Latest / Wired To Hunt Podcast / Wired To Hunt Podcast #89: The State of Whitetails in 2016 w/Kip Adams

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Wired To Hunt Podcast #89: The State of Whitetails in 2016 w/Kip Adams · Wired To Hunt Podcast

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wire to Hunt podcast, your home for
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: deer hunting news, stories and strategies, and now your host,
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: Mark Kenyon. Welcome to the Wire to Hunt Podcast. I'm
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: your host Mark Kenyon. In this episode number eighty nine
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: ten the show, we're joined by Kip Adams to discuss
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: the current state of white tales in North America and
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: how things have changed over the past year. All right,
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: welcome to the Wire to Hunt Podcast, brought to you
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: by Sick Gear. Today. As I mentioned, we've got a
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: great guest, a repeat guest in fact, and that's Kip Adams,
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: the CUTIA May that's the Quality Deer Management Associations to
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: rector of Education and Outreach. And last year at right
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: about the same time, we had Kip on the show
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  Speaker 1: to discuss the state of white tails in two thousand
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: fifteen and it was a fascinating and the lightning discussion.
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: So given the response we had from that episode, it
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: made sense that we should do a similar check in
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: this year to see where things stand across the nation
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: with white tails Today. Unfortunately, Kip was willing to join
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: us again, so we're not going to be around the bush.
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: As my co host Dan actually couldn't join us for
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: this episode, so it's just me and instead of our
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: usual BS session, we're going to jump right into the interview.
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: And with that, I know there's probably like three people
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: cheering in their cars right now, excited that they don't
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: need to hear me and Dan talk about stupid stuff.
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: So with all that said, we are going to take
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: a real quick break for word from our partners at
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: Sick of Gear, and then we'll bring on Kip to
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: discuss the state of white tails in two thousand and sixteen. So,
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: as you know, every week we take a quick second
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: to hear from our partners at Sick of Gear, and
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: today at wanted to hear from Sick of Product category
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: leader Dennis Zuck about exactly what it takes for a
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: new product from SICKA to make the cut and be
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: released to the public. So here's Dennis with some interesting insight. Yeah,
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: I mean, and it kind of goes back to some
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: of those simple first statements we talked about and talking
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: thinking about, you know, what is it this product needs
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: to do to be interesting and unique and what what
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: need does it need to fulfill? You know, So that's
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: part of it, and the other part of it is
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: is you know, you know, is it something that people
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: are gonna be happy to own and feel like they
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: you know, it was worth everything that they spent to
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: own it. Um, is it going to be We used
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: the term fit for use, which is kind of a
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: corny way of saying, you know, fit for the field?
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: You know, is it? Is it something that is ready
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: for prime time? And you know, for us, we we
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: weigh that really heavily. We we play the long term
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: bet here. We we believe you wear our stuff long
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: enough you'll come to really appreciate the details and the thought,
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: you know. And if we have a product that we
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: don't think lives up to that, then it just doesn't
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: make falls It falls short of the floor, It falls
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: onto the floor and never finds its way to a
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: retail rack. How much of that, you know, is left
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: on the cutting room table and disappears versus how much
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: of that is then put into the hopper for in
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: the future. Is are a lot of these things still
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: and evolving system and process? Oh tons of that? And
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: so that you know, you asked that stuff that question,
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: has that need gone away? You know? And maybe if
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: that first product doesn't hit it the way we wanted
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: to hit it didn't mean to mean the need went away.
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: And so if we still feel like there's an opportunity
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: to address that pain point you might have or create
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: that product that's going to make that difference, we're still
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: going and we absolutely have several of those and we're
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: just we just don't feel where we want them to
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: be yet, and but we're excited to bring them out
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: in the coming years. They take years of development, some
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: of some of the harder things, you know, they say,
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: if it's easy to do, everybody would do it. Some
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: of those products fall into that that that space. Pretty
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: fascinating stuff. So to learn more about SICK and what
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: new products they have released to the world, visit sit
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: could gear dot com. Now let's bring Kip Adams on
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  Speaker 1: the line. All right here with this now on the
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: line is Kip Adams. Welcome to show. Kip, Hey, thanks
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: for having Mark. I'm happy to be here today. Yeah,
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: we're we're excited to have you back. It was just
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: a little over a year ago I think that you
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: made your fear first appearance on the Wired Hunting podcast
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: and that was such an interesting discussion that we wanted
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: to revisit that topic again here today, and that topic
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  Speaker 1: last time was essentially the state of white tailed deer
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  Speaker 1: in the country as of that period early two thousand
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  Speaker 1: and fifteen. So today I'm hoping we can look at
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  Speaker 1: that same question the state of white tails in America
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  Speaker 1: or across North America for for that matter. And uh,
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  Speaker 1: you know where we are today in two thousand and sixteen,
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  Speaker 1: a year later and last year when we first talked,
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  Speaker 1: as imagine, you remember, things were looking pretty rough. A
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  Speaker 1: lot of the numbers that were coming in, We're showing
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  Speaker 1: that harvests were down, record book entries were way down.
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  Speaker 1: I think there's maybe a sense of a little bit
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  Speaker 1: of a sense of panic almost that this kind of
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  Speaker 1: white tail boom had busted. So to kick us off, Kip.
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  Speaker 1: Now that we're, you know, a year later down the road,
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  Speaker 1: it's your high level what's your high level impression of
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  Speaker 1: where we stand today? Are Are things better? Are things worse?
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  Speaker 1: Is it about the same? What do you think? Him?
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  Speaker 1: I think overall, things are definitely better. Um, I think
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  Speaker 1: there's still lots of issues impacting dear and some of
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  Speaker 1: the things we talked about last year, some of the
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  Speaker 1: problems are still there. But at least some of the
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  Speaker 1: harder starter to turn around a little bit so um,
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  Speaker 1: thanks to the things that we need to really be
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  Speaker 1: paying attention to. But overall, definitely not worse and um
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  Speaker 1: and I think anything a little bit better. Okay, Well,
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  Speaker 1: that that's good news. And that's kind of what I've
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  Speaker 1: been picking up as we're we're seeing new estimates coming
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  Speaker 1: in from this past season, and as I talked to
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  Speaker 1: people like you and others, definitely seems like maybe we're
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: we're back on track. And I guess that kind of
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  Speaker 1: brings me to a question that I think a lot
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  Speaker 1: of people talked about I've reference just a minute ago
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  Speaker 1: in kind of in relation to this bust or kind
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  Speaker 1: of like this bubble has burst um over the past
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  Speaker 1: five ten years, as you know, lots of things have changed,
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  Speaker 1: and some people are saying, you know, the white tail
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  Speaker 1: population has crashed, the bubbles burst, etcetera. On the other hand,
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  Speaker 1: I've heard some people talk about the fact that maybe
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  Speaker 1: this was more of a mild correction and or a
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  Speaker 1: little hiccup in in where things are going. Where you know,
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  Speaker 1: this kind of change in the white tailed world over
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  Speaker 1: the last few years, how do you view that? Was
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  Speaker 1: it a crash, is it a correction something in between.
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  Speaker 1: I don't think it's a crash. I think there are
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  Speaker 1: some places that have certainly really lost a bunch of deer,
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  Speaker 1: and uh um, I will come set to mine, particularly
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  Speaker 1: just from the buck harvest to what's gone on over
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  Speaker 1: the past decade. But in most places, UM, it's it's
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  Speaker 1: more aptlete termed the correction because deers just couldn't continue
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  Speaker 1: to to expand at the rate they were throughout much
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  Speaker 1: of the range. For the last five to ten years,
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  Speaker 1: most day walace agencies have been purposely trying to reduce
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  Speaker 1: some dear herds. Obviously, when their herds are brought down,
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  Speaker 1: then buck harvest actor decline. So today, you know what,
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  Speaker 1: we're killing fewer deer in many places. UM. Much of that, though,
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  Speaker 1: is has been prescribed, so it's not a crash if
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  Speaker 1: you're prescribing it and you know we're trying to accomplish it.
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  Speaker 1: I think it's a it's a lot more. I guess
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  Speaker 1: a correction would be a better, better explanation for it. Now.
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  Speaker 1: I do think there are areas where herds are brought
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  Speaker 1: lower than there should have been. So you know, some
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  Speaker 1: hunters were asked to reduce deer herds, and you know,
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  Speaker 1: locally it could have easily take them too low. And
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  Speaker 1: I have friends and colleges across the White Tales range
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  Speaker 1: that leave in some of those areas that you know,
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  Speaker 1: oh my gosh, this is this is way lower than
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  Speaker 1: we had anticipated, and in many cases lower than the
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  Speaker 1: agencies have prescribed. So I'm not I'm not arguing with
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  Speaker 1: some of the people that say, man, I heard is
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  Speaker 1: that's a crash in my backyard. I think with the
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  Speaker 1: disease outbreak we've had the HD outbreaks over the last
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  Speaker 1: five years and some other issues, there certainly are hunters
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  Speaker 1: in local areas where hers are really down, but deer
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  Speaker 1: managers often you know, talk about populations of deer, so
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  Speaker 1: they manage it a little higher scale. The state agency
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  Speaker 1: folks do so for the most part, they're now desers
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  Speaker 1: are definitely lower, but I'm very confident they had not crashed,
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  Speaker 1: and even in areas where they are lower than they
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  Speaker 1: need to be now can be corrected relatively easily. Speaking
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  Speaker 1: speaking of those corrections, so last year, I think I think,
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  Speaker 1: at least from my standpoint, in the winter of two
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  Speaker 1: thousand and fifteen January February March. I think from what
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  Speaker 1: I saw, the kind of fever pitch of concern about
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  Speaker 1: deer harvests going down and population struggle, I think it
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  Speaker 1: kind of reached a pinnacle there, at least as far
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  Speaker 1: as I have been paying attention to. And from that,
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  Speaker 1: it seemed like a number of states addressed that very
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  Speaker 1: issue you mentioned of the fact maybe in some places
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  Speaker 1: our harvest was too heavy, you know, maybe we were
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  Speaker 1: killing too many doughs, Maybe we were describing some things
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  Speaker 1: that went too far, and there seemed to be some changes.
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  Speaker 1: One example I can think of was in Ohio there
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  Speaker 1: are a number of counties, um that they pulled back
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  Speaker 1: on dough harvest totally. Or and I think in the
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  Speaker 1: upper pendents of Michigan, same thing, something along those lines. Um,
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  Speaker 1: do you think you know we're the examples of these
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  Speaker 1: changes being made this past year that you think we're
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  Speaker 1: the right changes? We have some positive updates been made
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  Speaker 1: to regulations to to deal with this slight change in
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  Speaker 1: population and what kind of harvest our populations can sustain. Yeah. Actually,
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  Speaker 1: I think there's two parts to that one. Um U
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  Speaker 1: that there are several agencies or state wilife agencies that
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  Speaker 1: reduced analyst opportunity for this year are the ones you
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  Speaker 1: mentioned Western Maryland um same way UM placed in the
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: Pennsylvania the same way places throughout the US reduced the
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: opportunity for hunters to take in on this year. So
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  Speaker 1: I think that certainly helps and equally is importantly with
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: that you have a lot of hunters who are just
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  Speaker 1: doing a better job today recognizing, hey, you know what,
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: Jeffer are very low So even if the agency of
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  Speaker 1: my state willige agency tells me I can still shoot
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: three doll or five doll wherever the case may be.
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: I think a lot more hunters today are doing a
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: better job recognizing I don't need to fill all these tags.
