The MeatEater Podcast - Ep. 052: Upper Bitterroot, Montana. Steven Rinella talks with Idaho game warden Eric Crawford, big-game guide Remi Warren, and Janis Putelis from the MeatEater crew.

Episode Date: December 30, 2016

Subjects discussed: wild game on Craigslist; words Remi thought he’d never hear from Steve; PFD violations; the violation that the MeatEater crew reported; glassing for violations; reporting incentives; the Lacey Act; killing caribou with a .22; Aldo Leopold on improving the pump but not the well; hunting bears with dogs; traditional use; shooting from a motorized vehicle; common game violations; drones for hunting; radio hunting; Google Earth, and more. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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uh you know you you're you're mature when you can sit down with a game warden and not be real nervous. Are you not nervous? No, I'm not nervous at all. Yanni, I noticed, is fidgety. He's fidgety like he's hiding something right now. Eric. Yes.

Yeah. Eric Crawford. Introduce yourself. Eric Crawford. We'd call you a game warden. Is that what you like to go by? You can call me a game warden. I guess professionally referred to as a conservation officer. Or a fish cop. That's one of the many terms that are used. And a buck cop. Endearingly. Yeah, exactly. So give your official title like what's your business card say on it uh it would say uh regional investigator actually so and so of in idaho i do a fishing game and you have a so you have a region within the state yeah i work out of the the clearwater region okay which is

kind of central central north central idaho what, like a regional investigator, so you're not out driving around in a marked pickup with a gun on your whole hip. That's not your deal. I am not, no. I, more of a, I guess you could say a support function to the uniform officers now. A bit more of a, I guess you could say, a support function to the uniformed officers now. A bit more of a technical expertise, whether it's with search warrants, writing them or executing them, and also electronic, I guess you could say, evidence.

So whether it's stuff associated with those search warrants, say cell phones and searches of cell phones. Gotcha. And or electronic surveillance. So more of a passive type stuff. Hey, Yanni, who was it? Oh, real quick though. Remy's here, Remy Warren. How's it going?

Command master hunter, Remy Warren. We're actually hunting with Remy right now, taking a little break. Remy, tell them all about it. You got a bull today? Yeah, I shot a nice bull today. I heard some words I never thought Steve would say. Hey, why don't you shoot first?

No, man. That's my – I try to be generous, man. I don't know. The last time I felt you, you were like, step back. I'm going to shoot. He was worried about your ears, huh? Yeah, exactly. No, actually, last time,

I think you used me as a rest once. Yeah, I believe that. You remember? Yeah, I almost used you as a rest today. Yeah, I know. Should have, actually. No, it was a rim. He got a rest today. Yeah, I know. Should have, actually. No, so Remy got a bowl today. That was fun.

Where was I? Everything appeared to be legal. Yeah. We're not in your jurisdiction, though. Yeah. But you still like to sniff around. Yeah. I still have brothers over here that I can help out.

We actually even abided by rules that don't even exist anymore, just in case. Yeah. The ones that are ingrained in you. even exist anymore, just in case. Yeah. The ones that are ingrained in you. Cut the tag before you do anything. Even though they've changed the lingo a little bit, Montana. Had you spent time as a... Hold on, let me ask this first. Raise your hand if you've had violations.

I've had two violations, they're pfd violations the same place opening day duck season two years in a row i got tickets for not having a pfd and hear me out we were only using the canoe to put decoys in because it was so shallow we would just wear our waders and drag the decoys in the canoe. Get a ticket. Canoe and no life things. I'm like, but we're not even. Ticket or a warning? No, a $75 ticket. But we're not using the, like, it's just.

And so the next year, I'm like, what was the chance that happened twice? Get done, dog hunt. A different gentleman pulls in, writes writes the same damn ticket. So that's my only real- So now you carry a PFD. Yeah. That's my only bad violation. Now, Yanni, what all violations have you had? It wasn't really me, but I was involved in a violation.

I'm a little embarrassed to tell it because I'm kind of going to- You don't have to tell it. I'm going to have to throw my dad under the bus. Your dad is a violator. Well, to get me hunting. Giannis' dad is also Giannis. Out of state. With everybody being named Giannis, we had basically added a different dad in a different state once.

And it caught up to us. Oh. We had to make a mess. Geez, Giannis. that's a residency issue yeah is what we call that yeah a wrong class license which is pretty serious yeah yeah in idaho it's a mandatory revocation oh is that right yeah yeah for how long uh minimum one year good because we were just in our pre-discussion, we were

talking about some, and we'll get to this, we were looking at some violations in the fines and Yanni and I were quite surprised that it seemed pretty lenient. Some of the fines. If we were playing like Price is Right

on violations, I would have guessed, I would have been throwing out numbers way fines. Yeah. If we were playing like prices right on violations, I would have guessed, I would have been throwing out numbers way higher. Sure. Yeah. And some of that stuff hasn't been adjusted for inflation. Right? So that's for sure.

If the fine doesn't go up in 20 years, it winds up seeming like very outdated. It would. It would. But so when you think about penalties, you know, so penalties come in two forms, financial or loss of privileges. Yeah. And so mainly,

many of the prosecutors kind of weigh that in their consideration of what they're going to either plead it out or try to get for a penalty. So, I mean, sometimes money doesn't mean anything to anybody, but losing privileges does. Oh, yeah, I got you. And so privileges anymore are far-reaching

because there's this thing called the wildlife violator compact. Yeah, explain that. See, we're getting backlogged on things you need to explain, but since we're on that, explain that because that's good stuff, man. So there's, I believe it's up to 42 states now. Is it really? Yeah. I remember it was just like the West and Pennsylvania or something like that. Yeah. Yeah. But now there's 42 states. I believe it's up to 42. And so if you're revoked in one of those states, you're revoked in all those other states. Can I go out on a limb? Out on a limb and say that Texas is not one of the 42.

I don't know which aren't. They're getting there, though. I can just picture him being not on that list. Yeah, we need a fact checker. My friend Doug Dern is real good at it, but he's not here right now. He would already be fact-checked. Really?

You're going to find my phone. Yeah. I could think of a handful of digital radio programs that could use a staff fact checker. You'll look that up, Ryan and me? Remy's on it. Report back to us, Remy. Doesn't Wisconsin deer season open shortly?

Yes. Yeah, my friends in Wisconsin are always shocked when I have to double check about when it opens but it's like some saturday oh so it could be this saturday it is tomorrow so uh so yeah you lose your privileges in one state and you lose them in 42 states yeah and that that started in the west right it was like it did yeah idaho was one of the original members of the compact yeah and so you can understand why it started in the West, because who comes to hunt the West a lot of the times?

Mm-hmm. You know? Easterners. Exactly. And so if they just go back. They just bump out into the next state. Yeah, if they just go back to their eastern state and they're like, ah, who cares?

You know, I'm revoked in Idaho. I'll just hunt Colorado in my home state. Yeah, but now it's far-reaching. Yeah. So let me back up to some of the things I wanted to get some clarity on. Sketch out for me real quickly how you became what you are. So you studied what in school? So, yeah. what you are so you went you studied what in school so yeah so i uh um so i have an associates

in environmental studies and a bachelor's in fisheries okay so i grew up back east uh went to college in the upstate new york first in and then back to pennsylvania to a state school and then uh when i was completing my uh my senior year on my bachelor's, I was in the senior seminar class and had to look for jobs. You learn to write a resume and all that. Like the focus of the class is looking for jobs. Pretty much, and writing resumes. And so I had already spent a summer in Southeast Alaska on an internship and so I knew I knew I wanted to come back west even though Alaska is a little bit different than Idaho yeah but I learned pretty quick that

after our stint in Alaska it wouldn't be nearly as fun going back just because of what we were doing and all the things we got to do and so I just happened to apply for a job in Idaho and came out and worked as a fishery seasonal for two years. Oh, is that right? Yeah. Yeah. And then a wildlife seasonal for two more. So many guys I know that wound up doing fishing wildlife work would do those seasonal gigs to start out.

Yeah. And that's what... Do like signing on to research programs. Yep. And that's what dude like signing on to research programs yep and that's what uh that's what pretty much everybody does that's pretty much your foot in the door so that's just how it works it's not how it works it just you know you need to gain experience somehow and so you know i worked back east in new york state for uh as a fisheries technician for a

season and then went to alaska and then came to Idaho. And so I had a little bit of a resume building. And so it just built here. And quite honestly, when I got to Idaho, I had no intentions of being a game warden whatsoever. And so one of the seasons I worked in wildlife, I was trapping bears, black bears, for research. We were using aldrich snares to do it. And so one of the game wardens came out to work with me and I'd known him for a couple of years.

