The MeatEater Podcast - Ep. 081: Live from Bozeman

Episode Date: September 11, 2017

Steven Rinella talks with his big brother Matt Rinella, Ryan Callaghan, and Janis Putelis of the MeatEater crew.Subjects Discussed: Cormac McCarthy's brutal code of morality as it relates to Steve's marital advice; the illegitimacy of stand-up paddle boarding; the ethics of sasquatch hunting; Luke Rein as the resident MeatEater philosopher; Dirt Myth's commanding presence; how to expose your kids to the beauty and grit of hunting and fishing; elk hunting is a vision quest; squirrel hunting; the business of selling wild animals; and more. Connect with Steve and MeatEaterSteve on Instagram and TwitterMeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeShop MeatEater Merch Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hey folks, exciting news for those who live or hunt in Canada. You might not be able to join our raffles and sweepstakes and all that because of raffle and sweepstakes law, but hear this. OnX Hunt is now in Canada. It is now at your fingertips, you Canadians. The great features that you love in OnX are available for your hunts this season. Now the Hunt app is a fully functioning GPS with hunting maps that include public and crown land, hunting zones, aerial imagery, 24K topo maps, waypoints and tracking. You can even use offline maps to see where you are

without cell phone service as a special offer. You can get a free three months to try out OnX if you visit onxmaps.com slash meet. This is the Meat Eater Podcast coming at you shirtless, severely bug-bitten, and in my case, underwearless. We hunt the Meat Eater Podcast coming at you shirtless, severely bug-bitten, and in my case, underwearless. We hunt the Meat Eater Podcast. You can't predict anything. Thank you for that. That's all I really wanted to do tonight. So thank you. I appreciate it.

It's super dark, but where's a dude named Justin Grimes? He's on his honeymoon they made this part of the honeymoon trip which is really flattering we're glad you're here when I give wedding and marriage advice no one ever asks but I do give it you're not going to understand it until you do it,

but read the works. As you think about your married life, read the works of Cormac McCarthy and look in there for the strict moral code that governs the world of Cormac McCarthy. Because you'll find that the people that he's most severe with are people who make a decision to do something and then later try to live a life in which they hadn't made that decision.

If you're just flat out evil, Cormac McCarthy doesn't hurt you. He hurts people who dabble in evilness. So bear that in mind. But Bozeman, man, like, yeah, I heard everybody yelling earlier from Montana. Like, I live in a constant jealousy of Montana residents. You know, I lived here a long time it's like i miss it i love it i learned a thing from my two-year-old recently that when my two-year-old's jealous of something he just destroys it so like if his sister draws a cool picture and everybody's like oh rosemary it's amazing he just is like no it ain't and um so i kind of want, now I almost like Montana to go to shit. Because there are way more people who move here to just go to shit.

And then I wouldn't have to come here and be so bummed out all the time. It's really heartbreaking for me to come here. They advertise Montana where I live in Seattle. They advertise Montana. So like when I'm driving around stuck in traffic jams, I got to look at dudes in Montana, billboards of dudes in Montana doing fun stuff. And it recently got better because for some reason they got a guy up there now paddleboarding. And like, so I feel no jealousy. Like I feel like 15, 20 years ago, if you'd had a dude over your

house and you live on a lake and you're like hey man you can take the kayak out you take the canoe out bro um you could take this surfboard i could like duct tape a stick onto a paddle but it's like it's like the works it's like harry potter books where in a vacuum you know if you'd set humanity back and let it go again, we wouldn't be paddle boarding. It's like, like, but, but if you set the clock back of humanity, a million years and like, let it go again, I would love to do that 10 times and see which things we stick with and which we don't. And I'm damn sure like a person is going to see a horned animal walk by,

and he's like, I'm going to find a way to run a projectile through that thing's ribs a couple inches behind its shoulder blade. It's like that again and again and again will emerge. But I don't mean to hack on paddle board. It's just like seeing that sign really is... I just feel like it's not a legitimate pastime, man. Moving to Bozeman, though, there's a long history of moving to Bozeman. And it's like, when I think about, oh, I should move back here, your head's overwhelmed with all the things that could go right and the things that could go wrong. Years ago, me and Matt here, we went to check out

66 miles east of here. The highway runs over a grave site 66 miles east of here. And it's like, there's a bunch of bodies buried in a grave and they piled some rocks on it. And later, like the highway kind of runs right along. It's between the highway and the railroad. So every time you go by, you look and see this grave. And this guy, it was 350 years ago and 300 and 350 years ago and 361 days, I think, ago. There's this guy who is in Illinois and his two daughters and his wife get carried off by pneumonia. And he's got one boy left. This guy's by the last name of Thomas. He's got a boy named Charlie. So the only thing he's got left and he's got family in Bozeman. So in 1866, this dude packs up and he's going to move out to Bozeman, make the big jump. And he follows the, or he goes to St. Louis and follows the Oregon

trail and like he's on the Oregon trail going along in Southern Wyoming, along the plat. And then he jumps off and he's going to go and follow the Bozeman trail. And at that time, the Bozeman trail jumped off the plat and went up the East flank of the Bighorns and hooked around to the North of the Bighorns. So this guy's going along and he passes what will be in a few months after his passing, the Fetterman fight, where 70-some soldiers get massacred by Sioux warriors. And he goes a little further and passes the little Bighorn battlefield, where in 10 years, a couple hundred soldiers will get massacred by Sioux and Cheyenne warriors. And he's traveling with Jim Bridger

and they come across a grave site where they just buried some other guys and he's all bent out of shape. He's got a diary and he writes about how the wolves had dug him up and tore their rib meat off him. And there's another grave site and the wolves had tore their face off them. And he starts painting this like awful picture of moving to Bozeman.

Eventually a wagon breaks down and he leaves Bridger behind. And this guy's a minister. And he's thinking to himself that I'm going to put my faith in God and travel without arms. Because now that we're west of the mouth of the Bighorn, we're in crow country. And everyone knows you're safe in Crow country. So he pushes on by himself and they get over, like I said, 66 miles here, a little bit outside of Columbus. And it's him and his boy and a wagon driver named Joel Schultz. They get attacked. The next day they find the dad. He's got 13 arrows stuck in him and he's scalped and he's parked by the rear tire of his wagon. His little boy's got three arrows and he's scalped by

the front tire of the wagon. And Joe Schultz, the wagon driver, is down by the river. He's got a dozen arrows in him and he had two cutthroats, two cutthroat trouts that they found the next day. So he was one trout over his bag limit. And I always return, like approaching, I always like pass that grave site when approaching this area. And I always think of that. But then like, if you juxtapose that with my brother, Matt, wasn't there a bit in there where the son has a um diary and it says has a diary the dad has a diary and in there it says something like yeah jim bridger told me not to go this way but he's full of shit or something like that that that's rumored he had a diary when he crossed bridger creek he wrote in his diary that we lost our coffee pot the the crazy thing is the last thing thomas wrote in his diary that we lost our coffee pot. The crazy thing is the last thing Thomas wrote in his diary,

the night before he died, he wrote in his diary, we broke our champagne bottle. People have always wondered if it meant that he was so close to Bozeman that we were celebrating prematurely or that like losing his coffee pot when he crossed Bridger Creek, he busted the champagne bottle.

So there's like that version of moving to Bozeman, which sticks in my mind. But then you have like Matt. Matt moves to Bozeman, earns himself a PhD. He points out that it was his second one because he already had a pretty huge. And then, still do, then marries a girl

at the ranch. So does that version of moving to Bozeman. I think about that, I do think about this all the time. So with that preamble, we're going to roll through some vexing questions. And many of these questions have come from folks in the audience tonight. Some of them are going to be on the easy end of things, such as a guy was wondering, were you to encounter a, he calls it a legitimate Sasquatch. Were you to encounter a legitimate Sasquatch, like not, you know, the fuzzy one, not like an out of focus Sasquatch, but a legitimate Sasquatch. And the comedian Mitch Hedberg, he postulates that Sasquatch, Bigfoot is just blurry.

And you can't get a good picture of him. But if you're going to do it, he's like, would you take a crack? He adds to it. He adds the question, the guy with the question adds some color to it. He's like, no one's going to believe you. So here you are in this situation where you're just going to become the laughingstock. Would you kill Bigfoot?

Are you looking at me? Yeah, no, no. I don't have an interesting answer to that question. There's no way I'm just going to shoot some two-legged thing that's walking around. That's where I'm at on it. It's like, yeah, there's no tag system.

I would just let it walk. I would let it walk. You're saying you'd let it walk for legal reasons. No, it's not like a reward punishment thing. It's just like, hey, I've never seen one of them before. Let's make it be dead. Yeah, but you're like, guys are going to African safaris.