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: In fact, if I don't fill all these tags, that's
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: probably better locally for me. So I think we were
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  Speaker 1: also seeing hunters taking responsibility to try to be better
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  Speaker 1: managers within their own area and help regulate the number
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: of dough that removed as well. So so I think
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: both of those situations will working together to help us out. Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: that's that's a pretty big point. I think, especially kind
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: of tied back to what you mentioned a second ago,
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  Speaker 1: where you know, managers or game agencies and whatnot. They're
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: making decisions based at a population level, at a high level,
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  Speaker 1: trying to manage as best as they can, but they'll
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: never be able to manage down to the individual property
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  Speaker 1: as as we as hunters see things. So even though
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: on my property maybe I'm seeing that things are awful,
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  Speaker 1: I don't understand why our agency is saying we need
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: to kill more doughs when there's no doughs behind my house. Maybe, um,
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: of course it can. It can work the other way,
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: and that the agencies might be seeing one thing statewide,
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: but that doesn't pertain to your situation, and you as
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: the individual need to know when to pull back or
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: when to push forward at that At that level, I
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: think to your point, Kip, that's really where things almost
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: have to go if we want to have have a
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: well managed deer herd, and may of these cases you
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: just can't do it perfectly from the very highest level, right,
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: That's absolutely right, And you know, not our state wall
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: if agencies they manage it either a county level or
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: the deer management unit level or wildlife management unit level
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: or whatever you know it may be called in your state,
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: but obviously you I don't hunt at that level, you know,
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: we hunt at the property level, so you can get
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: within any deer management unit in the country, and I'm
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: sure fine pockets of habitats that has more deer than
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: it should and others that have fer deer than it
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: could support. So you know, hunters are an opposite end
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: of that. So I think it's just more important than
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: ever for process hunters to collect some you know, some
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: information about local deer heard observation data or whatever to
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  Speaker 1: get a good feal for all right, even with whatever
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: my state taliament can be taken here, let me help
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  Speaker 1: be as responsible as I can and remove the right number,
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: which the great numbers neither too few nor too many
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: to help the local situation. And I firmly feel that
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: hunters today are taking a bigger role in that than
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: ever before, and I see that as a very good thing. Yeah, absolutely,
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: so I kind of want to take a step back
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: here before we continue diving deep on a few of
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: these things as we are. Um, you just finished working
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: on the two thousand sixteen White Tail Report, which is
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: a great resource that you guys have the Quality Deer
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: Management Association put out every year. UM, and I know
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: that there there's a whole slew of different types of
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: information that that would be helpful. But having finished that
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: just recently, what what were the biggest takeaways for you
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: when you looked at all the friend data and segments
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: of white tail related information out there, what stood apart
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: for you as the big takeaways from the two thousand
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: six edition of this year's white Tail Report. I think
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: there's some some really important pieces of information and some
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: real important trends for hunters to understand or at least
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: to be aware of. But my personal favorite in it
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: is that once again, the percentage of one and a
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: half year old bucks and in the national buck harvest dropped,
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: and it dropped to the point that for the first
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: time in our history across the US now we are
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: killing more bucks that are three and a half are
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: older than bucks that are one and a half years old.
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: And that is just absolutely amazing to me. And you know,
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: there's certainly are a few states that still do not
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: collect harvest data, they don't collect age data on their harvest,
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: but the vast majority of the states do so they
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: report that data to US. And for the first time ever,
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: we killed more bucks that were at least three and
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: a half than one and a half, and that is
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: incredibly special and something that every hunters should be proud of. Yeah.
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: So so speaking of that, um, of course, you know,
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: being a member of the Quality Deer Management Association and
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: really being a supporter and in line with many of
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: the different things that you guys are promoting and talking about. Um,
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: this is something I'm excited about. But for someone who
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: maybe doesn't have experience with the ideas of quality deer
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: management or the benefits of their being this higher percentage
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: of three and a half or older deer, Just for
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: those people that maybe don't really see why this is
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: so exciting, can you just walk us through why is
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: this a good thing? Why is this good for deer
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: and deer hunters. Sure, deer are a very complex animal
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: with how they communicate with each other and how they
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: essentially have evolved, and the more natural age structure that
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: as managers we can have today, you know, I mean,
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: in the better job we do shooting deer, so that
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: the standing proper deer has as natural of an age
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: structure as possible. It allows all those mechanisms of the deer,
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: how they communicate, react, work the way we're supposed to.
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: So it's just a It makes you, at least it
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: should make you feel really good to think, you know what,
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: I'm doing my part to allow this deer herd to
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: act the way that it was evolved. So and today
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: we're closer to that than ever before. So that's one
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: part of the second part of it, from just a
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: pure hunting perspective, UM, you know, there are more older
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: bucks out there than ever before for people to chase around.
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: And even if you don't get to kill an older deer,
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: just the fact that you have those older bucks in
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: the population create an entirely different hunting opportunity. Older bucks
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: leave a lot more rubs, they leave a lot more scrapes,
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: they do a lot more calling, they interact a lot
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: more during the breeding season. So it's an entirely different
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: opportunity to hunt a population of deer that has some
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: older bucks in it. And then obviously at the end,
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: hunters love antlers and and uh and big deer, whether
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: it's big bodies or big antlers. And the fact that
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: you have a higher percentage of bucks out there today
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: in those older age classes UM just gives the opportunity
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: to both photographs, see and shoot. UM many bigger deer
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: than we had even five or ten years ago available
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: to us. Yeah. Yeah, I can definitely say that I've
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: seen a lot of those benefits myself, both the places
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: that I've been able to manage properties and other places
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: where I've walked into a state maybe that just has
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: a has a higher population of older age class. Dear,
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: it's it's I mean, as you know, kid, it's just
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: a different situation. One of the one of my favorite
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: things is just like the dear behavior that you get
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: to see is so much different in a population that's
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: more natural when there's a you know, more mature deer.
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: You get to see things like dear fighting, You get
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: to see that happen, You get to see intense competition
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: during the rut, and all the other things that come
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: with that. Um you get like, for example, for the
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: longest time I grew up hunting in Michigan, I never
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: saw a deer over two years old. And then the
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: first time I went and hunted in Iowa, I had
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: like a five year old, supermature great big nine point
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: within like forty yards of me. I was filming a
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: buddy hunting and this buck was snort wheezing over and
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: over and over again for like thirty minutes. And that's
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: something I never heard in my life to that point.
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: I never got to see anything like that. And those
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: are the types of just awesome experiences I think you
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: can have when you're in a situation where that population
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: is more balanced. Um hunters love the challenge of calling
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: a turkey in, or just the involvement of interacting with
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: an animal. Same thing else as why I like turkey,
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: and that's why I like uh duck hunton and goose hunting.
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: I love the interaction with the animal. And now, more
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: than ever before, deer hunters are having that same opportunity.
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: So that's pretty cool. Yeah. So, so here's the thing
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: about the mature buck numbers that that you shared in
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: this report. You know, I've posted some articles about it,
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: and I think other media publications have been sharing this
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: great news. Excuse me, But inevitably you hear people say,
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: and this is whether you're talking about age, structure of
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: a deer herd or just the numbers of deer harvested.
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: People say, well, how could you know that that percentage
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: of three and a half year old bucks were killed?
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: Nobody in my state tells what, how older bucks were anyways?
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: Or how can you claim that deer were killed this
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: last year? You never saw my dear um. So this
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: this raised the question that lots of people have. I
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: just recently worked on a little article about it, so
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: I've been kind of asking these questions myself too and
• 18:16
  Speaker 1: trying to understand it. But for listeners, Kip, can you
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: can you walk us through how state deer harvest estimates
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: UM are our creative are discovered and shared. I know
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: you guys have a section in the White Tail Report
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: about this that's pretty fascinating. I'd love to hear from
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: you on it. Yeah, there's actually two parts to that.
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: One is how they estimate the actual harvest or the number,
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: and the second is, which is a different question, is
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: how they estimate the age structure of it. So we'll
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: do the harvest first and then move on to the
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: age structure. Perfect and the states do this in different ways,
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: but there's really two main techniques that the agencies will
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: used to estimate their harvest. And and what we reported
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: this year in our What Tail Report is some states
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: report the minimum number of deer they got killed, while
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: others try to report the total number of deer or
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: they you know, they estimate what that is, and I
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: obviously estimating the total deer kill in my opinion, is
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: far better. Um. But what most will do is historically,
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: when we had very short seasons, real well defined seasons,
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: most deer were killed over you know, a small period
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: of time, almost every state agency had a check station
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: or hunters will bring their deer in and biologists and
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: technicians from the agencies could look at them, and that
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: provides some confidence to the hunters that the agencies were
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: we're getting their hands on deer and and things were good.
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: And uh And I'm a big fan of check stations.
• 19:35
  Speaker 1: I really really like mostly because I like the interaction
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: between the agency and the hunters gives them a chance
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: to talk and meet each other and not brand check
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: stations for for a long time prior test to my
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: employing with q d n A. But today and actually
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: they do get good data from them. But even then,
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: some people who kill a deer, they'll take them to
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: the check stations even if it's required. So the whole
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: idea of that that's the only way to get total
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: data is using check station is really false. I mean,
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: people people kill deer and sneak them home anyway. Um,
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: fast forward to today. Our seasons today are so much longer,
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: and we have a lot more seasons available, you know,
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: more both seasons, cross both seasons, early muzzle overseasons. And
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: given the fact that hunters just take advantage of them,
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: which they absolutely should and that I personally do. But
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: what happens now is suddenly, rather than killing the majority
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: of the deer and just a handful of date, they
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: get spread out over a few months. So to have
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: agencies man a check station, it's just financially not possible
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: in areas anymore because you just can't get your hands
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: on enough deer um in a short period of time.
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: So what almost every state has gone to now is
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: some other form of collecting data. Nearly every state today
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: uses some type of online checking system, or at least
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: that as one of the options for you to check
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: your deer. Where you kill a deer and you have
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: to report it, you can send in a card, you
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: can call a telephone number, you can just get down
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: and computer, and so they at least have that data.
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: So some people say, you don't what, I don't have
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: to report my dear, so they don't know, Well, and
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: the old days you didn't have to take you deer
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: to the check station either if you didn't want to.
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: So the accuracy there's not not a big difference. But well,
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: most agencies will do is they apply some form of
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: a correction factor or they get him an estimate on
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: the people who don't actually legally report their deer. So,
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: for example, in Pennsylvania, when you kill a deer, but
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: I'll use Pennsylvania because that's where I'm from, you have
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: to report it. You can send in the report card
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: or use online or whatever. And the online is easy
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: just such that I always do. So they have a
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: measure they know everybody who reported a deer. Well, then
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: what the game commissioned by Honest do is they will
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: go out and visit me lockers, food processors, that kind
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: of thing where they have deer and we'll collect information
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: from them. So in Pennsylvania, you have to tag a
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: deer so they can see every deer that's there, see
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: who killed it, and then they can collect data from
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: it themselves, go back to their computers and say, hey,
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: you know what I see. Mark Kenyon killed the deer
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: and I had it. I looked at it today. In
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: this meat processor. Let me go check our records and
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: see if Mark Kennon reported this or not. And from
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: that they know that less than half of the people
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: that legally kill a deer actually report them. And you
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: know what that part is. We should be extremely embarrassed
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: by that, you know, given how easy it is to
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: report it, and that you know it's in our best
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: interest to report them. So is that is that an example?
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: Is that an example number? Kip? Or is that actually
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: what you guys have? And I don't know what the
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: exact number is, but I do know that it's it's
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: a less than on the hunters who legally kill a deer? Reporter?
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: Is that in Pennsylvania or is that a Pensylvania And
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: the Pensilia Game Commission has has published that data. Um,
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: I just can't remember what the exact percentage is, but
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: I know it's less than fifty okay, society, No, no, no,
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: that's a good point. So with that, you know the process,
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: our game commission will get their hands literally on forty
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: or fifty thousand deer a year. He's the average hunter
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: has no idea that. So they say the game commission
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: can't know how this because you know I didn't report
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: my dear or they didn't ask me if I killed
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: a deer. Well, the reality of it is they get
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: their hands on a lot of deer, they can double
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: check it with look, I reported, and then from that
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: they're able to estimate what the total harvest likely was.