Trapping bears out in the woods or trapping bears that were problem bears? No, no, no. Out in the middle of it. What kind of snares? Foot snares, right? Aldrich. Yeah. Yeah. Foot snare. Yeah. And so one of the game wardens came out and was helping me. And so he had had a master's degree. So the unwritten rule in the agency is that you have to have a master's as a minimum to be a biologist. You know, there certainly are other avenues to do that. And so he had a master's and I couldn't understand why he was a game warden. And so here we are sitting on a river eating lunch and he, and he, it was,

yeah, he was just like, listen, we're out here. Where's your supervisor? In the office. You know, we're out doing the fun stuff. And the light came on. I was like, yeah, heck yeah. Yeah, I should probably be a game warden. And the kind of, you know, that was 16 years ago.

So yeah, just because of that little lunch on the river with the game warden. That was your epiphany. It was, It was. It was. So did you for a while become a game warden? What do you call the version of it? What do you call a warden who is just out in his patrol vehicle checking licenses? Just a regular old.

So it would be you start out in Idaho as a conservation officer when you first come on, and you're in that position for about a year, and then you jump up to a senior conservation officer. And so that would be the actual uniform function, the patrol function, where you have a patrol area. And this is kind of a... And you did that for a while? Yeah, for the vast majority of my career. I worked as an investigator for almost five years in another region and then came back to investigations just a few years ago.

But the vast majority of my time was in uniform. And so I've had the pleasure of working all around the state so far. But the interesting thing in Idaho, there's only 77 uniform officers. And so on average, a uniform guy has 1,100 square miles to patrol in the state of Idaho. So bigger, you know, huge in Eastern standards. Yeah. So have you ever figured out the ratio of hunters per? Per per square mile no hunters per war oh no so yeah i'm not sure how many i think we i don't even know how many hunting licenses you got that on your list there remy uh first per game yeah oh yeah the states texas gets a little redemption because

they're not on the list delaware hawaii massachusetts nebraska and new jersey not on the list yeah those are the ones that aren't on there and it looks like most of them except for nebraska and maybe new jersey are in the process of changing yeah so huh well there you go um so now you're gonna work on how many light, yeah, the ratio of hunters per officers. Now, someone was recently saying to Giannis, he's a conservation officer with saying to Giannis, right? He's like, I don't need to go out in the field anymore. I got Facebook.

Yeah, it certainly can be a tool. And it's kind of funny because the younger officers, I mean, they like being on there. I don't have the patience for it. But we've gotten to a society that likes to promote themselves. Oh, yeah. And some of society isn't necessarily as smart as they should be with what they promote.

And in a way, in the 16 years that I've been a CEO, things have changed drastically in those 16 years of people's motivations and whatnot to violate. And some of it's self-promotion and want to be known. That's what those boys said down in, not in Kentucky, where We crossed the river and went into, what state did we go into? Was it Ohio? No. Sure we weren't in Kentucky? I thought we crossed.

On the swamp rabbits? Yeah. We were still in Kentucky? We were in Kentucky. Anyways, maybe we were with wardens that worked both sides of the river. But yeah, I was like, they kept talking about these rings.

And these guys were, they were drug dealers, right? Yep. Yeah. And they bust up this poaching ring. And I'm trying to think like, well, why is there a poaching ring? And finally, so I asked him like, well, why are they poaching? He's like, oh, just so they can brag. Yeah.

And sometimes you see, you know, as far as a poaching ring, I mean, I haven't been exposed to a ring, but you'll definitely see, you know, there's value in wildlife, whether it's in the sale of the meat or the sale of the antlers. I mean, antlers are worth a lot of money, either if you're selling them by poundage. Do you ever catch anyone who's selling meat? We have knowledge of people that are selling meat. Yeah.

Oh, yeah. Into what, like how are they going about it? So, advertise on Craigslist. Oh, no shit really. Sometimes. I thought you were going to say,

I one time went to this dinner. I went to this dinner one time down in, it was in Charlotte, North Carolina. Is that kind of like a, like a, not a hippie dippy town, but like kind of like a cool little town

sure oh it's a giant city of the south i was in some cool little town in north carolina yes that's it who said that remy so yeah i was there and i go to this thing this guy's having his wild game dinner and i'm already smelling the fish because he's selling tickets to it yep so he's charging 75 a plate to have a wild game dinner and you come in there and he said i had kind of been in on this from the ground up. I'm like, you can't do that. I know people do it for fundraisers.

So this guy comes out and says, oh, we're doing it as a fundraiser for the TRCP. So I quickly call the TRCP and I'm like, hey, man, tell me when a donation comes in. It never came in. But here's what kind of messed it up too is the dude serves one of the dishes and he said oh it's alligator snapper from such and such river and you know as you know there's you know you're not there's not a harvest on alligator snappers out there right now and i later learned he was way off there are no alligator snappers in that river so now i didn't know if the whole thing was just a sham do you mean like he's just selling whatever and acting like it's yeah and we don't would you ever you don't you don't see somebody that that is that uh yeah that is that out out there what what we see kind of nowadays

is pretty much the sale of antlers or the sale of meat, but it's mainly associated with drugs, say meth. Somebody that's a meth user, it's easy to get antlers. It's easy to get meat. Only trying to raise money. Yeah, somebody that's an addict. For example, a couple years ago, I get a call. It's January. I think it was like a January 10th or so.

I get a call from the local dispatch. I guess we got it from our Citizens Against Poaching hotline that this person was calling in to report a guy was going out to help his buddy retrieve a moose. Now, moose season had been closed for months. It was January 10th. There's no big game season other than Lion open at that time of the year. And so, lo and behold, we go out there

in the middle of the night and actually contact these two guys. And so, the interesting thing was that the guy that was doing the shooting, he had an appearance two days from then for possession of meth. Oh, really? Yeah. And so, those are the kind of people

that you deal with. And he thought he was going to sell the head. I don't know what he was thinking, you know. But it was probably something along those lines. Yeah. And they didn't have a moose. They didn't harvest a moose. They had shot at deer.

I mean, it was very apparent. There was snow on the ground, and so they had spotlights. And, yeah, he was hidden up on the hill when we got there, and it's pitch dark, so it's a little bit of a, he, you know, he was hidden up on the hill when we got there and it's pitch dark. So it's a little bit of a safety issue, you know? And so he ended up coming out and then ended up finding his backpack, backtracking him in the snow and finding his backpack. And then going through it,

he had this family heirloom 22 with a contractor's laser electrical tape to tape to the barrel dude that's a good idea yeah but then here was the get the getter so and then he had a knife and it was it was lock blade so you open it up and on it says poacher and there's a whole bunch of hashtags on it no shit yeah and he claims that somebody gave it to him but that that kind of explains the mind of people you know that i mean it's the things that we see as officers or game wardens are a lot of people you couldn't even dream it up you know but what's the what's the most common what's the most common violation so So generally, as a patrol guy, it would be like fishing without a license.

You know, somebody's just going to go fish and, you know, take their chance. You're just going to write that ticket all day long. Yeah, all day long. Hey, folks, exciting news for those who live or hunt in Canada. And boy, my goodness, do we hear from the Canadians whenever we do a raffle or a sweepstakes. And our raffle and sweepstakes law makes it that they can't join. Whew. Our northern brothers get irritated.

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onxmaps.com slash meet. Welcome to the OnX Club, y'all. What's the most common hunting-related violation? Probably evidence of sex. You know, and sometimes you gotta do you know, so, you know, as a uniformed guy, you're looking for

compliance, right? It's a great day when everybody is compliant. You know, and then you wanna balance that with deterrence, right? It's a great day when everybody is compliant, you know, and then you want to balance that with deterrence, right? So you got to present this charade that you're everywhere all the time, you know, to, to, so people don't violate because they're afraid they're going to get caught, right? But if they know they're not going to get caught, then there's no motivation to not violate. Well, that's what, that's aldo leopold's famous line is ethics you know you're hunting ethics are what you do when you know you won't be caught and so i

yeah a term that i use anymore are situational ethics okay you know and so um each situation dictates the ethics and so during the course of my career, you see different ethics depending on which part of the state you might work in. You know, we had a, the Citizens Against Poaching Program have a bunch of trailers with a bunch of seized heads in them, taxidermied, you know, and stories related to it. And so we were running one of those trailers in a small rural town and this very nice older gentleman came up and was thanking us for the job that we did and so on and so forth. But then he stopped and said, I don't care how hard you boys work. It's just a way of life here. That's what we do as poach. You know, it was just like, it kind of takes the wind out of your sails. You're like, hey, thanks for being so appreciative,

but thanks for telling us that we're not having to, we're not being, you know, deterring your behavior. And that's just kind of how it rolls, you know? And so you just got to balance that deterrence and compliance. You know, like, for example, I'm a field training officer, so I get to train newer COs. And so, you know, you might have a close season elk, for instance, and solve the case. So you collect some kind of firearms evidence, ballistics evidence, and link it all up.

