper all I
- 6:16Speaker 1: had a official stamp on it, official signature on it,
- 6:21Speaker 1: and it said like what day you know, whatever, what
- 6:24Speaker 1: day you had it, and this and that, and it
- 6:27Speaker 1: says you can resume normal activities. In my case, you
- 6:32Speaker 1: can resume more normal activities January. Um. But Delta, who
- 6:38Speaker 1: I'm normally a fan of uh won't accept it, And
- 6:42Speaker 1: they said, or you need a letter saying that you're
- 6:46Speaker 1: cleared for travel, And I'm like, but it says right here,
- 6:48Speaker 1: I can resume normal activities in January. Nowhere can you
- 6:52Speaker 1: find point to me a website that says that spells
- 6:57Speaker 1: out that requirement that leveling isn't normal activity. I'm not
- 7:02Speaker 1: putting this on you, Brody. I just mean, like, no
- 7:04Speaker 1: one could point. So it's Sunday, I can't get hold
- 7:09Speaker 1: of me. You call, you call your doctor's office, and
- 7:12Speaker 1: it'll be like, you know, if it's an emergency, call whatever,
- 7:16Speaker 1: and in the fight's gonna leave. My whole family now
- 7:20Speaker 1: has their tests. So I go down, I go to
- 7:22Speaker 1: the tent and and you know, it's my faults. I
- 7:27Speaker 1: don't speak Spanish, so I'm not I'm not blaming anybody.
- 7:29Speaker 1: It's like, I'm not blaming anyone but myself. But it's
- 7:31Speaker 1: very hard to convey my concerns. And I'm going to
- 7:38Speaker 1: do the rapid test. And the thing is once you've
- 7:41Speaker 1: had it, like you can get these residual positives. So
- 7:46Speaker 1: I take the test and be like, I'm either going
- 7:48Speaker 1: to be in Mexico for a couple of weeks fishing, yeah,
- 7:53Speaker 1: minus my family or and thankfully it came back negative
- 7:58Speaker 1: and I was able to get on the damn plane.
- 8:00Speaker 1: So you were trying to say, like, listen, I need
- 8:02Speaker 1: a test, but here's my unique situation, and they're like,
- 8:06Speaker 1: you need a test or you don't need I was like,
- 8:08Speaker 1: what do you think? What like, what's your take on
- 8:12Speaker 1: this situation? You know, can you like barely swab my nose?
- 8:17Speaker 1: You know? And they man, they were just it was
- 8:20Speaker 1: very binary, oh for sure, but just gets hilarious because
- 8:25Speaker 1: you could suck out the language part. Put you on
- 8:28Speaker 1: any place in the planet in that situation, and I
- 8:31Speaker 1: guarantee that person is gonna be like, bro, I'm not
- 8:34Speaker 1: here to think about your situation. I'm here to swab
- 8:38Speaker 1: you or not. I want to know if it was
- 8:40Speaker 1: the family upset or were they just ready to leave
- 8:42Speaker 1: you there? Uh yeah, I don't know. It wasn't like that.
- 8:49Speaker 1: What the kids were that they get they get a
- 8:51Speaker 1: little uh, they get a little anxious about stuff like that.
- 8:55Speaker 1: You know, I'll be like whenever see each other again.
- 8:58Speaker 1: They they were getting anxious, especially the oldest one. He
- 9:02Speaker 1: kind of he was tracking what was he was tracking
- 9:04Speaker 1: what was going on and was not liking what he's hearing.
- 9:06Speaker 1: He's not quite old enough to be like, listen, I
- 9:08Speaker 1: have a boarding routine, and I just need to get
- 9:12Speaker 1: into my routine. You deal with you, Yanni. Remember how
- 9:17Speaker 1: I was telling you about all about um this thing
- 9:20Speaker 1: in Germany that that I I was that I didn't
- 9:24Speaker 1: really know what I was talking about, but I had heard.
- 9:27Speaker 1: I had heard that in Germany you put your dog
- 9:30Speaker 1: in a barrel with a raccoon and they du get out.
- 9:33Speaker 1: Are you remembering this? That's right? Okay, well the guy
- 9:37Speaker 1: and I said, and I got around equating this to NAVDA,
- 9:41Speaker 1: which is the North American Versatile Hunting Dog Association of
- 9:44Speaker 1: which my friend Ronnie is you know, he's always been
- 9:47Speaker 1: very involved there. Um and and the president. I remember,
- 9:52Speaker 1: I just want to sing clear my name. I remembering.
- 9:59Speaker 1: I remember being a little incredulous, little skeptical of your statement. Well, oh,
- 10:05Speaker 1: i'd heard this German thing a bunch for me. No,
- 10:10Speaker 1: not from you. I don't want to get into how
- 10:13Speaker 1: I know about it, but I know about it, and
- 10:16Speaker 1: I know what's here's listen, typically associated with drop stars. Yeah,
- 10:24Speaker 1: and it's like, I don't know what that is. It's
- 10:26Speaker 1: one of those dogs. It's like a shade of a
- 10:29Speaker 1: hair of a difference between a German short haired pointer Navidad.
- 10:32Speaker 1: This is Ryan Callahan. You can come on after me
- 10:34Speaker 1: for this statement, my apology, and then you come with him.
- 10:39Speaker 1: You guys got to back up about why you put
- 10:42Speaker 1: your dog in a barrel with it, Pam. It's called
- 10:46Speaker 1: the sharpness like a barrel better a sharpness test here.
- 10:51Speaker 1: I don't want to get into it like I didn't
- 10:55Speaker 1: make this up. I don't wake up one day and
- 10:57Speaker 1: make up there's such a thing to fight. I believe
- 11:00Speaker 1: it's something people would do to Why would they do
- 11:04Speaker 1: it though? That's why I'm saying. They call it like that.
- 11:06Speaker 1: He's got them these that he's blood. He got sharpness,
- 11:09Speaker 1: sharpness which is like a which is a which is
- 11:11Speaker 1: a soft term for having a lot of gird. Yeah,
- 11:16Speaker 1: you don't want spirit, you want your coon dog running
- 11:18Speaker 1: away from a raccoon. It's just a way to test
- 11:21Speaker 1: like that. That dog is the high test fighter. Yeah, Okay,
- 11:28Speaker 1: I did not Ronnie. Ronnie had explained to us that
- 11:32Speaker 1: historically when they hunted farms game farms in Europe, they
- 11:39Speaker 1: wanted their upland bird dogs if they came upon a
- 11:43Speaker 1: vermin to kill it. Well, he's coming on the show
- 11:46Speaker 1: pretty soon. Can you remember that Ranny could talk about
- 11:49Speaker 1: this whole thing, because he's got me all in trump, possums, raccoons, skunks,
- 11:54Speaker 1: egg eaten things, feral cats, anyhow, he were it in.
- 12:00Speaker 1: He's fired up, very friendly. David Trehan Tryan Treyhan, President, President,
- 12:07Speaker 1: North American Versaal Hunting Dog Association, wants us to know
- 12:11Speaker 1: that this sort of thing, he said, I made what
- 12:15Speaker 1: sounded like a vague, factually incorrect reference to the sharpness
- 12:19Speaker 1: test used in some German testing systems that are unrelated
- 12:23Speaker 1: in NAVDA, And he doesn't know where I'm getting this
- 12:28Speaker 1: whole barrels with the raccoon thing anyway. So he's like,
- 12:30Speaker 1: you got that wrong, and then you got the fact
- 12:32Speaker 1: that this has something to do with NAVEDA wrong. Says
- 12:36Speaker 1: it's neither condoned by NAVDA, nor, to the best of
- 12:39Speaker 1: my knowledge, practiced by any of our members. We're concerned
- 12:44Speaker 1: that listeners who are unfamiliar with NAVDA, our goals and
- 12:47Speaker 1: our mission might come away from that discussion thinking that
- 12:50Speaker 1: has done at all, or worse, thinking that it's common
- 12:53Speaker 1: practice and that would be truly unfortunate. And he goes
- 12:57Speaker 1: on to say they have eighty five chapters, ten thousand men, birds,
- 13:00Speaker 1: US and Canada. And although some aspects of our testing
- 13:05Speaker 1: system are based loosely on those used in Germany, NAVI
- 13:09Speaker 1: does not evaluate dogs performance related the hunting mammals of
- 13:14Speaker 1: any species. Rather, we focus exclusively on upland and waterfowl hunting.
- 13:22Speaker 1: And they are dedicated to treating all animals, including dogs
- 13:25Speaker 1: and game, with respect and dignity. So remember and remember
- 13:31Speaker 1: that show Happy Days. Fonzie was he was he wasn't
- 13:36Speaker 1: able to say wrong. He'd be like, I was ru Yeah,
- 13:46Speaker 1: I mean I was wrong, Like I was wrong. Hey,
- 13:49Speaker 1: you corrected it, but you know that was wrong. I
- 13:54Speaker 1: should still a little bit. It's not fair. I was wrong. Okayky,
- 14:03Speaker 1: I'll tell them about the moss balls. Oh boy, m okay.
- 14:08Speaker 1: So apparently if you're an aquarium enthusiast, you buy these
- 14:12Speaker 1: moss balls to drop in your aquarium tank. Um. And
- 14:16Speaker 1: this is something that's distributed through like all these national
- 14:19Speaker 1: pet store chains. And it was found that there are
- 14:24Speaker 1: some zebra muscles inside moss balls. Zebra muscles proliferate at
- 14:30Speaker 1: a high higher rate. They are are bad for native ecosystems.
- 14:37Speaker 1: Is a non native species like like transforming, like what
- 14:42Speaker 1: zebra muscles in the Great Lakes. If if, if you're
- 14:46Speaker 1: worried about wolves in Colorado, you should be worried about
- 14:49Speaker 1: zebra muscles in your neck of the woods. But there
- 14:52Speaker 1: are Great Lates zebra muscles sympathizers. Yeah, Okay, here's one scenario.
- 14:59Speaker 1: With all to respect, there are, yeah, but the Great Lakes.
- 15:04Speaker 1: So they're like an experimental aquarium anyway, It's like it's
- 15:09Speaker 1: already all made. Never mind, go ahead, I'm staying out.
- 15:12Speaker 1: I'm done. I'm done. I'm gonna talk about this rabbit fever.
- 15:15Speaker 1: Deal with this little girl. That's it. Um muscles, Right,
- 15:19Speaker 1: they filter feed. They eat zo plankton and phytoplankton. So
- 15:24Speaker 1: in systems where we see maybe just dirty water, that
- 15:29Speaker 1: can oftentimes be a shipload of food that all of
- 15:34Speaker 1: our fish, including game fish, when they're at a very
- 15:37Speaker 1: young age, they depend on that zo plankton phytoplankton to
- 15:41Speaker 1: get large enough to where they can then start being
- 15:44Speaker 1: more fun fish to catch. If you're just worried about
- 15:47Speaker 1: game species, right, um what zebra muscles can do is
- 15:52Speaker 1: they proliferate so heavily. They can clean a system so
- 15:57Speaker 1: much to where that water is crystal clear and you're like,
- 15:59Speaker 1: oh my god, how pretty the lake is. Must be
- 16:02Speaker 1: must be good, must be good talking, but it can
- 16:05Speaker 1: be very very scarce on life. And um, then you
- 16:09Speaker 1: can get in all this other stuff that like the sun,
- 16:12Speaker 1: sun's rays are penetrating way deeper in the water calling
- 16:15Speaker 1: than they used to be, and then other things that
- 16:17Speaker 1: can proliferate and the oxygen can go way down in
- 16:20Speaker 1: the lake and then everything dies. Okay, vegetation, You get
- 16:24Speaker 1: aquatic vegetation in places you never had it before. Yes,
- 16:28Speaker 1: and then it's only suitable for what always lives, which
- 16:31Speaker 1: is carp um. Anyway, your aquarium moth balls, moss balls, okay,
- 16:40Speaker 1: old moss balls. Don't I would think, don't just pitch
- 16:44Speaker 1: them out in the yard. I was calling them zebra
- 16:46Speaker 1: balls on the podcast. I thought that was cute. Um,
- 16:50Speaker 1: don't pitch them out in the yard or just throw
- 16:52Speaker 1: them away. If you have purchased some of these things,
- 16:56Speaker 1: I'm sure is there a brand name? Like, what is there?
- 17:01Speaker 1: I didn't see a brand name, but these are apparently
- 17:04Speaker 1: like ubiquitous amongst uh you know, national pet store chains
- 17:09Speaker 1: and things like that. So uh, take them, throw them
- 17:12Speaker 1: all in the freezer for a good twenty four hours,
- 17:15Speaker 1: or like most people do, we'll just forget about them
- 17:17Speaker 1: for several months, and then then by the next time
- 17:20Speaker 1: you come across him, then you're cool to throw them away. Um.
- 17:24Speaker 1: Or you know, you can like soak them in bleach
- 17:29Speaker 1: um and then throw them away. But the the worst
- 17:32Speaker 1: thing you can do is like don't flush them down
- 17:34Speaker 1: the drain or throw them out in the storm drain
- 17:36Speaker 1: or something like that. One of the broody was talking
- 17:39Speaker 1: about zebra muscle sympathizers. I'll tell you who's not is
- 17:43Speaker 1: industry in general, because like filtration systems and stuff like that.
- 17:47Speaker 1: Uh uh yeah, they clog them up. You're water power plants,
- 17:53Speaker 1: stuff like that. I don't know what the actual number is,
- 17:56Speaker 1: but it's like a billion dollars a year just managing
- 18:00Speaker 1: of the things, yeah, cleaning cleaning them off. Yeah. So
- 18:03Speaker 1: like Montana, you know there's water, there's watercraft check stations
- 18:07Speaker 1: all over the place, uh in the summer months, and
- 18:11Speaker 1: one of the things they're looking for are zebra mussels inside. Um.
- 18:16Speaker 1: The the building area of your watercraft. And then if
- 18:23Speaker 1: you look at this stuff online, you'll always see like these,
- 18:27Speaker 1: um kind of stereotypical pictures of zebra muscles being stuck
- 18:31Speaker 1: all over old boat props and the bottoms of boats
- 18:34Speaker 1: and and uh and then like in the Great Lakes especially,
- 18:40Speaker 1: you get like on the lock systems. Uh. Just yeah,
- 18:45Speaker 1: somebody's making good money cleaning off zebra muscles. So if
- 18:49Speaker 1: you got moss balls, bleach them, bleach, bleach your balls. Uh. Okay,
- 18:57Speaker 1: this is for Easter. Tu Larima story for Easter. A
- 19:03Speaker 1: guy a listener wrote in Um, he says he's got
- 19:08Speaker 1: a public service announcement, so he's apparently a Tonka truck enthusiast.
- 19:14Speaker 1: That's how this starts. Correct, He's a Tika truck enthusiast
- 19:19Speaker 1: and wakes up and checks on Craigslist and sees that
- 19:22Speaker 1: there's a kid selling a bunch of Tonka trucks. Sow
- 19:25Speaker 1: him being a Tonka enthusiast. Um, it's funny. I we
- 19:32Speaker 1: have a lot of Tika trucks, and I as a kid,
- 19:33Speaker 1: and I imagined my mother's attic being sort of this
- 19:38Speaker 1: repository of amazing vintage perfect Tonka trucks. It must just
- 19:45Speaker 1: be up there, and I got my kids pretty excited
- 19:47Speaker 1: for a trip to Grandma's. Went up There's just not
- 19:49Speaker 1: what I remember. Did you get rid of them? Are?
- 19:52Speaker 1: They just was like by a bunch of tiker trucks.
- 19:56Speaker 1: I mean, there's one that's not a tiger truck. It's
- 20:00Speaker 1: got three tires. I'm not sure what happened over the
- 20:05Speaker 1: last thirty years. It's not the attic I imagined it being. Uh,
- 20:12Speaker 1: he's a time enthusiasts. So he goes to the guy.
- 20:15Speaker 1: He goes by. He goes to this kid's house by
- 20:17Speaker 1: the time of trucks, makes his purchase, and the kids
- 20:20Speaker 1: mentions like, hey, I also raise rabbits, So meat rabbits.
- 20:26Speaker 1: The guy raises the meat rabbits. So he buys a
- 20:28Speaker 1: meat rabbit and the trucks and brings the rabbit and
- 20:33Speaker 1: the trucks home. But the meat rabbit he gets to
- 20:37Speaker 1: a seven year old and the meat rabbit scratches. The
- 20:40Speaker 1: seven year old barely drew blood. Everyone goes about their business.
- 20:48Speaker 1: Now imagine this now so we know where this is going.
- 20:51Speaker 1: But but picture that he gets a rabbit rabbit scratch
- 20:54Speaker 1: as a kid twenty days goes by. Her lift notes
- 20:57Speaker 1: swell up. She gets a high fee. Her go to
- 21:01Speaker 1: the hospital in Oregon. They keep focusing on has she
- 21:05Speaker 1: been scratched by a cat? Cat scratched? Fever? Damn furs?
- 21:16Speaker 1: Time man, I got it, so keep asking about cats. Um.
- 21:21Speaker 1: They give her some antibiotics, do nothing. Lymph nodes grow
- 21:24Speaker 1: to the size of an egg. They do a surgery
- 21:29Speaker 1: on the poor girl. They remove her tonsils, They remove
- 21:34Speaker 1: her lymph nodes. They leave a three inch scar on
- 21:37Speaker 1: her neck. A month goes by, the fever returns, the
- 21:43Speaker 1: lymph nodes swell again. They go to you see Davis again,
- 21:48Speaker 1: you've been scratched by a cat again? They say, No,
- 21:51Speaker 1: I forgot to mention this in Oregon where you scratched
- 21:54Speaker 1: by a cat? No, but she was scratched by a rabbit.
- 21:59Speaker 1: You see Davis where you scratched by a cat? No,
- 22:01Speaker 1: but she was scratched by a rabbit. All of a
- 22:03Speaker 1: sudden to realize that this poor girl has had to
- 22:06Speaker 1: lurma and it was not diagnosed. So they do more surgery. Relieved,
- 22:14Speaker 1: removed two more lymph nodes. A cluster of necrotic dead
- 22:17Speaker 1: lymph nodes deep inside her neck, some dead tissue and
- 22:21Speaker 1: skin around the area put around the right by right
- 22:25Speaker 1: antibiotic savor life. They nick a nerve that controls or smiles,
- 22:30Speaker 1: and now her smiles off. It's crooked. She's got a
- 22:34Speaker 1: six inch scar below the three inch scar. The guy's
- 22:39Speaker 1: father in law goes and kills the rabbit. Later, someone
- 22:43Speaker 1: from the Center for Disease Control and Sacramento calls to
- 22:46Speaker 1: interview the family. They thought she maybe had plague, doesn't
- 22:52Speaker 1: and then expresses disappointment in the family for having killed
- 22:56Speaker 1: the rabbit, and they hung up on the person. Yeah, horrible,
- 23:03Speaker 1: guy says. With Easter coming up soon, I know people
- 23:05Speaker 1: be buying rabbits for their kids, and they should be
- 23:07Speaker 1: informed of this disease. Now, we talked about to Lorimi
- 23:11Speaker 1: extensively in the Wilderness Skills book, all the different ways
- 23:15Speaker 1: you can get it. You know, there was a guy,
- 23:18Speaker 1: I don't know if we mentioned this. Have you mentioned
- 23:19Speaker 1: this in the book? A guy that hit a desiccated rabbit,
- 23:23Speaker 1: a dead desiccated rabbit with a lawnmower and contracted a
- 23:27Speaker 1: airborne to lorimi and his lungs. Yeah, I think we
- 23:30Speaker 1: may have. And there's actually I think we mentioned that
- 23:33Speaker 1: there there has been talk of weaponizing because you can
- 23:37Speaker 1: arisolize it scary. This guy says, um, this will give you.
