Latest / The MeatEater Podcast / Ep. 947: Are You Happy to See Me or Is That a Bird in Your Pants?

Transcript

Ep. 947: Are You Happy to See Me or Is That a Bird in Your Pants? · The MeatEater Podcast

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the news show, everybody. This week, we've got
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: Jordan Sillers here at the news desk, which is news
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: in and of itself, but he's going to cover some
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: news too. We got a bobcat poaching ring of criminals
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: who desperately need to sharpen their pencils. What happens when
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: a youth deer season hunting team starts losing some of
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: their senior talent? Where are you most likely to get
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: killed by hitting a deer with your vehicle? It's Delaware's
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: turn to deal with CWD, so get ready for that
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: civil war. Bird smugglers stuff birds down their panties. I
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: feminized it.
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: That's fine.
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Underwear. No one cares about that story.
• 0:48
  Speaker 3: Briefs.
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Let me try this. We should AAB test this.
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: Bird smugglers stuff birds down their briefs.
• 0:59
  Speaker 2: That's alliteration.
• 0:59
  Speaker 4: I like that.
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: Versus bird smugglers stuff birds down their panties. That's going
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: to do way better.
• 1:06
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I think panties will hit harder for the SEO.
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: And more. But first, Operation Night Cat. Now, before I
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: get into Operation Night Cat, I always thought, I always
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: was under the impression that when you name an operation,
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: you use code language. Yeah. Like my favorite while my
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: favorite by far of all time poaching bust was operation
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: North shore.
• 1:34
  Speaker 3: That was the one in, in Ohio.
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: It was the giant deer meat, smoky taxidermy walleye tournament
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: ring racketeering, everything you love racketeering, wire fraud, all the
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: bad sounding crimes. But then when you get into it,
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: it's basically dudes were shooting deer in making smoky sticks,
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: selling smoky sticks in bars, and then taking that money
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: to pay their taxidermy. And then one day, one of
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: them runs off and catches a bunch of walleyes somewhere,
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: goes off to another state, joins a walleye tournament at
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: a gas station, wins. And so then he had all
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: these fraud and racketeering charges. The wire fraud was because...
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: one of them, a guy poached a deer and he
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: had a girlfriend call the hotline to, to report the deer.
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: So when you read it, it was like reading Al Capone's.
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: It was like, like you're reading like Al Capone's rap sheet. Yeah.
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: But it was like this big venison smoky ring. Anyways,
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: they didn't call it operation venison smoky. So operation night cat.
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: I feel that if you, let's say you were a
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: Bobcat poacher and you're poaching them at night and someone's like,
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: Hey man, I heard that there's this operation brewing called
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: Operation Nightcap. One might go, jeez.
• 3:01
  Speaker 3: I better be careful.
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: I wonder if that involves me. That's why you can't
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: do that.
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: I wonder, honestly, though, if they just make those up
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: for the press release afterwards. And if they actually use
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: the operation name when they're talking about it.
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: I don't know. I don't know. Oh.
• 3:15
  Speaker 4: But you would think it's only internally that they're using it.
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: That's another thing. No.
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: Because you've got inside moles, man. They're probably just like,
• 3:23
  Speaker 2: the case about the Bobcats. That's probably what they, when
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: they're talking to each other, like, what are you working
• 3:28
  Speaker 2: on today? Oh, the case about the Bobcats.
• 3:30
  Speaker 4: Yeah, Bobcats.
• 3:31
  Speaker 3: I'm sure we can get law enforcement or game warden
• 3:34
  Speaker 3: to write in.
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: If someone in New Hampshire can write in, we'd mighty
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: appreciate it. Were you guys, just admit it. You shouldn't
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: have called it Operation Nightcat because you're going to tip
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: off the offenders.
• 3:46
  Speaker 3: I'd just like to know who gets to choose. There's
• 3:48
  Speaker 3: someone that gets to pick the name. A bunch of
• 3:50
  Speaker 3: people put names in.
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: I would have called it Operation Rolling Thunder.
• 3:54
  Speaker 3: They already used that one. Wasn't that?
• 3:55
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: Okay. Epic Fury.
• 3:57
  Speaker 3: There you go.
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: Desert Storm.
• 4:00
  Speaker 2: I don't know.
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: I would have come up with something novel and called
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: it that. Anyways, here's what Operation Nightcat is all about.
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: It's one of these ones. I'm not in any way, shape,
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: or form downplaying the crimes that we're going to get into.
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: These are serious wildlife crimes. But what I like is
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: when a poaching ring winds up racking up a lot
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: of terminology that makes you feel like it's something much worse.
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: This is an international poaching ring. But what happens is this. Well,
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: first off, let me tell you why we're talking about it.
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: Just right now, a bunch of these guys, three of
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: these gentlemen involved in this Bobcat poaching ring in New Hampshire,
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: they've already pled guilty to state charges, but now they're
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: dealing with their federal stuff. And they're going to be
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: sentenced in October 20. And just now, this month, they
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: pled guilty to some federal stuff, and they got sentencing
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: coming up in January. But here's what these guys were
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: up to. It's kind of an interesting deal these guys
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: had going on. I didn't know this till this came out.
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: I had no idea. New Hampshire is one of these states.
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: And it's a dumb rule. They have a dumb rule.
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: And I didn't break the rule. So I can say
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: that it's a dumb rule. They have a dumb rule
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: where they have no bobcat hunting in New Hampshire. I
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: had no idea. I learned the other day, I saw
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: a headline. This is something we, can you add this
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: for the new show? California, there's a little movement in
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: California about bringing bobcat hunting back. Wow. That never happens.
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: So for some dumb reason that I don't understand, New
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: Hampshire has no bobcat hunting season, no bobcat trapping season,
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: no bobcat hunting season. So these dudes in New Hampshire
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: are licking their lips about how they could be making
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: all this money trapping cats and hunting cats. All of
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: them are... New Hampshire State Prison Corrections Officers. Some retired
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: and some not. The main ones is this dude, Sherwood Dubry. Dubry.
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: I ought to drop the R. Follows him just to
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: be Sherwood Duby. Randy Inman. These two are 48 and 49.
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: So these are like dudes I'd be hanging out with age-wise, right?
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: They're in my little pockets. And Sherwood Dubree Sr., who's 72.
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: So you got these two guys, one of them's dad,
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: all corrections officers. And they want to start getting into
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: the Bobcat trade, but they live in a state where
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: they can't trade in Bobcats. So between 2018 and 2022,
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: they're trapping and hunting cats. And they get like a
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: little bait station going. They got thermal scopes. They got
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: traps out. And they start harvesting bobcats. They harvest a
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: total of 41 bobcats during the period that they're looking
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: at these guys' activity. But bobcats are a sighties species.
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: The reason bobcats are a sighties species isn't because bobcats
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: are threatened or endangered by any stretch. They're not, but
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: they're a spotted cat. And many cats around the globe
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: that are spotted are threatened and endangered. And so in
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: order to monitor bobcat movements, you put a CITES tag
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: on them. And it's meant to avoid confusion between other
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: endangered spotted cats.
• 7:39
  Speaker 3: And the states issue those CITES tags, correct?
• 7:43
  Speaker 5: Yes.
• 7:43
  Speaker 3: And New Hampshire does not issue those tags.
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: There are a handful of things like this. We've talked
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: about this in the past, but just as an example.
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: In Texas... where Jordan Sillars comes from. That's right.
• 7:55
  Speaker 2: Great state of Texas.
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: In the great state of Texas, check this out. In
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: the great state of Texas, there is no closed season
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: on bobcats. There is no bag limit on bobcats. There
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: is no salvage requirement on bobcats. Meaning 365 days a year,
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: you could shoot bobcats in Texas and throw them in
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: a ditch. No problem.
• 8:21
  Speaker 4: Or not even pick them up.
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: Or not even go even move them. Yeah. You don't
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: even need to do the work it would require to
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: put them in a ditch. Just not even go over there.
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: You don't need to go over and even look to
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: see if you got it or not. And you're a-okay
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: in Texas. But if you want to sell a Texas
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: bobcat or move a bobcat from Texas to the Oklahoma panhandle,
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: you got to go get a CITES tag on it
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: because they're very... interested in how spotted cats move.
• 8:51
  Speaker 3: When you say move, you mean?
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: Cross state lines. Right.
• 8:54
  Speaker 3: And in the markets. They're the product or whatever. Humans
• 8:59
  Speaker 3: moving their hides.
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: Humans moving the hides. And you're like, well, are bobcats endangered? No,
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: not at all. They're like, the IUCN has them listed
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: as a species of least concern. But there are many
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: very imperiled spotted cats, like the snow leopard, for instance.
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: And so When you see a spotted cat on the market,
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: it's just calling out, yo, this is a bobcat, not
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: some crazy spotted cat that's in danger. So they can't
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: sell their cats. Not only are they illegal getting them
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: in New Hampshire, but they can't sell them. They can't
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: send them out of New Hampshire legally to a fur market.
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: If they were in a situation where, let's say, they
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: weren't allowed to get muskrats or something like that, that
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: are not a society species, this whole thing probably would
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: have never been detected. But what they had to do
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: is they had to get their cats and send them
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: to a buddy who's in a cat state. So they
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: sent them to their buddy in New York and their
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: buddy in New York goes down. and he's like, Hey, yo,
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: I caught these in New York. And he gets side.
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: He's tags on them. Then they sent them to a
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: Canadian auction house and sell them the rub. So when
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: I heard this, I was like, oh, I could see
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: that they were tempted. Like I said, they were licking
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: their lips at the cat market. But it turns out
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: that the cats these guys are dealing with are cats
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: caught between 2018 and 2022, meaning these 41 cats they
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: got were worth, do a drum roll, Phil. That's pretty good.
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: 65 bucks a piece. That's what I'm saying. This is
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: a poaching ring that you need to sharpen your pencils.
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: Cause when you get into like the fines that these
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: guys have generated about something so stupid. What I did
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: a little, I did a little calculation. During these four years,
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: these three guys who have good jobs are corrections officers.
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: These four guys have made a grand total. Before they
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: divided up their earnings, they've made themselves $ 2, 665.
• 11:08
  Speaker 2: Over four years.
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: Over four years divided by four. What's that per year?
• 11:13
  Speaker 3: That's not a good hourly rate.
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: You're an educated man. You have a doctorate.
• 11:16
  Speaker 2: $ 500 a year, I'd say. So they're making $ 500 a year.
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: Not a lot.
• 11:19
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: You can buy something cool with that.
• 11:24
  Speaker 2: But that's just, then they have to split it up.
• 11:26
  Speaker 2: So each of them.
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: Yeah. But the other day, a friend of mine observed me.
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: I have a diesel truck. He has a diesel truck.
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: He observes me. Every time I fill my truck, I
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: could have bought a Ruger 10-22.
• 11:38
  Speaker 2: Oh, that's depressing.
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: He's like, I just stand there watching that thing go, oh, wow,
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: I could have bought a 10-22 or I could have
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: bought a break open shotgun.
• 11:49
  Speaker 2: Ugh.
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: So yeah, they're making a little scratch. Now, that was good,
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: but I didn't mean it. Did you catch that, Phil?
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: Not at all. I missed it. I wasn't. They're making
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: a little scratch.
• 12:05
  Speaker 4: Oh, yeah.
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: Of the cat market. That was solid.
• 12:07
  Speaker 2: That's pretty good.
• 12:08
  Speaker 3: Cat scratch.
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: Now, had they done it at last year's prices, had
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: they done all these 40 cats at last year's prices,
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: they would have pulled in $ 8, 200. Not bad. Because last year...
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: cats in their surrounding states. Like basically any cat walking
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: last year was worth 200 bucks. So they would have
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: made 8,200. Had they done it all last year, they
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: would have made $ 8, 200. So for their crime that brought
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: them in $ 2, 665, they are now on the hook for
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: $ 20, 500 in restitution and fines. Is that just the state stuff?
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: Because the federal stuff hasn't been Here's the deal about it.
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: If you're a poacher, here's where you've got to start thinking.
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: The state... There's a thing in wildlife law where the
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: state will have a restitution thing. Let's say you were
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: to come to... Let's say you came to... Well, we're
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: sitting in Montana, so we'll do Montana. Let's say you
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: come to Montana and you kill a Boone and Crockett
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: bighorn sheep. You poach a Boone and Crockett bighorn sheep.
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: The state is allowed to say, well, what's that worth? Well,
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: the governor's tag for bighorn sheep and a guy buying
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: the governor's tag is anticipating getting a Boone and Crockett
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: bighorn sheep. Those governor's tags will go for $ 250, 000, $ 300, 000.
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: So the state assigns a value to the wildlife. A
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: small ram has a restitution that's different than the big ram.
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: And a lot of states build in these like trophy
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: restitution fees, meaning if you kill a giant trophy, the
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: restitution goes up. The state restitution in New Hampshire on
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: a bobcat that can't be monetized anyways is 500 bucks.
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: So if you get caught poaching, if you catch a
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: bobcat and sell it for 65 bucks and you get
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: caught poaching for it, it's $ 500 in restitution, not counting
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: your fine. Am I trying to bring a level of like,
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: a level.
• 14:06
  Speaker 2: Of rationality to poaching? These guys aren't real bright, seems
• 14:09
  Speaker 2: like to me. Because the other thing I noticed here is...
• 14:13
  Speaker 2: One of the reasons they were caught and found guilty
• 14:15
  Speaker 2: is because they're sending text messages back and forth to
• 14:18
  Speaker 2: each other. Apparently, some of them said, hey, I know
• 14:21
  Speaker 2: this is wrong, but we're doing it anyway. You know,
• 14:23
  Speaker 2: that kind of stuff. And also videos, it sounds like,
• 14:25
  Speaker 2: of them actually shooting the animals.
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: But here's the thing that demonstrates that they were rational beings.
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: One of them texts another. This shows that they're like
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: thinking people. One of these men sends another one a
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: text message saying, I hope they don't start a Bobcat season.
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: Because that would lead to a lot of competition. Right.
• 14:54
  Speaker 4: They had a monopoly going.
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: He's like, we're making so much money. Wouldn't it suck
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: if other guys could get in on this? And then
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: it was just all legal. Uh, so they got federal
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: sentencing coming up and, and where this, this is the
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: thing we've talked about a lot on the news show.
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: And this is like, this is, there's a thing that
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: gives wildlife law. There's a thing that really gives teeth
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: to wildlife law. And it's like, here's, here's a hot
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: tip to poachers. I, we should do a pamphlet. So
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: you want to be a poacher. I'd be like, number one,
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: the thing, if you are a poacher, If you're a
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: small-scale poacher guy like these guys, there's one thing you've
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: got to have on your fridge on a magnet. Don't
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: send shit to other states. I'm going to leverage the
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: presence of Jordan Sillers, because people are probably sick of
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: hearing me talk about this. Jordan Sillers, you're an expert
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: in law, because you host Blood Trails. Yeah, that's right. Now,
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: why would you, if you're a budding poacher, you're an
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: aspiring poacher, why would you have a fridge magnet That says,
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: don't send shit to other states.
• 16:15
  Speaker 2: Because as soon as you cross state lines, you bring
• 16:18
  Speaker 2: in the feds. And, you know, if you're a criminal,
• 16:21
  Speaker 2: you do not want to involve the federal government in
• 16:24
  Speaker 2: your activities. Because that adds another layer of investigative power,
• 16:29
  Speaker 2: but also another layer of penalties, which you're going to
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: get hit with if you are found guilty of federal
• 16:35
  Speaker 2: crimes as well as state crimes, which is exactly what
• 16:37
  Speaker 2: these guys got.
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: Yeah, because of this thing called the Lacey Act. Right.
• 16:43
  Speaker 4: Do you think these guys are aware of the lacy
• 16:45
  Speaker 4: act when they were they are now they are now
• 16:49
  Speaker 4: but were they when they were uh.
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: I think the last time he used the word lacy
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: was probably lacy lingerie or like you know whatever.
• 16:56
  Speaker 3: Cagney and lacy remember that yeah i feel like these
• 17:01
  Speaker 3: guys they didn't know how bad the the punishment could.
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: Be so the late the lacy act stuff um The
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: Lasiak stuff came about, I can't remember what year, but
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: it kind of came about during the dark ages of
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: wildlife in America, which was late 1800s, early 1900s, when
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: you had this emerging group of conservation leaders, including well-known
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: figures like Theodore Roosevelt and others, who are trying to
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: get a handle on that... States could make all these
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: wildlife laws, but if the states don't get serious about
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: enforcing them, it doesn't matter. Yeah. So a state would
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: come in and they have people, whatever, you know, killing
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: great blue herons and egrets to sell the feathers. And
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: some state says, hey, from now on, you're not allowed
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: to kill great blue herons or egrets. But they don't
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: do anything to stop it. They would pass these laws
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: and then they don't put any money into enforcement. They
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: turn a blind eye. So they came up with this
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: Lacey Act thing where they're like, the feds are very interested.
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: So the feds are like, hey, if you violate a
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: law and cross states, we're going to seize authority. And
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: it was the Lacey Act that really let them start
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: hammering wildlife traffickers and poachers. Because the feds got serious
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: about it before many of the states did. And it
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: still really stings you today. I brought up earlier that guy,
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: A guy took walleye from one state and drove over
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: to do a fishing tournament in another state, right? A
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: guy like that is, like, as innocuous as that might seem,
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: a guy like that is violating LASIAC. If you shoot
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: a deer and turn it into smoky sticks, and you're
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: selling those smoky sticks in Ohio, but then one day
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: you happen to be over in Indiana and sell a
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: batch of your smoky sticks at a bar you like
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: to frequent in Indiana. You just got, now you're in
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: trouble with the feds, man.
