The MeatEater Podcast - Ep. 225: An Expensive Episode

Episode Date: June 15, 2020

Steven Rinella talks with Adam Weatherby, Kevin Wilkerson, Luke Thorkildsen, Ryan Callaghan, Brody Henderson, Phil Taylor, and Janis Putelis.Topics discussed: boring stuff about beer; Elmer Fudd is now disarmed, Steve in small claims court; the Long Tong Song (credit to Andy Martin); indirectly talking to your boyfriend through a baby cat voice; Kevin regenerating his thumb; Jani bars; Rinella-Putelis 2020 and MeatEater's goal to open up more access to public land; Cal's gluteal crease; proof loads and ballistics; why breaking in your rifle is actually important; getting a solvent buzz off gun cleaning chemicals; our new Weatherby Vanguard MeatEater Special Edition rifle; hammer forging barrels; the one song Doug Duren ever finished; and more.To learn more go to weatherby.com or sportsmans.com/meateater 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.

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Download the Hunt app from the iTunes or Google Play Store. Know where you stand with OnX. Okay, Cal, go on. First tell people what you were saying really boring stuff about beer. Yeah, I mean this is road well traveled here. We're not

cutting a new trail. We're talking about how the perception is an IPa must take a lot of time um because of the complex flavors and uh how powerful the beer seems but in reality like a pilsner is so highly refined it takes takes a lot more time to produce than an IPA. And, you know, like your German beer circles, there's, you get a lot more respect for producing some highly refined Pilsner. So it takes more skill to make Miller Lite than a triple IPA. Whoa.

Let's tackle that. Whoa. Your Miller Lites, your Coors Lites, I think they fall in a different category. Just to piggyback on top of that, pilsners are lagers, so they're cold. They're cold fermented, so it takes more time for the yeast. But that's part of why it takes so long, is the yeast. Some professionals here. I would rather hear people. You don't Some professionals here. I would rather hear people...

You don't even need fire. I would rather hear people say... I'd rather go around the room and have everybody say, like, when I cut my toenails, I like to do... And have them go through the order that they do their toenails.

And then the next person says, well, I like it to do the same way. Or I start on the left and go it's like i just what brought this up is um kind of the the the drink i'm having my wife drinks a shitload of uh chalotas which is it's beer and comodo juice it. I guess it makes a little salt. And we were, um, her, her, her birthday happened not long ago, but I had to go away on her birthday early in the morning. And so we had been turkey hunting and I

arranged it when we got back from camping, turkey hunting on the doorstep would be like a care package of things that I know she likes. And one of the things I know she likes is Budweiser gelato, or so I thought. So we get home and there's like flowers, fancy chocolates, and a six-pack of Bud gelato Tallboys.

So the next day on her actual birthday, I totally forgot about her birthday and called her once to complain to her about something that I thought she did and didn't do. Um, and she was nice. And I called back a minute later and she's like, oh, he must have remembered that it's my birthday. But instead I was calling her to tell her a different thing I wanted her to do. At which point she got real, uh, mad that I had again, forgotten all about her birthday. And I pointed out that I hadn't, I had just celebrated it the day before and reminded her about the bud

geladas. And she pointed out that she drinks bud light geladas. So it didn't even really count. Fail. Fail. So now I'm drinking. So now you're drinking them. I went home and found it in the fridge.

It's a tall boy bud. And now I'm having it. So now you got the full strength gelada. I rather enjoy it in the fridge. It's a tall boy bud, and now I'm having it. So now you've got the full strength Chilada. Mm-hmm. I'd rather enjoy it. Good stuff. I don't know if you guys heard this. This is an interesting thing to talk about for a second here.

I didn't know anybody did this. They redid Bugs Bunny and Elmer Fudd. Are you aware of this? Yeah, it's kind of all over the news. Oh, but they made a conscious decision that Elmer Fudd has no gun. Correct. So he still has dynamite. He still has high-intensity explosives.

You know, funny stuff. They're also going to allow him to hunt Bugs Bunny with a scythe. Yeah. As if that's like... So he totes so much worse. Elmer Fudd now totes a scythe. He's been disarmed and like the creators of this cartoon show are basically no we're not doing guns he still orders stuff like they're

still doing the acme products but man a couple things is all the best jokes were about the guns like your barrel getting tied in a knot that's that that joke never gets old and then when he's down in the appalachia they have like the blunderbusses and people put their fingers in the end of the barrel and all that. That's all it takes. But what's interesting, the first thing I thought about it, I don't know if anyone's made this connection, is there's a term. If you're a dude who just thinks about guns through the lens of hunting, you run the risk of being called a fud meaning you're not like supportive enough of gun rights because you just like hunting guns and it's bad to be a fud and here it's like it's almost like uh what happened to elmer fudd is what they say will happen to all

fuds you'll get like disarmed so now here the poster boy for being a fud has been disarmed on the Bucks Bunny show. It feels to me like, you know. Like it's all coming true. It's got me feeling circumspect, man. A guy wrote in, he got, a guy wrote in that got fish cuffed which is interesting he was uh he's a long haul trucker and he carries a tackle box around and stuff because he likes to stop fish and he was in the dakotas and he goes in his tackle box to get out of rapala and he's like it's like real he says he describes it as a beautiful COVID-19 evening, meaning apparently no one's anywhere around.

Trips and falls and snags both his thumbs on the Rapala. Whoa. But his phone's in his back pocket. And his hands are so snagged, he can't even get them out of his back pocket. And he's like bleeding all over the place and trying to wave people down. He needs to raise both of his bloody hands.

So he needs to raise both his bloody hands in the air to try to get help, which he says wasn't working. And eventually he finds his way down to a bar. And everybody was so excited about their bar being back open again that he was able to get himself taken care of in north dakota um cal's got big news go ahead cal where do you want me to start like you're this is your this is your um

you know this is like your thing. You want to talk? The passage of the... Oh, okay. What news are you going to share with me? Have you been going on some hot dates? Is that the news you're going to share with us? Oh, yeah. I'm sorry.

That's right. Great American Outdoors Act. Which one do you want to start with? We can start with Great American Outdoors Act. That's a great one so you know we've been harping on this for a long time because it's um contains it's a big package that has a ton of bipartisan support and it but even even though that existed, we still needed it to be introduced for consideration, basically. Word came down that Mitch McConnell was going to actually introduce the Great American Outdoors Act. We all got super excited. little bit of uncertainty that if it hit the floor because there was so much support

um that the little bit of dissenting voice out there their only opportunity to stop this public lands uh this very beneficial to people who like to be outside public lands beneficial package their only way to stop it would be to filibuster so the package gets introduced and somebody has to say yeah you want to debate this and during that debate situation is when somebody could stand up and be like yeah hey i I got something I want to talk about and just go until you can never get a vote. Right. But what happened instead was they immediately go, go directly to a vote. Uh, instead it's called Clouture, Clouture.

Um. That sounds like a kind of drink. Yeah. Like a, I'm drinking a Clouture. Um, uh, and so you, you, everybody, and there's a big, very, uh, supportive very supportive vote, 80 to 17, I think, that said, yes, let's move this thing on. So now it's done or it's not done? It is not done.

I sometimes have a hard time with news stories because I think that they're done, but they're not done. Yeah, well, I did this post on Instagram that was like, hey, go check this out because I want you to be involved. And everybody's like, yeah, we won. Well, until this second, I thought we had one. Yes, so sorry. Well, the House has passed it, right? No. No.

No, they voted. So the Senate, because Senator Heiner sent me a text with the results. They just voted to vote. Yes, to skip the debate portion, it's going to come back out early next week for the actual vote.

So it's still very much a, you know, stay on your elected officials. By the time you're hearing this, it's all history. Do you think the overwhelming majority to vote to vote is a good sign? Yes, I would take it as a good sign because it eliminates one of the threats, which would be just the thing being filibustered.

And for the sake of moving on with everything else that's going on in the country, we just got to blow past this good thing, which um so yeah it's it's a good thing it's it's very much progress right now there's a bunch of uh republicans and democrats that have basically said yes we want to see movement on this thing um and that right there was an opportunity to stall it and open it up so and there's only 17 dissenting voices and um of those 17 you know there's folks that are you know adamantly against against any sort of support for public lands, you know, kind of anti... Who you'd expect. Yeah, so really Mike Lee, Utah's...

Oh, so he didn't like it. No, no. And he's one of the folks that has been, you know, he'll let you know that he doesn't like it. But did people not like it from both spectrums? Or was all the dislike coming from One Direction? Most of the dislike is coming from One Direction. And because there's no, like, list of these 17 that I've been able to find.

Oh, it should be available, right? Well, because it's not. Yeah. It's not out. You haven't found it or whatever the hell. Yeah. But Ted Cruz, right? Hold on, he didn't like it?

He don't strike me as a real outdoorsman, to be honest with you. He doesn't see the sun a lot. We can tell that. You know, his famous quote is, Texas has 2% public lands, and that's 2% too much. Hmm. So he's not going to be voting on behalf of public lands. Where the hell do these kids go out on their little scooters or whatever?

Where do they wind up? Well, I mean, that's the hard part about doing this conservation work and working with people that don't want to... They can fight against all this public work stuff. I mean, vehemently and ardently and just rally hard against it but at the end of the day they still get to go out and use it they still get to go take in those probably people they're so um pure so pure that they would be like i don't like it and i won't even go on it yes for sure that exists oh yeah yeah um so so what happens now now it goes to the house yeah and it uh

they they should wrap this thing up on uh tuesday or wednesday is is the word on this on the hill and then there will never be another problem. This is it. Then we get a win. No, because then it'll have to go to the Senate. Yes. No, I thought it was passed on. Jeez, you guys. Who's the preliminary vote?

No. This is not the preliminary vote. This was, we're bringing this thing out onto the floor for debate. Okay. We voted to say we are not going to have a debate. We want to go to a vote. Okay. We're like, great.

We're going to bring this bag out next week, and we're going to vote so everybody can study up on this. This is the House, correct? Oh, do you think that this- And then it's going to go to the Senate. Yes. I'm right. Oh, yeah. He did say this.

Yeah. Great American Outdoors cloture vote. 80 to 17. Cloture. I didn't notice that part. Oh, yeah. He did say this. Yeah. Great American outdoors cloture vote. 80 to 17. Cloture. I didn't notice that part. Clouture, I think, is what it is. Clouture. Yeah.

I mean, we get it all from the French. So, is there a chance that they were voting to debate it? Yes. But when they vote for real, it might be unanimous. It could very well be unanimous. It could very well, um, be some, a little bit of political games of like, um, I'm going to be a nice person and push it this way. So everybody knows, but then I might dingy in the back when we go to the actual vote. Um, you know, there's, there's a a lot of stuff that's still up in the air.

So, yeah, I mean, it's another deal. Like, we had an incredible amount of outpouring from, you know, people that listen to the show and listen to the Week in Review and follow everybody's social channels. I was talking about the Great American Outdoors Act. An incredible amount of people wrote in and said, you know, I have never, ever done this before, but I actually got a hold of my senator.

You want to know something interesting? Yanni called his, tell him, Yanni. I called Representative Gianforte. Yep. Left him a message at his Washington, Gianforte. Yep. Left him a message at his Washington, D.C. office. It was a weekend. It was Saturday, so I just got a voicemail. Not a voicemail. I left a voicemail

on a machine. He's like, Greg, this is Yanni. Yeah. What's up? I live just down the street from you. Bozeman, Montana. All I gave him was my name and the city that I lived in, and then on Monday I received an email from his office saying, thanks for

reaching out. That's customer service. I don't know what kind of technology if that's what you want to call it. That's next level customer service. They actually were able to find you on his email and email him. Yes. Are you not getting the newsletters? I've emailed them before. I already previously had you on record.