And the whole case is solved. You know who your suspect is, they get prosecuted. But the thing that I relayed to a young officer is we might've caught the bad guy, but that elk's still dead. It's not walking around anymore, you know? And that's what, you know, hopefully that's what you want to do is have a much of a deterrence factor. So that stuff doesn't happen. My older brother, um, he's a half brother. My father had a son long. He was a grown man by the time I was born. He was a game warden in Colorado.

And he once worked a case where a guy was culvert trapping black bears, but then selling them to clients. Oh, geez. But what he would do is he'd open the door on the culvert and the client would shoot the bear when it come out of the thing. And he had all these pictures he showed me

where he stakes it out with the camera where the guy's releasing the bear. Yeah. And the guy opens the culvert and the bear runs out and the guy, the shooter, misses the bear. So the bear just gets away. But he goes and takes the guy to court and presents it. And the only thing he got the guy on was something

because the guy never killed the bear. It was like some discharge in a firearm or. Yeah, and sometimes. He's like, there's no dead animal. Yeah. No, no, it was the guy got a legal transport of wildlife. Oh, the guy that was. The culvert trapper.

And so, yeah, some of that, you know, you got to look at the code. You know, that's what we enforce is Idaho code. It's specifically Title 36. And so as an officer, you have to really learn the definitions. So, you know, the definition of like take is all encompassing. You know, it's any attempt to do so, you know, is pretty much how it sums it up. You know, the pursuit, actually hunting know it's pretty much how it sums it up you know the pursuit actually hunting it's it's very broad and so knowing that you understand you get a better understanding how

you need to react to a certain situation in the field like when you see inner regs attempt to take yeah attempt to take yeah now so you don't have to actually kill something yeah exactly when you're trying to do it when uh so not leaving evidence of sex on a quartered out animal is a very common violation it would yeah it is and a lot of times it just somebody gets carried away and chops the necessary items off you know when they're skinning it or quartering it. And so it's just one of those things. You can use it as an educational tool. Yeah. What's another, what are some more common ones? Is wanton waste common or not common? It's not so common. So you see good compliance there. You do, you do, you do. And it's kind of interesting. So in that same little rural town,

you know, you try to make inroads, you know, the success of a uniform guy really relies on the relationships, right? So if they appreciate, at least in my experience, if they appreciate you beyond just being the game warden, you know, if they see that you're treating everybody the same, you know, then they're going to give you a little bit more respect. And so, but for whatever reason in, in those rural towns, they're like, Hey, you know, people got to eat as long as they're not wasting it. It's none of my business, you know? And it's, you know, it's like, well, listen, you know, that might've been the case back in the depression years, but there's lots of programs anymore where, you know,

you can get meat to fill your freezer, you know, other than poaching the state's wildlife, you know? And it's, I mean, in the end, it's all of our wildlife, right? You know, whether you're a licensed buyer or not, or appreciate wildlife in general. And so that's kind of the sad thing to, you know, you can't break it, get over that hump with them, you know? Yeah, I understand that.

It's more than. I heard that growing up all the time. Like if someone's using it, needs it, it's more excusable. Even now, I think people would argue that point. Well, it's in the rules, man. Does Idaho have the deal where shooting trophy animals is way worse than shooting non-trophy? Yeah, they're associated with trophy penalties so break that down for people so in idaho there's a general civil penalty

and so i i believe and i can't rattle off the actual numbers but i think it's a like for an elk it would be just generally elk it would be civil penalty. Okay, that's what's assessed. I think that's right. For poaching. Remi, you want a fact check. Fact check. How's it going on the other projects? Yeah, I got it.

We got, oh, for the game wardens, the closest I could find was just broken down by number of people. California is the worst for... Game wardens per hunter? Yeah, it's 185,000 per game warden. That's just population. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

That's population. And then Montana, in contrast, Montana has about 8,800, and Wyoming is 8,500. Alaska has one for every 16, about 7,000. Those are state troopers. That's just population. That's not actual hunters or licensed fires. Then you can kind of

draw some conclusions from there. We have 10% of the population. But then California has one of the lowest participation rates. Exactly. Sub 1%. I think. New Jersey and California are sub 1%. Oh, yeah.

So shooting big critters compared to little critters. Yeah. And so then it jumps up. Okay. So like a trophy, what would it be? A trophy, which bounces off of the Boone and Crockett definition of trophy. It would be what the minimum is okay for antler size um with the exception of any sheep any mountain goat any moose um any caribou mount caribou they those have specific there's no trophy associated with

it just straight up um ten thousand dollar oh trophy fine big ass finds yeah yeah yep and so so what okay why that why is it 760 for an elk and 10,000 for a mountain goat so that would be just for so if they take a um and i should have the numbers in front of me i don't want to misquote them but so a uh so like a cow elk close season it would be 750 all right that would be the civil penalty but if it was a bull elk and it, it would be $750. That would be the civil penalty. But if it was a bull elk and it was a trophy, I think it jumps up to $2,000. And so those are those inflation numbers. They haven't been adjusted for forever.

But it is trying to send a message. It's trying to differentiate the pot hunter from the guy who's the swinging dick bragging hunter. Well, I don't think that's really necessarily the intention of it. It's just I think that society or hunters value trophy animals more. And so there's just more value placed on those individual animals as compared to a cow elk or a doe mule deer or white so you don't think it's a way to like be lenient on people who are shooting poaching for meat no no not at all it's just the value system the value of the animal to

the state yeah yeah exactly and so you know and all of that is, is, you know, it's Idaho law. And so it's, it's enacted by the legislature of the state. And so, which, you know, do as the people want theoretically. And so that's how those things come about. Yeah. Do you feel that, and I don't want to put you in any kind of situation where you're, you know, where you're saying stuff you shouldn't say, or, you know, where you're walking too far out of the line, but do you feel that people in enforcement, such as yourself, do they generally feel that, man, we should be having steeper penalties, or this should, you know, I can't believe this guy got off with this amount of money or do

you generally feel like that the the punishment fits the crime so i think generally you don't even have to break it down in into terms of enforcement personnel or or somebody else you know i mean even you just a second and said man why why why, why is it so low? You know? Yeah. I mean, so I think the general public would, would think, you know, depending on how egregious the crime is and you see it all the time, you know, on the internet anymore that people are, are very hyped up when there's good penalties. I mean, you'll see it, it'll, it'll hit the internet and it's great and people are happy with that. And, you know, or if it's a bad penalty, I mean, you'll see that on the internet and social media that, man, why didn't he get more of a fine or more of a revocation? And so it's kind of interesting because here we are as sportsmen and we do our part in

conservation, but there's one more step. And that's, we always talk about biology as a course of conservation, but there's one more step. And that's, you know, we always talk about biology as a course of conservation, but rarely do we talk about enforcement, you know? And so that's more of a way for the public to get involved is in the enforcement, not only reporting violations, but taking note to these penalties that are assessed and even, you know, doing whatever to enhance penalties.

Yeah. Yanni, tell them about the violation we reported the other night. It's a long story. We just happened to be hunting near a populated area, but just happened to have national forests right behind, you know, right behind folks' houses. And Steve had never been in that situation. So he's a little uneasy about it. I'm like, yeah, but it's like, it's fine.

Like we're following the rules. Like it's all good. You know, it's like, yeah. Yeah. It's like, we, as long as you're not, we killed the elk there, killed the elk there, killed the elk there. There's a sign. We're on national forest.

Yeah. Yeah. As long as you don't like shoot at the elk when the houses are you know on the other side of the elk just feel funny yeah sure being like you're on national forest but you're perched up above like a small town and i also said i said there's some locals running around here that no matter what how what kind of mistake we could possibly make they've already done it and probably done tenfold. And not, what, 10 or 15 minutes later, we hear shots ring out, and we're like, shit, that's close.