They're like, so that's what that looks like. Wham! The folks that mistake, or these, let's say you go on a hunt, right? You've never been in bear country ever. Yeah. And you go on a hunt in the Bitterroot Range, and the outfitter says, shoot any bear country ever. And you go on a hunt in the Bitterroot Range and the outfitter says, shoot any bear you see. And that hunter shoots a grizzly bear.

I hate that. You got to know what you're shooting at. So for that reason, no, I have never seen that. I have no idea what it is. I'm not going to pull the trigger for the sake of- Yeah, prove the point.

You can't judge the trophy quality on it. Having no established scoring. Yeah. It might change after I come out with my story, but I would just let it pass and then be one of those...

No, you sons of bitches believe me, I'm going back. Yeah. But I would know. And I feel like I'm trustworthy enough where there'd be at least a small contingent of people that would trust me. And we would, it would regenerate at least for another 50 years. It'd be a strong, you know, Bigfoot community. No, I would not. I would always think less of you. I would like, I would always, I would always question your judgment. I would always think a little bit less of you. I I get into, are there Bigfoot arguments? The thing that I found that I like to use, and I don't know if

it's really that effective, is I bring up that- Is this an argument that serious people have anymore? Do you ever turn on cable television, man? They build whole shows around it. Like I said. I'm not even indulging. No, I will indulge it for me, because It's interesting. It's a thing I try out when arguing with people about the plausibility of Bigfoot. I like to go to when Florida was down to 40-some panthers. That multiple panthers every year getting hit on the road. And look at all their really limited populations of animals. And then how many of them turn up dead on the road. And look at all their like really limited populations of animals and then how many of them turn up dead on the road. And then to bring up the idea that the

entire history of automobile travel, we haven't hit one yet. Like that, it's just like, if you got six of something, one of them is going to get hit by a car and all other populations of animals. Well, maybe they're just super smart. It could be. Okay, here's another one that came in. I actually want to kind of hire this guy. There's a guy named Luke Ryan who I I want to hire as a resident company philosopher. Luke Ryan has this. He's got a lot of things that he comes up with, and this is one he comes up with.

Have you guys been tracking about the Lone Star tick? Okay, there's a tick, Lone Star tick. It's common in Texas. This tick bites you. And when it bites you, it's like when you get bit by a tick and it might carry a bacterial infection that gives you Lyme disease. This tick carries an infection that winds up, and this is legit, I went and read about this. It winds up that you become allergic to red meat. It's an infection that carries with it a red meat allergy. You become allergic to red meat, you become allergic to dairy. So he's wondering, were this to happen to you, how would your relationship to hunting change? Like, would you keep hunting? I hate this question. Yeah. It's kind of like, yeah, it's like, it's like a question that comes up, but I just like this because it has like a

spin on it. Like, Like how wet are you? You know? Because he points out, you could go and still hunt and feed it to your kids, food banks, but you can't eat it. Yeah, I wouldn't. I just, I would take it out of it. I mean, I just.

That'd be it? Yeah, there's just, it would lose its mystique at that that point so last year my dad called up and he said hey would love it if you could get me an elk this year so for the first time in a long long time i shot two elk last year i don't but yeah i don't know if the desire, I wouldn't have the, you know, hungry hunter hunts best, right? Yeah.

Yeah, I don't know. That's a tough one. What about you, Giannis? Well, he did add in that you could, you know, you would turn into the world's best waterfowler and upland game hunter, right? That's what I was going to say. He added that in?

Oh, yeah, no, he gets rich. No, yeah, he gets rich no yeah he thinks about this stuff what oh that's a thing it's just red meat yeah from big game animals red meat and dairy you can still fish you can still eat cranes geese ducks those are pretty dark you give up on all the big game yeah i would definitely do it because i've often pointed out it's like if it wasn't for if it didn't get food and it wasn't fun, if you drop either of those two things out,

I'm done. If it ceases to be fun and it ceases to yield food, I'm paddle boarding. I'd probably do it too. I would. Well, Giannis, you and I were just talking the you know purely getting groceries yeah you know there's i have spots where it's like all right didn't get anything i don't call it hunting because i know for a hundred percent certainty i'm going to be coming home with something yeah yeah the grocery get yeah

it's total groceries yeah and i wouldn't say yeah i don't chalk that up as like yeah super fun outing it's like boy i'm gonna go take an afternoon off and go get a whitetail doe. But it's fun. Yeah, there still is some fun. Yeah, for sure. More fun than going to Albertsons. It'd be hard for me to hypothesize. I think I'd have to go through the process and be at home, butcher it all up, wrap it all up, and then all of a sudden be later in the fall or that winter not eating it and then see how i felt about it oh really all right how about this one this is another luke ryan luke ryan's wondering this you're okay it's such a complicated two-part question and then yanni like sequestered some of the

information that i can't think about from the cooking side of things how many times do you try to make some off-cut taste amazing i feel like i would have a horrible gastrointestinal life for a long time yeah because i just keep trying oh you just see when it wore off. Yeah. Yeah, no, I'm with you. Well, maybe if I do this. Hey, I thought about it. I worked for many an outfitter in Colorado, more than one. So you can say all that information. Okay. Now I have permission to say something that I was earlier forbidden from saying.

But I got it so worked out now that I don't need to say. It'd be this. A guy's wondering this. Luke Ryan puts this out there. You go on a guided trip. Okay. You go on a guided trip and then you're thinking to yourself, uh, okay, now what I'm going to do is just come back and hunt this exact same spot. Now that I know what's up. So you book a trip, the guy takes you out,

he's like, this is my great secret spot, and you do the thing, and the next year, you're like, see you next year. But as an equal, is that immoral?

I say yes. So all the yeses go like, yeah, in the audience. That was the no's. So all the yeses go like, yeah, in the audience. No. No. Yes. That was the no's. Ooh. I have to say yes.

Because you came out of the guiding industry. Well, I don't think that's the real reason why. You're saying yes immoral. Yes immoral. I've seen it firsthand and yeah i mean it's no different than walking in on the last final of the year and i grabbed stephen ranella's final paper off the desk scratch his name out put my name in you did all the work you did all the studying. You filled out the test. I just put my name on it. Yeah.

I want to weigh in. I say no. I say no. I say it's not immoral. Not immoral. No, you paid the guy. You know what I mean? You paid him to... That's true.

That is a good point. Now, if it's your buddy and he takes you to his spot, that's an entirely different... I think there's a prostitution analogy there. to his spot, that's an entirely different. I think there's a prostitution analogy there. I don't even need to ask that question. That is so immoral that I don't need to ask. Yeah, it goes without saying. Then a buddy.

You'd never do that to a buddy. Where's the difference? You paid him. I think you could come up with a prostitution analogy here. Okay, just to provide a little context here. There's a guy that somehow he realizes a place that Giannis used to guide. Can I talk about this? Yeah.

No, I realize that all the outfitters that i worked for all had a similar setup where we sort of drove through some private property camped on private property lodged on private property and then went to hunt a national forest the three outfitters that i worked for and again people can just do as much research as they want they all had a very similar setup so to know exactly where this guy was talking about you know it'd be hard to figure out. You'd have to go hunt three different spots that are, you know, 100 square miles each

and then go, oh, yeah, I know what you're talking about. But anyways, yeah. What's the difference? So he's got, I think, how his question was posed. His question makes it less morally, makes it more that it's okay to do this yeah because he wants a right he wants that answer no he here's the deal this is why i don't want to get into it he's got bodies working at this outfitter so my okay i'll tell his question and then i'll give my point he's

got buddies working at this outfitter that have obviously opened their mouths and talked about the setup of this location right so they've gotten this inside information now he's asking if it's morally okay to use that information to go behind these private ranches and basically go and hunt these spots that these guys are so there's other ways to get in there that don't involve going through the private property totally you can get in that now and what he's saying is, so he's saying that his buddies screwed up and they lost their tight-lippedness. And they're like, well, where we're really killing these elk

is on National Forest above the ranch that we're based out of. So he says, I'll see you up there. And then you take that as a transgression against the outfitter? Is that what you... Well, I think just against your... Well, one, the guy's messed up for flapping their gums.

And then two, yeah, it's like, give them a little respect. If they told you about that spot, it's like where they're working, don't go... How did our buddy say it the other week? Piss in the... Piss in the cathedral. Yeah. Or no.