That is a solid CRM. But even then, even then. Follow up. I was impressed. Man, yeah. I like when little things make you feel proud of our system. When I took someone to small claims court, I walked away feeling I was patriotic for months after that. What happened?

I had a dispute with a landlord and uh the house i was renting burnt down i thought well since it burnt down i feel like it wasn't my fault someone else they knew what caused it the house burned down i was like i feel like i should get like my rent back because i didn't burn it down but now i can't go into it because it's burnt down and they're basically like no and that was really getting on my nerves. And I eventually got them in small claims court. And the judge spent the whole time yelling at them. And you just sat there? I just sat there.

And the judge is like, you've got no problem. The checks come rolling in and you just cash them and then there's a problem. And then, duh, duh, duh, duh, duh. And just, I almost started to feel bad for the person i never said anything the judge was so irritated by them he prorated the month or whatever judge like give him his money yeah cool the judge like all they do is yell at the person god bless america that's the justice system the judge is kind of like, what? Yeah.

What? Yeah. You have nothing. What are you even talking about? Yeah. That's great. Yeah. So I guess let's recap here.

Senate voted. To not clouture. No, to clouture. All right. Now, if there's going to be a vote next week, that is a vote vote. Like, yays, nays to move this bill on. You know, the final step is the executive branch, right? This bill's got to hit Trump's desk, and he's got to sign it.

Yeah, he'll sign it. Yeah, I mean, he's voiced public support for this already. Yeah, and he'd be overridden anyway. Well, it's very, you know, this is something everybody wants right now. Yeah, and it's coming out of his, and it's got big support from the interior department anyway, so. Yeah. Good. Okay, now tell us about the next thing, Cal. Or do we want to take a break and talk about the song about Yanni?

Is it too much news? Is it too much news in a row if Cal goes into more news? I like the idea of breaking it down. Depends. Is it an uplifting story like the one that he ended with last time we were all together? It's up. Yeah, I'd say it's uplifting. You want to do the land access that's what i want to talk

about now let's break it up and talk about yeah because we got to talk about another song later so i feel like rather than talking about two songs later which i thought would be a good idea a minute ago now i want to talk about one song now where uh yanni i wrote i started trying to work on a song about yanni set to the Ballad of Davy Crockett and someone found or someone did it better on, what's it on Phil?

Reddit. Can you play it for us real quick? Yeah. They didn't strum along or anything. The Latvian eagle has a keen game eye. He wears a power ring. It makes him extra sly his trekking poles known for making big bears cry if you hear a blouch kiss your ass goodbye Yanni Yanni Chimani he's one hell of a guy it's really nice man I mean just everything about it just came

uh right together. Yanni Chimani, the way the song came about is we were in Bolivia with the Chimani tribe, and I was going to write a song about if Yanni decided never to go home. Yeah, but I think that was spurred on by, because you were having a lot of thoughts and visions. You like to play a sort of like what-if game with yourself. I like to call them sort of like what if game with yourself i like to call mind movies and it involved like you know if something were to happen to my wife and my family and i had to restart again i'd do it down here be down here because a lot of what we saw they don't no there's nothing wrong with it but they don't keep up their homesteads or

their villages the same way that we do here in the states a lot and i really wanted to clean everything up you really wanted to like spruce it up so you had these visions and organized grand visions of you know giant villages all nice and tidy and lawn mowed the fishing equipment organized that's right and um i don't know i guess from there when you realize that wasn't going to really happen then you spawn that into the song yeah it was all about yanni but and that's we came up with yanni chimani the best part of that trip uh i don't want to name who it was one of the guys we work with had just had to had just had to call it off with a girlfriend. Do you think we're okay to talk about this?

Oh, yeah. He'd had to... We got some intros we got to do. He'd had to call it off with a girlfriend because... It's a weird reason to have to call it off with someone. One of our guys is dating a girl who had a cat, a house cat. And she would talk to him as though speaking through the cat in a baby voice.

In a cat baby voice. In a cat baby voice. This is someone whose nickname is familiar to everyone, right? Well, I'm going to give him a different name right now. Okay. Let's say his name's Dave. So if Dave was laying there and the cat was there, she would be across the room and she'd be like, Dave, I'm here to be pet.

Okay. And he couldn't handle it. And he had to call it off so what happened though while we're down there the chimani were explaining to us that there's a woman that will go into the river it's a it's a demon like a like a extra what's where i'm looking for? Spirit? A spirit. A spirit that goes into the river. An evil spirit. A beautiful woman. A beautiful nude woman will go into the river and pretend to drown. And she'll seduce men to come out to save her.

And then she'll grab them and pull them under the ground. Aren't they called sirens? Yeah, it's like a mermaid. It's like a mermaid siren thing. So somehow, Phil's story about the cat and this woman got conflated to it became that there is a woman

in the river who goes, Phil! I'm drowning, Phil! Call the safe! You gotta redo it now with Dave I thought it was Dave I thought it was Dave so we reimagined it we reimagined it where

these two things got conflated to where there was a siren who would go in the river and be Dave come save me I'm drowning Dave my feet are wet and I believe the one night that we we fished that hole until dark and then some of the chimayas had hung back and maybe even fished into the darkness and when they came back some of them were claiming that they had heard that she was yeah yeah not in her kitten voice just the regular one that they were used to you um let's do

introductions I failed to do that then we're coming back to you Cal Kevin yeah I'm Kevin Wilkerson marketing director at Weatherby do you mind recapping for people super quick about your thumb? It's not a super quick story. We talk about this all the time. This is the main thing we talk about. He talked about it today at the range. And I was like, I can't believe he brought it back up. It's the main thing we talk about. We've told at least a dozen people.

I think the first time we heard it was at my place for dinner. It was. That was the second time I heard it. Was it better the second time? Where'd you hear it the first time? I heard it the first time we heard it was at my place for dinner. It was. That was the second time I heard it. Oh. Where'd you hear it? Was it better the second time? Where'd you hear it? The first time. I heard it the first time.

No, we were. Remember when we were witness to a mild catastrophe at Sheep Show? Sheep Show. Oh, yeah. Sheep Show. I was witness to a mild catastrophe at Sheep Show. Okay. It was a catastrophe that I almost witnessed.

That inspired you to tell the story about your thumb. I guess that's true. Yeah. And then I guess when we were antelope hunting at Adam's. I asked you about it again. Oh, you to tell the story about your thumb. I guess that's true. Yeah. And then I guess when we were antelope hunting at Adam. I asked you about it again. Oh, you asked me about it again. So yeah, you've heard it a few times. That was the first time I heard it.

It's actually caused productivity issues for us. We talk about it so much. I'm glad people think it's a good story. I don't know if I believe it. And that's why I'm not going to recap it. Because it's a very unbelievable story. And I think a recap would do it no justice.

If we're going to share this story with our listeners, we got to get the whole kit and caboodle. I'll do a quick... Do you mind? You can tell it another time.

You don't need to tell it right now, but I'll tell the short version. Go ahead. Unless it makes you uncomfortable. No. Oh, heck no. I don't care. Kevin Wilkerson cut off his thumb.

Right at the knuckle. At the knuckle. And gecko-like, he regenerated his thumb. To a point, yes. And it doesn't feel quite right, but it's definitely there. Yeah. But if you look at his two thumbs, I don't think that anyone here...

Have you heard this story, Brody? Actually, I'm one of the few people who haven't. The right thumb is regrown. The left thumb is the original. Bullshit! That thing's your regular thumb. No, this is the one. No, that's a regenerated thumb. I mean, look, they're definitely different.

The thumbnail is substantially different. The nail is double times as thick. It's a regenerated thumb. I mean, look, they're definitely different. The thumbnail is substantially different. The nail is like double times as thick. It's definitely a different shape. I feel like I've been set up. No, don't even. You can see how flat it is. You gotta look close. It does have a flat hole. It doesn't have the same meat content. We call them Wolverine around the office. What I did too is I gave it a couple pokes

and I poked it and prodded it. Is it bigger than the other one? Oh yeah, it's way bigger. I can actually palm a basketball with my right hand I poked it and prodded it. Is it bigger than the other one? Oh, yeah. It's way bigger. Yeah. It grew back like one and a half size. I can actually palm a basketball with my right hand, and I can't palm a basketball with my left hand, and it's all because of the thumb being a little bit longer. Like the bionic thumb.

Yep. I got to hear the detailed version. It's a wild story. It got cut off in a grinder. I mean, it was a very, it was a gruesome accident. I think we'll have you on, and I'd like you, when you come on, I want you to tell the full thumb story and then tell the full story about the sign you found in Alaska. Okay.

But I also want to know. What about the drumstick and the eyeball? Oh, that's a good one. Oh, I like that story. And I like the stuff about catching the wild. The drumstick and the eyeball is rugged. Wow. You got some good ones.

Oh, the sign? The sign you found in Alaska? Amazing story. I actually told that story like last week. Somebody asked me about it because they were at the house. They said, hey, what's that sign? I said, oh, it's one of my best stories. You're like, grab a pulpit chair.

The pulpit chair is going to take a while. If you record it on the podcast here next time, then you can just play it out. Oh, refer people to it. Refer people to it. I could just say, yeah, it's episode XX on Meat Eater. I'm going to call that episode Calvin Wilkerson's Greatest Hits. That's all injury related except for the sign. Anyways, that's me.

Glad to be here. Oh, did you say what you do though? Oh, yeah. I'm the Director of Marketing and Customer Service at Weatherby, Sheridan, Wyoming. Okay. Luke? Luke Torkelson. I'm the vice president of sales, marketing, and product development at Weatherby.

And my thumbs have not regenerated. You just got the thumbs you were born with. The regular old thumbs. They're kind of boring. Well, Brody's here. Yep. Phil, we already heard from Phil. Brody, me and Brody just turned in a group project mostly turned in our

Wilderness Skills and Survival book, which early estimates are that it will be about 600, around 600 pages. Last one you'll ever need. That sounds like a lot of value.

But they're not going to make you split it into two like they did the complete guide to hunting. No. That's a good story for people to know because when we did our complete guide to hunting, butchering, and cooking wild game, that was intended to not be volume one and two it was intended to be one big book but that was a large format color book with the bazillion photographs in it

so the publisher was like you can't we're not going to make a 700 page book like they just don't do that especially color and big and she's like you either gotta like we gotta figure it out so you either throw half of it in the garbage or make it two and that's how you either gotta like we gotta figure it out so you either throw half of it in the garbage or make it two and that's how that came to be too well luckily i'm glad yeah but this one there's no splitting up yeah you'd have to do like nine books nine small books so giant book uh illustrations beautiful illustrations the same illustrator if you look at the complete guide, did he do illustrations in the cookbook?

I don't believe we had any illustrations in the cookbook. Yeah, but he did do, this illustrator did do Yanni's special bandana series. That's right. Yanni's how to gut a deer bandana. Speaking of Yanni, he's got a couple choice stories in the survival book. Yanni's contributions in the book are so good,

we call them... Yanni bars. Yanni bars. People are familiar with sidebars. It undersells these calls, sidebars. Oh, man. Yanni's inputs. Yanni on avalanche.

Yanni on spike camps. Yanni on all manner of things. Yeah. I feel bad I wasn't able to chip in more. Yanni on the bear on pepper spray pistol debate. That's a good one. Which he points out that one time he had his pistol and his pepper spray and a bear came at him and he grabbed his trekking pole.