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: Yeah. And it only takes one. It's not like your
• 19:03
  Speaker 2: whole operation has to be out of state. It's like
• 19:05
  Speaker 2: one violation where you're carrying that poached animal across state
• 19:09
  Speaker 2: lines and the federal government can get involved.
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: I just heard about a great Lacey Act deal. A
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: guy that got stung on a Lacey Act and it
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: was as simple as this. He had Check this one out.
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: He had poached a deer, I believe in Georgia, but
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: his taxidermist was across state lines. Yep. And bam, federal. Yep.
• 19:33
  Speaker 2: The other thing I noticed with this one is that
• 19:35
  Speaker 2: they shipped him up to Canada. Now, Not knowing anything
• 19:38
  Speaker 2: about the first, you.
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: Know, not much about the first raid. That's the last
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: thing I'll get into.
• 19:41
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Okay.
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: That's the last thing I'll get into.
• 19:42
  Speaker 3: Can I ask a question?
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: Please.
• 19:44
  Speaker 3: How are they, were they jack lighting these things and
• 19:46
  Speaker 3: killing them at night? Like what were they?
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: They were running traps.
• 19:49
  Speaker 3: Okay.
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: Because one of them mentioned, one of them mentioned choking
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: a cat, which means he trapped it and put a,
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: put a noose on it. Like a dog, dog. Yep.
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: With a catcher. Yeah. Put a catch pole on it.
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: There is a catch pole. It should probably be rebranded,
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: but it was a very, very good catch poll, and
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: I happen to have one called the Death Ray. It
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: could maybe use a rebranding, but it's sort of the
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: gold standard of catch polls. But the reason they're sending
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: it up to the international market fur auction.
• 20:27
  Speaker 2: Just a bigger market.
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 20:28
  Speaker 2: Better, better prices.
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Like a lot of country buyers. Like if you,
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: if you caught Bobcats or muskrats, whatever, and you went
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: to a country fur buyer, a local fur buyer, go
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: to a local fur shed and sell your furs. That
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: individual is almost certainly sending them to Canada too. Okay.
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: So they're just sending them up to the big fur
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: auction in Canada, which is where it just becomes international. Right.
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: The reason their cats aren't that valuable is that like the,
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: the color's poor, the fur quality's poor. Like, If they
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: had done, do this, times 40 times 1,100.
• 21:00
  Speaker 3: Steve says times like an elementary kid. Multiply.
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: I'm not sure what you call it, man. 44,000. Had
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: they done this last year in, let's say, Wyoming, they
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: would have made that amount of money. How much money? 44,000.
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: They would have made 44,000 instead of their two grand.
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: So they're also operating in the wrong state. Well, they
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: wouldn't have broke a law in Wyoming because they would
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: have been allowed to catch cats. So, yeah. Poachers got
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: to sharpen their pencils. If, in fact, this was all
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: on their minds. But an interesting case, nonetheless, because it
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: brings in so many aspects of wildlife law. And I'm
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: a sucker for poaching rings. If you ever get tired
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: of doing all those murders and all that, Jordan, on
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: blood trails, You might just think of one that explains....
• 21:56
  Speaker 4: Inside the mind?
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: Like, you know what? Mind of a poacher. Mind of
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: a poacher. That's not bad.
• 22:02
  Speaker 3: Yeah, which brings up, like, you know, maybe they were
• 22:06
  Speaker 3: thinking they were going to make some money, but I
• 22:08
  Speaker 3: think there's also, like, this kind of, like, psychological aspect
• 22:13
  Speaker 3: to where it's exciting to be doing something like you
• 22:15
  Speaker 3: know what i mean they kind of get like addicted
• 22:17
  Speaker 3: to that part listen oh the.
• 22:19
  Speaker 4: Guys that we've talked to that have busted these rings
• 22:21
  Speaker 4: they say that's the number one reason they're in.
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: It yeah i'll tell you what it is like i
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: feel it because i like i've been pulled by all
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: these like when i was young we would thank god
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: never did it across state lines but a dollar let
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: me put this way A dollar made hunting, fishing, trapping
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: is worth a million dollars made like digging a hole.
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: It's just different. Yep. The feeling of that money in
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: your wallet is just different. You know, I remember selling
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: 40 gallons of smelt for a dollar a gallon on
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: the black market. Yeah. In high school. And that 40 bucks,
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: it was like having helium in my pocket. Like, I
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: just felt like, I was like, dude, I'm like, fuck
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: Daniel Boone, dude. And so I think that they're like,
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: they get that money and they're like, I'm old school,
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: Davy Crockett, Daniel Boone, like, like the old hide hunters.
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: It's just, it's just a, it's a kind of money that,
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: To certain individuals, it's a kind of money that just
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: feels different. You're making money doing what you love.
• 23:38
  Speaker 3: And you're pulling a fast one.
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: Oh, I'm not excusing it, man.
• 23:42
  Speaker 3: No, no, I'm saying the pulling the fast one thing,
• 23:44
  Speaker 3: that's part of it.
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: Oh, that appeals to people too. They're getting away with something.
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: I understand. Yeah, I'm not, I find, this is the
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: last thing I'll say on this whole thing, but I
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: get in trouble with my wife all the time for this.
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: I'm often interested in like, I'm more, I'm interested in
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: the stories that people tell themselves. Meaning let's say your
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: wife's saying about two people, you know, and they got
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: a divorce or something. And the one of them did
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: something horrible. I'm often thinking about, well, there's probably two
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: sides of that story. But if you say that to
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: your wife, she gets mad at you. So, so, but
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: I'm often wondering like, what is, you know what I mean?
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: So in these guys, it's bad what they did and
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: they're getting their due, but I'm also curious about what
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: is in their mind.
• 24:36
  Speaker 4: I feel like you're giving them too much credit. I
• 24:38
  Speaker 4: think we should try to get an interview with them
• 24:40
  Speaker 4: to actually speak to these individuals. But yeah, I feel
• 24:44
  Speaker 4: like you're giving them too much credit.
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: What was the credit I gave them?
• 24:49
  Speaker 4: Just that they're walking around thinking that they're Daniel Boone
• 24:52
  Speaker 4: because they made some money.
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: They definitely were. They definitely were. It'll be a short interview.
• 24:59
  Speaker 3: I don't think they're going to agree to the interview
• 25:01
  Speaker 3: in any case.
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: I don't know. All right, on to our news. Our news.
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: That's you, Jordan. Come on, dude. Pull it together.
• 25:18
  Speaker 2: I'm up now. Am I talking about Blood Trails?
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: Yes, sir. Wasn't that why you're here?
• 25:22
  Speaker 2: Yeah. You thought you were going to talk.
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: About the Lacey Act?
• 25:23
  Speaker 2: I thought you were going to tee me up.
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: No, no.
• 25:26
  Speaker 3: You're on your own.
• 25:27
  Speaker 4: It's fine.
• 25:27
  Speaker 3: This is a tight new show, man.
• 25:29
  Speaker 2: It's fine. Yes.
• 25:30
  Speaker 4: Okay.
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: Over to you, Jordan.
• 25:31
  Speaker 2: Thank you, Steve.
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 25:34
  Speaker 2: Blood Trails Season 3 is out now. Episode 1 comes
• 25:40
  Speaker 2: out today. As with the last two seasons, we have
• 25:43
  Speaker 2: eight new episodes that will come out every Thursday over
• 25:47
  Speaker 2: the next eight weeks. So each episode is a different story.
• 25:52
  Speaker 2: I'm really excited about this season. I think we have
• 25:55
  Speaker 2: a nice mix of stories that you may have heard
• 25:59
  Speaker 2: of before, but maybe not in quite this much detail.
• 26:02
  Speaker 2: For example, we're covering the Chai Vang story. murders from
• 26:07
  Speaker 2: up in wisconsin from 2004 so we talked with a
• 26:11
  Speaker 2: bunch of game wardens we talked with uh some of
• 26:14
  Speaker 2: the the families of the victims we talked with our
• 26:16
  Speaker 2: buddy uh yivang i talked with him um and i
• 26:20
  Speaker 2: think we do a good job really covering all sides
• 26:23
  Speaker 2: of of that story and it's a it's horrible it's
• 26:25
  Speaker 2: tragic um what's the first episode that's out today First
• 26:29
  Speaker 2: episode that's out today is kind of the other end
• 26:31
  Speaker 2: of the spectrum. We cover some other cases that really
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: have not gotten any coverage at all. So the episode
• 26:38
  Speaker 2: that's out today is about a high school kid. He
• 26:41
  Speaker 2: was a senior up in Minnesota. He went up to
• 26:46
  Speaker 2: a cabin with a bunch of buddies. They were gonna hunt.
• 26:50
  Speaker 2: They were also gonna party a little bit. And he
• 26:53
  Speaker 2: disappeared the next morning and has never been found. No
• 26:57
  Speaker 2: trace of him has ever been found. Just nothing. He
• 27:00
  Speaker 2: just disappeared.
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: Yep.
• 27:01
  Speaker 2: And so it was kind of chalked up to, well,
• 27:04
  Speaker 2: maybe he just felt because it's a kind of a boggy,
• 27:07
  Speaker 2: you know, marshy area up there. Maybe he fell in
• 27:10
  Speaker 2: one of those, but he never rose up. There's not,
• 27:12
  Speaker 2: his gun was never found. Um, and so they took
• 27:15
  Speaker 2: a pretty hard look at some of the other boys
• 27:16
  Speaker 2: who were at the cabin. And so there's questions even today,
• 27:20
  Speaker 2: you know, who knows what. And so I was able
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: to talk with two of those boys who were there
• 27:25
  Speaker 2: as well as, uh, Noel's brother, um, and some other folks.
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: So it's a good one. One of the problems I have,
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: and I'm not saying I haven't listened to this episode yet.
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: A problem I have with listening to blood trails. Okay.
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: Is oftentimes the guy that did it is it's so
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: clear who did it. All I can think about is
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: how we could go kill that guy without getting caught. Yeah.
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: Or when you got it narrowed down to two people
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: that you'd get them both together, torture them.
• 27:56
  Speaker 2: Hmm.
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: To find out who did it. It's like, I just
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: get so full of revenge. I gotta not listen.
• 28:05
  Speaker 3: I'm like, you.
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: Know that guy did it, man. Someone's just gotta get him.
• 28:12
  Speaker 2: Hey, I get that. And I tell you, the families
• 28:17
  Speaker 2: get that too. In this case, I don't.
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: Know how they live. In some of the past episodes,
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: I don't know how the families can live. That guy 100%
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: did it. Yeah. But they never found the body. So
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: the guy just gets to walk. Right. Yep.
• 28:30
  Speaker 3: Do you got to give your brain a break from
• 28:32
  Speaker 3: these stories now and then like all that dark stuff? I,
• 28:35
  Speaker 3: I don't, it doesn't.
• 28:38
  Speaker 2: It doesn't seem to, I mean, I'm when I'm talking
• 28:41
  Speaker 2: with like, like just the other day, I talked with
• 28:43
  Speaker 2: a mom whose son went missing up in Kalispell and
• 28:49
  Speaker 2: they never found him. And when I'm talking with her,
• 28:51
  Speaker 2: I I'm feeling for her cause I have kids. Um,
• 28:55
  Speaker 2: But I think I'm able to compartmentalize a little bit
• 28:58
  Speaker 2: and not let it affect me in the day-to-day. I
• 29:00
  Speaker 2: will say I have intentionally not covered stories about little
• 29:07
  Speaker 2: kids because there are several pretty famous stories of five-year-old
• 29:13
  Speaker 2: wanders away from camp and it's kind of suspicious.
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: I can see you doing that. That's too sad.
• 29:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah, we might one of these days, but I just can't.
• 29:22
  Speaker 2: I can't really meditate on that for any length of time. So, um,
• 29:26
  Speaker 2: but yeah, bloodshed season three out now.
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: Are there some episodes where you just know who did it?
• 29:33
  Speaker 2: Um, there, there are a few where I have very
• 29:39
  Speaker 2: strong suspicions. And I'm, of course, not the only one.
• 29:42
  Speaker 2: Do you have revenge fantasies? I don't, personally.
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: You don't get that feeling?
• 29:48
  Speaker 2: No, I don't.
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: I start thinking, but man, I don't want to get
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: in trouble. Steve, I.
• 29:55
  Speaker 2: Maybe Brody will get them. Steve, you and I have
• 29:58
  Speaker 2: talked about a number of episodes. One of the things
• 29:59
  Speaker 2: I have learned about you is Steve has a very
• 30:01
  Speaker 2: strong sense of justice.
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: Yeah. When it comes to murdering people, yeah. The Bobcat deal,
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: that's one thing, but this is a whole other level, man.
• 30:09
  Speaker 2: It's a good thing. It's a good thing. I think
• 30:12
  Speaker 2: these victims need advocates, and a lot of times that's
• 30:15
  Speaker 2: their family. But people with that strong sense of justice...
• 30:20
  Speaker 2: It makes me too mad.
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: I've got to turn it off. Yeah.
• 30:23
  Speaker 2: Well, there will be several... I should know who did
• 30:24
  Speaker 2: it right off the bat.
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: There will be.
• 30:25
  Speaker 2: Several you will not like... this season. This first one, actually,
• 30:29
  Speaker 2: there is someone who a lot of people are very
• 30:33
  Speaker 2: suspicious of in this first episode. And there's no smoking
• 30:37
  Speaker 2: gun exactly, but he made some statements that are very
• 30:42
  Speaker 2: concerning about what happened.
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: Do you mind backing up? You mentioned that, is it
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: Chia Vang? Sorry, what was the name?
• 30:51
  Speaker 2: Chai Vang.
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: Chai Vang. Do you mind, people will be familiar, most
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: people will be familiar, but do you mind Touching on
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: that because it'll prop people will remember this and.
• 31:00
  Speaker 2: There's a Nash It was like a national news to
• 31:04
  Speaker 2: 2004 Chai Vang killed six hunters in Northern Wisconsin and
• 31:09
  Speaker 2: wounded two in a shootout in a shootout, right? So
• 31:13
  Speaker 2: what happened was he wandered onto some private land? He
• 31:17
  Speaker 2: got up in a tree stand that you know, it
• 31:20
  Speaker 2: was on private guy walks up says hey, you can't
• 31:22
  Speaker 2: be here This is private land. You have to get
• 31:24
  Speaker 2: out of this tree stand. He comes down and He's walking,
• 31:28
  Speaker 2: he's told to go, according to the guy who found him,
• 31:31
  Speaker 2: he's told to go one way, he goes a different way.
• 31:34
  Speaker 2: But he's, it's kind of, it's amicable, like there's no
• 31:38
  Speaker 2: yelling or anything at this point. The guy that found
• 31:41
  Speaker 2: Chai Vang radios back to the cabin, hey, I found
• 31:44
  Speaker 2: a guy up here in this tree stand. Some guys
• 31:47
  Speaker 2: at the cabin get on ATVs, drive out, and confront Chai,
• 31:52
  Speaker 2: because apparently this had happened a couple times before, trespassers
• 31:55
  Speaker 2: on the property. And so they start yelling at him.
• 31:59
  Speaker 2: He probably yells back. There's this confrontation. Everyone agrees it
• 32:05
  Speaker 2: doesn't get physical. There's no shoving.
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: There's no punching.
• 32:08
  Speaker 2: There's no fighting. The guys that come out from the
• 32:10
  Speaker 2: cabin don't have guns. The only people who have guns
• 32:13
  Speaker 2: are the first guy who found him in the tree
• 32:15
  Speaker 2: stand and Chai Vang. And so at this point, this
• 32:19
  Speaker 2: is where the story, there's some disagreement. Chai Vang's walking away.
• 32:25
  Speaker 2: They see his back tag number. So at this point
• 32:27
  Speaker 2: in Wisconsin, you had to wear a tag on your
• 32:30
  Speaker 2: blaze orange with a number that identified who you were.
• 32:34
  Speaker 2: So they see his back tag number. They say, hey,
• 32:36
  Speaker 2: we're going to call that in. You know, you're going
• 32:37
  Speaker 2: to get in trouble for trespassing. Chai says he's walking away.
• 32:43
  Speaker 2: He looks back and sees the guy who had the gun,
• 32:48
  Speaker 2: the original hunter who confronted him. He says that that
• 32:51
  Speaker 2: guy had the gun, was shouldering it. And then he
• 32:54
  Speaker 2: hears a shot and sees some.
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: Dirt fly up.
• 32:58
  Speaker 2: Everyone else who was there says that didn't happen. They
• 33:00
  Speaker 2: say no one shot, no one ever shot at you.
• 33:04
  Speaker 2: And so Chai turns around. He has a military surplus.
• 33:11
  Speaker 2: I forget the exact model, but it's like an AK, basically.
• 33:14
  Speaker 2: So it's semi-auto, has 10 rounds in it. He turns around.
• 33:18
  Speaker 2: He unclips his scope from his gun because he's only...
• 33:23
  Speaker 2: 25-30 yards away from these guys and start shooting.
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: Yeah, but he had fought in the He had fought
• 33:30
  Speaker 1: in the secret wars. He had not. Oh, he had not.
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: So he wasn't from, he didn't fight in Laos with
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: the Americans.
• 33:36
  Speaker 2: He was too young. His dad did. He was in
• 33:39
  Speaker 2: the Army National Guard in California where he had a,
• 33:44
  Speaker 2: you know, sharpshooter badge, basically. But he never saw combat.