- 23:44Speaker 1: He says, this will give you something besides c w
- 23:47Speaker 1: D to talk about. Then he goes on to say,
- 23:49Speaker 1: if you have any health issues, he says, you know,
- 23:53Speaker 1: call your local trapper before seeking medical. I wonder if
- 23:59Speaker 1: they wipe out the uh the other if they went
- 24:04Speaker 1: to the kid's Yeah, I would think so. He probably
- 24:10Speaker 1: went back and he was probably selling Tonka trucks with
- 24:12Speaker 1: a rabbit the bag. Oh man, that's all that story is. Man,
- 24:19Speaker 1: watch out for tik trucks. But in your long and
- 24:24Speaker 1: illustrious cotton tail hunting career, how many have you come
- 24:28Speaker 1: across that you suspected of having to know? I don't
- 24:31Speaker 1: check them, but you know what, I used to hunt
- 24:32Speaker 1: cotton tails with a guy. They had gotten to Loremia
- 24:34Speaker 1: from cleaning cotton tails. I make a point of looking
- 24:37Speaker 1: at the liver. I've never seen what I haven't checked.
- 24:39Speaker 1: It was a bad one. This guy's name was Ken.
- 24:41Speaker 1: He was a hay farmer and he had gotten to
- 24:44Speaker 1: Loremi and his old man got to Loremia. And he's
- 24:47Speaker 1: still hunted rabbits. What's the lever supposed to look like?
- 24:53Speaker 1: Like yellow or white spots? I believe. I used to
- 24:57Speaker 1: make rabbit tempera with for ken, make rice, cook a
- 25:01Speaker 1: bunch of vegetables, make a sweet and sour sauce. Cut
- 25:03Speaker 1: the rabbit little strips. Make a little temper rabbit strips.
- 25:06Speaker 1: Put it on there. Don't sweet and sour sauce all
- 25:08Speaker 1: over it sounds good. He liked it. Yeah, something fried
- 25:13Speaker 1: with a bunch of sugar on it. Yeah, most people
- 25:16Speaker 1: are gonna dig that one. There's also that rabbit hammorrhagic disease.
- 25:23Speaker 1: It's still going around right now, which which is nasty.
- 25:27Speaker 1: But um, that's just another observation thing. You know, call
- 25:33Speaker 1: your local department and Natural Resources or fishing game and
- 25:36Speaker 1: let them. Yeah, there's a lot of good county by
- 25:39Speaker 1: county maps where you can see, like if all of
- 25:41Speaker 1: you've seen all kinds of dead rabbits, it will show
- 25:43Speaker 1: this new hammorrhagic thing cruising around. Yeah, we should talk
- 25:45Speaker 1: about that more extensively sometimes. All right, John Wellmi ready, Yeah, okay,
- 25:51Speaker 1: last time, tell about briefly recap the book we had
- 25:54Speaker 1: you on about last time. Last time I was here
- 25:58Speaker 1: talking about a book called Old Ones, which was about
- 26:03Speaker 1: endangered species conservation. That's the most boring way to put it, um,
- 26:08Speaker 1: and the more interesting way to put it is, it's
- 26:10Speaker 1: sort of about how America has treated and thought about
- 26:14Speaker 1: its wildlife throughout its history. So, you know, why, why
- 26:18Speaker 1: are we a country that at the beginning of one
- 26:21Speaker 1: century we want to kill all the bears and at
- 26:23Speaker 1: the end of another century when we want to make
- 26:24Speaker 1: sure that the bears don't go extinct? Um. So there
- 26:27Speaker 1: was a lot of on the ground reporting about the
- 26:30Speaker 1: kind of byzantine efforts to save the last you know,
- 26:33Speaker 1: Lang's metal mark butterfly at an industrial site in California
- 26:37Speaker 1: and things like that, and then a lot of history
- 26:39Speaker 1: about uh sort of you know, different eccentric characters throughout
- 26:42Speaker 1: American history have had, you know, very unique ideas and
- 26:45Speaker 1: and sometimes progressive ideas about are sort of obligations to
- 26:50Speaker 1: UH to wildlife. And in that conversation you hinted at
- 26:56Speaker 1: because I think you were working on this back then,
- 26:59Speaker 1: you were in this book. You're working on your book
- 27:02Speaker 1: that became This Is Chance. Yeah, I've been working on that.
- 27:05Speaker 1: That book, This Has Chance took me about six years
- 27:08Speaker 1: of work Um. So I've been just amassing, you know,
- 27:11Speaker 1: historical research for years and years, so it was very
- 27:14Speaker 1: much always on my mind, and I probably you know,
- 27:17Speaker 1: took any opportunity I could just start downloading the things
- 27:20Speaker 1: I was I was finding out at that point. Yeah,
- 27:23Speaker 1: when you started working on tell people what this is.
- 27:26Speaker 1: This is Chances. And then when you tell, like, explain
- 27:29Speaker 1: what you were, what you were getting at when you
- 27:33Speaker 1: started working on it, and and and how it kind
- 27:37Speaker 1: of became different than what you thought. Yeah, well this
- 27:40Speaker 1: is Chances, a book about the Great Alaska earthquake in
- 27:43Speaker 1: nine four sometimes it was the Good Friday earthquake. Um.
- 27:46Speaker 1: It happened on Good Friday evening, right as the sun
- 27:49Speaker 1: was going down. Um. And the book basically tells the
- 27:52Speaker 1: story in in pretty intimate detail. Um, just the narrative
- 27:57Speaker 1: of these first three days in the city of Anchorage.
- 28:00Speaker 1: So this was a time, this is just a few
- 28:02Speaker 1: years after Alaska statehood, when Anchorage was uh kind of
- 28:07Speaker 1: you know, beginning to feel like a real metropolis in Alaska.
- 28:10Speaker 1: I sort of saw itself as as fulfilling the promise
- 28:14Speaker 1: of of what Alaska was gonna be. And suddenly you
- 28:17Speaker 1: have this nine point two magnitude earthquake that shook the
- 28:21Speaker 1: city for four and a half minutes and you know,
- 28:24Speaker 1: just causing all kinds of destruction, but also really upending
- 28:27Speaker 1: people's you know, sense of of their of their community.
- 28:31Speaker 1: That that's the part that that's one of these that
- 28:33Speaker 1: blows my mind about the the earthquake, one of the
- 28:36Speaker 1: biggest earthquake in US history, right, Yeah, that's correct, the
- 28:40Speaker 1: second most powerful one ever measured, and the and the
- 28:42Speaker 1: most powerful one in the US. But the fact that
- 28:47Speaker 1: I felt one once, that was like it was over
- 28:50Speaker 1: before you could tell what you were feeling. But the
- 28:53Speaker 1: fact that that lasted longer than a rock song, you'd
- 29:00Speaker 1: almost like settle into it. It is kind of it's
- 29:05Speaker 1: hard to imagine. Makes four and a half minutes seemed
- 29:08Speaker 1: very long, very long. Yeah, that was definitely the first
- 29:13Speaker 1: thing that grabbed me about it, one of the first,
- 29:15Speaker 1: maybe the first thing I found about the earthquake, which
- 29:17Speaker 1: I had never heard of. You know, I grew up
- 29:18Speaker 1: on the East Coast. It's you know, happened fifteen years
- 29:21Speaker 1: before I was born, or fourteen years before I was born.
- 29:24Speaker 1: It just it just kind of went over my head
- 29:26Speaker 1: that there had been this this disaster. So one of
- 29:28Speaker 1: the first things I found was just this big report,
- 29:30Speaker 1: you know, four hundred page report um of individual people's uh,
- 29:36Speaker 1: you know, recollections of this is what was happening to
- 29:38Speaker 1: me during those four and a half minutes. And you
- 29:40Speaker 1: see a lot of like mental gymnastics of you know,
- 29:43Speaker 1: first not like you're saying, not knowing what the hell
- 29:46Speaker 1: is happening, And that can go on for a minute.
- 29:48Speaker 1: You know, thirty people think it's it's the Cold War,
- 29:50Speaker 1: people think it's a nuclear attack or whatever it is
- 29:52Speaker 1: Judgment day, and then there's a kind of bargaining phase.
- 29:55Speaker 1: You know, they're coming up with different different explanations, and
- 29:59Speaker 1: some people, you know, just it seemed like they just
- 30:01Speaker 1: kind of gave up hope that that they were ever
- 30:03Speaker 1: gonna kind of make sense of this thing. You know,
- 30:05Speaker 1: there was enough time that you could kind of go
- 30:07Speaker 1: through you know, certainty and fatalism and all these kinds
- 30:10Speaker 1: of emotions and and just lock onto these these different
- 30:13Speaker 1: bizarre images, uh that as your mind's trying to to
- 30:17Speaker 1: make sense of them, trying to make some kind of
- 30:19Speaker 1: story about what's happening to you. John, I have a question, Yeah,
- 30:24Speaker 1: did anybody anyone of those reports ever say that, oh,
- 30:28Speaker 1: at minute three, I just settled in. Uh, you know,
- 30:33Speaker 1: they're they're definitely I don't think anyone put it so explicitly,
- 30:36Speaker 1: but you definitely you could. There were There were definitely
- 30:38Speaker 1: accounts where it was like, you know, I tried to
- 30:40Speaker 1: hold on to this and that didn't work. So and
- 30:43Speaker 1: they would go through four or five different things, you know,
- 30:45Speaker 1: and uh or you know, at first I was trying
- 30:47Speaker 1: to keep my car from jerking into the opposite lane,
- 30:50Speaker 1: but then the steering wheel was wrenching my wrists and
- 30:52Speaker 1: that seemed dangerous. So then I decided to you know,
- 30:54Speaker 1: hunker down here. So yeah, there was It's it's amazing,
- 30:58Speaker 1: you know. I mean if I recommend you actually just
- 31:01Speaker 1: sit with a stop watch for four and a half
- 31:02Speaker 1: minutes and see what that feels like, because you can
- 31:05Speaker 1: go crazy when the earth's not shaking, you know. Um.
- 31:08Speaker 1: So yeah, it's the that psychological part of it, the
- 31:11Speaker 1: surreality of it and the disorientation. Um. I still can't
- 31:15Speaker 1: really get my head around, you know. When you you
- 31:17Speaker 1: mentioned growing up not knowing about that earthquake. Um, it's
- 31:20Speaker 1: still lived. You know, my brother lives an anchorage has
- 31:23Speaker 1: been there for a very long time. Now, Um, it's
- 31:26Speaker 1: still almost like, I don't want to say it's a
- 31:28Speaker 1: daily part of life, but it's it's just like it's
- 31:32Speaker 1: the earthquake. And you know, we used to go hunt
- 31:36Speaker 1: ducks in a place that used to be agricultural fields
- 31:40Speaker 1: but it fell whatever eight ft and became a marsh.
- 31:46Speaker 1: And there's still pieces of equipment and stuff sticking out
- 31:48Speaker 1: of the water. You know. It's like people just like
- 31:52Speaker 1: talk about it as as this thing, and there's still
- 31:55Speaker 1: all the trees from the areas that slumped into the ocean,
- 31:58Speaker 1: trees sticking up. Yeah. Yeah, there were a lot of
- 32:02Speaker 1: you're probably talking about Portage. There was this whole, yeah,
- 32:05Speaker 1: a whole a whole little community that just exactly just
- 32:08Speaker 1: sunk and got inundated by by the salt water. But yeah,
- 32:13Speaker 1: I think that's that's what struck me to when I
- 32:14Speaker 1: went to Anchorage. There's there's places that you know, they
- 32:17Speaker 1: just couldn't really rebuild in the way they wanted to,
- 32:20Speaker 1: you know. So the there's an earthquake park Um, which
- 32:23Speaker 1: was basically the luxury neighborhood of Anchorage at the time,
- 32:26Speaker 1: that just sloughed off this ridge onto the shore line
- 32:30Speaker 1: and now now it's a park you can hike through.
- 32:32Speaker 1: They've got little interpretive signs and things. Um. Yeah, it's
- 32:35Speaker 1: very much a part of the identity of the city.
- 32:37Speaker 1: I think. Um, it's a city that is really proud
- 32:40Speaker 1: of its history, and it doesn't have you know, as
- 32:42Speaker 1: long or you know, as crowded of a history as
- 32:45Speaker 1: some other uh you know, cities on the in America.
- 32:48Speaker 1: So yeah, it's a real touchstone for people. One of
- 32:51Speaker 1: the things I liked about the book is explains a
- 32:53Speaker 1: little bit about I know, it's like it's hard, we'll
- 32:56Speaker 1: get to what the book narrows in on, but uh, Richter,
- 33:03Speaker 1: like you you always here. You know the Richter scale.
- 33:05Speaker 1: And I remember in early college I had to take
- 33:08Speaker 1: geology one O, one or something and they explain how
- 33:12Speaker 1: that scale is exponential. So a nine is ten times
- 33:16Speaker 1: worse than a than an eight. Um. But I guess
- 33:21Speaker 1: you thought you thought I was worth putting in your
- 33:23Speaker 1: book talk about what Richter, like, the guy Richter, what
- 33:28Speaker 1: he was doing, and how this earthquake kind of played
- 33:31Speaker 1: into his work and life. Yeah, I love that you
- 33:35Speaker 1: asked about that. I mean, I know that as a writer,
- 33:37Speaker 1: you know, you probably read that. I knew exactly what
- 33:39Speaker 1: what was going on, which was, you know, there's not
- 33:41Speaker 1: a lot of science in the book. But I started
- 33:44Speaker 1: reading about Richter and I was like, I gotta get
- 33:46Speaker 1: this guy in here somehow. I was like, yeah, you're
- 33:48Speaker 1: like doing a book. You sometimes you're like, I don't
- 33:50Speaker 1: care how I'm jamming this in. Yeah, I don't care
- 33:53Speaker 1: where I put it. That was definitely it. I was like,
- 33:55Speaker 1: you know, if it's okay, I'll give him two pages. Okay,
- 33:58Speaker 1: oh you don't like that, editor, have at one page?
- 34:01Speaker 1: Al right, how about half a page? But yeah, but
- 34:03Speaker 1: I got him in there, and then you of course
- 34:05Speaker 1: zeroed right in on it. And that's the first first
- 34:06Speaker 1: thing we're gonna talk about. But yeah, Charles Richter. Um.
- 34:09Speaker 1: I didn't know anything about the guy. But he wasn't
- 34:11Speaker 1: He was an odd duck. Um he was he he um.
- 34:16Speaker 1: You know, I sort of uh, I sort of had
- 34:18Speaker 1: this image of him as this kind of like, uh,
- 34:21Speaker 1: someone who's exceptionally good at the science he's doing and
- 34:24Speaker 1: kind of exceptionally bad at every other facet of of
- 34:27Speaker 1: social existence, you know. And uh he he was in
- 34:32Speaker 1: a kind of polyamorous relationship for a while and wrote
- 34:35Speaker 1: a lot. You know, was seemed not so sensitive about
- 34:37Speaker 1: it and have the great greatest sensitivities about he was
- 34:40Speaker 1: dappled in nudism, I believe. Um. In any case, he
- 34:44Speaker 1: wasn't we all yeah, well when you know every time. Yeah,
- 34:50Speaker 1: he he wrote some really really bad poetry which I
- 34:54Speaker 1: had the pleasure of of reading. Um explained the polyamorous relationship. Uh,
- 34:59Speaker 1: you know, I don't actually know that I can go
- 35:01Speaker 1: too too much into death and that at the moment
- 35:04Speaker 1: rabbit hole. No, I just don't remember all the details,
- 35:07Speaker 1: remember that there there was a lot of there was
- 35:09Speaker 1: a lot of consternation from his wife that he lived with.
- 35:12Speaker 1: In my memory that you know, he he wasn't really
- 35:14Speaker 1: good at at juggling everything as far as I remember. Um.
- 35:18Speaker 1: But yeah, but the thing that I the thing that
- 35:20Speaker 1: I loved was that he enters the story. This is
- 35:23Speaker 1: why I could justify putting him in the book there. Yeah,
- 35:25Speaker 1: when you're that he enters the story in this very
- 35:28Speaker 1: kind of representative moment where he's you know, he works
- 35:31Speaker 1: down in southern California running his lab, and he's sitting
- 35:34Speaker 1: at home about he and his wife have cocktails poured
- 35:39Speaker 1: and they're turning on the radio to listen to a
- 35:41Speaker 1: broadcast of a concert, and he's got this giant dude
- 35:45Speaker 1: that I'm sorry, but that just doesn't happen anymore. No, No,
- 35:49Speaker 1: it doesn't. I mean it kind of I feel like
- 35:51Speaker 1: it's kind of happened this last this last year a
- 35:53Speaker 1: little bit. We're kind of all our grandparents sitting in
- 35:56Speaker 1: our chairs side by side. You know what's on the
- 35:59Speaker 1: list tonight? Hunt um. But yeah, that's that's the kind
- 36:03Speaker 1: of the kind of a mood that they were setting that.
- 36:06Speaker 1: It was a really mid century, you know, elegant living room.
- 36:09Speaker 1: I've seen pictures of it and kind of this uh,
- 36:11Speaker 1: you know, a gorgeous southern California home. And he has
- 36:15Speaker 1: um been pissing off his wife by um installing a
- 36:19Speaker 1: bunch of scientific instruments in his living room, um, right
- 36:23Speaker 1: in the middle of the living room so that he can,
- 36:25Speaker 1: you know, measure earthquakes and stuff. And she does not
- 36:28Speaker 1: like this, although he in his telling she's she's grown
- 36:31Speaker 1: accustomed to it and is fine with it now, but
- 36:33Speaker 1: you kind of have to question that. And they're setting
- 36:36Speaker 1: them down with their their concert, and all of a sudden,
- 36:38Speaker 1: the needle starts starts jumping, measuring the great Alaska earthquake,
- 36:41Speaker 1: you know, without out a couple thousand miles away, and
- 36:45Speaker 1: uh he uh. He turns to his his his wife,
- 36:48Speaker 1: and he says, oh, that's a that's a great earthquake,
- 36:51Speaker 1: you know, and and she and she doesn't really she
- 36:55Speaker 1: doesn't respond, you know, so because because he's talking over
- 36:58Speaker 1: the concert. Um so, but I like that moment, I guess.
- 37:03Speaker 1: And the reason why I felt justified to cram it
- 37:05Speaker 1: into the book is because I tell that that little
- 37:07Speaker 1: anecdote just as a kind of end note to a
- 37:09Speaker 1: kind of panorama of all of the destruction and chaos
- 37:14Speaker 1: that's happening in Alaska, and then reverberating out, you know,
- 37:17Speaker 1: until it's getting smaller, you know, these actual the shaking
- 37:20Speaker 1: is getting smaller and smaller, and people registering is getting
- 37:23Speaker 1: smaller and smaller, until finally you come all the way
- 37:25Speaker 1: down the coast, uh, and you've kind of just got
- 37:27Speaker 1: this dweeb in his living room just kind of, you know,
- 37:31Speaker 1: pausing between SIPs of his cocktail, saying, oh, look at that.
- 37:34Speaker 1: You know, something's a shaking, you know, So that's somewhere exactly.
- 37:39Speaker 1: It seemed to me to reveal something, um, you know,
- 37:42Speaker 1: kind of profound about suffering. I guess something that happened
- 37:46Speaker 1: during the concert, right, remember that concert? Because why did
- 37:52Speaker 1: so few people die? Yeah? That's a really good because
- 37:56Speaker 1: it seemed like you know, and reading i'm it plays
- 38:00Speaker 1: out when you're reading it, it plays out. Yanni wouldn't
- 38:05Speaker 1: like it because you don't really know what's gonna you know,
- 38:07Speaker 1: what's gonna happen. The daughters will be irritated, but you're
- 38:12Speaker 1: thinking that, uh, that out like thousands of dead people. Well, yeah,
- 38:17Speaker 1: like the whole luxury neighborhood ends up on the beach.