Didn't use that. He's like, so when the rubber meets the road, I don't know. But in theory, here's what I was going for. But I heard a really nice compliment about that book, and so directed at you guys, was that the book was very entertaining to read and story-like, but was equally balanced with good skills and education. Yeah, it's a good combo.

I mean, stories like you were telling helped out with that yeah yanni bars yanni bars get yours um it'll be coming out it'll be a while but you know you want to hear some hard salesmanship when that book comes i'm talking to you people out there when that book comes out, make no bones about it. I'm going to come and prepare, start saving your money and stuff like that. Because when that book comes out, we got screwed out of the bestseller list with our Fish and Game cookbook. I was so excited just for personal reasons and also just for general reasons

to have it be that on the New York Times bestseller list was a Fish and Game cookbook. I could go into a long story about why. We sold plenty of books to make the list, but the way they count, they were all quick lesson on publishing here. We're getting way off track, Cal. People need to know this. So when you look at something being a New York Times bestseller, they want to see it sold from a variety of sources

because there's a thing where people can buy their own book onto the bestseller list. And now and then a book will make the bestseller list and it gets accused of bulk accounts. So because if the weather's right, you could have a nonfiction book come out and sell like 4,000 or 5,000 copies and hit the bestseller list in certain categories. So people with means have at times orchestrated their own bestsellers. Their own purchases. Where they just, they had monies on object to them and they've gamed it. So what the Times likes to see is they like to see it sold all around the country from a variety of sources. Then what they like to see is they actually do it.

So certain independent bookstores are 2X when they run their formula. We sold all the books that were in print, we sold before the book came out, all through Amazon. So by the time the book came out, it was already back-ordered thousands of copies. And we had sold enough through pre-orders to hit the bestseller list. In fact, we know the exact numbers of what the bestseller, because our publisher had a bunch of them. We know we sold more copies than books that beat us on the bestseller list, but it didn't count because they had all been single-source pre-orders through Amazon. So the numbers were not accepted.

So this time, man, we're talking about it pretty early. What is it, June? We're talking about something that's going to happen in like November or December. But get ready. Yeah. Start asking your local bookstore now. Plan on not getting it through Amazon. Is that what we need to tell them?

They just need to buy it all over. You've got to buy it from a lot of places. Two, three different copies. Multiple copies. Each person. Call up Weatherby down in Sheridan, Wyoming. Cash, debit, credit. After you order a rifle, ask them if you got Steven Reynolds' book. We're not saying don't buy it at Amazon. But if you have the

option of buying it at a bookstore, do that. No, we're going to... The problem was that the the the enthusiasm for the book do you remember we did an episode of the podcast called begging and pleading it was like basically we just told everyone what's in the book i think that to walk through this new book is going to take is going to be begging and pleading part two a and b yep you see what I'm saying? And we're going to spend two episodes walking through the book.

Everybody's got to order the book. Just prepare yourself. You'll learn a lot. I don't think it's going to be expensive. Per page, it's going to be like barely that much money per page. You're right. But I tell you what, this is going to be an expensive podcast for the viewers. Because of all the stuff they've got to do?

Oh, yeah. Yeah, we're not done. Oh, we're not done. You're not done selling. Yeah, not even close. Okay, so we've got to move on towards the sales part. We've got to introduce Adam with his 307 hat. Area code?

Yep. Okay. Not 406. 307. And not 206. And not 907. 307. One of the small. And not 907. 307. One of the small handful of single area code states.

That's right. Where residents of that state tattoo that area code onto their arm. And then I wonder, well, what happens when they split the area code? Or wear a hat. We had actually done it. That's for people who aren't very committed. We did a serial number of a gun and auctioned it off for, I don't know what, 15 grand or something? 14 or 15.

14 or 15,000 bucks because it was serial number 307. W-Y-0-0-0-3-0-7. Oh, really? Somebody paid 14, 15 grand for it. Cool. Really? Yeah. There's a large subculture of people that are obsessed with that.

Yeah. In Alaska, everybody gets 907 tattoos and whatnot. Right. But I feel that at some point they're going to split the area codes. When I was a little boy, my area code was 616. Me too.

Now it's 231. So what do I do with my tattoo then? I'd have to change it into like the Mark of the Beast? 666? Not going to do that. No.

I don't know. You're just stuck with a 616 area code. Yep. So be forewarned. Well, when people see that, they'll just be like, oh, he's code. Yep. So be forewarned. Well, when people see that, they're just like, oh, he's OG. Or you put a little number next to it and say, see footnotes, and then you can start tattooing footnotes.

Yeah, yeah. 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. Well, if you're sick of, you know know sucking high and titty there on x is now in canada the great features that you love in on x are available for your hunts this season the hunt

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As a special offer, you can get a free three months to try OnX out if you visit on X maps dot com slash meet on X maps dot com slash meet welcome to the on X club y'all so Cal the land access initiative you just came back from a location I don't know if you can tell people

what the location is or not yeah I just came back from kind of a secret mission to Maine and was working with some nonprofits. So, you know, it's essential travel. It's for the good of the people. It's work-related. It's got to be good.

Yep. It's work-related and essential for the people. So quick recap. Big thank you to everybody who's purchased Rinella Putellas campaign merch. Rinella Putellas 2020. Like we said, the proceeds from all of those sales are going to more hunting and fishing. Somehow, someway.

We're going to find access projects that provide more. That's the baseline. And we reviewed an incredible amount of submissions over the last few months and started reaching out and talking to individual project owners across the U.S. Can you remind people real quick what that process looked like for you, Cal? Like what you asked of folks. Yeah, so there was a big questionnaire and then there were follow-up questions. But, you know, essentially it was, you know, how familiar you are with the project, what it provides, like is it access to a landlocked chunk of ground?

Is it access to water? Does it provide opportunities for hunting and fishing both? What else can you do out there? What's the habitat like? Is this a habitat improvement project? Um, and really, you know, trying to whittle down to, because the hard part with this stuff is you are never, ever going to talk to somebody who's like, yeah, it's not that great of a place, but I just thought I'd throw it in there. You know, everybody is very attached to their project, their piece of ground. Uh, and they're, and they're very passionate about it. Yeah, let me take this back one quick, one step even further back than that.

What we're doing is we're, maybe you said this and I was just being stupid and didn't catch it, but we're raising money through Ranella Patel's 2020 to try to do land acquisition. Yes. And so Cal was soliciting input where people who were the eyes and ears on the landscape, people who would say, oh, you know, it'd be a sweet property if we could get it into the public domain. Yes. Sorry if you made that clear. No, that's great. I mean, um, the, you know, I'll, I'll tell you right now. And if this is you, please write in call, um, like the pie in the sky idea is someone out there listening is going to be like, oh, well, grandma or granddad there. they'd be totally happy to shave off a 20-acre long strip that connects to that huge chunk of national forest that nobody can get to or BLM or something like that and through a phone call and cutting a check.

Or wouldn't that be a sweet river access? Yes. On a chunk of river or lake where no one can get into it. Yeah, and we just make a permanent easement for the good of the public to go down there and enjoy. And then there's a huge variety of projects that came in. How many? That were more complex. complex the you know we ended up with folks that like actually were serious filled out everything uh the way you're supposed to and had an actual spot um that wasn't a mix of vague details um to details, um, to, uh, two six, two 64.

Seriously? Like two 64 full submissions. Yeah. Yeah. And, and, you know, like I said, these were the people that were, uh, serious enough to be putting in some thought and then got those, uh, down quite a bit, um, to, to something manageable.

And now you're out doing some, now you're out hitting the ground to try to get the smell of the place. Yep. And. Cal sent me a beautiful photo of a waterfall. Yeah. And he found some moose and deer tracks.

Yeah. And this place is, is pretty unique because it's a body of water, um, that is the property is contiguous and it, and it in, in the heart of this contiguous property is, uh, a small lake, a pond. Um, and, uh, it's, it's really cool. Uh, you know, our editor in chief, Anthony Licata,ata uh he worked for a very long time at field and stream uh before that publication was called field and stream it was called uh forest and stream was the predecessor to field and stream and this body of water, uh, was actually advertised as a place for folks to get out of the city and come up and fish in 1893.

No, really? Yeah. Yep. They, uh. So are you, is it secret or not secret? I don't want to say the, the actual township. Yeah. But this is, this should give plenty of idea, right? Like right now it's,

it's de facto public access. It's in, it's in Maine, but it is private property. And what a lot of folks don't realize, uh, about Maine is there is a ton of access in the state, but it is primarily private ground that just isn't posted. Got you. I don't want to get out ahead of ourselves here, but we're going to make a pledge to personally not ever go there to fish or anything. Listen to this. Because I don't want anyone to think that it was. What if Cal already fished it?

Did you already fish it, Cal? Yeah, a little bit. You got to test it, right? Well, yeah, he's just like taking it for a test ride, man. But then don't go back. 1893, this camp that they had in there fishing. 1893. Their weekend take was 500 trout.

Damn. Prolific fisher. Now, is it a property that connects to more property? Yes, it does. It does. So it does open up more access than just the property itself. It's a multi-year thing. Right now it does, you know, but like I said, there's, the convoluted part of this thing is, you know, there's groups working on providing permanent access right now there's

access to that ground but it's not permanent it's permanent in the fact that the landowners that have it now are still have the mindset that's been around maine for a long long time of i'm not using all this ground i don't need to post it. Folks want to occasionally walk through here to deer hunt or pick mushrooms or whatever. That's fine by me. Hunt grouse. We saw a ton of, ton of grouse, a ton of rough grouse. Um, and, uh, yeah, but the, the hard part is, is, is as these lands change over, right, there used to be like these giant timber company lands up there. There still are some, uh, major timber company lands. Um, that's really what people are, are doing a lot of hunting and fishing on, but it's private.

Just like you guys experience here in Western Montana, there's kind of this de facto access program. Like Weyerhaeuser lands and. Yeah. And it's been around for so long. People are like, oh, that's just, they don't even know it's private property. They think it's U.S. Forest Service ground or something like that. But it's like, it changes hands one more time. And that new buyer is like, well, no, no, no. The privacy is what I want.

It doesn't matter if I'm only there a weekend or whatever. So is the goal to get a chunk shaved off that will just allow access to the public ground that's behind it? Uh, the goal right now would be to, uh, would be to purchase this acreage that includes the pond, um, that there's a, uh,

defined easement in place right now, little parking area, um, foot it's right now it's foot access only into the pond. Um, and it, the cool part here is this township has zero public land owned by the township. And this would be the very first chunk of public land, even though like it's, it's fully documented that this township, people growing up and living and raising families there, they've, they've been utilizing this place, um, since, you know, well before 1893.

Well, 1893, it got a little publicity and forest and stream. But. Cause they toured a new one on trout. They toured a new one and they were like, bring more camps. Um, so. There's a lot we're leaving out because like little like details yeah but uh where we might land is this so we got some money in the in the in the campaign coffers yeah um but the election happens in november right so we'll take office it's like the campaign won't be going anymore um we'll have a new

secretary of ag doug duran we got our whole cabinet atf ronnie bame pat durkin secretary of the navy we got the whole cabinet filled out but in the meantime as long as you buy ronella patel's 2020 better hunting and fishing for america stuff it goes into the the our kitty of money when our kitty of money is right and we identify our place there might be a discrepancy right yes and when we identify what exactly that discrepancy is there's going to be a mad dash for to to find ways to get the support we need to push it across the finish line in a hurry. Yes. But don't dig into your book buying money.