• 33:47
  Speaker 2: So this is something that I assumed when I first
• 33:49
  Speaker 2: heard this story. This guy saw combat You know, he
• 33:53
  Speaker 2: had some form of PTSD and he's just reacting in
• 33:56
  Speaker 2: a way that he had before. But he never did.
• 33:59
  Speaker 2: He never saw any active combat. So he starts shooting
• 34:02
  Speaker 2: all these hunters. And not only does he shoot and
• 34:05
  Speaker 2: kill two of the guys there, he then chases after,
• 34:11
  Speaker 2: there's a father and son who are there. The father
• 34:13
  Speaker 2: runs one way, the son runs the other. He chases
• 34:16
  Speaker 2: after both of them and kills both of them. He
• 34:19
  Speaker 2: chases them down, shoots them in the back, kills both
• 34:21
  Speaker 2: of them. And then, The cabin, there's other people at
• 34:26
  Speaker 2: the cabin, they're getting radio calls. They hear, hey, someone's shooting,
• 34:29
  Speaker 2: send help. So two other people who are at the
• 34:33
  Speaker 2: cabin get on a four-wheeler and drive out, and he
• 34:38
  Speaker 2: also shoots both of them. Neither of them were armed.
• 34:41
  Speaker 2: He claims the one guy was armed, but there was
• 34:43
  Speaker 2: no gun that was ever found. So he shoots both
• 34:45
  Speaker 2: of them in the back as they're driving past him.
• 34:49
  Speaker 2: He shoots and kills both of them, and doesn't kill
• 34:51
  Speaker 2: them immediately either. um, has to finish the job basically on,
• 34:56
  Speaker 2: on both of them.
• 34:57
  Speaker 4: Um, how many people total then?
• 34:59
  Speaker 2: Six people died and two were wounded.
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: Oh yeah. Yeah.
• 35:03
  Speaker 2: Um, so you can imagine, I mean, you can imagine
• 35:06
  Speaker 2: like how much attention this got, um, court TV, like
• 35:10
  Speaker 2: filmed the whole trial, uh, the next year. And so we,
• 35:14
  Speaker 2: we have some of that footage where we play.
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: Um, and you could dig into this whole story. Who
• 35:18
  Speaker 1: did what? Yep. When, why? Yep. Yeah. That's great.
• 35:23
  Speaker 2: So that's episode two. That'll be out next week.
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: Congratulations, man. Thank you. And then we're working on a
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: hot one. Yes.
• 35:32
  Speaker 2: Yes, we are.
• 35:32
  Speaker 1: The hottest one.
• 35:34
  Speaker 3: Your passion project?
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: Passion project, yeah. Youth Deer Season's coming up here. Youth
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: Deer Season's coming up in Montana, and it's big changes
• 35:44
  Speaker 1: this year because we're losing... We're shedding a lot of
• 35:48
  Speaker 1: senior talent is what's happening. You just get them up
• 35:52
  Speaker 1: where they know, you just get them up where they
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: understand and then they age out.
• 35:57
  Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.
• 35:58
  Speaker 1: It ends at 15.
• 35:59
  Speaker 3: My kid didn't. Yours did. Mine didn't.
• 36:01
  Speaker 1: I thought you were aged out.
• 36:03
  Speaker 3: No, he's got a cross-country meet. He's committing to that team.
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: Oh, that's right.
• 36:07
  Speaker 3: Remember you were giving him shit about it?
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: Oh, so we only got one aging out. Yeah. Well, yeah,
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: but we got a lot of problems. We got one
• 36:13
  Speaker 1: that's in a some kind of, we got one that's
• 36:15
  Speaker 1: in a brace. Yes.
• 36:16
  Speaker 4: Injured.
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: Injured from a rock climbing incident. Mm-hmm. um we got
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: one aged out we got one sticking staying true to
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: his team.
• 36:29
  Speaker 3: Yeah and he's got i don't think he would be
• 36:32
  Speaker 3: doing this but he's got a uh mule deer tag
• 36:36
  Speaker 3: in colorado this year so he's got a fallback he's
• 36:39
  Speaker 3: got a fallback hunt.
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: Yeah yanni's elder daughter this is her last year.
• 36:43
  Speaker 4: Oh man see i feel like Yeah, I mean, obviously,
• 36:48
  Speaker 4: they'll be better after this hunt than they are before
• 36:51
  Speaker 4: this hunt because they'll have more experience, but I feel
• 36:53
  Speaker 4: like I'm coming in right now with my varsity team.
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: You got some seasoned players out there. Yeah.
• 37:02
  Speaker 4: They're, they're, they're, they're going to get the job done.
• 37:05
  Speaker 4: They're going to hike hard. They're not, there's going to
• 37:07
  Speaker 4: be a lot less whining. Like we're, we're, I knew
• 37:10
  Speaker 4: they were fired up about this one. Cause when I,
• 37:12
  Speaker 4: like a week ago and I went, okay, we need
• 37:13
  Speaker 4: to start packing, right? Like let's get the things, like
• 37:16
  Speaker 4: get them in piles at least, you know, get your,
• 37:19
  Speaker 4: the hunting gear and the clothes and, and just the
• 37:22
  Speaker 4: pile of socks and get in. Usually three days.
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: Usually you're wasting your breath.
• 37:26
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 37:27
  Speaker 4: Three days later, you're like, okay, we started. And as
• 37:30
  Speaker 4: of three days ago, I think everybody's pretty much packed
• 37:33
  Speaker 4: and ready to rip.
• 37:33
  Speaker 3: Well, they better be.
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: That's great.
• 37:35
  Speaker 3: Because they only got.
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: Hours.
• 37:37
  Speaker 3: Hours. It's kind of nice though, going like after you.
• 37:41
  Speaker 1: Well, 24.
• 37:42
  Speaker 3: After you build that veteran up, it's kind of nice
• 37:45
  Speaker 3: going back to the beginning with the younger, the younger ones.
• 37:48
  Speaker 1: See, I know that's what I'd be all like depressed
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: and everything. Like the other day, I knew it, but
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: I didn't really put it together that my older one's
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: a junior. Oh, it was like a gut punch. He's
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: going to move away. Yeah.
• 38:00
  Speaker 3: He was 10 when we started.
• 38:01
  Speaker 1: 10. I know, but now it's like, he's going to
• 38:03
  Speaker 1: like go off and. I don't want him to go away.
• 38:06
  Speaker 3: I know. That's how I feel about my kid. I'm like,
• 38:08
  Speaker 3: are you going to go to school here in town?
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: That's what I was telling him. I'm like, you have
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: to apply to local school.
• 38:13
  Speaker 3: You can stay here if you want.
• 38:15
  Speaker 1: Dude, hit me. We were out pronghorn hunting, and all
• 38:18
  Speaker 1: of a sudden, it never really hit me. I was like,
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: he's a junior, man. He's going to move away. I've
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: got to find a way to hold him captive. But anyways,
• 38:26
  Speaker 1: so I still got an 11-year-old. So I got him.
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: Plenty of seasons left, man. Plenty of seasons left.
• 38:33
  Speaker 3: It won't be that long. It'll just be me and
• 38:35
  Speaker 3: Steve and the two young ones.
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: I know. Quiet camp, dude. Quiet camp. But the nice
• 38:42
  Speaker 1: thing is that I was bringing, he's going to be
• 38:45
  Speaker 1: exceptionally seasoned because he, for years, had to come along
• 38:48
  Speaker 1: and couldn't even hunt.
• 38:49
  Speaker 4: Yep.
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: He had to just walk along.
• 38:51
  Speaker 4: Mm-hmm. We might have to, next year, maybe invite a
• 38:56
  Speaker 4: new family.
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: I was thinking about that. Recruit some fresh talent. Yeah,
• 39:00
  Speaker 1: we need a talent scout.
• 39:00
  Speaker 3: How old is Corey's kid?
• 39:03
  Speaker 4: He's eight this year, so he'll be ready to go
• 39:06
  Speaker 4: in two years.
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: Oh, let's grab that guy. Yeah.
• 39:08
  Speaker 4: Marshall.
• 39:09
  Speaker 1: We should tell him he can come right now and
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: just start the... Yeah. What do you call that? What
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: do you call that? He could be like a benchwarmer.
• 39:15
  Speaker 3: Training.
• 39:15
  Speaker 1: Yeah, a benchwarmer. Yeah, we need to recruit talent. It's
• 39:19
  Speaker 1: going to get quiet around there.
• 39:20
  Speaker 4: If we bring Marshall, it won't be quiet.
• 39:24
  Speaker 1: Yeah let's grab him speaking of kids the other day
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: i sent this is so funny the other day i
• 39:30
  Speaker 1: sent my boy i'm like hey go get your sister
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: from school we i he had to go get his
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: sister from school early because we're taking off to go
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: hunting so he takes his buddy to go and they
• 39:41
  Speaker 1: go down to the junior high school and they're like
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: parked in the parking lot they're they're trying to learn
• 39:46
  Speaker 1: how to blow duck calls And they can't figure out why,
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: but some lady's like staring at him. And they watch
• 39:53
  Speaker 1: her and pretty soon she's over talking to a cop.
• 39:57
  Speaker 1: And then pretty soon the cop is over banging on
• 39:59
  Speaker 1: their window. And they roll the window down and he goes, oh,
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: is that a duck call? He goes, someone said you
• 40:10
  Speaker 1: were in here smoking drugs.
• 40:12
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: So he says the cop then has a laugh and
• 40:18
  Speaker 1: he watches the cop go back over to talk to
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: the reporting party and clear the air on the violation.
• 40:27
  Speaker 1: Too funny, man. One other one. I was at a pancake,
• 40:33
  Speaker 1: a fire department fundraiser the other night. It was a
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: pancake sausage dinner. I'm sitting there and I'm referring to
• 40:39
  Speaker 1: the pancakes on my plate as flapjacks. My kid's like,
• 40:43
  Speaker 1: why do you call them flapjacks? I'm like, it's a synonym.
• 40:46
  Speaker 1: It's a pancake synonym. Flapjacks are pancakes. Pancakes are flapjacks.
• 40:50
  Speaker 1: And there's this old timer sitting across from me at
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: the bent folding table. And I said, sir, you probably
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: know the word flapjack. He says, I'm familiar, but those
• 41:01
  Speaker 1: are pancakes.
• 41:02
  Speaker 4: So like what? I don't know.
• 41:08
  Speaker 3: I think you're right. I think you're right.
• 41:09
  Speaker 2: Flapjack is just like a.
• 41:10
  Speaker 1: Flapjack's a freaking pancake.
• 41:12
  Speaker 2: That's a more fun word, I think. Flapjack.
• 41:14
  Speaker 1: I like that. I don't know.
• 41:16
  Speaker 2: More fun to say.
• 41:17
  Speaker 4: I'm bringing a big old, the giant bag of Krusty's
• 41:20
  Speaker 4: Flapjack mix to youth camp, so we're going to eat
• 41:23
  Speaker 4: a lot of pancakes one morning.
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: Okay, time for your news. On a recent episode, we
• 41:31
  Speaker 1: had discussed this. We had discussed Speaking of game laws,
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: we didn't discuss what happens. Let's assume you live in
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: a state where you can't shoot deer with a spotlight,
• 41:46
  Speaker 1: which is all the states, and your state spells out
• 41:51
  Speaker 1: legal method of take.
• 41:53
  Speaker 3: And legal shooting hours.
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: And legal shooting hours. So legal shooting hours is 30
• 41:57
  Speaker 1: minutes after sunset. Legal method of take, meaning it's archery season,
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: so you're allowed to shoot a deer with a bow, whatever.
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: But all of a sudden, you do a thing that
• 42:06
  Speaker 1: commonly happens where a hunter goes out and they hit
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: a deer. And they wait an hour. So now it's dark.
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: They're hunting in the evening. They hit a deer. They
• 42:14
  Speaker 1: wait an hour. They go out and they find the deer.
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: And lo and behold, the deer is still alive. It's dying,
• 42:19
  Speaker 1: but still alive. Most guys in this situation, you'd shine
• 42:24
  Speaker 1: a light, right?
• 42:26
  Speaker 4: Oh, there he is.
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: He's still alive. And someone's going to shoot him with
• 42:29
  Speaker 1: a bow. Or you cut his throat. Well, if you
• 42:34
  Speaker 1: cut its throat, you've now killed it with something that's
• 42:37
  Speaker 1: not a legal method of take. If you shine a
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: light and shoot it with an arrow, you just spotlighted
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: a deer.
• 42:44
  Speaker 3: And shot after legal.
• 42:45
  Speaker 1: And shot after legal shooting light. So we were wondering,
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: why don't more states contemplate these scenarios and clear it up?
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: Because you could feasibly come across a wounded deer at
• 42:57
  Speaker 1: night and be like, well, it's after legal shooting light,
• 43:00
  Speaker 1: I can't shoot. And I was pointing out that... I
• 43:04
  Speaker 1: never even thought of this. And I would, prior to
• 43:07
  Speaker 1: this ever dawning on me, I would, without hesitation, use
• 43:10
  Speaker 1: a flashlight and shine it and put another arrow into it.
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: Without hesitation. So I wondered, is this a common violation?
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: Why isn't this contemplated in game laws? And a listener
• 43:24
  Speaker 1: wrote in from North Carolina. And in North Carolina, they've
• 43:29
  Speaker 1: contemplated it with very specific language. which is, I had
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: never heard of this before. In North Carolina, you have
• 43:42
  Speaker 1: until 11 p.m. to dispatch a wounded animal after legal
• 43:49
  Speaker 1: hunting hours. Here's the wording. This is pretty great. If
• 43:53
  Speaker 1: a hunter kills or wounds a big game animal during
• 43:56
  Speaker 1: legal shooting hours, that's an important detail here, During legal
• 44:01
  Speaker 1: shooting hours, the hunter may use a portable light source
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: and a single dog on a leash to assist the
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: hunter in retrieving the dead or wounded big game animal
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: and may dispatch a wounded big game animal using a.
• 44:19
  Speaker 1: 22 caliber rimfire pistol, archery equipment, or a handgun otherwise
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: legal for that season. You have until 11 PM.
• 44:33
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 44:33
  Speaker 3: It's a great, it's a good way to like kind
• 44:36
  Speaker 3: of prevent some malarkey with like high powered rifles and spotlights.
• 44:43
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 44:44
  Speaker 3: You know, just short range stuff.
• 44:45
  Speaker 1: No, that's a great, I think that that that's a thing.
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: I'd be curious to hear from other game wardens about it,
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: but that's just like an interesting wrinkle that just had
• 44:52
  Speaker 1: never occurred to me until I heard of a guy
• 44:54
  Speaker 1: getting a citation for shooting a wounded deer at night
• 44:57
  Speaker 1: with a light. Yeah.
• 44:59
  Speaker 2: I'm surprised someone, a game warden, would... Like, if it's
• 45:02
  Speaker 2: clear he's not spotlighting, he's not poaching at night, if
• 45:06
  Speaker 2: it's clear he shot during legal hours, I'm surprised a
• 45:09
  Speaker 2: game warden would issue a citation like that.
• 45:12
  Speaker 1: My understanding, though, is that the deer was duking it
• 45:16
  Speaker 1: out with a dog in a pond. Hmm. So maybe
• 45:22
  Speaker 1: there's a question of, like, just how wounded was it? Yeah,
• 45:25
  Speaker 1: I don't know. Yeah. I don't know. Yeah. I don't know. Yanni?
• 45:31
  Speaker 4: Yeah, that's where it gets tricky. Hold on, you want
• 45:36
  Speaker 4: me to read this number two about shooting the buck
• 45:38
  Speaker 4: with the crossbow?
• 45:39
  Speaker 3: No, no, we're good.
• 45:40
  Speaker 1: No, no, no, we're good there. All right. No, but
• 45:43
  Speaker 1: the guy had a specific question.
• 45:45
  Speaker 4: Ryan wrote in, I just finished watching the whitetail rut
• 45:48
  Speaker 4: hunt with Giannis. Giannis mentioned how he was spending 12
• 45:52
  Speaker 4: hours a day sitting in the saddle. Now, I am
• 45:55
  Speaker 4: no saddle hunter. That is a really long time to
• 45:58
  Speaker 4: be up in a tree with no potty breaks. My
• 46:02
  Speaker 4: question for the crew is, what do they do for
• 46:04
  Speaker 4: bathroom breaks on those all-day sits? I just pee right
• 46:09
  Speaker 4: out of my tree stand, and somehow, at least for
• 46:13
  Speaker 4: the last six years, I'm very lucky that somehow I
• 46:17
  Speaker 4: just get into a pattern where I literally make it
• 46:20
  Speaker 4: all day, and then when I get home, I empty
• 46:24
  Speaker 4: my bowels, I go to sleep, I wake up, and
• 46:26
  Speaker 4: I do it all again. So I haven't had to
• 46:29
  Speaker 4: deal with number two in the saddle. If I had to,
• 46:32
  Speaker 4: I would climb down, dig a hole, poop in the hole,
• 46:35
  Speaker 4: and then climb back up.
• 46:35
  Speaker 1: In the tree. You're able to take a whiz right
• 46:40
  Speaker 1: out of that saddle, huh?
• 46:41
  Speaker 4: Oh, yeah.
• 46:42
  Speaker 1: Just like normal.
• 46:43
  Speaker 4: Just like normal.
• 46:44
  Speaker 3: I wonder if there's any super hardcore whitetail tree stand
• 46:47
  Speaker 3: hunters that wear those adult diapers.