- 38:21Speaker 1: That is like like literally like someone cleared a table
- 38:24Speaker 1: and said, all the houses down off the edge of
- 38:27Speaker 1: the table. Yeah, yeah, it's um. I mean that's the
- 38:31Speaker 1: key point for me was that it took days to
- 38:34Speaker 1: realize that fewer people had died than anyone imagined. That
- 38:37Speaker 1: to me was the real drama of this. This story
- 38:40Speaker 1: was like calling their way back from this complete disorientation
- 38:44Speaker 1: to just figure out the most basic information about what
- 38:47Speaker 1: just had happened. Right, you know, how many of us
- 38:49Speaker 1: are dead? That seems like a pretty fundamental thing to
- 38:52Speaker 1: get your head around after something like this. But yeah,
- 38:54Speaker 1: there's a couple of different reasons. I mean, first of all,
- 38:56Speaker 1: the there there were you know, there was just just
- 38:59Speaker 1: over hundred deaths of numbers kind of up in the
- 39:01Speaker 1: air still, but UM, and a lot of these deaths
- 39:04Speaker 1: were the majority of them were actually in um Native
- 39:07Speaker 1: Alaskan villages that just had a tsunami from tsunamis resulting
- 39:12Speaker 1: tsunamis UM. You know, the entire villages were just kind
- 39:15Speaker 1: of a race by those waves. UM. And so you
- 39:18Speaker 1: had UM you know, sadly that was where a lion's
- 39:21Speaker 1: share of of the deaths were in Anchorage itself. The
- 39:25Speaker 1: story is a lot more complicated because on the one hand,
- 39:28Speaker 1: it's you know, it was Alaska's you know, greatest metropolis.
- 39:31Speaker 1: It was also not a very densely populated place, right
- 39:33Speaker 1: and there weren't a lot of tall buildings at all.
- 39:35Speaker 1: There's a lot of you know, small, single family wooden structures,
- 39:39Speaker 1: which which fared you know, not exactly well, but you
- 39:41Speaker 1: didn't have complete you know, pancaking all over the place. UM.
- 39:45Speaker 1: And then the other the other reason, which I found
- 39:47Speaker 1: most fascinating was a lot of people survived because there
- 39:51Speaker 1: was this great burst of energy um, all around the
- 39:55Speaker 1: city right after the shaking stopped to go find people
- 39:59Speaker 1: in the package. So, um, you know this search and rescue,
- 40:03Speaker 1: you know, I mean to even call it, that makes
- 40:05Speaker 1: it sound way more organized and methodical than it was.
- 40:09Speaker 1: At first. It was just this scramble to peel people out.
- 40:13Speaker 1: You know, you had people just passer by outside the J. C.
- 40:16Speaker 1: Penny Building working in teams bringing in tow trucks and
- 40:19Speaker 1: other equipment, cutting torches to get people out of cars
- 40:23Speaker 1: that had been buried in the rubble of the collapsing facade.
- 40:26Speaker 1: So whereas in a lot you know, a lot of disasters,
- 40:28Speaker 1: you know, a lot of the debts are people that
- 40:30Speaker 1: you know, they're not killed immediately by the disaster itself,
- 40:33Speaker 1: but you know they're they're killed by some you know,
- 40:35Speaker 1: they're they're trapped or something like that. A lot of
- 40:37Speaker 1: these people are being peeled out right away and taking
- 40:40Speaker 1: to get medical care. Um. So it's it's a much
- 40:43Speaker 1: more complicated story than that. But those are some of
- 40:45Speaker 1: the reasons that I that I really latched onto as
- 40:47Speaker 1: being kind of illustrated with what was happening in the city.
- 41:01Speaker 1: You know, John, I don't know, it kind of surprised
- 41:04Speaker 1: me too. I'm trying to think of out why I'm
- 41:08Speaker 1: trying to say it surprised me. It surprised me a
- 41:10Speaker 1: little bit because in a lot of ways the books
- 41:11Speaker 1: seem to have this It had almost the um libertarian ethos,
- 41:19Speaker 1: where it would be that all these um like structures
- 41:23Speaker 1: we put together, you know, like like organizational things and
- 41:28Speaker 1: official dumb and bureaucracy, right, so that we're all set
- 41:32Speaker 1: when ship hits the fan. But in this case, you're
- 41:36Speaker 1: going you almost make this kind of like, you know,
- 41:38Speaker 1: it almost seems like you're enthusiastic about the fact that
- 41:43Speaker 1: that stuff doesn't work, and what does work is just
- 41:46Speaker 1: people like doing what needs to be done. And it
- 41:50Speaker 1: kind of seems strange to see you. You know, this
- 41:52Speaker 1: is like prepay when you wrote it was pre pandemic.
- 41:56Speaker 1: You know, I wonder if you'd look at it differently
- 41:58Speaker 1: now when you see that that you know, like how
- 42:03Speaker 1: we've responded to the last year in terms of our
- 42:05Speaker 1: reliance on bureaucracy and government and following the guidelines in
- 42:10Speaker 1: this book being like, dude, guidelines don't work, man, at
- 42:14Speaker 1: least here, And then you know, I mean, that's that's
- 42:16Speaker 1: something that I've been I've been thinking about a lot, obviously,
- 42:19Speaker 1: and and to be honest, it's not it's not as
- 42:22Speaker 1: easy to resolve for me as it as it might seem.
- 42:24Speaker 1: It kind of reminds me of So there's a there's
- 42:26Speaker 1: a big portion of the book that's about sort of sociology,
- 42:30Speaker 1: sociologist who studied disasters, and and there's a great book
- 42:33Speaker 1: by Rebecca soln It called The Paradise Built in Hill.
- 42:36Speaker 1: I don't know if any of you guys have read that,
- 42:37Speaker 1: but it's it's explicitly about that. It's just about this
- 42:41Speaker 1: field of sociology. That's that's showing what you're talking about
- 42:43Speaker 1: that you know, it's people banded together and do right.
- 42:46Speaker 1: And I remember I know Rebecca and she she had
- 42:48Speaker 1: started working on that book. She published a piece, uh,
- 42:51Speaker 1: sort of about that premise in Harper's I think, and
- 42:53Speaker 1: it came out the week of Hurricane Katrina. And I
- 42:56Speaker 1: remember talking with her then and and she's she's putting
- 42:59Speaker 1: forward the thesis, you know, people are are good, they
- 43:02Speaker 1: band together, and on the TV, you know you're seeing
- 43:04Speaker 1: just you know, kind of chaos and full and I
- 43:06Speaker 1: think she had the presence of mind to know that um,
- 43:09Speaker 1: you know, she's looking at it in a on a
- 43:11Speaker 1: different time scale, and that also a lot of that
- 43:13Speaker 1: media stuff is uh is incorrect when it first comes out,
- 43:16Speaker 1: and it took her years to piece together the story
- 43:19Speaker 1: the kind of true reporting the show that that her
- 43:21Speaker 1: initial insect is true. I don't know why I'm I'm
- 43:24Speaker 1: going on about her, except for just I think she's
- 43:25Speaker 1: an amazing writer. Uh. You know, my book owes a
- 43:28Speaker 1: debt to her, to her book, But in any case, UM, yeah,
- 43:32Speaker 1: I think you're right absolutely that what's happening in the
- 43:34Speaker 1: book is you have a lot of Cold war bureaucratic
- 43:38Speaker 1: structures in Anchorage and elsewhere that are set up to
- 43:41Speaker 1: handle disasters, but what they're really set up to handle
- 43:44Speaker 1: is like nuclear war, and no one set up to
- 43:47Speaker 1: handle nuclear war, you know. So, so you have UM
- 43:50Speaker 1: in the place of these um kind of official agencies
- 43:55Speaker 1: kind of unraveling or being slow to adapt to the situation,
- 43:59Speaker 1: you have endo visual people UM, including Genie Chance, who's
- 44:02Speaker 1: sort of the main character of the book, who are
- 44:04Speaker 1: who are kind of rising up and meeting the problem
- 44:07Speaker 1: in front of them. And then not only are they
- 44:08Speaker 1: meeting the problem in front of them, but then they're
- 44:10Speaker 1: banding together in forming kind of ad hoc organizations to
- 44:14Speaker 1: solve even bigger problems. And it just keeps going like
- 44:16Speaker 1: that all weekend. And I think that is absolutely true,
- 44:19Speaker 1: and that's absolutely characteristic of what tends to happen in disasters. Um.
- 44:24Speaker 1: You see that when people have studied the responses you know,
- 44:28Speaker 1: in all kinds of different kinds of natural disasters all
- 44:30Speaker 1: around the world. Um, what we saw this year, I
- 44:33Speaker 1: think is, um, you know a lot of that, you know,
- 44:36Speaker 1: and we can we can talk about that too, because um,
- 44:39Speaker 1: I've actually been involved with a group like that, um
- 44:41Speaker 1: where I live. But UM, but I think what you're
- 44:43Speaker 1: referring to is we've we've also seen, uh, you know this,
- 44:47Speaker 1: there's some elements of a disaster that only government can address.
- 44:52Speaker 1: Right those people are gonna kick in. The ordinary people
- 44:54Speaker 1: are gonna kick in right away and start digging someone
- 44:57Speaker 1: out of rubble, or organizing search and rescue or getting
- 45:00Speaker 1: food to people, things like that. But there's also things
- 45:02Speaker 1: happening on a grand scale that only government is going
- 45:06Speaker 1: to be able to solve. And because my books only
- 45:08Speaker 1: dealing with those first three days, I'm not talking necessarily
- 45:10Speaker 1: about a lot of those things. I'm not talking about
- 45:12Speaker 1: rebuilding a city, making sure the water system is safe, um,
- 45:18Speaker 1: things like that. And so I think the thing about
- 45:20Speaker 1: I mean, we we kind of got to see it
- 45:23Speaker 1: in real time at the beginning of the pandemic or
- 45:25Speaker 1: even through the middle of the pandemic, where you had
- 45:28Speaker 1: people doing as much as they could, you know, staying
- 45:31Speaker 1: staying home, sewing masks, doing three D printing face shields,
- 45:35Speaker 1: you know, all sorts of things. But when you have
- 45:37Speaker 1: a government response that's just not kicking in on a
- 45:41Speaker 1: problem of this scale. If those people are only going
- 45:43Speaker 1: to get you so far. UM. So I could have
- 45:46Speaker 1: told a lot more of the story of how the government,
- 45:49Speaker 1: especially the military, being that there was, you know, this
- 45:51Speaker 1: huge military presence in Alaska. Um, they had a lot
- 45:55Speaker 1: to do with making things run smoothly after the quake. Uh.
- 46:00Speaker 1: But to me, for those three days, the most interesting
- 46:03Speaker 1: story to me, and and the most surprising story, was
- 46:06Speaker 1: the story of these people who were in many cases
- 46:08Speaker 1: surprising themselves and really managing to get ship done in
- 46:12Speaker 1: ways that they wouldn't have been able to predict beforehand.
- 46:17Speaker 1: Explain how did I slap that one way? Did I
- 46:22Speaker 1: defend my thesis successfully. Yeah, I think I think that
- 46:26Speaker 1: you you tackled it well. I do not view this
- 46:29Speaker 1: as an anti government manifesto. It was good though, to
- 46:34Speaker 1: see because you know, at the beginning of you can
- 46:36Speaker 1: only you can only equate a pandemic and an earthquake,
- 46:42Speaker 1: like the comparisons. You kind of run out of comparisons
- 46:45Speaker 1: pretty quickly. But right early in the pandemic, I did
- 46:49Speaker 1: see a lot of folks, including some people who I like, Uh,
- 46:54Speaker 1: their initial thing was I'm gonna get ready to start
- 46:57Speaker 1: killing my neighbors when they come for my food. Right, Like,
- 47:02Speaker 1: there's there's some folks that that's where they're That's just
- 47:05Speaker 1: where they go. It's it's sad that that's where they go,
- 47:08Speaker 1: but that's where they go. And other people are like,
- 47:10Speaker 1: I wonder how I could help my neighbors, you know? Um,
- 47:13Speaker 1: And you really see in the three Days that that
- 47:16Speaker 1: you describe, you see overwhelmingly is what can I do
- 47:21Speaker 1: to help my neighbors? Not um, how can I get
- 47:24Speaker 1: ready to kill them all when they run out of water? Uh?
- 47:27Speaker 1: But talk about how how how Genie Chance enters the thing?
- 47:32Speaker 1: And like you know the books called This is Chance,
- 47:34Speaker 1: which is named after which you wouldn't guess from looking
- 47:37Speaker 1: at the cover necessarily, but named after a particular person
- 47:41Speaker 1: who really emerges as this star player in this in
- 47:45Speaker 1: this drama. Why did you choose not to introduce Genie
- 47:49Speaker 1: Chance on the cover when when her name is so
- 47:52Speaker 1: clearly on the cover? Children I like to I like
- 47:57Speaker 1: to torment children who can't stand suspend and uh, I
- 48:01Speaker 1: need to plug their ears when scary things happened in movies. Um, yeah,
- 48:05Speaker 1: I mean Genie Chance. For me, discovering Genie Chance and
- 48:09Speaker 1: discovering the earthquake happened simultaneously. That report that I mentioned,
- 48:14Speaker 1: you know, just collecting individual people's accounts of those four
- 48:17Speaker 1: and a half minutes, that was something Genie did. Um. So.
- 48:21Speaker 1: Genie was a part time radio reporter, working mother and
- 48:25Speaker 1: anchorage at the time, which was a pretty rare thing
- 48:27Speaker 1: on on its own. Um And she was just, you know,
- 48:30Speaker 1: completely tenacious person. And she ended up by sort of
- 48:36Speaker 1: a quirk of luck, but also like her own persistence,
- 48:39Speaker 1: winding up in the heart of everything, you know, immediately
- 48:43Speaker 1: after the quake, right at the police station where information
- 48:46Speaker 1: was starting to come in, the the official city response
- 48:49Speaker 1: was starting starting to take shape, and she had this
- 48:51Speaker 1: mobile radio unit in her car that she used to
- 48:53Speaker 1: report UM as a kind of roving reporter around Anchorage normally,
- 48:57Speaker 1: and so she was able to get on the radio
- 49:00Speaker 1: in once the station was up and running and relay
- 49:03Speaker 1: a lot of that information. And at first that was
- 49:05Speaker 1: a very simple job, and over the course of these
- 49:07Speaker 1: three days it becomes um a much more important job
- 49:10Speaker 1: and a much more elaborate job where she just kind of,
- 49:12Speaker 1: you know, stumbled into being a really integral part of
- 49:16Speaker 1: of the whole community response and also like a voice
- 49:20Speaker 1: that was guiding a lot of people in town through it.
- 49:22Speaker 1: So even you know, saying like we need a diesel
- 49:24Speaker 1: fuel over here, or we need a doctor and here,
- 49:27Speaker 1: you know, that was her giving that information. And then
- 49:30Speaker 1: also people who couldn't were separated from their family members,
- 49:33Speaker 1: just you know, hours of just reciting people's names and saying,
- 49:35Speaker 1: you know, your mother is looking for you. Uh, you know,
- 49:38Speaker 1: give us, we'll come here, we'll get a message back,
- 49:40Speaker 1: and relaying those those back and forth over the air. UM.
- 49:43Speaker 1: But that report that I mentioned, uh, that was that
- 49:47Speaker 1: was all her doing. That was after the quake, she
- 49:50Speaker 1: went back and interviewed all these people to just kind
- 49:52Speaker 1: of collect in oral history like that. And I found
- 49:55Speaker 1: that report and in the very beginning, there's a little
- 49:57Speaker 1: author's note that says, you know, the author is a
- 50:00Speaker 1: our time radio reporter who was on the air for
- 50:02Speaker 1: fifty nine hours after the quake, and her family recorded
- 50:05Speaker 1: a lot of those broadcasts, and uh, you know I
- 50:08Speaker 1: saw that and and my my, you know, journalists spiky
- 50:12Speaker 1: scent started tingling, and I just thought, I got to
- 50:14Speaker 1: find these these tapes, um, which which I did. Ultimately
- 50:18Speaker 1: I found found a lot of hours of broadcasts from
- 50:21Speaker 1: the radio station Katie and I and that that was
- 50:23Speaker 1: kind of the backbone of this book. It allowed me
- 50:25Speaker 1: to to really tell it in a minute by minute
- 50:28Speaker 1: kind of way. Uh. You could times have mentioned how
- 50:33Speaker 1: the book focuses in a few days, but when towards
- 50:39Speaker 1: the end it doesn't, because I mean it's very much
- 50:42Speaker 1: about like the day of the quake and the immediate aftermath.
- 50:46Speaker 1: But it we don't need to go into this and
- 50:47Speaker 1: to go high level of detail because people need to
- 50:51Speaker 1: go read it and find out. But for her, um,
- 50:57Speaker 1: it never ends, you know. I mean it's like there's
- 51:00Speaker 1: these handful of people that that this becomes sort of
- 51:03Speaker 1: the defining thing in their life and then and then
- 51:07Speaker 1: shapes and and kind of in unhappy ways. Uh yeah,
- 51:13Speaker 1: that being like this pinnacle moment you never eventually I
- 51:18Speaker 1: guess you kind of stranded on the the pinnacle, you know.
- 51:22Speaker 1: For her, Yeah, I don't know that I put it
- 51:25Speaker 1: exactly that way. I mean I think that she, you know,
- 51:28Speaker 1: when you think about what it would have been like
- 51:30Speaker 1: to be like a working mother in nine four, I mean,
- 51:34Speaker 1: she was dealing with a kind of um sexism that
- 51:37Speaker 1: it's it's just almost funny to see it now, like
- 51:40Speaker 1: you you feel like it's a satire, you know, the
- 51:41Speaker 1: way people would talk to her. And so during the
- 51:45Speaker 1: quake for her to just ascend to this position of
- 51:49Speaker 1: of you know where she's just so obviously competent and
- 51:53Speaker 1: getting stuff done and being so valuable to the community
- 51:57Speaker 1: without question, I think that really, um it kind of
- 52:01Speaker 1: freed her to to just accept her own you know, awesomeness.
- 52:05Speaker 1: I guess, you know, like it was just sort of
- 52:07Speaker 1: like the last the last thing she needed to feel
- 52:09Speaker 1: like why am I wasting my time? You know with
- 52:12Speaker 1: other people's expectations. So in that way, it was a
- 52:15Speaker 1: kind of door that that opened for her, and she
- 52:17Speaker 1: went on to have this career in the legislature and
- 52:19Speaker 1: and did a lot of really um, you know, important
- 52:22Speaker 1: work there. But yeah, there is there is a moment
- 52:24Speaker 1: in the book where when you kind of just fast
- 52:26Speaker 1: forward through the rest of her life and you do
- 52:29Speaker 1: realize that that it, you know, it was a very sad,
- 52:32Speaker 1: you know, last phase of her life for a variety
- 52:34Speaker 1: of reasons. And that was something that I just really
- 52:37Speaker 1: tried to keep and keep my eye on as I
- 52:39Speaker 1: was going through the whole process of researching this book.