You got to have a separate pile of money. You're going to have to, you got many piggy jars here. Or piggy banks rather. The other thing to keep in mind is, just like I said, you're never going to go out, be invited out to check out something that people don't care very passionately about. Yeah. They all have an incredible amount of value.

And I do not want people to think like this is a one and done thing like um this is uh the something the cabinet's going to push very strong for uh for uh multiple years um and hope that we can have just a long lasting program we need to get it permanently funded permanently Permanently funded, exactly. Just like LWCF. Yeah, so Cal's work on this, he's expanded, or this isn't a one-off. This is not a one-off. Cal's going to become like Ted Turner. He's going to have just ranches and stuff all over the place. The inverse of.

I'm like, yeah, I know about ranches all over the place. But yeah, so this is a cool project. Found some moose tracks. Found some deer tracks. There's a loon that comes in there every night. Did you catch any fish? One mallard in there. I long-lined released some very small brook trout.

And then, what the heck else? Two really, found two really cool frogs. Um, did a little, uh, uh, chewing on some different plant species. Uh. Did you go swimming? Is it a good swimming pond? Yeah, it would be.

It's 40 feet deep. So I wasn't jumping in the water here in June. Yeah. Yeah. You thought it would be chilly. A little chilly deep. So I wasn't jumping in the water here in June. Yeah. Yeah. You thought it would be chilly. A little chilly. Yeah. Yeah.

Were the skeeters bad? I have a mosquito bite or like right in the very top of the gluteal crease. That happens to be since I have no. So when you scratch it, people think like you're not clean. Well, yeah. And on top of that, like i don't don't have a lot of meat on my butt my pants like to ride right about there it's just it's highly irritating so as if we didn't want to shake hands for covid now we don't want to shake

cal's hand for sure exactly exactly so that's yeah when cal didn't shake had nothing to do with the global pandemic man there's a huge project in Wyoming that's very cool. Oh, really? That's being worked on by a lot of folks. Yeah. And there's a great project here in Montana that I'm actually going to have a phone call

on here this evening, too. Oh, so you haven't made the call yet, but you flew out there just to kind of feel it out. He had to scout it out. Feel it yeah all right yeah yeah cow man see if it's a right one pavement for yeah the pavement for access man yeah and then there's so much more to go like this yeah like i said we're gonna be beating on this stuff for a long time because um you know it's now or never for all of this stuff. I'd like to buy a whole state.

Would be good. Just the whole state. When you go to TheMeteor.com to buy some Ranella Patelis merchandise, don't limit yourself or don't think that you're going to limit yourself to a t-shirt. There's hats. There's brown ones.

There's blaze orange ones. Hunter's Orange for hunting season. Some bumper stickers. Bumper stickers. I think there's a small oval sticker too. There is a reusable cloth bag. If you don't like to use the old plastic bags, the grocery store. What else?

Yard signs. Do they sell those? Really? Do we have yard signs? Do the yard signs come out? I have a yard sign. I don't know if it's sold. The yard signs might be coming.

Keep your eye out for that. Yanni was a salesman for a while. Tarming and sports. I can tell. That's right. He was a salesman, and then he was a... The song that we just played is actually called Long Tongue Yanni, isn't it? Because he was a grill man.

Don't tell me, Yanni. He's a grill man at Toscanini's. Good work. Good work. And he was a salesman at Tarman Sports. And he led

in, did you lead in sales, Yanni? No, no, that wasn't me. Definitely not.

No, no. We didn't keep track. What's going on at, tell us what's going on at Weatherby. You guys are all getting all cozy in your new headquarters? Yeah, no doubt about that. We are.

We're actually. Did you get shut down? Did you get shut down? No, it's the 307. We do what we want. They still respect liberty down there. Yeah. My wife heads up HR, so that's helpful too.

You've got a direct line. No, we had... We didn't shut down, but we had... We got a big factory. We were able to kind of social distance, keep our thing going. We're cautious. We got a lot of room in there. Yeah.

Yeah, we do. I mean, it's our... You got to depend on a supply chain from around the world coming in and customers to ship to. So every day there for a while, it was a little hectic trying to figure out what's going on, but we're all healthy and we're ship to. So every day there for a while, it was a little hectic trying to figure out what's going on, but we're all healthy and we're making guns. Did you guys run into problems where components you needed were coming from places that weren't able to produce components?

Yeah. The reason I bring this up is I was at Sportsman's Warehouse. We're going fishing this weekend with the kids, so I had to go grab sinkers, bobbers, bait holder hooks, all that kind of stuff that tends to get left in all the trees around and tends to get left in the bushes around the lake. Dude, stripped clean. I mean, the store is stripped clean. I'm guessing that's a function of supply chain or no? Yeah, and demand too.

It's both. It's really both. I mean, in, in firearms right now, obviously everybody's been kind of reading. There's crazy things going on. Our, our, our product line, cause we're kind of more of a, you know, primarily hunting, you know, and less self-defense, uh, that sort of thing. So we didn't see the spike. Everybody else did.

You haven't felt it like. Same with just the sustenance and going out there and harvesting my own meat and catching my own fish and just getting outdoors finally, too. I think there's a delay on that, and people have been a little trapped. But the supply chain was certainly there. I mean, we have a lot of components, say, going to one rifle. And so, I mean, one spring can hold up a whole rifle from going out the door. But you didn't run into that.

We ran into some. Not bad. We ran into some stuff. We were kind of fortunate. Days, days, and maybe not even weeks. We were fortunate. Some of the bumps we had were the things we already had product of and the things we needed we kind of had. So we're just.

Got lucky. Yeah. Yeah. You know, I didn't really appreciate the lengths of where that, of how that stuff would affect manufacturing, but I was even trying to find a part for a jet foot on an outboard engine. Had trouble? Well, I called this guy and he's like, man, you and everybody in the country. I'm like, how many people are actually looking for like an impeller sleeve?

Because they're all gone. Really? There's like one guy in California that makes them. He can't go into his plant because there are none. If you find one, let me know. The weird demand and the supply chain stuff. And I mean, it's weird. And then of course we shipped gun dealers

around the country. And so everybody with FFLs is like, man, we had a COVID hold list of just different states and different things and who you could ship to and who you couldn't. It was definitely nuts for a while. Some of our distributors had some of their best days in history, like 10, 20, 30 of them in a row.

And so they're telling us, hey, pause for a minute on some of the hunting stuff because we got to get 9 mil and 223 ammo up in here. Yeah. Gotcha. Yep. So. That's probably cooled off. Well, I don't know. Maybe that's cooled off a little bit now.

Now we're in riot season. Yeah. I still think it's pretty hot. Yeah. It actually upticked again now with all the violence in the country and stuff. So it's – everybody's scared. Yeah. So it's – we've seen fear-bind over the years, politically driven a lot or unfortunately say after some sort of tragedy in the country, some guys come out, say we're going to pull an Elmer Fudd on you and that sort of thing and take your guns and it spikes.

And for us in our line, people are like, wow, you must be selling a lot of guns right now. We're, again, we try to make just a good quality product for you to go take in the outdoors. It's not as much that. Yes, you don't feel all that. Fear buying stuff, but it affects the whole industry. So the demand is different. What dealer stock is different, what they have, what they don't have, where their attention

is. So the whole thing kind of affects, it's just kind of a giant, you know, pool that everything kind of gets mixed up in. But for us, we just like stable, like this is what our customers want. We want to make it, we want to get it to them. So it's a, it's a little different rather than the, cause after a big high, you get a big low. That's for sure.

Cause then you get everything overstocked, everybody discounts it, rebates it. And so it's a little messy. So we just try to provide more consistency. We were, I can't remember who I was talking to the other day. We were visiting about the real or perceived.22 ammo scare of what the hell year was that? Oh, that was a while ago. That was a long time ago. Five years ago.

But the thing is like it feeds on itself because I never thought anything about 22 shells I mean if I needed 22 shells

I'd go and buy like one of those slidey CCI 150 pack whatever be like hey there's

my 22 shells but the minute I heard yes you know there's a shortage of 22 shells then I'd walk

into a store and I'd see 22 shells and I'd buy them all or you'd see like there's a limit

of a limit of 1,022 shells and I'd be like well yeah or you'd see like there's a limit of a limit of 1022 shells and I'd be like well I'll be Dan if I'm not buying a thousand even though I need zero yeah that's right and I even saw like during that shortage it was that I was into Cabela's one time you couldn't buy 22 ammo if you didn't get a Cabela's credit card. What? Oh, really? Sneaky. To get 22 ammo, you had to sign up for a credit card. I remember you could only get it if you bought a gun. I remember I would walk into Bass Pro Shop and you could buy a 22 rifle and you only

got the 22 ammo if you bought that rifle. Wow. They had little combos like that flying all over the place. Yeah. And then there was articles being written where people thought that there's all these conspiracy theories, but it was basically, in the end, it seems like the main argument is people that manufacture ammunition tool up to manufacture certain kinds of ammunition. And then they tool up and do other runs, and they were just busy doing not.22s.

It is true. Making ammo, you've got to do big runs and they were just busy doing not 22s it is true making ammo you got to do big big runs of certain things there's really long lead times like making brass you know doesn't happen overnight and you know getting powder there can be powder shortages so the different things so it is true like you can't just flip a switch you know and do that like it's months of planning in in advance for that. So 22 shells and now N95 masks. Yeah, hand sanitizer. Is it a thing like because I'm not loading my own

ammo anymore. Can I like collect all my Weatherby brass and just send it to an address and you guys will take it back and make it into more. We don't offer that, Cal. If you come down with a pocket full, we'll help you out.

Thank you. Or like for federal ammo, can you have all that brass and just ship it off to federal just as like a recycling program? Oh, like what happens if you mail it back to them? Yeah. That's a great question. We've actually never. We actually sell our once fired brass that we use in... We actually sell our once-fired brass that

we use in our testing. Yeah, fire-flown brass. Yeah, as we go through it, we repackage it into older packaging and we sell it. Because it can be loaded by different times. It's gone in hours. You sell it as once-fired brass, like, spent brass. Online, we'll just go, okay, we got a bunch of it from our ranges and then just put it on like a day

later. It's just gone. It's gone in one day. Guys, eat it up. Is it like a mixed pl it on like a day later. It's just gone. It's gone in one day. Guys eat it up. Is it like a mixed platter? Like a chef's platter of ammo? No, it's usually the cartridge they want. Okay, you sort it.

You don't really want a 300 if you got to say a mil. And it's boxed. I thought you'd sweep up the floor and into a garbage bag and send it off

to some guy. They're not making jewelry out of the stuff. So it'll have a spent primer so you got to get the primer out on your own

and if you want to tumble it whatever you want to do. The guys that want it they want it. It's tough. So it'll have a spent primer. So you got to get the primer out on your own. And if you want to tumble it, whatever you want to do. Really? The guys that want it, they want it. It's a discount. And you just sell it as doing people a favor. I mean, it's not like a lot of money. It's better than us just recycling it because that'd be the next best thing.

Because we can't sell it as new ammo if it's already been shot. Because the annealing lines are going to be a little bit different. And it's going to look a little more dull so we don't it's not worth the time to retumble and re-anneal and do all that stuff so you guys have some really nice brass yeah we do top notch well thank you yannis nice brass yeah um the how many times can you reload a shell oh it's uh depends on the brass and it depends on the brass. And it depends on the cartridge. It does. So anywhere from...