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: So are they exactly right with it? Probably not, but
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: I bet you they are within you know, a few
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: percentage points of being exactly right. But the more important
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: part of that is, since they do that the same
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: way every single year, if they are a little bit off,
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: at least their estimate from year to year is incredibly consistent.
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: And that's the real important part from from the management end.
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: So so that is a great example of how to
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: do it. Now the other way of how states do it.
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: In many states in the southeastern US used this second technique,
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: and I personally think that this is the best. What
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: they do is they actually use a survey company that
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: will randomly survey a certain number of hunters to ask them,
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: you know, how many deers they shout, and they can
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: ask them all kinds of questions from them and using
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: a statistically valid sample. What it does that allows them
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: to then estimate what the total number of deer hunters
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: killed their near and they are incredibly accurate. It's the
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: exact same strategy that we use in our political polls,
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: because you know, in any election, any big election, you know,
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: they run these polls by talking to a certain number
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: of voters, so in many cases we know who's gonna
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: win those before the vote ever takes place. They are
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: incredibly accurate. And deer managers use the same type of
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: thing to estimate statewide deer harvest, and that is a really,
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: really good way to do it in most cases, because
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: of so many hunters in the states, these survey companies
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: only have to talk to about one percent of the
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: deer hunters to get a big enough sample to make
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: them accurate. So average hunter doesn't understand that or may
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: not even believe it in many cases, but it uh,
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: it is incredib really accurate one done appropriately, So yeah,
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: I mean, it's it's natural especially if like for for
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: in my example, I didn't really pay attention too much
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: in statistics class in high school, so it kind of
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: seems crazy. But through like you said, properly conducted surveys
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: with a statistically significant sample size and process, you can
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: actually see what the results would be within that smaller
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: sample size let's say ten thousand people or whatever. And
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: because of statistics that actually can be applied to the
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: total hunters or whatever, it might be amazingly accurately. And
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: I was kind of digging into this issue myself, trying
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: to see, you know, how accurate is it. And in
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: the case of Pennsylvania, there was a resource, the penn
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: State uh Dear Force Study. I like it was. I
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: was reading an article where they explained that they were
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: trying to verify their survey and when they look at
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: the survey that the random sample survey that they send
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: out compared to the the on the ground harvest numbers
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: that they get, I'm doing the things you mentioned, the
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: checkens plus the correction factor. They found that their accuracy
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: of the survey was within I think two to nine
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: of the actual numbers they got, So surprisingly seems very accurate. Um.
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: Is there is there any other way that states that
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: do this check to verify or is it just like
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: the math is going to be right no matter what,
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: we don't need to verify it. No. M some most
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: states don't. The ones they use the actual hunter survey. UM,
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: they don't need to verify because that's already statistically valid. Uh.
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: The states that just require the harvest to be reported, um,
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: most of those do not verify. I believe the Pennsylvania
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: in New York are the only two that do so.
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: For the rest of them, um, they are reporting in
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: most cases just a minimum do you ever do harvest
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: that they know of, and then they just use that
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: number from year to year. So I think the majority
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: states do not know the exact percentage of hunters that
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: did report, you know, the harvest legally, like Pennsylvania knows.
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: So so what they based off in and is okay,
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: we have the minimum number of deer that we know
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: we're killed. We'll use that number moving forward. So it's
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: it's a good number. But there are better ways to
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: do it, um. In some cases more costly ways. But
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: if you can get the total estimate, and particularly to
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: a hunter survey like that or checking those deals like
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: Pennsylvania or New York does, those are much preferred methods
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: and produce a lot more confidence in that actual number.
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: So so did I hear you correctly come mins ago
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: and you said that you believe the best option is
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: the servey. You think that that is the best option
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: I do because it is the UH is done often
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: by an independent company, often by Responsive Management, which is
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: a natural resource survey company based out of Virginia. They
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: do work for all state agencies and federal agencies and
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: from a natural resources and often Responsive Management of the
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: ones that conduct a survey, and they are just simply
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: the best of the business of what they do. So
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: um in my opinion, that is the best way to
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: go for the agency because you not only get numbers
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: to do, then you can have opportunities to ask other
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: hunter related questions either on you know, their ideas on things,
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: of the preferences for things, so you're getting that data
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: which is top of the line. Plus you have an
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: opportunity to engage those hunters on other important topics. So
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: I really like those hunter surveys. That's interesting being from
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: Michigan where we don't have any kind of mandatory checking.
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: I've always complained about it, and I said, why, you know,
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: we should have a check and we shouldn't have just
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: a random survey that you know, just a handful people
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: to take. Being uneducated about it. I always thought that
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: was a worst option, But it's interesting now as I'm
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: starting to hear from you and doing my own research
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: that that actually, that's a pretty good way of going
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: about it, um And I think there's a lot of
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: people probably listening that have been confused about this too.
• 28:55
  Speaker 1: So I'm glad that we could dive into it a
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: little bit because I think it's a Once you hear
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: about it, it makes sense and you can understand why
• 29:03
  Speaker 1: states do it the way they do it. But when
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: you don't have any idea, it kind of seems like
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: these states are coming up with numbers and management plans
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: kind of willy nilly based on a handful of helpful
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: people checking in their deer sharing data and everybody else
• 29:15
  Speaker 1: kind of keeping it to themselves. So it's interesting, very interesting.
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: So so mark that answers the actual harvest part. In
• 29:23
  Speaker 1: the second half of that is the age structure party, like,
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: how do how the agencies get that? And there's a
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: few different ways that they will. Some of them still
• 29:30
  Speaker 1: do maintain check stations, or they can collect biological data
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: from the deer coming in, you know that way they
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: can pull a jawbone or look at that job bone
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: to get age data. Some of them require the hunters
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: or ask honors to send in the incisors, the front
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: incisors to their office, which they will then send to
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: lab for cementa manually aging, so they can get it
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: that way. Um. So there's different ways that they will
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: get that age data. Pennsylvania gets it by those meat
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: locker checks where they can see the job bones of
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: those de So there's a few different ways there. Um.
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: So there's more ways that they're getting age structure data
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: than the not. Actually, Virginia is a perfect example. Through
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: their d MAP program, they require all of their d
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: MAP cooperators to collect job bones from all the deer
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: that are harvested, provide them to the agency so the
• 30:17
  Speaker 1: agency can then age those deer. So lots of different
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: ways for that. The important thing there is at least
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: most states do collect age structure data. Um. It blows
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: my mind that there's a few that still don't because
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: I think man as a deer bothers there, I would
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: so want to know what the age structure that harvest
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: is and you know how it changes over time. There's
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: there is literally a handful that that don't have that data. Um.
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: Most do. And with those even if or even given
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: that some states collected differently, um, I believe that most
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: of the states that do collect it at least continue
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: to collect it the same way each year, so they
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: do maintain that consistency across the gears, so they can
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: monitor changes in the age structure, whether it's going up
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: or down or staying stable. So you can you can
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: at least monitor those trends, which which is the ultimately
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: most important thing. That's right, Yeah, and that's what they
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: really really need to be able to do so. So
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: so taking a step back then to the white Tail report,
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: seems like the big piece of good news, the fact
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: that we've seen this kind of threshold pass where there's
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: more mature bucks being taken. Were there any other items
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: of good news that you found as major um takeaways
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: from this this most recent year. Yeah, the sure, we're
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: I think one of the really cool thing is going
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: on right now is something called the Wild Harvest Initiative. UM.
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: As a hunter, you know, I've preached the benefits of
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: hunters for years to to non hunters, and you know,
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: in the amount of wild game that we consume but
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: then also share with others, will actually some researchers from Canada,
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: Shane Mahoney from Conservation Visions and Newfoundland have started this
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: and he's actually starting an effort to quantify the amount
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: of wild game and wild fish consumed in North America
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: because his his contention is that there is so much
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: more game that is eaten than most folks realized. That
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: if that game was not there and it was not
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: harvested and consumed by hunters and anglers, the cost that
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: you can on, the costs to US and Canada from
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: the agricultural and would be astronomical. So think about it.
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: I know you're a big hunter and outdoors and think
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: of all of the deer and elkin turkey in the
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: US you lead each year. You think that if you
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: didn't have that and you had to buy that much
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: more beef and chicken, and I'll multiply that, you know,
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: by twelve million deer hunters in the in the country. Uh,
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: this is this is pretty cool. It's it's going to
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: be a monumental effort and that's why there's lots of
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: different organizations and people who will be involved helping this um.
• 32:50
  Speaker 1: We are so excited about it at qdm A that
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: that we have pledged fifty tho dollars to help in
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: these efforts. And my personal opinion is that this has
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: a chance to show how important hunters are to society,
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: hunters and anglers, especially hunters to society, and for the
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: first time, you know, we have a great opportunity to
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: show non hunters and particularly anti hunters just how down
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: important we are to what's going on, you know, even
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: just from a feeding perspective. So so the wild Irve
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: was initiative, I think is super cool and I'm excited
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: to see a guest started this year. Yeah, us too.
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: I We actually had Shane on as a guest last year,
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: and uh, you know, as you know, kid, he's a
• 33:30
  Speaker 1: very inspiring individual and a lot of things he's working
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: on are pretty exciting and this being a perfect example
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: of that. So I did think when I saw that,
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: when I saw the qtu Ay was was stepping up
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: to help with that, I was pretty excited to hear it. Um,
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: It's it's definitely a worthy cause for sure. Now on
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: the other side of the coin, then when we're talking
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: about some of the different challenges maybe that are facing
• 33:52
  Speaker 1: deer and deer hunting, there were a lot that we
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: talked about last year. Um, what do you think this
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: year are the are the greatest channel and just facing
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: either the animals themselves or our traditionist hunters or opportunitiest hunters. Well,
• 34:06
  Speaker 1: I think we certainly had diseases sturnally still a big one,
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: and we looked at a couple of different things of
• 34:12
  Speaker 1: that this year. And one of the questions we asked
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: every day whilife agency was, you know, what is the
• 34:17
  Speaker 1: single biggest management issue that you face on a daily basis?
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: I mean, would you spend more time and more resources
• 34:24
  Speaker 1: on than anything else? And for more When all the
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: results came back, the largest by far and half of
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: the states reported this the single biggest issues that they
• 34:33
  Speaker 1: spend more time and resources on our disease and captive
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: deer issues. And uh so what that means is that
• 34:41
  Speaker 1: they then robbed the opportunity for spending all of that
• 34:44
  Speaker 1: time and resources on other things that would be more
• 34:48
  Speaker 1: beneficial the hunters, like hunter access, hunter recruitment, habitat enhancement,
• 34:53
  Speaker 1: and that kind of thing. So so I think that's
• 34:56
  Speaker 1: still a troubling, troubling one that that is such a
• 34:59
  Speaker 1: big issue. And I agree that I'm not saying they're
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: wrong and spending it time where they should, And I
• 35:04
  Speaker 1: think that it absolutely is the biggest because of some
• 35:06
  Speaker 1: of the impacts of that. So we see that, but
• 35:09
  Speaker 1: also one of the newer challenges UM has to do
• 35:13
  Speaker 1: something from the law enforcement end. And I know we
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: have some hunters that would said, man, you know, I
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: can't stand my law enforcement officers, or someone I said,
• 35:21
  Speaker 1: they love them. But wherever hunters fall on that, you know,
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: law enforcement, wildlife enforcement, and it was a big part
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: of what we love to do. It's necessary, it's important.