I'm thinking about hitting the dirt. Yeah. And we finally find the origin of these shots, and we see a dude running. We couldn't really see where he was taking the shots from, but we see him running down a road back to his truck, no orange no running down the road with the right with the rifle no cars blowing past yeah go ahead yeah throws his rifle in the truck puts his orange on in colorado you have to have a hat on doesn't put a hat on then grabs his rifle and more ammo and continues to go up the hill.

We don't know if he was, he might have been 50 feet from the center line, which is what you have to be there. Yeah, but then he finagles his way back down the road, touches off six more rounds to make a total of 10 rounds. Jeez. And then the next time I shine my binoculars down there, he's being visited by a police officer. Yeah, and it's amazing how people just lose their mind over wildlife.

I mean, it's just, it's kind of startling that they would do that, you know? It's like, have a little respect for the wildlife and fair chase for that matter, you know? And I mean, i don't understand it do you know have you read or heard of a um prominent conservationist and author named jim posowitz by chance okay yeah i had occasion to interview him for a movie project a film project inherit the hunt right yeah he wrote that. And Beyond Fair Chase?

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, which is, that's a staple in hunter education now. Yeah, for sure. Yep. Interviewed him for a documentary we're doing. What do you got going on over there, Remy? I was just checking things,

but I couldn't find the finds or any of that. But there is a regulation book sitting right there somewhere, if you see it, just on the top. Do you got anything, because I know you've been busy and you've been doing a great job, is there anything you uh need to add at this point well i think with some of the violations you know the fines even like say these trophy areas

or whatever i would think why don't they just open it up to an auction see how much someone would pay for that tag because i know it's quite a bit more than they're paying for the fines and then and then charge them that so they double so somebody gets a tag next year for that tag because I know it's quite a bit more than they're paying for the fines and then and then charge them that so they double so somebody gets a tag next year for that price like to do this shot this shot it has to pay that yeah the dude that got that gigantic buck off that uh winter range area in Wyoming yeah yeah that's a hundred thousand dollar buck right why don't why don't we let uh the the market decide what that guy's fine is auction off one tag and that's the thing i mean you think about how valuable wildlife is anymore and i mean that's how that's how civil penalties should be assessed you know is what you know granted more people some people have more money than others but

i mean yeah in reality that's value yeah yeah exactly because it's a lot more than three thousand dollars two thousand dollars what i mean yeah you know in some of these places people are paying 10 times that to go shoot something like that yeah and here's somebody stole it from a guy that could have drawn that tag on his own and now you know he's taking from everyone and it's not it doesn't seem like the return is the same as you know especially if it's something that was a hundred percent intentional and he's set out that day to go make that violation yeah that's another thing i want to ask you about but but there's make this jim posse's point real quick um he said something to me when i was talking

to him that's really really uh stuck with me we're talking about like unethical hunting practices but i think it's appropriate for poaching too. And he's like, why it's so offensive, as he was explaining, is that we've created like the symbol of American wildlife, okay? So an elk, for instance, has its value because of this system we've created around it where it's like this wild animal that

takes a skill set and effort to go get. Okay. It's elusive. It's hard. You have a lot of areas where success rates are 10 or 20%, right? So the elk's value was created by a monitored system of wildlife management okay it's there's an exclusivity to the animal right yeah yeah absolutely and when you when you cut corners to get it what you're chasing after is the value that was created by the legitimacy of the pursuit and you just want like you want the symbolism and you're cashing in on the value of something but you're doing it in a way that like completely disrespects where the value came from like a shoot in a gigantic bull it's like buying it's like buying a fancy watch in downtown Manhattan, but you're only paying 25 bucks for it. You know what I'm saying? No, there's this company,

Rolex, that makes these great watches. So when people see that, they think, oh, this is a man of means. Exactly. With taste and class. Yeah. But I just bought it for 20 bucks and then here i am and now people are going to think the same way about me yeah and here i have a a 200 inch mule deer on my wall and man that's a heck of a mule deer you know and what's the story behind that i'm cashing in on all the glory created by all the dudes out there pounding the ground yeah yeah exactly and i got it for 20 bucks and that's it yeah and it's a great point that jim makes you know and and i mean we've we've done it to ourselves in society you know it's just that the value has gone up and up and up yeah you know do you have anything else around me right now

that's it but i'll jump in when i cool uh you you were just talking remy you made a point about especially when you've got malicious intent or like made a point about especially when you got malicious intent or like like like clearly you're like you didn't like accidentally pouch yeah I I've seen well I have a newspaper clipping in in a cookbook that I have at home that's got the picture of a dead llama in the back of a truck and this guy legitimately thought that it was an elk yeah you know and it's like I mean that's just plain stupid but then i've been around here before and seen people driving into a check station or whatever going oh look at this white tail i shot and it's a bifurcated four by four 28 inch mule deer you're going oh my god yeah let's and so i mean i think there's i think there's like a

non-malicious intent a true accident accident, and then just plain stupid. And plain stupid's up with malicious intent, but not as much as an accident or something like that. Yeah, there is this old game word that I used to work with, and he's since retired, but he used to use the old comparison of, it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, looks like a duck, it's a duck. And so, but he would replace duck with poacher.

And so it's a very broad statement, but once you're a game warden or a CEO for long enough, you kind of figure it out. There are those people that make honest mistakes. And so you have to, you know, handle those situations as an educational opportunity. And then there's others that are premeditated and malicious about it. And so, but it's a, it's a fine line that you walk trying to decide on, you know. But you do, you do practice leniency.

Oh yeah, absolutely. If you know the mistake was made oh yeah absolutely you you'd send me a thing where a guy you'd send me a thing where you were observing some fishermen didn't you send this to me no someone sent this to me i thought when we were like early communicating about you coming out and you sent me a thing where a guy had um where a fisherman had like caught some fish and had him on a stringer and actually oh that was probably in the magazine yeah that's what it was yeah not a video it was a magazine article yeah yeah it was an article you sent yeah a copy of the idaho ward magazine yeah yeah but a guy like a warden observes a dude yeah it was the article you said yeah a copy of the idaho ward magazine yeah yeah but a guy like a warden observes a dude yeah catching fish he wasn't allowed to have probably gross over

limits it's probably putting him on a string and then when the warden goes down um he's like catching no well what's that string out there? And then the guy would wait around, act like he couldn't find it, and they'd all gotten away. Yeah. Yeah, letting them off. Yeah, and then the warden went out and promptly found the stringer

right where he thought it was. So there you got a guy, he's like just outright bullshitting you. Yeah, absolute intent. Yeah. Which would kind of like almost make it like personal. Yeah, but you can't.

So that's another thing that, you know, for young officers to understand that it's not personal, you know. Yeah, you wear this uniform today, and it probably is an affront to the uniform, you know, like, hey, I'm going to get one over on the game warden, you know. But they don't look at the name tag, you know, it's, you're the guy in the green and the gray. I mean, that's what our uniforms are in Idaho. And so it's the guy or the gal in the green and the gray, I'm going to get one over on the game warden. And that's all it is, you know, at night, you can't go home taking everything personal. I it would drive you crazy you know i got you you know it's

just not a good way to conduct business because then you just get yeah i mean they're still hunters they're still fishermen they're still licensed buyers there are great hunters and fishermen out there you know and in reality almost upwards, it's probably close to 99% of the contacts that we as CEOs make don't involve a violation. It's just a regular old compliance contact, which is great. You know, whether it's a fisherman or you go into a camp during the fall, I mean, there's no violations. Everybody's compliant. I mean, to even push it further, you've built the relationship with those people

and then you kind of look forward to seeing them. Oh yeah, look, the folks from such and such are back camping at that same spot. Oh man, they got a new wall tent this year. So you find yourself rooting for the people. Like you pull up, you're not like, man, I hope they have a violation. Yeah, absolutely not.

But with that being said, when you get out of the truck, you're like, is there a violation? You're not like, man, I hope I get to write a ticket. Absolutely not. And if that's how you're doing your job,

you know that, oh, I want to write a ticket, then that's a poor way of doing the job if you get out of the truck and say my job is for compliance and i and if there's a violation i'm going to find it without a doubt but you don't like hope man hope this next camp has a violation hope we get a ticket yeah yeah that's not that's not how we operate. So what about people who come, let's just say a hypothetical that you- I don't like hypotheticals. No, no, okay.