- 52:42Speaker 1: Was it's a very weird thing to write about three
- 52:45Speaker 1: days that happened fifty plus years ago, because you're your
- 52:49Speaker 1: head so in the minute by minute drama of that time,
- 52:52Speaker 1: and then you look up from that and you say,
- 52:54Speaker 1: I wonder what happened to this guy? And nine times
- 52:57Speaker 1: out of tend you hit an obituary, you know, and
- 52:59Speaker 1: you realize that these three days were just a sliver
- 53:01Speaker 1: of time in these people's lives, and uh, And that
- 53:05Speaker 1: really shaped the whole feeling of the book for me,
- 53:08Speaker 1: was to to think that there's this kind of intensity
- 53:10Speaker 1: that kicks in in these moments, but a lot of
- 53:13Speaker 1: the feelings that that come up in those times, and
- 53:16Speaker 1: a lot of the possibilities that come up in those
- 53:19Speaker 1: times are things that kind of haunt you or or
- 53:21Speaker 1: carry you carry on for the rest of your life,
- 53:23Speaker 1: so that you could have someone at the you know,
- 53:25Speaker 1: top of their game, you know, like Genie, you know,
- 53:28Speaker 1: in this moment, and then you you sort of you
- 53:30Speaker 1: wanted to last. You want it to stay as of
- 53:32Speaker 1: her life, and and it, you know, it keeps going
- 53:35Speaker 1: higher for a while. But you know, eventually kind of
- 53:37Speaker 1: all our stories and in the same way, um and
- 53:40Speaker 1: somehow that just made the whole story of the quake
- 53:42Speaker 1: more poignant to me. This this idea that your life
- 53:44Speaker 1: can be disrupted, you know that violently at at any minute. Well,
- 53:47Speaker 1: you know, in the end, it's kind of what we
- 53:49Speaker 1: all kind of get get the earth, you know, stripped
- 53:52Speaker 1: out from under us. I guess okay, tell folks, you
- 53:56Speaker 1: know the title subtitles, Okay, can I get? Can I get? In?
- 53:59Speaker 1: A one more questions? Didn't go? Man? John? What did
- 54:04Speaker 1: it put you in any sort of like a like
- 54:06Speaker 1: a different space to spend six years in three days? Yeah, yeah,
- 54:14Speaker 1: it really did. I don't even really know how to
- 54:17Speaker 1: how to talk about that. I mean, it was it
- 54:20Speaker 1: was insane, Like it's just an insane thing to do
- 54:23Speaker 1: in retrospect, you know, like like I remember one night
- 54:26Speaker 1: somewhere in the middle of like we were having you know,
- 54:28Speaker 1: having dinner with the family, and we're doing that. You know,
- 54:30Speaker 1: who would you living or dead? Who would you like
- 54:32Speaker 1: to have to dinner? You know, as Gennie Chance, you know,
- 54:34Speaker 1: like question, you know, and you know it's like it's
- 54:37Speaker 1: not only it's not only Genie Chance. It's like it's like,
- 54:40Speaker 1: you know, the uh, the second in command at the
- 54:44Speaker 1: National Guard. Because I really wanted to know, like where
- 54:46Speaker 1: where were you standing when you said this? You know,
- 54:48Speaker 1: like it's not they were not normal concerns, you know. Um,
- 54:52Speaker 1: but yeah, I think that it's Uh, it definitely made
- 54:54Speaker 1: me think about my own life differently in the sense
- 54:57Speaker 1: that I think anytime you have the luxury of really
- 55:00Speaker 1: trying to to zoom out and realized that you know, this,
- 55:05Speaker 1: this moment that we're in is is just going to
- 55:07Speaker 1: be this little narrow, um, you know, speck of a
- 55:10Speaker 1: much longer line, Um, it really starts to mess with
- 55:14Speaker 1: your head because I just don't think we normally have
- 55:16Speaker 1: the tools to like integrate all that information. But definitely
- 55:20Speaker 1: I feel like I mean, even the other day I
- 55:22Speaker 1: was I was just like standing on my on my
- 55:24Speaker 1: front lawn looking at this this maple tree, and I
- 55:28Speaker 1: was thinking like, oh, yeah, it's starting to look a
- 55:30Speaker 1: little unhealthy, like yeah, maybe maybe twenty years from now
- 55:33Speaker 1: it'll it'll keel over. And and also this used to
- 55:35Speaker 1: be a tree farm, so I wonder if this was
- 55:37Speaker 1: you know, this came up after they cleared all the
- 55:39Speaker 1: furs or what, you know. Just suddenly seeing these moments
- 55:42Speaker 1: on a much huger time scale, Um, I think is
- 55:46Speaker 1: something that I may never stop doing, just kind of instinctually, um,
- 55:50Speaker 1: because I spent so much time kind of stuck in
- 55:54Speaker 1: you know, stuck in the past. I don't know if
- 55:55Speaker 1: that makes any sense. It's it's something I'm still trying
- 55:58Speaker 1: to unpack for myself. Honestly, are you doing a new
- 56:01Speaker 1: book now? I wish? Um. No. I mean, this year
- 56:07Speaker 1: has been just completely strange professionally, so I've been kind
- 56:10Speaker 1: of dabbling on a couple of things. But um, I'm
- 56:12Speaker 1: one of those people that kind of just had to
- 56:15Speaker 1: pump the brakes a little bit and deal with you know,
- 56:17Speaker 1: kids and and keeping my my family life working. So
- 56:21Speaker 1: um So, No, just in the since the new year,
- 56:24Speaker 1: I've been I've been really starting to look for what
- 56:26Speaker 1: my next project is going to be. But there were
- 56:27Speaker 1: a few months there where I was like just a
- 56:30Speaker 1: whole part of myself was was deactivated. You know, do
- 56:34Speaker 1: you have to restrain yourself from turning to the kids
- 56:38Speaker 1: on like all their events, right and being like, well,
- 56:43Speaker 1: if you think about it, it's not that big of
- 56:45Speaker 1: a deal. Yeah, yeah, I think I think I do.
- 56:51Speaker 1: I mean I have to do that to myself too.
- 56:53Speaker 1: But yeah, around the time, right right after I finished
- 56:59Speaker 1: this book, I did um before it had come out,
- 57:02Speaker 1: but after I was done with it, I did a
- 57:04Speaker 1: story about the um the campfire in northern California in
- 57:08Speaker 1: two thousand nineteen. Um So, I did a big magazine
- 57:11Speaker 1: story about that. And that was another similar situation where
- 57:15Speaker 1: I basically just told the story of like six hours
- 57:17Speaker 1: and was you know, had videos of multiple angles of
- 57:20Speaker 1: different things and was just you know, just like even
- 57:23Speaker 1: more compressed than three days of an earthquake, was the
- 57:26Speaker 1: six hour you know, evacuation of this one this one car.
- 57:30Speaker 1: And I definitely started like looking around at you know,
- 57:33Speaker 1: the trees on my property and noticing which ones are
- 57:36Speaker 1: gonna fall in the driveway and all that stuff. And
- 57:38Speaker 1: I made the mistake of kind of like talking about
- 57:40Speaker 1: that a little too much with my daughters. And I
- 57:42Speaker 1: think it's you know, I really it was not good parenting,
- 57:45Speaker 1: you know. I sort of loaded them up with a
- 57:47Speaker 1: kind of awareness of peril that I don't think was
- 57:50Speaker 1: was recommended. Um, But yeah, you gotta you gotta put
- 57:54Speaker 1: up some walls sometimes, and I'm not necessarily very good
- 57:56Speaker 1: at it. I made the mistake one time, um of
- 58:01Speaker 1: explaining to my kids how the sun will burn out,
- 58:04Speaker 1: you know. And I was telling them that the Earth
- 58:07Speaker 1: kind of in a midlife crisis, like you know, for
- 58:10Speaker 1: a billion year old planet, and the sun is gonna
- 58:13Speaker 1: peter her out and maybe about that long. And they
- 58:16Speaker 1: just can't comprehend the time. So in their mind is
- 58:19Speaker 1: still like any moment are they look at? I told, well,
- 58:25Speaker 1: you won't know until eight minutes after it happened, So
- 58:28Speaker 1: but no, they feel like at any moment is just
- 58:30Speaker 1: gonna go blue. Yah. Well, I remember, I'm gonna blame
- 58:34Speaker 1: you a little bit, Steve, because I remember I think
- 58:37Speaker 1: maybe I heard you on a interviewed. I think it
- 58:39Speaker 1: was an I don't think it was a conversation we
- 58:41Speaker 1: were having where you were talking about your son and
- 58:44Speaker 1: just loving your truck and knowing that everything that you
- 58:47Speaker 1: need to survive is in your truck and uh and
- 58:51Speaker 1: uh and I feel like that's what That's what I
- 58:54Speaker 1: was aiming for, you know, I was aiming for that
- 58:56Speaker 1: kind of like we got this kind of vibe that
- 58:59Speaker 1: I don't think I carry it off, and I didn't
- 59:01Speaker 1: carry it off the same way. I gotta work on
- 59:04Speaker 1: my tone or something. You know. What's messing with me
- 59:07Speaker 1: on this is I A huge part of me is like,
- 59:14Speaker 1: don't be in a city center, don't be in a
- 59:19Speaker 1: in a place where the infrastructure is so built up
- 59:22Speaker 1: when these disasters occur. And it's it's really boning me
- 59:26Speaker 1: out that the uh, you know, the superstructure less native
- 59:34Speaker 1: villages on the coastline were the ones that had the
- 59:36Speaker 1: highest mortality rates. That's it was just like not it
- 59:40Speaker 1: was lack of not the narrative you want to hear,
- 59:43Speaker 1: it's not it's not yeah, well there, yeah, I mean
- 59:46Speaker 1: there is a school of thought that the you know,
- 59:49Speaker 1: if you stop thinking of people as problems during disasters
- 59:52Speaker 1: right as as chaos that needs to be controlled or avoided,
- 59:55Speaker 1: and you start seeing them as parts of the solution,
- 59:59Speaker 1: then that suggests you want to be around as many
- 1:00:01Speaker 1: people as possible, right because mutual aid and all that stuff,
- 1:00:04Speaker 1: it's just you've got more to work with and uh
- 1:00:07Speaker 1: and then again, you know, so this is I live
- 1:00:08Speaker 1: on Bambridge Island, which is next to Seattle, so it's
- 1:00:11Speaker 1: a I think it's twenty seven thousand people community, you know,
- 1:00:14Speaker 1: and I've been, um, I've been really blown away by
- 1:00:17Speaker 1: a lot of the things that volunteers in this community
- 1:00:20Speaker 1: have been able to do during the pandemics. I've been
- 1:00:21Speaker 1: working volunteering at the vaccination clinic they're running. They just
- 1:00:24Speaker 1: did their ten thousand DOCE yesterday, which is insane for
- 1:00:27Speaker 1: a community this size, and they're doing, you know, people
- 1:00:29Speaker 1: from all over this part of the state. And I
- 1:00:31Speaker 1: think that maybe there's also a sweet spot where you
- 1:00:33Speaker 1: have a community where you know, it's small enough that
- 1:00:36Speaker 1: people feel a part of it and feel like the
- 1:00:38Speaker 1: problems are manageable and that they can step up and
- 1:00:41Speaker 1: actually make a difference with that, but it's not quite
- 1:00:43Speaker 1: too small where you know, you don't have that kind
- 1:00:46Speaker 1: of critical mass of of human energy to get things done.
- 1:00:50Speaker 1: But yeah, I agree, I mean, it wasn't. It wasn't
- 1:00:52Speaker 1: that people in those villages weren't weren't taking care of
- 1:00:54Speaker 1: each other. They were. I mean, they were really heroic
- 1:00:56Speaker 1: in terms of, you know, trying to get everyone, you know,
- 1:00:59Speaker 1: clambering up these hill sides, keeping kids warm overnight, things
- 1:01:02Speaker 1: like that. But they were just up against that was
- 1:01:04Speaker 1: more geography, I think than sociology. They were just up
- 1:01:07Speaker 1: against a giant wave that was that was coming on
- 1:01:10Speaker 1: their on their coastline. So you can I'm I'm trying
- 1:01:13Speaker 1: trying to reassure you. Go, you're doing a good job.
- 1:01:16Speaker 1: You're doing a good job. Okay, I'm practicing for my kids,
- 1:01:21Speaker 1: all right, John hit us with all the all the
- 1:01:23Speaker 1: detailed information, all right. The book is called This Is Chance,
- 1:01:27Speaker 1: The Shaking of an All American City and a voice
- 1:01:29Speaker 1: that held it together. And it just came out in
- 1:01:32Speaker 1: paperback from find people at Random House Books and you
- 1:01:36Speaker 1: can buy it with your money. Um was a good pitch.
- 1:01:43Speaker 1: Tell everybody where. I mean, you can find it anywhere
- 1:01:46Speaker 1: you can find I want to I want to see
- 1:01:47Speaker 1: if I want to see how you walk this delicate line.
- 1:01:50Speaker 1: Where should people find the book, John You can buy
- 1:01:53Speaker 1: it from from Eagle Harvard Book Company on Bambridge Island, Washington.
- 1:01:57Speaker 1: Go on there, go on their website and tell Johnson
- 1:02:01Speaker 1: that was very that was that was very diplomatic, and
- 1:02:03Speaker 1: anywhere else books are sold. Yeah, all right, man, Uh,
- 1:02:07Speaker 1: we'll talk to you in six years when you got
- 1:02:08Speaker 1: another one. Thank you. Appreciate that. You gotta find something
- 1:02:15Speaker 1: that happened in one day, because then maybe he'll take
- 1:02:17Speaker 1: you just two years to do it. Yeah, or like
- 1:02:19Speaker 1: a couple of minutes. Maybe I'll just I'll do a
- 1:02:21Speaker 1: book about this podcast. I'll just retrace, I'll interview, I'll
- 1:02:24Speaker 1: find out what was your interior monologue is going on
- 1:02:26Speaker 1: as we as we supposed all look forward to reading.
- 1:02:29Speaker 1: Thanks man, Uh, come back anytime you got something you
- 1:02:31Speaker 1: gotta plug you. If it's just a magazine article, cool,
- 1:02:34Speaker 1: I'll do that. Thank you very much to talk to y'all.
- 1:02:39Speaker 1: Cal Are you hip to the whole deal about how
- 1:02:41Speaker 1: you look like the guy from ram Jam? Nope, you're
- 1:02:44Speaker 1: not hip to that. No, no one showed you this.
- 1:02:48Speaker 1: I mean, who's looked into ram Jam deeper than the
- 1:02:51Speaker 1: song Black? Betty right. Well, that's that's how we know
- 1:02:54Speaker 1: about it. You haven't seen this, cran, do you mind?
- 1:02:58Speaker 1: You don't know about this? Holy shit, that guy looks
- 1:03:02Speaker 1: like you, but you don't look this like poo. This
- 1:03:07Speaker 1: is no that brought up. We actually found Callahan. Callahan
- 1:03:14Speaker 1: is a collaborator in lyricist for The Grateful Dead named
- 1:03:20Speaker 1: Robert Hunter, who weirdly died at seventy eight. Even though
- 1:03:25Speaker 1: you're sitting here right now, if you show that is cal,
- 1:03:34Speaker 1: it's unbelievable, dude, can you can you cal? Can you
- 1:03:43Speaker 1: fold your hands and rest your head? I have advice
- 1:03:46Speaker 1: for men. This is my advice for men in photographs.
- 1:03:52Speaker 1: Keep your hands away from your face. But for me,
- 1:03:55Speaker 1: if you don't mind, can you rest your chin on
- 1:03:58Speaker 1: your hands? Okay? Right here, right here? Were we need
- 1:04:04Speaker 1: to play? Like? Yeah? Where can we putting on the
- 1:04:07Speaker 1: other direction? Can get other direction for me real quick?
- 1:04:09Speaker 1: And then look at me, look at me? No, no,
- 1:04:12Speaker 1: you gotta have your yeah hold here for the for
- 1:04:19Speaker 1: the audience out there. We are looking at a front
- 1:04:25Speaker 1: from if you go to Rolling Stones magazine, I think
- 1:04:30Speaker 1: it's Rolling Stone, Rolling Stones, sorry, Rolling Stones, Rolling Stones magazine.
- 1:04:41Speaker 1: And I turned up the picture. It's a Robert Hunter,
- 1:04:46Speaker 1: grateful dead collaborator and lyricist. A at we ain't getting
- 1:04:51Speaker 1: richer because we can't get a picture that it's unbelievable anyhow,
- 1:04:57Speaker 1: what gets me to thinking about wolves? Yanni? Janni's got
- 1:05:06Speaker 1: Does this qualify as a book? Can we do this
- 1:05:08Speaker 1: qualify as a book report? We play a book report? Jingle? Yeah?
- 1:05:12Speaker 1: What the hell? Yeah? But first before my book report,
- 1:05:16Speaker 1: you got to introduce our guests. That's joined us. Now,
- 1:05:19Speaker 1: that's real port and Joann, you do it that all
- 1:05:21Speaker 1: the time. Go ahead, Johnny, No, I asked you to
- 1:05:24Speaker 1: do it. Oh, bro do you do it? Wow? That
- 1:05:29Speaker 1: just went to hell real quick because because because Brody,
- 1:05:33Speaker 1: you're mainly you're mainly friends with our guests. Yeah, Kell
- 1:05:35Speaker 1: knows him to. Our mystery guest is gas Bar Para
- 1:05:39Speaker 1: Cone joining us in Colorado, gas Bar, introduce yourself. Thanks, guys, Yeah,
- 1:05:45Speaker 1: I guess our paracone. Uh appreciate the opportunity to join
- 1:05:48Speaker 1: you guys. Have been in the hunting team and angling
- 1:05:51Speaker 1: space for most of my professional career and UH happy
- 1:05:54Speaker 1: to join the conversation today and your your neck deep
- 1:05:57Speaker 1: and wildlife politics for reasons passing all understanding. Yeah, I
- 1:06:03Speaker 1: worked for a group called Freestone Strategies, and we're a
- 1:06:05Speaker 1: full spectrum public affairs firm and a large portion of
- 1:06:09Speaker 1: my portfolio is involving, uh, you know, the greater realm
- 1:06:12Speaker 1: of wildlife politics. Yeah, alright. I think it's important to
- 1:06:17Speaker 1: note also that you you formerly served on Colorado's Wildlife Commission. Yeah.
- 1:06:23Speaker 1: I was. Actually I started my tenure when it was
- 1:06:27Speaker 1: the former Division of Wildlife. Obviously, Parks and Wildlife merged
- 1:06:31Speaker 1: under the Hick and Loop administration, and I continued to
- 1:06:34Speaker 1: serve under the newly formed Colorado Parks and Wildlife for
- 1:06:37Speaker 1: four years after that. So, um my, my work continued
- 1:06:42Speaker 1: kind of in that space when I became the legislative
- 1:06:44Speaker 1: director for the Department of Natural Resources under Governor Hick
- 1:06:48Speaker 1: and Loopers. So uh like, like you indicated, I've been
- 1:06:52Speaker 1: necked deep in this stuff for the better part of
- 1:06:54Speaker 1: a decade here in Colorado. Good you like that? That
- 1:06:59Speaker 1: was one of Okay, now ya, he's gonna do his
- 1:07:01Speaker 1: Yanni's book report book report. Who um, who's verbiage? Who's verbiage?
- 1:07:17Speaker 1: Crin is is Escaped about a wolf that escaped the island.
- 1:07:27Speaker 1: The articles huh, go ahead, Yanni real curious about that
- 1:07:31Speaker 1: that word. Yeah, this is Canadian broadcasting. They use the
- 1:07:36Speaker 1: word escape. It's interesting. Well anyways, Yeah, there was a
- 1:07:41Speaker 1: radio colored female wolf on i'le Royale that she was
- 1:07:45Speaker 1: brought there from Minnesota. And uh, if everybody remembers, I
- 1:07:51Speaker 1: can't go into too much details. I'm not gonna remember properly,
- 1:07:54Speaker 1: but I believe there was like too many moves on
- 1:07:56Speaker 1: i'le Royale and they brought in some wolves to take
- 1:07:59Speaker 1: care of the wolf problem or the moose problem and
- 1:08:02Speaker 1: so on and so forth. I'm guessing this is probably
- 1:08:04Speaker 1: part of that. Yeah, hey, do you when you because
- 1:08:06Speaker 1: you grew up in Michigan Unity, did you grow up
- 1:08:08Speaker 1: saying Isle Royale or we do? We would always call
- 1:08:11Speaker 1: it Isle Royal, Isle Royal, probably Royale, I guess after
- 1:08:18Speaker 1: maybe I maybe never said it until I was thirty
- 1:08:21Speaker 1: years old and had long been gone from Michigan. Yeah,
- 1:08:25Speaker 1: you know that that you don't want to get too
- 1:08:27Speaker 1: much detail. But like a long time ago, that island
- 1:08:29Speaker 1: which is out Lake Superior but sits between Michigan Peninsula Canada.