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: And last year there was a story out of Illinois
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: that you know, they lost a big chunk of wildlife
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: officers all at once. So we start digging in and
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: seeing exactly what was going on with this. You know,
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: what were the trains when we found out is you know,
• 35:43
  Speaker 1: there's just a handful of states that actually have more
• 35:46
  Speaker 1: wildlife officers today than they did a decade ago. Um,
• 35:50
  Speaker 1: there's a bunch of states that have fewer today, and
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: you know, and that's not good. That China is going
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: absolutely the wrong way, you know, given that particularly we
• 35:58
  Speaker 1: have more older deer today. We you know, it's just
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: an increased focus on wildlife in general. The fact that
• 36:04
  Speaker 1: we have fewer people out there help them to its
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: enforce those laws is not not positive at all. Right,
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: if you're if you're concerned about poaching or people you know,
• 36:13
  Speaker 1: not checking in their deer or doing all sorts of
• 36:15
  Speaker 1: different things that as individual hunters and manners, we of
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: course hate to see if we don't have more law
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: enforcement officers to actually help manage that and deal with that,
• 36:25
  Speaker 1: we're we're gonna be putting ourselves in a worst position
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: year in and year out. That's right. And to take
• 36:31
  Speaker 1: that one step further, we wanted to say, Okay, you know,
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: like how what is the density of wildlife officers out
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: there across the country, And it is amazing how much
• 36:39
  Speaker 1: at varianties some states. Uh for instance, Maryland, Maryland has
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: more wildlife officers on a per square mile basis than
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: any other state, and it averages out that each of
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: their officers covers twenty eight square miles. So one officer
• 36:55
  Speaker 1: twenty square miles is a lot of ground to cover,
• 36:58
  Speaker 1: you know, And that's the lowest in the country tree
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: it goes all the way up to the other end
• 37:02
  Speaker 1: of the spectrum is North Dakota. So each officer in
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: Maryland averages twenty eight square miles to cover each officer
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: in North Dakota covers one eight hundred and sixty five
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: square almost two thousand square miles. So you apply, you know,
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: figurett the acoes that I mean is this funding and
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: and graded vranted that you know in North Dakota has
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: a lot fewer hundreds than Maryland does a lot more
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: open land. But but still think about that if you
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: live there. You know, when your officer has to cover
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: almost two thousand square miles, you know, what are the
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: chances that he or she, you know, we'll be able
• 37:37
  Speaker 1: to respond quickly to you know, somebody that's poaching near
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: you or something that's I mean, that's just absolutely off
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: the charts and not that's not not a good thing
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: at all. And it's not you know, North Dakota game
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: of Fisher's Fall and not criticizing them by any means.
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: I mean, all of these states, you know, both the
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: law enforcement and in the biological and you know, it's
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: all regulated by their budgets and so man or man.
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: But that's that's pretty amazing that there's a handful of
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: states you know that a thousand square miles and more
• 38:08
  Speaker 1: that each officer has to cover, so US not not
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: very conducive for them, you know, really being able to
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: help somebody in a very local situation. Well, before we
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: move on to my next question for Kip, we do
• 38:22
  Speaker 1: need to pause briefly for word from our sponsors of
• 38:25
  Speaker 1: this episode, Bear Archery. As we've done over the past
• 38:28
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  Speaker 1: dot com. And now back to the show. Yeah. So, so,
• 39:14
  Speaker 1: speaking of budgets, this is something um that I saw
• 39:17
  Speaker 1: you guys wrote about in the report as well, and
• 39:19
  Speaker 1: it's something I thought about to a degree, to very
• 39:24
  Speaker 1: I believe a significant amount of the budget made available
• 39:27
  Speaker 1: to these state agencies who helped manage our dear herds
• 39:30
  Speaker 1: and enforce these important laws and everything. A significant portion
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: of that budget comes from license fees. Correct, And you
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: guys did you guys took a look at how license
• 39:40
  Speaker 1: fees have or have not changed across many of the
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: white tail states, um recently. Could you tell us what
• 39:46
  Speaker 1: you get what you've found there, and that would be
• 39:47
  Speaker 1: curious on your opinion on a couple of things related
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: to that. Sure we are, we put that in in
• 39:52
  Speaker 1: your right. Those license fees pay a big portion of
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: our agencies budgets. And I tell people is you know
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: what if you want to help wildlife, wile license You know,
• 40:01
  Speaker 1: even if you're out a hunter, just buying a hunting
• 40:03
  Speaker 1: or fishing license helps tremendously. And you know, and people
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: off the roll their eyes that you're not a hunt
• 40:08
  Speaker 1: Do you like do you feed birds? Oh? Yeah, I'd
• 40:10
  Speaker 1: love to see songbirds. You know, well, sankahuna, you know,
• 40:13
  Speaker 1: help out by buying a hut license. That's a great
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: way for them to be able to help. So, but yes,
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: with the hunting license sales. Then we took a look
• 40:21
  Speaker 1: at eye you know, when was the last time that
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: you actually increased your license price? And I'll be the
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: first to admit that I know that, you know, we
• 40:28
  Speaker 1: don't like to pay more for a hunting license, and
• 40:30
  Speaker 1: you know, no hunter wants to do that. But the
• 40:32
  Speaker 1: reality of it is, you know, if that pays most
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: of the funding for those wildlife and wildlife management that
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: we love, we should at least hope that those license
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: fees can cover the appropriate amount to fund this stuff.
• 40:44
  Speaker 1: So so we at to every state, you know, when
• 40:47
  Speaker 1: was the last year that you increase the price of
• 40:50
  Speaker 1: your resident hunting license? You know, there's lots of different
• 40:53
  Speaker 1: varieties of non hunting licenses and other parts of resident
• 40:56
  Speaker 1: youth centers. We just made it very clear and the
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: isn't that hunting license when was the last year was increased?
• 41:02
  Speaker 1: And there was only a handful of states that have
• 41:05
  Speaker 1: increased that price within the last five years. Uh, a
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: lot more states that increased it five to ten years ago,
• 41:13
  Speaker 1: and unfortunately the majority of states that hasn't been increasing
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: over ten years. So you take a look at the
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: cost of living more than ten years ago versus today,
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: it's very different. You know, think about what we pay
• 41:24
  Speaker 1: for gas or you know, or a rifle or even
• 41:26
  Speaker 1: arrows for our boat today very different than than you know,
• 41:29
  Speaker 1: fifteen twenty years ago. And and I actually goes all
• 41:32
  Speaker 1: the way back the state that has maintains are licensed
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: the longest. And this just blows my mind. Kansas has
• 41:38
  Speaker 1: not increased the price of their uh res since you
• 41:44
  Speaker 1: think about the opportunities of the hunting opportunities you have
• 41:47
  Speaker 1: in Kansas. You know, tremendous, tremendous opportunity with deer, tremendous
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: bird opportunities there. You know, people go to Kansas all
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: the time to be able to hunt. And and that
• 41:58
  Speaker 1: agency unfortunately is working under you know resident I mean
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: license price it was based all the way back. Even
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: though I know we don't like to pay more for them,
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: they certainly deserve more hunting license there to help more
• 42:14
  Speaker 1: adequately fund a lot of the management efforts they're trying
• 42:17
  Speaker 1: to do, right, I mean, I think at least me personally,
• 42:20
  Speaker 1: I would imagine a lot of other serious hunters out there.
• 42:24
  Speaker 1: I mean, I would gladly pay more because I think
• 42:28
  Speaker 1: maybe people have questions like, well, if we pay more,
• 42:30
  Speaker 1: is it just going to some other you know, patting
• 42:32
  Speaker 1: the pockets to somebody else, or is it actually going
• 42:34
  Speaker 1: to go to our agency and conservation and all that
• 42:37
  Speaker 1: kind of stuff. I guess I understand those questions, but
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: I think if I'm going to pay extra for something,
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: I would much rather be paying extra here where I
• 42:45
  Speaker 1: know that it's going to support a very important cause
• 42:48
  Speaker 1: and a budget that's already significantly strapped these agencies and biologists,
• 42:53
  Speaker 1: and I think they, as we've talked about their serious
• 42:56
  Speaker 1: needs for additional funding, we the people using it, be
• 43:00
  Speaker 1: responsible for trying to help that a little bit. I
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: don't think. Yeah, no, I agree. I agree. One other
• 43:07
  Speaker 1: thing that was very positive that we saw mark was
• 43:10
  Speaker 1: hunter access was always a big issue. And uh, you know,
• 43:13
  Speaker 1: in a lot of plays, people just don't have a
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: good place to go to hunt. So we have states,
• 43:17
  Speaker 1: Uh you know how many acres of state owned land
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: do you have right now it's open to deer hunting?
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: You know, this is not national lands, it's not national
• 43:25
  Speaker 1: forests or national parks or anything in the States that
• 43:27
  Speaker 1: people can get, but just state owned land. You know
• 43:30
  Speaker 1: today versus ten years ago, And what we found out
• 43:33
  Speaker 1: today there's over fifty million acres of state owned land
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: that's open to deer hunting right now, or at least
• 43:39
  Speaker 1: when the most recent deer season was in and uh
• 43:42
  Speaker 1: in most states have that trend was up from a
• 43:45
  Speaker 1: decade ago. So I had more land today state own
• 43:48
  Speaker 1: land for deer hunters than than ten years ago. Unfortunately,
• 43:51
  Speaker 1: there's certainly states to Texas or Kansas, they have very
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: little private land, you know, I mean public land. It's
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: almost all private, so doesn't help them a whole lot.
• 44:01
  Speaker 1: But for much of the United States, um, a lot
• 44:04
  Speaker 1: of the states today have more land in the past
• 44:07
  Speaker 1: for hunters. So that's a good thing because they're certainly
• 44:09
  Speaker 1: not making any more of it. And as we've become
• 44:11
  Speaker 1: more urbanized and people lose places to hunt, the state
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: lands like this just become all that more important. So
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: I was glad to see that that trend was increasing. Yeah,
• 44:20
  Speaker 1: definitely access and public lands across the board, national land,
• 44:23
  Speaker 1: state it's important thing. As you mentioned, I think I
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: think we had maybe talked about this once before, just
• 44:29
  Speaker 1: about how one of the main reasons why people indicate
• 44:34
  Speaker 1: them having had to quit hunting or not be able
• 44:37
  Speaker 1: to get started hunting is because of a lack of
• 44:39
  Speaker 1: places to hunt. UM. So this speaks to the larger
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: issue of hunter recruitment to and retaining hunters. Um, this
• 44:46
  Speaker 1: manas across the board for all those things. That just
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: for sure, that's absolutely right. So I want to I
• 44:54
  Speaker 1: want to jump back real quick to the topic of
• 44:57
  Speaker 1: license views. I'm just curious about your opinion on nonresident
• 45:01
  Speaker 1: license fees and the dramatic disparity in resident prices versus
• 45:06
  Speaker 1: non resident prices. Is this is kind of where maybe
• 45:09
  Speaker 1: we're seeing the opposite of what's happening on the residents side.
• 45:12
  Speaker 1: On the resident side, it seems like, you know, these
• 45:15
  Speaker 1: these fees are very very very low, and maybe we're
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: not raising them enough to help out. On the other hand,
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: you've got the nonresident fees, which in some states are
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: getting very very high and very limiting. Do you have
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: any opinion on that? I mean, is that the right
• 45:29
  Speaker 1: way to go to just charge nonresidents a huge increase
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: in fee for for those people to hunt or I
• 45:35
  Speaker 1: don't know. I struggle with this myself, and maybe it's
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: just because I'm a nonresident hunter in many cases. Um,
• 45:40
  Speaker 1: but I don't know. Do you have an opinion on that?
• 45:41
  Speaker 1: Is that the right way to go? Yeah? Well, I
• 45:43
  Speaker 1: think that it's certainly. I do like it that resident
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: fees are less than nonresidents. I think it's a benefit
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: to the people living, you know, within that state that
• 45:51
  Speaker 1: they do not have to pay as much as somebody
• 45:54
  Speaker 1: coming in from another state. So I completely get that,
• 45:56
  Speaker 1: and I'm fine of that. Um. Having said that, there
• 45:59
  Speaker 1: are amendous variants in nonresidencies for different states. Some states
• 46:05
  Speaker 1: almost giveaway a nonresident hunting license, whereas others, you know,
• 46:09
  Speaker 1: really really reap the benefits of the opportunity that people
• 46:13
  Speaker 1: want to come there. And actually Illinois is a perfect example.
