Bear Grease - Ep. 39: Bear Grease [Render] - Sky Busting, Gadwalls, and a Dying Forest

Episode Date: February 2, 2022

On this episode, Clay and Brent Reaves host four guests -- Director of the Arkansas Game and Fish Austin Booth, Commissioner Anne Marie Doramus, as well as MeatEater's own Sean Weaver and Max Barta -- while on a duck hunt in Southeast Arkansas. The crew discusses the dying forests of the green tree reservoirs, along with Clay's habit of skybusting ducks. The conversation meanders from why Gadwalls don't have a soul to how public opinion can sway conservation decisions. These decisions on forest health are interesting topics because the solutions are so long term, it's hard to put a present value on them. This is the last podcast in our series on the Green Tree Reservoirs of Arkansas. Connect with Clay and MeatEaterClay on InstagramMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop Bear Grease Merch Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. Guaranteed Human. First Lights fieldware collection is made for the work that happens long before opening day and continues when the season ends. Products built for early mornings, full days in real use. Hard wearing where they need to be versatile where it matters. No shortcuts. Just gear designed for the work that earns the season.

Built to perform, built to last. Check out. First Light's new field. Worldware Gear at firstlight.com. My name is Clay Newcomb, and this is a production of the Bear Grease podcast called the Bear Grease Render, where we render down, dive deeper, and look behind the scenes of the actual Bear Grease podcast. Presented by FHF Gear, American Made, Purpose Built, Hunting and Fishing Gear that's designed to be as rugged as the places we explore. Hey, before we get started here, if you don't mind, I'm going to change my boots real quick.

What is in your jacket? Are you putting on the cross? Oh, okay. I just got to get a little more. I feel like I should go change. I feel underdressed. So I'm, uh, Brent, why don't you describe what I'm putting on here? Well, Glenn, I'm speechless.

Clay has pulled out a pair of gray crocs, official crocs because I can see the alligator on the side. And he has them in work mode. They are. Four-wheel drive. four-wheel drive and they match his puffy jacket. They do. They do match my gray puffy jacket. And they're named.

It's quite the ensemble. Now, wait a minute. Are we, do I need to hook mine in? Are we going to fight? For this, I would hook them in four-wheel drive.

Here we go. I just, after last render, when, you know, kind of dogged on the crocks and my kids bought these for me for Christmas. So they are, they're highly convenient.

The gift that keeps on giving. They are. Waterproof. Jelly of the month club. Don't worry about. Man, they are, especially when you're duck hunting because I was this week, if you listen to the podcast, you heard me say that I have a goal to see how long I can be a waterfowler, which I'm a new waterfowler, how long I can be a waterfowler and not actually own my own pair of waiters. So I'm borrowing waiters, but it's come back to bite me when Sean Weaver is the guy you're borrowing them from because he duck hunts, you know, 100 days a year or whatever. and the waiters that he let me borrow had a hole in it.

I learned that you can take crux with you so you can stay in the waiters the least amount of time possible. Nice. Let's talk about another thing, and that is that you were complaining about how they made your figure look. You were like, oh my gosh, I look huge in these.

It's a true story. He did. They were giant. Looked big on camera. Yeah, they're giant. They were, Brent, I mean, they were like 18 inches wide at the knees. Those are jodfers. Well, I heard Sitka offers a slim-fit waiter.

Okay. Makes you look like 10 pounds trimmer. I'm really just looking forward to see if first light offers like a modern cut. I tell you what, Clay, I started off the season with six pairs of waiters. And we're whittled down to two. Wow. It's pretty rough. Fly fishing waiters is what he's using.

I feel sorry for him because I think those are leaking now. Well, those big waiters you gave me, they leak pretty good. But listen to this, hot tip, Austin. I'm going to introduce everybody here in just a minute. Hot tip. These waiters were, like, soaked in the left foot, and we hunted the day before, and it was cold. I mean, it took me four hours to get warm once I got home.

It was, I was chilled. That was cold. I had to play some coffee to warm him up while we were hunting. Yeah, it worked. What I did the next day, because they didn't dry out, is I put a Ziploc bag over my foot. It worked great. Have you done that before? I carry a roll of trash bags.

Really? Yeah, trash. For leaky waiters. And the great thing about the trash bag is you can tie it off the ankle, shin, the knee, crotch. And crotch. I've gone that out with it. Have you ever, like, what's that old thing you used to do with the pillowcases, put them around your feet when you're a little kid, hop around? A potato sacriac.

Yeah. Yeah. Have you ever done that with like two legs in the waiters? Absolutely. Oh, man. Waiters is a whole other story. Hey, once again, we have to, we have like legitimate guests on the render all over. Brent and I are the only ones that are the regulars here.

The cremogens, yeah. So Brent, we're going to have to really behave beyond our best game because we have, I'm going to go left to right, to our left, Max Barter of Meat Eater. Max is, probably should introduce Sean first because Max works with Sean. Weaver. Right hand man. Right hand man. But you're left-handed.

Yeah. Is that a slight to him? Keep moving. Max is a photographer, producer, waterfow hunter, 25 years old, fraternal twin. He eats a lot. He's a trim man, though, eats a lot. Max, as I read on his Instagram profile handle, he could make friends with a two before. And it's true.

It's true. Max, good to have you, man. Thank you for having me. Welcome to Bear Grew Shrender. Max Bartas sounds like a future president. It's a good name. That's a strong name. I haven't thought about that yet, but maybe.

It's funny you bring that up because every time we roll into a new group of people, we're trying to do something, trying to get somewhere and get something accomplished. Max slows us down. And I always say, don't worry, Max is just running for president. That's right. Because I'm just talking to people, getting to know him, being nice, trying to make them smile. Yep. You should say for the record here, I'm Max Barta and I endorse this message. Yeah. Yeah. Okay, I'll say it. My name is Max Barta and I endorse this message.

Oh, it's good. That is right. South Dakota representative. To your left, Sean Weaver of Meat Eaters. Sean, you're an old pro on burgers. You've not been on the render though. Nope, not been on render. Sean drove, he drove to my house from Missouri. He was on his 100 days. Well, no, no, no. It was far for him because he drove from Utah to Missouri and then down to my house late one night to record those that session that we did so it's on it was a late night but it was worth it it it ended up being worth it for you did really good and so Sean worked for me neither you

you've worked for me to her for less than a year less than a year yeah but we are currently actually this is our last ducking of the season putting the final touches on the new show, Ducklore. Yeah. Which will be part of the Meat Eater Network. Can we tell people how many shows there are? Is that a secret? I don't think that's a secret.

The first season will be six episodes, and we're also filming the second season in the same year, which will be six episodes. So there are 12 episodes of Duck Lord. And we can say that that's why we're here right now. That's why we're here. We will later disclose where we're at. Yeah.

Not yet, though. No. All, Austin, all entertainment is, it's just drama. Drama and hooks. Okay. So you have a little drama, like this is a secret location, but you tell them you're going to tell it later. Foreshadowing.

Foreshadowing. So we'll tell you where we're at later. Later, meaning like 30 minutes? Like when we get to our next guest. No, it's great to have you shot. It's been awesome hunting with you. We're going to talk more about our hunt. To your left, Anne Marie Dramis.

Anne-Marie, great to see you. Clay, thank you for having me. Glad to be here. So, Anne-Marie is a commissioner, and this is the reason we have to be on our best behavior. You too as well. Sounds good. And Mary is a commissioner of a little organization

they call the Arkansas Game of Fish Commission. And so we've been here, Sean and I and Max have been here hunting with Anne-Marie for the last four days. Yes, sir. Five days. Four. And she's been hosting our team here at kind of the family, the family duck club.

which has been super fun. Great to have you. Hey, glad to be here. We've had a great time the past few days. Got our fair share of Hunson. Got you on your very first gadwall shoot, which, Bravo. We're glad that you finally moved away from the Mallard. Yeah.

