The MeatEater Podcast - Ep. 592: MeatEater Radio Live! Pack Donkeys, One Minute Fishing, and Surviving a Grizzly Attack (08/29/24)

Episode Date: August 30, 2024

Welcome to our brand new MeatEater Radio Live! podcast. Join Steve Rinella and the rest of the crew as they go LIVE from MeatEater HQ every Thursday at 11am MT! They’ll have segments, call-in guests, and real-time interaction with the audience. You can watch the stream on the MeatEater Podcast Network YouTube channel, or catch the audio version of the show on Fridays. Today's episode is hosted by Spencer Neuharth, Janis Putelis, and Randall Williams. Guests: Seth Walk of Hauling' Ass Backcountry and Alaska grizzly attack survivor Tyler Johnson  Connect with The MeatEater Podcast Network MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Welcome to Meat Eater Radio Live. It's 11 a.m. Mountain Time on August 29th. and we're live from MeatEater HQ in Bozeman, Montana. I'm your host, Spencer Newharth, joined by Giannis Poutelis and Randall Williams. On today's show, we're talking to Dr. Seth Wach about using donkeys for backcountry hunting. Then we'll discuss Liam Neeson's 2011 thriller, The Grey, for MeatEater's Movie Club. After that, we'll give Seth Morris one minute to catch a fish from the Meat Eater pond, followed by a cheticate about

having babies and killing elk. Then we'll call Tyler Johnson, the man who accidentally shot himself during a grizzly attack. And finally, we'll discuss the top three states we'd like to own a hunting property in. Yanni, Randall, welcome boys.

It felt like fall was in the air this morning. Feels good. Snow on the mountains yesterday. Oh. Is that the first time this year? Yeah, first time since probably May. First time, okay. You saw snow?

Yeah, the crazies. Oh, that's good to hear. It melted off by the afternoon, but boy, it was an encouraging sign. It was chilly enough that when I was getting my morning arrows in, I had to put on a hoodie. Oh. Oh, a black hoodie, Yanni, which I'm told is available in the First Light store next week.

I feel like we've been begging First Light to make black stuff for years, and they're doing it next week. And egg on our face, all three of us wore the black First Light thing today. Oh, that's because there was an email that said, please, please tease the black. And this is what we're doing right now.

We're just teasing it. I feel like I'm Lawrence Fishburne in The Matrix. When all three of you are wearing it, it's not so much a tease. It's kind of a slap in the face. Yeah. Now, in just a minute, we're going to be going to Dr. Wok. But Giannis, tell us what we should know about Dr. Seth Walk before we get him on the phone. Sure. Seth and I actually met in a Suburban driving up to the start of the Bridger Ridge Run three years ago

when Maggie drove us up there to the start. It's a long drive all the way up to Ferry Lake there. And so we start every day in the Suburban. There's like eight people crammed in there chit-chatting. And some dude in the back is like, yeah, man, I hunt the backcountry with donkeys and those things are badass and I'll put them up against anyone's stock. And that got your attention.

Yeah. I was like, what now? And so anyways, we've become friends in the past three years. And I sort of invited myself on uh backcountry elk hunt where we could uh sort of film and uh see what it what's all about hunting with donkeys um and uh i also one more thing i'm gonna tell you about seth because he's too humble to tell you about this he's had a program a deal with himself he wanted to kill an elk 10 years in a row, all on public land in Montana

with his bow, and never hunt the same spot more than three times in a row. Wow. Doing it on hard mode. He's done it now 11 years in a row. Dang. Okay. Yeah. So, like I said, I'm like, yeah, this is probably a good guy to know. So, anyways, let's talk

to Seth. Where do you go from there after 11 years in a row? Now, Dr. Seth, welcome to the show. Tell us where you're standing today. Hi, guys. Thanks for having me. Yeah, I'm outside of Bozeman at my friends Frank and Aaron's ranch, and they pasture my donkeys for and Aaron's ranch. And they're, uh, they pass through my, uh, my donkeys for me

in the summer. Now, uh, the, the donkeys thing, tell me like why donkeys over mules or horses or llamas? Uh, yeah, that's a great question. Uh, I think the first thing was I got a pretty sweet deal on the first two that I got. They're pretty cute compared to horses. So, yeah, we were doing things on a shoestring budget. And anyway, I ended up with four donkeys for like 200 bucks. So you can't beat those numbers. But looking at things like how they perform, man, they are just, they are hardy animals. They can eat almost anything and survive.