• 46:15
  Speaker 1: You know, Illinois has a really good deer hurt else
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: people want to go and hunt deer, and if you're
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: as a nonresident going in, you're gonna pay through the teeth,
• 46:23
  Speaker 1: you know, to get there. Um, I guess I don't
• 46:26
  Speaker 1: have as much of a problem with that state charging
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: an adequate fee for nonresident as I do some of
• 46:34
  Speaker 1: the states like Ohio that almost give away the nonresident license.
• 46:39
  Speaker 1: And I'm so I've been very pleased that it wasn't
• 46:42
  Speaker 1: that much. And there's probably some hunters saying, you know,
• 46:45
  Speaker 1: that's terrible, why you know, we should be cheap, But
• 46:47
  Speaker 1: I'm looking at it from I guess the funding end
• 46:50
  Speaker 1: and think, man, oh man, let's budgets are cut today,
• 46:54
  Speaker 1: we as hunters end up getting hurt in the long
• 46:56
  Speaker 1: run where you have really inexpensive I guess nonresident licenses
• 47:01
  Speaker 1: like that. So I think it would be a lot
• 47:03
  Speaker 1: better off if there was a little more parody across
• 47:05
  Speaker 1: the board on what nine residents were we're having to pay.
• 47:09
  Speaker 1: In some cases it probably would be a lot less.
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: You wouldn't have to pay nearly as higher fees, you know,
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: maybe like in Illinois, if some of the other places,
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: you know, it was a little higher, a little more
• 47:18
  Speaker 1: representative of what the opportunity was you were getting. So um,
• 47:23
  Speaker 1: you know, I think ultimately, and this has been the
• 47:25
  Speaker 1: news lately, where you know, should non hunters have to
• 47:28
  Speaker 1: pay some of the bill for the wildlife use and
• 47:30
  Speaker 1: all that? And and I'm a firm believer in yes,
• 47:33
  Speaker 1: because hunters have paid for all of us for so
• 47:36
  Speaker 1: long that you know, I think other users should pay
• 47:39
  Speaker 1: a little bit. And some will say, well, yeah, but
• 47:41
  Speaker 1: then they will get to say at the table if
• 47:43
  Speaker 1: they do, and you know what, they already have a
• 47:45
  Speaker 1: stake at the table. So as I don't think that
• 47:47
  Speaker 1: that just because they pay it adds anything to them. Historically,
• 47:51
  Speaker 1: you know, hunters were about the only ones sitting at
• 47:53
  Speaker 1: the table stakeholder wise, and that's not the case at
• 47:56
  Speaker 1: Hall anymore. There's a stakeholder group is much much bigger,
• 48:00
  Speaker 1: and so these others that are benefiting from our wilefe resources.
• 48:04
  Speaker 1: I firmly feel that they should pay a little bit
• 48:05
  Speaker 1: of their own fair share to be involved with that
• 48:08
  Speaker 1: as well, right right, And I think, um, you know,
• 48:11
  Speaker 1: I believe that there was some legislation that was was pushed,
• 48:14
  Speaker 1: maybe a decade or more ago, trying to add some
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: type of excise tax on other outdoor recreation items, non
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: hunting related, hiking, camping, et cetera, that kind of stuff,
• 48:23
  Speaker 1: and that was shot down. Is there any chance of
• 48:26
  Speaker 1: something that ever ever happening again or have you heard
• 48:29
  Speaker 1: winds of something like that being brought back to the table.
• 48:32
  Speaker 1: I haven't heard anything recently on that, so it's possible,
• 48:36
  Speaker 1: I guess as being considered out. I just don't know
• 48:38
  Speaker 1: about it, but um, I do think that it will
• 48:40
  Speaker 1: be brought back just because as budgets become more limited
• 48:43
  Speaker 1: and they have to find ways to help fund some
• 48:45
  Speaker 1: of the stuff and given that those other people are
• 48:48
  Speaker 1: you know, are using those resources. You know, I think
• 48:50
  Speaker 1: that's a very responsible way to coop that back. And
• 48:55
  Speaker 1: uh so it's a good way to do it. And
• 48:56
  Speaker 1: I have some first hand experience with that. First job,
• 48:59
  Speaker 1: I had to out of schools for the State of
• 49:01
  Speaker 1: Florida or for Flow the Game and Fish and managed
• 49:03
  Speaker 1: ten thousand acres down there for the state, and any
• 49:06
  Speaker 1: hunters who came into our wildlife management units had to
• 49:09
  Speaker 1: buy a management stamp and then that gave them the
• 49:14
  Speaker 1: right to hunt on at that point, like four million
• 49:16
  Speaker 1: acres in the state. Well, anybody who came in and
• 49:19
  Speaker 1: use those lines that was not hunting didn't have to
• 49:21
  Speaker 1: pay a cent. And that argument was we're not shooting
• 49:24
  Speaker 1: anything or killing anything. But my argument was, as the
• 49:27
  Speaker 1: biologist in charge of that, a big part of my
• 49:30
  Speaker 1: budget each year went to maintaining the roads and maintaining
• 49:34
  Speaker 1: the creek crossings and doing everything else so that everybody
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: that wanted to use that property could access it. And
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: I was glad to do it, but you know what
• 49:42
  Speaker 1: I would tell the bird watchers, You know, you tear
• 49:45
  Speaker 1: this road up every bit as much as you know
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: somebody driving by hare hunting or you know, you need
• 49:49
  Speaker 1: to use that creek crossing as much as somebody else.
• 49:52
  Speaker 1: So in my opinion was always even though they're not
• 49:56
  Speaker 1: shooting or taking meat home, you know what, most hunters
• 49:58
  Speaker 1: who come on here aren't take too much meat home.
• 50:01
  Speaker 1: But yeah, still they you know, they are using they
• 50:05
  Speaker 1: are I guess, seeing the beauty of the place, they're
• 50:08
  Speaker 1: seeing the wildlife, of photographing wildlife. They're using the resources
• 50:11
  Speaker 1: that we have there to allow them to access it.
• 50:13
  Speaker 1: So so I always felt that they should pay as well. So, um,
• 50:19
  Speaker 1: whether that comes back or not, I certainly would would
• 50:21
  Speaker 1: vote for it. And when I'm buying binoculars and hiking
• 50:24
  Speaker 1: boots and all other stuff, you know, I'd be glad
• 50:26
  Speaker 1: that that part of what I was paying goes to
• 50:29
  Speaker 1: make sure that there are places there to be able
• 50:31
  Speaker 1: to hike and see wildlife long into the future. Yeah,
• 50:35
  Speaker 1: I agree. It just seems like a common sense thing
• 50:38
  Speaker 1: to me. Um, Now, I know, you know, increasing taxes
• 50:42
  Speaker 1: or increases in license fees or any of these things.
• 50:44
  Speaker 1: You know, it's kind of taboo. Obviously, lots of people
• 50:48
  Speaker 1: want to stay away from saying those words because people
• 50:50
  Speaker 1: don't like them. But at the same time, when it
• 50:52
  Speaker 1: comes to a resource that we value so much, I
• 50:56
  Speaker 1: think we need to step up sometimes too and help
• 50:58
  Speaker 1: take responsibility for it. So I want to take a
• 51:01
  Speaker 1: step back again now to one of the first challenges
• 51:05
  Speaker 1: you brought up that are facing deer and deer hunting today,
• 51:08
  Speaker 1: and that is disease and captive deer related issues. UM.
• 51:13
  Speaker 1: And I know they're kind of tangled in together, so
• 51:15
  Speaker 1: we might kind of cross crisscross between the two, but
• 51:18
  Speaker 1: starting with the on the disease standpoint from you know,
• 51:21
  Speaker 1: from what I've heard and seen over the last year,
• 51:23
  Speaker 1: so we haven't had a real big year when it
• 51:26
  Speaker 1: comes to h D, e h D or anything like that.
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: I'm compared to what happened in two thousand twelve and
• 51:30
  Speaker 1: two thousand thirteen when those diseases had major impacts on
• 51:33
  Speaker 1: populations across a number of states. UM. But I think
• 51:38
  Speaker 1: c w D chronic wasting disease is something that has
• 51:40
  Speaker 1: definitely still been prevalent and and we've been seeing more
• 51:44
  Speaker 1: and more of that pop up in the news over
• 51:45
  Speaker 1: the last year. UM. For instance in my home state
• 51:48
  Speaker 1: of Michigan. UM, Kip, what is your take on number one?
• 51:53
  Speaker 1: What's what's the status of c w D across America
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: this year and number two where things only on this
• 52:01
  Speaker 1: on handling things, on researching things, on coming up with
• 52:04
  Speaker 1: some type of solution or plans. What's happening here? All right? Well,
• 52:09
  Speaker 1: we now know that the c w D is in
• 52:11
  Speaker 1: twenty three states and two provinces and Korea and an
• 52:16
  Speaker 1: elk and Canada. They got shipped to Korea, so CDBs
• 52:19
  Speaker 1: in those places. And the real big things that came
• 52:22
  Speaker 1: out of two thousand and fifteen both research on the
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: disease wise, and what we saw was that the first
• 52:28
  Speaker 1: time we saw that the plants can definitely uptake the
• 52:31
  Speaker 1: prions or the infectious material that causes CWD and pass
• 52:34
  Speaker 1: it to other animals and uh and then that's pretty scary,
• 52:37
  Speaker 1: meaning you know, if you have an animal that has
• 52:40
  Speaker 1: c w D and deer can transfer that disease you
• 52:43
  Speaker 1: know through yearn and feces and that so if a
• 52:45
  Speaker 1: deer who has it defecates in an area, which that
• 52:48
  Speaker 1: means is if if a plant grows there later, it
• 52:51
  Speaker 1: can take up those pres are the infectious material from
• 52:55
  Speaker 1: that up through the root system up through the plant
• 52:57
  Speaker 1: out into the leaves and then when other animals come
• 53:00
  Speaker 1: and eat those leaves, passed that onto the other animal,
• 53:04
  Speaker 1: and that had not been shown before and until now,
• 53:07
  Speaker 1: and that's that has serious implications for the spread of
• 53:12
  Speaker 1: the disease, you know, from a deer end, but also
• 53:14
  Speaker 1: just from an agricultural one. And I also think about
• 53:17
  Speaker 1: the Midwest or anywhere you know where our road crops
• 53:20
  Speaker 1: are in all the corn and soybeans and other stuff
• 53:22
  Speaker 1: that that it takes to feed our country is grown.
• 53:26
  Speaker 1: And now for the possibility of these pres being taken
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: up into those plants and then put into other deer
• 53:33
  Speaker 1: and the American consumer, you know, I think that's just
• 53:36
  Speaker 1: the beginning of what we're going to talk about there.
• 53:38
  Speaker 1: And that was more concerning because the other big piece
• 53:41
  Speaker 1: of research that came out last year was that they
• 53:43
  Speaker 1: had now seen some infection in humanized mice, some CWD infection.