Give me a more satisfying answer. I want it to be just a five. That's a rabbit hole there, Sean. Five. Yeah, the comments will fly in. Well, I've done this. Well, this won't work. Adam Weatherby, he don't know.

Yeah, I mean, you'll find people that will say they'll only load it three times. Yeah. And then you'll have people that, depending on the load that they make, that they've developed, that they've shot for years, they might load it five times. Yeah. The risk being that something eventually weakens. Yeah, but you find that in the loading, not in the shooting. So your neck, you know, as you're resizing, it's going to begin to have problems and stuff like that. Oh, you know it.

Yeah, so it's not the integrity of it necessarily, you know, when you're firing it. But you can tell when it's, you know, the neck might start to crack, you know, or different things as you're doing it. So they're just weakened. Yeah, you would generally see it before you pull the trigger. You know that it was played out. Yeah. And, but you, when you sell ammo, you don't sell, people aren't into that. The what?

Once fired brass. No, all of our ammo has never been fired, I mean, on the case itself. And then when we're doing our testing or load development or whatever, we've got just piles and piles of brass, so we'll just sell that as once-fired brass after we shoot it. How many times do you – does every rifle get shot? Good question. Yes.

Every rifle actually gets a proof load through it. Okay? So not everyone, you know, we sell thousands of guns. I'm not personally going down. Everybody thinks my grandpa did. I know that. He drives everyone down to the range. I go down there personally, shoot a target, send it off to everybody. But obviously we lot test for accuracy. I – I mean we accuracy test with two underground

ranges. You guys have seen it and we do accuracy testing every single day. So whether that's we got a new barrel, whether that's we got a new cartridge, a different load, a different type of powder, a different lot of certain bullets, a different lot of brass. I mean everything – a different contour barrel, different type of steel in the barrel, a different type of carbon fiber in the barrel, all those things are going to affect the accuracy, bedding. So all of those things send us down to the range. Every gun, every rifle is actually shot with a proof load. And that proof load is

actually loaded hotter. So like it's, we actually, the loads are colored, so you know that they're beyond, you know, usually say a load, depending upon the cartridges in the low 60,000 something PSI. So obviously we're- That's what's going on inside the chamber. Correct. So, you know, we're delivering a product every day to customers that are putting, you know, 60,000 plus PSI within inches of somebody's face. God, that's really high.

What's your tire on your truck? 30. Right. Exactly. So it's like, it's obviously- I never really thought about that before. Isn't that crazy? 60,000 PSI inside that thing.

And you're not putting it underneath your truck. You're putting it foot and a half away from your kid's head. Yeah. You know, so it's crazy stuff. So obviously the development or action is really important there so that we can tell the integrity of it. So every rifle that we produce can tell the integrity of it. So every rifle that we produce has a proof load through

it and depending on that load Who makes those proof loads? It depends. The ammo companies actually do. So different ammo companies do. We make some but then we'll get them. You can buy them through. Name an ammo company they're going to probably have a proof load department.

So like Joe Blow can buy a proof load. Oh, I don't know about that. I don't think so. I don't think they supply that. I don't know because what it is is you're giving it. So if it's, let's say normally you're 62,500 max PSI, getting technical here. I know I do that on your podcast from time to time. But the SAMI spec, kind of the governing agency, if you would, of those safety type of things for

firearms. Let's say it's 62,500. That proof load could be 85,000, 90,000 PSI. So if a guy goes and hand loads, not that we've ever had any customers put the wrong powder, say, in a cartridge before ever. No wildcatters ever. No, no. We have a customer service department for a reason, but for a lot of reasons. But so we actually put that so it's hot in there. So if for some reason all the things went wrong, customer hand load, put different powder in it, all those things that we know that the structural integrity of that action is going to hold up with a proof load in there. So every rifle has a proof load that goes through it. Is that done inside some kind of chamber? Yeah. We have like a

it's a proof load fixture, a trap. So it's not like you're scoping that up and going down to the range because you're not doing anything for accuracy when you're doing a proof load. You just want to make sure it functions. So we actually have a fixture that we put it in and it goes into that fixture and it's in a room

about the size of this podcast room and there's a blast shield that comes over it, and it's triggered remotely. That's what I was getting at. So if you do have some kind of thing. Right. We do value the lives and health of our employees. So it goes in there. You made your kids come down and do all the briefing.

So it goes into this trap kind of in the room. So it's just a safety type of thing that happens with it. And then the accuracy happens on a frequent basis, but not everyone, you know, is shot. And that depends. We have a range certified type of thing or, you know, custom guns are a different story, but yeah. And then, so the reason I was, that's great to know. I didn't know all that, but the reason I was asking is. Too much info? No, not at all. But do you then go clean it so someone doesn't buy it and it looks like it's been shot? Or do people look and they want to look like it's been shot? Well, there's an actual process.

And then, you know, plus there's a break-in procedure that we recommend for our rifles as well. So, you know, that somebody's going to do, you know, upon getting their rifle. So they're going to, you know, get it and do a bunch of break-in. So usually you want it to dirty up just a bit. How real is the break-in process in your mind oh so i feel like it's like a thing that a lot of people just ignore yeah so we actually just did a our weatherby podcast we did a full episode on break-in because it's one of the most asked questions we get so meaning they they phrase it like do i really have to do i gotta go out and

buy the ammo and go take the time to do it yeah 40 rounds of weatherby ammunition down the pipe does it help? Does it not? I still can't get it to shoot. So we actually just updated our break-in process about a month ago. Our engineers have actually been doing a lot of testing on that recently to really see. And to be honest, it does help. And it so depends on your barrel.

Fouling. Yeah. Your barrel. Copper fouling and cleaning it. So you have the rifling process of that barrel. Accuracy is so dependent upon barrel quality and consistency. And so you have a chunk of steel that you've really put a lot of stress into. So you've drilled it.

You've reamed it. You've rifled it, honed it, done all these different things, lapped it to the inside of that barrel. And so a lot of it, as that bullet catches the rifling inside of there and those lands and grooves, and as it travels through there, really what you're doing is breaking in the inside of that bore in essence, so that as it goes through, there's consistency as it does that. Obviously, it's not like we send it out with burrs. I mean, all those things are checked, but really when you're firing, you're truly breaking that in. I mean, all those things are checked. But really, when you're firing, you're truly breaking

that in. I guess, you know... You're in some minor way changing the inside of it. You are. Until it gets to a state of some static point. That bullet's going through that thing so fast that it's changing it a little bit at a time. And so when you send three bullets down it, you know, our breaking

procedures, three shots, clean it. Three shots, clean it. Which asked me if I ever do that. Yeah, so it's a loaded question. Anyways. It's a loaded question. We have a good gunsmith team at Weatherby. You've got a lot of people that won't adhere to it and probably are just fine.

And then you've got a lot of people that buy a Weatherby rifle that's a quality item and they follow the procedure. They will, yeah. And that's good. item and they follow the procedure they will yeah and that's good it's good either way but as we've seen testing in the recent months uh and as we look at it on data from the engineers i personally do think it matters we got graphs and i mean so we've done all that and it does matter now i i have picked vanguards out of a box in a 300 weather being just gone down to the range and shot sub half minute you know of angle groups i mean just just right out of the box there's there's so much of a

variance too even from barrel to barrel out of the same factory bullet to bullet and that's what's crazy and it's hard and it blows engineers minds a little bit because they don't like it they like to say here's a formula and this works And there are certain things obviously that make an accurate rifle inherently accurate, but it's amazing the variation that you will get in anybody's rifles from gun to gun. Bullet to bullet. Bullet, you know, what loads

it might like. You might have a 6.5-300 Weatherby. I have a 6.5-300 Weatherby, same model, and yours likes a different bullet than mine. Yeah. It's crazy. It's every time. And it's probably because that that barrel is whatever 24 26 28 inches long and there's just differences in there we need to come back to this when we talk about the next thing because there's a good tie-in to the to the next thing and break in and what happens to a group on a on a personal collaboration type thing that we're going to talk about.

Cal went out today and shot a group, and the first two was actually, we thought the second shot missed the paper, but it was through his first hole. Same hole. Yeah. Like Robin Hood. Dude, he broke it in today. And actually, shots four and five, he shot five. One and two were in the same hole, and four and five were in the same hole.

Really? How far apart were one and two and four and five? And what happened to three? Three was... Solid question. Three was in between. They were less than an inch and a half apart. No, three was only from one and two, three was, I would say, .6,.7 away from one and two.

Four and five got a little bit high. Maybe inch high or something like that. So it was still a tight group. But real quick, the breaking period before we leave that. Basically 40 rounds at three shots at a time. No, not 40. You said 40, I think. I said our old one used to be 40 shots.

Tell us a new one. Give us the summary, right? Is that what you want? The summary of the new one is there's a lot of information on weatherby.com. But you can – we suggest now one box of ammo. And we did this strategically because it's difficult. We don't want people to have to buy more ammo than they need to use. Because ammo in today's time, even if you're shooting a 6.5 Creedmoor, is fairly expensive, even compared to any Magnum load you're looking at.

Ammo prices have just gone up in general. But we suggest a one-box break-in. We wanted to make it less than 40 rounds. And with all the testing we've recently done, we felt confident in being able to change that break-in period to a one-box. And so we suggest doing it with two different loads because as Adam said, it might like a 130 or it might like a 140. And if you're going to shoot it anyways, grain bullet. Yeah. If you're going to shoot it anyways and pick the best bullet, you might as well figure out which one it is during break-in. It also just helps with the fouling of the barrel. So we suggest a one box

break-in. It's generally, I believe, three shots clean, three shots clean, resting in the middle because of the heat of the barrel you want it to cool off. And in the middle of that, you'll know a lot about your rifle by the end of the break-in. So you got to clean that rifle or that barrel six or seven times during that session.

And when you say clean it, you're talking like? So this is the other side of your conversation is that that's also very much so up to the shooter. Some people might use hoppies or hops, whichever way you want to say it. Two brands. I don't understand. It's just number three. No, is there any arguments you made for it not being hoppies? I hear it different all the time. There's a number of bore cleaners that work. arguments you made for the that it not that it not being hoppies i just heard i hear different

all the time there's there's a number of bore cleaners that work i think the key is that you get it wet you clean it and then you patch it till it's dry i'll tell you what i got a bottle of man it's like it feels like uh like you could get real high off it what is sweet 7.62 yeah you got to be careful with that stuff. That stuff's heavy duty. Well, I didn't, it's like, but it's for getting copper out, I gather. Yeah, yeah. Copper felon. And you can get copper.

Yeah, that's another subject. Another subject. I bought a full on head deal, you know what I'm trying to say? Oh, a respirator? Respirator. To use it? Just for cleaning in general. I got to be, general. For gun cleaning.

I don't know, man. You're just in there and it's, you know. Really? Steven Rinella, that ain't going to be what kills you. Is it his garage with the respirator on? Listen. He and Brody just got done with the best book ever and he just doesn't want to lose

any of that good stuff. Yes. Steven Rinella, that ain't going to lose any of that good stuff uh yes steve ranella that ain't gonna be what kills you ranella uh that'll give you a bad headache that's what i found i found that i felt that um it was subtle but i felt that my when i'm certain solvents i felt i would i was getting a little like a little buzz now once upon a, I would have been like, I'm going to go out and smell my solvents. But at this point in my life, I don't need any. I mean, maybe I'll have a gelata, but I definitely don't need a chemical buzz.

Yeah, so. Yeah, there's a lot of hearsay on breaking. I don't need a solvent buzz. Right. In our data, around round 12, it was consistently when you would start to see improved groups. Flattening out. Yep. No kidding.