They're real resistant to diseases that horses get. And yeah, they can carry up to 25% of their body weight where horses are kind of in the teens. So pound for pound. 25% means what for these donkeys that you have so like a 500 pound donkey that's 100 pounds on your back and that's that's a safe carry um there was a study out um in a journal that i read when they looked at donkeys over in in uh countries where donkeys are used traditionally like pakistan and almost 90 of those donkeys were packing like 50% of their body weight. So once these animals get conditioned and they're used to the country,

boy, they can carry a house. And you're prepping these donkeys today for the upcoming hunt with Giannis. What does that mean, though? What does prepping a donkey weeks in advance even look like? Yeah, I mean, their training really starts early, you know, whenever the weather breaks and we've been going on walks just around the pasture, making sure everybody knows each other. Um, we just picked up our fourth, uh, in May. So I was really concerned about how she was going to walk where, where in the pack string, she was going to feel comfortable um we have a young

one she's only two years old and she's just a donkey in training so just figuring it all out so that happens you know for weeks but today um you know i'm just going to go back over their hooves make sure that their hooves are nice and trim there's no cracks and then do a little saddle work. Um, make sure that the leather's good. Uh, we did lose a, um, one of our, uh, straps on the saddle. I'll show you guys here in a minute, uh, on our recent trip. So I'm going to replace that. Yeah. Put a little more cushion on the pads where they need. Um, just make sure they're comfortable. If they're comfortable, man, they'll work all day for you all right introduce us to the to the girls and then uh show us show us what you're doing with the uh with the saddle

all right let me change this around you all see that yep all right so uh yeah these are the girls um they they usually pasture down down yonder over there. And when I come in with some treats, they come running up here. And I get them haltered up and put them on the fence here. This gal is our first. Her name's Dottie. And she's just a lover. She's about 15 years old.

And, yeah, she's a general giant. This is her daughter, and she came from a pretty big jack. So we were hoping to get a little bit more size, but she's going to end up looking just like her mom, which is fine. Seth, on the next one, Seth, get us a close-up of Denver's face and ears. Yeah. Because that really makes the donkey. You can't beat these ears. Her mug is just so cute.

Very cute indeed. Yeah. How long is a donkey's ear? I mean, those things have got to be 10 inches. Not quite a foot long, right? Yeah. Having some technical difficulties here. We've got people on cell phone signals.

I think we are losing Dr. Seth, but I feel satisfied. I learned a lot about donkeys there. I was going to hit him with some trivia before we went. I was going to ask him what a group of donkeys is called, so I'll ask you two instead. Do you know what a group of donkeys is called? No. There are four acceptable terms. You got to guess. A group of don know what a group of donkeys is called? No. There are four acceptable terms.

You got a guess? A group of donkeys. A group of donkeys. We were looking at a whole collection of donkeys there, and I was wondering what that was called, so I Googled it. My guess will be herd. Herd is one of the four. Looks like Seth's back has got a stronger signal.

We can try to bring him back in for a little bit longer. All right. I want to see what he's doing with those saddles. All right, Seth, we got you again. Oh, sorry about that. Yeah. Which guys, you want to hear something about the saddles? Yeah, well, just show us what's going on.

Are you just making adjustments? Yeah, so one thing that I look for, say, with this britchin in the back here is how it's riding on the animal and hopefully you can see here that her her hair's getting a little rubbed off here it's not breaking the skin or anything but you can imagine that going downhill this is really putting pressure on her leg and so what i'm going to do is uh try to make that a little more comfortable i have this nice i'm going to cut some strips on that just glue it on that that strap and uh see if i can't make that a latigo um for two reasons number one as you can tell here they really enjoy chewing on leather so if you're not careful they'll just chew it off and the latigo strap for those of

you that don't know is the one that goes uh under their belly right yep yeah that's right but the other reason why this one isn't long enough anymore, I don't know if you can see this right here. This is Pudge. That's Donkey Pudge. She was just eating a lot of hay this year, so she grew a little bit in the belly. So we'll fix that up.

I have another Latigo here on the fence. I can just use that to replace it. Seth, we're going to get you out of here in just a second. We've got one last question, though, before you go. Do you know what a group of donkeys is called? You've got a whole fleet of them there. They're not called a fleet, but do you know what a group of donkeys is called? Oh, boy, I call them a herd, but I don't know.

Oh, okay. Yeah, herd is one of the four acceptable terms. The other are coffle, pace, and drove. So that one's for free, Seth. You go ahead and use that. You'll sound like a professional donkey man when you call them a drove or a coughle of donkeys. Dr. Walk, thanks for joining us. Keep Yanni safe in the backcountry, and good luck on the elk hunt.