Just something I've seen happen, I know happens. You shoot a deer and you go there, there's two deer landing because you didn't even know there's one behind the deer. Okay. Guy comes to you and says, calls up, I got a problem. Here's what happened.

Do you, is that different to you and says, calls up, I got a problem. Here's what happened. Do you, is that different to you? Let's say, okay, let's say this happens to two guys. Both we just know because of omniscient knowledge. We know that both were accidental. One comes and tells you about it. Now they're both accidental. One guy comes and tells you about it. One you find out about.

Do you view those two situations differently? They're both accidents. So yeah, it happens a lot. And we have this discussion with people that violate and this, you know, you can make a poor action worse by the way you respond to it. I got you. And so you can dig yourself a much deeper hole. And if you would just be honest and come forward right away, that hole would not have gotten dug at all. And so that guy that reported that accidental kill,

yeah, there's ways to handle in that. And it doesn't always involve the violation or writing a citation. Is that right? But the guy that leaves the other one on the Hill and then just denies, he shot it until you dig a bullet out and be like, yeah, this, this two 70 lead, you know, what are you shooting? Two 70. You don't. Well, no, it couldn't have been me. Was there anybody else here with you? No, no it couldn't have been me was there anybody else here with you no no well let's

line up the shot here and yeah that's how they handle the situation and you can make matters a lot worse you know and a lot of times that you see that you know so you would say like and not just doing your job just being a just just being a guy you would say that it's better to call up and go, I have a problem. Oh, yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. And we see it all the time. The few times that we had to call, and we would call in when we had a violation, you'd

leave a client. You're talking when you were guiding. Yeah, when I was guiding in Colorado, we'd leave a client. And I had a guy shoot a mule deer doe once, thought it was a small cow elk. And I'm trying to think what the other one was. But twice, basically, the warden came up and looked the whole situation over and was like, all right, pay for the processing, donate the meat, you just keep your tag and keep hunting.

Yeah. And those are individual, you know that there's a there's kind of this this unwritten playbook i guess you could say how to handle those situations you know a lot of times that's what you see an officer will do is you know or say that say that they do shoot the elk um the say they shoot a bull but a pass through kills a cow okay so now you have a cow on the hill and so rather than uh you know leaving that on there they leaving it on the hill they call and report it you go up and be like okay well you guys need to pack that thing down to my truck and we're going to take to the food bank that's back to that whole thing that

there's opportunities for people to get game meat other than going out and poaching it and so you know and paying for the processing you know um and so the those are the way you kind of handle those things and it's a good way i mean it's a good way for everybody you know yeah actually they would always give us a choice it was like that or lose your license and you can't hunt next year. And they'd be like, eh, okay. Yeah, I don't, you know, yeah, we don't give choices. It's, you know, because then it's almost like extortion in a way. Like, hey, you know, you hold fast with your decision. No, this is what I've done 50 other times.

This is what I do. This is how I handle the situation. So does the bulk of your, does the bulk of your more high profile is not the word I'm looking for. But serious offenses. Okay. Serious. I'm moving away from accidents now.

Okay. So if you look at, you know, over the last few years or whatever, and you look at the bulk of your what you'd call poaching cases, like intentional malicious intent poaching cases, do most of those cases originate from tip lines, or do they originate from just field work and having officers on the ground? Yeah. So that's a great question, Steve, because we in Idaho, I think it was 2012, we had a study done on our law enforcement program done by the University of Idaho. And that was actually kind of one of the questions that got teased out of how do you report violations? And so very few of the violations come from the cap line. Most of them come from contact with an individual officer. Really? People aren't using the lines.

They don't know how to use them effectively. They don't know how to use them effectively. I mean, the cap line gets a pile of calls. But when you start teasing it out, and you're like, well well geez this this isn't a this isn't a violet you know it's not a violation you know like oh i've i i see five dumped carcasses well it's because somebody was too lazy to take it to the dump and they wanted to they didn't want to put it in their garbage can because pickup wasn't until you know tuesday and today's monday

or you know wednesday of the previous week so you know they don't want it stinking up and so they just go take it and dump it somewhere. Or they hear a shot. They hear a shot and somebody must be poaching. Well, is it hunting season? Yeah, exactly. And so there's, you know, that's kind of where it all balances out. So the tip line gets inundated with calls,

but not a lot of like real workable stuff. Yeah, yeah. I mean, it does get workable stuff and they're very, very, they're a great tool. And I would encourage anybody that witnesses a violation to call it, you know, in Idaho and I'm sure in most Western states and they, there's a reward for reporting violations that are successfully. In Utah, they've got a deal where if you report a violation and it's convicted in a trophy unit, you receive a tag the next year.

I don't think there's any. Are you kidding me? No. Dude, I just sit down and go to the Henrys and just start blasting for violators. Because I would catch a violator probably quicker than I'd ever draw a tag. You're kidding me.

No, that's a cool. That's a great way to get a tag. Yeah, because the money thing just seems kind of ambiguous. It's like, oh, if I could have a tag here next year. Well, plus we could do something. We could get a guy that doesn't hunt anyway. Send him in there to commit a crime. We glass him up, turn him in.

He takes the fall, and we get a sweet tag. No, see, you take, he gets the fall, you get the tag, then I report the conspiracy and then I get the tag. Two tags. The dominoes are beginning to fall. That's a great idea, man. I wonder if they've given out any tags

yet. I don't know. But a lot of those, Steve, it comes down to, again, it comes back to those relationships. It's so important as a field officer to have, but let me back up. Cause you were saying, so you were comparing tip line to what? To individual officer relationships and reports directly to officers. Oh, okay. I thought you meant officers just sniffing stuff out. You're saying, Oh, no reported violations to officers. So people will call their officer more readily.

And we still, I mean, as far as reports, yeah, there's far more that come that are successfully prosecuted through officer contact than there is the tip line. So people being familiar with their officer, calling their officer directly and saying, hey, here's what's up. Yeah.

I see what you're saying now. Yeah, I've watched a few people poaching before and breaking numerous violations and called the tip line and it was like nothing happened. Then they came back the next weekend, did the same exact thing and I just called the local officer

and within a matter of an hour, the guy was completely, yeah, you've been charged and everything. Why do you think that is? So this time of the year, the tip lines are inundated with calls. And again, they don't, a lot of them don't add up. And then a lot of them are call centers. And so you're not getting all the information. But it's just, like I said,

it's just having that positive relationship in your communities. And then people just know that, you know, you're going to treat those, the next person the same way, you know? And so they're more willing to give you good information with reportable violations that are prosecutable. Now, what was the, what's been the worst

like poaching case you've worked? So over 16 years, of course, there's been all kinds. It just runs the gamut. And so it's kind of say like what the worst is, you know, memorable, memorable, interesting, worse, like just a handful. I mean, every year it gets more memorable, you know like a memorable memorable interesting worst like just a handful i mean every year it gets more memorable you know it's like we were looking at those uh those decoy videos

i mean yeah they're pretty they're egregious violations and they're you know i think that most people would be appalled when they watch them you know so he uh showing us, before we came out, he was showing us videos of ASAs. Yeah, yeah, artificially simulated animals. Yeah, so basically, when you got some people you know are up to no good, you put out like a fake deer or elk. Yep. And then just see what happens when they drive by. Yeah.

And this thing doesn't look like a target. This thing looks like it's like a full taxidermy yeah yeah which is in that public opinion survey that we did um that is ranked as one of the the lowest acceptable forms of enforcement that we use by the public they think it's entrapment no they don't think it's entrapment they just don't like to be duped they don't like to be tricked is how it goes really yeah yeah but i think they had three it had a handful of cases it's it's it's on youtube right yeah it's on the it's on the whole fishy game yep yeah um so they got it there's they put one out at night on a road and this son of a bitch knew what he was doing because this dude rolls up and is instantly out of the truck shooting yep like he knew

he was like night hunt yep because there's no way you'd have he didn't take enough time to like assess the situation look around for his gun yeah this guy like piled out of the passenger side and a lot of those guys that we get in those situations they got sneakers on like there is no way they're getting out of the truck that day they have no intention the shoe that hits the dirt's the only one that's the shoe they have no intention of getting out of the truck that day they're just gonna go road hunt all day yeah you know and another one some people roll up on a ASA that's a cow elk. Yep. And the shooter is just riding around in the back of the truck.