Cool. And when you guys are cleaning them, are you cleaning them, cleaning them? Bristles and wire brushes? Each person. Each person. Yeah, but if it's a protocol, if you're suggesting something. We do. Don't be fuzzy. They have a protocol. You were not talking

to gunsmiths nor engineers here. They're down in the basement and they have a very tight protocol. We don't know that protocol. I'll tell you that protocol. Kevin Scott. You're saying that thumb grew right back. I'm texting just fine over here. Does your phone recognize the grown back thumb?

No, because it's not real. It was before the... What do you mean? This? Well, I tell you, I froze my thumb this winter, and my phone wouldn't recognize my frozen thumb. Oh, no. Sometimes this phone, depending on... Yeah, depending on certain times, I've once, multiple times, tried to touch a button and

been like, I don't know what's happening. Like your regenerated thumb isn't sending out the emails. This is the regenerated thumb Siri calls him by a different name. Dave. Dave?

Yeah, yeah. No, not me. What's the voice? Dave! No, I'm in the world. I'm in the world. 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. Our northern brothers get irritated. Well, if you're sick of, you know, sucking high and titty there, OnX is now in Canada. The great features that you love in OnX are available for your hunts this season. 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. That's right, we're always talking about OnX here on the MeatEater podcast.

Now you guys in the Great White North can be part of it, be part of the excitement. You can even use offline maps to see where you are without cell phone service. 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. Are we waiting for you to do something? No, you don't have to let me. I was looking up that. No, go to Weatherby.com and check out the barrel break-in procedure. Now we're also going to tell about something. So remember all the piggy banks everybody's got laying around?

So you got your piggy bank to buy the book. Yeah. Tell them the name of the book, Brody. The Meat Eater's Guide to Wilderness Skills and Survival. No, you got it wrong. The Meat Eater Guide. We batted around. Obviously, I'm not in the way. No, but listen, it was the Meat Eater F we batted around because we obviously yeah no but listen it was

the meat eater fishing game cookbook yeah so we thought there was a minute where we're almost going to change tack and call it meat eaters no the like meat eaters yep guide to wilderness skills and survival but then in the end went with the meat eater okay guide to wilderness skills and survival i'm not privy to these high level decisions would it have been apostrophe s or s apostrophe good question apostrophe yes you didn't get that you didn't get that apostrophe yes and my my beloved agent uh mark thought that um thought that when people are searching stuff, you don't change stuff like that, man. Like searchability on books. You want everything to be consistent.

So that's what it is. It's a sweet cover. It's got a morel on the cover, don't worry about it. Not just a morel. Anyway, that's only a small portion of your piggy bank. Well,

that's one. That's one support jar full of dollar bills and quarters. Yeah, that's a bank. Then you got bank for buying up

all Cal's ranch land and ponds and whatnot that he's buying. That's the Rinella Putellas 2020 campaign merchandise

where your proceeds go to providing more or better hunting and fishing for America. Yeah, not Cal's private land bank, but it is the... It's just deeded to him. They're all just randomly deeded. Later I'll be like, I never read the contract.

I don't know. I don't know. It's like Cal just buying all this stuff for himself. And what you're going to need to go hunt Cal's land if he lets you on is... Our new rifle. That's right. Yeah.

Now, I could call it the Meat Eater Weatherby. You could call it the Weatherby Meat Eater. I'll leave that up to you. What did we call it today when we were filming, Cal? It is the Weatherby Vanguard Meat Eater Special Edition. How about the Meat Eater Special Edition Weatherby Vanguard Meat Eater Special Edition. How about the Meat Eater Special Edition Weatherby Vanguard? You're trying to put your brand first, not mine, Steve. In giant letters and little letters, it'll say, like, Weatherby Vanguard.

I didn't know meat eaters started making guns. They're on top of the world. So, the Weatherby Vanguard Meat meat eater special edition rifle which we i think we recorded a podcast probably march of last year we started to have a dialogue about it i think a little bit and i'd be like you know what you ought to do yeah you've done that a few times now steve if i was you if i was you here we did A little over a year later. And I remember we just sat around and kind of said, hey, what about if we, since we're partners now and, you know, doing these things together, let's try to do something that's unique, different, and something that has a lot of features that are important to you guys. Yep. And it's coming out later this month.

June. 20. June 26. June 26. It June 26th. And speaking of, can we talk about the place I was talking about earlier? Yeah, let's do it. We're just being all in.

This is actually exclusive. First time anybody's ever heard about it. Yes. This podcast will be the first release of this. You can go find it at Sportsman's Warehouse. It will be exclusively at Sportsman's Warehouse and Weatherby.com. Youman's Warehouse and Weatherby.com. You can buy it directly from Weatherby.com. If you drove, here's my promise.

Yes. I've learned a lot of terms. One of the terms I hate is the term value proposition. Okay. So I'm not going to use that. But that's what you mean. That's what you want to use. Why should you buy this thing?

Yeah. Here's my like a value proposition. If you were to make a line, a line representing like quality and a line representing being like, what's the word I'm looking for? Economically responsible. What's a better term for that? This is where those lines... Listening to your wife? Yeah.

About buying a gun? No thing is going to do this better than that. I agree with that. That's what I think we tried to do in this rifle. As clearly articulated as that was. MSRP is $999. Another way of saying it is you get a little bang for your buck. Yeah, that's...

Yeah. In terms of bang for your buck, for like a $1,000... You know it's not $1,000. A $1,000 rifle that's like custom rifle features, just cool looking, good shooting. Available in multiple cartridges. It's just that you're not going to, like you are, am I allowed to say this kind of stuff?

You are not going to do better. That's the kind of stuff, yeah, you're right. Yeah. Yeah, I think it is that, it is that value and in that sweet spot, less than a thousand,

I mean, it'll be on the Sportsman's Warehouse shelf. You can go pick it up. And one of the things I think that's really cool about it is it looks real different. And I think, Steve, that's one thing you guys shared with us initially is like, what's something we could do that when you look at that, you go, that's the Weatherby meat eater gun. Whatever that one place. Meat something or other. No, but, you know, that's that meat eater rifle that's there and that's different. And so this is our first production rifle that we've ever done with a spiral fluted barrel.

We've been fluting barrels probably since the 90s. Actually having it, which aids in heat dissipation primarily, adds a little bit to the rigidity of the barrel. But really it helps it to cool more because it gives it more surface area. But really we say all that, but people buy fluted barrels because they look cool and they look different. And that's the number one reason. I like them. And then this one has spiral flutes,

which kind of make it even stand out more. And that was something when you guys were like, what can we do? We haven't done it. You can tell you're walking down Sportsman's Warehouse and you go, wow, that guy looks different. And you belly up to that glass case full of pistols and knives and you look beyond there and you're like, what is that fancy rifle? You'll be able to tell from a long ways away, we got a

Meat Eater logoed floor plate on it on the bottom so when it's sitting in the gun rack, you'll be able to see the cool Meat Eater logo from behind the pistol counter as well. And those I think will be in the paint job because we did the Cerakote with it, tried to match Cerakote to the metal work with our paint on the stock.

Don't go light on the Cerakote because there's nothing more depressing, and I've had this happen to me, you buy a new rifle and just watching the thing rust, man. Like, if you go out you know, and you just... One trip to the old fish shack. Yeah, go to the fish shack and just watch your stuff rust. It's depressing.

It's hard. And people, it's like at the end of the day when you're back at camp or in your tent or in your truck, like are you thinking I really got to wipe down every piece of that gun that got wet today? Like you're not. And so it is good to have the corrosion resistance of the Cerakote on there. So the whole action. It's got a tungsten Cerakote finish on all metal work. Right.

That's the color of it. It's a gray. It's called tungsten. It's a gray. It's called Tungsten. It's got a little metallic flavor to it. It's dull, which in a lot of circles you think, well, dull's not good. But Chuck Hawks said that the high polish, what do you call high polish blue steel? Chromal. Blue barrel.

He's like, you don't know how many animals' lives have been saved by those pretty shiny rifle barrels, right? So it's nice to have a nice dull low key there's no shine gonna be coming off that spiral fluting then we met what was the chuck hawks uh what was the chuck hawks quote we put into one of the in one of the guidebooks it was about 22 no we had two because he had one quote about his dislike of gun writers. Oh, yeah. Even though he is a gun writer. Yeah, but I think you chose to put in Chuck Hogg's quote about gun writers.

Yeah, that's in there. But also his 22, his thing about how much he likes 22s is in there. Anyhow. And then custom paint job on the stock to match that tungsten Cerrico. We got a really talented paint team in Sheridan, Wyoming. Every stock's hand-painted. It's got a three-way safety. Explain to...

You like the three positions. I love it. We were hunting Wyoming last year, and I remember talking about that. Why do you like it? Well, I like it because it allows you to open, you know, it allows you to open your bolt without needing to put the gun on fire. It seems safe. Which for, I feel for people who just are getting familiar with firearms, it's a nice feature. It is.

And to piggyback on that, I think it's very nice for the mentor who is next to the person who's getting used to firearms. Yeah. To have that visual, you know, it's just another thing. Like when you're next to somebody you're spotting, there's that animal on the hillside, first animal, whatever. It's a very easy visual check to see exactly what's going on.

And sometimes what the problem is, safety's still on. Straight up. Things got to go all the way forward. Yeah, that's my thing with it is I think with someone who, you know, a more experienced shooter, I mean, it's never going to be a bad thing to have it, but a more experienced shooter, they're just, like, much more aware, you know, you're more aware of muzzle control, right?

But with people that there's no downside to it, but with people who don't have that level of familiarity, I think it's just like another thing. And it reduces the confusion of when you go to open your bolt and then you're confused, like, do I put it on fire to open the bolt? Is that right? And, you know, it just lets you do that. So our three position safety all the way back or away from the muzzle, is on safe, which you cannot operate the trigger and you cannot lift the bolt. In the middle position, you can open the bolt, but the trigger is defeated.

And then the third position or all the way forward towards the muzzle. Guns blazing. Ready to fire. Yeah, straight up in the air is the middle. I like it. I think it's good. What are the cons? I don't know.

Are there cons? The only potential con is if you're all the way back on safe and you only click forward once, trigger doesn't go. But it's also the benefit to that is to teach people trigger control. Because you see new shooters, they'll go from safe to the middle position and then they're getting ready to shoot they pull it and then they just they wiggle the gun or they jerk so hard you can't you catch and you're like don't do that you you would know you wouldn't hit anything with that so it's a good training tool as well yeah i like it but i've been talking a lot i have a 10 year old and he likes to to – he's getting real excited about shooting and very infatuated with all kinds of – any kind of firearm, ballistics conversation. Anyways, he's got a break open.

410 is a good training thing. And the thing that – like to Cal's point, but when you look and what you see, I like it because I can just look and I know what's going on. Right? I know. I'm like, open that thing up. And it just, it just takes,

it takes my stress away. Sure. Absolutely. Not that it's a parallel, but I mean, you know, it's just like when you're with people, I think it's,

it's something to think about. And later when they get super familiar and then, and then it's not as big of an issue. But at first, it's like,

there's a little bit of a redundancy in safety features. Yeah. Another thing to bring up is the threaded barrel. Oh, yeah. Another major. The way I like to pitch this is we've done a lot

of the customization for you. Yeah. Like there's very strong, uh, very strong things on, on this, uh, whether it be Vanguard meat eater, super edition, I'll call it the Super Edition. Added the Super. That, you know, we've taken the liberty of making what would be customization options for you

in what is the standard package, but you can further customize because it's got a threaded barrel with a cap on it. That's how you'll get it when you buy it. But you can also put a muzzle brake on there if you unthread that cap. Or if you had it set up, you could put a can on there, a suppressor on there. Yeah, let me tell you what. I just had my double deuce, my.22, threaded for a suppressor. Guess what the guns double deuce, my.22 threaded for a suppressor.