- 1:08:33Speaker 1: It was like a Lynx Caribou eco system. And then
- 1:08:39Speaker 1: because it freezes now and then new stuff shows up
- 1:08:41Speaker 1: and leaves, and moose got out there. There's like some
- 1:08:45Speaker 1: speculation that I don't think people who know there's some
- 1:08:48Speaker 1: some people think he says it freezes. He means the
- 1:08:50Speaker 1: lake freezes, sorry, which is how a wildlife got out
- 1:08:54Speaker 1: to the island and occasionally leaves the island. Yeah, so
- 1:08:57Speaker 1: I had which kind of hard to believe that there's
- 1:08:59Speaker 1: like a boo out there at one point in time,
- 1:09:01Speaker 1: like not like a long I mean, in modern times,
- 1:09:04Speaker 1: there was caribou um and then everybody, you know, everybody's
- 1:09:09Speaker 1: always dying off, and someone new walks out there, and
- 1:09:12Speaker 1: then most recently became like tons of moose um. They
- 1:09:18Speaker 1: don't want anybody to hunt out there, which and so
- 1:09:20Speaker 1: they're trying to control That's actually a whole other story
- 1:09:23Speaker 1: we're gonna get into at some point here. Uh. And
- 1:09:25Speaker 1: we've talked about a little bit trying to like open
- 1:09:28Speaker 1: up the pressure of the park Service to allow hunting
- 1:09:30Speaker 1: to bring the moose numbers back down to a more
- 1:09:34Speaker 1: manageable thing. But right now, what they're trying to do
- 1:09:35Speaker 1: is truck wolves out there. And you think that the
- 1:09:37Speaker 1: wolf would be the happiest wolf on the planet. Going
- 1:09:41Speaker 1: back to your escape thing, I think it's it's the
- 1:09:43Speaker 1: notion that it was collared, captured, brought there. So the
- 1:09:48Speaker 1: idea is that like, that's where it's supposed to be
- 1:09:51Speaker 1: because it was biologists intentions to remain and then it escaped.
- 1:09:58Speaker 1: Different sort of feeling of escape because it was put
- 1:10:02Speaker 1: on an island surrounded by, you know, hundreds of miles
- 1:10:05Speaker 1: of water, and you would think that there'd be no
- 1:10:09Speaker 1: way that this wolf would ever leave that island. But
- 1:10:12Speaker 1: in twenty nineteen came the Polar Vortex, which when I
- 1:10:16Speaker 1: read this, it got me thinking, how come the crazy
- 1:10:18Speaker 1: storm that we had like a month ago that killed
- 1:10:22Speaker 1: probably thousands of birds in Arkansas and south and all
- 1:10:26Speaker 1: kinds of crazy animals in Texas, it never got a
- 1:10:28Speaker 1: big crazy name like the Polar Vortex. M Yeah, that's
- 1:10:33Speaker 1: a good point. Yeah, you guys that didn't that didn't crossed.
- 1:10:36Speaker 1: I think they should have dubbed the Great chill Off.
- 1:10:42Speaker 1: You have something or another. So she leaves uh Ile
- 1:10:47Speaker 1: Royale or Royal, depending on what part of Michigan you're from,
- 1:10:51Speaker 1: and travels all around, crosses the U. S. Canada border
- 1:10:54Speaker 1: a few times. All in all, travels thousands of kilometers
- 1:10:59Speaker 1: until at some point her radio collar dies and from
- 1:11:04Speaker 1: what the people that were watching her can tell you
- 1:11:06Speaker 1: that she kept on cruising around and uh, last time
- 1:11:10Speaker 1: they had her was near Thunder Bay, which is like
- 1:11:14Speaker 1: north west part of Lake superior Um. So yeah, a
- 1:11:19Speaker 1: lot lots of traveling. Pretty kind because she went back
- 1:11:24Speaker 1: home more or less. But then it was like something
- 1:11:28Speaker 1: got the wires got crossed. Man, it just became a wanderer, right,
- 1:11:33Speaker 1: but as this next story will show you, they like
- 1:11:36Speaker 1: to wander this. Uh, next stories about two year old
- 1:11:40Speaker 1: wolf that was collared in bamf and uh he traveled
- 1:11:44Speaker 1: all the way from uh Alberta to Montana in five days,
- 1:11:50Speaker 1: three hundred miles. Yeah, pretty amazing. It's like you're not
- 1:11:56Speaker 1: even stopping to eat, man, or like if you're eating,
- 1:11:59Speaker 1: you're eating on the oh yes, scavenging. I'd imagine. I
- 1:12:03Speaker 1: don't imagine he like followed it, heard it. I don't know.
- 1:12:06Speaker 1: Maybe you run into a pack of deer and get
- 1:12:08Speaker 1: lucky and be cool to see his line of travel,
- 1:12:10Speaker 1: Like was he just straight line in it for Montana
- 1:12:13Speaker 1: or you know, yeah, because I mean that whole like
- 1:12:16Speaker 1: Cootney Country is not flat right country. It's mountainous, heavily timbered.
- 1:12:22Speaker 1: Uh and uh some big water in there too, three miles. Yeah,
- 1:12:29Speaker 1: the hunt, the wolf was killed by a hunter legally
- 1:12:32Speaker 1: here in Montana, and uh, that got a lot of
- 1:12:35Speaker 1: people's attention. But what a chief scientists for a nonprofit
- 1:12:41Speaker 1: called Yellowstone to Yukon says, what you should focus on
- 1:12:45Speaker 1: is how cool it is that that wolf was able
- 1:12:48Speaker 1: to do that. And then it shows this amazing like
- 1:12:53Speaker 1: corridor and connectivity for wildlife that it can still happen.
- 1:12:58Speaker 1: And if a wolf can do that, then ley bears
- 1:13:01Speaker 1: can connect between uh, you know, the wilderness of Canada
- 1:13:04Speaker 1: and the Yellowstone ecosystem as well, which is really neat
- 1:13:08Speaker 1: and it's a hard thing to figure out unless you
- 1:13:10Speaker 1: have a dead wolf in this circumstances. That's the thing
- 1:13:13Speaker 1: I always think about this is how many animals are
- 1:13:17Speaker 1: actually running around with the collar. Like when we were
- 1:13:19Speaker 1: caribou hunting this year and I took my boy cariboo hunt,
- 1:13:21Speaker 1: we saw hundreds of caribou go by. Okay, I saw
- 1:13:25Speaker 1: one with a collar. And that's an intensely studied herd
- 1:13:29Speaker 1: where they it's that they have a ton of collars
- 1:13:31Speaker 1: and now have people that in the winter full time
- 1:13:33Speaker 1: track them. So you watch hundreds of things and one
- 1:13:35Speaker 1: goes by the collar in an area where it's like
- 1:13:38Speaker 1: they're doing a collaring study. Um, how many things go
- 1:13:43Speaker 1: unnoticed because no one has a collar on. But then
- 1:13:46Speaker 1: every week there's some crazy story about something wearing a
- 1:13:49Speaker 1: collar doing well, you know, like the same journey. So
- 1:13:52Speaker 1: all the all the unsung. There's a lot of unsung
- 1:13:55Speaker 1: heroes out there. Man, what's going on we don't know about.
- 1:13:59Speaker 1: But there's that aree tutors that theory that the collar
- 1:14:01Speaker 1: scrambles their brain exactly. There's this lady in Wyoming, her
- 1:14:05Speaker 1: dog brought outside of Wyoming, her her dog brought her
- 1:14:12Speaker 1: a recently deceased blackfooted ferret. Right, this is like the
- 1:14:16Speaker 1: rediscovery of the of living black footed fair That's that's that,
- 1:14:20Speaker 1: I mean a while ago. Oh yeah, this this was
- 1:14:22Speaker 1: a while ago. But it's like that discovery served a
- 1:14:27Speaker 1: huge purpose that just kind of came back to light recently. Um,
- 1:14:32Speaker 1: and it it was because of a dead faret that
- 1:14:36Speaker 1: a dog picked up problem. It's like, it's just funny
- 1:14:39Speaker 1: how things work. You gotta start with something dad Sometimes Yeah,
- 1:14:43Speaker 1: and they cannot and that's like the problem. That's like
- 1:14:45Speaker 1: the real Bigfoot problem, right, no dead ones. We got
- 1:14:53Speaker 1: a collar one, then we'll know. You put a collar
- 1:14:56Speaker 1: on one of those suns of bitches, all of sudd
- 1:14:57Speaker 1: he's gonna wind up. You know, You're gonna call him
- 1:15:00Speaker 1: up wherever, like in Washington where they all live, and
- 1:15:02Speaker 1: he's gonna wind up dead on a road in Connecticut
- 1:15:06Speaker 1: with that breaking collar around his neck the back of
- 1:15:08Speaker 1: a van. He'll just be like, I don't know, dude,
- 1:15:11Speaker 1: they put that collar around me. That has went for it.
- 1:15:13Speaker 1: They started walking. But wolves moving and us moving wolves
- 1:15:18Speaker 1: around is why we've got gas bar on. Jeez, that's good, Brodie,
- 1:15:22Speaker 1: see that? Yannie, Oh, Yanni. Um, here's a question for
- 1:15:26Speaker 1: you about your book report. I've always been familiar with
- 1:15:31Speaker 1: the group the Yellowstone to Yukon or is it Yukon
- 1:15:34Speaker 1: to Yellowstone Yellowstone Yukon, Which is this, you know, maintaining
- 1:15:38Speaker 1: this travel trying to imagine that you're maintaining a wildlife
- 1:15:42Speaker 1: travel corridor. They would connect the greater Yellowstone ecosystem with
- 1:15:47Speaker 1: the you know, the Canadian wilderness and then the vast
- 1:15:51Speaker 1: boreal forest. Uh. But the wolf didn't make it to Yellowstone,
- 1:15:56Speaker 1: And isn't a big problem with the Yellowstone to Yukon
- 1:15:59Speaker 1: core or how do you connect sort of the glacier ecosystem,
- 1:16:04Speaker 1: like the connectivity between the Glacier Flathead ecosystem, Northern Continental
- 1:16:11Speaker 1: Divide ecosystem and Yellowstone. Like, now, if some guy had
- 1:16:15Speaker 1: shot him down by Yellowstone, then I think he'd be like, oh,
- 1:16:18Speaker 1: the corridor works. But he had it was hundreds of miles.
- 1:16:24Speaker 1: He didn't make it to Yellowstone. He made it like halfway.
- 1:16:27Speaker 1: It's probably at least three dred miles to go, you know. Yeah,
- 1:16:30Speaker 1: he still had to cross I ninety, which is proving
- 1:16:34Speaker 1: not as a difficult right, Like, yeah, it's a barrier. Um,
- 1:16:40Speaker 1: A couple of wildlife overpasses on would would do some
- 1:16:44Speaker 1: serious wonders. But you know that wolf sniffing distance from
- 1:16:49Speaker 1: running all the way down the bitarets um, and you know,
- 1:16:54Speaker 1: not having too much of a gap between a cross
- 1:16:59Speaker 1: and I fifteen into the y E can see it. Yeah,
- 1:17:03Speaker 1: then the wolves made across Interstate eighty from Wyoming into Colorado. Yeh,
- 1:17:08Speaker 1: they did the impossible already. Yeah, alright, Brody Jimny bears
- 1:17:12Speaker 1: have done that too, right, let's not go there yet.
- 1:17:15Speaker 1: You have run run the bitter yeah down, no, no, no,
- 1:17:19Speaker 1: I have gone from southern Wyoming into Colorado. Oh by
- 1:17:23Speaker 1: government helicopter. Well and catapult, Oh yeah, government catapult that
- 1:17:30Speaker 1: we don't know making fun, but we do know about
- 1:17:33Speaker 1: the wolf. Okay, Brody and Yanni run this whole program here.
- 1:17:47Speaker 1: Um so last year, gas Bar, when did that go through?
- 1:17:52Speaker 1: This year? November? So there there is a ballot initiative
- 1:17:57Speaker 1: that passed in Colorado to reintroduce wolves. Not not really
- 1:18:02Speaker 1: though you already messed up. I don't think that that's true.
- 1:18:06Speaker 1: What's not true about it? I thought it was like,
- 1:18:08Speaker 1: it's not that level of specificity. Well I can let
- 1:18:11Speaker 1: gas Bar, you know, talk about it. But anyway, we'll
- 1:18:15Speaker 1: clear that out. But at the same time, there is
- 1:18:19Speaker 1: a pat now a breeding pack of wolves established in Colorado,
- 1:18:22Speaker 1: which is caught. You know, it was too late for
- 1:18:25Speaker 1: that to have any impact on the measure that passed.
- 1:18:29Speaker 1: But we've got these two things happening concurrently, and we're
- 1:18:34Speaker 1: past the point of like the reintroduction is happening. But
- 1:18:38Speaker 1: gas Bar, do you want to explain to Steve what
- 1:18:42Speaker 1: what happened? Look? Yeah, like, uh, Okay, the initiation, what
- 1:18:48Speaker 1: was the damn initiative proposition? There you go, look at this.
- 1:18:52Speaker 1: Now he's got the number. Yeah, so you know you're
- 1:18:56Speaker 1: you're both right here. Um. Following this continuous trend of
- 1:19:00Speaker 1: ballot box biology that we've seen throughout the West, Uh,
- 1:19:04Speaker 1: Colorado voters narrowly past Proposition one fourteen that requires the
- 1:19:10Speaker 1: state to reintroduce the northern gray wolf into Colorado. Uh.
- 1:19:18Speaker 1: Well yeah, there's some caveats to this though, of course. UM.
- 1:19:21Speaker 1: You know, it isn't as simple as to say, you know,
- 1:19:25Speaker 1: we we passed the proposition, Now we go buy a
- 1:19:27Speaker 1: bunch of wolves and drop them off in the state. Um.
- 1:19:30Speaker 1: This gets a little bit complicated on it on account
- 1:19:33Speaker 1: of a couple of different timing things that happened. Uh,
- 1:19:35Speaker 1: most predominantly the ruling that came out of Secretary Bernhardt
- 1:19:39Speaker 1: last year delisting the wolf in the lower forty eight.
- 1:19:42Speaker 1: That happened also concurrently, of course, while the ballot major
- 1:19:45Speaker 1: was in place. So there's a really unique convergence of
- 1:19:49Speaker 1: events that um is unfolding for the first time, and
- 1:19:51Speaker 1: not a lot of precedents on on how to navigate this.
- 1:19:54Speaker 1: And we can get into that in detail if you
- 1:19:55Speaker 1: guys would like, But effectively, what Proposition one fourteen acquired
- 1:20:00Speaker 1: UM was for the Colorado Parks and Wildlife Commission to
- 1:20:05Speaker 1: create a plan to reintroduce the wolves, and what they
- 1:20:07Speaker 1: need to consider is, uh, the details for restoration, including
- 1:20:13Speaker 1: specific selection of donor population, the place, manner and schedule
- 1:20:19Speaker 1: of reintroduction, actions necessary or beneficial from maintaining a self
- 1:20:24Speaker 1: sustaining population, and details for management, including distribution of state
- 1:20:29Speaker 1: funds to compensate for livestock losses. So, uh, you know,
- 1:20:34Speaker 1: the Commission has some lateral and how they go about
- 1:20:37Speaker 1: developing this management plan. They recently just approved about a
- 1:20:41Speaker 1: month ago a broad scope outline that puts some booke
- 1:20:46Speaker 1: ins on the process, and that requires the formation of
- 1:20:51Speaker 1: three things, the first of which is the hiring of
- 1:20:53Speaker 1: a third party facilitator, the second of which is the
- 1:20:56Speaker 1: creation of a working group, which is kind of the
- 1:20:59Speaker 1: social amen of all of this, and then a scientific
- 1:21:02Speaker 1: technical group, all of which will advise the Commission and
- 1:21:06Speaker 1: the development of that final plan. Hey, gas bar can
- 1:21:10Speaker 1: before we get too deep into the that policy stuff,
- 1:21:15Speaker 1: do you want to talk about kind of the the
- 1:21:17Speaker 1: wrenches that we're getting thrown into the process. Like just
- 1:21:21Speaker 1: recently in regards to what Polus government Polis said as
- 1:21:27Speaker 1: well as how it was going to be, there was
- 1:21:31Speaker 1: some speculation that hunters and anglers were going to fund
- 1:21:34Speaker 1: this thing and like that. These are the reasons why
- 1:21:37Speaker 1: a lot of people were upset. Yeah, I think that's
- 1:21:41Speaker 1: exactly right, Um, and I share that sense of frustration. Um.
- 1:21:45Speaker 1: The language in the ballot was relatively arbitrary, associated with
- 1:21:51Speaker 1: who was responsible from a fiduciary and financial perspective, UH,
- 1:21:55Speaker 1: to pay for the implementation of prop One fourteen and
- 1:21:59Speaker 1: why it does allow for um donations and contributions from
- 1:22:04Speaker 1: third parties as well as the opportunity for an appropriation
- 1:22:08Speaker 1: for from the General Assembly to the Division to pay
- 1:22:11Speaker 1: for all of this. Absent any of that action, the
- 1:22:15Speaker 1: plan has to be implemented on the backs of dollars
- 1:22:17Speaker 1: generated through the sale of hunting and fishing licenses. And
- 1:22:21Speaker 1: you know that's a frustration dust, not only because I
- 1:22:23Speaker 1: think it flies in the face of this general underlying
- 1:22:26Speaker 1: sentiment of Pittman, Robertson and Dingle Johnson. Um. You know
- 1:22:31Speaker 1: it's worth noting, of course, the sportsmen of a long
- 1:22:34Speaker 1: history of being willing to underwrite wildlife and conservation programs,
- 1:22:39Speaker 1: so long as as those revenues go back to the
- 1:22:41Speaker 1: perpetuation of the sport. That doesn't seem to be the
- 1:22:45Speaker 1: case in this instance. And so um. Last year, during
- 1:22:49Speaker 1: the legislative session, shortly after the passage of Prop One fourteen,
- 1:22:53Speaker 1: we went to a couple of members um in the
- 1:22:56Speaker 1: Colorado General Assembly and had asked them to draft and
- 1:22:59Speaker 1: pass legislation that would have required the General Assembly, via
- 1:23:05Speaker 1: taxpayer dollars, to come up with the revenue sources for
- 1:23:09Speaker 1: the implementation of Proper one fourteen. Unfortunately, COVID does what
- 1:23:13Speaker 1: COVID does and gotten the way of it and destroyed
- 1:23:16Speaker 1: the whole process. Um. So here we are again this year,
- 1:23:19Speaker 1: back at the legislature with a similar bill requesting that
- 1:23:23Speaker 1: no general or I'm sorry, that no sportsman dollars be
- 1:23:26Speaker 1: made available for the implementation or the restoration of wolves.
- 1:23:31Speaker 1: Want to be clear, though, you know, this is not
- 1:23:33Speaker 1: an effort to effectively relitigate or overturn Proposition one fourteen.
- 1:23:38Speaker 1: It is is merely a way to identify an alternative
- 1:23:41Speaker 1: revenue source. Let me let me hear with a couple
- 1:23:44Speaker 1: of questions here, just so I can understand this better.