Shorts. With shorts on. But a camo jacket. But already in the back of the truck, like ready to roll. Yep. Get some cracks off. But her, the driver, her man or whoever it was, he had a good cow call coming out of the cab. Yeah, he's cow calling out of the call coming out of the cab. Yeah, he's cow calling out of the truck.

Another guy, it was like a party that was shooting a lot of whitetails out of a boat. An officer said, can't be shooting that whitetails out of the boat. Next year, they put one out on the edge of the lake they like to hunt out of their boat. They pull up and what, rip off 14 shots at it? Yeah, in a minute, 30 seconds minute 30 seconds 36 seconds yeah out of

two bolt action rifles which i mean that's a lot of reloading going on the one with the uh lady in the back of the truck shooting kind of made me think like i've seen you know a handful of wildlife violations that i've reported and a lot of them had family there like there was kids there was and it's almost like they're just raised, like when I teach someone how to hunt, like, you know, ethics and this and that goes into it. And it's like, they're just doing the exact opposite in poaching. Like, do you see that a lot where it's almost a generational thing? Like that's how we hunt. That's how they learned. And so, yeah, it comes back to that situational ethics Remy and so in some in a lot

of these communities that we work I mean they're very rural and so you as the officer are one of the lead hunter ed hunter education instructors and so you know all these kids and then shoot a couple years later here they do they come rolling up blasting the decoy you know and it's just like hey weren't you weren't you in my hunter ed class you know and it's just like hey weren't you weren't you in my hunter ed class you know and it's just like what what where'd we go wrong you know or hey who you know you don't recognize them and be like hey who'd you who'd you take hunter ed from oh officer such and such well i know we covered this so what's the deal you know and it's that situational ethics they just you know like one of them,

one of the things that sticks out to me is another decoy. And we spend a lot of time in the region that I work in dealing with decoys because we have a trespass issue and a road hunting issue, which is a safety issue is what it comes down to. And they, I mean, it was a granddad taking his grandson out. And it's not like granddad was old. He was in his fifties, but it was 10 granddad taking his grandson out and it's not like granddad was old he was in his 50s but it was 10 degrees that morning and so here we are standing out in the bushes in the dark

freezing our butts off and then lo and behold they come rolling up and this kid just took hunter ed that year you know and it's just like and granddad's got sneakers on he's like well it's 10 degrees you think we're gonna go walk in the woods well why'd you even leave the house then you know yeah it just i don't know they just lose their mind do you think that but some of these people it's not like i could see if you had some gigantic buck decoy out yeah and it's not yeah but i could see then you might have some guy pull up and like the gears are turning right and he's like this is wrong but man but the people you were showing us aren't they're ready to roll yeah oh yeah i mean they're they're like actively out hunting yeah can you actually not put out large like um because i i'd

heard that maybe you used to be able to but now you can no longer put out like trophy size animals. Yeah, we don't have anything in our, whether it's our policies or standard operating procedures that prohibits us from doing that. We just don't. We don't need to. It's so rampant.

The one my brother rolled up on was a big mule deer. In Eastern Montana, he rolled up on a big mule deer. Yeah, and we... And he said it had an electronic neck. Yeah. You know, tail flaps. But he said he was looking at it, trying to figure out what was wrong with it.

And all of a sudden, someone's banging on his window, telling him to move along. But he said it was a nice buck. Yeah, I had a buddy a couple years ago that was coming out of a spot and saw a really big bull on the side of the road, and it just stood there and stood there. And he looked at it, and he's like, man, those guys must be running a decoy. And he drives off, and he ends up texting me. He's like, man, I saw you guys' decoy.

I'm like, what are you talking about? And he's like, yeah, are you guys running the bull elk on such and such a road? Nope, not us. Oh, really? Yeah, it was a live elk just standing there being stupid, you know? He probably ran back and took a crack at you. Yeah, no. No, he was just like, oh, unbelievable.

But I think, like I said, not toot my horn, but there's been a lot of memorable cases. But kind of earlier on in my career, worked with another officer that would receive information that these two women had drawn moose tags. And that their husbands were actually bull moose, which is a trophy species. And I know once in a lifetime. And so the husbands had already killed their bull moose once in a lifetime. And so now they had in their pockets their wives. And so we were, yeah, it was a grand scheme that was just absolutely foiled.

And so they each got $10,000 fines. So they each went up killing a bull. Yep. And you guys kind of knew who was going to be pulling the trigger on those hunts. Oh, yeah. We had all the information we needed. And it was just a matter of tracking them down and interviewing them and coordinating that. The wives were nowhere to be found.

They were 200 miles on the other side of the state. Oh, really? Yeah. Oh, yeah. Now, $10,000 is a kick in the nuts, man. Yeah. Yeah. And a revocation that goes along with it.

Oh, so that comes with a pull of your privileges oh yeah yeah every every vial every misdemeanor you can have your license revoked for up to a year or not more than three years i guess it is yeah and then you're losing it in 42 states yeah yeah that would stink hey folks exciting news for those who live or hunt in Canada and boy my goodness do we hear from the Canadians whenever we do a raffle or a sweepstakes and our raffle and sweepstakes law

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As a special offer, you can get a free three months to try OnX out if you visit onxmaps.com slash meet. onxmaps.com slash meet. onxmaps.com slash meet. Welcome to the OnX Club, y'all. Yeah, man. And that happens. And you can't hunt in Texas either. You'd be hunting Jersey and Hawaii. And Nebraska.

Yeah. Well, Nebraska, you know, Hawaii's got good hunting. Yeah. Man. So what's your message to sportsmen when it comes to adherence to the law? Do you ever get to say to a guy, a poacher, right? Do you ever get to tell him like, man, here's why you ought to be with the program i don't get into the point of lecturing very much no you know one you know sometimes they're just absolutely ticked off that they got caught

and so it's not the time nor the place because officer safety to to have that conversation you know got you and so um you know and some guys you know i had another supervisor back in the day it's long since since retired that he'd be like yeah he's like see that guy he found religion you know and you refer to that he was a reformed poacher you know and and so yeah and he was a reformed poacher you know and and so yeah and some guys they they turn around and then other guys are just like catch me again you know and you don't take the time to be like you know this is awfully abstract but you're stealing this from your fellow man oh yeah no we in some instances we do you know and

you you kind of it's not so much the guilt trip, but, you know, it's not so much, you know, I put it in terms of, man, you got kids, you got a grandkid, you're stealing this from them. You're not hurting me, you're hurting them. You know, you're hurting the next generation. This has nothing to do with me. You know, you're stealing from somebody else. And we have that conversation with me you know you're stealing from somebody else and we have that conversation routinely you know and and i think when you put it in those terms sometimes people see the light they don't you know they don't put it in that broad perspective of who they're probably looking

at as a victimless crime and that's what all wildlife crimes are is a victimless crime you know you look at traditional policing in the United States, there's always a victim, right? And, you know, whether it's a homicide or, you know, something like that. Stealing a lawnmower, whatever. Yeah, there's always a victim. But in wildlife crime, you know, yeah, it's the property of the state. And then, you know, the residents are the state. But in the end, you know.

It's too abstract. If you don't know, you don't know. You don't know what you don't know you don't know you don't know what you don't know right and so it just it ends up being a victimless crime and so yeah in the end i mean it comes down to an appreciation of wildlife and what what its value is you know and and you know are you willing to do it right it's it's hard to understand why some people do it you know because they'll just keep doing it and doing it and doing it but like i think like like what this guy was saying about just people

doing it for the for the bragging rights i do really think that that's at least the kind of poaching i find most problematic i really think is people saying i want the recognition. I want the respect that comes with success in hunting. I want to be able to demonstrate to my peers. But I don't want to go through all that bullshit and have all the

uncertainty. I just want to get it like this. So I can come home and be the guy that got one. Yep. Yeah. That troubles me more than like a dude who, you know, whatever, shoots a whitetail doe for the freezer. It's wrong as it is. It's just like different to me. Now, I know that that like goes against everything, right? That you probably believe in being the job you have and everything. But just like I, like you do, you draw like, you know,

we have like all these relatives when it comes, not relatives like people related to you, but you make like relative comparisons of worse and worse and worse, you you know then you have like the you know like the the folk hero robin hood right i mean yeah you know he'd poach the king's game to to to give the meat to the poor to the poor yeah so it is kind of like ingrained in your head there's like there's like an acceptable thing well and, and that's like I was saying earlier with the old, you know, where it's the old guy, you know, we're going to keep doing this,

but hey, we're not going to report violations because they needed the meat. You know, it's that to minimize the whole violation itself. Yeah, but I get your point. Like it's not the Great Depression anymore. No, nope. No. And in society has,

you know, we see it more and more that society has placed a pretty significant value on wildlife in the United States. I mean, that is why it's held in public trust, right? Cause we all value it. It's just nowadays in this time we have placed even more value on it.