The baptismal fountain. Piss in the baptismal fountain piss in the baptismal pond um so what if i mean look at all the things if you're going with anybody your buddy outfitter guide whoever if they can't blend them all together i absolutely think you can't that like don't blend the thing is if you are going with somebody who has a wealth of knowledge about the area about the animals aren't you taking enough away without having to go to the exact spot i'm learning so much when i go out with you i'm like this is the way steven ronella hun. I come away with that. Do I have to go in there and

kick you out of your spot too? No, because here's the thing. He's making a claim of ownership. You're sort of making a claim of ownership that only takes away your right to access. So you're saying like, sure, anyone else is welcome to go here. The whole 360 million Americans are welcome to go here. But you can't because of how this piece of information came to you. So I think it winds up being like a little bit like you're sort of getting screwed out of a god-given right because of the way that a piece of information flowed right it's a business train it's a business transaction you gave the guy money to take you to a hunting spot i mean if you if you if the

if the author didn't want you to go in there go in there should be part of the contract or something yeah moving on no no no because it brings up the point of going into hunting spots that you've never been to with your buddy and if you're the kind of guy that might follow up with a hunt of your own in that same spot you might want to you know bring that up to your buddy it's taking you into that spot well if i ever hired an outfitter it would be because i could go into the spot he showed me i've done that on family vacations. I've done that.

We go down somewhere. It's hard to figure the fishing out. Go out, like hire someone to do the panga. Go out and fish for two hours. Come back and be like, resume business. Like, and then a more. On the way back, you're like, hey, you know where I can rent a panga? Yeah, exactly.

See, I would feel mad. So I think sometimes I would just turn down being showed or even told about a spot and just go there and learn it on my own to have a clear conscience about it. With the friend thing, though, final thought on this. With the friend thing, it's way different. And when a friend takes you somewhere and shows you something, you have an obligation. Oh, it's like at that point, it's like sleeping with his wife at that point. And at some point, if he says, you know what? You just go ahead.

That's you. Then you'd have to later call back again and be like, well, my cousin, right? He's in town. He'll probably never come back. I have anxiety going with dudes to places because I'm like, what if I really like it? Yeah.

What am I going to not go back? Yeah, what if it's full of elk? It's like I'd almost like not have to permanently scratch off yeah an entire chunk of the earth and just like go find it on my own somehow 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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That's a sweet function. As part of your membership, you'll gain access to exclusive pricing on products and services handpicked by the OnX Hunt team. Some of our favorites are First Light, Schnee's, Vortex Federal, and more. 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. Welcome to the OnX Club, y'all. Moving on. Joe March.

Over your many years of hunting, what is the most common mistake you've found yourself making over and over? I know exactly. i do too mine is that i'm putting the sneak on something like i found something i'm gonna go get in on it and the something being an animal um getting in on it mean i'm gonna like you know stalk in on it, I'm going to stalk in on it, is that I all of a sudden realize that I'm crawling and going way around, and I also realize that I'm just in plain sight of the thing. Because misreading of the lay, because you know what you think, if I really was going

to do this right, I would go three miles way you know but i bet i could you know that little rise and that little low thing and that brush and then you just sort of like you're going along and the next thing you know you're looking like oh it's looking at me it's just right there but i somehow like misread all this stuff that is like it just happens again again again so do you feel like you're misreading the landscape or are you just trying to take a shortcut? Shortcuts. Shortcutty, like shortcutty, shitty little shortcutty things.

It's a gimme. That's a gimme. Being nonchalant. Yeah, mine's similar. Mine is that I think I've spooked it, but I haven't. So I start being uncareful because that's gone, and then I run right into it.

Similar, I think just moving too fast. That's why I like going on a long hunt because I feel like it takes three or four days until I really start moving at the pace of the woods. And I feel like once I hit that pace, then all of a sudden, game's just like doing this in front of me. But when I'm moving too fast

and I'm looking at my toes instead of having my head up, taking it all in, I feel like I'm not seeing the game. You're not in the zone. Kel? I'll say it could be indifferent. It's forgetting my long-handled spoon.

And get your knuckles full of freeze-dried food. That's a camping mistake. It is. It will bother me the entire time I'm in the woods. Because I know better. Yeah. And you just say, and there you are with freeze-dried cheese stuck to your knuckles. Do you have anything profound to say about being alone in the wilderness?

This is from a guy named Bob Dean who should, if he's not, he should be in the sausage business. Bob Dean. Do you have anything profound to say about being alone in the wilderness? By yourself or in a small group, being completely responsible for your well-being without communication or support from your society. Society. Does that say that? Society.

If anybody gets anything, it's gratifying to know it'll be me. Since I'm alone, I hope just someone gets something. Don't care who it is. But you're always with the llamas, so in the morning, you look at all of them, you all of them you're like somebody's gonna get something today right guys i think the thing that that i've come to like about not come to think of i've always liked about

wilderness and there are many of them and and i didn't really think to articulate it this way until fairly recently. I started riding my bike in Manhattan years ago, and I spent a couple years, about a year riding a bike regularly in Manhattan. And I realized that doing it, there was no room to have any other, there was no room to have any other, there was no room for any other thought. So you're riding along and you can't be like, man, I should call my mom more often. It's like, you just can't think about anything besides exactly what you're doing

because exactly what you're doing, it's so dangerous. You just described yoga class and how they set that up in the beginning. But it's artificial. That's why I don't like it when they try to do it to me in yoga because I'm like it takes a lot more than a bunch of us sitting around in comfortable clothes trying to be the kind of people who aren't thinking about other stuff i need to be like forced into the situation of not thinking about other stuff and so when riding my

bike and like when i was doing a lot of bike riding in manhattan i was often thinking about wow it's really like i don't get this feeling that often of not having any room for any other thought, but exactly what I'm doing. And I realized that like in a lot of wilderness experiences, not when you're like laying in your bag at night, but just all the things that go into it, it winds up being like, you're forced to for sometimes days on end, that you're like, just be focused on this thing because there's so many there's so many aspects to it and things to keep in mind that you you do lose you quickly lose sight of all the nagging things that are rolling around in the back of

your head i think i've talked about a fair bit is they did this study one time where they had people they paired up people and put them in a gymnasium and had them throw a ball back and forth. So they break everybody up into pairs and each pair of people has to play catch. And there's an observer assigned to each pair and the observer is supposed to just count how many times the ball changes hands. So it's a gym full of people playing catch and there's people watching them play catch and count how many times the ball changes hands. And in the middle of this, they have a guy in a gorilla suit walk through the gym. Later, they say like, how many times did the ball change hands? And you'll be like, it changed hands 33 times. Did you notice anything unusual while you were counting the ball change hands? Most people

don't see the gorilla come through the room. And like, those are people who are bad at being in the woods. Those are like, those are like bad wilderness people. And, um, and I think it's like that, that you have to just be aware of like what you know, you need to be aware of, be aware of what you're, you're not really knowing you need to be aware of, but just like spatial awareness is nice. Last night at dinner, college town, a lot of pretty girls walking around. It's not because I don't care about what you're saying. I'm just being aware of what's going on. And you were. Yeah.

Yanni, wilderness? I think it comes back to the thing I mentioned about moving slowly and getting to that point where you're just like, I think it's all the same thing that we're saying, that all the other stuff gets out of the way, and you're sort of just focused on just being there. And you get to just experience, I think, days or time

or however you want to look at it, slower than my regular day of getting up and just like jamming and going and cooking and then you know the office yeah back from yoga totally back again no um so yeah i just think that's it's good for me for my head my soul to just experience that slow pace yeah absolutely i've been on a few hunts where um you know the the it's been a number of things clients guides where there's connectivity up on the mountain some and now it's worse and worse with um like the iridium go there's ways to be connected to the outside world. And I truly don't want any of that stuff on any hunts anymore because I've noticed,

I had just example up in BC last year or the year before, I had this, you know, awesome weasel encounter. You know, weasels up there checking you out and running up and looking at you and just kind of doing their very inquisitive extremely entertaining thing yeah only person that noticed it because the other two dudes were up on their phone because they've got a signal on top of some mountain or something yeah yeah it takes you out of the out of the space and i think more and more as connectivity becomes, I mean, almost a given in a lot of these areas, you'll always have it. We need those spaces and times to disconnect. Check out. Yeah.

I went to a lecture by a guy that had done solo long-distance canoe trips. And when I went to see him, he'd come off of just doing the whole shore of Lake Superior, which is months long. And he was talking about, he was saying like, you know when you're out in the woods for 10 days, how everything seems to be slowing down and becoming quieter for 10 days. He says, at six months, I haven't found the end of that.