Yeah. Although shooting Mallards is a lot of fun. I will say that. But yeah, we did have a good shoot on the first day. Yep. Had a great hunt the second day. And anyway, I think we're going to get out there in the morning, too, before you guys head out. Yeah.

We'll talk more about our, we'll talk. more about our hunt. How long have you been a commissioner, Emery? This is my third year. So it's a seven year term. It is seven year term. Three years into a seven year term. That's right. And I serve with six other commissioners from around the state. Yeah. And one non-voting commissioner who is always the head of the biology and zoology department for the University of Arkansas. Dr. Stephen Bupre. Got to give him a shout out. Snake man. That's right. He is a snake man. Yeah, snake man. tell me describe how the commission works like do most states have an appointed commission do we know that in your next the next guess i'm going to introduce is austin booth the director

of the game's fish do most states have an appointed but that is a secret i'm not going to tell you that until later well i couldn't tell you exactly the number but i do know uh there's many states where actually so let me go back to what the commission does essentially we're a governing body who oversees the rules and regulation for all fish and wildlife in the state of Arkansas. So a lot of responsibility on our shoulders. Right. And in other states, I do know that some are still, their rules and regulations are controlled by the legislature. Correct, Austin.

But for the most part, each state has their fish and wildlife agencies who determine that. Yeah. And so tell me what would you say your main job is as a commissioner? Hearing, hearing from the public, listening to the public, balancing science and public opinion in order to make the best decisions possible for our sports men and women throughout the state of Arkansas. But primarily making regulations. Yes. And more than that, approving budget approvals, for instance, we just this last month approved for a boat ramp to be put in down in South Arkansas. So several other things that we do in regards to, you know, not just fish and wildlife, but emphasis.

structure yeah throughout the state yeah awesome um who are your uh favorite uh i'm kidding i can't i was going to ask some awkward question were you gonna were you gonna ask who would be like my ideal dinner party or something something like that but i was going to ask who your other favorite commissioners were but it was a joke all of them yeah we have a really great group of commissioners uh we're all friends we all work great together and i feel really really lucky to to serve on on this panel with the group that we have. Yeah. You know, it is interesting, and I'm not an expert

on government nor an expert on the way other state agencies work, but there are government structures, state government structures where the legislature votes for wildlife regulations and laws, okay? And so that to me is a problem, because then whether our deer season is this date to this date or our bear season is this to this, all of a sudden becomes a literal political issue that you vote on to the general public.

And so people start to run on campaigns about wildlife, just like the New Jersey governor did when he said in a, I mean, it was like a, this is part of my campaign platform. Did he get rid of bear season? Yeah, he did. He said, we're going to shut down bear hunting in New Jersey. And he did it. And so because every, and I said this in the podcast, any type of government, somebody's going to have some reason why. You know, they don't like it. Right.

And I take it he had never been bear hunting. Oh. Yeah. No. No. No. No way. You just wanted to do it.

Point being having a commission, seven people or eight people that are making wildlife decisions, it's usually really good. I mean, because these people are typically going to be people that are involved in wildlife management. And I would rather entrust that kind of stuff to seven people that have some founding in the state rather than the general public. So that's just. just my two bits on state government because my buddy's up in Michigan. So we work pretty closely with Bear Honey magazine with the Wisconsin Bear Hunters Association and the Michigan Bear Hunters Association. Super strong state agencies that raise tons of money.

And basically they spend their life fighting anti-hunting legislation. And that is, and it's because they have that type of government. And so, anyway, it's just a fight. So love it. One of the many things that we have going for us in Arkansas is we have a great legislature. They strongly support the outdoors. Yeah. They understand the economic benefit to Arkansas that, you know, tourism brings.

All the out-of-state hunters coming here, the out-of-state anglers. They know their communities just as well as we do, and they understand how in the natural state outdoors is just in our veins. and having a commission that makes those decisions, basically insulates us from outside political influence, outside the state coming into the state. And so it's not so much that we have a problem with the legislature here, but it kind of insulates us from out-of-state influence. And couldn't be happier with the legislation that we have. I agree with that, Austin. Actually, there's several legislators who are hunters and anglers, too. Absolutely.

You bet. Something I'm proud of. I was with him this afternoon. Good. Clay, did you introduce that fine man? Hey, you keep your chair, buddy. Stay in your lane. We take 20 minutes on introductions.

I'm not like your boss. You're not president yet, Max. Okay. Friendly reminder. Max would do that. He's such a nice guy. You're afraid everybody's going to be left out. Wait until I get to this guy.

To Anne Marie's left. Austin Booth, the director of the Arkansas I'm fishing fish. You're like a regular unbearerries now. If regular means two, then you're right. No,

good to have you, man. Great to have you. Now, if I get crocs, will I upgrade from regular to emeritus? There's no place to go, but up. Yep. I feel like I need to go change into crocs.

Well, I'm embarrassed. If my family was here, if my wife was here, I couldn't wear these. She don't like them? Well, I might have to defend her. And you can't win a light wearing these.

The volcano. She loves them. Right? Yeah, you just. I mean, let's say something goes wrong between me and Austin, you know. And we go fist to cuff. Right. He's going to beat me to the ground because, for a couple of reasons.

Well, let me tell you. I was going to say, I'm going to do with your shoes. I'm going to go ahead and say that's not going to be the biggest. Is the other reason the knuckle dragging Marine? Because I've heard him say that before. You know, I'm pretty wiry, but, you know. Austin, you've been duck hunting a lot, though. I have.

You have some good duck hunts. I've been on some great hunts this year. Yeah. We've got a lot of ducks in the state right now. That's what I hear. Yes. We're loaded full with hunters, loaded full with ducks, still down from the long-term average. Duck hunters or ducks?

Ducks. Ducks. Compared to where we were last month, a whole lot of ducks in the state right now. We just learned we were Sean and I were in a boat with Luke Naler a couple days ago, and he was describing to us the aerial counting. Yes. I just turned to Luke and I said, how many Mallory and I said, how many Mallory and ducks are in Arkansas right now and he just spouted off I think he said 530,000 532,000

I can't count that and then and I said okay how do you know that and he described to us how they how they bring a cauldron in an airplane and they sprinkle like a weird concoction of of like gar blood and antifreeze and just like oh wow no I don't know I was like man this is not what he said No. No. Can you describe how they count those? Do you know? Okay.

It was transects where they fly random lines across the delta and they get a count on that line and then extrapolate out over those different transects. Over the square mileage of the delta, how many ducks that would be. That's amazing. And I asked him, I said, how confident are you in that number? And he may have been joking, but he said plus or minus 150,000. I don't think he was joking. He was.

He was not joking. Yeah. So it's pretty amazing. Do other states do like, are we doing weekly counts during duck season? No, we do a handful throughout the season, but they're not weekly. And I. Are they monthly? No, it's based on the splits.

Okay. But there are other states that do them, but obviously, this is Arkansas. We do it best. We do it best. for sure. It's entirely based on places that are kind of epicenters, right? How many states would you say do that? Well, the Illinois River Valley, I believe, gets flown every week.

The Missouri River and South Dakota gets flown. And North Dakota, weekly? North Dakota as well weekly. Okay. Just kind of depends where you're at. But places that are, I guess, historic migration routes and also epicenters of waterfowlers. Okay. typically get flown.

Yeah, that's really neat. To Austin's left, Brent Reeves. Check. One and the only. Good to have you, Brent. So Brent drove down from where he lives. So we are, I haven't said where we're, but I did say where we're at. We're in southeast Arkansas in the Delta.