Well, hopefully we'll be putting some elk meat on their backs here in about nine days. Yes, sir. I look forward to it. All right. Thanks, Seth. See look forward to it. All right. Thanks, Seth. See you. Thank you. Yanni, are you going to kill an elk when you're out there, you think?

Oh, yeah. And is this a spot that he has been to in his 11 years? Okay, brand new. We're hunting new country. But we scouted it a little bit this past weekend, and we saw some good sign. Okay, and maybe we'll get a report on a future Meat Eater Radio on how that hunt goes down. That could be. We have cell service in there.

Okay, good to know. Now, the next thing we're doing is a segment that I've been looking forward to all week, and that's Meat Eater Movie Club. Oh, boy. Oh, that's nice, Phil. Thank you. Thank you for that. Of course.

Today, we will be discussing Joe Carnahan's 2011 film, The Gray, a harrowing tale of survival set against the unforgiving Alaskan wilderness. Liam Neeson stars as John Otway, who is among a group of oil field workers stranded after a plane crash. In addition to the brutal cold and relentless wind, the men must also contend with a pack of ferocious wolves hell-bent on killing each and every one of them. On the surface, The Grey appears to be a classic survival thriller of the man versus nature variety. It quickly transforms, however, into a profound meditation

on life, death, faith, and the resilience of the human spirit. The bleak, snow-covered setting serves as both a menacing danger to the crashed survivors, as well as a metaphorical canvas for their internal struggles. And I'll wrap up here quickly. Neeson delivers a powerful performance as Otway, a hardened wolf hunter grappling with his tragic past while shepherding the other men in their flight, excuse me, in their fight to endure. The film's unflinching examination of profound themes and its philosophical undertones elevated above the typical blockbuster fare, inviting viewers to contemplate their own finite existence,

the meaninglessness of human suffering, and what it truly means to live in the face of inevitable death. Wow. Now what I would like our listeners to know who aren't watching this is that Randall wrote that all out on a legal pad, and he has what appears to be about six pages of notes for our movie club discussion on The Grey. Oh, yes, Spencer. And I have a factoid here that I asked you guys not to research this film in advance of our conversation. So, according to newspaper reports

that were also published in Outdoor Life, the movie's crew obtained four wolf carcasses in advance of production from a trapper named Dick McDiarmid, a local of Smithers, B.C., where the movie was filmed. Two of the dead wolves were used as props, and two were eaten by the cast as part of a pre-shoot bonding experience.

Wow. No shit? Yep, yep. Do you think it worked? Did that feel like a bonded cast that you were watching? So the reports that I saw, they were given a choice of wolf stew or some sort of meat on the bone, and nearly everyone vomited.

Except for Liam Neeson. He said he went back for seconds of the stew. It could not have been that bad to be worthy of vomiting. As they say in the film, Spencer, it tastes like dog shit. Now, Randall's going to leave. They vomited after eating it. Yes, yes. As opposed to before, so they could eat more.

Well, it's like a reaction. They're like, oh, it smells bad. Yeah. Now, Randall is going to lead the movie club discussion for today, so he just gave us a plan. Where do we go to from here? I would be curious just for your initial reactions, and Phil, please feel free to chime in.

I know that you also have screened this. I did. So just thoughts. My thoughts, I had low expectations and it barely cleared them. You know, this is not like a movie that I need to see again.

I would say those are my initial quick thoughts. Yep, I can wrap it up with this one sentence right here. Jennifer was pissed that she had to watch it.

Oh, you know what, I could have said the same sentence but just swap out Jennifer for Shelby. She wandered in the room a few times

and she's like, this movie's not for me. She actually started being like, hold on, has this guy made any good movies? Are all his movies this bad? Has she not seen Schindler's List? I have a note here from Sydney. She said, are we sure this movie isn't just about Liam Neeson collecting wallets?

I have the exact same note. One of the last things I wrote was, let's see, a man discovers he has a wallet collecting fetish. That's good, that's good. All right, so quickly, I'm curious from the perspective, to put a mediator spin on this,

from the perspective of an experienced hunter or angler, was there any part of this film that was authentic to you? Authentic. Four things here that I thought they got right. The lighting at night was very good. I feel like movies are too eager to have nighttime in the wilderness be portrayed as though there's street lamps everywhere, and you can just see a thousand yards.

And sometimes it's like that, a few thousand yards. Sometimes it's like that. A few nights a year, it's like that. Especially when there's snow on the ground. Often it's not. I feel like fictional nighttime scenes in the woods are often way too bright. This movie didn't do that. They made it good and dark.