• 53:49
  Speaker 1: And what that means is, you know, the World Health
• 53:51
  Speaker 1: Organization has always said that there's general evidence that c
• 53:54
  Speaker 1: w D has been passed to a human and that's
• 53:57
  Speaker 1: a very good thing because obviously we couldn't eat that
• 54:00
  Speaker 1: and if it did, but they're always doing research just
• 54:02
  Speaker 1: to see, you, like, how solid is this species barrier
• 54:05
  Speaker 1: that keeps us out. So they take these mice and
• 54:07
  Speaker 1: they put some human genes in them, and they were
• 54:10
  Speaker 1: basically feeding them the CWD material, and uh what they
• 54:14
  Speaker 1: found was gosh done it. They actually got you know,
• 54:16
  Speaker 1: infected with it. And to be very clear, they were
• 54:19
  Speaker 1: doing this in a lab and they were getting this
• 54:22
  Speaker 1: material into them, you know, in ways that it's highly
• 54:24
  Speaker 1: unlikely you or I could ever come in contact with
• 54:26
  Speaker 1: in the real world. But it's still the first time
• 54:30
  Speaker 1: that they've showed, you know, it may be possible. So
• 54:35
  Speaker 1: given that now they know it goes to plans and
• 54:37
  Speaker 1: that they can make these mice infected with it, that's
• 54:39
  Speaker 1: a big deal. And some people continue to say that
• 54:43
  Speaker 1: cwds are you know, it's overblown, This is not a
• 54:45
  Speaker 1: big deal. They could not be more wrong. The absolutely
• 54:49
  Speaker 1: is a huge deal. The two biggest newspaper articles out
• 54:54
  Speaker 1: last year in CWD. One of them were the headlines
• 54:56
  Speaker 1: said that the experimental CWD vaccine failed initial testing. But
• 55:01
  Speaker 1: it certainly would be good if we could have a vaccine,
• 55:04
  Speaker 1: you know, because the biggest way that the disease currently
• 55:08
  Speaker 1: has spread is do live animals. And when we move animals,
• 55:11
  Speaker 1: you know, to two different game farms and shooting preserves
• 55:14
  Speaker 1: and that kind of thing. So so if we could
• 55:17
  Speaker 1: think it a vaccine that was certainly would be good.
• 55:20
  Speaker 1: At this point we don't. And the second headline that
• 55:24
  Speaker 1: was so big was said, the c w D kills
• 55:28
  Speaker 1: of the deer head annually in this one place in Wyoming,
• 55:32
  Speaker 1: you know, and this is one of the first areas
• 55:34
  Speaker 1: that actually got the disease. And what they see now
• 55:37
  Speaker 1: is that of their deer die annually to that disease.
• 55:41
  Speaker 1: That's a big deal. I mean, that's on top of
• 55:43
  Speaker 1: the deer that die to hunters and cars and predators.
• 55:47
  Speaker 1: And so think about that. You know, if if you
• 55:50
  Speaker 1: where you are in Michigan or in Wisconsin where we
• 55:52
  Speaker 1: first had it in the east, you know, one out
• 55:55
  Speaker 1: of five deer gone, that's that puts a lot fewer
• 55:59
  Speaker 1: deer in the land escape for you or I to
• 56:01
  Speaker 1: go see and and shoot. That's for sure. And the
• 56:04
  Speaker 1: disease experts take a look at and say, you know what,
• 56:07
  Speaker 1: this is a disease that takes a long time to
• 56:09
  Speaker 1: really start showing population level impacts. And uh, I think
• 56:14
  Speaker 1: we're just starting to see those out west. And sotly
• 56:17
  Speaker 1: means you know that we will follow, we will see
• 56:19
  Speaker 1: him here in the East. But I am I am
• 56:22
  Speaker 1: extremely discouraged at what the future CDPT holds for us.
• 56:26
  Speaker 1: And I'm extremely disappointed at some of our folks in
• 56:29
  Speaker 1: the US who continue to say that this is not
• 56:32
  Speaker 1: a big deal on hunters don't need to worry about it.
• 56:34
  Speaker 1: They absolutely need to be concerned with it. Yeah, it's
• 56:37
  Speaker 1: it's it's uh. To your point, it's kind of disheartening
• 56:40
  Speaker 1: to see some people that have a very large platform
• 56:42
  Speaker 1: in the hunting world say some stuff that seems very
• 56:45
  Speaker 1: counter uh, counterproductive, and not in line with with what
• 56:49
  Speaker 1: science is telling us in any way whatsoever. Right, um So, So,
• 56:54
  Speaker 1: I think to your point, the issue that I think
• 56:57
  Speaker 1: some people have is that a lot these impacts of
• 57:00
  Speaker 1: c w D are slow moving. The population level impacts
• 57:03
  Speaker 1: like we're seeing in Wyoming right now, that's not happening
• 57:06
  Speaker 1: yet in Michigan. The issue is that if we don't
• 57:09
  Speaker 1: do something about it in Michigan, someday we might have
• 57:12
  Speaker 1: that issue where thirty percent of your heard is impacted
• 57:16
  Speaker 1: in dying from something like that, and you know, to
• 57:18
  Speaker 1: pass that, to pass that down to our children or
• 57:22
  Speaker 1: grandchildren seems like a pretty awful thing to do, just
• 57:25
  Speaker 1: so that we can have it easier now in today's
• 57:27
  Speaker 1: hunting world, or don't need to deal with a couple
• 57:29
  Speaker 1: of extra regulations or whatever it might be. Um. So,
• 57:33
  Speaker 1: so that brings me to the next thing I'm curious about.
• 57:35
  Speaker 1: When you look at how states handle c w D
• 57:39
  Speaker 1: when they discover c w D and what they then
• 57:42
  Speaker 1: do after that, it seems like there's a number of
• 57:45
  Speaker 1: all sorts of different states are going about in different ways.
• 57:47
  Speaker 1: It doesn't seem that there's any consistent playbook that everyone's following.
• 57:51
  Speaker 1: I think you can see a perfect example that with Wisconsin,
• 57:53
  Speaker 1: who took a very aggressive approach to it when they
• 57:55
  Speaker 1: initially discovered it and then incredib if I'm wrong here, kid,
• 57:59
  Speaker 1: but when I understand right, they had this aggressive approach
• 58:02
  Speaker 1: to begin with, and then after so many years there's
• 58:04
  Speaker 1: been all sorts of public outcry upset with what was done,
• 58:08
  Speaker 1: and now it seems that what's being done when it
• 58:11
  Speaker 1: comes to c w D in Wisconsin is much more lax,
• 58:15
  Speaker 1: and it's much more Okay, We're just going to kind
• 58:17
  Speaker 1: of live with it. Um Can you can you tell
• 58:19
  Speaker 1: me first, is that accurate and then number two, is
• 58:23
  Speaker 1: there any kind of what's the best way to handle it?
• 58:26
  Speaker 1: I guess when the state does discover or once the
• 58:28
  Speaker 1: state has it, is there any type of best practice
• 58:31
  Speaker 1: for for how to move forward in a positive direction. Yeah,
• 58:35
  Speaker 1: and with Garden Wisconsin, uh, you know, in fairness to
• 58:38
  Speaker 1: the DNR there, they were the first state east of
• 58:40
  Speaker 1: the Mississippi River to get it, you know, clear back
• 58:43
  Speaker 1: in two thousand and one and two thousand and two
• 58:45
  Speaker 1: of the big years there, and so little is known
• 58:47
  Speaker 1: then that the best day at the time said, you
• 58:49
  Speaker 1: know what, you just need to eradicate deer and stop
• 58:52
  Speaker 1: it from spread. So that's what the DNR tried to do.
• 58:55
  Speaker 1: And obviously that failed miserably because they you know, they
• 58:58
  Speaker 1: didn't have the support of the hunters and the landowners
• 59:01
  Speaker 1: too to execute that plan. So it turned into a
• 59:04
  Speaker 1: a fiasco there, you know, and and find us to
• 59:06
  Speaker 1: them though, because it just wasn't that much known about it,
• 59:09
  Speaker 1: And it turns out, looking back, you know, that was
• 59:11
  Speaker 1: absolutely the wrong approach to take um. So the loose
• 59:17
  Speaker 1: public support moved forward, it turned into and a political
• 59:22
  Speaker 1: hot potato that has never really allowed them to acquately
• 59:25
  Speaker 1: address the disease, and so now rather than managing the disease,
• 59:31
  Speaker 1: they are simply monitoring it. And that's what the official
• 59:34
  Speaker 1: verbage out of Wisconsin is is that we're no longer
• 59:36
  Speaker 1: managing the disease. We're just monitoring it to see how
• 59:39
  Speaker 1: it spreads. And boys, from a manager standpoint, that is,
• 59:42
  Speaker 1: he's the worst thing in the world to be able
• 59:44
  Speaker 1: to do. And you know, and the DNR does not
• 59:46
  Speaker 1: want it to be that way. They're they're forced to
• 59:48
  Speaker 1: be in that way. So they're just watching it spread
• 59:51
  Speaker 1: and spread and just grow larger in the state by
• 59:54
  Speaker 1: the day. You know, one of the states that has
• 59:56
  Speaker 1: one of the strongest hunting cultures and hunting traditions you know,
• 59:59
  Speaker 1: in North America is losing a piece of it every
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 1: single day because because of what they're doing. Uh. Fortunately,
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 1: other states have learned from that experience, have learned from
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 1: new research, and I think your state is a perfect example.
• 1:00:12
  Speaker 1: You know, Michigan has a very calculated approach, I think,
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 1: a very confident approach to to what they need to do,
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 1: and they have thus far done a great job, you know,
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 1: not dictating to the public what will happen, but talking
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 1: to the public about what will happen what they need
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 1: to do and asking for help and support, you know,
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 1: and because by doing that, you've gone or under support,
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 1: because if you want to go in and sharp shoot
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 1: on some of these lannual you need access. And thus
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 1: far they have done a really good job being good
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 1: partners with the public. So I think that they have
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 1: a much better chance of maintaining the disease in small areas,
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 1: you know, and keep it from growing like we've like
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 1: we've seen a growing Wisconsin. Do you do you think
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 1: that something like a set of best practices or protocol
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 1: is that something that that's needed or be beneficial for
• 1:01:02
  Speaker 1: an organization like uh, I don't know, like a cum
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 1: A or an n d A or anyone or just
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 1: a state agency to put together Hey, here is our
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 1: recommended approach to handling a CWD situation. So there's something
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 1: standardized across all the different states. Because it doesn't seem
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 1: like this whole cw excuse me, c w D thing
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 1: is going to disappear anytime soon. It's more than likely
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 1: given things that we've talked about, and given some of
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 1: these issues with the captive deerheard transfers, it seems like
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 1: if anything, it's probably gonna start showing up more places.
• 1:01:32
  Speaker 1: Is there a need for some type of standardized approach
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 1: and prescription for how to deal with this? There? Yeah,
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 1: there is, and I agree with you that this is
• 1:01:40
  Speaker 1: going to continue to spread given the captive industry and
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 1: some others. So many states do have pretty similar CDVt
• 1:01:49
  Speaker 1: plans or at least components for those plans. How they're
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 1: gonna react and what they're gonna do. I'm one of
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 1: the big differences states. The authority over captive servits and
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 1: something are different by state, So some states just to
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 1: state while ife agency has complete authority, others it's the
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 1: Department of agg Some that shared. So because of that,
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 1: many states CWD plans. Response plans differ slightly based on
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 1: how much authority of the DNR has over those different components,
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 1: but at least there is consistency across much of the board.
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 1: On all right, let's identify where the diseases first. That's
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 1: uh monitor around it to see is it very contained
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 1: or is it already getting away from us to try
• 1:02:33
  Speaker 1: to assess the situation and then figure out the best
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 1: way to move forward. But along those lines, actually what
• 1:02:39
  Speaker 1: we we bean qtum A just developed we now that
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 1: it's in Michigan and spreading our q DMA members in
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 1: our state chapters. Man, we could really use some help,
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 1: some talking points to share with hunters as we talked
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 1: to him about how we as hunters can help with us.
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 1: So actually we worked with the d n R there,
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 1: we worked with the c W the project leader from
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 1: U s g S as a national Wallett Health Council,
• 1:03:05
  Speaker 1: and UH put some best manage of practices together for
• 1:03:08
  Speaker 1: hunters from a management side. You know there's information out
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 1: there right now best management practices. You know, if you
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 1: hunt in one of those zones, how to process me,
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 1: what to do, but there's never been anything for somebody
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 1: who lives or managers habitat in those zones. So we
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 1: actually just put together a two page best management practices
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 1: centered around the four cornerstones at QDM with HERD management,
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 1: habitat management, hunter management, and herd monitoring. What the average
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 1: hunter in a CDVIT outbreak zone can do UH to
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 1: do his or her part to help improve the situation.