• 46:52
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 46:53
  Speaker 4: I haven't heard of that, but there's definitely people that
• 46:55
  Speaker 4: still pee in a bottle. Right.
• 47:01
  Speaker 1: Oh you know like buckman juice.
• 47:05
  Speaker 4: Which is doug duran's urine which is doug.
• 47:07
  Speaker 1: Duran's urine i was helping my i was helping my
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: boy set up my boy was trying to get a
• 47:13
  Speaker 1: white-tailed doe with his bow and i was taking a
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: whiz down below there and um and he was like
• 47:19
  Speaker 1: worried about it and i said man a deer probably
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: want to come up and smell it and he sat
• 47:23
  Speaker 1: there and he said sure enough a fawn came along
• 47:25
  Speaker 1: and smelled that smelled that buckman juice there you But yeah,
• 47:28
  Speaker 1: I remember being very like when I did a lot
• 47:31
  Speaker 1: of like growing up doing a lot of tree tree
• 47:34
  Speaker 1: stand hunting. I remember being there was a common conversation,
• 47:37
  Speaker 1: people being very concerned about urine, human urine, like in
• 47:41
  Speaker 1: the in like the serious whitetail world. Is that conversation over?
• 47:46
  Speaker 4: No.
• 47:47
  Speaker 1: Okay, so guys that really know still wonder about it.
• 47:51
  Speaker 4: There's still people that take precaution not to just pee
• 47:56
  Speaker 4: to the base of their tree.
• 47:57
  Speaker 1: Because they feel that what? That if a.
• 48:00
  Speaker 4: Deer comes downwind and for some reason wouldn't smell them,
• 48:05
  Speaker 4: but would only smell the urine, I don't know if higher,
• 48:09
  Speaker 4: lower air currents or whatever, but that somehow the urine
• 48:11
  Speaker 4: would spook the deer. I've just seen it too many
• 48:15
  Speaker 4: times now where I am on a high ridge, and
• 48:18
  Speaker 4: I know my wind's blowing clearly off the ridge, way
• 48:22
  Speaker 4: down and disappearing into the atmosphere. But that pee at
• 48:27
  Speaker 4: the base of the tree is right there, and deer
• 48:29
  Speaker 4: come right by it. And they stop. They smell it.
• 48:33
  Speaker 4: But I've never had them blow out because of it.
• 48:36
  Speaker 4: I think it just turns to ammonia.
• 48:40
  Speaker 1: Pretty quick.
• 48:40
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 48:44
  Speaker 1: This came across my mind. awareness my desk the other
• 48:48
  Speaker 1: day that uh i was kind of surprised by that
• 48:51
  Speaker 1: well sort of surprised you're gonna let phil play the
• 48:53
  Speaker 1: sound oh you got a good one phil.
• 49:01
  Speaker 3: Every week same one every week.
• 49:03
  Speaker 1: Time for the news dude i thought maybe you got
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: in there and crafted a new one no that's a
• 49:07
  Speaker 1: good one phil thanks man yeah that's cute thank you
• 49:09
  Speaker 1: cute is what i aim for check this out and
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: this makes sense a little bit In the state we're
• 49:15
  Speaker 1: sitting in right now in Montana, this is the state
• 49:19
  Speaker 1: where you're most... likely to be killed by hitting wildlife
• 49:25
  Speaker 1: with a car. So not that you're going to hit it,
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: but that you're going to die hitting it.
• 49:30
  Speaker 3: This is just wildlife, not just deer or other animals.
• 49:35
  Speaker 1: Okay. deer... I about got killed the other night hitting
• 49:38
  Speaker 1: someone's black angus. Which blends in exceptionally well with a
• 49:44
  Speaker 1: black angus.
• 49:44
  Speaker 3: No, I just asked because Montana has moose and elk
• 49:48
  Speaker 3: and larger.
• 49:48
  Speaker 1: That's why. I bet you that's gotta be why. That's
• 49:52
  Speaker 1: gotta be why the fatalities are so high because you're
• 49:55
  Speaker 1: hitting stuff that's big and it comes up into the windshield, man.
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: You're knocking the legs out from it and sending it
• 50:00
  Speaker 1: into the windshield. So... These guys looked at the whole country,
• 50:07
  Speaker 1: dying from hitting wildlife. 2015 to 2024. Hold on.
• 50:13
  Speaker 4: Did it say why PlayCasino.com was looking into this?
• 50:17
  Speaker 1: Because I don't know. They might just generate a bunch
• 50:21
  Speaker 1: of viral statistics stuff, which I'm a sucker for. I
• 50:25
  Speaker 1: don't know why. The data experts at Play Casino.
• 50:29
  Speaker 3: They got their information from the Department of Transportation.
• 50:36
  Speaker 1: So there's some interesting numbers though. Between 2015 and 2024.
• 50:40
  Speaker 1: So 2024. Yeah. So a nine year, during a nine
• 50:44
  Speaker 1: year span in America, 2,115 people got killed from hitting
• 50:52
  Speaker 1: wildlife with cars. But here's the crazy deal. Hawaii in
• 50:55
  Speaker 1: that time period, not a single person in Hawaii was
• 50:59
  Speaker 1: killed hitting something. All those hogs, All those chickens.
• 51:04
  Speaker 3: Axis deer.
• 51:04
  Speaker 1: All those axis deer. No one gets killed by hitting chickens, but.
• 51:08
  Speaker 3: Wild cattle.
• 51:09
  Speaker 1: Scratch chickens. Yeah. An axis deer must be like, it
• 51:14
  Speaker 1: just doesn't have the necessary ass to kill a person.
• 51:19
  Speaker 1: No one in Hawaii in nine years died hitting wildlife.
• 51:23
  Speaker 1: But when you're driving around Hawaii, there's junk all over
• 51:25
  Speaker 1: in the roads. Yeah.
• 51:26
  Speaker 2: No one like swerved and like hit a, you know.
• 51:29
  Speaker 2: concrete barrier.
• 51:30
  Speaker 1: I don't know if they count that.
• 51:32
  Speaker 2: So they have to hit the animal.
• 51:33
  Speaker 3: Maybe.
• 51:34
  Speaker 1: I get my boy a talk and do the air night.
• 51:35
  Speaker 1: I let him take the wheel driving at night and
• 51:37
  Speaker 1: there's a lot of junk in the road. And I'm like,
• 51:38
  Speaker 1: you know, that just like run it over, man. It's sad,
• 51:41
  Speaker 1: but yeah, you know, just how it goes. Interesting thing
• 51:48
  Speaker 1: about it too, is these fatalities, it like, it just
• 51:52
  Speaker 1: makes total sense. These fatalities peak in October, November. It's
• 52:00
  Speaker 1: like the rut, man. Yep. Like during the rut, Americans
• 52:04
  Speaker 1: die hitting deer with cars.
• 52:06
  Speaker 3: Well, I mean, you drive down 90 here between Belgrade
• 52:11
  Speaker 3: and Giannis' you know, Bozeman. It's like whitetails dead everywhere.
• 52:15
  Speaker 1: Oh, yeah. All over the roads, man. So this data
• 52:22
  Speaker 1: is like, it's like likelihood, right? So it doesn't deal
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: in sheer numbers. But in sheer numbers, the number one
• 52:29
  Speaker 1: hitting state The number one death state for hitting wildlife
• 52:33
  Speaker 1: is Texas. A lot of people, enormous numbers of deer.
• 52:39
  Speaker 1: Fast people.
• 52:39
  Speaker 2: Fast speed limits.
• 52:40
  Speaker 1: Free people just infused with freedom. That's right.
• 52:46
  Speaker 3: And that 80 mile an hour speed limit. Those high
• 52:49
  Speaker 3: fences don't make a difference in that case.
• 52:51
  Speaker 1: Just a lust for freedom. A lust for freedom barreling
• 52:55
  Speaker 1: down the Texas highway. That's right. And millions of deer.
• 53:01
  Speaker 1: More deer than we have people by far.
• 53:03
  Speaker 3: 210.
• 53:09
  Speaker 1: Pennsylvania, 135 people killed hitting wildlife. Michigan, 124 from people
• 53:15
  Speaker 1: hitting wildlife. Michigan and Wisconsin are kind of like very
• 53:18
  Speaker 1: much the same place. So Michigan, 124. Wisconsin, 121. I've
• 53:25
  Speaker 1: always made the case. I don't know if this is true,
• 53:27
  Speaker 1: but I feel like it's true. Someone should do a poll.
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: I think a person in Wisconsin is more likely than
• 53:32
  Speaker 1: a person in Michigan to know what watershed they live in.
• 53:35
  Speaker 2: Why do you say that?
• 53:40
  Speaker 4: Wisconsin versus Michigan?
• 53:41
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that it'd be like a great way
• 53:43
  Speaker 1: of measuring. This would be a good money for like,
• 53:46
  Speaker 1: if someone was a researcher, you would do a survey
• 53:50
  Speaker 1: and find out Who, what state has the most sort
• 53:55
  Speaker 1: of environmentally aware populace? And to measure it, you would
• 53:58
  Speaker 1: just say, if you take a piss, what is your
• 54:03
  Speaker 1: pisses route to the ocean? And if they could do it, right?
• 54:12
  Speaker 1: If they could say Bear Creek into Muskegon River, Muskegon River,
• 54:18
  Speaker 1: into Lake Michigan, Lake Michigan into the St. Lawrence, out
• 54:22
  Speaker 1: into the Atlantic. You'd be like, cool.
• 54:26
  Speaker 2: Can you imagine calling someone on the phone?
• 54:28
  Speaker 1: I was going to bring that up because they have
• 54:33
  Speaker 1: a remarkably similar number. 124 and 121 people killed hitting deer. California,
• 54:38
  Speaker 1: 80 people killed hitting deer. But for statistics, Montana.
• 54:46
  Speaker 2: Montana.
• 54:48
  Speaker 1: More than double the rate in the second place, Wyoming.
• 54:51
  Speaker 1: More than double the rate of dying, hitting deer.
• 54:57
  Speaker 2: I wonder if there are specific locations in Montana, specific
• 55:04
  Speaker 2: locations that just funnel animals and there's a highway.
• 55:07
  Speaker 3: Is this that Sealy Highway?
• 55:10
  Speaker 1: That's a deathbed, yeah. That's a deathbed. I got a buddy.
• 55:15
  Speaker 1: He was a tree surgeon. We used to work together. Like,
• 55:19
  Speaker 1: I'm going to say it, and you're going to think
• 55:21
  Speaker 1: that it's a lie, but we were right where it happened,
• 55:24
  Speaker 1: and he walked me through it. He killed seven whitetails
• 55:28
  Speaker 1: in one hit.
• 55:29
  Speaker 3: Holy cow.
• 55:30
  Speaker 4: Wow.
• 55:31
  Speaker 1: He showed me where it happened.
• 55:33
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I think I remember you saying it was so bad.
• 55:35
  Speaker 3: I don't know if it's still that bad, but it affects, like,
• 55:38
  Speaker 3: bald eagles.
• 55:38
  Speaker 1: Golden eagle.
• 55:39
  Speaker 3: Golden eagle.
• 55:40
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a golden eagle migration corridor. Because the deer,
• 55:44
  Speaker 1: there's so many dead whitetails on that road.
• 55:48
  Speaker 4: Hmm.
• 55:49
  Speaker 1: Over to you, Jordan. All right.
• 55:53
  Speaker 2: Here we have a story, another crime story, that caught
• 55:58
  Speaker 2: my attention for reasons that will become obvious.
• 56:00
  Speaker 1: Because it involves men's underwear.
• 56:02
  Speaker 2: In a moment.
• 56:05
  Speaker 4: All right.
• 56:06
  Speaker 2: So a Cuban man, permanent resident in the U.S., but
• 56:09
  Speaker 2: a Cuban citizen, named Alberto Hernandez Castillo was picked up at...
• 56:17
  Speaker 2: Miami International Airport, I think it was last Sunday, Customs
• 56:20
  Speaker 2: and Border Patrol officers noticed what they described as a
• 56:24
  Speaker 2: strange bulge in the man's pants.
• 56:28
  Speaker 1: Now, you might be.
• 56:30
  Speaker 2: Wondering why they would be interested in such a thing.
• 56:33
  Speaker 2: According to the criminal complaint, Castillo appeared to be nervous
• 56:37
  Speaker 2: and when asked, couldn't offer a believable explanation for what
• 56:41
  Speaker 2: was going on. down there.
• 56:43
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's like, are you happy to see me? Yeah.
• 56:45
  Speaker 1: Or do you have birds in your pants?
• 56:47
  Speaker 2: Exactly, right, right. I would have loved.
• 56:49
  Speaker 4: To know what his explanation was.
• 56:51
  Speaker 2: Turns out it was the birds. The complaint says, I'll
• 56:56
  Speaker 2: just quote from it here, the pat-down revealed that Hernandez
• 57:00
  Speaker 2: Castillo was concealing six cylindrical clear plastic containers. So six
• 57:07
  Speaker 2: plastic cylinders, they were each wrapped with tape and then
• 57:10
  Speaker 2: had black mesh material near the opening. And Phil has
• 57:15
  Speaker 2: some photos, I believe.
• 57:17
  Speaker 1: I love when people come prepared with photos.
• 57:19
  Speaker 3: Which one do you want to pull up here, Jordan?
• 57:21
  Speaker 2: Let's do the one with the pants in question. So
• 57:30
  Speaker 2: each of these tubes was sewn into his underwear and
• 57:34
  Speaker 2: each tube contained live birds. Now, if you're on YouTube
• 57:40
  Speaker 2: watching this, which you should, you can see this photo here.
• 57:43
  Speaker 2: Interesting outfit for someone trying to evade detection. That's just
• 57:47
  Speaker 2: kind of an aside. The gold shoes are a bold choice.
• 57:50
  Speaker 1: Yeah, he looks like a dude who's like, he looks
• 57:53
  Speaker 1: like a dude who has in mind that people are
• 57:55
  Speaker 1: going to be like, what are that guy's up to?
• 57:57
  Speaker 4: I don't know.
• 57:58
  Speaker 3: You could go the opposite way and say it's just
• 58:00
  Speaker 3: like so distracting that you wouldn't even think.
• 58:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah, he's like, dude, they're going to be so tripped
• 58:04
  Speaker 1: out by my clothes. They're not going to notice my bold.
• 58:07
  Speaker 2: Every NBA logo on my shorts. So, It's a little unclear.
• 58:13
  Speaker 2: We don't know from the complaint exactly how this worked.
• 58:16
  Speaker 2: We know that these cylinders with birds inside were sewn somehow.
• 58:20
  Speaker 2: There appears to be some kind of mesh situation happening.
• 58:25
  Speaker 2: But in any case, you know, it was probably uncomfortable,
• 58:29
  Speaker 2: but I looked it up. It's only an hour flight
• 58:31
  Speaker 2: from Havana to Miami. So, you know, not a hugely
• 58:34
  Speaker 2: long time to sit there with a bunch of cylinders
• 58:37
  Speaker 2: with birds in them in your pants.
• 58:39
  Speaker 3: I might be getting ahead of myself here. Yeah. What
• 58:43
  Speaker 3: about the noise the birds would make?
• 58:44
  Speaker 1: I was just wondering, like, are they in there going tweet, tweet, tweet, tweet?
• 58:47
  Speaker 2: That is a great question. So this doesn't specifically mention that,
• 58:50
  Speaker 2: but there are other stories, similar stories, we'll get to
• 58:53
  Speaker 2: in a minute, that mention the birds were sedated. So
• 58:57
  Speaker 2: that's probably, yeah, that's probably what he did in this case.
• 59:03
  Speaker 2: Because you're right. Though, you know, they're small little sounds.
• 59:08
  Speaker 2: Maybe he could pass that off.
• 59:09
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 59:10
  Speaker 2: Hear it maybe in in the airport i'd.
• 59:11
  Speaker 1: Just be i'd be going on oh excuse me.
• 59:16
  Speaker 2: You just just watch a video of birds on your
• 59:18
  Speaker 2: phone the whole time and then people.
• 59:19
  Speaker 1: Will yeah it's like oh it's just ate something not did.
• 59:22
  Speaker 2: Not agree so the birds there were 10 birds so
• 59:26
  Speaker 2: six cylinders 10 birds so some of these had two
• 59:28
  Speaker 2: birds in one Um, there were eight yellow faced grass
• 59:32
  Speaker 2: quits and two blue grass beaks. Um, and they appear
• 59:38
  Speaker 2: to have survived most of them. There's that photo that
• 59:41
  Speaker 2: was up earlier. There's a cage with the birds in it.
• 59:45
  Speaker 2: I count nine, I think eight or nine birds in there.
• 59:47
  Speaker 2: So most of them survived. They seem to be okay. Um,
• 59:51
  Speaker 2: but here's where it gets interesting. So you're probably asking
• 59:53
  Speaker 2: yourself at this point, why would a man survive? put
• 59:57
  Speaker 2: birds in his pants, and try to get into the U.S.
• 59:59
  Speaker 1: Can I take a stab at it? Go ahead. Because
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 1: he's going to sell them into the illegal pet trade. Right.
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 2: So that is possible. They are kept as pets, of course.
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 1: Or he's a fetishist.
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 2: I didn't come across that in my research, but possible.
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 1: Possible.
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 2: Anything's possible these days. What I did find, though, and
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 2: this is not something I'm familiar with, and I was
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 2: talking with Brody about this before the podcast. He wasn't
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 2: familiar with it either. which makes me feel less uninformed.
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 2: But apparently these birds, it's possible they were competitors. So
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 2: there is a thing called songbird competitions. It's popular in
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 2: the Caribbean, in South America, in certain parts of the US.