I said we were in Amory's family duck camp, which is true. But that is located in southeast Arkansas near Stuttgart. Yeah, Stuttgart. Brits and Duck Capital of the world. Stuttgart. Close to where, actually, Brent used to hunt quite a bit. Just up the road. Yeah.

Yeah. So you hunted 10, 15 miles from Stuttgart. Oh, no. Raydale from here is probably, what is it, eight miles? Yeah. Nine miles? Yeah. Yeah, not far.

Great. Hunting the same ducks. It looks like them. I have a question for Brent. Just so I can have a baseline for your formal attire. Yes. You're wearing crocs this time. The last render, you had a zip tie on your overalls.

Yeah. Have you upgraded to a button? The button. This is the button. All right. I was wearing those yesterday. and I thought, man, I'm glad these didn't come out in the rotation tomorrow. They think you only had one pair.

Do you have to cut off the zip tie every time? Oh, no, it's on the side. Oh, okay, gotcha. Yeah, no, it's zip tie. We were talking the other day, a friend of mine, I don't know if I said this on the last render or not, but a friend of mine who I met during bear baiting season last year, Corey Eisenhower brought me a mess of squirrels,

and I was talking to him on the phone. and hung up the phone, and Alexis says, what were you saying? I said, well, my friend Corey's going to bring me some squirrels. She said, did you say he was going to bring you a mess of squirrels? My wife's from Texas. I said, yeah, my friend Corey's bringing me a mess of squirrel. She said, I swear, it's like I have been living on an 11-year episode of he-haul

with no commercial. Sometimes she wonders how she got to where she's at. Every time I see her, I wonder how she got asked for that because she's such a wonderful woman. She is. And she has a taste for roughness. Oh my goodness. Sean, walk us through our waterfow hunts. And let me say, let me just tell people,

I have been immersed into the Arkansas waterfow world for the last month and a half more than any time in my entire life. Okay. I've quickly become very opinionated, very informed, very knowledgeable. and like all my other waterfowl friends, pretty much know what to do. I mean, you know how to blow a duck call now. Very good duck caller, of course. Excellent duck caller, the best.

No, no, I have, it's kind of interesting to how this all came about, but I was bound to end up in Arkansas duck hunting just because it's, I mean, I've lived so close my whole life, and it just wasn't something that we did, didn't have any connections here. And then to come here and to experience it and more than just experience it

to see the culture of it. And then it's one thing to hear from somebody from Stuttgart or somebody from down here like you three, how cool it is, and the culture here. The real data point that I listened to that was like, hey, these folks ain't lying. With Sean Weaver,

who has been like, Clay, this is the place for waterfowl culture even last summer when we started planning doing a hunt together i it kind of blew my mind a little bit i was like you live in arkansas we've got to get you into the delta and do some duck hunting yeah we have to and yeah so this this week's hunts have been before we before we go there so we went into stuttgart and we went to max prayer wings which is an event all of its own austin's eyes are rolling in the back of the Max? Okay, Max, tell us about going on Max Prairie Wings.

So, ever since I started Waterford Hunting, we didn't have any, like, great waterfall stores up in North Dakota. And me and my dad, I was shopped on Max Prair Wings. And this was 10. Were you named after B Max? No, it just occurred to me. M-A-C-S and M-A-X. Oh, man.

That would have been cool. But, yeah, anyway, so, like, growing up, me and my dad would always shop online at Mack's Prairie Wings. Okay. And I was so, such a big fan of it. Because, like, every time a max package showed up, I was like, I don't know what that's going to be. It's going to be decoys. So when we pulled up in the parking lot, we're walking in, you were like, I've been waiting 15 years for this.

Yeah. He had his phone out. He disappeared in the store. We didn't find him for, like, 45 minutes. I literally walked down every single aisle. When we, when I was like, I think all you bought was chapstick, though. That's a chip. That's it.

Every duck under. needs it well when I said it's time to go he goes I have not walked down every aisle yet I was like okay it was fun max brought the energy that I needed when I walked into max pray wings but so we went there and you know this is just kind of a waterfowl epistency you walk in everybody's they're all waterfowlers you know you just you just kind of realize you're in this like hub of seriousness for this thing well then we drive down the street just within sight to go see Jimbo Ronquest. Down the street, you mean on the other side of the parking lot?

Yeah, we actually had to get on the two-lane road and back in, but yes, like right there. They told me we're going to go by Jimbo shop. And I had only met him just we hunted a couple days, but we were at a duck camp and they said, we're going to go to a shop. I am envisioning a wood shop where people make duck calls, like a small metal building. Like elves? Maybe with a couple of, yeah, maybe some elves. You know, some duck mounts maybe and a little bit of this and that.

Man, it is a straight up, like, beautiful facility. Very, I mean, the architecture of it's super cool. And it's the R&T world headquarters. Yeah. And you go in there and there's a, I don't know if it's a restaurant, but there's a bar there. And there were just guys hanging out. I mean, just crowded with people.

Waterfowls. I didn't know anything like that existed. Like, what I wanted to have was like the Squirrel and Coon Club up in Northwest Arkansas all where everybody came and did that. I just don't think we're as cool as the waterfow guys. So I say all that to say, there's so much built down here around

this culture, which is so cool. I would come to your squirrel club. You'd come up there. I would. I'm a squirrel hunter now. You are? And Marie's a squirrel hunter. Yeah, we went squirrel hunt on the second day. Yeah, before we get to the tucks, we've got to talk about the squirrel's priority.

I think it is squirrels. I think it is squirrel to. Okay. Squirrel time. No. We'll come back to these squirrels. I'm totally instruct about squirrels. Tell us about our hunts or about Suckgart. I think it is worth mentioning with the Max and R&T that it also demonstrated how small the

waterfowl community can get and how you can be just one person removed from pretty much everybody because we ran into several friends. Yeah. And like, you know, someone that Max has known since he was a little kid in R&T shop. and I ran into a friend in Max, and it just, it gets small quick. Yeah. But no, our hunts, you know, we started off here on Ann Marys, which is, was great.

And kicked it off with a Cypress hunt, which alone was like worth the price of a big reservoir, basically a man-made like that had big, big cypress trees scattered all throughout it. Yep. And it was a gadwall hole. Yes, it was. You know what? We gadwalled Clay. Yes.

That's what we did. He had to diversify his duck harvest. Yeah. So the joke was, Brent, that I had only killed Mallards, which is a true story. I had only killed Mallors my whole waterfowl career. That's how long, though. Three days. You know.

You know, at Clay's Duck Club at West Fork, Arkansas. Yeah. Yeah. And so we killed several gadwals, which broke my streak of Mallard. And so, you know, the joke became that they gadwalled me. Because we know the mallard is the king. That's been established. But it was super fun.

It actually was one of my, I mean, well, I'm going to say it's better than the rice hunt. But it was fun. I'd like to go back there. It was fun. What I liked about that hunt, it was basically Clay and I in one cluster of trees, the other Amory and Sean and the other camera guy in another cluster of trees. And it was kind of like Clay and I versus. them.

Oh, yeah. And we would shoot the ducks on the left side. They would shoot the ducks on the right side. But it was just so much fun just to gab back and forth and just overall great time. We did pretty good. What was his? Clay learned a few things. Max, give me a quick estimate on his shell to duck ratio.

Oh, ooh. Better than my shell to throw. I will say, Clay likes to shoot. It doesn't matter if they're at 15 yards or 50 yards. I have to defend Clay's honor for a minute here, though. Are you wearing cold? You got a double. That was awesome.

I was getting to that point. Clay had a nice pair come in on the left side and dumped them both. Put on a clinic, Brent. Right. Run it to the plug. That's what we said. Sean. Clay turned over and he's like, did you guys shoot?

No. I was like, why did those dugs fall so quick? Sean, are you calling a double two ducks with two shots or two ducks with lunch? Two ducks at two shots. Two shots, yeah. It's two shots. Two for two. Yeah, it does take a little bit of time to understand when you're skybusting and when you're not.