I thought the lighting around the campfires was fine. It was beautiful. There's a few scenes where they could have easily, when they finally get to the forest and they're kind of in that hole and they're looking up the hill where they can hear the sounds, they could have easily lit it up and shown the big monster on top

of the hill, but they chose not to. They just left it dark. Yeah, I agree. There was a lot of film grain. You could tell this movie was shot on film, so it's a lot darker and more gritty than movies are made these days i mean like visually yeah yeah yeah next next thing i thought they got right um when diaz i think it was diaz was cutting the head off the wolf i was like oh that that knife work looks like what would happen when you're cutting the head off the wolf and i've now learned that that was probably one of the four wolf carcasses see i had this in my

inauthentic column. I thought the knife work looked good, but there wasn't enough twisting. There wasn't enough twisting. Not enough twisting to remove an animal. I thought there was the right amount of struggle. It took him like a minute to do it, and I was like, okay. Yeah, for a fellow like that, that would probably take him like a minute. And the last cut of meat looked like it was cleaned through like a piece of meat,

and I'm now realizing that that was probably the case because it was likely one of those four wolf carcasses that they had. The two that didn't get eaten. I was like, okay, that looked like someone cutting the head off of a wolf. So I'm satisfied here it was. The next thing, Liam Neeson mentions that wolves have a territory of about 300 square miles. I did some Googling and that seems right specifically to Alaska. I was going to ask you about that. Yeah, so that seemed good.

Here's what I like most. The first thing after the plane crash that he does is he goes through his luggage to find a stocking hat. Now, I've noticed in movies that take place in brutal cold that they are not emphasizing that they are cold by putting on headgear as far as like a stocking hat or a face mask. Game of Thrones is the worst offender of this. They can be north of the wall, wandering through the worst blizzard that a human has ever seen,

but there's not like a stocking hat or a face mask to be seen. And it's like, it's clearly not that cold. Are those real people? They're like fictional. There's like Jon Snow is the worst offender. He has never worn a stocking hat in like 10 seasons of that show. That's not a real stat, but it sure

seems like it is. So he wanted to wear a stocking hat. He was immediately cold and he's like, I need to fix this and he went for a stocking hat and I thought that was good. Yeah. Giannis, why don't you take on the question of what you found to be inauthentic? Oh, I don't get to tell you my... I only had

a couple of hits. A couple of hits. I put them under hits and misses. Hits was that they used the strainer to kill somebody. And if you're familiar with what a strainer is, if you spent time on a river, that's a log that's

across a river, and a lot of times the current can get you pinned up against it and you can't get out from that situation and you can get trapped. So I thought that was like, oh, wow. It wasn't quite proper because the strainer itself wasn't what got him. It was his foot gets stuck between the rocks, but still, I like that. Different snow conditions. We had We had, you know, like cold, blowing snow, powdery, deep snow. Sure. And then it kind of turns into some more springtime crusty, and they seem to kind of keep up with that even on their jackets. If you noticed in a couple of the later scenes,

they had this like almost crusty, frozen to their shoulders snow, which I was thinking like, man not that might not be that easy to continuously get right you know through the day as you're shooting one scene um last but not least dirty fingernails oh you know very authentic like when you see some close-ups of Liam Neeson's hands sometimes, dude, that guy's hands look like he's been out in the wilderness for a couple weeks. A nice touch. What about

inauthenticity? Oh, boy. My notes were five times longer. Maybe we'll keep this to a couple points. Like I said, notes were five times longer. I'll just skim in here. The day length was way off. Assuming this was winter in Alaska, those days should be three to six hours of daylight. They were not. They spent equal amounts

of time in daylight as they did at nighttime. No way that's what would be happening there. How the wolves were so audible when they attack. This is why I'm looking forward to asking our guest Tyler later, who just got attacked by a grizzly. Did that grizzly come in announcing its presence

and growling and just telling you at the top of its lungs I'm a grizzly and I that grizzly come in, like, announcing its presence and growling and just, you know, telling you at the top of its lungs, I'm a grizzly and I'm here to kill you? Because that's what the wolves did. These were supernatural wolves. Yeah, these wolves were just sort of dead. They were man killers, as stated. On that note, the eye shine, the eye shine of the wolves, it's impressive enough in real life.

They didn't need to make it look like their eyes were headlamps. There was teeth shine in one shot. I didn't catch that. Yeah. like their eyes were headlamps. There was teeth shine in one shot. I didn't catch that. Yeah. We see elk antlers in the den, which elk are only found on four islands in way, way, way southern Alaska, which is not where they crash their planes. Those elk were thousands of miles away from home at that point.