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 2: And the way these competitions work is they're usually male
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 2: songbirds and they're naturally competitive. So they'll kind of sing
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 2: back and forth to each other. It's a bit like Glee,
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 2: the animal version of Glee or one of those acapella,
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 2: you know, competition movies, but with birds. And there's, I
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 2: assume there's different ways of organizing these competitions, but usually
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 2: it's the first bird to make 50 different chirps or
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 2: to sing 50 different songs. And so they'll- I've never
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 2: heard of this. Yeah, they'll put two cages next to
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 2: each other and the birds will sing back and forth.
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 2: Someone will be paying very close attention, I assume. And
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 2: listening to all the the chirps and noises that these
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 2: birds are making and the first 250 wins So it's
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 2: not like, you know cockfighting or dogfighting. It's very the
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 2: birds aren't being injured or harmed They're actually very well
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 2: taken care of sure man. The problem is when don't try.
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 1: To excuse this don't try to humanize this guy Okay.
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 2: But fair enough like a bobcatch. Well, he is he
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 2: he is bringing them into the country illegally And there
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 2: is a financial incentive here. So he could be selling
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 2: them into the illegal pet market. However, if they're sold
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 2: as competitive birds for these competitions, and this is from
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 2: the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and I couldn't believe
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 2: some of these numbers, they can be sold for as
• 1:02:12
  Speaker 2: little as $ 500, which seems like a lot for a
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 2: little songbird. But as much as $ 10, 000 people will pay
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 2: for these birds.
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 3: For a real good competitor.
• 1:02:21
  Speaker 2: Right, which gives you an idea of, Potentially the level
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 2: of money we're talking about when it comes to gambling
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 2: because that's a whole part of this too, right? As
• 1:02:30
  Speaker 2: people are gambling on these birds, which that might be illegal.
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 1: I'm not sure Can I hit you with a quick question?
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 1: Yeah Years ago I was in Hanoi and I would
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 1: notice that a lot of old people would go down
• 1:02:42
  Speaker 1: to parks and they would have songbirds in cages.
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 2: Mm-hmm and they would just.
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 1: Kind of You just see him go to a park
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 1: with a songbird. Yeah with a blanket over it And
• 1:02:54
  Speaker 1: they would be in groups and they would just have the,
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 1: they would take the cover off. And you just see
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 1: like collections of six or eight old people with six
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 1: or eight little cages with songbirds in them. Yeah. Is
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 1: that maybe what they're doing?
• 1:03:05
  Speaker 2: That may, may well be. I've looked up a few
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 2: videos of these competitions and that's exactly what.
• 1:03:10
  Speaker 1: It looks like.
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 4: People have a cage.
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 1: I don't like what in the world is that? Yeah.
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Here we have a family boards.
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 1: That's my life.
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 5: This sound means it's dawn in Guyana, and if it's Sunday,
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 5: that means the showdown is not too far off. Bird
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 5: owners gather across the country to proudly exhibit their birds
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 5: and have them face off against each other in whistling
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 5: competitions called Guyana Speed Singing Contests.
• 1:03:36
  Speaker 1: Bird for me is not just competing.
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 2: Here you go, Steve.
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 4: Fascinating.
• 1:03:42
  Speaker 3: Traditional songbird competition in Hanoi take place weekly, frequently on
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 3: Sunday mornings.
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 1: Damn, that's what I was looking at.
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 3: Mostly meet on weekends, especially Sundays.
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 3: Enthusiasts assembled in coffee shops, lakeside corners, and parks.
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 3: All over the place.
• 1:03:59
  Speaker 4: Average competitor, 70 years or older.
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 3: Wow.
• 1:04:03
  Speaker 1: So, you know, that's, it's taken me many years, but
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 1: I've always been like, what is going on with that? Okay.
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 1: Cool.
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 2: So the next question you might have is, you know,
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 2: if you were, if you're in Cuba, you know, maybe
• 1:04:14
  Speaker 2: you have family up here. You want to, you know,
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 2: continue this hobby that you love. Why wouldn't you just
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 2: import these birds legally? The problem is the quarantine. So
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 2: when you import wildlife into the U.S., it has to
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 2: be in quarantine for 30 days to make sure it
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 2: doesn't have any diseases. What these competitive bird trainers say
• 1:04:36
  Speaker 2: is that that 30 days of quarantine undermines their training.
• 1:04:41
  Speaker 2: birds training.
• 1:04:42
  Speaker 1: So song out of them. Yeah.
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 2: They, they take the, you know, when the bird is young,
• 1:04:47
  Speaker 2: they put them in a cage in a quiet place
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 2: and they play recordings of bird song.
• 1:04:52
  Speaker 1: Okay.
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 2: And so the birds learn the song and they slowly
• 1:04:55
  Speaker 2: kind of acclimate them to be around people and other noises.
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 2: And so they don't lose their, their, you know, the
• 1:05:01
  Speaker 2: songs that they've learned. Uh, what they say is the
• 1:05:03
  Speaker 2: 30 days in a random, you know, us government facility
• 1:05:06
  Speaker 2: kind of ruins them it ruins the birds and if
• 1:05:09
  Speaker 2: you've you know invested a lot of time in these
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 2: animals they don't want to do that so that is
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 2: potentially a reason why some of these guys and there
• 1:05:15
  Speaker 2: are other examples i could cite of people smuggling these
• 1:05:20
  Speaker 2: little songbirds into the u.s.
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 1: Yeah but drugging them and sticking them down your pants
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 1: i mean there's another knock the song out of his
• 1:05:28
  Speaker 1: back i.
• 1:05:29
  Speaker 2: Guess not there there's another guy who um wasn't quite
• 1:05:32
  Speaker 2: as creative this was just last year he put Two
• 1:05:36
  Speaker 2: orange-fronted parakeets in brown paper bags and stuffed those down
• 1:05:39
  Speaker 2: his pants so he didn't have the cylinders. Another guy, similar,
• 1:05:43
  Speaker 2: he put them in hair curlers, like women's hair curlers,
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 2: and put a bunch of those in his carry-on bag
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 2: and was caught for that.
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 1: Um and i was i'm looking at your notes here
• 1:05:54
  Speaker 1: that dude was he was fixing to get three thousand
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 1: bucks a bird that's he.
• 1:05:58
  Speaker 2: Told authorities three thousand.
• 1:05:59
  Speaker 1: Twenty twenty thirty four birds now that guy sharpened his pencil.
• 1:06:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah he's that's like a hundred grand he's yeah that's
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 2: a that's a yeah that's that's an mba that's an
• 1:06:09
  Speaker 2: mba style wildlife violator right there man right yeah um So, yeah,
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 2: as far as penalties, like Max is 20 years in prison,
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 2: you know, $ 250, 000 fine. Most just get probation, especially if
• 1:06:22
  Speaker 2: they're a first-time offender for something like this. But, yeah,
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 2: I was fascinated. I had no idea about these competitions.
• 1:06:28
  Speaker 1: Hmm.
• 1:06:30
  Speaker 4: It makes me, it reminds me of, I believe, I
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 4: can't remember where, we must have done it for live,
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 4: but remember that story we covered about how the, there
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 4: was those pigeon trainers that were shooting the hawks?
• 1:06:42
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 1:06:42
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:06:43
  Speaker 4: Yeah. Very similar.
• 1:06:47
  Speaker 1: Like little bird subcultures, man. Subcultures that lead to criminality.
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 4: And also have a lot of bedding involved.
• 1:06:59
  Speaker 3: Been a while since we've talked about the on-again, off-again, on-again,
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 3: off-again saga of the Ambler Road in Alaska. There's an
• 1:07:08
  Speaker 3: update that just happened. But if you're not familiar... Um,
• 1:07:12
  Speaker 3: the Ambler road is a road that's, uh, being proposed
• 1:07:16
  Speaker 3: to be built, uh, in the Southern Brooks range of
• 1:07:19
  Speaker 3: Northwestern Alaska. It's going to be a 211 mile long
• 1:07:23
  Speaker 3: industrial gravel road connecting the Dalton highway to the Ambler
• 1:07:27
  Speaker 3: mining district. Um, the reason that the road is, is
• 1:07:33
  Speaker 3: proposed to be built is access to copper, zinc, lead, gold,
• 1:07:36
  Speaker 3: and other mineral deposits. Um, For mining for foreign mining companies.
• 1:07:43
  Speaker 3: Why is it always foreign mining companies?
• 1:07:45
  Speaker 1: I'll never get that. The ore from this thing goes over,
• 1:07:50
  Speaker 1: and there's some arguments that it benefits China more than
• 1:07:53
  Speaker 1: the US.
• 1:07:56
  Speaker 3: Two companies, Trilogy Metals out of Canada and South 32
• 1:08:00
  Speaker 3: Limited out of Australia, stand to make $ 1. 5 billion if
• 1:08:04
  Speaker 3: this road is built. And the road would be restricted
• 1:08:09
  Speaker 3: to only authorized industrial traffic. So, like, the public can't
• 1:08:13
  Speaker 3: drive down that road. It crosses through all kinds of
• 1:08:18
  Speaker 3: public lands, including 26 miles of Gates of the Arctic
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 3: National Preserve. And the mines could be active as long
• 1:08:26
  Speaker 3: as 30 years. More than... Go ahead.
• 1:08:31
  Speaker 1: No, you go ahead.
• 1:08:33
  Speaker 3: More than 80 Alaska Native communities have expressed opposition to
• 1:08:39
  Speaker 3: the road. Obviously, the flip side of that is that
• 1:08:44
  Speaker 3: this road would certainly provide jobs and economic benefits to
• 1:08:50
  Speaker 3: local communities in Alaska. So there's that to consider. This
• 1:08:54
  Speaker 3: all started back in 2015 when an application was issued
• 1:09:00
  Speaker 3: sent to the federal government. In 2017 to 2020, the
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 3: Bureau of Land Management conducted an environmental impact study. And
• 1:09:10
  Speaker 3: in Trump 1 administration, the road was approved and issued
• 1:09:17
  Speaker 3: a 50-year right of way. 2022, Biden administration suspended the
• 1:09:22
  Speaker 3: authorizations over deficiency in the environmental review. 2024, the project
• 1:09:29
  Speaker 3: just got completely rejected following a supplemental impact review. Now,
• 1:09:36
  Speaker 3: this year, or no, last year, the Alaska Department of
• 1:09:41
  Speaker 3: Natural Resources approved an easement across about 7,000 acres of
• 1:09:46
  Speaker 3: state land. This will be important later. 2025, President Trump
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 3: approved the appeal reversing the Biden administration's federal rejection. BLM
• 1:10:01
  Speaker 3: reissued the federal right away. So it just like went
• 1:10:04
  Speaker 3: back to where it was in Trump won. This year,
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 3: Alaska DNR reaffirmed its state land easement approval and In response,
• 1:10:17
  Speaker 3: seven conservation organizations filed an appeal in Alaska Superior Court
• 1:10:22
  Speaker 3: challenging the approval. That's just for this state crossing through
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 3: this state land. It doesn't have anything to do with
• 1:10:29
  Speaker 3: the federal side of it. The National Parks Conservation Association
• 1:10:37
  Speaker 3: announced the lawsuit alleging that the DNR had failed to
• 1:10:41
  Speaker 3: adequately evaluate environmental impacts. So you've got seven plaintiffs, uh,
• 1:10:49
  Speaker 3: National Parks Conservation Association, Northern Alaska Environmental Center, Alaska Community
• 1:10:55
  Speaker 3: Action on Toxics, Alaska Wilderness League, Center for Biological Diversity,
• 1:11:00
  Speaker 3: Sierra Club, and Winter Wildlands Alliance. Now you might recognize
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 3: that some of these groups, a couple of them at least,
• 1:11:09
  Speaker 3: are like groups that we haven't spoken kindly of in
• 1:11:13
  Speaker 3: the past. Um, you got anything to add on that?
• 1:11:18
  Speaker 1: Strange bedfellows, man.
• 1:11:19
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 1:11:20
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 1:11:21
  Speaker 3: Um, this, there, this whole thing is being managed for
• 1:11:25
  Speaker 3: trustees for Alaska, which kind of represents a lot of
• 1:11:28
  Speaker 3: Alaska native, uh, communities. Um, and they're just saying again,
• 1:11:34
  Speaker 3: that they failed to evaluate environmental impacts. Um, And again,
• 1:11:40
  Speaker 3: this is only challenging that state land easement, not the
• 1:11:44
  Speaker 3: federal stuff. Some potential impacts would be, if the road
• 1:11:49
  Speaker 3: goes through, would be on the Western Arctic caribou herd,
• 1:11:54
  Speaker 3: the road would pass right through their migration corridor and
• 1:11:57
  Speaker 3: potentially interfere with seasonal movement. There's a lot of potential
• 1:12:01
  Speaker 3: impacts on fish and rivers. sedimentation in rivers, altering stream channels,
• 1:12:07
  Speaker 3: degrading habitat.
• 1:12:09
  Speaker 1: You know how many streams you have to culvert?
• 1:12:11
  Speaker 3: Thousands.
• 1:12:12
  Speaker 1: 3,000. Yeah. Yeah. Across like 11 major river systems and
• 1:12:17
  Speaker 1: culvert 3,000 streams. Yep.
• 1:12:22
  Speaker 3: Obviously, all of those are of concern. One particular concern
• 1:12:28
  Speaker 3: is the Kobuk Wild and Scenic River.
• 1:12:30
  Speaker 5: Okay.
• 1:12:33
  Speaker 3: Yeah, you're looking at that map there.
• 1:12:35
  Speaker 2: Do we know how much crosses through state versus federal?
• 1:12:40
  Speaker 1: How much?
• 1:12:41
  Speaker 3: I'm assuming not as much state because they only had
• 1:12:44
  Speaker 3: to get that one.
• 1:12:45
  Speaker 1: Easement for state. Yeah, the states along the corridor, the
• 1:12:48
  Speaker 1: states along the pipeline corridor that they're coming off of.
• 1:12:50
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:12:50
  Speaker 1: Okay, gotcha.
• 1:12:53
  Speaker 3: Yeah. So, caribou, rivers, fish.
• 1:12:57
  Speaker 3: And all the construction and noise and human activity could
• 1:13:00
  Speaker 3: also displace other Arctic wildlife species. There's concern about permafrost.
• 1:13:07
  Speaker 3: The road could accelerate thawing and erosion. And it would
• 1:13:12
  Speaker 3: enable additional mines, gravel pits, and industrial infrastructure. And Native
• 1:13:19
  Speaker 3: Alaskan subsistence communities, like if it affects that caribou herd,
• 1:13:25
  Speaker 3: it's definitely going to affect you know, their ability to
• 1:13:29
  Speaker 3: feed themselves with caribou and fish and, and could just
• 1:13:34
  Speaker 3: kind of ruin traditional hunting areas. So where we're at
• 1:13:38
  Speaker 3: now is, uh, the Alaska Superior Court is going to
• 1:13:42
  Speaker 3: review the challenge to the, to the easement. Um, federal
• 1:13:47
  Speaker 3: road authorizations remain a separate legal issue. Um, And the
• 1:13:53
  Speaker 3: proposed mine is entering a new environmental review process that
• 1:13:58
  Speaker 3: will happen on November 2nd. So a couple of weeks,
• 1:14:03
  Speaker 3: I guess. Right now, the road's only proposed. It's not constructed.
• 1:14:08
  Speaker 1: This fight is playing out like any other of these
• 1:14:14
  Speaker 1: major environmental battles. The Pebble Mine in the headwaters of
• 1:14:18
  Speaker 1: Bristol Bay. One administration and the next. the mine in
• 1:14:22
  Speaker 1: the headwaters of the Boundary Waters Canoe Area, Ambler Road.
• 1:14:27
  Speaker 1: These are environmental fights that play out over decades. I
• 1:14:31
  Speaker 1: think that the administration was hopeful that they were going
• 1:14:34
  Speaker 1: to fast track this thing. But within this Ambler Road
• 1:14:39
  Speaker 1: thing is a lot of stuff that just strikes me
• 1:14:42
  Speaker 1: as a lot of BS. Any talk about this being
• 1:14:46
  Speaker 1: a 30-year project, it is bullshit. Okay. It's a, it's a,
• 1:14:55
  Speaker 1: it's a forever project. It is like no one, like
• 1:15:00
  Speaker 1: if you put people, any, anyone involved in proposing this
• 1:15:03
  Speaker 1: thing or the financial backers of this thing, and these
• 1:15:05
  Speaker 1: guys have enormous biz dev, like that you would enter
• 1:15:08
  Speaker 1: into a deal like this and spend hundreds of millions
• 1:15:11
  Speaker 1: of dollars on regulatory stuff. Like the biz dev expense
• 1:15:16
  Speaker 1: and building this mind. is, is astounding for, for something
• 1:15:20
  Speaker 1: that might not even go. This is a forever deal.
• 1:15:24
  Speaker 1: Like no, if you put someone on a lie detector test,
• 1:15:28
  Speaker 1: anyone that really knows what's going on and you said, Hey,
• 1:15:31
  Speaker 1: is this a 30 year thing?
• 1:15:33
  Speaker 2: No.
• 1:15:33
  Speaker 1: Well, I mean, it, it, it, this will, it will
• 1:15:37
  Speaker 1: bleed to hundreds of projects. Yeah.
• 1:15:39
  Speaker 3: And I mean, in the, I think it was in
• 1:15:41
  Speaker 3: the Trump one administration. It was a 50 year permit
• 1:15:45
  Speaker 3: for the road or something.