And that is still a little unclear to me. Out of state her. The very first shot of the day, I think, was Clay tried to sky bust a duck. Is that right? I'm trying to think that. I will say, yeah, that is correct. I will say I appreciate that when Clay doesn't hit a duck, he turns to me and says, now was that sky busting?

Was that too far? Was that too far? Should I not have done that? Yep. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Which I respect that because he's trying to learn for sure. Yeah, it's not like he's just willingly burning boxes of shells. I just don't like to let opportunity slip through your fingers, man.

I hear that. We really, really threw Clay off, though, Sean, when we started our gadwalled duck calls. He was like, why are you guys just going, me, me, me, me, he got on me. He goes, that's not how my boys call that. I said, that's not how me and Jim called us. Yeah, I'm not a fan of the gadwalled. They just got no heart in their call. You know, the mall is like, whack, wah, whack, whack, wow.

It's like they're stuck in traffic. In the, in the, in the, in the, in the, in the, in the, in the, in the, in the, in the, in the, in the, in the, yeah. That's about what they sound like. Bebe, beep, beep, beep, me, me, me. I was like, I was like, John, you're never going to call it gadwall in with that. Trust me. I mean, you've never done it.

Okay, so we have the gadwall shoot. Maybe all that amary tell about the next, the next, the next hunt at what y'all call them the mayor's field. Yeah, the mayor's field. Yeah. Because it is, uh, it's a field located across the street from the self-proclaimed mayor of this area's, uh, house. So, yeah. You can see it.

You can see his house from where we're hunting. Yeah, yeah, we could. So pretty straightforward on our, on our naming of our duck holes. But yeah, we hunted hunted in a rice field. Very, very windy day. We had a north wind that was what, like 20 miles per hour. At least. I mean, yeah, it was super duper windy.

And we have a blind there on the corner, but I don't always like to hunt out of a blind. I feel like sometimes they can flare off of it. So actually, we went about 150 yards west of where that blind is and set up all behind the trees. We were sitting on the ground. And we knew there were a bunch of ducks in there. We did. We scouted the day before.

We had seen just Mallards just piling in there. Yeah, they wanted in there bad. We got a beautiful watch the night before scout. It was a good scout. Yeah. So go in, have our shoot. we're done by 9 o'clock. Had a even a few teal light in the hole.

So that was a really cool hunt. I think a cool thing to mention there is that we were hunting them like turkeys, sitting under a base of a tree, sitting on a little pad. Yeah, yeah, it was fun. We're calling in a lot of pairs. It wasn't like big groups of mallards. Well, it's so late in the season that they are paired up right now. So that's typically how you're going to see them.

Yeah. I don't think I scout busted any on that. hunt. No, they came right in. They floated in. Did you shoot? Yeah, I shot. Yeah, Clay I got my left. And the, and the teal. I killed my limit of allergies and the teal, didn't it? Yep, you did. Yes, sir. Yeah. And the teal, the teal shot was not something just to skip over. No what? It was pretty good. And so the third day, we went to Biomeda. Tell us about that, Sean. What is Biomeda? I don't know.

Well, I think it's been in Sean's dreams since he was a little boy because he was all googly-eyed from the moment that we stepped foot into the parking lot. Oh, yeah. He's like Max at Prairie Wings. Yeah, pretty much. Yeah, Max at his own store. Yeah, Max at Max. Yeah. When you think of Arkansas duck hunting, obviously, you think about flooded green timber.

And when you think about places to hunt in Arkansas, you think about. You do. I mean, ultimately, the reason a place like Stuttgart has its reputation is places like Bimita. And, yeah, I've wanted to hunt there a long, long time. I was really, really excited to make it happen. I was excited to just get to be out there. But ultimately, the third day was pretty rough as far as hunting.

Tell us, just give us a little rundown the first day with your boat and stuff. A little drama. Yeah. Oh, goodness. Well, anyone that, if you follow my Instagram and ultimately once you see duck lore come out, you'll find that I've had boat problems beyond all possibility this year. I mean, it's been unbelievable. November boat motor took a pretty much catastrophic failure. It took well over a month to get fixed and then thought it was fixed, had it run good for about a week, maybe max.

If that. Yeah. Like, I mean, really? it would seem as though and by me this week we had another catastrophic failure went to go turn out of the channel we're in flooded timber

right in the heat of the moment of trying to get back to where we're going and it's kind of stressful running up a cut we'd been bumping people out no no no no no no no I was wearing actual boots so I was out of a bully a few people that's not true

that didn't happen you were wearing rocks. So yeah, we're running up a channel and we're going to cut out of it and shuts off, go to turn the key and nothing. Like literally no power switch batteries, do a computer reset to Neify motor. And she's toast. She's toast. So luckily we had Amory's boat out there, the Sea Witch.

The Flying Squirrel. We've been trying to name it. day. The flying squirrel, the sea witch, trying to think. Sean Salvation would be a good. I advised, I gave Amory some advice on naming stuff. You never want to name anything with more than two syllables.

Which made it complicated, actually. And a one syllable is better, but for a boat you can go to. But anyway, because there was a couple that were thrown in, and I was doing my syllable test, and I was like, no, it's not going to stick. I mean, you can name it that, it's not going to stick. Got to be two syllables, one or two syllables. That was sick. Clay, do you know what?

Boat stands for? Boat stands for. Yeah. Nope. Bust out another thousand. Oh. I believe it. That's not the only bird trouble that we have.

Yeah, at this point I've got like four boats then. So the short version of this story is we went ahead and just parked the boats and we were close enough to our hole that we walked into where we were going to hunt. And we didn't kill a duck that morning. So we hunted by Amita. and did not kill a duck, saw a lot of ducks, had two ducks flying to the hole early. That I could have taken shots on, but I felt like they're irresponsible,

even though they're well within shooting range. It was just kind of low light. I had just loaded my gun. I guess I should have been more ready, but it felt like I just didn't. I felt like I was shooting into the abyss because down there in that green timber, it's dark in there.

Yeah. And when they hit the water, they just disappeared. Yeah. They're all soon just not there. They're just part of the black. Even though it was legal shooting light. And then when that happens right at legal shooting light, you think this is going to happen a lot more.

So you don't really take a chance. And then the only other chance we had the whole day. And I'm going to tell you guys something about waterfowlers that you may not even know about yourself. Here we go. Okay. Because this bird comes in. And I mean, he just flies right over the top of me,

but above the canopy, I shoot at the bird twice, boom, boom, used two of my 15 shells that I could have a biomeded. So I had 13 left. I'm glad to hear that. And I miss the bird.

And then I go, did I sky bust that bird shot? And he was like, absolutely. And he was like, Clay, that was a working bird. Okay. So it was a total misjudgment.

I mean, I just thought this is my chance. You're just too excited. Just too excited. I shot at this bird above the canopy, missed it. Austin, this is what all waterfowlers do.

You've done. it. I mean, I just, I guarantee you of all of you've done it. Prince's done it. Emery's done it. I don't know what he's going to be. The one bird that you skybust is the one that you were going to kill.

Even though 150 other birds had done the exact same thing and didn't land in the decoys because Sean's like, that bird was working. That bird was working. That bird's working. That bird's working. Play you blew it. Here's what's bad when

that happens is when you got somebody in party it does that, then there's actually, or one duck comes in by itself and somebody throws up and shoots and there's- Right behind it. Right behind it. Straight up. That is hard to understand when you're supposed to shoot. Oh, yeah. It's terrible.