And then just like the wolves in general, we now know due to modern studies that there isn't an alpha wolf. And they have a whole thing in this movie about an alpha wolf being overthrown. That's not how their hierarchy works. It's just like family groups. And an alpha to researchers in the 40s is what we now know to just be like the mom or dad. And so that was way off. And they made too much of the movie about some other wolf wanting to become the top wolf, and that factored into the decision. And he was the Omega wolf.

Yeah, yeah. I got a good shot class. These wolves have a man. Yeah, that was good. Last thing, just how thirsty these wolves are for human blood. Since 1922, there have been 10 fatal attacks in North America from wolves. Well, this movie had half of them. Giannis, anything to add there?

Yeah, I had a bunch of the same notes, but I'm surprised you didn't pick up on the very first one that hit me. And it was within, I think, five or ten minutes of the movie. Is that there's a scene where he looks at his rifle or he checks his rifle before he's packing up. And then it cuts to a box of shotgun shells. Even I caught that and I'm Phil. Good job, Phil. Phil, go to the photo.

I'm so sorry. Hold on one sec. After the plane crash, he goes to find that his bolt action rifle has been destroyed and then he goes through the ammo box that's there just for us to see like three shotgun shells and I was so amused by it I had to take

a picture of it so that was his ammo for his bolt action rifle right there I did pick up on it we just don't have the time to go through everything. There was a lot so on that note they make a bang stick or supposedly,

by basically just electrical taping these shotgun shells to the end of a pointy stick. That's a stretch. Probably not going to work. The torches and the fires were just like a little bit too bright, a little bit like weather wasn't affecting their torches whatsoever. The logic of going to the trees to escape. Yeah. The wolves.

They seemed so, well, I guess not all of them were sure of it, but Liam Neeson was sure that they had to make it for the forest. Well, my thought was as soon as they crash, he's just like, they're not going to find us. We need to leave the biggest trace of our existence. We need to leave the most visible landmark, Freddy's or something. We need to get away from this plane, which is the exact opposite thing you should do. And take their wallet so that when somebody does find the wreck,

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Really quick, what is John Otway's job? Is it to protect gas workers from wolves? He's like a wildlife control. Is that an actual threat? No. In real life? They do have people serving in those roles in some instances. I think it's more for polar bears and things like that.

Okay. Yeah, like there'd be a wildlife specialist at an airstrip there, but there's not a guy who's just there to gun down the wolves. As they come running into. Yes. It's clear this man has a checkered past, possibly as like a hitman or a mercenary. I loved his, one of the first things he says is, I don't know why i did half the things i've done but i know this is where i belong and i thought that that really sets the stage for who this guy is yeah i love uh i love films that have one guy who sort of knows everything and is the expert and then there's like 10 other characters and because

there's nothing memorable about them they have to always address one another by name so it's just like it's just like bill what did you do to john i didn't do anything tim john did that himself you know like that's the whole movie i think half of the dialogue was them repeating their names so you'd remember that they're characters yeah and then half of it was f bombs i did look up there are uh and i apologize for anyone who screened this and was put off by the profanity. I wasn't aware of it until we picked it. But 161 uses of the word in 117 minutes. That puts you somewhere between Magic Mike and Born on the Fourth of July.

Okay. Not quite Goodfellas numbers. No. It really discredits the guy that's supposed to be the expert when all of a sudden he's like, let's run into the forest. They'll never find us there. The other thing that was a little bit of a stretch, Jennifer actually picked up on this one,

was that they're sub-alpine because they're in the timber, and the rotund fella, I can't remember his name, but he gets altitude sickness, ends up dying from it. Was that Hernandez? Come on, guys, all these memorable characters. Let's hear it. We got Diaz, Hernandez. But you just, you know, like max, you might be at 5,000 feet.

Sure. That's a stretch to put someone down. Guys, we could go on for a very long time with all the notes that I'm asking here. Yes, you have ten more pages of notes. But I think we need to wrap this up. My plan was to ask you whether or not you could recommend this around the campfire

and maintain a shred of your credibility as an outdoorsman, but based on your reactions to the film, I'm not quite sure that we need more than a one-word answer. Yeah, I would not. Two out of five stars. Giannis? 1.5 out of 5.

Phil, just as a, just, would you please just rate it as a work of cinema? I think Spencer's right on the money. This is a two out of five, but let me say, I was working at a movie theater when this movie came out, and it was very popular. It was also a very popular movie to find dip cups in, spit cups, it's that kind of genre movie you knew after a screening of the gray

be careful picking up cups because you might flip some oh i i will say this movie actually was critically acclaimed uh it was well received but i did find one uh quip that i'll share with you which is less than celebratory. It says, on the downside, there's a lot of dull, pretentious philosophizing about the heartlessness of nature and God. On the upside, you get to see a man punch a wolf in the face. Okay. That's the gray, everybody. That is the upside.