• 1:15:46
  Speaker 1: So it's a, it's a forever project.
• 1:15:48
  Speaker 3: They're going to take every last ounce of the stuff
• 1:15:51
  Speaker 3: they can get.
• 1:15:51
  Speaker 1: It's a forever project. It'll be like, once it's there,
• 1:15:55
  Speaker 1: it's like, it's just there.
• 1:15:57
  Speaker 3: And then there's the, if it ever does close, there's
• 1:16:00
  Speaker 3: the cleanup that has to happen afterwards.
• 1:16:02
  Speaker 1: You know, dude, let me tell you something that's not
• 1:16:06
  Speaker 1: going to happen in Alaska. they're not going to tear
• 1:16:08
  Speaker 1: up a road.
• 1:16:09
  Speaker 3: Right. It's like, I'm saying the mind. Yeah. Yeah.
• 1:16:12
  Speaker 1: It's, it's a, it's a forever thing. Yeah. I'll tell you,
• 1:16:15
  Speaker 1: let me tell you another thing. That's a forever thing. Uh,
• 1:16:21
  Speaker 1: those minerals will be eternally valuable and they are there forever.
• 1:16:28
  Speaker 1: I don't right now. See, I don't right now. See, um,
• 1:16:33
  Speaker 1: any sense of urgency. and going after these minerals. As
• 1:16:39
  Speaker 1: someone who's kind of an environmental nationalist, let's say, should
• 1:16:47
  Speaker 1: we be in a situation, should we find ourselves as
• 1:16:50
  Speaker 1: a nation in a situation as dire as we were in, say, 1941, right?
• 1:16:57
  Speaker 1: It might be a different conversation to me. It might
• 1:16:59
  Speaker 1: be a different conversation about, like, we're in an existential crisis, right? um,
• 1:17:06
  Speaker 1: we need these things to save the free world. I
• 1:17:10
  Speaker 1: might be like, let's talk. Sure. But I, like, I don't,
• 1:17:14
  Speaker 1: it's not going anywhere.
• 1:17:16
  Speaker 3: Well, it's not coming into the United States. That's for sure.
• 1:17:19
  Speaker 3: It's leaving the United States.
• 1:17:20
  Speaker 1: And then what's so funny about it, it's going to
• 1:17:22
  Speaker 1: leave the U S is or, and then we're going
• 1:17:24
  Speaker 1: to pay a bunch of goofy ass tariffs on it
• 1:17:26
  Speaker 1: when it comes back as a, as product.
• 1:17:28
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 1:17:29
  Speaker 3: To buy it back.
• 1:17:30
  Speaker 1: To make other dudes a bunch of money.
• 1:17:32
  Speaker 2: Yep.
• 1:17:34
  Speaker 1: And it's like, this is, you are, you are tapping
• 1:17:38
  Speaker 1: into one of the, I mean, you are tapping into
• 1:17:41
  Speaker 1: one of very few of our last vestiges of like
• 1:17:47
  Speaker 1: pure wilderness. Yeah.
• 1:17:48
  Speaker 3: Pristine. Just untouched.
• 1:17:51
  Speaker 1: And it ain't going nowhere.
• 1:17:53
  Speaker 4: Nope.
• 1:17:53
  Speaker 1: It's like, to me, it's like, why now? For foreign,
• 1:17:58
  Speaker 1: that's this thing too. like for foreign mining companies but
• 1:18:02
  Speaker 1: even if they were u.s owned mining companies i still
• 1:18:04
  Speaker 1: have a lot of questions but to me it's like
• 1:18:06
  Speaker 1: calm this is a foreign mining company.
• 1:18:08
  Speaker 3: Wanting to say miss in the boundary water like.
• 1:18:10
  Speaker 1: I don't get why is it always that way and
• 1:18:12
  Speaker 1: why is it always like shadow investors and stuff and
• 1:18:16
  Speaker 1: they build these like they build these orgs just to
• 1:18:20
  Speaker 1: front these things where you don't even understand the backing
• 1:18:23
  Speaker 1: of it just the whole thing blows my mind so
• 1:18:25
  Speaker 1: i get like Why do we got to basically go
• 1:18:28
  Speaker 1: in and trash a bunch of our national treasure at
• 1:18:35
  Speaker 1: this point in time to benefit other dudes? This is
• 1:18:40
  Speaker 1: kind of maddening.
• 1:18:42
  Speaker 4: It'll benefit some Americans too, obviously. And that's why this
• 1:18:47
  Speaker 4: is getting pushed forward.
• 1:18:49
  Speaker 1: Yeah. And like, yeah. And they're able to like give
• 1:18:51
  Speaker 1: a lot of money to politicians and politicians are willing
• 1:18:54
  Speaker 1: to do their bidding because they're giving them tons of money. Like,
• 1:18:56
  Speaker 1: like I get all that stuff. I just, you know,
• 1:19:04
  Speaker 1: I can't get excited about this damn road. The other
• 1:19:07
  Speaker 1: question that comes up, so they built the Dalton Highway,
• 1:19:09
  Speaker 1: the Trans-Alaska Pipeline, they put a road on it. That
• 1:19:11
  Speaker 1: road's open to the public. And there's a lot of
• 1:19:14
  Speaker 1: people that are like, if they build the Ambler Road,
• 1:19:16
  Speaker 1: so 200 miles of road, paralleling the Brooks Range, crossing
• 1:19:22
  Speaker 1: all these streams, there's some people that say, and it
• 1:19:25
  Speaker 1: won't even be open to the public. But I look
• 1:19:28
  Speaker 1: and I'm like, man, I don't know. Would it be
• 1:19:30
  Speaker 1: great if it was?
• 1:19:32
  Speaker 2: Well.
• 1:19:33
  Speaker 1: Does that make it better?
• 1:19:34
  Speaker 3: For some people, it would. that access would be great.
• 1:19:38
  Speaker 4: Right.
• 1:19:38
  Speaker 1: In all honesty, like in all honesty, I'd be one
• 1:19:43
  Speaker 1: of the first dudes down that road. Should I be like, right.
• 1:19:46
  Speaker 1: Do you know what I'm saying? Like, I don't know
• 1:19:50
  Speaker 1: if they do cut the road. Um, I don't even
• 1:19:56
  Speaker 1: know how I feel about it. I don't know how
• 1:19:57
  Speaker 1: I feel about it, but when people go like, and
• 1:19:59
  Speaker 1: it won't even be open to the public, I often
• 1:20:01
  Speaker 1: wonder like, would that really be the best thing to
• 1:20:04
  Speaker 1: have it be open to the public? I believe that
• 1:20:06
  Speaker 1: it eventually would be open to the public.
• 1:20:08
  Speaker 3: Probably, yeah.
• 1:20:09
  Speaker 4: It wouldn't be good for those people that are subsistence
• 1:20:13
  Speaker 4: living up there.
• 1:20:15
  Speaker 1: If it doesn't open to the public, if they build
• 1:20:19
  Speaker 1: this road and it's not open to the public, it'll
• 1:20:22
  Speaker 1: not be open to the public because of because of
• 1:20:28
  Speaker 1: native Alaskan resistance to it being open to the public
• 1:20:31
  Speaker 1: to non-local non-subsistence recreational hunters and anglers pouring into that
• 1:20:38
  Speaker 1: area and putting pressure on a resource that they don't
• 1:20:40
  Speaker 1: want pressure.
• 1:20:41
  Speaker 3: I mean, just look at the map. Like you'd open
• 1:20:44
  Speaker 3: all that country to from, from Fairbanks, you drive up there,
• 1:20:48
  Speaker 3: take a left and you're in there. And to what
• 1:20:51
  Speaker 3: the only way you could get in there before is
• 1:20:53
  Speaker 3: by plane.
• 1:20:53
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 1:20:54
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:20:54
  Speaker 1: And people aren't even factoring in the main thing, dude.
• 1:21:00
  Speaker 1: Once you get into Alaska logistics, okay, here's what happens
• 1:21:04
  Speaker 1: is when that's open to the public. And again, like
• 1:21:09
  Speaker 1: I have very mixed feelings about this. Once that's open
• 1:21:11
  Speaker 1: to the public, that's air, that's airboats on all those rivers.
• 1:21:18
  Speaker 3: Right. Yep.
• 1:21:20
  Speaker 1: You, it's like you have opened up like a pan.
• 1:21:24
  Speaker 1: You're opening up a Pandora's box when you put airboats.
• 1:21:30
  Speaker 1: in jet boats on everything that that thing crosses. Yep.
• 1:21:35
  Speaker 3: Yep. That's a great point.
• 1:21:37
  Speaker 1: It is just like, I can see not, not even
• 1:21:41
  Speaker 1: from the, not even from the, not even from the
• 1:21:44
  Speaker 1: conservation angle of tapping an industrial corridor and putting hundreds
• 1:21:50
  Speaker 1: of mines in one of our last great wildernesses, not
• 1:21:54
  Speaker 1: even from that, but from the, from the mind of,
• 1:21:59
  Speaker 1: people that live subsistence lifestyle, native Alaskans that live subsistence
• 1:22:02
  Speaker 1: lifestyles in those areas, from the impact, the eventual impact
• 1:22:11
  Speaker 1: of airboats and other types of operations coming off, snow
• 1:22:16
  Speaker 1: machines coming off of a 211 mile, basically a trailhead
• 1:22:18
  Speaker 1: that runs 211 miles. It's a big, big deal. deal.
• 1:22:28
  Speaker 1: It'll be a big, big deal to them. I'm the
• 1:22:31
  Speaker 1: kind of guy that would be on the receiving end
• 1:22:32
  Speaker 1: of it because I'm the kind of guy that would
• 1:22:33
  Speaker 1: be up there pack rafting and stuff.
• 1:22:35
  Speaker 3: I'd feel icky, but then I'd see a giant herd
• 1:22:37
  Speaker 3: of caribou and be like, well, you know.
• 1:22:38
  Speaker 1: You know what you'd say? Everybody else is doing it.
• 1:22:43
  Speaker 1: It's the great story from the Buffalo hide hunter. I
• 1:22:46
  Speaker 1: think it was Buffalo Jones who said, many days. He's
• 1:22:51
  Speaker 1: talking about being on the Texas plains. He says, many
• 1:22:54
  Speaker 1: days I would come home at night And I would
• 1:22:59
  Speaker 1: want to hang up my rifle. I was so sickened
• 1:23:01
  Speaker 1: by what I had done all day. And I was
• 1:23:04
  Speaker 1: going to quit. But then I'd wake up in the
• 1:23:06
  Speaker 1: morning and off in the distance. Boom, boom, boom. And
• 1:23:11
  Speaker 1: he's like, someone else is going to do it anyway. Yep.
• 1:23:14
  Speaker 1: And I'd head back out. And you'd have like that,
• 1:23:17
  Speaker 1: you know, I'd be like, oh.
• 1:23:20
  Speaker 3: Get yours while the getting's good, you know.
• 1:23:22
  Speaker 1: I heard it's pretty sweet. But again, this is like
• 1:23:25
  Speaker 1: a not, what I'm talking about is way future. I'll
• 1:23:27
  Speaker 1: be dead. Because let's say it goes 30 years and
• 1:23:32
  Speaker 1: there's no access, I'm already out. So I'm talking about
• 1:23:35
  Speaker 1: the future. I'm not even talking about myself. When talking
• 1:23:38
  Speaker 1: about the future, what's that Aldo Leopold quote? I'm glad
• 1:23:42
  Speaker 1: I will not be a young man in a future
• 1:23:47
  Speaker 1: without wilderness. I was telling my 16-year-old this quote yesterday,
• 1:23:52
  Speaker 1: two days ago. I was like, I'm glad I'll not
• 1:23:56
  Speaker 1: be a young man in a future without wilderness. Maybe
• 1:23:58
  Speaker 1: you will be. Right. I didn't have to suffer through it.
• 1:24:04
  Speaker 4: He won't be, but maybe his kids.
• 1:24:06
  Speaker 1: No. Deeply uneasy, personally, me, deeply uneasy about this road.
• 1:24:14
  Speaker 1: And the biggest thing is the shit ain't going anywhere.
• 1:24:17
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:24:17
  Speaker 1: If we really, as a country, really, really in the future,
• 1:24:22
  Speaker 1: you know, are in some spot where it becomes of, like,
• 1:24:26
  Speaker 1: existential significance. Let's talk.
• 1:24:30
  Speaker 3: We'll check back in on it, I'm sure, at some
• 1:24:33
  Speaker 3: point down the road.
• 1:24:35
  Speaker 1: It's money in the bank right now, bro. Money in
• 1:24:38
  Speaker 1: the bank. Gold in the bank. Zinc in the bank.
• 1:24:43
  Speaker 4: Delaware found its first cases of CWD last year, Brody.
• 1:24:47
  Speaker 3: Was it last year or this year?
• 1:24:48
  Speaker 4: It was last year.
• 1:24:50
  Speaker 3: It was?
• 1:24:51
  Speaker 4: Yeah, but this year they're implementing a... Yeah, it was
• 1:24:56
  Speaker 4: last year. Gosh, now you got me tripped up.
• 1:25:00
  Speaker 3: I think it might have been this year, man. I
• 1:25:02
  Speaker 3: think it was April of this year.
• 1:25:06
  Speaker 4: Why were they sampling in April?
• 1:25:08
  Speaker 1: I don't know.
• 1:25:12
  Speaker 3: Double check. You go on and I'll check.
• 1:25:15
  Speaker 4: I wrote it, right? I wrote it down there. Anyways,
• 1:25:17
  Speaker 4: they found two in the last year, approximately. And it's
• 1:25:22
  Speaker 4: prompted an activation of the state's CWD plan. Which was interesting. Well,
• 1:25:26
  Speaker 4: two things were interesting.
• 1:25:27
  Speaker 1: During the 25-26 hunting season, they sampled 600 deer and
• 1:25:31
  Speaker 1: got two positives. Yeah. Okay.
• 1:25:36
  Speaker 4: Delaware's Division of Fish and Wildlife, it's actually the Department
• 1:25:41
  Speaker 4: of Natural Resources and Environmental Control Division of Fish and Wildlife.
• 1:25:46
  Speaker 4: That's a mouthful.
• 1:25:46
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it is, man. I wouldn't even be able to
• 1:25:49
  Speaker 1: begin to make one of the acronyms out of that. Uh-uh. D-N-R-E-C.
• 1:25:54
  Speaker 4: Division of Fish and Wildlife. Anyways, they've been on top
• 1:25:57
  Speaker 4: of it, man, since 2003. Every single year, about 600
• 1:25:59
  Speaker 4: to 650 samples. And so that's 13,000 total. And so then, yeah,
• 1:26:02
  Speaker 4: the 25-26 hunting season, which they must be talking about
• 1:26:04
  Speaker 4: last year, came up with two.
• 1:26:16
  Speaker 3: It says it was confirmed in April of this year,
• 1:26:20
  Speaker 3: so the samples could have come.
• 1:26:21
  Speaker 4: From last fall.
• 1:26:23
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it says they collect them during hunting season.
• 1:26:26
  Speaker 4: Yeah, it's just odd that they throw the 26 in there.
• 1:26:29
  Speaker 4: This was tripping us up. Anyways, so yeah, they implemented
• 1:26:33
  Speaker 4: emergency regulations. They basically made a CWD management zone in
• 1:26:38
  Speaker 4: Lower Sussex County, which we've spent some time in out
• 1:26:42
  Speaker 4: there on the Delmarva Peninsula. Um, just so happens that
• 1:26:46
  Speaker 4: this is where like most of the deer are in
• 1:26:48
  Speaker 4: the state. And so it would, you know, you'd go
• 1:26:52
  Speaker 4: to guess that this is going to be where CWD
• 1:26:54
  Speaker 4: would pop up. It's where the most deer are killed is, uh,
• 1:26:58
  Speaker 4: down in Sussex County. Um, I was surprised to see like. Here,
• 1:27:04
  Speaker 4: these numbers are Delaware. 16,000 hunters. They kill about 16,000
• 1:27:09
  Speaker 4: deer annually.
• 1:27:10
  Speaker 1: That's a hot hunting state right there, man.
• 1:27:13
  Speaker 4: If you're a Delaware hunter, I mean, obviously, there's a
• 1:27:17
  Speaker 4: few out there that are probably killing two or three
• 1:27:19
  Speaker 4: or four. I don't know exactly how they're- Yeah, but
• 1:27:21
  Speaker 4: that's extraordinary. Yeah, it's wonderful hunting, sounds like, in Delaware
• 1:27:26
  Speaker 4: and especially in Sussex County. Um, anyway, so they set
• 1:27:30
  Speaker 4: up a, uh, CWD management zone where you got to
• 1:27:33
  Speaker 4: check deer in during the November shotgun season. Uh, and
• 1:27:37
  Speaker 4: they placed, placed a ban on, uh, natural urine based
• 1:27:42
  Speaker 4: buck lures. Um, I know, I know, but they're doing
• 1:27:47
  Speaker 4: what they can, you know?
• 1:27:48
  Speaker 1: Yeah. That feels like really COVID-19 to me.
• 1:27:53
  Speaker 4: A little over the top.
• 1:27:54
  Speaker 1: Just a little like what?
• 1:27:56
  Speaker 4: And I don't know, are they going to ban selling them?
• 1:27:59
  Speaker 4: Or is it going to be like Wisconsin where you
• 1:28:01
  Speaker 4: can't bait, but every gas station has bait for sale?
• 1:28:04
  Speaker 1: To me, it just seems like that one, banning urine-based
• 1:28:09
  Speaker 1: buck lures, to me, seems like just grasping at straws.