It's still, it's still happening six months in, which gives you a sense of how wound up we could potentially be that he hasn't unwrapped. He hasn't unraveled the string at six months. So when you think you're all kicking ass at 10 days, not even scratching the surface, there's a tight coil, man. I remember when you and I would go, first we'd go hunting for four or five days. I remember we'd come out and we'd be driving home

and like 50 miles an hour would feel super fast. Yeah, I know what you're talking about. You miss the pacing of things. What happened for me, though, that really changed the connectivity thing is after 9-11, because you used to go and didn't care, right? Because I didn't have family or anything.

So you'd went and be like, I didn't care what was really going on. And then all of a sudden you get introduced to this thing that you could have these instantaneous cataclysmic events happen that you weren't aware of. And it took me a long time to be comfortable totally unconnected for a long time because in my mind that happened like that you're like because you normally be like well what could happen what could possibly happen then all of a sudden you introduce this idea that like

oh like a thing could happen and it nags you that you're out of the loop we went remember we went hunting the breaks and it was it was in that period at the beginning of that period when the when the bush gore election it like it there was it wasn't clear who had won it and we put off the trip for the election night then we're like okay i guess we're just gonna have to go and not know we're gone right but we thought it was gonna be like so who's president you're like they still don't know yeah yeah yeah we thought it was gonna be a like a just a couple hour delay it turned into what was it event ultimately i don't remember how long days month i want to give you a flip side to

this though because i something i think about quite often now is is when i was working in the woods um you know for the majority of my year and i was you know in large part because of wanting to be i was disconnected from the outside world, I had very few thoughts running through my head, or at least looking back on it, I feel that way. Now, I feel like I get cluttered because I know, like the public lands access issue is something that, you know, I'm constantly thinking about now. And when I go into the woods, I'm staring around being like, oh my God, are we really going to screw this up?

Whereas back before when I was spending way more time in the woods, I never thought about any of that stuff because I just truly didn't even think about being connected to it. Yeah, you weren't a global citizen, you were a woods man. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah, you weren't a global citizen, you were a woodsman. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. This guy was picking up on something.

Cody Bomber, he was picking up on something I said sometime where I was talking about how I know a lot of people who are a lot better at hunting than me. And he's like, what's the difference between yourself and the people who are better at it? And I know, Matt, you think a lot about Kent Unlin being a real good hunter. Oh, yeah, the best. Who's not with us tonight.

No, and there's a couple other guys in Miles City. And frankly, I don't know. If I knew, I'd just start doing what that is. Yeah. You know? Yeah, for me, I think it's like when i look at the people i think the thing that we do to measure like good huntingness would be that how much is someone able to do a lot of times we're looking at how much is someone able to do something again and again and again and again

so it'll be like oh he killed you know in 20 years he's killed 20 bulls with his bow so that person would develop a certain renown right yeah especially when he goes out and does it in like three days yes there's like burning all my vacation time and i find that like and i find that like just because of the details of my life i do i do many many kinds of things. And so I have this good cursory knowledge of tons of shit, but don't focus in on the thing. And when I look at a really great hunter, I'm looking at someone who can just do the impossible all the time.

Like some guy hunting in the Midwest on public land with a bow, killing nice bucks every year right no farm permissions i'm like that to me is like the he's doing the impossible right oh it's it's easy to define who the who the you know good hunter is it's much more difficult to say how he got to be that way yeah and i but i think that like when i think of the guys that are so much better than me i think it's like people who have picked a thing that's difficult and just somehow focused and became like singular in their pursuit why is it being the guys i look at i'm like that's amazing it's not so much as someone who's like jumps around hunts every state and hunts all around the world and does all these things once

it's like it's the the person with the laser focus yeah but not the laser sight define the good hunter steve just for me did like somebody that has like something that's hard to do um like killing an elk on public lands every year in montana i think of that with a bow even with a rifle but uh i think of that as um but you've achieved that not with a bow um generally though okay without using all your vacation time. Okay. I like it.

Yeah, Matt will go. You one time went and did 21 days. I routinely go 20 days. Yeah. There's some time card fudging that goes into it good on you for getting to hunt 20 days like the guys that are better than you what do they do like what makes them better than you oh i mean a ton of stuff i'm i don't feel like I'm very good at any of it. I feel like I'm still here.

I look up to many, many people. So I just need more days in the woods. To hone your skills. I don't think that's it for me. I think there's something that differentiates. Like Kent Unlin was an excellent hunter 15 years ago you know so like i've got way more time in the woods now than kent did 15 years ago yeah you get more time in one trip than he does yeah he doesn't yeah he doesn't need to go out very long

you think there might be like a little bit like a thing six cents something a little drop of something that some hunters have and some yeah maybe he doesn't smell i don't know there's actually something to that man smelly people i am a smelly people yeah um dirt math i mean we're gonna say yes right i mean love the, but that's a powerful musk. He's got a commanding presence. Is there a way to stop hunting with someone but still be friends? He says, also, it sounds like the hunting equivalent of that girl or guy in a relationship that doesn't want to date, but still wants to be friends. Can you have a hunting buddy that you're just like,

it just, I can't. And I've had this happen in my life. I know you've had to have in your life where you're just like, I can't hold that guy anymore. Can you still like be buddies? Something changes. It becomes hard to be friends.

Right. But I've done it. We call it being OTC'd. Out of the club. Out of the club. And it's hard to still be friends when you've pulled out the love making. Cal, no experiences? Oh man, I think, boy, yeah, I'm sure I'm missing a few,

but they've, they've kind of naturally went their own way. Yeah. Yeah. It happens, man. They don't like, they don't like the style. They the style. Their idea of hunting was a lot different. Those types. You know, it's more me. I'm sure. It's me. No, I think that like hunting together creates like really tight, close friendships. Yeah.

It creates really tight, close relationships. And it winds up, it's just different. Like if you spend a handful of trips with someone it's just it's just you're just different with them you get to a place you don't get to hanging out like drinking a beer and and so yeah the later be like man i don't want like like i don't want to go out in the woods with you anymore and be with you out in the woods anymore because of whatever it is about you you can't you can't be like but let's go get a beer yeah remember that one time we went hunting together that was fun and then i got sick of you i have i mean i have buddies that i'll go hunt with and not pack a rifle because that's the only way you know it's like yeah love spending time with

you guys let's go out and i'll spot some stuff or call some stuff. But you're not going to hunt with them? No. Yeah. Yeah. All right. So with regard to technology, where do you draw the line? And what this guy's getting at recently is there's NOCs now, okay some guy recently came out with a knock that

you put in your arrow that has a tracking device in it so you can stick something and track it using gps technology so he's talking about knocks um and he talks about trail cameras at what point is like at what point does fair chase not exist anymore? And I think he's looking for an answer. I think Justin Brose, bro, Justin Brose, is looking for like a concrete thing that you just won't do. Like a demarcation criteria.

Yeah, he wants it clean, he wants it neat. You can't do like a demarcation yeah he wants it clean he wants it neat it can't you can't do that because it's a nuanced thing like having a knock that tells you where your gut shot deer went that just seems like better living through technology now this game camera thing you can see where that could that's treading on some uh thin i want to talk about the knock and i think it's tied into this what makes a good hunter thing. I would argue that the more you lean on technology, the fewer skills you actually develop. Like I'd be like, ah, I'm just going to gut shoot it because I got these knocks. Bullshit.

Yeah, no one's going to do that. No, but he's saying because you don't have to then track the gut shot, and find it without the tracking technology that you then don't possess those skills. Okay, but if you get a pass-through, if you get a pass-through, it doesn't do anything. It doesn't do anything. It's just going to show you where you shot. Right, but it's much more fun to talk about these sorts of matters

pretending that it's going to work good. Okay. Because then it allows you to explore the ethical concept. It's the same thing with the lighted knock, right? Like lighted knocks. You know. Legal this year in Montana. The evil thing with the lighted knock right like lighted knocks you know legal this year in montana brother of the lighted knock right or the friendly brother of the lighted knock yeah when it when it passes through it puts out little arms and stays inside

you know something like that i mean i don't even like reading books about hunting because I feel like I'm going to grab some chunk of knowledge that I haven't actually learned yet and just assume it. And that's going to hurt me in the long run. So when it comes to the technology thing, like, yeah, I have a map that I use way, way, way more. But, yeah. But here's, 5,000 years ago, people on this continent were not using bows. Correct. Or five to seven.

They were using the addle addles, okay? The bow and arrow was invented a bunch of different times around Earth. So at some point in time, it went from being that you were using a spear throwing, well, you were using a hand-thrown spear, and then you're using a throwing board to get a better spear throw. And then all of a sudden, some dude comes rolling over the mountain who's got a bow.