It's very nuanced. And it's all about how you feel and what you are used to watching those birds do. And it changes day to day because some days you get that one or two here or there that do pop in and finish. And it's like, that's... all we're going to get the big flocks aren't going to do it on certain days and so you got to take those singles and pairs and then there's other days where like your best strategy if the birds are really working really doing it letting those singles of pairs peel out keep moving land whatever

and let the back end keep finishing but it all just changes on day to day basis you got a new guy with you better you better but I'm on a short rope I mean yeah yeah I need a short rope with stuff like well like last week and we were hunting the White River had them working in the timber for a little bit but then 8 o'clock rolls around

and we're shooting them on the dip so not going full clay nukem and shooting them above the trees what does that mean on the dip like they start to duck in but don't fully commit right

and had kind of a slow morning but killed six mallors me in the group and then went to a more stool unit that afternoon and shooting them in the decoy so only just couple of miles from each other, but different time of day,

you know, calendar year, it changes. Last spring, Clay Newcomb and I collaborated with Jason Phelps at Phelps game calls and building each of our own favorite turkey diaphragms called prime cuts. Now, I'm going to tell you, I love mine because it's easy to use. I'm not going to go, I'm not going to

win a turkey calling contest. It's just not going to happen. But when I run this call, I get the sounds that gobblers are looking for. I have a great turkey hunting track record. If you go listen to real turkeys out in the woods, they're not going to win calling contests, right?

That's who I listen to. I can make those sounds on my cut. I also hunt with Phelps's cut, and I hunt with Clay's cut because they're all three great cuts. Check out Prime Cuts at Phelpsgamecalls.com. I think you'll be glad you did, and you'll find

out that the Steve Rinella cut is an easy-to-use cut for beginning callers who just want to start making good turkey noises. and getting action. So the second day, and we can tell this story pretty quick, the second day we went back to Biomeda. I had to get a mallor in Biomedia.

Yeah. I had to. So we walked in, it took us a while, we went to a walking area, walked in, tried to find water, made a big loop because we didn't find water as well as we thought we would. My legs are sore right now. Yeah, we were pulling.

I was trying to convince him to bring less stuff. He wouldn't listen. And then, but we finally, find water and we get back in there we found a nice hole where in a hole means usually where timber is falling over I wouldn't have known that like why is there holes in timber what's that

mean usually it's where a tree is falling over and there's the opening of the canopy with ducks can get down they're wanting to get in these these in this dead fall of timber yeah wind thrown wind thrown yeah and basically we you know called a few birds nothing serious at all and then we're done like we're

we decide we're leaving and And that's where you can tell me what happened. Well, I will say that we walked around in that area until we found where we kind of jumped some birds and saw some birds working in too. So there was birds kind of in that area and we were seeing some close-ish, but nothing really wanted to come decoy

and check out what was going on. Dead calm and cloudy, which is like worst-case scenario for duck hunting, especially in the timber. Especially in the timber. And morale was low. Yeah, I was kind of at that point where like, I was kind of at that point where it's like, you know what, it just isn't in the cards. Let's go home.

I'll have to come back and get that mallard. And it must have been our splashing as we turned to walk out and feet kick in and all of a sudden. We're just talking. I mean, we're talking like normal voices. Yeah. Just BS and no one behind a tree or anything. We didn't have her guns out. pulling a jet sled, guns on the shoulder,

and Drake Mallard got too close. So what happened, Austin, is that we just kind of see some birds out of the corner of the eye, and they're kind of cupping up a little bit, but they're, Sean says they were in the canopy. They weren't. They were, they were, they were. He was even. If I had shot and missed, it would have been skybusting.

Hold on a second. I'm going to defend myself here. They came, okay, they were, let's say they were in the top of the canopy. I learned my lesson, though. I let you shoot first because I just was like, are we shooting? these ducks are not, because I'm not going to be the one that's going to skybust them. So I had the gun up, and when I heard you shot, I just unloaded. Boom, boom, boom.

We shot three times. And you clipped one. Yeah, I clipped him. Broke his wing, fell 40 yards away. He was off to the races. Yeah. Yeah, when I saw it, it hit the water and just started swimming. And man, I was going to tackle it if it took it.

I took off running as fast as I could after that duck. It was anything but what, like, I guess I would consider. success on a normal hunt, right? Like I go, just like any duck hunter does, but I want them fluttering, hanging over decoys, but ultimately I got that one mound. Now it's kind of like, it's going to have to be a little bit of a personal vendetta deal to come back and actually learn some stuff about this place. Because it's unbelievable. The scale of it is hard to comprehend. When you look at it on a map, you can go, oh, you know, that's 10 miles there or whatever the heck it is, you know. But when you get out in that timber and realize, like, how far 200 yards or 300 yards is in that kind of environment,

whereas 200, 300 yards in South Dakota on a, on a lake or, you know, even a mile on a lake in South Dakota, like, ducks flare from a mile, like from gunshots and whatever else. out here you can have so many groups of hunters stuffed in a mile and like you have no clue what's going on a mile away not a darn clue yeah and i can see how guys spend their whole lives learning that timber i mean really like picking it apart 17 000 acres of floater timber yeah and as a camera guy on that hunt i see everything in a whole different perspective you guys were seeing it as duck hunting and I was sitting back here like this feels like a big game hunt like everyone was talking quiet moving slow

and it was like yeah pretty much a spot and suck and like we said like we just need to get that one mallard and after the previous or the day before all the troubles and getting skunked it was like we all want that mallard

we all have one goal and it's that mallard yeah that was the things we could have gone we could have stayed here and probably killed a lot of ducks but we went back. I wanted to stay here.

Just for the record. Hey, that's a good place to start talking about this last podcast. We talked about these green tree reservoirs really dug in deep. Austin, did we cover it? If somebody listened to that podcast, would they come away with the info

that you feel like they would need to understand the problem, understand what's going to be done, understand the challenges? Yes. yes yeah there's a lot to it it's uh or what would you like to even add to it or expound on like as you were listening you're like man i'd like to talk more about that well this render is appropriate for it because i mean obviously these guys heard the first heard the first beer

agrees then heard the second render but now here seeing biomeda smelling by meada watching the sunlight the sunrise come through the trees having the boat right in And y'all understand it. And it's almost an Arkansas spiritual connection to those red oaks with water on them and greenheads coming through them. Having you guys here to talk about it first and then to see it, I think it's the most powerful connection because it's not just a resource that we're conserving. It's something that's really important to the character of our state. If the second beer grease was incomplete in any way, it's hearing these guys talk about what they've seen that's kind of made it complete. It was interesting being out there to see a lot of dead timber.

And, you know, I have no frame of reference. I might have just gone out there and just been like, well, this is just what it looks like. One day we were there with somebody who had been there a lot. And he was like, man, he said, look at all these leaning trees. And I just thought leaning trees were normal. But he was like, those leaning trees are an indication of a root system that is compromised. And those trees aren't supposed to be leaning like that. And you just look through this forest and there's a lot of leaning trees, a lot of dead trees.

And so I mean, you know, the thing is real, you know. Yeah. Well, and we use the analogy, wet feet a lot. Talking about the tree's roots now. That has limited persuasion with two men weighing crocks right now. It's all perspective. wet feet, not men and crocs, but anyways. No, you know, you all the boating, all the boating canals, all the ditches we have in there.

Well, due to increased rainfall, this October, November was the first time in three years that has been dry enough for us to get in there just to clean out those ditches, clean out the canals, three years. So we've got some challenges on our hands, and it's an important part of the state that's at risk, but we're going to do what we can when we can. Yeah. And Marie, what did you think? Anything, what stood out to you and what we discussed or anything you'd like to add to it? I mean, I think that our director, Austin Booth, put it all very well,

that it's an important part of our character here in Arkansas having these green tree reservoirs. I mean, you don't get anything like it. It's funny because Sean and I were talking earlier, it's crazy that eight hours north of here, ducks land in dry fields. Right. And then you get down here and they're landing in water.