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 1: And actually we have that on a website. I get
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 1: a we can get a copy of that too you
• 1:03:45
  Speaker 1: so you can see it that that's kind of the answer.
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 1: The states have their way that you're going to go.
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 1: But you know clearly that as hunters we have a
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 1: big opportunity to help the situations like this. So it
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 1: addresses things like should I stop playing any food plots,
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 1: should I not plant root crops? You know, should I
• 1:04:03
  Speaker 1: start killing all of deer when they're young? Kind of
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 1: the whole thing. How that fits in. We gave them
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 1: what we feel at the best strategies to help make
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 1: things the best moving forward as it possibly can be. Well,
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 1: that that's a great resource, it sounds like, and that's
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 1: available at I'm assuming at qum A dot com. That's correct. Yeah,
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 1: so let's there, and I know what folks in Michigan
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 1: are sharing like crazy with there, uh, fellow hunters there.
• 1:04:28
  Speaker 1: But yes, anybody who lives in a zone like that
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 1: can go grab it at QTMA dot com and also
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 1: encourage people, you know what, if you don't live in
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 1: the CWG zone, you should take a look at it
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 1: as well, just to see what these people are going
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 1: to have to deal with, to give them a little
• 1:04:41
  Speaker 1: more incentive to keep fighting to make sure that it
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 1: does not get to their area, because that's certainly just
• 1:04:47
  Speaker 1: a curse once it is in your area. Yeah, yeah,
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 1: it's scary to see that creeping down into my neck
• 1:04:52
  Speaker 1: of the woods here in Michigan, and uh in so
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 1: many other places too. I know a lot of our listeners,
• 1:04:56
  Speaker 1: I'm sure you have to deal with that in one
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 1: way or another. Um so so kind of the final
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 1: piece of that puzzle then, and we've alluded to it
• 1:05:01
  Speaker 1: a couple of times, But the captive deer industry, for
• 1:05:06
  Speaker 1: for a hunter like myself or maybe some of our
• 1:05:09
  Speaker 1: listeners who who who aren't involved in the business of
• 1:05:12
  Speaker 1: captive deer and who don't hunt in a captive deer facility,
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 1: why should we care what's going on with this industry
• 1:05:20
  Speaker 1: and how it's being regulated. Why should we care? The
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 1: biggest thing today the average hunter today is that the
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 1: vast majority of disease experts, you know, the people studying
• 1:05:29
  Speaker 1: this disease across the country, say it is not moving
• 1:05:33
  Speaker 1: or growing across the country the way that it would
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 1: if it was just naturally spreading. That it's being moved
• 1:05:39
  Speaker 1: much much faster and arriving in new areas at a
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 1: much higher rate. So it all comes back to the
• 1:05:45
  Speaker 1: you know, the most likely way that it is moving
• 1:05:48
  Speaker 1: across the landscape right now, is by deer from inside
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 1: of one fence being moved to to another fence. And
• 1:05:55
  Speaker 1: so wherever you are on the whole deer an offense issue.
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 1: Whether some people say that's unethical, some said no, that's fine.
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 1: You know, it doesn't matter where you are on that
• 1:06:03
  Speaker 1: and I'm not going to say where I think you
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 1: should be. But given that we are moving this disease around,
• 1:06:10
  Speaker 1: more so with live dear that we're moving in any
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 1: other way, and given that this disease is by far
• 1:06:16
  Speaker 1: one of the single biggest implications negatively impacting our future
• 1:06:21
  Speaker 1: herds in our future hunting opportunities, that's why hunters should
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 1: be most impacted. A buyers are most concerned. I guess
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 1: whether we really should stop the movement of the live deer,
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 1: you know, up among facilities like that, given that that's
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 1: the number one way that we're spreading it. So if
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 1: we know that the single best way to to help
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 1: slow the spread is to stop that live transport, so
• 1:06:43
  Speaker 1: as the hunters, I think that's where you know, we
• 1:06:45
  Speaker 1: should recognize, Hey, here's something I can do and let
• 1:06:47
  Speaker 1: folks know that I don't agree with this either or
• 1:06:50
  Speaker 1: if they don't want to get involved, and they think, man,
• 1:06:51
  Speaker 1: why should I? That's why, because that is the best
• 1:06:55
  Speaker 1: way that we can help slow to spread down and
• 1:06:57
  Speaker 1: keep it from coming to their neighborhood. Yeah, definitely, And
• 1:07:00
  Speaker 1: I've talked about my own personal ethical views on this.
• 1:07:04
  Speaker 1: I won't dive into that any further and beat that
• 1:07:06
  Speaker 1: dead horse anymore. But but it's great to hear too.
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 1: You know, again, the scientific and the reasons behind the
• 1:07:13
  Speaker 1: dangers of this continuing as is from a simply dear
• 1:07:18
  Speaker 1: herd deer management standpoint. Um. And related to that, another
• 1:07:22
  Speaker 1: thing that popped up in the news this year were
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 1: concerns with the transfer of CWD in relation to the
• 1:07:28
  Speaker 1: dear yeurine industry, several states banning the use of dear
• 1:07:32
  Speaker 1: yurine attractives. Um, what do you think is going on there, Kip?
• 1:07:35
  Speaker 1: Is that something we're seen more often? And do you
• 1:07:37
  Speaker 1: think it's a good idea? I think you're gonna see
• 1:07:40
  Speaker 1: it talks about a lot more often, given now that
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 1: both Virginia and Vermont have banned the use of of urine,
• 1:07:46
  Speaker 1: and I know that Pennsylvania considered it, you know, I
• 1:07:48
  Speaker 1: was actually considering right now. So that's one of those
• 1:07:52
  Speaker 1: great areas because if you take a look at you know,
• 1:07:55
  Speaker 1: we know that the pre CWD are spread through urine.
• 1:07:59
  Speaker 1: Where we know that for sure, but we don't understand
• 1:08:01
  Speaker 1: is exactly you know, like how much that the prens
• 1:08:04
  Speaker 1: are needed to tremence further disease or you know it's
• 1:08:08
  Speaker 1: a little bit okay and more not. That's where some
• 1:08:10
  Speaker 1: of that gray areas. So that's where a lot of
• 1:08:12
  Speaker 1: the argument is going on right now. So if you
• 1:08:14
  Speaker 1: musa say, you know what to be the most conservative,
• 1:08:18
  Speaker 1: should we not allow any urine at all? There are
• 1:08:21
  Speaker 1: some people and some states like Virginia Vermont are there.
• 1:08:24
  Speaker 1: There's others that say, you know what, there's not the
• 1:08:26
  Speaker 1: evidence that that clearly shows this, So we're not gonna
• 1:08:30
  Speaker 1: you know, stop while moving up for my take of
• 1:08:33
  Speaker 1: it is you know what we have, we have other
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 1: synthetic urns that people can use for attractants. And and
• 1:08:38
  Speaker 1: I tychnically and very conservative minded, and I always fall
• 1:08:42
  Speaker 1: to the side of the resource on this one. So
• 1:08:44
  Speaker 1: I completely understand where the states are coming from. Um
• 1:08:47
  Speaker 1: I think it's going to be a much bigger issue
• 1:08:49
  Speaker 1: moving forward. Now that you have two states that have
• 1:08:51
  Speaker 1: definitely done it, and a third that is trying. I
• 1:08:54
  Speaker 1: think that you're going to see more states go that
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 1: route in the very near future. It's definitely be an
• 1:08:59
  Speaker 1: interesting thing to keep an eye on and the waves
• 1:09:03
  Speaker 1: that could send through the hunting industry too, people, because
• 1:09:07
  Speaker 1: I think it's a very slip result because we also
• 1:09:09
  Speaker 1: know that that dirt has pre so you know, does
• 1:09:12
  Speaker 1: that mean that you if you go into a state
• 1:09:14
  Speaker 1: that has CWD, you can't bring your hunting boots back
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 1: with you because they can't hit mud at them? You know?
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 1: Does it mean that now that plants can take up
• 1:09:21
  Speaker 1: the pre ends, that you can't bring in hay from
• 1:09:23
  Speaker 1: a state to the c w D. I think that
• 1:09:26
  Speaker 1: there's a huge can of worms that the urine is
• 1:09:29
  Speaker 1: you know, part of with this, and it's it's a
• 1:09:33
  Speaker 1: challenging time for the disease end of it for sure. Yeah. Yeah,
• 1:09:36
  Speaker 1: I think it again comes down to some of these bigger,
• 1:09:40
  Speaker 1: bigger aspects of that, like the transfer of captive deer.
• 1:09:43
  Speaker 1: If we can try to nip some of those things
• 1:09:45
  Speaker 1: in the butt sooner than later, maybe we don't need
• 1:09:47
  Speaker 1: to go down this warmhole of issues with transfer through
• 1:09:51
  Speaker 1: whether it be attractans or mud or who knows what.
• 1:09:55
  Speaker 1: So you're absolutely right. Yeah. Um So, one other thing
• 1:10:00
  Speaker 1: I noticed in the White Tail report that I want
• 1:10:02
  Speaker 1: to try to touch on real quickly before we have
• 1:10:03
  Speaker 1: to wrap things up, was the fact that and tell
• 1:10:06
  Speaker 1: me if I got this right, Kip, but I think
• 1:10:08
  Speaker 1: off the top of my head, I remember seeing that
• 1:10:10
  Speaker 1: the national average faun recruitment rate is the lowest ever
• 1:10:15
  Speaker 1: has been or lowest in the long period of time.
• 1:10:17
  Speaker 1: Is that right, Kip? And why is that? And why
• 1:10:20
  Speaker 1: is that something that we should be aware of and
• 1:10:22
  Speaker 1: should pay attention to. And we monitor that very closely,
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 1: and you know, we get the data from the state
• 1:10:27
  Speaker 1: wilife agencies each year or every other year real quick.
• 1:10:31
  Speaker 1: Back in two thousands, the average fond recrui rate was
• 1:10:34
  Speaker 1: was almost one pon per doll. It was just on
• 1:10:37
  Speaker 1: like point eight nine phons per recruited into the deer.
• 1:10:40
  Speaker 1: Fast forward the two thousand and fifteen that had dropped
• 1:10:43
  Speaker 1: to point five eight fons per do, so just over
• 1:10:47
  Speaker 1: half a faon per do today, so very very different
• 1:10:50
  Speaker 1: than why the implication those hunters is obviously for recruiting
• 1:10:54
  Speaker 1: fewer ponds that means deer herds do not grow nearly
• 1:10:57
  Speaker 1: as quickly as they used to. UM, so you're not
• 1:11:00
  Speaker 1: bringing nearly as many deer into her now. If you're
• 1:11:02
  Speaker 1: in a situation where do you have too many deer anyway,
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 1: this is a very good thing for you because it's
• 1:11:07
  Speaker 1: helping you out. If you're et the other end of it,
• 1:11:10
  Speaker 1: where you know what, we're trying to grow a deer herd,
• 1:11:12
  Speaker 1: then then this is not good at all. Um. The
• 1:11:15
  Speaker 1: slip side is, you know about every other fon born
• 1:11:18
  Speaker 1: is a buck fon. So if you're looking to bring
• 1:11:20
  Speaker 1: the most bucks into a deer herd, the way to
• 1:11:23
  Speaker 1: do it is to have the most fonds hit the
• 1:11:25
  Speaker 1: ground in the spring and survived till fall. So there's
• 1:11:28
  Speaker 1: a really big picture that is just the productivity rate
• 1:11:31
  Speaker 1: of the deer herd. You know, people want to see deer,
• 1:11:33
  Speaker 1: they want to shoot deer, and as these fond recruitment
• 1:11:36
  Speaker 1: rates drop, that just means there's going to be fewer
• 1:11:38
  Speaker 1: deer there to see and to shoot. And that's being
• 1:11:41
  Speaker 1: impacted by increasing part of the populations, a loss of habitat.