You're like, that's cool as shit, right? Yes. So he starts using that. And then you fast forward and you have muskets and then some guy starts decides to cut a spiral groove inside of a musket barrel and make a rifle and the people that you were using that like daniel boone hunted with he had a rifled barrel he went into the woods thinking that he was using a technologically advanced tool that was leaps and bounds ahead of what was available to his father i get what you're doing but it's wrong you get what i'm doing but it's like it's just it winds up being a march and i'm going to play devil's advocate for a minute here because there are some

people who in dealing with fair there's some, like hunting philosopher types who in dealing with fair chase, think that we just need to abandon that idea and focus on what they think we should focus on is the idea of, of fair use. Meaning we're dealing with a finite resource. We're going to need to figure out not enforcing and making ethics legal or like this is fair, not fair. He's like, how much pie is there to divide up? And then we're going to need to limit our technologies, not based on it being fair or right or nice, but we're going to need to limit our technologies to allow the maximum pool of individuals a chance to get a piece of the pie. And it winds up being like, you're talking about the same thing, but you're approaching it in a way that I think is like, it just almost winds up being easier to think about. So if you're going

to have technologies that are going to drive efficacy through the roof, so it used to be that like bow and arrow, like in this state, I could be wrong, but I think that archery success rates on elk had always hovered somewhere between 10 and 20 percent. So you could give out that many more tags, okay? For every elk, like for every elk killed, you could go out and give out five tags and give that many people opportunity to go and figure out who's going to be the one that gets the one elk. Once technology pushes where our efficacy rates are going to go so high, where we push it to 80%, you're then going to say, okay, most of you people are no longer able to go into the woods. Because we have a limited pool of resources here. Fair use. I would say that you are then also going to have

a very limited amount of people who even want to go into the woods because part of, okay, access, recruitment, that's like the biggest issue that we're facing right now. And I use this analogy, like the stock, and it's good for out here, right? Everybody's got a rancher buddy or a friend who's got a rancher buddy who's got the stocked pond

out on their place. And it's like, yeah, I want to go fish that stock pond. I want to go fish that stock pond. And eventually you get to go out. First cast, you catch a fish. Second cast, you catch a fish. Third cast, fourth. Eventually you're like, well, I know I can catch a fish. Second cast, you catch a fish. Third cast, fourth. Eventually you're like,

well, I know I can catch a fish out here. Very rarely do you ever return to that stock pond. Yes. Because there's no mystery. Yeah. But here's the thing. I'm driving at a lot of what you're driving at. We're saying limiting technologies, and we're going to have to, we're going to have to continue to, because we already limit technologies. You can't jack light, okay? Or you can't for something, jack light frogs. You can't jack light deer. You can't use artificial light to find a deer. We're already in the practice of limiting technologies. What these people are saying, we talk about the fair use idea rather than fair chase or ethics are saying, yes, we're going to limit technologies, but we're not going to frame the discussion around telling you what's

right and wrong. We're going to limit it to be that we're going to be able to have the maximum number of potential, the maximum number of people having potential to extract a resource. To maintain the best numbers, we're going to limit efficacy. To limit efficacy, we're going to start ruling out technologies. We're not dictating what's right and fair and good. We're just dictating like,

how can we maintain maximum engagement with a limited resource? So they're getting at what you're getting, but they're not trying to like, they're just trying to like discuss it in a way that doesn't make it seem moral that doesn't make you have to pick between right and wrong yeah i got you i'm a fair user i would say that you're a fair user i find myself being in that way because it is it's like i do all i have all kinds of things i do that weren't available before and if your only measure of morality is, was it available before?

Well, the whole damn thing. Boots. It's like, you know what I mean? It gets really tricky. But it's like, you know, obviously terminal tackle is a heck of a lot easier, more efficient in most cases than fly fishing. I like to fly fish. It's a fun thing to do. Some people say it limits

you. I say that. Yeah, you do often. Yeah. But you know, there's got to be some, you know, I find like anybody going into any sport, any activity, they're never going to be more passionate about it than when they're learning and if we inject all this stuff that makes it easier and easier and easier you know i'm like when are we going to get to the point where it's like i can kill a deer off my couch in front of my computer yeah right and then we're just not going to have people that want to go out in the woods but we're the only like we're the only like, hunters are the only type of people, fishermen too, who really are, like, screwed up about this stuff. In sports, they're always, like, making rules in sports,

and people don't turn it into this big, like, what's right and wrong and a big moral dilemma. It's just, like, we agree that for our game to kind of, like, be the way our game is, you can't use that shit. Right? And everybody's, like, there's not, like, all this hand-wringing. Yes. You know? be the way our game is, you can't use that shit, right? And everybody's like, there's not all this hand wringing. Yes. You know?

Yanni, you got a couple little girls coming up. They're popping some rabbits around the house. Not quite yet. Not quite yet? No, they talk about it a lot. Okay. Sometimes the disdain of their mother, their mother has a little cringe on their face when they see a bunny rabbit go by,

and they go, Papa, bunny rabbit, let's kill it. He's like, ah. But yeah, not quite yet, but go ahead. But I mean, do you want to bring them up the way you were brought up with that technology, or, you know, let's say in 16 years? I don't really care as long as they're in the woods you know and enjoying it so yeah but i'm we've been not gonna engage in the hand ring no we've talked about the fair use thing before i think it makes a lot of sense it does i've never heard

that argument before but that sounds reasonable and i think you're just gonna get more people you know the of different mindsets to sort of converge and be like yeah we can all agree upon that because we all want opportunity we all want to hunt every year and for me to hunt every year and everybody else that wants to hunt every year we're going to have to limit how we do it and our success rates okay how do you cope with the brutality this one guy named dave smith who'd be hard to look up on facebook with that name dave smith says how do you cope with the brutality of mother nature and its food chain i find the wolves and bears to be bullies of the animal world as they strive to kill the young and helpless maybe i'm becoming too soft for the sport or I'm not even going to read it because I don't want to be associated with that kind of thinking.

Maybe I'm becoming too soft for the sport. Wondering if anyone else feels the same and becomes upset because you're unable to help a young animal live another day. Would you rather see the yearling become a good age rather than the bear or wolf pull it away and shred it to pieces while it remains breathing? He really like is just just just very visceral. Selling you. Yeah. If you say yes to that, he's leading you where he wants you to go. Mercilessly ripping it while it screams in agony.

I mean, I don't know. How do you feel about that? gripping it while it screams in agony. I mean, I don't know. How do you feel about that? 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

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onxmaps.com slash meet. Welcome to the OnX Club, y'all. You know, when I see a predator-prey prey interaction i am damn sure always rooting for the predator oh i'm always rooting for the prey like when you watch like you're rooting for the prey yeah like when you watch stuff on tv on tv like if you're watching like in your motel room like uh you know cheetah going after a baby gazelle or something. I'm definitely rooting for the gazelle. I think you're in the minority. No, he's not in real life.

A break, okay. I'll remember this the day I die. We were, do you remember when we took the writer Ian Frazier on his first deer hunt? Okay, again, we talked about the breaks earlier. We were in the Missouri breaks. We're in that area with all the white cliffs. It's called the White Cliffs area. It is? Okay. Again, we talked about the breaks earlier. We're in the Missouri breaks. We're in that area with all the white cliffs. It's called the white cliffs area. It is? Okay. We're in the white cliffs area with Ian Frazier, who is full of, he's very nervous about what he knows is bound to happen on this hunt. That blood could very well be shed by his hands.

And I remember we're floating along, and pigeons, which are called rock doves, where they're from, where they're native range in Eurasia, there's a bunch of pigeons nested up in the cracks in the White Cliffs. And there was a red-tailed hawk. Oh, I would be rooting for the hawk. Yeah, working the area over the cliffs.