I will say one last thing that I want to say. My favorite scene in the whole movie was when talgut uh is afraid of heights yeah he's climbing this is the most preposterous scene in the movie and i loved it they may like make like a makeshift uh like line to go go down this for this ravine his glasses fall off he's terrified he falls slams into a tree falls 100 feet down hitting every branch on the way imagines his daughter is tickling him in the face, and then it immediately cuts to a bunch of wolves ripping him apart. Yeah, never mind. How the hell did the wolves cross

that giant canyon? That's what I was wondering. 300 mile territory. They can be wherever you think they're not. Did it come into your minds at all that 14 years prior to this movie coming out, there was this great movie called The Edge that came out.

Didn't occur to me. And it was way better. Yeah. And I could see that someone was like, let's just redo that with wolves. Sure. And maybe instead of the guys, you know, having sex with the same woman,

you know, this guy, whatever. We'll twist up the plot a little bit. I mean, The Edge could be eligible for a future Meat Eater movie club. I'd much rather re-watch that. And if people have a suggestion, they should send their movie suggestion for the Meat Eater movie club to radio

at themeateater.com. Alright boys, we are going to move on. The next thing we are doing is a segment, a new segment called One Minute Fishing. Do I feel lucky? Well, do you, punk you punk go ahead make my cast all right uh one minute fishing is where we go live to someone who's fishing and they have one

minute to catch a fish and if they're successful we'll make a 500 donation to a conservation group this week our angler is Seth Morris, who's at the pond behind our office, and he's fishing for a donation to Trout Unlimited. Seth Morris, Dr. Lip Ripper, welcome to the show, and happy birthday. Thanks, guys. Appreciate it. You don't look a day over 33.

Thanks, Randall. Appreciate you. Now, Seth, tell us about the conditions out there and how you are going to try to be successful with just one minute of fishing. Yeah, so we're out back behind the office here. I'm in a spot that I've fished plenty of times before and have caught quite a few fish, usually brook trout. But we've got some inflow coming in here from the creek, a little current over there, some shade.

I think that's going to be the spot where I catch them. Hopefully. Fingers crossed. And you were scouting this morning, but you didn't make any casts because you wanted the trout to stay dumb until it got to the moment that mattered. That's right. What's the lure of choice? And if like 30 seconds in, do you have another lure in your pocket

that you might switch to if that one's not working? No, all the eggs are in this basket right here. It's a number four Panther Martin. A little number four spinner Panther Martin. It's got a yellow body and some red dots, silver blade. And this is, to be clear, for those of you who are listening, Seth is fishing on the small pond behind our office. Behind him is some sort of nondescript commercial development.

It's out to Bozeman. And we're going to see what he can do here. Seth is going for a trout. That's mostly what lives in there. Seth, your one minute of fishing starts when you make your first cast. I will give you updates as you go. So go ahead and try to catch

that fish. Alright, let's do it. It looks like it's still cool out there late in the morning. Seth's got his black furnace hoodie from First Light on. How many casts do you think he can get in one minute on this little pond? Five?

I think, yeah. Way more than that. It's not a real aggressive retrieval he's using here. He's now 20 seconds in. Seth, you have 40 seconds. Oh, he just hooked up. Oh, he missed it. He farmed it.

Did he miss it? He farmed it, ladies and gentlemen. Oh, he missed it. Okay. Oh, goodness. Seth, you had. Seth had a fish on and just sat too hard and pulled it right off his lip. Seth, you got 20 seconds to go.

20 seconds. Oh, my gosh. There goes that fishing show. Seth's palms look like they're getting a little sweaty. 10 seconds, Seth. 10 seconds. Five, four, three, two, one. Let's let him.

All the real sound effect next time. Well, for Seth. Seth, now tell us what happened on that bite that you had. Was it a bite indeed? Yeah, that was a bite, and I just had one there on that last cast too. Oh, man. I don't know what to tell you. It just didn't hook up.

Well, it looks like you need two minutes of fishing next time. Maybe sharper hooks. To be successful. Need some barbs on those hooks, Seth. Oh, they're barbed, buddy. Seth, thank you for joining us. We're going to have you join us again for another one-minute fishing sometime. And, yeah, you're going to be a regular on this segment.