And to top it off. It's the same ducks too. Yeah. And they're flying through trees and landing in water. It's just unbelievable. So it's a big part of, yes, our, our state, our heritage, the whole flyway in general,

something that we can't stand to lose and we have to do whatever it takes and whatever is within our control to help save these trees. I thought that was a good point that Austin made on the podcast was that there's lots of reasons why, I mean, a system this complex, it's not just one, it's usually not just one issue. It's usually multiple things. And there's only so many things that you can cleanly touch and manipulate. There's some things that are just, there's, you know, there's issues with just other stuff that's hard to manage.

So the point being this is what we can do. This is what we're going to do. There's other more longer term issues that we're going to deal with, you know. You know what Luke Naylor said in that in your last podcast, he said wildlife management is a mixture of science It's an art. Yep. All goes hand in hand. And if I could just add one thing to what I thought was, I don't know, poignant about the last podcast

was that you have, you have Bobby, our chairman, who's talking about a generation prior to him, right, the Rex Hancock era. So he's talking about the generation before him. And Marie and I, you know, we're looking to Bobby, who's a generation before us. And we're making decisions about the generation after us right now. Yeah. And probably the generation after that too. Yeah.

So it's just one snapshot of what, you know, duck hunting in Arkansas is. It spans four generations just in the context of one decision. And that's what it means to the state. And that's why it's a good story to tell, but also one to be committed to for the long term because that's what it takes. Bobby talked about Rex Hancock and what he did up at the Cash River. And, you know, I obviously heard the name Rex Hancock before, but I didn't know the whole story. And so that was really educational for me to hear.

And honestly, really rings a bell with what we're going through right now and the decisions that we're having to make. You know, Luke brought up that he introduced a phrase to me that I wouldn't have known humans dimension research. Which I had to look that up. He said it in the podcast, and I just shook my head. I knew what he's talking about. I went back home and looked up what that meant. And humans dimensioned research is a field of study, academic study, where people try to understand how humans value natural resources.

And so, like talking about Rex Hancock, and the multiple interests that went into the cash river, I mean, there was, that was a big, that was a big amount of energy being put into channelizing the cash. I mean, that was the economy of our, Arkansas would have been at stake. So there would have been farmers that would have been like, hey, we want barges running up and down the cash to take our crops to market.

There would have been all this stuff, but somebody had to stand up for wildlife, for wild places, for a way of life and had to really like put some teeth into it. You know, and it was interesting that humans dimension research, just that everybody values the land differently. when we toured a farm this week where the sky had basically just it was like i described it it was like Jurassic park but for ducks just in terms of like all the things that they were doing and we were driving through seeing ducks and there was it was just a incredible place right and i had the thought

while we were there like he's trying to turn this place back into a wetland essentially for ducks most most of the world is going the other direction A wetland is not valuable to you unless you value waterfowl. So this is the whole idea of that when people look at a piece of land, nobody's thinking the same thing of why that land has value and how it should be used. And that's why we have to have these strong, strong opinions, strong science, strong conviction, perseverance, dedication.

There's just a lot that goes into saving wildlife in 2022. Amen to that. I mean, it's true. Yeah, it is. You know, on that note, talking about Rex Hancock specifically, it was an interesting bit for me in the podcast where it's mentioned how he's like this ordinary guy that, you know, fights for this like fundamental ecological component in the area. When you look at, when you look at waterfowl over the last hundred years, you see this a lot where,

relatively speaking, nobody's, so to speak, just average. guys come along and impact great, great things to the resource. You know, Ding Darling wasn't a nobody, but now he's like considered the, you know, father of the National Wildlife Refuge System. And ultimately he was a cartoonist that was like making fun of politics and ends up creating, you know, okay, huge portion of the cash. It's National Wildlife Refuge. You know, Ding Darling's father, the National Wildlife Refuge System. And you have these guys that just come along, like see this kind of like,

this is the Hill I'll Die on moment of their life. Of like they know it takes only one man, but it's one person sees there's fundamentally something wrong and they have to stand, you know, for what they believe. It's happened a lot of times, hadn't it? And we owe those singular people. We owe them a lot over years. Yeah, Mr. Bobby said,

he couldn't imagine this part of Arkansas if the whole cash river had been channelized. Like how much it would have changed the flyway, how much it would have changed the system. And just so, yeah, those things are so critical. I've personally seen part of the stretch that was before it kind of got stopped. There's, you know, small stretch of the cash that was channeled. And it's, uh, it like instantly makes you disheartened. When you look at it, you're like, oh, this is what it would all been. It's a line.

You know, so much of the last 150 years in this country, we were trying to get out of this place being a wilderness, you know, a place that was uninhabitable. I mean, like we talked about in the first one, about how much of Arkansas literally would have been uninhabitable, I mean, because of flooding. And then, you know, so man has always been in this, in this, you know, struggle to make nature more consistent.

and more manageable. But some of this waterfowl stuff, we're going, we need to go back the other direction. So anytime you're going against the current of kind of the modern trends, you know, it can be an uphill battle. John, what's stood out? Anything stand out to you in the podcast? There's so many things.

All the waterfowlers have been like, Clay, this is the best bear grease podcast you've ever done. And I'm like, of course it was because you love waterfowl. It was a great podcast, very information. entertaining, educational, the whole bit. You may be a little bit biased. I may be a little bit biased. I know a few people on there.

Just a minute ago, Anne-Marie had mentioned eight hours north here. Ducks feeding in dry fields, then here they're being in the timber. It really shows how, well, one, how these birds adapt is they travel down the flyway and back up the flyway. But two, also, like, how important it is

to understand the whole system from start to finish. Yeah. You know, as I was producing this podcast, and just gathering information, the evidence is so clear of what needs to be done. It was almost like, well, this is a no-brainer. There's no story here because this is what needs to be done. What's the challenge, Austin? Like why are, what could make it fail? Well, I'm very sympathetic to that position because everybody in Arkansas, in this part of the state anyways, They live 305 days a year waiting for the other 60. That's not just duck hunters. That's gas stations. That's grocery stores.

That's beds and breakfast. That's restaurants. And so to look at a resource and think it's dying. There's a whole lot of reasons that you don't want to believe that. We're also not looking at kind of like what we talked about earlier. We don't have a luxury of like single cause problems. It's really easy to sit here in 2022 and be like, yeah, this is a no-brainer. But you go back five years ago, you go back 10 years ago, 15, 20, 20 years ago.

We learned a great deal about red oak dormancy, learned a great deal about what standing water versus sheet flow does the trees. We've had an immense increase in the rainfall that we get. So we're at a luxury right here and right now of information that I'm that I'm not willing to look back on years prior and fault guys for for not having and for fault them. There you go. For not believing like, oh, this is going to get better. This is going to get better. You know, the drainage will be better.

We won't get as much rain next year. But looking forward to what could make this all not work out, it's going to come down to whether it's dry enough when we need. need it to be drowdered to put the work in and whether we have public support for the forest management and for the infrastructure that we need to put in so how would public support like how would that like what would some what would a group of people do that would cause that not to work i just trying to understand that well yeah that's a great question just raised just raise cane so much so that it just causes problems for you guys to do it yeah that's right you know for so many years people were used to, okay, Balmita or Hurricane, you know, opening weekend of duck season, there's

going to be water in there sticking with tradition. And now we can't guarantee that because we never know what the weather's going to hold for us. And that's something that's really difficult to grasp. That's the last thing. I know it was said last time that none of us, you know, want that to happen. And this is, you know, we wish that we were not in this situation, but we are. And we have to adapt and change and do it as necessary to save the resource. I think that Mother Nature's answer in systems is an answer to variability. And that really the only constant in life is change, that things change. And you just can't deny that this has changed.