And the pigeons were real nervous about getting out too far from the cliffs and i remember and the re this was well over a decade ago this was in 2017 years ago i remember exactly what you said and i remember the look on his face because you said man i hope that thing comes down and bitch slaps one of those pigeons. And it was like, it was like an epiphany. It was like a thing went off in Ian Frazier's mind of being like, like a sudden awareness of a way that one could view nature. And I think it like changed him forever. Like the look on his face and it was like a kind of a laugh, kind of a revelation. It was kind of like someone saying, if someone came down and said to you like, you know what, uh, you know, when you die, that really is the end. You'd be like,

ah, geez. Really? Yeah. So I know you root in that case you're right it's apparently it's case specific because yeah i there's nothing sadder you know it's like it's weird to as a hunter to say things like this and realize that you think things like this but to me there's nothing sadder than an offspring being separated from its mom i know that plagues you a lot offspring being separated from their moms it is sad oh it makes me laugh i just makes you so uncomfortable i know but it's just true man yanni pray man predator man when i'm watching bbc no why are you guys talking about television it's like you guys spend an enormous amount of time outside yeah but how many times how often you actually see something kill

something exactly okay that's what i'm saying are you rooting for it to happen or not when i'm watching no matter what i'm watching i'm always like i'm watching if i'm watching the bear i'm like always hopeful that all of a sudden he's just going to rampage into something and tear it to pieces can i read between i just like i'm like always hoping if i'm watching an analog i'm like in the best case scenario on the question for a minute you want to read what he actually wrote no no no i just want to read between the lines i think he's an anti-predator don't you think that he's saying we ought to get rid of all the wolves yes he's an ant i believe that he might

and i can say this dave smith because who in the world is going to find dave smith i think dave smith might be an anti-predator yeah i mean and that's where and he's like i'm an anti-predator guy i don't want to just come right out and say that. So I'll talk about the brutality with which they kill. Right. I'm not picking sides. I'm rooting for the interaction to happen, and I'm just happy to sit there and watch and enjoy the observation, whatever happens.

Sometimes if you're watching one of them documentaries and the lion looks all scraggly and super hungry, then I start rooting for him. Good point, good point. I am with Giannis completely here. Every time I've seen something, big or small, I am just in awe of, just by somehow, some crazy set of circumstance being in that small area of the entire frickin' planet that this is happening.

And it just magically happens in front of me. Like, I can't get my head around from that to be like, I'm team squirrel on this one. It's just an amazing thing. Yeah, you're not in a position to root. No, they'd be like, hold on, you two. Can't we work this out? No. Yeah, and I mean, there are no bullies of the animal.

They're just doing what they do. Yeah, I got you. This is kind of in the same vein. Someone says they have a three-year-old daughter. No, three-year-old. I don't know if boy or girl. He started exploring. Oh, it is a girl.

He started exposing her to the concept and outcomes of hunting and fishing as a source of food. He says she helps, and he throws that in quotes, and I know exactly what those quotes mean. She helps me portion and package primal cuts of game. And again, she helps clean and flay fish. She knows that the food we eat is deer and fish and turkey, but I have not exposed her to the more gruesome tableau. I like this guy. To the more gruesome tableau of killing or skinning

an animal for fear of painting her nightmares. Ah, this guy's good. Jonathan Ingram is really good. Read on. But I have not exposed her to the more gruesome tableau of killing or skinning an animal for fear of painting her nightmares. What are your thoughts on how best to expose our kids to these things without pushing them into the opposite polar extreme? Obviously, every kid is different, but general thoughts would be appreciated. Early and often. These guys have never bred a woman, which I pointed out before. So they're not like even kind of. I'm just going to turn slightly this way. But I can simulate it really good. Hall. Never successfully bred. I'm going to turn slightly toward Giannis. I get this a lot. And I think that there's a real, there's like a lot of trepidation with parents that I think maybe didn't exist before, where parents are really worried about exposing kids to violence yes i

like i think that he really is getting at he doesn't want to ruin it later by over pushing now but in addition to his concerns i think there's a real concern where parents feel that like hunting is violent it's a violent act can Can't get around it. Um, and limiting kids exposure to violence. I think toward this idea that like, uh, they're not going to become violent people like human. They're not going to pick up like human on human violence. I've even encountered where I live. People who think that their kids like seeing a firearm is somehow going to push them in that direction. Like the only thing separating their kid from becoming a sociopath is that they haven't seen a gun yet.

And I always like to think there's a little bit more holding my kids back on that end. But yeah, I think there's a lot of fear around this. What have you, as you've dealt with it with your daughters, and I know that they've seen a lot of the tableau

i think you can do a lot worse with just what's out there on television um yeah i guess television mostly and just general media for scaring your kids away from whatever it is you don't want them to be as you know scared of you know of. If he's talking about actually painting nightmares, I don't think that's going to come from cutting a chicken's head off or gutting a deer, but it will come from something like, my kids are seriously scared of, I don't even know the name of the movie. What's the one with the little yellow characters? There's thousands of them.

Minions, yeah. They watch that shit and they are scared. They don't know what's going on. There's stuff moving fast every direction and when you're not used to that there's a lot of violence for a kids movie in there.

I think a lot more there than us at home. It's like slapsticky violence. Yeah, I think if you watch it with the critical, yeah, yeah. But still, again, stuff they're not used to because they just don't watch that kind of stuff at home. Can a non-breeder just interject quickly? Please. Please.

So I think that a lot of this is just innate in kids. Like some of them, I have friends whose kids, you can look at the kid and be like, that kid ain't gonna hunt. Yeah. Yeah. And then you got people, kids on the other end of the extreme, we're just at the cabin and you know that Matt,

our good friend Matt Drost and his daughter was there, his 11-year-old daughter. We catch an octopus in one of the shrimp pots, and she's playing with this thing. It's stickers are hanging off and crawling. And she plays with it for a half hour and then just takes a knife and cuts it down. Yeah. She lives with the reality.

She was brought up with that though i'm guessing right yeah they raised they're trying to make their non-hunting kids into hunt into hunters and they're exposing them to all of it but it's just not catching on sure you know you know there's two interesting things uh the thing like we're always like tripped up that we're in this that like now as a society we've arrived at these things that other people weren't dealing with but francis there's a historian in the 19th century historian francis parkman and francis parkman wrote at the time like the the definitive history of the french and indian war and he was asthmatic and was sent by his doctors like, you need to go out west.

So in 1846, he comes out west and visits the Black Hills of South Dakota in 1846. And now it's believed that Francis Parkman was probably in the same Oglala Sioux camp, that Crazy Horse was probably 13 or 14 years old and that he was traveling with crazy horse and he would describe how joyfully the Sioux children would torment everything that they found that was alive with toy bows just it was just like if it moved you went after with your toy boat and he took it to be that it was just like a if it moved, you went after it with your toy boat. And he took it to be that it was just like a training thing. And there's a documentary that's about first contact groups in South, first contact groups in the Brazilian rainforest. And the kids in those

communities, you are brought up to bring stuff home and jab it and jab every little thing you can find. And so I think now, like when we look at, now, if I look at my kid and my kid, like, he's very aware of hunting, really interested in hunting. I mean, all three of them are, but the oldest one's more, he just puts a lot more together because he's older. He has this thing now where he's like, he knows we hunt. He's done some hunting. He's hunted small game. He sees it. He he wants to get it and you might be like oh you know we've created this demon well i don't know like are you criticizing all those like all all those other cultures who cultivated that and children like you're gonna learn a skill set

you're gonna learn a skill set this way you know like as much as we would disapprove it now what do we do when we were kids oh we had that the what do we hunt the the mode of being a kid that you just described where yeah we hunted chipmunks if there's a lower chamber in hell for people that wantonly kill rodents it was just like it was like you wanted to hunt and it's like all the other stuff that later gets piled on top of that all that all the ideas of of use and ethics and all stuff at the time was just not there at the time it's like all the other stuff that later gets piled on top of that, all the ideas of use and ethics and all that stuff, at the time it was just not there. At the time it was like there's certain people who just want to engage in the activity and learn it.

And that was how you learned it. Later you learn all the things that make it what it is. So I don't think it's necessarily like, I don't view it as a thing I need to shield my children from. There are things that they, like you saw, my boy, for whatever reason, he doesn't like to see sea cucumbers get harmed. Same kid that'll go down to the ocean,

collect all kinds of eels and little fish and put them in a bucket to suffocate overnight. Yes. And you're like, hey man, let's let those go. They're a slug. They're gonna die. And he's like. But a seagullull or I'm sorry,

a sea cucumber, he wept over the death of a sea cucumber. So I don't know. I don't run around spending a ton of time, like thinking that there's something wrong with what seems to be like really natural things about my kids. And I do put a ton of weight on what were my experiences and what are the experiences of the people that I love and associate with the most. And the people that I associate with the most and that I love the most grew up around catching fish, cutting them up and cleaning them, shooting squirrels, cutting up and cleaning them. And they turned into, like despite all of it, turned into like the most stellar individuals

that I've found on the face of the planet. So I'm just not gonna now like buy into this idea that we need to question it all. We took some folks into the Frank Church wilderness a couple of weeks ago. One of which was a pescatarian that had never killed her own fish. So he took care of that.

And another gal who had never caught or killed a fish. But can you explain that? So she was just eating fish, not eating... It was the only protein, yeah. And this is, because I put out a big spread for the first night. The only animal protein. Yeah, only animal protein, yeah.