You know, you know, like it would be interesting to hear from you three like i mean remy already kind of pointed it out with the utah was the utah example or just that how much how much an auction tag would go for you know and how much that value is but you know i think that all of us would agree that wildlife, you pick any species, has a specific value to you, whether it's an intrinsic or a monetary value. It's just that's how. Yeah, I think I always think about, when I think about preservation of wildlife and being a law-abiding hunter and all things go with it. At a time in our nation's history for a long time,

we had wildlife kind of like, we had wildlife despite our best efforts to eradicate it. Meaning just uncontrolled market hunting, right? Environmental exploitation, you know, it was like we were devouring the resources and we still had some. Yeah, and it's interesting because, you know, and I think about that and, you know,

as part of conservation, like I said earlier is, you know, you think about those times, whether it was market hunting for plumage, for women's hats or unregulated bison hunting, you know, that almost decimated or did decimate populations. What was the thing that stopped it all? Regulations, right? Yeah. That's what changed everything. Not us doing biology.

It was about regulations and the fear of getting caught. And so, yeah. Yeah, that was like the follow-up point I was going to make is, now we have wildlife in this country because people have worked their asses off in order to have it. It's not like they're kind of by happen chance anymore. No, not at all. Now it's there because, no, because we put together

this elaborate system by which we could have civilization coexist with wildlife. What's allowed that is creating laws and enforcing them. Had we never got around to doing that in the

years basically from around 1900 to around 1930 if we hadn't put together the suite of wildlife laws we have now you and i'm not like pulling this out of my ass i mean you would not have american wildlife well yeah and you look at um the lacy act was from the 1930s right i think is when or the 70s when was lacy acts, right? I think is when, or the 70s. When was Lacey Act? I should know this.

Oh, the one that legal wildlife traffic. Yeah, yeah. I think that, I don't know if that came a little later, but like Pittman Robertson, 1930s, Banner, Mark, Huntington, that stuff all came out around that time. And then the ban on sale of plumage, Migratory Bird Act,

like a whole suite of things started coming out. Somewhat earlier, on sale of plumage, Migratory Bird Act. Yeah. Like a whole suite of things started coming out. Somewhat earlier, because I think it was still the 1890s, and Wyoming made it a jailable offense to kill a buffalo. Right? And then it became illegal to sell wild game in New York City, and then on and on. And we created this thing thing and then we had this

radical rebound um and now we take some of us and that's the I think that's a point we need to clarify though is that um most hunters and anglers the vast majority are law-abiding and and very committed conservationists. It's just that very few that ruin it. Oh, yeah. And I know a lot of people will say like, oh, we shouldn't even be having this conversation because you're making it look like all the stuff goes on. But we're talking about real stuff that goes on.

Yeah. But I think that a poacher should know that the reason he even has something to poach is because of wildlife laws. Yeah, exactly. It's not like wildlife laws aren't keeping you from the resource. Wildlife laws created the resource or allowed the resource to exist. Yeah.

And they absolutely take it for granted. Yeah. I think it might be motivated in some part by a lack of historic perspective. Yeah, I think historic perspective and appreciation. Like you said, we have these wildlife numbers now because of our forefathers decided that it was important. That we were going to spell out stuff you can do, stuff you can't do. Yeah, and so now, yeah, they just take it was important. That we were going to spell out stuff you can do, stuff you can't do. Yeah. Yeah. And so now, yeah,

they just take it for granted. I'd be like, ah, you know, shoot, there's another whitetail buck out there somewhere. What,

you know, what's one? Yeah. Remy, what's your concluding thoughts? I just, I'm going to go a little lower brow. You're still fact-checked.

It was the 1900, 1900 Lacey Act. Lacey, was that early? And some of the laws, it looks like 1907 were starting to be enforced. I was just glancing. No, but I think the whole Pittman-Robertson thing was 27 or 30. I think so.

Yeah, it was the Federal Restoration and Wildlife Act. Yeah. And that was when they put excise taxes on firearms and ammunition to support wildlife conservation. That was PR, Pittman Roberts. And then Dingle Johnson was fishing. Yep. Yep.

So what do you mean you're going to go more lowbrow? I want to know what the dumbest thing you've ever seen is. Oh, that's your clue? Yeah. No, your concluding thought can be a question. Yeah, because I mean, I think that's just, there's got to be some stuff that you've seen. It's like, oh my gosh, this is pretty stupid.

I think that the decoy one with the gal riding into the back of the truck. I mean, I've seen lots of stupid stuff, but that one. So to put that one in perspective, know like the the program you know says they were actually targeted that that couple and they had drove by two weeks before that spot and we had contacted them regular compliance check and we're like man there's gonna be a tag transfer here the guy's gonna shoot her elk never would i have imagined that she was gonna be riding to the bed of the truck but they had already drove by the decoy once. And we were like, man, they didn't see it. Yeah. They didn't glass it up? No, they didn't see it. It's standing out in the stubble field.

It's like, God darn it. And then they ended up turning around and I can see them. And then they came back. I mean, that in itself is unbelievable. They were already contacted. I mean, within that 100-yard stretch of that roadway, they were contacted by myself and another uniformed officer just 10 days before that. Saying what? Telling them what? Just a regular compliance check. And then when we got done, you know, checking licenses and tags, and we're like, hey, you got permission here?

Oh, yeah, yeah. And it's just like yeah i don't it doesn't sound like you do it doesn't sound like you know who the landowner is and uh and so yeah just regular compliance check and as we're walking back to the patrol vehicle you know the officer i'm with and we're both like he's gonna shoot her elk there's no question about it lo and behold no not at all she's gonna shoot it from the bed of the pickup laying on the the roof of the cab when you guys put the decoy out you figured the dude would show up and shoot at it yeah yeah with her tag turned out he was just a great caller that's funny what's your gluten dog yanni it's a concluding follow-up question too um i've always been interested about like the

pursuit of game in a vehicle right we know you can't shoot from motorized vehicle and you can't in idaho in idaho yeah well yeah yeah with the exception of waterfowl there's probably only just a few states but then you can't shoot waterfowl unless the motor's cut. And all forward motion is ceased. Yeah, so we'll speak just for Idaho. But I'm guessing you can't harass wildlife from a vehicle. Nope. So you can't like corral them or herd them or drive them. Nope.

But these days, a lot of times you get in a situation where... So how do they spell out like motorized use to like pursue an animal? So it would be as an aid to hunting. Yeah. There's specific hunt with a motorized vehicle. So, and we kind of touched on it earlier, that definition of hunt is very broad. Chase, pursue, harass.

It's very broad. And so it's easy to fill in what they're doing. See, that's's I've always I think maybe you're kind of thinking of like some Arizona regulations as well maybe because I think in Arizona if I spot say I'm sitting in my truck with a window mount and I spot an elk I have to leave I can't actually go after that elk because I would be from a motorized vehicle no you couldn't know you technically you couldn't drive over there and then go after it that's kind of my question is where do you draw the line where do you draw the line you can't glass from a truck well but let's just say you're a mile away and then you drive over you're not even in the truck you glass

an animal oh drive oh i thought you can't walk 400 yards yeah oh you get out you get out again and then you hike up there yeah it's a very fine line i mean in in north idaho where we all work i mean it's plain as day they're just you know for a lack of any better term because it's not defined in in the regulations road hunting that term in itself i mean we all know what it looks like but it's uh i mean that would be that hunt with a motorized vehicle now what remy's talking about spotting elk like 200 or two miles away and then driving a mile and then hiking the other mile up to them i mean that would certainly be within within bounds so in in id though, say you're driving down a forest service road. You look over, you see a deer.

You get out and you are, I don't know what your rule is for shooting off a road or whatever. You can't shoot from a publicly maintained highway. So if you're on a forest service road and you're actually off the road, so you're not violating any, is that not legal?

The way that we, the question that we usually ask are you looking for something to hunt are you looking for a place to hunt okay right right so so for that road hunter you know are you are you looking for a place to hunt are you looking for something to hunt yeah right it makes sense right. If you're just driving around all day looking for deer out of the truck, we've got a problem. If you're like incidentally driving and all of a sudden,

you know, you're like, holy crap, slam on the brakes, get off the road, make sure you're not on posted property. Yeah, it's a different story.