• 1:11:46
  Speaker 1: You know, there's lots of things that play into that,
• 1:11:49
  Speaker 1: but the important part of it is for people to
• 1:11:51
  Speaker 1: recognize that that's way fewer today than it used to
• 1:11:55
  Speaker 1: be in the past. So the average hunter for most
• 1:11:58
  Speaker 1: part just does not need to shoot or tenno shoot
• 1:12:00
  Speaker 1: as many animals deer today as they could have ten
• 1:12:03
  Speaker 1: to fifteen years ago. So or at least for everyone
• 1:12:06
  Speaker 1: you do shoot today, the impact on that deer hurt
• 1:12:08
  Speaker 1: is much greater than it would have been in the past.
• 1:12:12
  Speaker 1: Is something is conducting some type of survey on your
• 1:12:16
  Speaker 1: own individual property to try to understand what the faun
• 1:12:19
  Speaker 1: recruitment rate on your own in your own area is.
• 1:12:22
  Speaker 1: Figuring out how to do that a pretty important thing
• 1:12:24
  Speaker 1: for the average deer hunter because I think you know,
• 1:12:26
  Speaker 1: it's pretty serious deer managers. There's a lot of guys
• 1:12:29
  Speaker 1: that do that, um, but I don't know if the
• 1:12:32
  Speaker 1: random guy that hunts five acres but maybe it doesn't
• 1:12:35
  Speaker 1: do a ton of food plots and stuff. I don't
• 1:12:36
  Speaker 1: know if that type of person is actually paying attention
• 1:12:38
  Speaker 1: to things like fun recruitment rate and how that might
• 1:12:41
  Speaker 1: impact how many deer they kill. Would you recommend that
• 1:12:43
  Speaker 1: more people start doing that? Oh, I absolutely would. And
• 1:12:46
  Speaker 1: a cool thing about it is that it's free. It
• 1:12:49
  Speaker 1: doesn't count you anything. To do, and it and it
• 1:12:51
  Speaker 1: doesn't take any more time because you just do it
• 1:12:53
  Speaker 1: while you're hunting. And I'll tell you that I think
• 1:12:56
  Speaker 1: everybody should should do an observation right every time they
• 1:12:59
  Speaker 1: go hunt, regardless if you're hunting on five acres or
• 1:13:02
  Speaker 1: ten or a thousand or ten thousand. And you know
• 1:13:05
  Speaker 1: I am in north central Pennsylvania. We share our property
• 1:13:08
  Speaker 1: with lots of friends and family members. And but where
• 1:13:10
  Speaker 1: the rules is, every day you go hunting, you keep
• 1:13:13
  Speaker 1: tracking how many hours you hunted and how many bucks
• 1:13:15
  Speaker 1: does and fons you saw and uh and that's it.
• 1:13:18
  Speaker 1: So you know, it's very simple to do. It doesn't
• 1:13:20
  Speaker 1: cost anything. I get that data from all the guys
• 1:13:23
  Speaker 1: on our farm throughout the whole year, and that allows
• 1:13:25
  Speaker 1: me then to just see, like at the end of
• 1:13:27
  Speaker 1: the year, from an observation standpoint, you know, how many
• 1:13:31
  Speaker 1: bucks did we see, how many fons, how many doughes,
• 1:13:33
  Speaker 1: And that allows me to figure out about how many
• 1:13:36
  Speaker 1: fons per dough we had. And then the important part
• 1:13:40
  Speaker 1: is that I compare that to what we had last
• 1:13:42
  Speaker 1: year and the year before and five years ago and
• 1:13:44
  Speaker 1: ten years ago and now. So that gives me a
• 1:13:47
  Speaker 1: really good feel for you know, what is the reproductive
• 1:13:51
  Speaker 1: or the recruitment rate on our place? Is it going
• 1:13:53
  Speaker 1: up or is it going down? And I use that
• 1:13:56
  Speaker 1: every year when I set a target dough harvest, I
• 1:13:59
  Speaker 1: use that for that a lot when we pick out,
• 1:14:01
  Speaker 1: you know, are we gonna shoot three dolls this year
• 1:14:03
  Speaker 1: or five or twenty so so yeah, whether you won't land,
• 1:14:07
  Speaker 1: you have public land or whatever. I stry to encourage
• 1:14:10
  Speaker 1: hunters to just keep tracking that. It is the perfect
• 1:14:13
  Speaker 1: way to figure out, you know, are you likely having
• 1:14:16
  Speaker 1: more ponds are fewer ponds uh than in the past,
• 1:14:19
  Speaker 1: and then allow you to make good choices as a
• 1:14:21
  Speaker 1: hunter to to shoot the right number of dolls. I
• 1:14:24
  Speaker 1: think a big takeaway from me and hopefully for a
• 1:14:27
  Speaker 1: lot of people listening. You know, just over the last
• 1:14:29
  Speaker 1: couple of years, as we've seen things changing with you know,
• 1:14:32
  Speaker 1: our herds being slightly less productive, not being able to
• 1:14:35
  Speaker 1: reproduce this quickly and recruit those fonds up into the
• 1:14:37
  Speaker 1: adult population, with habitat loss in live places, with large
• 1:14:42
  Speaker 1: disease issues in some areas. As all these different things
• 1:14:44
  Speaker 1: are happening, it's seeming more and more often that the
• 1:14:48
  Speaker 1: one size fits all strategy for hunters is no longer
• 1:14:51
  Speaker 1: going to work, and I think the responsibility is going
• 1:14:54
  Speaker 1: to have to continue falling on the individual hunters and managers.
• 1:14:57
  Speaker 1: We more and more need to take what our state age.
• 1:15:00
  Speaker 1: She's tell us, use that as a guideline, of course,
• 1:15:02
  Speaker 1: but then say, okay, what does that mean on my
• 1:15:04
  Speaker 1: individual property, and start making more more informed decisions. I guess,
• 1:15:08
  Speaker 1: based on what we're seeing on the ground, Um, exactly,
• 1:15:12
  Speaker 1: that is exactly right. And I hope that that's something
• 1:15:15
  Speaker 1: that that I can do a better job of and
• 1:15:17
  Speaker 1: that everyone can try to try to learn a little
• 1:15:19
  Speaker 1: bit more. I think a lot of it comes down
• 1:15:20
  Speaker 1: to education, right, trying to fair Okay, how do I
• 1:15:22
  Speaker 1: figure out these things? But I think once you pass
• 1:15:25
  Speaker 1: that for those first couple of steps, it's in an
• 1:15:27
  Speaker 1: easy habit to fall into and then um, you know,
• 1:15:29
  Speaker 1: allows you to make better decisions as a hunter. No one,
• 1:15:31
  Speaker 1: no one's gonna pull the trigger, but you, your your
• 1:15:33
  Speaker 1: state agency isn't pulling the trigger. Um, your neighbor isn't
• 1:15:36
  Speaker 1: pulling the trigger for you. That that's on you, um,
• 1:15:39
  Speaker 1: and it's on me and all of us. So I think, um,
• 1:15:42
  Speaker 1: I think maybe that that's a big message I hope
• 1:15:44
  Speaker 1: we can all take from this is that there's a
• 1:15:46
  Speaker 1: lot of things going on today and we need to
• 1:15:48
  Speaker 1: take responsibility for as much as we can. That's right.
• 1:15:51
  Speaker 1: I've ended the last few seasons with unused do tags
• 1:15:54
  Speaker 1: in my pocket that from our place, and I certainly
• 1:15:57
  Speaker 1: couldn't have used and hand the opportunity to use, but
• 1:15:59
  Speaker 1: just chow with not to because of the situation we
• 1:16:02
  Speaker 1: were in where five to ten years ago, uh, we
• 1:16:05
  Speaker 1: fought tooth and nail to the last day to fill
• 1:16:08
  Speaker 1: every day tag we had from everybody that hunted our
• 1:16:10
  Speaker 1: place just to make sure that we were doing right
• 1:16:13
  Speaker 1: by deer. And it's a very different situation for us today.
• 1:16:15
  Speaker 1: And even though I could still shoot as many those
• 1:16:18
  Speaker 1: on our farm as I could have five and ten
• 1:16:20
  Speaker 1: years ago, I shoot far less because of the situation
• 1:16:24
  Speaker 1: we're in. Yeah, So this is this has been great stuff.
• 1:16:28
  Speaker 1: And there's about twenty tho other things that like to
• 1:16:31
  Speaker 1: talk to you about, but I know we don't have time. Um,
• 1:16:34
  Speaker 1: But for people who want to learn more about some
• 1:16:36
  Speaker 1: of these different resources we've talked about, or the white
• 1:16:39
  Speaker 1: Tail report that was recently um, you know put out there,
• 1:16:42
  Speaker 1: where can they go to get that kind of information, Kip,
• 1:16:45
  Speaker 1: So they can go right to our website at QDMA
• 1:16:47
  Speaker 1: dot com. Um, we do these annual wait till reports
• 1:16:50
  Speaker 1: each year. They're all on there. They're all free downloads
• 1:16:53
  Speaker 1: for folks, so in addition to all the other cool
• 1:16:56
  Speaker 1: deer stuff they can grab. But yeah, just go reach
• 1:16:58
  Speaker 1: to QDMA dot com and get what they need. Definitely,
• 1:17:01
  Speaker 1: I highly highly recommend anyone listening as well, if if
• 1:17:04
  Speaker 1: you aren't a member all the Quality Deer Management Association yet,
• 1:17:08
  Speaker 1: even if you're not interested in targeting mature boxer or
• 1:17:10
  Speaker 1: doing any of these larger things, if if you want
• 1:17:12
  Speaker 1: to do nothing but learn more, joining the cut May
• 1:17:15
  Speaker 1: dot com is a great place to start. They're just
• 1:17:17
  Speaker 1: full of tremendous resources, their magazine, their website. Uh, people
• 1:17:21
  Speaker 1: like Kip just there's so many opportunities to learn more
• 1:17:25
  Speaker 1: about deer and deer hunting and how to be a
• 1:17:28
  Speaker 1: more responsible deer hunter and manager in a world where
• 1:17:30
  Speaker 1: I think that's that's more new than ever. So please
• 1:17:33
  Speaker 1: join the Kuti May if you haven't already. And Kip,
• 1:17:36
  Speaker 1: thank you, thank you so much for your time here today.
• 1:17:38
  Speaker 1: This is this has been fascinating and I appreciate you
• 1:17:40
  Speaker 1: sharing with us. All right, Thank you, Mark, always good
• 1:17:43
  Speaker 1: to talk with you. You have a good day. Thanks
• 1:17:45
  Speaker 1: a lot you too. All right, Well, as I expected,
• 1:17:48
  Speaker 1: that was a great conversation and I certainly learned a
• 1:17:51
  Speaker 1: lot and hope you did too. Before we wrap things up, though,
• 1:17:54
  Speaker 1: we do need to give a big thank you to
• 1:17:56
  Speaker 1: our partners who helped keep this podcast on the air.
• 1:17:58
  Speaker 1: So thank you to say could Gear, Trophy, Ridge Bear Archery,
• 1:18:02
  Speaker 1: Redneck Blinds, huntera maps Ozonics, Lacrosse Boots, and the White
• 1:18:07
  Speaker 1: Tailed Institute of North America. And that said, most importantly,
• 1:18:11
  Speaker 1: thank you to everyone out there tuning in today. We
• 1:18:13
  Speaker 1: really appreciate it. I hope you found this chat with
• 1:18:16
  Speaker 1: kept informative and empowering as we discussed more and more
• 1:18:20
  Speaker 1: of the future of white tails is on our shoulders,
• 1:18:22
  Speaker 1: so let's take that responsibility seriously. Until next time, stay
• 1:18:27
  Speaker 1: Wired to Hunt,