Guess what the gunsmith charged me to thread that.22 for a suppressor? $200. $150. No, man. It was like, I want to say it was $300. No way. Yeah, I believe it. You're like, that's an entire new.22.

Well, I just said I'd like to have this done. I didn't get into it. I didn't haggle about it. I didn't, like, haggle about it. I didn't, like, haggle about it ahead of time. Wow. Yeah. Well, that's what, like, back to that customization and having that on there. And we got that thread cap that's flush, too, so we tried to do it where

you can't hardly see where that line is, you know? Oh, no, it's clean. It looks clean. And then we're actually getting, we actually are making muzzle brakes for the Meat Eater, for the Weatherby Vanguard meat eater special edition super rifle. We are making muzzle brakes for it. There will be one for the 24-inch barrels, one for the 26 in the tungsten color in a little package. They'll be at Sportsman's or on weatherby.com so you can get –

Just go get one. You can get that. I think – what is the retail on that, Luke? 60 bucks or something. $60 or $70 for a break. A lot of times you're paying well in excess. $100 tried to keep that down, too. So if, you know, we do have it in six cartridges.

Some of those you probably won't need a break for. Some of them you might want one for, depending. And the thread pattern, this is the thing I don't understand about the suppressors is... Oh, yeah. It's like universal thread patterns. No. No. Yeah.

Because one of the ones I have, you got to get a... When you buy your suppressor, you got to get a reducer. Yeah. Or an expander. Can one of you guys explain it simply? Yeah.

This Meteor rifle is threaded half 28, which is very common. The other common rifle is a is threaded half-28, which is very common. The other common rifle is a 5.8-24, which on the No. 3 contour barrels is more popular because it's larger. But if you take a No. 3 all the way down to a half-28, you're removing

so much barrel, it's unnecessary. So that's probably where you had to run a reducer. Yeah, 9.16-24? Well, my thing, my suppress suppressor came with a mountain of reducers oh yeah and then i was just confused by that whole thing yeah actually we just recently standardized to a half 28 um on this like kind of this is more of a hunting it's a number two contour so it's it's not a big old barrel because we wanted the weight of the rifle to be you know you can go down and because cal you you were just shooting, you just shot

a couple hundred rounds or something? Yeah. Didn't you out of one at a competition or something? Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I was going to say. Well, yeah, you went to a shooting tournament. Yeah, the S3 sniper challenge. Did you win? Nope. Nope. You know,

learn a lot when you go out there. The shooting competitions I've done, I'm like, I'm just trying to very consciously, uh, keep things in a hunting perspective. Cause that's my goal is, is to come away with good practical hunting practice. Um, and you know, you're, when you're shooting around, uh, these people where this is really, some of them, it's their job to shoot. And some of them that is,

that is their sport is shooting competitions. Yeah. Um, you're seeing stuff that is, is not anything that you would see on a mountain anywhere. What was the average weight of those guns? Yeah. I mean,

there are 20 pound rifles out there probably. Yeah. I mean, there are 20 pound rifles out there probably, huh? Yeah. I mean, there's a lot of, yeah. Everyone's, yeah. Yep. And they're built specifically to shoot targets. What's nice about those things though, those super heavy rigged up guns is when you touch them off, the thing doesn't even move.

No. Yes. And that's- You're just like watching, like looking through the scope, like watching TV, man. But you shoot like nothing happens. One- Everything just stays like perfectly fine through that's. You're just like watching, like looking through the scope like watching TV, man. Like you shoot like nothing happens. One. It just, everything just stays like perfectly fine through that scope. One of the guys that we were shooting in a group with, he's like, man, you have got to get a.

Go on. Not a suppressor. The other thing. Muzzle break. Muzzle break. And I was like, man, it's a six and a half Creedmoor. I don't need a muzzle brake. He said, no.

He's like, the muzzle brake is so you can stay on target. It's a big deal for them. And watch your impacts through your scope. Yeah. So you don't got to shoot at some antelope off the distance and be like, did I get it? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Which I was like, oh, okay. I guess that makes some sense. But, you know, the whole reason I have never shot with one is because I don't like dirt and stuff getting in there in the field on like long hunts and stuff. We've shied away from filming because you can kind of ring the bell of whoever, if someone's, you know,

lying out next to you. And so I've even had guys get, um, semi hostile at shooting at the range. Oh yeah. People don't want to be next to the guy with the muzzle break. Yeah. And then I don't know if it's really,

yeah, I guess it matters like for, for filming where you kind of have people who might be off to your side and stuff, it just seemed like. Yeah. It definitely hurts the person next to you more than it hurts the shooter. What it also does though is it helps if somebody does have a problem with flinching, especially if you have a larger caliber or whatever. By having it, if you're wearing hearing protection, sometimes you can get rid of a flinch more. I think if you give a little too much recoil, a larger cartridge to either a newer shooter

or maybe a child or something like that, they can develop a flinch because you're like, just suck it up and shoot it. And they can develop some pretty bad flinches. So I think the muzzle brake sometimes is helpful to give somebody something that's a little tamer. But the hearing thing is definitely. So one thing on the break-in process,

so the Weatherby Vanguard Meat Eater Super Special Edition was brand new. We went out to start getting prepared for the sniper challenge. Where was Seth? Well, Seth shot for me so I could go to Maine and check out that property on Sunday. So he actually shot a hundred and some rounds. I shot a hundred and some rounds at the challenge itself. Who shot better? I don't know.

I'd be willing to bet we were pretty even. But he, I think Seth said he rang a target at 1168. No, did he? Yeah. Good for Seth. Yeah. But, uh, so during the break-in process, uh, I actually broke it in with the, um, Trophy Copper, Federal Trophy Copper. Um, was like, oh, that's a, you know, a minute group.

I was like, that's that's a, you know, a minute group. I was like, that's, you know, good group. And then, uh, proceeded to shoot a bunch of steel and was very impressed. And this was like taking a lot of time to shoot steel,

um, making sure everything was right. But where were you doing all this? Uh, out at the, you'll see it tomorrow, I think. But out at a friend's range that he let us use, and there's steel everywhere. I was hearing about people going and doing stuff

that I didn't get invited to. Yeah, yeah, yeah. All the time, all the time, man. People are like, oh yeah, we were all drinking. So, I was like, oh, is that right? I know I wouldn't go, but at least I'll be asked. But very impressed with the rifle. And then, um, you know, finally got our target loads.

So we didn't have to shoot up all the trophy copper. Um, I felt like the target loads weren't flying quite as good out of the gun and I cleaned it in between these. So kind of had like an, almost a new break-in process with the with the target load um and then did you know shot 200 plus rounds out of that rifle just at the match jeez got it clean the you know a little due diligence cleaning on it and then shot it today and went back to trophy copper and that three shot group with the trophy copper was i think a lot of those 20 pound rifles out of that match you'd be very pleased with yeah you can get one half an inch it was pretty tight yeah yeah it was about a half inch a little over his his group. And the funny thing was, though, the first one, he had a little turret on top.

Kind of forgot he'd been shooting over 1,100 yards. Dude, that's the thing, man. So he goes down to the target today at 100 yards, and I'm all, dude, you hit dirt like feet above that target. I'm in the spotting scope. And he just goes, and he's just spinning that turret like a top, and then sure enough just drills the bullseye. Yeah, does it go to a drill to get it back where it belongs? Pretty much. Yeah.

No, it's a good, it's a great rifle. How much do they weigh, like short action? The short action is 6.38. Oh, nice. Did you just make that up right now? Nope, that's actually exactly. Not super light, not super heavy. And the Magnum, the Magnum will be 7.38.

There's six cartridges? Oh, yeah. 6.5 Creedmoor, 6.5 300 Weatherby, 300 Win, 300 Weatherby. 257 Weatherby. And a 7mm Remington. 7 Rem Mag. Yeah, and this is something we worked together. But there's a

257 as well. Yes. Johnny's old 30-06 didn't make the cut. No, no, no. But we did talk to you guys. I know that you guys were a big part of that as well. I knew about Yanni. I just wanted to rub it in on Yanni. And at Sportsman's Warehouse a little bit,

because they have 105 stores and know their customers and in their areas and know what they like, too. So I think between the three, we were able to pick up on those six cartridges. So it gives you a variety of stuff, short action, long. Real quick, back to the break. Is there like an average percentage of reduced recoil when you put a break on? It's about 50%. No.

Is it really? Yeah. It's very difficult to measure. Is it really? Yeah. It's very difficult to measure because it's a perception. And it's also cartridge related. Wouldn't it be that you'd put it against something that measures force

and just do it or not? Let us talk to your engineer and figure it out. Let's figure it out. Get some pillows. People do, but there's variations on how people even measure that. Well, I know but there's variations on how people you know even measure that so there's

well i know that there's like significant i mean there's a significant recoil reduction with those yeah i know that different things recoil different ways for sure like yeah i had a um what's the queens of the plains rifles yanni i hadH? Uh-huh. That recoil is tremendous but spread out over such a long period of time. It's boom! It's kind of like a five minute long like vroom!

Yes. Within a 7mm mag, it's like pow! Smack! It's like the fastest kick to the jaw, man. Bullet weight, too. A.375 shooting a heavier bullet, so it's more of a push against your shoulder. Yeah, it's like if Andre the Giant is giving you a slow punch.

It's very similar to.300 Weatherby, truthfully. At.300 Weatherby, people think, oh, God, it's going to be horrible. It doesn't really bother me. It doesn't bother me. I don't like the real poppy, jaw-busting ones that give you a headache. Yes. And those will more than likely be lighter grain bullets shooting fast. Mm. Mm.

Because they're snappy. Yeah. Like, what's, in your opinion, what's the worst recoil in a round? Oh, I don't know. 30-06. The worst one. Oh, no, actually. Are you being serious?

I've had a 30-06 in a small gun, in a lightweight gun. It'll just jump out of your hands and do flips. Lightweight gun. You've got to catch it. But I've also, there's the.378 Weatherby Mag, like our big old cartridges, like African Safari stuff, and that's the smack and the wallop and the Andre the Giant, like all mixed into one. It gives you the whole experience.

I mean, I've shot a.460 Weatherby Mag with a 500 grain bullet without a break. Once. And it gives you the You just gotta do it. Actually, you guys should just you guys should just do it. You just,

it's fun. Next time you guys are down, you gotta shoot it once just it is so much force. You know what I shot one time? I can't remember. It was one of those it was like sharps,

like a replica sharps. What the hell they're not 45-70s what are they? like a 416 Rigby or a I don't know either way

I was in California we were shooting this thing okay and it had one of those those Quigley down under sights it should have been a 45-70 what was it

oh a sharps I'm not kidding you he said he was like oh yeah you can see the bullet I'm like you can't see the bullet you can see the bullet. I'm like, you can't see the bullet. You can see the bullet. It was a 45-70, 100%.

Yeah, definitely. We were shooting. He had the target out like a couple hundred yards out, and I was like, there's no way. What are you talking about? But you look, you catch a glimpse. It seemed like it was like halfway there, and you catch a glimpse of the slug going through the air. It's almost archery.