- 1:23:48Speaker 1: Why did the arrival of wolves walking in on their
- 1:23:54Speaker 1: own four ft into the state, Why did that not
- 1:23:59Speaker 1: sort of gait and undo this whole conversation, Like, if
- 1:24:02Speaker 1: the goal was to reintroduce wolves, why would you not
- 1:24:06Speaker 1: be just ecstatic that it happened? You know, I'll say naturally.
- 1:24:13Speaker 1: I mean it happened on the back of the Yellowstone reintroduction,
- 1:24:16Speaker 1: but that was a long time ago. It's accepted now
- 1:24:21Speaker 1: you had a natural reintroduction. Why why why is that
- 1:24:24Speaker 1: not just viewed as a victory and that it puts
- 1:24:28Speaker 1: to end the conversation. I think from our perspective, it
- 1:24:33Speaker 1: is kind of viewed as a victory. Um. You know
- 1:24:36Speaker 1: that discovery occurred after Proposition one fourteen was on the ballot.
- 1:24:42Speaker 1: What simultaneously happened, as I mentioned, was Secretary Bernhardt issued
- 1:24:46Speaker 1: a rule delisting the wolves in the lower forty. And
- 1:24:49Speaker 1: so where we stand now is the Commission has got
- 1:24:54Speaker 1: this obligation by the people of Colorado to move forward
- 1:24:57Speaker 1: with a plan. Um, because we are in a scenario
- 1:25:02Speaker 1: where the wolf is not listed. Uh. And back to
- 1:25:05Speaker 1: the point that you had raised, Brody, the Governor had
- 1:25:07Speaker 1: made a request of the Colorado Parks and Wildlife Commission
- 1:25:10Speaker 1: to expedite the timeline for the reintroduction effort of Prop.
- 1:25:15Speaker 1: One fourteen. The reason in the thinking behind that, I
- 1:25:18Speaker 1: can assume is that I don't think there's anybody who
- 1:25:22Speaker 1: is of the opinion that the wolf is not likely
- 1:25:24Speaker 1: to find itself back on the list in the near future.
- 1:25:27Speaker 1: And so there's this narrow window of opportunity where you
- 1:25:30Speaker 1: aren't subject to the endangered species laws and rules that
- 1:25:33Speaker 1: governed reintroduction like took place in in Idaho and Wyoming, UM,
- 1:25:40Speaker 1: And so you know, hypothetically there's nothing legally that would
- 1:25:45Speaker 1: preclude them from just going and purchasing wolves and dropping
- 1:25:48Speaker 1: them on the landscape. UM. Fortunately, the Commission, I think
- 1:25:53Speaker 1: so good wisdom and pursuing what they're calling it a
- 1:25:57Speaker 1: preliminary tin J, which is a section of the the
- 1:26:01Speaker 1: s A. But it effectively, UM would establish a plan
- 1:26:04Speaker 1: that in the occasion the wolves were to get relisted again,
- 1:26:07Speaker 1: it would give some give the state some flexibility on
- 1:26:10Speaker 1: the management prescriptions, particularly with respect to lethal take. So yeah,
- 1:26:16Speaker 1: you know, there's a question as to you know, what
- 1:26:19Speaker 1: a determination from US Fish and Wildlife Service UM would mean,
- 1:26:23Speaker 1: because these reintroduced populations traditionally have been UM non essential
- 1:26:30Speaker 1: separate populations. But now that we have an established population
- 1:26:35Speaker 1: in the state, there's a question as to what does
- 1:26:37Speaker 1: that mean UM for a reintroduction effort, and we're an
- 1:26:41Speaker 1: uncharted territory here, it's relatively unclear what US Fish and
- 1:26:45Speaker 1: Wildlife Service might say about that. Is So you guys
- 1:26:49Speaker 1: think that the Biden administration is going to turn around
- 1:26:52Speaker 1: and UH is going to turn around and and re
- 1:26:57Speaker 1: like relist wolves. They did include it on their Rural
- 1:27:02Speaker 1: review UM coming out of this every year and incoming
- 1:27:06Speaker 1: administration has the opportunity to take a look at the
- 1:27:09Speaker 1: rules that were issued under a previous administration, and they
- 1:27:12Speaker 1: do have the authority to overturn those. I think what's
- 1:27:15Speaker 1: more likely to happen is that a judicial determination will
- 1:27:20Speaker 1: result in them going back on the list. Man. As
- 1:27:23Speaker 1: far as the it's not just as far as like
- 1:27:28Speaker 1: the FEDS to use the broad term, but like the
- 1:27:30Speaker 1: s A in regards to reintroduction, right, it's not just
- 1:27:35Speaker 1: the presence of wolves in the state, but it's the
- 1:27:37Speaker 1: health of that population. Right. So isn't there a lingering
- 1:27:41Speaker 1: question of like we're gonna do some uh uh some
- 1:27:47Speaker 1: some damn studies this spring and and see if we
- 1:27:53Speaker 1: can't howl up a bunch of wolf puppies in the
- 1:27:56Speaker 1: Stata why or in the state of Colorado. Yeah, I
- 1:28:01Speaker 1: think those are still slightly separate discussions though, right, because
- 1:28:05Speaker 1: the statutory mandate that came from the voters, uh is
- 1:28:10Speaker 1: a question that's disconnected from the evaluation of es A. Right,
- 1:28:16Speaker 1: there's not necessarily a scenario where a Fish and Wildlife
- 1:28:20Speaker 1: or a FED decision in this case, would have the
- 1:28:23Speaker 1: effect of circumventing the responsibility that the Parks and Wildlife
- 1:28:28Speaker 1: Commission is tasked with right now, So I think they,
- 1:28:31Speaker 1: you know, exist independently, and how they come together and
- 1:28:35Speaker 1: ultimately approving a reintroduction effort is the question. And it's
- 1:28:41Speaker 1: anyone's guess how those two will be evaluated, uh, concurrently
- 1:28:45Speaker 1: by the FEDS. Gasbar just recently correct me if I'm wrong. Um,
- 1:28:52Speaker 1: we found out that it's not going to be a
- 1:28:55Speaker 1: situation where they just start cutting wolves loose this year,
- 1:28:58Speaker 1: that they that, like Governor polls suggested, like, they have
- 1:29:03Speaker 1: to follow the planning and procedure process that was outlined
- 1:29:06Speaker 1: in the initiative. Yeah. The thinking is that this will
- 1:29:11Speaker 1: occur over a three year timeline, and there's a there's
- 1:29:14Speaker 1: a huge social element to this, as you might imagine,
- 1:29:17Speaker 1: just given the politics that surround reintroduction efforts, particularly with
- 1:29:22Speaker 1: respect to wolves, of course. But um, yeah, so the
- 1:29:25Speaker 1: Science and Technical Committee presumably will dedicate a lot of
- 1:29:29Speaker 1: time to identifying what is suitable habitat how the interplay
- 1:29:34Speaker 1: between the existing wolf population in the state and this
- 1:29:37Speaker 1: wholly separate introduced population might exist. Um. And you know
- 1:29:44Speaker 1: collectively that that social element and the science and technical
- 1:29:47Speaker 1: element um will help script the ultimate management plan. And
- 1:29:52Speaker 1: the thinking is that that will be that will take
- 1:29:55Speaker 1: place over roughly a three year timeline. UM. The statue,
- 1:30:00Speaker 1: the language, and the proposition says that they need to
- 1:30:03Speaker 1: take the steps necessary to introduce wolves by the end
- 1:30:05Speaker 1: of That doesn't necessarily imply that wolves need to be
- 1:30:09Speaker 1: on the ground at that date, but that the process
- 1:30:12Speaker 1: for the reintroduction needs to be concluded and the effort
- 1:30:16Speaker 1: needs to commence quickly thereafter. You know, I'm gonna get
- 1:30:21Speaker 1: to a rumor I heard as beyond rumor, but um
- 1:30:25Speaker 1: an idea about different strains. Um, well, some people call
- 1:30:31Speaker 1: subspecies of wolves. But before I said that, I'll point
- 1:30:35Speaker 1: out the historically wolves existed in a continuous band. Um.
- 1:30:42Speaker 1: You know there there there weren't gaps and populations, right,
- 1:30:45Speaker 1: So you had these large, you know, these large gray
- 1:30:50Speaker 1: wolves in the north, and then you had what we've
- 1:30:52Speaker 1: come to call the you know, much smaller Mexican gray
- 1:30:55Speaker 1: wolf from the south, and and you had these variations,
- 1:31:00Speaker 1: but there weren't hard edges between the populations. Isn't there
- 1:31:04Speaker 1: some issue in Colorado where it seems that the people
- 1:31:07Speaker 1: that are really driving for the reintroduction would have been
- 1:31:12Speaker 1: angling towards having it be Mexican gray wolves in the south,
- 1:31:16Speaker 1: but the ones that showed up on their own, are
- 1:31:19Speaker 1: you know, a larger, different northern animal. Is there is
- 1:31:23Speaker 1: there some friction there on that because I know the
- 1:31:26Speaker 1: proposition doesn't get into that. But wasn't that the intention
- 1:31:30Speaker 1: would be there would be Mexican gray wolves. There's been
- 1:31:33Speaker 1: a lot of discussion around that. Um. It's interesting because
- 1:31:38Speaker 1: the all of Colorado is in the historic range of
- 1:31:42Speaker 1: the northern gray wolf. That is not true for for
- 1:31:45Speaker 1: the Mexican wolf. And so I think from a um
- 1:31:49Speaker 1: you know, e s a standard perspective, the recovery of
- 1:31:53Speaker 1: the northern gray wolves is a is a more likely
- 1:31:55Speaker 1: scenario in Colorado. But you know, there has there has
- 1:31:59Speaker 1: been a lot of conversation and about you know, what
- 1:32:01Speaker 1: it might mean in the occasion that they were to
- 1:32:03Speaker 1: cross pollenate. Um. You know, if if northern gray wolves
- 1:32:07Speaker 1: were to migrate to the southern part of the state,
- 1:32:09Speaker 1: would there be conflict between the Mexican wolf population, and
- 1:32:15Speaker 1: so you know, there have been even comments from some
- 1:32:17Speaker 1: of the members of the Commission seeking to shift this
- 1:32:20Speaker 1: thinking from the Northern gray wolf to to the Mexican wolf.
- 1:32:24Speaker 1: As it stands currently, I think it's more likely that
- 1:32:28Speaker 1: the pursuit for reintroduction will likely fall with the Northern
- 1:32:32Speaker 1: gray And there there's another level of conflict, right because
- 1:32:37Speaker 1: the Mexican wolf is listed and the recovery efforts are
- 1:32:43Speaker 1: like there there's a legal conundrum there, right, It's like, well, no,
- 1:32:48Speaker 1: you're legally bound by the s A to recover this
- 1:32:52Speaker 1: wolf in these areas. And like how it's written and
- 1:32:55Speaker 1: what happens when gene pools start getting mad, Well, that's
- 1:32:58Speaker 1: what I understanding, Like all the all the hassle they
- 1:33:00Speaker 1: put in over the years, um, And you know, I
- 1:33:03Speaker 1: don't it doesn't bother me all all the work we
- 1:33:06Speaker 1: put in over the years to identify range, get source
- 1:33:09Speaker 1: population animals, and re established the Mexican wolf two, then
- 1:33:14Speaker 1: it ain't It's not far from the San Juan Mountains
- 1:33:16Speaker 1: to you know, so it seems like it's it seems
- 1:33:19Speaker 1: like you'd probably you know, I guess some people might
- 1:33:21Speaker 1: point out and be like, they don't really care about
- 1:33:22Speaker 1: those level of details. If it's wolves as wolves, and
- 1:33:25Speaker 1: then you gotta stop calling them Mexican wolves, right. You
- 1:33:28Speaker 1: need the old high school dance biological chaperones out there?
- 1:33:32Speaker 1: Whoa you too? If you if you had uh here,
- 1:33:41Speaker 1: I'll save my crystal. I'd like to say my crystal
- 1:33:42Speaker 1: ball question for later. Go ahead, Brodie. Oh, I mean,
- 1:33:45Speaker 1: I think we've we've hit it pretty good as far
- 1:33:48Speaker 1: as what's going on. I mean, why did you Colorado
- 1:33:52Speaker 1: people decided to put this up to I'm a registered
- 1:33:56Speaker 1: Montana voter jack um, But yeah, I spent a lot
- 1:34:01Speaker 1: of time there, and I was happy to live in
- 1:34:04Speaker 1: a state where I didn't have to compete with wolves
- 1:34:07Speaker 1: to kill an elk, you know, But then up here
- 1:34:10Speaker 1: it's like, you know, there's plenty of elk getting killed.
- 1:34:14Speaker 1: I know, I know, I'm gonna get crucified for saying
- 1:34:16Speaker 1: that that. Here. Here, here, Here's how I always explain
- 1:34:19Speaker 1: to people. Um Alaska has wolves across nineties some of
- 1:34:29Speaker 1: their historic range. They have grizzlies across the entirety of
- 1:34:33Speaker 1: the historic range. Why does everybody want to go honey
- 1:34:36Speaker 1: in Alaska? I don't know. I always tell people you
- 1:34:38Speaker 1: wouldn't like and you would like this. Wolves a load
- 1:34:40Speaker 1: of plays things with teeth everything. There's wolves everywhere, so
- 1:34:43Speaker 1: there must not be any animals there. But I do
- 1:34:45Speaker 1: have the wolf. But everybody wants to go there and hunt.
- 1:34:49Speaker 1: So it's like it is a hard thing for people
- 1:34:52Speaker 1: to explain it. You'd be like, wolves will be the
- 1:34:54Speaker 1: end of hunting in Colorado and and for a while,
- 1:34:57Speaker 1: it'll see if they come on hard because because it
- 1:35:00Speaker 1: there's a learning curve. There's a learning curve on the elk,
- 1:35:03Speaker 1: like when when they brought him into the when they
- 1:35:04Speaker 1: brought him into the Greater Yellowstone area, I mean you
- 1:35:09Speaker 1: saw two thirds drop offs and elk populations. I mean,
- 1:35:13Speaker 1: they they do not understand, like hey look at that
- 1:35:16Speaker 1: dog and and all of a sudden, Yeah, So my
- 1:35:19Speaker 1: my concerns in Colorado are they have. There are these
- 1:35:23Speaker 1: large elk herds that right now they can't figure out
- 1:35:27Speaker 1: what the hell is going on, Like the kaff recruitment
- 1:35:29Speaker 1: is very poor, and these elk herds are their numbers
- 1:35:33Speaker 1: are going down, and those elk herds are in areas
- 1:35:37Speaker 1: where wolves are gonna end up. For sure it is
- 1:35:41Speaker 1: gonna Yeah, it will. It's like, no more things piss
- 1:35:45Speaker 1: out of them. But I don't. I think it's it'll
- 1:35:47Speaker 1: knock the piss out of them, but it won't be
- 1:35:50Speaker 1: the end. No, no, Yanni, you moved. Yeah, I we've
- 1:35:55Speaker 1: got top are we are furnace is getting fixed. Finally
- 1:35:59Speaker 1: we've been out of Hea for like two weeks and
- 1:36:01Speaker 1: the dudes coming over. So he's gonna be in the
- 1:36:03Speaker 1: basement where I was at. Congratulations. And what else do
- 1:36:06Speaker 1: we need to point out? Though? About your Yellowstone? Uh?
- 1:36:12Speaker 1: You know Northern heard of Yellowstone that dropped by two thirds. Uh,
- 1:36:16Speaker 1: there was other factors, they think now there was like
- 1:36:19Speaker 1: a perfect storm of habitat a super high, unhealthy population
- 1:36:25Speaker 1: and then the wolves coming in that produced that precipitous drop.
- 1:36:29Speaker 1: And then it's you can't just say because the wolves
- 1:36:32Speaker 1: showed up that that's what did it. It was there
- 1:36:34Speaker 1: was some coincidence there. Well, there's it's never one thing.
- 1:36:37Speaker 1: But when you throw one more thing on top of
- 1:36:40Speaker 1: those herds that are hurting in Colorado, I mean, the
- 1:36:43Speaker 1: end results not gonna be good. I wouldn't imagine. Well,
- 1:36:47Speaker 1: and you honestly touched on an interesting point there, right.
- 1:36:49Speaker 1: A lot of the proponents of this have been using
- 1:36:51Speaker 1: this trophic cascade as the baseline for why this makes sense.
- 1:36:57Speaker 1: And you know, I think by all accounts, some of
- 1:37:01Speaker 1: the trophic cascade argument has been overblown. Um. You know
- 1:37:06Speaker 1: we've learned since the introductions. Can you explain trophic cascade? Please? Yeah,
- 1:37:12Speaker 1: the trophis cascade is effectively this idea, and as far
- 1:37:16Speaker 1: as I understand it, um, it originated out of this
- 1:37:20Speaker 1: this concept that predators and the relationship that they have
- 1:37:24Speaker 1: with prey can improve the ecological conditions of a select environment. Um.
- 1:37:30Speaker 1: It was reading the other day a study about some
- 1:37:32Speaker 1: of the early thinking about this, and they were talking
- 1:37:34Speaker 1: about the relationship between spiders who scared grasshoppers improving grass
- 1:37:39Speaker 1: conditions in a unique area. And of course, you know
- 1:37:43Speaker 1: when wolves were introduced into Yellowstone that that scientific theory
- 1:37:48Speaker 1: was quickly overlaid and a lot of the ecological improvement
- 1:37:52Speaker 1: in the Yellowstone area has been attributable alone to the
- 1:37:55Speaker 1: reintroduction of wolves. There's been a subsequent series of these
- 1:38:00Speaker 1: that have indicated that well, yeah, they certainly have contributed
- 1:38:03Speaker 1: to a degree of the improvement. Um, it seems a
- 1:38:08Speaker 1: bit overstated to claim that a soul species is accountable
- 1:38:13Speaker 1: for all of the improvement that we have seen. Um
- 1:38:16Speaker 1: at our Net, who's the chief scientist for t RCP,
- 1:38:20Speaker 1: was explaining to me that, you know, wolves very seldomly
- 1:38:23Speaker 1: changed their eating behabits, habits or their their food preference um,
- 1:38:27Speaker 1: specifically with relation to aspen and willows, which a lot
- 1:38:31Speaker 1: of the trophic cascade argument has been based on on
- 1:38:34Speaker 1: account of wolves being present. And so you know, undeniably
- 1:38:39Speaker 1: there there could be circumstances where wolves dispersing um wildlife
- 1:38:43Speaker 1: populations to other areas and disrupting the concentration that we
- 1:38:47Speaker 1: see in winter grounds might be beneficial to the health.
- 1:38:51Speaker 1: The other piece too, that the proponents have been talking
- 1:38:53Speaker 1: about is the potential benefit of the introduction of wolves
- 1:38:56Speaker 1: to the c w D problem that we have in Colorado.