• 1:28:14
  Speaker 2: They have a little explanation here on their site. They
• 1:28:18
  Speaker 2: say buck lures are connected to CWD because infectious abnormal
• 1:28:23
  Speaker 2: misfolded proteins called prions that cause a fatal disease are
• 1:28:26
  Speaker 2: shed in animal bodily fluids.
• 1:28:29
  Speaker 1: Understood.
• 1:28:29
  Speaker 2: And can be transmitted to other deer, either from direct
• 1:28:32
  Speaker 2: contact or in browsing vegetation. So are they saying the
• 1:28:35
  Speaker 2: the product itself can.
• 1:28:38
  Speaker 1: Yes. That you would be moving in. Okay. I, I,
• 1:28:41
  Speaker 1: I get it. Yeah. There's a lot of other things
• 1:28:44
  Speaker 1: going on all the time. Deer are always sticking their
• 1:28:48
  Speaker 1: noses against each other. There's, it's just, there's a lot
• 1:28:51
  Speaker 1: going on all the time to go and look and
• 1:28:53
  Speaker 1: be like, oh, that'll slow the spread. It's like, come on. It's,
• 1:28:57
  Speaker 1: it's like you're trying to do something. You're trying to
• 1:28:59
  Speaker 1: be helpful. I understand. You're trying to be helpful. I
• 1:29:02
  Speaker 1: just think that one is like a little, it, it, it, it,
• 1:29:07
  Speaker 1: it always strikes me as goofy. Yeah.
• 1:29:09
  Speaker 4: They're monitoring it, which is awesome. I'm glad to hear
• 1:29:13
  Speaker 4: they're so on top of it in Delaware. Um, they're
• 1:29:17
  Speaker 4: going to expand the zone if they find more positive
• 1:29:20
  Speaker 4: deer this year. Um, Brody asked me to give you
• 1:29:24
  Speaker 4: some stats of where we're at currently, CWD, and what
• 1:29:28
  Speaker 4: it was 10 years ago. In the country, we now
• 1:29:30
  Speaker 4: have 37 states.
• 1:29:32
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's like every few months, another state.
• 1:29:34
  Speaker 4: Gets added to the list. 10 years ago, we only
• 1:29:37
  Speaker 4: had 24 states.
• 1:29:41
  Speaker 1: It's undeniable that it's spreading. Undeniable. On the interview show,
• 1:29:46
  Speaker 1: we recently had on the director of Missouri's Fish and
• 1:29:49
  Speaker 1: Game Department, and you should listen to the whole thing.
• 1:29:55
  Speaker 1: It was all on the subject, but it seems that
• 1:29:58
  Speaker 1: there's a percentage. If you do good control efforts, there's
• 1:30:04
  Speaker 1: a percentage at which you can be effective. He, they
• 1:30:09
  Speaker 1: feel others feel too, that there's a, there's a prevalence
• 1:30:12
  Speaker 1: rate at which you're, you're not going to change the,
• 1:30:16
  Speaker 1: like these kinds of management exercises at, I think it's
• 1:30:20
  Speaker 1: five and above. At 5% and above, there's nothing you're
• 1:30:25
  Speaker 1: going to do. You're not going to lower the percentage.
• 1:30:29
  Speaker 1: You can suppress 1%, 2%, whatever. You can take management
• 1:30:33
  Speaker 1: efforts and suppress. I wish I remembered better all the
• 1:30:37
  Speaker 1: numbers he gave, but they're starting to come to the
• 1:30:39
  Speaker 1: conclusion that there's a prevalency rate with CWD at which
• 1:30:44
  Speaker 1: these herd reductions stop being effective. But states that get
• 1:30:50
  Speaker 1: aggressive early... sometimes have luck in keeping low-prevalency rates. But he,
• 1:30:59
  Speaker 1: Jason Sumners, and please go listen to the interview because
• 1:31:04
  Speaker 1: it's much more nuanced what I'm saying, is of the
• 1:31:07
  Speaker 1: opinion that at a point, these traditional herd reduction strategies
• 1:31:13
  Speaker 1: and other steps don't make a difference.
• 1:31:16
  Speaker 3: Did he say if there's anything that does?
• 1:31:20
  Speaker 1: No, there are areas, small areas, There are areas in
• 1:31:24
  Speaker 1: Missouri where they have stopped spending. Cause there's no, cause
• 1:31:29
  Speaker 1: there's no return on your investment.
• 1:31:30
  Speaker 3: I mean, you've got like areas like Doug's place where
• 1:31:33
  Speaker 3: the prevalence rate is super high. You've got some of
• 1:31:35
  Speaker 3: those areas here in Montana.
• 1:31:37
  Speaker 1: And you got finite, you got finite resources. You got
• 1:31:40
  Speaker 1: finite personnel and finite resources. And when you're at 20% prevalence,
• 1:31:44
  Speaker 1: you're not going to, you can go put all the
• 1:31:46
  Speaker 1: money in the world in there and you're not going
• 1:31:47
  Speaker 1: to make it 19%. Yeah. And so they, if they're,
• 1:31:52
  Speaker 1: And again, deer don't understand state boundaries. And the thing
• 1:31:56
  Speaker 1: is too, is Delaware is an exceptionally, you know, extremely
• 1:31:59
  Speaker 1: small state. So you're not controlling big chunks where your
• 1:32:04
  Speaker 1: management strategy is acting on itself. Like you have a
• 1:32:08
  Speaker 1: lot of area that's border country. Sure. With deer moving
• 1:32:11
  Speaker 1: across borders. And so if you're out of sync with
• 1:32:14
  Speaker 1: the states around you, This creates complications. In the areas
• 1:32:19
  Speaker 1: that Missouri is stepping away from on CWD management is
• 1:32:22
  Speaker 1: border areas. I believe on their southern border, they can't
• 1:32:28
  Speaker 1: spend there anymore.
• 1:32:29
  Speaker 3: They're kind of like circling the wagon where they can.
• 1:32:32
  Speaker 1: They have some natural barriers, some big reservoirs and other
• 1:32:34
  Speaker 1: things that form some natural barriers, and there's kind of
• 1:32:37
  Speaker 1: a zone where we're done. We're done.
• 1:32:41
  Speaker 4: Yeah, just from personal experience, It does seem like the
• 1:32:45
  Speaker 4: less deer, the less CWD. Like where we hunt in Wisconsin,
• 1:32:50
  Speaker 4: very low deer density compared to say where Doug's at.
• 1:32:54
  Speaker 4: And we've yet to have a positive case. We've been
• 1:32:56
  Speaker 4: testing all of our deer now for, I don't know,
• 1:32:58
  Speaker 4: probably close to 10 years. And the county has had
• 1:33:02
  Speaker 4: a few positives, but like we just don't have the
• 1:33:05
  Speaker 4: spread rate that they do down in Doug's.
• 1:33:09
  Speaker 1: Yeah, like you do when you get areas where you
• 1:33:10
  Speaker 1: got like 30 deer per square mile, 40 deer per
• 1:33:13
  Speaker 1: square mile. I think that kind of blows my mind
• 1:33:16
  Speaker 1: on the social aspect of chronic wasting disease. When we
• 1:33:21
  Speaker 1: did that interview with Jason Sumners recently, and anyone interested
• 1:33:24
  Speaker 1: in CWD, I highly recommend that you go and listen
• 1:33:28
  Speaker 1: to that interview because it's very comprehensive and it's look
• 1:33:31
  Speaker 1: at where we stand with CWD management today. There is
• 1:33:35
  Speaker 1: a faction, like there is a faction of the American
• 1:33:41
  Speaker 1: outdoor community that is resistant to even having a conversation
• 1:33:47
  Speaker 1: about CWD. I was made aware of this asshat on
• 1:33:50
  Speaker 1: Facebook who has all these posts where he's saying that
• 1:33:57
  Speaker 1: I'm getting paid. I'm getting paid. I individually am getting
• 1:34:05
  Speaker 1: paid by the government to talk about CWD because I'm
• 1:34:10
  Speaker 1: an anti-hunter.
• 1:34:12
  Speaker 4: Well, that explains that big diesel truck, that new truck.
• 1:34:16
  Speaker 1: And I'm trying to get people to stop hunting because
• 1:34:20
  Speaker 1: I'm a secret anti-hunter. And my way to help the
• 1:34:23
  Speaker 1: government stop hunters is to spread this fear about CWD.
• 1:34:29
  Speaker 1: And this guy's like, follow the money, follow the money.
• 1:34:33
  Speaker 1: And so I look into him. He's a deer breeder.
• 1:34:35
  Speaker 1: So I'm like, Oh, I followed the money and I'm
• 1:34:39
  Speaker 1: at your house.
• 1:34:41
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 1:34:42
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 1:34:42
  Speaker 3: Oh my God.
• 1:34:43
  Speaker 1: It just, it's like how it came to be that, that,
• 1:34:47
  Speaker 1: that you are sort of, um, that, that people would
• 1:34:52
  Speaker 1: not ostracize people who are having conversations about a, a
• 1:34:58
  Speaker 1: wildlife disease.
• 1:35:00
  Speaker 3: A scientifically like, acknowledge like it's it's real folks.
• 1:35:04
  Speaker 1: And to say you're i don't know i'd like to
• 1:35:07
  Speaker 1: follow i'd like to talk to as many people as
• 1:35:10
  Speaker 1: i can who have expertise in this field because i
• 1:35:14
  Speaker 1: want to understand it because i love deer and i
• 1:35:16
  Speaker 1: don't like deer diseases and it'd be like oh you're
• 1:35:19
  Speaker 1: a i'm gonna.
• 1:35:21
  Speaker 3: Tell your kids on the youth hunt that you're an
• 1:35:23
  Speaker 3: anti-hunter that's.
• 1:35:24
  Speaker 1: What they do is i don't like this dude like
• 1:35:27
  Speaker 1: this dude um I was going to have a little
• 1:35:33
  Speaker 1: bona fides tournament with him, but I'm not going to
• 1:35:35
  Speaker 1: have a bona fides tournament.
• 1:35:37
  Speaker 4: It just comes down to the fact that you're affecting
• 1:35:38
  Speaker 4: his pocketbook by what you're saying.
• 1:35:40
  Speaker 1: Follow the money.
• 1:35:41
  Speaker 4: Okay.
• 1:35:43
  Speaker 2: Is he in Texas? I'm not going to say.
• 1:35:47
  Speaker 1: Okay.
• 1:35:48
  Speaker 2: Because in Texas, that's like the nexus, right? It's like
• 1:35:54
  Speaker 2: the deer breeders.
• 1:35:55
  Speaker 1: There's a lot of tension. Yeah.
• 1:35:57
  Speaker 2: Right. And it's around CWD. It's all around CWD.
• 1:36:00
  Speaker 1: And here's the deal. If I view– if you're a
• 1:36:10
  Speaker 1: deer breeder, I view that as a livestock issue. Right.
• 1:36:14
  Speaker 1: It's a livestock– in most states, they regard it as
• 1:36:16
  Speaker 1: a livestock issue.
• 1:36:17
  Speaker 3: I'm sure most people are familiar with the connection to
• 1:36:19
  Speaker 3: deer breeding, but if they're not, can you.
• 1:36:21
  Speaker 1: Quickly– Um, because we put enormous social value on deer
• 1:36:27
  Speaker 1: and it's really hard to grow big deer in the wild.
• 1:36:30
  Speaker 1: And that's why like a big buck is regarded as
• 1:36:32
  Speaker 1: a thing of extraordinary value is it's like it's rarity.
• 1:36:37
  Speaker 1: And so someone long ago had the brilliant idea, um,
• 1:36:40
  Speaker 1: of being like, man, it's so hard to make big
• 1:36:43
  Speaker 1: deer in the wild. And it's so hard to get
• 1:36:44
  Speaker 1: a wild, big deer. I can, I can like just
• 1:36:48
  Speaker 1: grow one. I'll make a fence and grow a big
• 1:36:50
  Speaker 1: deer and people value big deer because they're so rare
• 1:36:53
  Speaker 1: and so cool and so wild, but now also not
• 1:36:55
  Speaker 1: just have them cause I made them. And, and generally
• 1:36:59
  Speaker 1: when you're in, when you're a deer breeder, your deer
• 1:37:03
  Speaker 1: are generally regarded as, um, under the purview of your
• 1:37:08
  Speaker 1: department of livestock, same way that you'd manage sheep, goats, cattle, horses, whatever.
• 1:37:14
  Speaker 1: It's like you're managed by department livestock. When we spoke
• 1:37:17
  Speaker 1: to Jason Sumners from Missouri. deer breeders in Missouri are
• 1:37:22
  Speaker 1: under the purview of livestock, agriculture department. And then you
• 1:37:25
  Speaker 1: have the wildlife department that works on deer.
• 1:37:28
  Speaker 3: And then you have CWD.
• 1:37:29
  Speaker 1: Well, yes. Yes, because here's where we're getting to. There is...
• 1:37:39
  Speaker 1: There are many people in the CWD space who point
• 1:37:42
  Speaker 1: to evidence asserting that captive deer have at times transmitted
• 1:37:47
  Speaker 1: CWD to wild deer. If it was shown, if it
• 1:37:52
  Speaker 1: was shown to me that that's actually not true, like
• 1:37:56
  Speaker 1: as we continue to study CWD and we look at
• 1:37:58
  Speaker 1: these transmissions and we figure everything out and we do
• 1:38:01
  Speaker 1: it and it turns out captive deer have never spread
• 1:38:06
  Speaker 1: a disease to wild deer, I would put the captive
• 1:38:11
  Speaker 1: deer industry right back in my head where it's always been,
• 1:38:13
  Speaker 1: which is a thing that I don't have an opinion about.
• 1:38:16
  Speaker 3: Right, but I believe there is a U.S. Fish and
• 1:38:20
  Speaker 3: Wildlife Service map that you can, I think that's where
• 1:38:23
  Speaker 3: it's from, that you can look at, which shows kind
• 1:38:28
  Speaker 3: of these expansions of CWD. And often in the center
• 1:38:34
  Speaker 3: of them is a deer breeding facility. You know, it's
• 1:38:38
  Speaker 3: just like, it's the bullseye in that CWD zone.
• 1:38:42
  Speaker 1: The first one ever identified. The first deer ever identified
• 1:38:47
  Speaker 1: to have CWD. was a mule deer in a research facility.
• 1:38:51
  Speaker 1: So in a government facility, that's important detail. The first
• 1:38:55
  Speaker 1: one ever identified was in a government facility in Colorado,
• 1:38:59
  Speaker 1: but people weren't checking wild deer back then. Right. I
• 1:39:03
  Speaker 1: don't know where to like, no one can say where it,
• 1:39:07
  Speaker 1: anyone that tells you where it came from is just talking.
• 1:39:09
  Speaker 1: They don't know. It's not known where it came from.
• 1:39:12
  Speaker 1: You can point to when was it first found? But
• 1:39:15
  Speaker 1: that doesn't mean that you found the first deer. Of
• 1:39:17
  Speaker 1: course you didn't find the first deer that ever had it. So, yeah.
• 1:39:23
  Speaker 1: What are you guys commiserating about?
• 1:39:25
  Speaker 2: There's just a map from Onyx with CWD by state,
• 1:39:30
  Speaker 2: like which states it's been found in.
• 1:39:33
  Speaker 1: There have been some very mysterious, there have been some
• 1:39:36
  Speaker 1: very mysterious jumps of CWD and Jason Sumners even talks
• 1:39:40
  Speaker 1: about it. It is not always edge effect. Meaning you'd
• 1:39:45
  Speaker 1: have like some center, like let's say, you know, wherever
• 1:39:47
  Speaker 1: you have like some center and then spreading out from
• 1:39:50
  Speaker 1: that and concentric rings would be more and more and
• 1:39:54
  Speaker 1: more and more and more. Like you imagine like if
• 1:39:56
  Speaker 1: without air travel and highway travel, the way the cold
• 1:39:59
  Speaker 1: would just kind of move from person to person and
• 1:40:01
  Speaker 1: drift out. You do have where CWD seems to go
• 1:40:05
  Speaker 1: and jump. And when it jumps, is it, is it
• 1:40:10
  Speaker 1: because someone sent a bale of alfalfa?
• 1:40:15
  Speaker 3: Or a breeder buck.
• 1:40:17
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Was it a bale of alfalfa that had a
• 1:40:19
  Speaker 1: bunch of deer saliva all over it and deer hair
• 1:40:22
  Speaker 1: in it? Was it a guy that went on a
• 1:40:23
  Speaker 1: hunting trip? He lives in, I don't know, he lives
• 1:40:26
  Speaker 1: in Iowa and he went out and killed a big
• 1:40:27
  Speaker 1: deer in Colorado and took it home and pressure washed
• 1:40:30
  Speaker 1: its brain all over his, you know, out in his backyard.
• 1:40:35
  Speaker 1: And he's got yard deer. Is it because someone moved
• 1:40:38
  Speaker 1: a breeder buck? Like you'll, we'll never know these things.
• 1:40:43
  Speaker 1: Like you don't know. But people look, and there's a
• 1:40:47
  Speaker 1: lot of attention and focus has fallen on moving live
• 1:40:51
  Speaker 1: deer that might have diseases. I'm interested in something I'll
• 1:40:58
  Speaker 1: probably never have, which is, like, I would love to
• 1:41:00
  Speaker 1: have certainty. If I knew somehow that that just wasn't
• 1:41:03
  Speaker 1: a thing, I would put it out of mind. It's
• 1:41:06
  Speaker 1: interesting that years ago, there was a ballot initiative came
• 1:41:10
  Speaker 1: up to make it that, like, in this state, they
• 1:41:12
  Speaker 1: banned deer captivity.