Gotcha. Yeah. Now, my concluding thought, and I don't even want you to respond to it. I think more states need to take a better look at radio hunting. Radio hunting?

Yeah. Like using electronic communications. Some states are out in front of it. Alaska, Montana. It's legal in Idaho and Nevada, but not Montana. Yeah, that's what I'm saying.

And that's that, you know, regulations are just hard to keep up with technology particularly it's gonna get it's like it's gonna get worse and worse yeah and yeah absolutely i definitely agree with you it's like i quoted aldo leopold earlier aldo leopold said we're always improving the pump but not not the well. Yeah, yeah, exactly. And ethics is constantly evolving. Hunter ethics is constantly evolving. But in this case, that's the interesting point.

But in this case, it's different than that because in this case, we're talking about emerging technology, not traditional use, but emerging tech. Clearly drones, people have no problem getting out ahead of the drone issue. Yeah, and that was quick to do. Okay, so it it's like that you know why it was quick and easy because there wasn't there wasn't a an emerging culture that were taking of drone hunters but i think that

they're kind of missing the boat on getting out ahead of electronic communications i think that's just going to get worse yeah that's all. Now go ahead and say what you... Well, so on somebody's reading list on the Meteor site, did somebody have Arctic Dreams? Yeah, me. I love that book. Yeah, so in there,

Lopez talks about how anthropologists know the hunting of buffalo by cliff jumps, and then also caribou by river crossings. But at that time, that was an ethical practice, which is interesting because today we would cringe if somebody did something like that. That's not true because there are still units in Alaska where you can kill caribou in the water out of a boat

with a 22 oh geez traditional use traditional use no i'm saying that was an area where that's like that's how traditional use that's how people have utilized that resource yeah for a long time and you can still sit at river crossings there and kill swimming care with a 22 but it's not i mean you can't do it i can't know if you're in that unit anyone no i think you have to have a subsistence permit it's a subsistence only for me i don't know if that is or not i'm i know that i would look that up but i'm but like the law positive the law tends to like favor traditional use just like running deer with dogs in the south like you could run deer with the dogs in the south. Yeah.

They'd hang and quarter you if you ran deer with dogs in Michigan. Yeah. Matter of fact, in Michigan, everyone looks at, if they see a dog chasing a deer, it's your civic duty to kill the dog. Yeah. Which is always, and it comes back to the situational ethics. Like I said, it's like people kind of get up in arms about you know whether it's um chasing bears or lions with hounds but then you you look at like a guy hunting birds upland it's like man you got that little quail

and that big dog chasing that thing yeah geez where's the balance and the way but the way I look at it is that people have been running bears and lions with hounds for 100 years. Yeah, 100 years. Yeah. Boone hunted bears and dogs. That's how Boone did all of his bear hunting was with hounds. Yeah. So it's like traditional use practice. Some emerging technologies come in and you look at like laser range finders really changed the game of

hunting. Yes. Now you could look and say, oh yeah, they allow people to take real long shots. And I'm also say, okay, but they could also dissuade you from taking shots. You have no business taking because it tells you more information. Like it's not an automatic, it's like, it could be helpful in other ways too, besides just like, as Leopold said, it does more than just improve the pump, right? Yeah. But I think in some ways, some stuff like two-way communications,

and I'm not outlandish to bring this up because a lot of states have, and like, these aren't like lefty states, Montana and Alaska. I mean, like conservative states with strong hunting cultures have gotten out and said two-way communications is not something we're going to, that's not a pump improvement we're looking at right now.

I think that shit's going to be, I think it's getting out of control and it's going to get worse. What do you think about, I've just kind of noticed this over recent years, it's something that I could see, probably never, but Google Earth maps. So you can be walking around now on your phone and see exactly what's in front of you. You no longer have to know the area as well as the person 10 years ago that had to read a topo map and actually hike around. Yeah, but, yeah, okay. the person 10 years ago that had to read a topo map and actually hike around yeah but yeah okay

so but then you could also say but then they had maps and prior to that they didn't have paper maps right yeah but what's the so like anything you look at is is it giving you a disadvantage to the animals i don't know i think if you had some way that was giving you real-time imagery of where animals were i think that's something they would take a pretty serious look at yeah but i don't imagine i'm just like from a pragmatic standpoint i don't imagine that fish and game agencies are going to start trying to control what mapping technologies you use see now here in montana it's illegal to use trail cameras after season starts right well yeah but while there's an open season. But that's pretty much the entire year.

Because, I mean, there's bird seasons. There's always some. There's like two months where you can't use. That doesn't break my heart. No, it doesn't on mine either. I mean, I actually think that, like in Nevada, you can use trail cameras on antelope. Well, the guy that used to go out and shoot a Pope and Young antelope

had to work his ass off for it. He had to go out there and find the antelope. He had to spend days in the unit figuring out where that antelope watered. Now you could just go out, and if you've got enough money, you could set out 100 trail cameras on 100 waterholes and hunt one day. Not that that doesn't take work this that and the other thing but your knowledge is not from hunting it's from technology yeah and but when i look at these rules i also look at what sort of state we're talking about montana

is a is a very hunting friendly state they just you know that initiative just came up where they're trying to ban trapping on public land got shot down by an overwhelming majority so i'm like when when montana does something like okay no trail cams during season i'm like okay that's coming from a hunting friendly position that's not coming from a position of just trying to like limit people's activity in order to curb or curtail hunting the trapping band in montana that got shot down i'm like that wasn't coming from a hunting friendly position that was just coming from the position of people trying to whittle away at your rights so it's like you're weighing this stuff out all the time in your mind what's your concluding thought i think you know sportsmen

just need to get involved support your local game warden. Bring them muffins and coffee in the middle of the season. Hot coffee, maybe a fresh baked pie. Would you say on average that CEOs are regarded or just like – Yeah, regarded. Do you get the respect you need? Just like on average, if it's one out of two times, are you like received in a positive manner

or in a negative manner? Positive, absolutely positive. Oh yeah, yeah. People like to see you out there. Yeah, and in that public opinion, yeah, they say in that public opinion survey we did, they say they don't see us enough, which you've got 1,100 square miles.

It's hard to do. Is that just a funding thing? If you guys had more funding, you'd have more CEOs? I have no idea. I have no idea. But people generally enjoy seeing the game warden. They like to know that you're out there keeping the playing field fair. But it's not just the game warden doing that.

You know, we need the help of sportsmen, you know, reporting violations when you see them. Yeah. I think, I mean, I think there's a lot of game wardens that are hunters, but it seems like now there's also, I've been seeing a lot more that are not hunters. They're just in the law enforcement aspect, but I almost think it is imperative that a game warden be a hunter himself

because they understand the value of the wildlife, not as a law, but as an animal that you value, you hunt, you eat. And to me, I just don't see how somebody that doesn't even hunt can, you know, like make that work yeah and we in idaho we are still very stuck to you having some sort of hunting and fishing background now i don't think we we check fact check like okay so so how many deer have you harvested over your lifetime you know how many days you you been out in the field? But that's one of the things I impress on those new officers is, hey, you muzzleloader hunt?

No? Well, you better start. There's no better way to talk the talk than to be able to do it yourself. It's like hound hunting. You ever been out behind hounds? Yeah. No, no. That's what the new guy yeah new guy would

say and our new gal and well you need to go find one of your local houndsmen and buddy up to them and get a better understanding of what's going on here yeah so you don't see what's happening so you know you're looking at when you see it yeah yeah so i agree with you rami it's it's imperative to be a good game warden and an effective game warden to totally understand and have that skill set you know yeah it just helps you you know it's a in a way as a game warden you're a hunter yourself you know you're just hunting a poacher you know what i mean and so you got to understand you got to understand where the game is and when to find the game you know and so just driving around

patrolling happenstance running into things just doesn't work yeah all right man we talked to a game warden the other day in colorado and i said hey you got anything cool you confiscated and he said um it's too hot and sunny no one's getting anything so i can't confiscate anything so he knew he knew the situation yeah yeah he's looking at it with a hunter's perspective yeah oh yeah and that's what you have to do so all right well thanks for joining us man yeah thank you if we can keep one guy from getting a ticket for something stupid that he should not have done and decides not to do it because he listened to this, this will have been a successful program. It will. All right. Thank you. you you hey folks exciting news for those who live or hunt in Canada.

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