And I took it to me and like, oh, you just don't like processed food. I was like, I got moose, I got all this. And it was sweet, but it was like, no, I can eat none of that. And that's where the last silver salmon of the year came in but um so it was an amazing amazing thing and these gals are in their mid 30s caught their first fish killed their first fish with shaking hands coached them through cleaning these trout. And

that was very tough, but I haven't opened up the stomach contents and look at stuff. And that actually made things better by turning it into a little bit more of a science project. So that might be a good tip for this fellow but i have women are vicious okay they are crazy like there is something in the brain that when they know they can provide man it i've seen it before and on this trip was no different once these gals had caught cleaned cooked on the campfire and eaten their own fish and actually shared the fish with others there's no doubt in my mind they would have sat there and cleaned that lake out yeah like to the point hey we've caught enough fish or you you said like you basically said you know it

is okay for there to be some brutality in your life yes and it was this quick connection going to like providing for yourself and it's food yeah and oh i can aid it you know the whole process they're like oh out of the lake into the the fire, food. They would not have stopped. They had to be forcefully removed from the lake. I'm doing a follow-up because what I do worry about, and I'd like to hear your take, is that, because I don't worry about, you know, painting their nightmares with deer guts and blood,

but I do worry about pushing it too hard. And then I has a couple friends that have you know adult kids now that aren't really hunters they hunt a few days a year and because it got shoved down there yeah they just were pushed too hard as youngsters and so i do worry about that more and really try to you know balance it out with you know dance class and um you know other things that little girls like and then we have hunting and fishing you know, balance it out with, you know, dance class and, um, you know, other things that little girls like, and then we have hunting and fishing, you know, and I try to really balance it. And so, and not jam it down their throat. Yeah. I think about that and I know people say it and I've even

said it before, but I feel like, um, I kind of view it like with our kids, I'm like, they're either going to be, let's do this full balls or not you know and so i haven't really worried that much about being really careful about like oh you know we're gonna be on the water an hour and if you want to stay i'm gonna get you off because i don't want to burn you out i just haven't thought about like i know people say it but i've pushed them because i think a big thing that i want to expose them to through hunting and fishing is i want to expose them to through hunting and fishing is I want to expose them to ideas about like being comfortable being uncomfortable okay so like

getting used to the idea that when you're uncomfortable you're still okay that when you're bored you're still okay that these are things that that lead to other things right that there's like you you pass through this and come out the other side and it? That there's like, you pass through this and come out the other side and it's like more amazing than anything you could have imagined. So if I just went up and set it up that everything was like this like really easy time.

No, I don't think you want to make it like an always like a success or always an easy time, but you know, not hunting fish, you know, 21 days in a row. Yeah, no, I got what you're saying. Like, yeah, okay, that you're saying like yeah okay that you're only read hunting stories at night you know throw out you know no more james and giant peach we'll just read about the coon coon hunters yeah no no i am sensitive to that i thought you're saying

something different i am sensitive to that like like i do really want well-rounded and it's like in my setup in my way my life structure I can't escape the well-roundedness. I don't have, we're not like in a place and sort of in a professional space where we could just do that one thing all the time. I think like, I think we get a lot of, that I've gotten a lot of mileage out of is that hunting and fishing has really opened up a lot of conversations and gives you a template to discuss a lot of things that are otherwise very difficult to discuss. I remember we were cleaning perch with my boy. He's seven now. He was four or five. We're cleaning perch and we're looking at'm like, you know. And he, and I was explaining, I'm like, she lays them out on the rocks on the bottom of the river,

and he comes in and just sprays the milk or semen on those eggs, and that's how it's fertilized. And it was like, it just took a second for him to think that that delivery mechanism would not work with human beings and i then i had like then i explained him like the the the difference right there's this other way of delivering the sperm more directly to the egg and the next day day, he... Maybe you can explain that to Ryan and me. Yeah, I keep needing to change where I'm aiming, so I'm not going to aim back this way. You got a packer.

The next day, I overhear him. he's explained this to his nanny and he says, and my mom did that three times. So it does. Yeah. This gives you like, like I think with everything, man, like set, you know, it's like the old like sex and death, right? Like death, sex, violence. but everything man like sat like you know it's like the like sex and death right like death sex violence it just gets gets you in a way of it just like opens up all this way to have all these

conversations and that just like based off like books you're reading you're like looking at like actual real shit on the land or on the ground or in the water and you're talking about like real things that have major implications so if there is some added risk that you're going to raise a sociopath because you guys went and flayed a perch, I don't know. I just don't think it's a real issue. I'm done. What was that? Everybody tracking?

Does anybody have a big thing they need to add, question? Everyone's tracking. Go ahead. What is the thing you got to add? What is each of your favorite animals to hunt? All-time favorite game animal. What are you looking at, Yanni? Nothing really.

Now I'm just thinking if you should give them hell or not for asking that question. Matt? Oh, nothing really. Now I'm just thinking if you should give them hell or not for asking that question. Matt, I know what yours is. Well, it's a difficult question because there's like elk hunting, which is just not fun, but it's like what I do most of the time. But you recognize it just sucks. Yeah, it's a vision quest.

It's not intended to be enjoyable. But just pure enjoyment enjoyment like squirrels probably yeah just as like having fun yeah yeah for me it used to be like i after having done it a handful of times it was dull sheep but now i think that like um i really i just really enjoy hunting mule deer because i like to spend a lot of time sitting up on a glass and tit just watching you know and it's like glass yeah it's like pretty like there's a lot of opportunity there's a lot of opportunities in a lot of places and i just like to i just i like those days where the day just passes and you just observe and um and mule deer like really lends itself to that you're kind of being most constructive I like those days where the day just passes and you just observe. And mule deer really lends itself to that.

You're kind of being most constructive. Sometimes you're being most constructive by just not doing anything. Just watching, watching, watching. So yeah, deer, muleys. Spotting it before your buddy. That's what it's all about. When I had dogs, I would have traded anything for bird hunting um the yeah i don't i mean i'd i'd truly enjoy it all it's very very tough but yeah mule deer is is absolutely my most favorite thing in the world when I'm hunting mule deer.

It's not like I'm ever thinking about being some other place. But I love calling things in. You know, ducks, geese, elk, deer, whatever. So that's not an answer. Everything. Yeah. Give me a lot of vacation time and I'll fill it. Bugling bulls, for sure.

Really. Bugling. That's real precise. I like that. You're welcome. What are your thoughts on hunting? This guy has a lot of questions. I feel like he's got a little bit of an axe to grind. Justin Burden, maybe.

Not in a bad way. What are your thoughts on hunting? He points out white-tailed deer in the preserve so he's talking about like animals raised in the pen raise environment like a high wire deer hunt yeah what are your thoughts on that like hunting fenced up animals for me i'd like i'd put it more on the grocery side of things than the hunting side of things. Yeah, it's called farming. Like, that's the only problem I have with it, is the confusion they're creating between farming and hunting.

But there's the added level of then, the action is very similar, right? You right you just like go and kill this farm race thing but then in post when it's consumed or talked about the farm animal remains the farm animal and it's just eaten but the supposed hunted behind high fence animal sort of might have this that dude is a tool if he tries to talk be like yeah and there i was i knew there was a fence just a little ways down i mean that's what i'm saying is it's it's it is the same but it's not the same so it might even be worse somehow it's like morally worse worse than farming but you have farm animals on your property and

i've gone out with you and shot them in the head with the 22 lambs right it just for me it's like there's no confusion between that right we're talking about a situation here now that has all the trappings of hunting but it's not hunting but i don't get confused by it there's a fence but why do people why do people like create the confusion uh yeah i don't get confused by it there's a fence but why do people why do people like create the confusion uh yeah i don't know well then you can blow this thing way up right and you talk about south africa and it's like well yeah but it's 20 000 acres of fenced yeah right but is that the i mean that's not really question I don't know. There's an enormous gray area. I put it to Jim Poswitz, who's kind of a hunting philosopher.

I put the question about it to him. And I was pointing it to him where I was saying, no one would say that you're bad if you raise sheep in a pen and shoot sheep and eat them. There's no ethical, that's nothing ethically wrong. That's just how we get meat. It's like farming, right nothing ethically wrong that's just how we get meat it's like farming right ethically a-okay but why do when a guy raises up a deer puts camouflaged clothes on goes through some of the sort of like some of the ghost adopts many of the trappings of hunting shoots the pandeer and then positions it as being that he hunted it

like why does that feel wrong like why does that feel wrong well i don't think it's wrong i don't think any of it of his unethical it's all the the first part of it that's all his own business and then the last part where he reacts like he hunted it that's just annoying i don't think of it as an ethical issue yeah not yeah, but he had a really interesting point about the business. Poswitz had an interesting point about the business of selling wild animals. So where you take wild animals,

raise them in a captive environment, and then sell hunts for those wild animals. What he doesn't like about it, and he doesn't pass a moral judgment. He says there's many ways to get meat. But what he doesn't like about it, and he doesn't pass a moral judgment. He says there's many ways to get meat. But what he doesn't like about it, and it was kind of the most interesting take on it that I've ever heard,

is Paz was pointing out, what they're selling, they're selling the idea of a wild animal. The animal that you've got in the fence only has value because it still brings to mind or is associative of wild animals. People don't pay to come shoot steers. Right.