• 1:41:15
  Speaker 3: I think there's some other states that have too.
• 1:41:17
  Speaker 1: It passed by a lot. And this is not a
• 1:41:20
  Speaker 1: softy anti-hunting state. No. This is a state where hunting
• 1:41:24
  Speaker 1: culture runs deep. Participation is very high. And they wanted
• 1:41:29
  Speaker 1: to open up canned elk hunts here. And there was a,
• 1:41:32
  Speaker 1: there was a citizen's initiative that banned it. So, um, is, is,
• 1:41:40
  Speaker 1: Does that point to an underbelly of anti-hunting sentiment in
• 1:41:44
  Speaker 1: the state of Montana? I don't think so. There was
• 1:41:46
  Speaker 1: hunters that did it. I don't know. I don't know.
• 1:41:55
  Speaker 1: Dying for more info. If there's a guy, this is true.
• 1:41:59
  Speaker 1: If there's someone out there that feels that, if there's
• 1:42:05
  Speaker 1: someone out there that feels that they have good empirical
• 1:42:12
  Speaker 1: evidence showing that captive deer have not spread CWD. And
• 1:42:22
  Speaker 1: it's hard to prove this, but good empirical evidence suggesting
• 1:42:25
  Speaker 1: that something else is at play, I would be very
• 1:42:27
  Speaker 1: serious about having that conversation. If it's out there.
• 1:42:33
  Speaker 3: I don't know.
• 1:42:34
  Speaker 2: But it's like, yeah. It's tough in Texas because you
• 1:42:38
  Speaker 2: mentioned most states, they treat them like livestock. In Texas,
• 1:42:43
  Speaker 2: they're wildlife still. And so Texas Parks and Wildlife is
• 1:42:47
  Speaker 2: over that. And the reason why when you come across
• 1:42:53
  Speaker 2: someone who is very vocal, like this gentleman you're referring to,
• 1:42:57
  Speaker 2: about CWD isn't real, it's not a big deal, trace
• 1:43:00
  Speaker 2: it back.
• 1:43:01
  Speaker 1: No, there's no one. The denier community has moved on
• 1:43:04
  Speaker 1: from it's not real.
• 1:43:06
  Speaker 2: How do you, what's farther than that? Oh, it's a conspiracy?
• 1:43:09
  Speaker 1: No, no, no.
• 1:43:10
  Speaker 4: No, no, it's real, but it's always been there and
• 1:43:12
  Speaker 4: it's nothing to worry about.
• 1:43:13
  Speaker 1: The denier community used to be that it's fake. They
• 1:43:18
  Speaker 1: change over time. The leading edge of the denier community
• 1:43:25
  Speaker 1: now sits at, I think it's that it's agricultural products
• 1:43:30
  Speaker 1: are spreading CWD.
• 1:43:31
  Speaker 3: Is that right?
• 1:43:32
  Speaker 1: But it doesn't matter. Right. Or something. But it's not
• 1:43:36
  Speaker 1: that it doesn't exist.
• 1:43:37
  Speaker 2: Yeah, but the incentive for the breeders, right, is because
• 1:43:40
  Speaker 2: when CWD is found in their facility, they have to
• 1:43:43
  Speaker 2: kill a bunch of deer.
• 1:43:44
  Speaker 1: And that pisses them off bad.
• 1:43:45
  Speaker 2: And that pisses them off. And so that's kind of
• 1:43:46
  Speaker 2: the connection where the incentive comes from. And this is
• 1:43:51
  Speaker 2: a huge fight in Texas. It's been, you know, ongoing
• 1:43:53
  Speaker 2: for years. There's been pretty famous... deer breeders who have
• 1:43:57
  Speaker 2: refused Texas parks and wildlife order to kill their deer.
• 1:44:00
  Speaker 1: Yeah. They viewed as government ovaries.
• 1:44:02
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 1:44:02
  Speaker 2: They eventually have to do it. Um, but it's, it's,
• 1:44:04
  Speaker 2: it's hard to imagine because then you hear reports of
• 1:44:07
  Speaker 2: deer getting out of these facilities that have tested positive
• 1:44:09
  Speaker 2: for CWD. And so it's hard for me to imagine
• 1:44:12
  Speaker 2: that it's never happened that one of those deer has
• 1:44:14
  Speaker 2: never spread it.
• 1:44:15
  Speaker 3: Oh, I mean, they don't even have to get out
• 1:44:18
  Speaker 3: nose to nose through a fence is.
• 1:44:20
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 1:44:20
  Speaker 3: It happens all the time. I'm sure.
• 1:44:22
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I don't, I've never met anyone who's not a hunter.
• 1:44:26
  Speaker 1: What's funny about this whole thing of it being like
• 1:44:28
  Speaker 1: that if you are interested in wildlife diseases, you're an anti-hunter.
• 1:44:32
  Speaker 1: What's funny is I've never met anyone who's interested in
• 1:44:36
  Speaker 1: CWD who's not a hunter.
• 1:44:38
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 1:44:40
  Speaker 1: Make a list. Make a list of the least huntinest
• 1:44:43
  Speaker 1: people you can think of in your social circle. This
• 1:44:46
  Speaker 1: is a real question. Do me a favor. Of the
• 1:44:51
  Speaker 1: people you text with, think of who is the least
• 1:44:54
  Speaker 1: huntinest people you text with. And if you got people
• 1:44:59
  Speaker 1: that hate huntin', put them on this list. Text them
• 1:45:02
  Speaker 1: and go, hey man, what do you think about CWD?
• 1:45:06
  Speaker 3: Is that that zombie disease I read about?
• 1:45:09
  Speaker 1: Or it'll be what? So the idea of being interested
• 1:45:15
  Speaker 1: in CWD is anti-hunting. Why aren't anti-hunters talking about CWD?
• 1:45:20
  Speaker 1: Only people that talk about CWD are hunters. Whenever I
• 1:45:24
  Speaker 1: talk about CWD, I'm talking about CWD and the people
• 1:45:27
  Speaker 1: I know that are most interested in CWD have hunted
• 1:45:30
  Speaker 1: the longest. Like the guys I know that are most like,
• 1:45:34
  Speaker 1: oh shit, this is terrible. It's like, let me guess,
• 1:45:36
  Speaker 1: you've hunted a long time. Dudes that started hunting last
• 1:45:40
  Speaker 1: year don't care about CWD. It's like a, it's an old,
• 1:45:44
  Speaker 1: it's a dude that loves deer thing. It's a symptom
• 1:45:47
  Speaker 1: of loving deer and being a lifelong hunter is that
• 1:45:51
  Speaker 1: you're worried about CWD. So to have it be that
• 1:45:53
  Speaker 1: it's like an anti-hunting thing is so weird. But hunters
• 1:45:59
  Speaker 1: care about CWD and guys that hunt wild deer blame
• 1:46:04
  Speaker 1: people that have captive deer. People that have captive deer
• 1:46:09
  Speaker 1: blame something different. Well, there's so many baked in self,
• 1:46:13
  Speaker 1: there's so much baked in self-interest. Like I'm full of it.
• 1:46:15
  Speaker 1: I have self-interest because I love deer and I like
• 1:46:17
  Speaker 1: eating deer. So I'm worried about CWD. They have self-interest
• 1:46:20
  Speaker 1: because they like selling hunts.
• 1:46:21
  Speaker 2: Well, and, and, you know, to be fair, it's not
• 1:46:23
  Speaker 2: just the breeders, right? Because what we were talking about earlier,
• 1:46:26
  Speaker 2: the ban on buck scent, right? Because when CWD comes in,
• 1:46:30
  Speaker 2: now we have a ban on, you know, baiting. And
• 1:46:33
  Speaker 2: so there are these strategies people rely on to go hunting,
• 1:46:36
  Speaker 2: just like average Joe, not a deer breeder. they like
• 1:46:39
  Speaker 2: baiting deer because it makes it a little easier.
• 1:46:41
  Speaker 3: There's also the economics of those products.
• 1:46:44
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Right. Right.
• 1:46:45
  Speaker 2: And so they're like, Hey, I, I don't want to
• 1:46:47
  Speaker 2: be restricted in the way that I've hunted for a
• 1:46:50
  Speaker 2: long time. And so, you know, there's an incentive. Yes.
• 1:46:53
  Speaker 1: And that one, like, and that one hits more again,
• 1:46:56
  Speaker 1: acknowledging the self-interest. Right. Right. My self-interest is, um, my
• 1:47:02
  Speaker 1: primary protein source is deer meat. So I'm interested in
• 1:47:06
  Speaker 1: the health of consuming deer meat. And, and I liked
• 1:47:09
  Speaker 1: in my favorite thing to do is hunt deer. So
• 1:47:11
  Speaker 1: I'm interested in that. Yeah. If you're a deer breeder,
• 1:47:13
  Speaker 1: you're interested in selling semen and stud bucks and bottled
• 1:47:19
  Speaker 1: deer urine and selling hunts and all that. But that's
• 1:47:22
  Speaker 1: why earlier, remember when I got prickly about the buck
• 1:47:24
  Speaker 1: urine thing? Yeah. I'm not a, I'm not a dough
• 1:47:27
  Speaker 1: and heat urine guy, deer urine guy. I don't employ
• 1:47:30
  Speaker 1: that tactic, but then I, just like a deer breeder,
• 1:47:34
  Speaker 1: I look at that and I'm like, Show me where
• 1:47:37
  Speaker 1: that's actually an issue. Knowing that since we don't know
• 1:47:43
  Speaker 1: what's spreading it, when you go and say, eh, I'm
• 1:47:48
  Speaker 1: going to change that. Yeah. You know, I'm going to
• 1:47:51
  Speaker 1: make that illegal. Yeah. It feels, it winds up feeling arbitrary.
• 1:47:57
  Speaker 1: So if I try to be as big of a
• 1:47:59
  Speaker 1: person as I can, I could picture that I'm raising
• 1:48:02
  Speaker 1: deer in a high fence operation. And then someone's like, hey,
• 1:48:07
  Speaker 1: you're doing bad. That you would say, please show me.
• 1:48:12
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:48:12
  Speaker 1: Show me where my deer that I have, show me
• 1:48:17
  Speaker 1: where they're spreading CWD. Yeah. Don't come to me with
• 1:48:21
  Speaker 1: a hypothetical. Yeah.
• 1:48:23
  Speaker 2: Which is why agencies, I mean, it's in their best interest,
• 1:48:26
  Speaker 2: I think, to think about the opinion of hunters and
• 1:48:31
  Speaker 2: like how they're going to react to whatever policies you
• 1:48:33
  Speaker 2: put in place. It's not the only thing, because sometimes
• 1:48:36
  Speaker 2: you got to do stuff that people hate. Yeah. That's
• 1:48:38
  Speaker 2: just what you got to do. But like, You got
• 1:48:40
  Speaker 2: to be careful.
• 1:48:41
  Speaker 1: And sometimes they take a ham-handed approach. It's just like,
• 1:48:44
  Speaker 1: it's like COVID-19 all over again. Yeah. Where, you know,
• 1:48:47
  Speaker 1: for one day I say, hey, you know, if Amazon
• 1:48:49
  Speaker 1: brings a box to your house, leave it out in
• 1:48:51
  Speaker 1: the rain for two weeks because you're going to get
• 1:48:53
  Speaker 1: sick off it. Yeah. If your parents are dying in
• 1:48:56
  Speaker 1: an old folks home, you can look at them through
• 1:48:57
  Speaker 1: the window, but you can't go hug them goodbye.
• 1:48:59
  Speaker 4: Right.
• 1:49:00
  Speaker 1: And you do all this crazy shit. And then later
• 1:49:02
  Speaker 1: we look at all the crazy stuff we've done and
• 1:49:04
  Speaker 1: you say, man, that got out of control. You know? Yeah.
• 1:49:07
  Speaker 1: Like whatever. vaccinating kids when kids don't get sick from it.
• 1:49:11
  Speaker 1: All that stuff. In the end, you look and it's crazy.
• 1:49:14
  Speaker 1: Someday we might understand CWD better and we might look
• 1:49:16
  Speaker 1: and be like, a lot of that stuff was stupid.
• 1:49:19
  Speaker 1: When Michigan was first trying to figure out CWD response,
• 1:49:22
  Speaker 1: they came in and they banned putting out deer bait
• 1:49:24
  Speaker 1: in all kinds of places. Then they later go, you
• 1:49:28
  Speaker 1: can put out five gallons of bait. It's like, oh,
• 1:49:34
  Speaker 1: so you've discovered that 10 gallons spread CWD, but a
• 1:49:40
  Speaker 1: gallon or five gallons doesn't spread CWD. Is that where
• 1:49:43
  Speaker 1: we're at? You have this data you can share with
• 1:49:46
  Speaker 1: the hunters of Michigan and people get like, come on, dude.
• 1:49:51
  Speaker 1: And the reason I bring up that COVID-19 thing is
• 1:49:53
  Speaker 1: because there's a thing, and I harp on this often,
• 1:49:56
  Speaker 1: there's a thing that happens when you're managing humans is
• 1:50:01
  Speaker 1: you push humans too far on something. And then they go,
• 1:50:06
  Speaker 1: never mind all of it. Which is where you landed.
• 1:50:11
  Speaker 1: The CWD COVID-19 thing will always feel like a parallel
• 1:50:15
  Speaker 1: to me. Because it's where you land when people say,
• 1:50:19
  Speaker 1: some of this is so dumb. Out of an abundance
• 1:50:23
  Speaker 1: of caution, I'm not open to anything you have to
• 1:50:26
  Speaker 1: say anymore at all. Like, my friend had to watch
• 1:50:31
  Speaker 1: his mom. Like, die in an old folks home through
• 1:50:35
  Speaker 1: a glass window and couldn't go hug her goodbye. I now,
• 1:50:41
  Speaker 1: I could be on the most crowded plane in the world.
• 1:50:44
  Speaker 1: I'm not wearing my mask because I'm done because you've
• 1:50:47
  Speaker 1: pushed me too far. And you run the risk with
• 1:50:50
  Speaker 1: the CWD stuff. States run the risk of doing that.
• 1:50:54
  Speaker 1: And I've seen it happen again and again, where people
• 1:50:56
  Speaker 1: just get like, man, you guys are nuts. Nevermind. Yep.
• 1:51:01
  Speaker 1: I'm done talking about it. And they've created a lot
• 1:51:03
  Speaker 1: of that. Yep. But it still worries the shit out
• 1:51:08
  Speaker 1: of me. You know? I don't know, man. It's the
• 1:51:12
  Speaker 1: end of the show. I don't know. You got any
• 1:51:14
  Speaker 1: more to add? Nope.
• 1:51:15
  Speaker 4: I'm glad they're there trying and doing something about it
• 1:51:18
  Speaker 4: than not.
• 1:51:19
  Speaker 1: Yes. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. I just can't. Yes.
• 1:51:24
  Speaker 1: Me too. It worries me. It honestly worries me sick.
• 1:51:28
  Speaker 1: It worries me, like CWD worries me sick. And for
• 1:51:31
  Speaker 1: the two reasons I always bring up, the human health aspect,
• 1:51:34
  Speaker 1: which tends to worry me less over time. And then
• 1:51:38
  Speaker 1: the herd health issue worries me sick because I like deer.
• 1:51:42
  Speaker 1: I like deer culture. I like deer hunting. I like
• 1:51:44
  Speaker 1: the whole thing. I like that we're going taking our
• 1:51:47
  Speaker 1: kids deer hunting tomorrow. Like, love it. So I worry
• 1:51:50
  Speaker 1: about it. But at the same time, I worry about
• 1:51:59
  Speaker 1: When people get, and it can happen that people get
• 1:52:04
  Speaker 1: a little drunk on, I don't want to say drunk
• 1:52:08
  Speaker 1: on authority. They just get a little bit chaotic.
• 1:52:14
  Speaker 3: Sure.
• 1:52:15
  Speaker 4: And we're already experiencing CWD fatigue.
• 1:52:18
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 1:52:18
  Speaker 4: I mean, geez, I was testing elk 20 years ago
• 1:52:22
  Speaker 4: in elk camp. We had to test every single elk
• 1:52:24
  Speaker 4: that we killed.
• 1:52:25
  Speaker 1: In Colorado. Yeah.
• 1:52:26
  Speaker 4: Um, you know, so it's like been a major part
• 1:52:30
  Speaker 4: of my whole adult hunting career. You know, that was
• 1:52:32
  Speaker 4: when I was, you know, in my early twenties.
• 1:52:36
  Speaker 1: Did you know that this CWD fatigue, you go to
• 1:52:39
  Speaker 1: Southwest Wisconsin. Do you know how long now CWD has
• 1:52:43
  Speaker 1: been at the forefront of deer hunting conversations in Southwest?
• 1:52:46
  Speaker 3: 30 years.
• 1:52:47
  Speaker 1: A quarter. Yeah. A quarter of a century. And a
• 1:52:52
  Speaker 1: lot of guys are like, we're still shooting big bucks.
• 1:52:54
  Speaker 1: We're still eating deer burgers.
• 1:52:56
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 1:52:58
  Speaker 1: I don't know. Worries me sick. All right, turn it
• 1:53:02
  Speaker 1: all off, Phil.
• 1:53:03
  Speaker 4: Thanks, Phil.
• 1:53:05
  Speaker 1: We'll see you guys next week. See you next week, suckers.