You can't deny that the prairie pothole region has changed. You can't deny that there's all these man-made, factors, whether it's power plants or the spread of corn farther west and farther north and changes of water quality and go down the line of all the things that affect a duck. And all those things are happening in synchronization while also, then like you throw the cherry on top that you have a dying force. Like to be frank, like there's a lot already going against Arkansas with those other things I mention when you start looking at Lake Sakakawea and North Dakota last year on the Missouri River, a hundred-some mile-long reservoir didn't freeze till almost February.

So held a lot of ducks longer. Yeah. So it's a complex issue. It's a very complex issue. But to come back to your point, like, there's things you can alter and you can change. Can I say something? Sure? I've said something in a long time.

So raise your hand proper. I'll call it. Max. I'm Max and I endorse this message. Before I listen to this podcast, I'll be honest with you. I didn't know there's a problem down here. And maybe that's me being out of state and not knowing about other state issues. Maybe that's just me having a closed mind and just worrying about my own state or just simply not listening to what people had to say.

But I listened to the podcast and I was like, there's no way that's happened. No way. Because like I was... That Clay, Duke, full of drama. I just always thought this great, awesome area was always going to stay great. And spending two days in the area, it was just like, yeah, I can definitely see the problem. I can definitely see the issues. And I think people need to open their ears and just work, like Sean said, worry about the whole dang flyway from the breeding grounds all the way to the wintering grounds.

I'd add two things to that, Max. You all went to Biomeda. and from a forest management perspective and a public opportunity perspective, the goal with Biomeda is to keep it from becoming like other wildlife management areas that we have. So if y'all were in the woods and you all had somebody pointing out, you know, dead or irreversibly dying red oaks with extreme basal swelling at Biomita, we can take it to some other places that would make you sick, sick to your stomach. Yeah, I'm sure.

Henry Grey Hurricanes. We're dying from the inside out. It's crazy. It's unbelievable. But if like that's the rain cloud, the silver lining is like, you know, we announced some of our water level management changes on September 3rd of 21. Feedback's been fantastic. I never, ever would have thought that we have the support that we've gotten since then because people are invested in the resource. We have a very unified commission.

The hunters are starting to see the change in the resource. You know, we had lots of public meetings this summer, trying to get people out in the woods when there's leaves on the trees to see what the trees look like in the summer when they're dead or irreversibly dying. We're in a really good place right now as a state to recognize the problem that we've been talking about for a long time, but now one that we're ready to move out on. Yeah. Yeah.

It's outstanding. You know, I think this whole issue is just making, basically making hard decisions for conservation, in wildlife and habitat is something that is going to happen in more places than just waterfowl. I mean, it's just undeniable that something is happening with historic patterns of climate, like weather has been wild, waterfall has been wild. This place is changing. And, you know, whether it's just a little blip, I don't know. But in my lifetime, this place has changed.

And I'm not saying this place, as in, I'm talking about planet Earth. Yeah, yeah. It's changing. So I think what you guys are facing and what the state of Arkansas is facing about making significant changes and the way we manage habitat that's going to affect people is something that's going to have to happen in the future. So I like to think that these decisions will be made maybe easier over time as precedence is set for, hey, we just got to suck it up. I mean, you know, I mean, we have lived in the glory days of some species of wildlife in North America. And we're in the glory days of some of them right now.

But there's going to become, you just can't get too used to something. Well, no, everything goes in cycles. Yeah. It is. And I think some of the few that would be detractors, like talked about in the podcast. That's why I wear my cowboy boots by Omita. Are people that saw the real true bona fide glory days of Arkansas. You know, Arkansas's highest record, duck harvest was 2001 or two, where it was like,

it was one million mallards right now one million ducks harvested one million mallards plus you know another million ducks on top of that that's incredible there's no state that ever ever has and ever you know for a long time probably ever come anywhere near that again things are just changing and that's that's everywhere right like we've got this hunter problem overall like less waterfowl hunters as well less people contributing to the resource and and and i think we just need that i guess that moment of it's there yeah it is there it's there tell me what you mean about that awesome well you know amory you'll know what I mean and so will Brent but you know

I'm 35 I'm gonna say how old amore is but she's 30 all right all right there we go and we're like at this like generational point in waterfowling where as Arkansasans we're like still young in the population group but we're old enough to remember duck hunting what it was like even in the 90s But we're young enough to, like, really see what it is now. And then behind us is this group of publicly and waterfowlers,

and they think that they're going out and having a great hunt because they're killing a wood duck limit. And there's nothing wrong with killing a wood duck limit. But if we're, like, trying to benchmark the long-term hunting quality of what an Arkansas GTR is, I'm glad you killed a limit of wood ducks, but that ain't it, buddy. and there's a whole lot more. There's gadwals.

There's gadwals. That's right. Blue bills. And. And like as that generation of Arkansas water fowlers grows, they're like starting to see like, hey, what I've heard about about by me to hurricane black river, you know, black swamp, you know, all of these like iconic duck hunting places. is like there's something that's not here and I want to fix it because I don't have it now, but I understand that I'm young enough for if we make a commitment now as Arkansasans that maybe I'll be able to enjoy it when I'm 50 or 60.

And young people impact change, right? Like young people drive change. Because they got that Instagram and that Snapchat. They got that fire. All those young ins. And, you know, we did four, we did four public meetings about our 100. level changes this year that we say the average age of our publicly and waterfowlers are between 22 and 25 that's pretty wild that's pretty young that's kind of cool it was younger than I thought

skybusters new generation skybusters you're an old man skybuster clay they're learning from the best wait till they see the video but but the the the crowd that we had at these public meetings 100% consistent with that wow that's great it's really encouraging that's super cool yeah I won't name any names, but when we were in Stuttgart, we had the public meeting at the R&T Tap Room, which I went to. Oh, really? That's where we had it at. And there were some fine, red-blooded American males that were ready to go out to buy me to that night and start digging up levees, getting that water out of that area. So, yeah.

I think I was just talking about hunter recruitment. I think the biggest detriment to waterfow hunting recruitment is leaky waiters. You know what? You need to buy your own waiters. You had your opportunity at Max the other day, and then you thought about it. There's spendy suckers. They're not. Waiters and jerk cords. I have to, we've been talking about, Austin mentioned these public meetings that we had.

Those were incredible. They really were. Very informational. You were able to go to some of them. I did. I was out of town for one of them, but I did go to the other three. And all very successful in people that really wanted to get out and figure out, okay, this is something that I'm passionate. about what can I do to help?

How do I understand this? How do I take this back and tell my friends? In fact, that's how Austin ended each of those meetings was the best thing you can do tonight is go out with the information that you learned tonight and go tell somebody about it. And I think I really do because of Austin and our staff at the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission. That is why so far this has been successful. And I think that's why it will be successful for the future is because of the educational

aspects that were put in place leading up to it. I hope it is successful because I want to come back. It will be. I do. I have faith. And while we're on this, this is something that hasn't been touched, but we've talked about this kind of off to the side.

You know, we talk a lot about public land, but also this timber die-off that we're seeing, we're actually dealing with that on our property as well. And we've had to take a step back at actually what I've learned in this process at Game and Fish is really, what inspired us to go and look at our own woods and say, huh, we got some leaning trees in there. You know, we've got some floating acorns that we've seen during duck season from these white oaks.

And what can we do to make our woods better? And so we've had to go in and do that. We actually left a big majority of our timber dry this year. Yeah. And it's something that. You said something this week that I wouldn't have known the statistic, but that 90% of Arkansas's private land. That's right.

90% of Arkansas is privately owned. So, but all that to be said, yes, we're doing this on our property, but it benefits the more people that do realize this and that get involved in their, in their own backyards and their own property, the more it benefits the whole state. Yeah. And so there's a lot of private duck clubs, private landowners, farmers that are getting this message to and doing stuff just like. like you guys here on your farm. Yeah, that's right. It's good. You know what else?