- 1:38:59Speaker 1: And again, um, you know, very likely maybe the case
- 1:39:03Speaker 1: you know, I think it's relatively fair to say that
- 1:39:06Speaker 1: the wolves have this innate sense of ability to to
- 1:39:11Speaker 1: peel off the weaker prey in a population. Um, as
- 1:39:16Speaker 1: far as I'm aware, and I need to state that
- 1:39:18Speaker 1: I'm not a biologist, but it seems a little bit
- 1:39:21Speaker 1: far fetched to me as well to think that, you know,
- 1:39:24Speaker 1: the introduction of wolves in Colorado would result in in
- 1:39:27Speaker 1: the stop of the spread or wholesale turnaround in the
- 1:39:30Speaker 1: c w D conditions that we have. So yeah, could
- 1:39:34Speaker 1: could there be some benefits? Sure, Um, I just don't
- 1:39:37Speaker 1: find those to be the baseline, uh scientific explanation for
- 1:39:43Speaker 1: the reintroduction that others have claimed. Oh that the scene
- 1:39:46Speaker 1: that d thing is a joke, man, We've talked about
- 1:39:48Speaker 1: that before too. Is like the animals are the animals
- 1:39:50Speaker 1: are infected for sometimes years before their symptomatic It's such
- 1:39:57Speaker 1: a joke. And then the thing that they you know,
- 1:39:59Speaker 1: and I'm about an have wolf person, but let's let's
- 1:40:01Speaker 1: let's at least talk with a little bit of like,
- 1:40:04Speaker 1: you know, have it be slightly reality tinged when we
- 1:40:07Speaker 1: talk about it. This idea that they you know, this
- 1:40:09Speaker 1: this Farley Moat oversimplification that came from the movie Um,
- 1:40:13Speaker 1: you know the never cry wolf thing that they like
- 1:40:15Speaker 1: trimm disease from the herd. They prey on calves and
- 1:40:21Speaker 1: pregnant females of pregnant females, your most valuable animal. It's like,
- 1:40:26Speaker 1: I understand, like it's fine to like wolves, but why
- 1:40:29Speaker 1: can't we just can't just like them as what they
- 1:40:32Speaker 1: are and not act like there's like these magical creatures. Well,
- 1:40:36Speaker 1: the trophic cascade argument is does have a very strong
- 1:40:39Speaker 1: correlation to systems in which people have been removed. So
- 1:40:45Speaker 1: this that's not a joke, right. It's like, if you
- 1:40:49Speaker 1: can the trophic cascade argument in in a vacuum in
- 1:40:52Speaker 1: which human beings don't exist, works great. You apply that
- 1:40:57Speaker 1: onto a system that's highly highly managed for wildlife over
- 1:41:04Speaker 1: human use interaction, like a national park. Um, you can
- 1:41:10Speaker 1: see it like applied there and see how yep, these
- 1:41:13Speaker 1: dots can connect. But it doesn't do us all that
- 1:41:16Speaker 1: much good in working situations where you know, human beings
- 1:41:22Speaker 1: are active on the landscape. Yeah, it's like that that
- 1:41:25Speaker 1: quote we talked about before describing Yellowstone is blank um
- 1:41:30Speaker 1: square miles of paradise surrounded by reality. Brody kind of
- 1:41:34Speaker 1: hit on an interesting point. Where Brody talked about not
- 1:41:36Speaker 1: wanting to compete with wolves, and I think it's funny
- 1:41:39Speaker 1: that how it's funny how much people tiptoe around that. Sure,
- 1:41:46Speaker 1: I mean, but I don't think there's anything wrong with
- 1:41:48Speaker 1: saying that, UM. I don't think there's anything wrong was
- 1:41:51Speaker 1: saying that that I value um having a resource to
- 1:41:57Speaker 1: be available to people, at least the knowledge I'm saying, like, yes,
- 1:42:01Speaker 1: I think that I like having elk, and like I'm
- 1:42:04Speaker 1: fine having elk and deer on the landscape because people
- 1:42:08Speaker 1: want them and we have like regulated legal hunting for them,
- 1:42:12Speaker 1: and so I'm fine having to be that we acknowledge that.
- 1:42:15Speaker 1: But people act like it's like it's it's a taboo perspective.
- 1:42:20Speaker 1: I like eating milk, And I think that there's a
- 1:42:22Speaker 1: lot of people in the wolf reintroduction world that don't
- 1:42:25Speaker 1: mind that are in the back of their head. They'll
- 1:42:28Speaker 1: never admit it. In the back of the head. They
- 1:42:29Speaker 1: do kind of like to stick it to hunters a
- 1:42:31Speaker 1: little bit like this is one guy like that one
- 1:42:33Speaker 1: of the chief marketing officers, like the CMO of the
- 1:42:36Speaker 1: wolf world, even what he called he talks about the
- 1:42:39Speaker 1: recreational big game killing industry. Like that's his viewpoint on hunting.
- 1:42:44Speaker 1: And I think he's like he used to hunt, but
- 1:42:45Speaker 1: then he quit. Um, and that's like how he typifies
- 1:42:49Speaker 1: the hunting world to say, like, oh, the only people
- 1:42:51Speaker 1: that that don't want a bunch of wolves is the
- 1:42:53Speaker 1: recreational big game killing industry. Um, as though it's like
- 1:42:57Speaker 1: naughty to go hunting. But I can say this because
- 1:43:00Speaker 1: at one point I did hunt so peasant or something.
- 1:43:07Speaker 1: Oh I don't know, man, tell me why, Like, give
- 1:43:10Speaker 1: me your perspective on it, Like can you talk like
- 1:43:12Speaker 1: as a person or you gotta stay all official gas bar?
- 1:43:16Speaker 1: Oh no, hit me, what's your question? Sell me? I'm
- 1:43:19Speaker 1: not liking wolves in Colorado unless you don't even care
- 1:43:22Speaker 1: to sell me on that. Yeah. I think the discussion
- 1:43:25Speaker 1: we're having here really is whether or not a reintroduction
- 1:43:28Speaker 1: is appropriate. Right. Look, I mean wolves are coming down, Um,
- 1:43:32Speaker 1: they've migrated in. It's not going to be long before
- 1:43:35Speaker 1: we have an established pack in Colorado and they're going
- 1:43:38Speaker 1: to coexist. I think that question is a foregone conclusion
- 1:43:42Speaker 1: at this point. Um. You know I'm sympathetic to what
- 1:43:46Speaker 1: you said. Look, you know I'm a big game hunter.
- 1:43:48Speaker 1: I spend a month in the field during archery season,
- 1:43:51Speaker 1: chasing elk every year, and it's my passion and it's
- 1:43:53Speaker 1: what I like to do. And I would be lying
- 1:43:55Speaker 1: if I said anything other than I'm worried about the
- 1:43:58Speaker 1: impact it will have on the big game populations. But
- 1:44:02Speaker 1: I don't think you can evaluate all of this in
- 1:44:04Speaker 1: a vacuum either, right, Brody touched on it. We've got
- 1:44:08Speaker 1: I live in northwest Colorado and we've got tremendous problems
- 1:44:12Speaker 1: with both our deer and our elk herd up there.
- 1:44:14Speaker 1: At the moment um, you know, it's accountable to changes
- 1:44:18Speaker 1: in habitat loss um. Drought conditions were incredibly severe last year,
- 1:44:24Speaker 1: our caffe recruitments somewhere in like the low thirty percent
- 1:44:27Speaker 1: at the moment the expanding outdoor recreation is having devastating
- 1:44:31Speaker 1: impacts on that piece as well, And so to layer
- 1:44:34Speaker 1: one additional UM component that will add strain to the
- 1:44:37Speaker 1: herd seems to me like we're getting pretty close to
- 1:44:40Speaker 1: the to the tipping point. And UM, I I come
- 1:44:44Speaker 1: from the vantage point that we need to take a
- 1:44:46Speaker 1: holistic perspective of all of this. UM. Wildlife management doesn't
- 1:44:50Speaker 1: exist in a vacuum, and Uh, you know, my experience
- 1:44:54Speaker 1: has been that the proponents of the wolf reintroduction are
- 1:44:58Speaker 1: interested in exclusively that peace. Um, I don't think they
- 1:45:02Speaker 1: have given honest assessment to the impacts across the board.
- 1:45:06Speaker 1: And you know, I'm relatively agnostic as to whether or
- 1:45:09Speaker 1: not there's a population of wolves in the state. I
- 1:45:12Speaker 1: would prefer that they come in naturally and that the
- 1:45:15Speaker 1: state maintains management authority. Um. You know, call me a skeptic,
- 1:45:21Speaker 1: but I am skeptical of of the reintroduction process. I mean,
- 1:45:25Speaker 1: when you look through the timeline of the listing and
- 1:45:29Speaker 1: d listing decisions that occurred with the introduced populations in
- 1:45:33Speaker 1: Idaho and Wyoming, in some cases they were taken off
- 1:45:36Speaker 1: and put back on the list, um, you know, upwards
- 1:45:39Speaker 1: of six different times. And we have far far exceeded
- 1:45:43Speaker 1: the recovery objectives in all of those cases. So it's
- 1:45:46Speaker 1: you know, to think that the plan that we come
- 1:45:49Speaker 1: up with as a state is going to have some
- 1:45:51Speaker 1: long lasting effect and won't be uh, you know, affected
- 1:45:56Speaker 1: by the long history of litigation efforts that we've seen.
- 1:45:59Speaker 1: I think is is a foolish perspective and so yeah,
- 1:46:02Speaker 1: I'm skeptical of the reintroduction effort on that account. You know.
- 1:46:06Speaker 1: By way of example, um, I think there was like
- 1:46:10Speaker 1: thirty one wolves that were introduced in total um in Idaho.
- 1:46:14Speaker 1: That was like the state didn't get uh the ability
- 1:46:19Speaker 1: to hunt them until two thousand and nine. Their their
- 1:46:23Speaker 1: recovery objective, if I remember correctly, was tin wolves or
- 1:46:27Speaker 1: tin populate or tin packs are tin packs or a
- 1:46:30Speaker 1: hundred plus wolves, And by two thousand and nine, when
- 1:46:34Speaker 1: the state finally got the management prescription and the ability
- 1:46:37Speaker 1: to harvest them via hunter, there was something like eight
- 1:46:40Speaker 1: hundred and fifty wolves and so um. Yeah, to think
- 1:46:45Speaker 1: that once our recovery objective in the state is achieved
- 1:46:48Speaker 1: in the state, at that point will is assume full
- 1:46:52Speaker 1: management authority and we will be able to keep the
- 1:46:56Speaker 1: population in check. From an eco ecosystem perspective, I just
- 1:47:00Speaker 1: I don't have much faith in that outcome. No, dude,
- 1:47:03Speaker 1: they'll they'll dick you. They'll they'll dick you around so
- 1:47:05Speaker 1: bad you'll never see the end of it. It's like
- 1:47:08Speaker 1: they it's kind of the playbook. And you know, I
- 1:47:11Speaker 1: would play dirty too if I was trying to get
- 1:47:13Speaker 1: what I wanted around wildlife. But they'll it's a playbook
- 1:47:17Speaker 1: that they're like, oh no, no no, no, no, it's just
- 1:47:19Speaker 1: gonna go like this. Then we'll hand it over to
- 1:47:21Speaker 1: the state and it'll be like this number and there
- 1:47:24Speaker 1: won't be these kind of restrictions, and then you get it,
- 1:47:28Speaker 1: it goes way longer, and then they will legally block
- 1:47:31Speaker 1: you in the courts from ever getting what the concessions
- 1:47:34Speaker 1: that were supposed to be made in terms of the reintroduction. Yeah,
- 1:47:38Speaker 1: and you're talking about an initiative that what was it,
- 1:47:43Speaker 1: gas bar, Like fifty four out of sixty four counties
- 1:47:46Speaker 1: voted against. Uh, yeah, so it passed in only twelve
- 1:47:52Speaker 1: of the sixty four counties statewide. And you know, remember
- 1:47:56Speaker 1: that the the initiatives said that introduction could only occur
- 1:48:00Speaker 1: west of the Continental Divide, so you know, effectively the
- 1:48:03Speaker 1: western half of the state and only four of the
- 1:48:07Speaker 1: counties west of the Continental Divide supported it. Um. But
- 1:48:11Speaker 1: you know, look, Boulder County supported it with a margin
- 1:48:13Speaker 1: of sixty to thirty two, and Boulder Counties kind of
- 1:48:16Speaker 1: our our our liberal hot spot in the state, whereas
- 1:48:20Speaker 1: Rio Blanco County, UM, a location that's very likely to
- 1:48:24Speaker 1: be picked as a reintroduction location, denied it. To twelve,
- 1:48:29Speaker 1: the average no voting counties in the area that would
- 1:48:32Speaker 1: be affected was sixty. This is a trend that we've
- 1:48:35Speaker 1: seen in all of the ballot majors, you know, dating
- 1:48:38Speaker 1: back to to the the constitutional ban on trapping as
- 1:48:43Speaker 1: well as the uh, the bear hunting restrictions that we
- 1:48:46Speaker 1: saw in the state. And so yeah, yeah, it's very
- 1:48:49Speaker 1: much an urban rural divide. Huh. All right, So that
- 1:48:55Speaker 1: that was time for the crystal ball question. Do you
- 1:48:58Speaker 1: think that, I don't know why you wouldn't think this,
- 1:49:02Speaker 1: but do you think that whatever, three years whatever, they
- 1:49:05Speaker 1: will be opening up crates and cutting loose new wolves
- 1:49:13Speaker 1: or do you think that somehow the existing population that's
- 1:49:17Speaker 1: got there on its own, would you know, it would
- 1:49:22Speaker 1: develop expand become healthy and self sustaining and they would
- 1:49:27Speaker 1: somehow magically be like, oh, never mind, We're just gonna
- 1:49:30Speaker 1: stick with what we got. Or do you think that
- 1:49:32Speaker 1: this is like happening, man, this is going to go down.
- 1:49:36Speaker 1: I think the latter part of what you said is
- 1:49:38Speaker 1: going to be true. Under either circumstance. The population that's
- 1:49:42Speaker 1: here is going to continue to breed. I do think
- 1:49:45Speaker 1: that the Parks and Wildlife Commission will develop a plan
- 1:49:49Speaker 1: for reintroduction of wolves. They are pursuing what's called this
- 1:49:53Speaker 1: preliminary ten j uh. It's never been done. Colorado will
- 1:49:57Speaker 1: be the first state that has actively, from a state
- 1:50:00Speaker 1: initiated perspective pursuit of reintroduction of of a wolf population
- 1:50:05Speaker 1: um on the assumption that the wolf goes back on
- 1:50:08Speaker 1: the list in the next three years. And I think
- 1:50:10Speaker 1: that's a high likelihood. I think there are serious questions
- 1:50:14Speaker 1: that remain as to whether or not US Fish and
- 1:50:17Speaker 1: Wildlife Service will ultimately approve a reintroduction plan in light
- 1:50:22Speaker 1: of the existing wolf population in the state. Man, the
- 1:50:27Speaker 1: wolves are almost screwing themselves. The wolves that we're going
- 1:50:32Speaker 1: to get dropped off probably the wolves that we're going
- 1:50:35Speaker 1: to get dropped off into the happy hunting grounds. They're like, man,
- 1:50:39Speaker 1: we're probably piste about the wolves that walked down there.
- 1:50:43Speaker 1: But the wolves walked down they're gonna be tough. They're
- 1:50:46Speaker 1: forged by fire man m hm. Disney. But you know,
- 1:50:52Speaker 1: the gas bar brought up a good point to me,
- 1:50:55Speaker 1: which is like it's all over, but the crime right
- 1:50:59Speaker 1: there commings. So hunters should they just need to accept it, right,
- 1:51:04Speaker 1: Like you've got to like accept it and kind of
- 1:51:07Speaker 1: be part of the process. At this man, the worst
- 1:51:10Speaker 1: thing you can do is the smoke pack of day philosophy.
- 1:51:15Speaker 1: You know, tell you what, be a part of the
- 1:51:22Speaker 1: conversation in a meaningful way. Yeah, there will be a
- 1:51:27Speaker 1: lot of people that will get like, you know, there's
- 1:51:29Speaker 1: some people that that it's to say, it's the crowd
- 1:51:32Speaker 1: that quit waterfowl hunting when they had to stop using lead.
- 1:51:36Speaker 1: There will be people. There will be people that that, uh,
- 1:51:43Speaker 1: don't have a lot of gur and we'll like up
- 1:51:46Speaker 1: it over. I'll be like I quit hunting by God
- 1:51:50Speaker 1: when the wolves. And then there'll be people who are
- 1:51:52Speaker 1: just who get after it and figure stuff out and
- 1:51:54Speaker 1: they'll keep doing well. But I'm telling you, man, it'll
- 1:51:59Speaker 1: be yeah, a shock to the system. Right. They eat
- 1:52:03Speaker 1: seven pounds of meat a day, so just get a
- 1:52:07Speaker 1: calculator out right, it's just a reality what hey, what
- 1:52:11Speaker 1: is the uh? Is there an initial number that they've
- 1:52:15Speaker 1: got a goal for? Well? No, and you know this
- 1:52:18Speaker 1: is really where the meat and the potatoes if this
- 1:52:20Speaker 1: plan comes together, and why sportsmen need to continuously engage
- 1:52:24Speaker 1: themselves in this process, right, because there are questions about
- 1:52:29Speaker 1: how many wolves will constitute a recovery objective where they
- 1:52:34Speaker 1: will be reintroduced um. You know, all of these questions
- 1:52:38Speaker 1: are going to be crafted um by the Commission over
- 1:52:41Speaker 1: the course of the next three years. And my hope
- 1:52:44Speaker 1: is that we as a sportsman community can engage in
- 1:52:47Speaker 1: this rather than just throwing our suckers in the dirt
- 1:52:49Speaker 1: and being upset about the fact that we lost at
- 1:52:51Speaker 1: the ballot, and engage in the process to develop what
- 1:52:55Speaker 1: could be the most thoughtful and well thought out planned.
- 1:52:58Speaker 1: But we broke this discussion last year and the legislation
- 1:53:02Speaker 1: we were trying to craft, and I've heard numbers as
- 1:53:05Speaker 1: high as two hundred and fifty UM. I think from
- 1:53:08Speaker 1: our perspective, we're looking at a closer a number closer
- 1:53:12Speaker 1: to around fifty UM. The precedents in other states, of course,
- 1:53:16Speaker 1: was ten packs or a hundred wolves. UM. Now when
- 1:53:21Speaker 1: you over the lay the landscapes of Idaho in Montana
- 1:53:26Speaker 1: versus you know, the western half of Colorado, I think
- 1:53:29Speaker 1: it lends itself to a lower number. Something I got
- 1:53:33Speaker 1: way more habitat here man, Yeah, exactly. And so but
- 1:53:36Speaker 1: it doesn't matter because they'll say, here's the thing. It
- 1:53:38Speaker 1: doesn't matter because they'll you'll agree on let's say you
- 1:53:41Speaker 1: agree on a hundred hunter hunters, good number, everybody can
- 1:53:45Speaker 1: live with a hundred. And then you'll get to hundred
- 1:53:49Speaker 1: fifty two and someone will be like, Okay, we're gonna
- 1:53:52Speaker 1: deal list and go to state management. And then you'll
- 1:53:55Speaker 1: fight lawsuits for twenty years and then it just doesn't matter.
- 1:54:00Speaker 1: That's the word. Yeah, it does not matter. It will
- 1:54:03Speaker 1: never You'll never get it undone. It'll just be. It'll
- 1:54:07Speaker 1: become like a thing that gets litigated to the point
- 1:54:09Speaker 1: where it'll just it'll find its number. I mean, it
- 1:54:13Speaker 1: took forever here, and it's so tenuous here. The history
- 1:54:16Speaker 1: has indicated that. And unfortunately, whatever plan we come up
- 1:54:19Speaker 1: with won't supersede. Uh. You know, federal statutes under es
- 1:54:25Speaker 1: a right and so our our plan will continuously play
- 1:54:28Speaker 1: second fiddle to the ongoing national es a discussion around
- 1:54:32Speaker 1: listing and delisting. And it's an unfortunate reality because, as
- 1:54:37Speaker 1: you mentioned, Steve, they're on their way here. We're gonna
- 1:54:40Speaker 1: have a population of wolves in Colorado in the next
- 1:54:44Speaker 1: couple of years before any of this is implemented. You
- 1:54:48Speaker 1: know what cracks me about the like the winey ass,
- 1:54:52Speaker 1: the wolf protection crowd is that you know, like you
- 1:54:56Speaker 1: look at Wisconsin right where they hit recovery objective, you
- 1:55:00Speaker 1: know eons ago they get way over recovery objective. But
- 1:55:04Speaker 1: then they have a hunt and they set a quota
- 1:55:06Speaker 1: and they go over to quota and everybody's all up
- 1:55:08Speaker 1: stem like home, when did you people start caring about quotas?