Okay, really quick. I just saw a comment from Steven Rinella, who must be tuned in. I don't know. It's like Steve's watching. I don't know where the hell he is. He has enough time to sit here and watch this show. But Steve says, when I proposed this segment,

I suggested that you get a single cast, not a whole minute. And then I took Steve's idea and I changed it to one minute fishing instead of one cast of fishing. You know what? I like this version better. He's still going. He's off the clock and he's still going. Alright, Seth. Keep fishing out

there. Let us know later when you get one. Maybe you can carry it right into the studio here for us because you're only about 20 yards away. Yeah, if I catch one, I'll bring it in. Happy birthday, Seth. Thanks for joining us. Phil, let's get some listener feedback from the show so far.

Oh, boy. Okay, let's see. We have one from Shelby Huber. I don't know if you're aware of her. She says, I know for a fact that Spencer loves donkeys. Oh, okay. This goes back to our segment with the other Seth. Are you a fan of donkeys?

Is this a thing? As far as, I guess, equestrian things go, if I were ranking them all, yeah, maybe a donkey at number one. Do you have a stuffed donkey at home? No. No, I don't think there's a stuffed animal in my home. Sorry, Corinne, I can't focus on that right now. No worries. Let's see.

There haven't been a lot of good comments. I've got to be honest. You guys need to step it up a little bit. I was just going to say Shane Burke, who was on our podcast before, survived the grizzly attack in Wyoming, said Seth forgot to say fish on when it took. That was the issue. That's a very good point. Okay.

Lesson learned for next time. And commenters, keep leaving us some feedback and we will review them again at the end of the show. We do have a couple gray things. It's talking about Jon Snow not wearing a hat

throughout all of Game of Thrones. It's the intensity of his gaze that keeps him going. I think that's true. That's just biology. That's a good comment. Yeah. Anyway, keep sending in comments.

Yeah, make them provocative. Yeah. All right, moving on. Questions are better than statements. Sure. Moving on. Our next segment is from Chester Floyd. This is Chetakit.

Oh, I've got a sounder for this. T-H-E-T-I-Q-U-E-T-T-E. Find out what it means to me. T-H-E-T-I-Q-U-E-T-T-E. Take care of C-H-E-T. Suck it to me, suck it to me, suck it to me, suck it to me, suck it to me what it means to me. C-H-E-T-I-Q-U-E-T-T-E. Take care of C-H-E-T. Suck it to me, suck it to me, suck it to me, suck it to me, suck it to me, suck it to me. Incredible. Oh, man.

The talent is boiling over. That was not going to be a weekly segment, but I think all of a sudden it just became one, so I can hear that sounder every time. Phil is going to play us a Chetakit that was pre-recorded from our very own Chester Floyd. Hello everybody, I'm Chester Floyd coming at you from Wisconsin and this week's Chetakit question comes to us from Corey. Corey writes, years ago my co-worker and his wife were

expecting their first child in October. I agreed to work longer on my hitch, sacrificing hunting time to support them. A few days after birth, he sent me photos of a dead elk instead of a newborn baby. Later, I discovered he left his wife and the newborn in the hospital to hunt out of state, causing me to miss prime mule deer hunting while trying to help him out i would love to know your thoughts and i'm curious as to how many others would have done the same wow cory thank you for writing in and sounds like you're pretty man pretty good man for doing that for your buddy we need more guys like you looking out for others and less guys like your buddy who seems like a pretty selfish dude more of the story is i imagine your buddy knows he messed up i mean ultimately

what's more important your family and a newborn a dead elk you know or friendship so i think everyone knows the answer to that the point is you don't ever leave your wife and your child in the hospital for any reason. And if you're going to send a picture to your buddy of a dead elk, he better not be covering you on your shift for something not related to hunting at all. We'll see you next week. Again,

I'm Chester Floyd and this is Chetiket. Being called not a very good guy by Chester, that hurts extra. That hurts three times that hurts extra that hurt him to say it it did it certainly did now Yanni you're a father an elk hunter a family man give us your feedback on this subject

Chester's spot on but I'm a little bit confused about Corey that wrote in that he's kind of bummed out asking about two separate things because he was like, my buddy left his family in the hospital, but also he called me

and I missed out on some prime mule deer hunting. So those two are not related to me. I feel like, hey man, if you're a good buddy, then sure, you're just going to... Oh, hold on. Sorry to interrupt. Oh, there's a brook trout that's probably not going to... Oh, hold on. Sorry to interrupt. Oh, wow. There's a brook trout that's probably not going to survive the day.

He's running back to the pond to throw it in. That's our new segment, 10 Minutes of Fishing, where we see if Seth can hook into a trout and he was successful, but that does not mean a donation today. What a phenomenal start to one-minute fishing. Yes, but the comments that are going to roll in now

from the fly-fishing catch-and-release elite will be thick. Keep them wet. I will vouch for Seth. That fish is already swimming by now. That's how close we are to this pond. You could spit from our back door. Tyler wants us to fry something on air next time that happens. Is that something maybe we can do at some point?