It eats red oak acres? Squirrels. Sure do. They need them. So we're not just saving ducks. Squirrels, Austin. Make squirrels great. Make them great again.

Hey, closers. Anything you guys want to say? Because this is the last, I'm always a little bit sad when we closed down a series. You know, when we got done talking about Daniel Boone, we talked about Daniel Boone for like six weeks. Yeah.

We found one of his decoys. We did find. the Daniel Boone decoy. Oh, we did. Yeah, on the decoy. I didn't know they had sharpies back then, though, but it did say DB. Or molded flambo plastic.

Yeah, it's pretty amazing. Wow. You never know. My closing comment would be, thank you for doing this, Clay. I do. I want to say that publicly. Thank you for just taking an interest in this

and not even being a waterfow hunter, but wanting to learn more and wanting to learn more about what we do with the Arkansas Game and Fish coming into this and spreading the good news. So I want to say that. It has been. It's something I needed, needed to know.

You know, and I know you're a big duck hunter now. You got your own duck call. You have a pair of leaky waiters, but hopefully you'll get some new ones someday. This has been an incredible week. It's been a lot of fun. It has been a lot of fun. Yes, Austin, your turn. Is your hand?

Sorry. Austin's brain's about to explain. I'm having a moment over here. He needs and rocks. First of all, for my first closer, I've been the director since July. Amory's been here. He's at three years, right? Yeah, I'm a junior now.

And this podcast is familiar with Luke. Luke's been working for this agency for 15 years. There's a whole other cadre of guys behind Luke and me, guys and gals that have been beating this drum and putting in the hard work for years and years and years to get to the public to this point, to get this agency to the point. I want to close it out by thinking, you know, Chris Racy, Brad Carter, Rob Willie, Buck Jackson, Garrick Dugger, Terrence Teal, Mark Hooks. Terrence Teal's, he a waterfowl guy. They sound like all of time. He is.

He's one's favorite Dutch is. Yeah. Gadwell. So there's just a, his wife's maiden name is Gadwall. There's a, there's just a, a ton of people that have been beating this drum for a long time. They've known that it's been the right thing to do. And it's easy for us to swoop into a podcast like this and talk about it in depth for a few hours.

but they've been making it their life's work for years. So just remarkably grateful for them. The other thing is, did you say that you have a duck call? God. Hand tuned by Jim Ronquist himself. He didn't even have to tune it because it was already perfect. So because I've listened to every single Barry Grays podcast, except for the Misty with a mustache render.

Okay. I remember that when people would come on your podcast in the early days, you used to make them give a mouth call or a nowhood, right? I mean, it happened. I think it's only fitting that you give us your best duck call. I will go and get it right now and bring it over here. Do you know where it's that? Yep, I do.

We'll just pause for a minute. Okay. Okay. All right. Stages yours? I believe in you. Okay, so we've gone and gotten, so we've gone and gotten the duck call that I got from,

I got it from Max, but Jim Ronquist tuned this himself. Wow. Yeah, I mean, I've got pictures of it. It has Jim spit in it, actually. It probably does. So the other day, I made a semi bet with Sean that I said, I bet I can blow a duck call

that is better than what you think I would. I didn't say it was going to be good. I just said it's going to be whatever your expectations are, I'm going to exceed it. That's exactly right. And so in Biomeda, in Biometa, I pulled this out and blew up for the first time ever. And it's not the first time I'd blown a duck call. I had blown them before, but probably like eight or nine years ago and never had any instruction. Just kind of, you know, I don't even know why I had a duck call, but I had one.

And I blew it a little bit. And I understand the sequence. I mean, I understand. There's a cadence. Yeah. Okay, here it is. I'm going to start off with a quack. Okay.

Can you do a duck? Can you do a guaddle? See, you did better. You did better. That's true. The quack was good. Now, right, here's, here was my three criteria. He had to have a good quack.

He had to have good fundamentals. of how to hold and place the call. See, that doesn't mean a thing to me. And then he had to have a good greeting. But sometimes they don't. Sometimes it takes a new guy to come in and teach the old guy's house. I don't know how to do it the Clayway. He's still against my...

I watched a video of you yesterday on Instagram and you were moving your hand like you were trying to fly away, buddy. But you're curving your hand around the end. No, with your other hand, you've been holding your hand like it's a goose called. You don't do that. Single. Okay, but the quack's fine. I had a decent quack. The quacks fine.

Awesome. What do you think? You exceeded my expectations. I believed in you the whole time. So the whole time you're like, he's going to nail this. But, I mean, can you do a gadwall call? How do you do it? Stuck in traffic.

No. No. Just blow. Yeah. Yeah. It's like a gazoo at a birthday party. They got no heart. Again.

A gadwall doesn't have a soul. I mean, listen to the passion of that. What did a gadwall ever do to you? Again. Again. No, that's, no, it's, dude. I try to put an ounce of heart on it and they're like, nope, that's not a game. Let me ask you a question.

Can we hear a grandfather crock call? Eight. Grandfather crock? Yeah, yeah. Here. Yeah, yeah. Eight years ago. This is clean. Eight years ago when we were sitting on a bear bait in Oklahoma and this 150-pound bear walks out with a radio collar on.

I said, shoot that one. It's banded. And he said, that bear, that's a baby. I'm like, no, it's bandied. He's got a collar on it. He's like, no, this ain't the way we do it. It was like, this is a duck hunter coming into bear hunt. Yeah, this bear had a radio collar on its neck, and he was like, man, that's the one you want to shoot him.

You wear that collar around your neck the rest of your life. He didn't hit with the rock. Okay. Is that good? Keep it going. It's a little tight, a little hard. Give us a feed and chatter. Oh, that's good.

That's pretty good, isn't it? Yeah. That's pure right there. Yeah, no, he's good. Mead expectations? Solid. He met my. expectations which is outstanding yeah well thank you all for for being on the render

austin thanks for everybody thanks for thanks a ton you guys welcome back if you're in northwest arkansas we're doing a render just drop in john max awesome have you guys you guys are welcome anytime as well i guess i got to talk with the main render crew to make sure that y'all met the standard you know this there'll be a lot of talk that's misty they'd be like well they did okay they kind of get like that that's misty yeah because j j j jill Josh will be out there just wishing he was catching trout with a spinning rod. Spending and sinning. Well, all right, guys.

Thanks so much for coming. Thank you, Clay. Good times are coming. Yep. It's been a fun week. Have the faith. Great. I'm going to put my cowboy boots back on.

Yeah. I might get in a fight before this is over. Who's the guy that does the sound at me, did you? Phil. Phil. I didn't chew gum this time. Oh, actually, it's a hayden Samick. Hayden.

Sorry, man. No gun. Hey, Samick, texting me the other day, and he's like, was Brent eating candy on the restaurant? On Blood Trails, the stories don't end when the hunt is over. They just get darker.

I've seen something in the road. I instantly thought it was a sleeping bed. And there was a full of blood. Oh, my God, he doesn't have a hit. Blood Trails is a true crime podcast born in the outdoors, where the terrain is unforgettable. giving, the evidence is scarce and the truth gets buried under brush and silence.

Indications were he should be right there, but he wasn't. This season, we're going deeper. From cold case files to whispered suspicions, from remote mountains to frozen backwoods. Each story begins in the wilderness and ends in darkness. Because out here, there are no witnesses, no cameras, just fragments and the people left behind trying to piece them back together. He's not an honest person. He's incapable of being honest. Somebody somewhere knows something. I'm Jordan Sillers.

Season 2 of Blood Trails premieres April 16th. Follow now on Apple, IHeart, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts. This is an IHeart podcast. Guaranteed Human.