- 1:55:12Speaker 1: You never cared about the recovery objective number? That like
- 1:55:14Speaker 1: became like a completely like you never cared about surpassing that.
- 1:55:18Speaker 1: But all of a sudden they go over a hunt
- 1:55:19Speaker 1: quote and everybody acts like they're married to these numbers.
- 1:55:21Speaker 1: So you don't care about the numbers? Yeah, like what
- 1:55:24Speaker 1: just unfolded? It was it Wisconsin where they but I'm like,
- 1:55:29Speaker 1: they went way over. But you guys have we've been
- 1:55:32Speaker 1: over the quota that you liked for twenty years, right,
- 1:55:37Speaker 1: and like, so don't act like all of a sudden,
- 1:55:40Speaker 1: like you really care about all the numbers being right
- 1:55:42Speaker 1: becase you don't give a about they only care about
- 1:55:44Speaker 1: certain numbers. It's it's indefensible too, because you also have
- 1:55:47Speaker 1: to be like, you know, you guys really screwed up
- 1:55:50Speaker 1: because all the other times wildlife science, wildlife management, Uh,
- 1:55:56Speaker 1: deals in perfect scenarios, there are normal mistakes when it's
- 1:56:01Speaker 1: done right, you know, when you're dealing with wild animals
- 1:56:04Speaker 1: and social science at the same time. Kills me. Which
- 1:56:09Speaker 1: is why all these discussions need to take place within
- 1:56:14Speaker 1: the state game and phish agencies. Right, We've seen an
- 1:56:17Speaker 1: onslaught of legislation all throughout the Rocky Mountain West this
- 1:56:20Speaker 1: year trying to address specific pieces not just you know,
- 1:56:23Speaker 1: well outside of the scope of wolf free introduction, but
- 1:56:26Speaker 1: trying to to manage hunting and angling as a sport
- 1:56:30Speaker 1: wildlife populations in general through through legislation. And I just
- 1:56:34Speaker 1: do not find it to be a proper venue for
- 1:56:38Speaker 1: wildlife management discussions that you know, those discussions need to
- 1:56:41Speaker 1: be led by wildlife professionals, founded on the best available
- 1:56:45Speaker 1: science at the time. Sure, a social element needs to
- 1:56:49Speaker 1: be incorporated in it. And I don't mean to undermine
- 1:56:51Speaker 1: or or discredit the importance of that, but uh, it's
- 1:56:56Speaker 1: been my experience that the legislature has not always yielded
- 1:56:59Speaker 1: the the best wildlife management strategies or policies. Oh, it's
- 1:57:03Speaker 1: the same thing. The State of Montana is just like
- 1:57:07Speaker 1: makes you want to throw up right now. It's like
- 1:57:09Speaker 1: very clear that wildlife is a vehicle for vendetta, Like
- 1:57:18Speaker 1: you're telling me you can look me in the eye
- 1:57:20Speaker 1: and say that this legislation is for animals somehow or
- 1:57:23Speaker 1: is this for who you're talking to, Like it's it's
- 1:57:28Speaker 1: a people thing, not an animal thing. And you know, look,
- 1:57:31Speaker 1: there there are some scenarios where it's been beneficial to write,
- 1:57:35Speaker 1: particularly on funding. We've seen it be advantageous in Pennsylvania
- 1:57:39Speaker 1: and some of the Eastern states on Sunday hunting and
- 1:57:42Speaker 1: blue laws. And so I don't mean to demonize it
- 1:57:44Speaker 1: across the board, um, because there have been occasions where
- 1:57:48Speaker 1: it's been beneficially, but those are like those are those
- 1:57:53Speaker 1: are social that's like social legislation, it's not like wildlife management.
- 1:58:00Speaker 1: That's good point. Uh, this is a tangent to this.
- 1:58:04Speaker 1: But I was looking at, you know, lawsuits to undo
- 1:58:07Speaker 1: the Bernhardt's deal liisting. I'm gonna wind up missing that
- 1:58:10Speaker 1: guy enough and and and more than a handful of ways,
- 1:58:12Speaker 1: but lawsuits looking to undo the the delisting. Now that
- 1:58:18Speaker 1: we've hit recovery objectives and how you always see humane
- 1:58:22Speaker 1: society pop up. It's funny that because they do the
- 1:58:24Speaker 1: nice stuff for dogs. People never realize that it's one
- 1:58:28Speaker 1: of the most powerful anti hunting, anti anti trapping groups
- 1:58:31Speaker 1: out there, like far and away there. Day I was
- 1:58:33Speaker 1: at Murdocks, like Murdock's Ranch supply, you know what, you're
- 1:58:36Speaker 1: like doing the thing and they ask you if you
- 1:58:37Speaker 1: want to donate something. At Murdocks, they ask if you
- 1:58:41Speaker 1: want to donate the Humane Society. Man we're driving, which
- 1:58:44Speaker 1: is like a weird like you're talking to like a
- 1:58:46Speaker 1: ranch community, whether they want to donate to the leading
- 1:58:48Speaker 1: animal rights like the leading animal rights organization of the country.
- 1:58:53Speaker 1: I thought, like, I think, like someone that kind of
- 1:58:55Speaker 1: slipped by someone, we're not about bringing it up with
- 1:58:57Speaker 1: the cashier. We're driving south to town and there's of
- 1:59:00Speaker 1: those anti trapping billboards out that way, and my kids
- 1:59:05Speaker 1: are like, what what is that. I'm like, you know,
- 1:59:08Speaker 1: some people don't like it. Yeah, they masquerade as dog helpers. Hey, Steve,
- 1:59:15Speaker 1: I did bring it up at Murdochs. And you know,
- 1:59:21Speaker 1: it's interesting because she said, yeah, it's like a very
- 1:59:24Speaker 1: hot topic because everybody in there is like, what this
- 1:59:29Speaker 1: doesn't make any sense, and um, it's like the local
- 1:59:34Speaker 1: Humane Society, which is like a different thing than the
- 1:59:37Speaker 1: H S U S. Is that right? Yeah, like they're
- 1:59:41Speaker 1: not connected. I think I think that there is a connection. Man.
- 1:59:50Speaker 1: Well no, because I don't think that the owners of
- 1:59:52Speaker 1: Murdocks and all the employees there would allow that. You
- 1:59:55Speaker 1: need to get your little producer cap on it, colonel
- 2:00:01Speaker 1: sniff it out. Alright, gas Bar, Um, you were born
- 2:00:07Speaker 1: in the US? I was Yeah, were you? I'm asking?
- 2:00:10Speaker 1: Were you? Yeah? Yeah, gas Bar, Para Cone. I just
- 2:00:14Speaker 1: feel like, uh, you know, I don't know Silian namesake?
- 2:00:18Speaker 1: Is it Sicilian? Yeah? That's my people. I know, I
- 2:00:22Speaker 1: know we're good people. Um, we're your are you were
- 2:00:27Speaker 1: your were your folks from Sicily? Are you guys been
- 2:00:30Speaker 1: in the US for a long time? Yeah, third generation
- 2:00:33Speaker 1: American and it's a little throwback name. Man, gas Bar,
- 2:00:35Speaker 1: you're the only gas Bar I know. Well, easy to remember,
- 2:00:41Speaker 1: I said of my grandfather. I am as well. Okay,
- 2:00:44Speaker 1: thanks for coming out and explain this wolf deal man.
- 2:00:46Speaker 1: You'll have to come back a whole bunch and keep
- 2:00:48Speaker 1: us up to speed on it. Be happy to thanks
- 2:00:51Speaker 1: for the time, guys. I'm not totally happy. I mean,
- 2:00:55Speaker 1: you did a great job. I just like, I just man,
- 2:00:58Speaker 1: stuff kind of you got some lingering questions. No, no questions,
- 2:01:03Speaker 1: I just just something about it. I don't like it.
- 2:01:07Speaker 1: I don't like I wish they would have done it.
- 2:01:08Speaker 1: I wish they would have done it like this around
- 2:01:11Speaker 1: as everybody what their opinion about it is. You know
- 2:01:13Speaker 1: what's interesting that, uh, you guys can pull off culling
- 2:01:17Speaker 1: all those geese out of the parks in Denver and
- 2:01:21Speaker 1: feeding them to the food shelters. Uh huh without putting
- 2:01:26Speaker 1: that up for a public vote. Yeah, there's a bit
- 2:01:31Speaker 1: of duplicity in some of the rags on the books.
- 2:01:34Speaker 1: I would be denying if I said otherwise. Yeah, the voting,
- 2:01:38Speaker 1: the voting on this stuff. I know this will never happen.
- 2:01:41Speaker 1: I mean, just to be ridiculous, to demonstrate ridiculousness. Will
- 2:01:44Speaker 1: it be like some day they'll be like, we're gonna
- 2:01:46Speaker 1: have a vote, and we're gonna ask you everyone in
- 2:01:48Speaker 1: the state. Should the pheasant limit be two or three?
- 2:01:52Speaker 1: That's the way it's going. I mean, well, and you know,
- 2:01:56Speaker 1: we have allocation questions before the legislature here. Now there's
- 2:02:01Speaker 1: a bill out there trying to limit the nonresident tags available.
- 2:02:05Speaker 1: And uh, you know, again, we periodically as a wildlife
- 2:02:09Speaker 1: Commission have gone back and taken a look at season
- 2:02:12Speaker 1: structures and and license allocation distribution between residents and nonresidents,
- 2:02:16Speaker 1: and you know, those take a couple of years there
- 2:02:19Speaker 1: among the more contentious conversations that occur in the state.
- 2:02:23Speaker 1: And you know, here we have kind of just a blanket,
- 2:02:26Speaker 1: one size fits all approach um that would uh set
- 2:02:30Speaker 1: in statute, uh that distribution requirement, and it's drawn uh
- 2:02:36Speaker 1: confrontation on on every side of the discussion, right, which
- 2:02:39Speaker 1: I think just underscores that the venue is not suitable
- 2:02:43Speaker 1: for those type of conversations. That we got one for
- 2:02:48Speaker 1: extending wolf season here in Montana, right, And it's like
- 2:02:51Speaker 1: you talked to a public a vote. Well, no, this
- 2:02:55Speaker 1: was some legislation, and it's just just funny, right because
- 2:03:02Speaker 1: they're like, uh, these folks who introduced this legislation, they
- 2:03:06Speaker 1: don't understand how bad hunters are at killing wolves, and
- 2:03:12Speaker 1: it's like, yeah, we can, we can make wolf hunting
- 2:03:15Speaker 1: season year round. The people who kill wolves are trappers,
- 2:03:20Speaker 1: but they only want to do it when furs good.
- 2:03:23Speaker 1: It's like, you know, the the biological basis is not there,
- 2:03:27Speaker 1: it's the social basis that is the point. Right. Well,
- 2:03:31Speaker 1: and like when they opened up Idaho's wolf harvest for
- 2:03:34Speaker 1: the first time. You know, I think they gave out
- 2:03:36Speaker 1: something like your listeners may tell me I'm way off
- 2:03:38Speaker 1: on this number, but you know it was several thousand tags, right,
- 2:03:42Speaker 1: and they ended up killing like a hundred and thirty
- 2:03:44Speaker 1: or a hundred and forty of them, which was like
- 2:03:47Speaker 1: the best hunting season I think Idaho had right right,
- 2:03:51Speaker 1: Like when she dropped off the table after that once
- 2:03:54Speaker 1: the wolves were like, oh, getting shot at now, trying
- 2:03:57Speaker 1: to move off the road. But with just under a
- 2:04:00Speaker 1: thousand wolves on the landscape, you would expect that hunter
- 2:04:03Speaker 1: harvest uh percentage to be a bit higher than that. Yeah,
- 2:04:07Speaker 1: it's a testament to the difficulty of the hunter harvest
- 2:04:10Speaker 1: approach and management. All right, man, thanks a lot, Thank you.
- 2:04:14Speaker 1: I'm back looking at this picture of Cal. Now, my god,
- 2:04:21Speaker 1: take it easy, buddy, I appreciate it. To wrap up, Cal,
- 2:04:26Speaker 1: plug your deal. Oh so, I guess the day after
- 2:04:33Speaker 1: this podcast will be the Louisiana episode of Cal in
- 2:04:39Speaker 1: the Field. Cal's we can reviewed my my podcast, but
- 2:04:42Speaker 1: something you can see visually on our meat eat or
- 2:04:46Speaker 1: YouTube channel. So the first episode was Trapping Live Trapping
- 2:04:52Speaker 1: grizzly bears with Idaho Fishing game. If you want to
- 2:04:54Speaker 1: see some if you want to see some amazing grizzly
- 2:04:59Speaker 1: bear footage that it's good. It is good, big grizzly
- 2:05:07Speaker 1: in a trap and they work it up and process
- 2:05:09Speaker 1: it and and eventually let it go. And yeah, it's
- 2:05:14Speaker 1: like that. It's incredible good example, like the internal frustrations
- 2:05:18Speaker 1: of being out on something like that. There's just like
- 2:05:21Speaker 1: an overwhelming amount of cool stuff happening and an endless
- 2:05:25Speaker 1: amount of things we could talk about, and it's like,
- 2:05:28Speaker 1: but here's like the most concise version that we could
- 2:05:32Speaker 1: get out to you. That was episode number one, which
- 2:05:34Speaker 1: is tearing it up on YouTube. Are been sitting there?
- 2:05:38Speaker 1: And episode two is Idaho Fisheries. We're talking about getting
- 2:05:44Speaker 1: rewarded for catching rainbow trout, which is is a goofy
- 2:05:47Speaker 1: deal but like bonny hunting rainbows. Hunting rainbows yea yeah,
- 2:05:51Speaker 1: on the South Fork of the Snakes. Another fun one.
- 2:05:54Speaker 1: And then Louisiana, Uh, we do all or we fish
- 2:06:01Speaker 1: for this really cool species called Atlantic triple tale, which
- 2:06:04Speaker 1: is a giant perch and super tasty fish, and you
- 2:06:07Speaker 1: learn about the citizens science going on with a fish
- 2:06:11Speaker 1: that people have been catching in the Gulf of Mexico
- 2:06:12Speaker 1: forever but only got on regulations on gold fisheries regulations
- 2:06:19Speaker 1: within like the last five years. That really surprised me
- 2:06:22Speaker 1: because it's such a highly esteemed eating fish, yes, and
- 2:06:28Speaker 1: such a prized sport fish, but people who like to
- 2:06:31Speaker 1: catch it. It surprised me there's just one of those
- 2:06:33Speaker 1: fish like oh yeah, they're always there, yeah, never never
- 2:06:36Speaker 1: mind those things. I think it's because there's no like
- 2:06:40Speaker 1: specific commercial task, like they only show up as bycatch
- 2:06:46Speaker 1: right bycatch, some folks target them, but you really got
- 2:06:49Speaker 1: to target them with with hooking line, so you know,
- 2:06:53Speaker 1: it's like is it worth people's time to go after
- 2:06:55Speaker 1: him in a in a market sense. And I think
- 2:06:58Speaker 1: it's just kind of an interesting thing that even now,
- 2:07:01Speaker 1: it's like there's so much life in the ocean that
- 2:07:05Speaker 1: we're still getting around to like properly identifying, doing some
- 2:07:09Speaker 1: real I mean, I talked to the one person who's
- 2:07:11Speaker 1: really researched Triple Tale. It's got Jim Frank's He's awesome. Um,
- 2:07:16Speaker 1: there's two fish in this world that I want to
- 2:07:18Speaker 1: catch that I've never caught in Triple Tales. One of
- 2:07:20Speaker 1: them the other one I came. I never it's like
- 2:07:23Speaker 1: a weird mental problem. I can't remember, but I always
- 2:07:25Speaker 1: have to ask Ghanni, Ny, what was the other fish?
- 2:07:26Speaker 1: I want to catch real bad? Oh, there's three fish
- 2:07:31Speaker 1: I want to catch real bad. You're gonna have to
- 2:07:33Speaker 1: give me just a little bit of a hint. It
- 2:07:35Speaker 1: looks like a little shark, but it's not kobia. Yeah
- 2:07:40Speaker 1: they're good man, a triple tail and a kobia and
- 2:07:43Speaker 1: then a she fish. Oh yeah, I'm must fish want
- 2:07:46Speaker 1: to be too? Yeah yeah, and then we yeah, go
- 2:07:53Speaker 1: all over Louisiana, hunt hogs, hunt gallon yule, which is
- 2:07:57Speaker 1: uh a marsh hand and just look at the effects
- 2:08:01Speaker 1: of salt water intrusion and and erosion in Louisiana. And yeah,
- 2:08:07Speaker 1: super wild, fun trip to Louisiana. So when you're shooting
- 2:08:13Speaker 1: at the pig, it looks sounds like you're raiding a
- 2:08:16Speaker 1: m you're raiding a target, Like you're raiding a target
- 2:08:21Speaker 1: out of them, like pretty tight work with a shotgun
- 2:08:24Speaker 1: and thick brush. Oh yeah, you know. The idea is
- 2:08:30Speaker 1: to go in without any judgment and experience things the
- 2:08:37Speaker 1: way people experience them in their places. And yeah, I
- 2:08:41Speaker 1: felt a little down. It's a little odd being like
- 2:08:45Speaker 1: so loaded shotgun bow, the boat boats under underpower, which
- 2:08:50Speaker 1: is storm in there and you're just gonna plow me
- 2:08:54Speaker 1: into a bunch of bushes. And that's how we're hunting hogs.
- 2:08:58Speaker 1: But yeah, it looks like it's like that. It's like
- 2:09:03Speaker 1: apocalypse now when the tiger comes. Yeah, just like firing
- 2:09:07Speaker 1: into some grass. I mean you can see what you
- 2:09:08Speaker 1: were doing. I'm not trying to make it like it
- 2:09:10Speaker 1: was unsafe, but it's just it's it's a it's a
- 2:09:12Speaker 1: good clip. Uh but yeah, you know, trying to take
- 2:09:18Speaker 1: a look at some different conservation issues. See how folks
- 2:09:22Speaker 1: you know, are exploring their spaces as they change over
- 2:09:27Speaker 1: time and different parts of the world. And it's been
- 2:09:30Speaker 1: super fun and and always very interesting. So good work
- 2:09:35Speaker 1: everybody check it out now. How I feel like if
- 2:09:38Speaker 1: you wanted to find it, like how people actually find stuff,
- 2:09:41Speaker 1: you'd go cal in the field into your YouTube search engine.
- 2:09:47Speaker 1: Would be real easy, call in the field, yep. Start with.
- 2:09:51Speaker 1: A smart thing to do would be go to YouTube
- 2:09:53Speaker 1: search meat meat eater and hit that subscribe button. Who
- 2:09:56Speaker 1: fill out Phil, Thanks, thank you all right, buddy. Thanks
- 2:10:04Speaker 1: tuning in. We got man, do you a lot of
- 2:10:06Speaker 1: tid landing things we didn't talk about but we'll talk
- 2:10:09Speaker 1: about him later, including yeah, I'm gonna do it like
- 2:10:12Speaker 1: how they do it in real shows man, like when
- 2:10:16Speaker 1: you do a teaser next week on I don't know
- 2:10:18Speaker 1: about it'll be next week, but including um, same sex
- 2:10:24Speaker 1: relationships and critters. I was waiting for Korean's like musical outra.
- 2:10:33Speaker 1: Thanks everybody,