So when you sell the opportunity to come shoot a deer, you're saying like, I'm taking a thing that has value because of the real version, that we've made a moral financial commitment to have wildlife, and it's created value for this animal. I'm taking that thing of value, putting it in an artificial sense, and capitalizing on the value that wildness has created to sell to you. And that's where he finds the offensiveness is like the the the sort of false marketing that's going on there right but it's kind of a victimless crime i mean it's like you're only just it's just mental masturbation if a guy wants to do it it's not hurting anybody until you

begin to look at and this is the point that he again if you were to put this to jim poswitz it's a victimless crime until you get to look at issues of disease right then disease transmission which is becoming a major issue with captive deer point taken so here you're in a situation where you're taking the essence of wildness selling that to someone in a situation that is threatening the existence of the outside of wildness that we're all acknowledging we value anyways by creating a fake version inside for sale. Yeah. Couldn't agree more.

Tricky shit. Essence of wildness. Should be a meat-eater branded cologne. All right, we're out of time. One more question, Steve. Oh. I was curious. The last podcast came out and I didn't have a chance to issue a question.

But when you're on an unlimited sheep hunt, you've got to check into the quota, right? And I've answered the question for myself, but you didn't answer it on the podcast. How do you see if the quota has been filled? Were those two sheep shot? And you've got to have a radio. Is that right? And then they put that out at noon. How's that? Oh, yeah, that's an interesting question. So he's referring to, there are, and it's not just the unlimited sheep units. There are a lot of hunts where they'll have a unit, there's black bear units like this, all kinds of areas, where they have like a minimum, they have a maximum mortality threshold that they're going to achieve in a population. And so sometimes it's limited to females, like you might have a mountain lion unit where they have a maximum female mortality threshold of three. So the season's going to stay open until they hit that cap.

And in those situations where you're hunting in one of those units, you need to stay apprised of whether the season's still open. And they'll usually make it that they're going to be like, that it closes on 48-hour notice. So someone kills the third female, let's say, and they'll usually make it that they're going to be like that it closes on 48 hour notice so someone kills the third female let's say they'll put out a notice and you have 48 hours let's say you're on a 10-day hunting trip um how do you know and you either you got to make a phone call so you either walk out and you know go to a pay phone, like in the old days,

or now a lot of people carry satellite phones. Or you time your thing out where you know that you can check it at the trailhead, and it's still open, so you know that you have at least 48 hours, and then you need to recheck again. In those quota system things, it's your responsibility to be constantly checking in to make sure the quota threshold hasn't been met. I know Pete Munich. Pete Munich, yell out.

Is it sat phone? Pete Munich didn't come? He left. Is Kurt here? It is the hunter's responsibility. Is it sat phone? I thought they had a radio station that would, you know, you pull up your little radio. Oh, Kurt?

And they play it at, say, noon or whatever time it is. That's what I read. I was just curious. Yeah, no, I'd like to hear from Kurt, but he's dead. Matt, any concluding thoughts? Oh, man. That was kind of a conversation stopper. It was rough. I guess, no.

I came in hard. I enjoyed chatting with you all in front of a bunch of people with a bright light in my face. No big meaning of it all, thanks. No, I don't have some big, some big, like, umbrella statement that I could make. Sorry. You didn't tell me I had to be prepared to do that. You know what I was going to ask you, but we ran out of time,

is a dude named Joe March had this. What makes a good human being? So I'm tempted to, like, you know, hold court about, like about Kant's categorical imperative or Nietzsche's idea of a ubermunch or something like that. But I think I'm just going to offer not what is a sufficient condition for being a good human being, but I'll offer what is a necessary condition. And I'd say that that's supporting public lands.

That was good. So, Callahan, we're going to run with what makes a good human being as the concluders. What makes a good human being? Patience. Really? What if you're patiently waiting to kill a small child? Well, perhaps in that situation, while you are waiting there for your opportune moment, you have an epiphany and move on.

Yeah? Can I go with trust and commitment? Yeah, you got to flesh it out a little bit. I mean, they can't just like... Are you? Because I just feel like it's a little, not soft, but it's a little bit like, I'm like, yeah,

the white supremacists have that. Matt just made two good concluding thoughts. I just feel like that, if you have those two things, man, you can kind of tackle anything and continue on and do well and

think all things that you try and relationships and jobs and the universe and i agree but you're taking for granted an enormous amount that they're trusting and committing to a thing that is that is of good that's true um because i had look i had the luxury to like think about this because i'm the guy with the computer with the questions on. And I'm like... That's an unfair advantage. You get to sound way more prepared. Well, yeah, I don't want you to think... Don't think I spent too much time on this.

We were just kind of still doing this. My wife can vouch for me. I was messing with this. Just so the audience is aware, I don't have any... I'm flying off the cuff here. I did think about this one, because I questioned whether it was like, you know, within our Bailiwick, right? Like, I questioned whether it was...

This question? Yeah, like, does it fit the theme? What the show is about? Right. And no. But there's something really seductive about it it's just like six clean words man and like what makes a good human being and when i had the luxury of thinking about this you guys didn't have i'd be like a thing i kept thinking is like what level of fine

tuning are we in while i'm talking with this please think about the commitment stuff because i do want to hear more but like to be like what level of fine tuning when we make a show we start out where we're talking like big huge problems things and then later like you know that like second can we change that second so that second you know where you like you're so like so a good human being i'm like are we what where is he now to begin sort of shaping him and advising him? And the reason I was thinking about that is like, up until a couple days ago, I wouldn't think that I had to be like,

oh, don't be a white supremacist. Right. There's a starter, right? You're saying the guy asking the question, you don't know where he is. Yeah, you'd be like, yeah. But now I'm like, oh, so we're starting out like, we're starting out like really broad, basic shit. And we're not able to hone in on the fine-tuned details.

You don't know if he's at the Ten Commandments level or if he's kind of further down the road in his journey. We're honing in on where Giannis is. Giannis is taking this great guy, right? And he's being like, yes, trust and commitment. You've got it. You're heading in the right direction. So yeah, if I think about what makes a good human being,

I'll tell you a thing I like in people, that I like in people when someone holds this contradiction where they're really steadfast, okay? But also really open to all the ideas floating around. But all the ideas floating around don't make them be like this, right? The ideas floating around make them just be like this, right? Can you see that my hands even move from side to side? Like, you know?

And that's a thing i like that's a thing i like that i think about and strive toward and like and just try to keep in mind as a guiding thing of like just being aware of all these things and and and enjoying the movement rather than you know our father hated movement right like he hated if you thought like if you thought something that these he didn't like it that you would deviate i like your yeah i like your what you're saying like uh all your beliefs are at least somewhat contingent but you believe in them real hard. Somewhat. Quite a bit. Anybody have a concluding thought?

I can't add to it. You know what I add to it? No, no. I feel like that was sufficient. Concluding thought. So what would you say to someone, specifically a woman, that was a hunter before and still is

but has a hard time hunting after giving birth? Because of the beauty of life? Yes. I wouldn't urge you to go hunting. I don't know what, I think that some things that happen to people are

pretty, like I don't, It's a legitimate question though, right? Yeah, I think it's a great question. i don't probably like a legitimate thing though right yeah i think it's a great question i don't think anybody that should doesn't want to go hunting should go home it's not that i don't want to i think and i tell my husband this is like once you've given life it's harder to take a life which sounds ridiculous but no i think i've heard this from other women before. You just watch the whole process play out, and it gives it like a level of sanctity.

And it's not anti-hunting, because we live off the meat, and we process it ourselves, and so it's not anti-hunting at all, but it's almost harder for me to be able to go hunting now after giving birth to a human being. No objections. Continue to support public lands.

Be patient. Be in tune to the idea that you might shift on that, but then remain steadfast and focused. All right, thanks for joining us. Hey, folks, exciting news for those who live or hunt in Canada. You might not be able to join our raffles and sweepstakes and all that because of raffle and sweepstakes law, but hear this. OnX Hunt is now in Canada.

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