We try to pride ourselves. You can't see our bullets. You definitely cannot see our bullets. That should be your slogan, man. Your billboard out there and share it in Wyoming. Can't see our bullets. 307. Can't see them.

We're excited about the project, though, with you guys. It's been a fun collaboration. I hope your listeners, watchers, whatever you call the people that are out there in the meat eater world. His knuckleheads. Yeah, all the knuckleheads listening. I think it's a, I think, to be honest, I think it's, there's going to be some experienced shooters and hunters that are like, wow, this is a rifle that I really want to own. But I think it's also something you could step into as more of a new or novice hunter into.

So I think it really, I don't know, I think hopefully, you know, kind of captures the vast part of the audience in that sense. Oh, yeah. We get so many emails, you know, kind of captures the vast part of the audience in that sense. Oh yeah. We get so many emails, people like lots of email. It's like a daily thing is people kind of trying to dig through the, all the rigmarole and language, right? They're like,

I want to get a rifle. I've always shot hand-me-downs. I want to buy. What should I get? Blah, blah, blah. It doesn't make sense.

I get overwhelmed. And now I'd be like, that. Yeah. There. Yeah. All ready for you. Yeah. And like Adam said, Sportsman's Warehouse has it, but also Weatherby.com.

And just to review that process real quick is that if you were to go to Weatherby.com and select a rifle and the cartridge that you want, you would then select an FFL that we would ship that rifle to. A lot of people don't realize we don't ship a rifle directly to your door. Can't. We cannot do that. So you have to select an FFL in your, I don't actually care where it is, but preferably in your city. You would select that off of our website. We would then ship that rifle to that FFL in which then you

would go in and complete the appropriate checks. Cost you like 30 bucks, right, to do it that way? Depends on the FFL. California is more you'll right, to do it that way? Depends on the NFL. California is more. You'll still have to do it in a 10-day wait period. Depends. Could be 100 bucks in California. And then sportsmen's are going to be stocking them heavy,

so it's a great opportunity to get in there, shoulder them, ask the guys behind the counter. We're going to be working on training with them. And so I think they're going to have some associates that are going to be excited about that. Again, I think it's going to pop off that shelf, you know, too. I want to hit a point that Kevin was making making just so people understand because i don't like the

lingo of the ffl yeah it's like federal no you did a great job i feel like some people won't know we're talking about just think all the federal firearm licensee so what happens is um there's a questionnaire and when you go to do a firearm transfer, you go down and fill out a very simple questionnaire, and it covers like if you have- Felony. Felony. Drug use. Like any kind of restraining orders, dishonorable discharge. Are you-

Recreational drugs. There's some kind of question around, I don't know how it's phrased, but something around- The trick question. Citizenship and all that. Have you ever renounced your U.S. citizenship or something like that? And then you can't just go down the whole thing going, no, no, no, no, no, no,

because they'll get you in the end. Yep. The last question is different. Read them all. You guys got to remember, don't just be like,

no, no, no, no, no. Of course not. And then that's all. That's what it is. So when people say like, go into my FFL or do it in the FFL, that's what it is.

You go down and you give them your driver's license. You fill out this thing. They check, make sure you're cool. And in most cases, most places, you walk out. Most places.

Some states do have a wait period, but most do not. And it will take a little bit of time for them to run the check. Yeah. So sometimes it will take a couple minutes. They'll say walk around the store. But like literally a couple minutes. Yeah. I don't think I've ever. It's the old phone-in days are long gone and

said Nick's National Instant Criminal Check System, something like that. And it's pretty fast. If you've got a real generic last name, Smith or Jones, it could take longer, but for most people it's pretty fast. But I did hear during the height of the COVID buying that they were up to a couple hours.

They did. Yeah. Oh, they got overloaded. It happens. No kidding. Yeah, especially if the store is really busy and you got a bunch of people at the gun counter, it might take some time.

Yeah. But while you're down there too at the store, I mean, usually you need accessories, whether that be ammo, scopes, mounts, all that kind of stuff too. So it gets you in there to see what else you're going to need to go along with it. So there's one other thing I want to comment on the rifle if I can.

Please. And then we'll, I think, and it depends on, you know, listeners and where they're at and their kind of technical knowledge of firearms and things. But like I said earlier, probably accuracy is dependent upon a number of different things and the barrel, I believe being key to that. And one of the things that Vanguard has, and I think for that value is it's there, you hear different ways of barrels are made and that's probably another thing's thrown out. And then everybody's like, what does all that mean? Button rifle and a cup barrel. And the Vanguard

rifles are hammer forged. And really what it is, it's talking about how the rifling is put in the barrel. Cause at first you just drill a hole, right? But you got to actually get that rate of twist that's in there, the actual rifling and And hammer forging in barrels has been kind of for a long time known as one of the premier ways to actually do a barrel in that it's actually literally pressed. That it's, you know, there's a huge, I'm trying to put it in.

Power hammer. It's like a massive power hammer. Yeah, it is. And it just goes, and it's doing this and it's actually then taking and putting the rifling in there and doing so in a way that minimizes the stress to the barrel so that it can maintain its concentricity. Is that a word? I like it.

You know, being concentric and all those things. So anyways, just the way that the barrel is done, it's hammer forged. There's different ways to do barrels, but we found that the Vanguard barrels are an excellent barrel, lasts a long time, but is very, very concentric as well. And that's one of the things that provides that accuracy. So you know how you look. The more you get into certain things, you find something out. Oh, yeah. And one of the things the Vanguard barrel's been known for for decades is that they have really good hammerforged barrels.

So something else to kind of throw in there if anybody geeks out on that stuff. I like it. If nobody cares. I like it. Yanni likes it. I like it. Well, yeah, Yanni likes that kind of stuff. Yanni Danzwaal. I do.

I know. Yanni Bonzwaal. Something I want to add up all Yanni's nicknames, man. Why do you have Yanni? Just have a little inside joke. No, we just like the nickname.

We like it. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, he's got a lot of nicknames. He says that from time to time. Yeah. Well, because Wayne Van Zwaal's a good friend of mine. That From time to time Yeah Well cause Wayne Wayne Vanswall Is a good friend of mine

That's why I think it's cool Yeah Yeah That's why you guys Like Wayne Vanswall He's a great guy Great guy We started with bird lists

For our yard We're at 26 Not bad Nice That's pretty good That's great Yeah I feel like You guys

Your family Would blow my family away Yeah we've started one too But we've fallen off So I don't think We've made it past. I feel like you'll blow past me very quickly. I haven't seen any hummingbirds yet.

I'm bummed. We got one. I can't, I think it might, I can't tell if it's broad-tailed or calliope though. It's a little problem. I used to just call them all hummingbirds. Then I found out that that doesn't work.

No. Lots of kind of hummingbirds running around. Phil, last thing. You're going to close with, so we got the song about Yanni we already played. I was disappointed to hear there's no accompaniment. Can I throw a concluder in first? Oh, yeah, of course.

Is it about the book? No, it's about your piggy bank. You need one more thing. Because after you get your super badass Weatherby meat eater rifle, you're going to need something to cut up the meat with your, that you can. Get the meat crafter knife to cut up your new stuff.

Or whittle your barrel down. It's that level of steel. No, don't do that. Don't touch your knife to your barrel. No, we've been doing some fun stuff, man. There's stuff we haven't done. We've never really engaged in it. I was always curious about it.

I'm just kind of like waiting for the right sort of... Well, you're passionate about quality products. I mean, that's what... When we go around hunting, you're like, you know what you guys should make? I'm like, that's impossible. You guys had half a brain. Yeah, no kidding. And if you know how to make stuff steve but you know but it's cool

because you guys are passionate about stuff i think it just came out in this new knife you guys did with bench made and i hope that you know people feel it came out in the rifle too that you guys um yeah i think your creativity and really kind of knowing you just do a lot of hunting knowing here from lots of folks so no it's been fun to get involved in it. Yeah. And we all, you know, feel free. Anybody else got a hot, hot concluder? I'll stick with the rifle one more time. I think it's, we are, we all here in this room put together a very quality product.

As far as what is out there on the market, there's a lot of kind of upgrades. Like if you, if you went to a lower price point rifle, a cheaper rifle, if you will, um, there's a lot of things that we feel eventually enough time on the ground, you'd be like, oh, you know, what would be nice is this, or, you know, boy, I kind of like that on that. And that's what kind of gets you working up a little bit into some different kind of quote custom things. And that's kind of what this package is. Um, and you know, it's still, it's under a thousand bucks, $999. Weatherby.com, which is still a chunk of change. But the good thing is, is you're not going to have that feeling of like, oh man, I wish this one had this or this one had this.

And it's something that just never goes away like you are eventually gonna be like ah i've had such a long life and hunted so long that i need to give this thing away uh and you'll get you'll be able to then hand down a very high quality shooting iron, it's like, you know, you can go, when you touch it and work the action on it, like work the bolt on stuff, it's like, you know, it's a quality gun. It's a quality gun. You're not like, ah, dang it, should have

bought the good one. I think what's hard in an audio podcast is we've tried to describe like the fluted barrel. It looks really good. We really didn't touch on how good the stock looks. The stock itself, hand-painted. It's a black base with kind of like a gray and a tan. It looks incredible.

So you've got to go check it out at Weatherby or Sportsman's Warehouse. Sportsman's Warehouse, weatherby.com. Last thing, our good friend Doug Duren, the beautiful and lovely Doug Duren, he wrote a song. What we're doing is our whole live tour got postponed. Everybody that had tickets to go to the shows knows this. Doug was going to do some of the live shows with us, and he wrote this song. He wrote a song about the podcast.

We played it last week. Yeah, yeah, yeah. People heard it. We just stuck it in there and people noticed. So, yeah, it's in people were like, I saw on Instagram, I think it was, people were debating whether or not it was Doug. But yeah, it's Doug.

Doug says that in his whole life, he's only ever finished one song. And this is it. Nice. Thanks, Doug. Yanni's in it. Oh. says that in his whole life he's only ever finished one song and this is it nice thanks Doug Yanni's in it a couple more verses of this and uh I don't know

it's an immediate podcast Talking about things you might want to hear It's an immediate podcast, people Talking about things you might want to hear Talk about hunting and fishing And conservation And occasionally About white-tailed deer.

No underwear Steve Rinelli. He's the host. Man, that guy likes to talk. Severely bug-bitten, underwearless Steve Manilis is the host. Man, that fella loves to talk. But make no mistake about it, my friends,

that skinny guy, he also walks a walk Ryan Callahan and Yanni Pasteles you know how can you not be a fan. O'Kell and Yanni Giamatti. Indeed, we should all be fans. O'Kell's got his conservation podcast

and Yanni is the world's most affable man music music music there's a lot to talk about in conservation

music and things we do and don't want to see Lots to talk about conservation And things we do and don't want to see All kinds of hunting and fishing techniques And then bad, bad stuff Like CW

Torn fingers and other weird injuries Hunting, hunting, hunting, hunting Fishing down on the farm Torn fingers and ripped nipples And other odd injuries Part of hunting and fishing Or life on the farm but if you're lucky like I was you know what they can just sew that thing right back on

learn to hunt in public access. Two more subjects we should all care about. Getting people out hunting public land and access. Hey man, those are two things that we should all care about. Fishing, catch and release. You think it matters to the trout? I do So welcome to this podcast, friends It's good to have you here Welcome to the Media Podcast, good people.

It's so good to have you here. Just remember, some of these things might seem real simple, but others, they're not so clear. Yeah, it's long, isn't it? Well, I can clean that up. Let me get the idea 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 on x hunt is now in canada it is now at your fingertips

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