Yeah, sure thing. Listen, there's a segment coming down the road someday that's going to involve George Foreman. But for now, we need to move on, and we are going to talk to Tyler Johnson. Tyler Johnson survived a brown bear attack but accidentally shot himself during the encounter. He is live from an airport

in alaska right now tyler welcome to the show uh we've been really excited to talk to you and we're glad you're still around to share your story first thing tell us what you were doing that day when you had the grizzly bear encounter oh you're muted buddy phil's got him i've got him all right yeah now i was hunting black bear with my father and uh well we found the wrong color bear yeah and where were you in alaska uh the kenai peninsula it's uh you know south of anchorageurrection Trail is. It's a trail that kind of hooks Seward and Hope. It's a 43-mile trail, and we were 17 miles deep into there. Now, tell us what happened in the minutes leading up to the encounter.

How did you wind up in the same exact spot as this grizzly? Well, we were following a horse trail, and it was a really old trail. It was just flagging, and when you're trying to follow a flagging, it's kind of hard with just the brush around trying to find it. We kind of lost the trail for a little bit. We were hiking around trying to find the trail. There was these willows and alders. I don't know if they ever tried hiking through them,

but they're extremely difficult to hike through with the pack on. We ended up finding the trail, and it was almost like a tunnel through the willows there. My dad found the flag first, so he goes ahead of me. And, well, when he was about 15 yards ahead of me I exited out of that tunnel kind of like this meadow the wind wasn't blowing so it's not like she could sniff this I couldn't we couldn't smell her or anything like that we just kind of all surprised each other the grass was oh no it's hard for me to remember that exact moment but might have been hip high, maybe higher.

And we all surprised each other. I think I was thinking about Top Ramen that night, you know, what I was going to have for dinner. Okay. Now, the surprise encounter, was it an audible thing first? Did you see the bear? Did you smell the bear? Like, what was your first clue that this was about to be bad? So my dad and the bear yelled at the same time, or roared and yelled. Like I said, I was behind my dad. I didn't smell her.

You know, you're always like, you can smell the bear before you see it, right? Not this one. At least I wasn't trying to find a smell for a bear at that moment. And she growled. My dad said, bear, bear, bear. And I mean, it was instantaneous. She did her yell enough to like stop your heart. She sprinted towards my dad, charged my dad. And this is four seconds. Like, I mean, her growl, I'm on my back. Four seconds.

Yeah, like I said, there was no real warning except for, I'm coming to get you. So what happened then when the bear had you on your back and it was on top of you? So she hit me like a train, man. My feet went over my head. I was still trying to unholster my pistol right when she was right like a train man. My my feet went over my head. I Was still trying to unholster my pistol right when she was right in front of me when she hit me I have a police holster. My dad's a trooper So he let me use his police holster that has a little button you press and then the strap moves forward Well, once you hit me that strap move forward and I pulled my pistol my legs were over my head I don't know if it was just reacting, you know, I tried maybe trying to kick the bear away,

trying to kick and shoot at the same time. Doesn't work out. So I ended up putting a bullet through my left thigh. And then the rest of the bullets found her neck and face repeatedly. And when you shot yourself, did you know in that moment that you had shot yourself? No. No. No.

I mean, you can imagine the adrenaline with a brown bear on top of you, grabbing your leg and, you know, chewing on you. It was, yeah, it was just shoot first and then look at the wounds later, you know? Yeah. Tyler, do you have any idea about how big this bear was i don't really have a scale to really match it with because i've never personally been like this close to a bear or right next to it like we laid next to that bear for two hours i've seen them you know on my hunts from afar i know it was a big bear uh My father, he sees bears all the time. He estimated it was like 400 plus.

She was 15 years old. She had a collar on. I got to see that up close. Yeah, they went out and retrieved the collar, and the data came back that she was 15 years old. So she wasn't a young or super old bear. And how many shots were taken between you and your dad and how many of those bullets found the bear so personally i can say uh i believe one bullet found my leg the other

seven found the bear in the face and neck um it's kind of hard to miss when it's right here in front of face except well I did just say shot myself but besides the point. My dad you know he wasn't just standing there he was getting a different angle on the bear when it was on top of me and so this is his point of view all he saw was my legs go up and then you know a bear's butt and so he went to a different angle so he didn't shoot through the bear to me. I did know he unloaded the whole magazine into the bear when it was next to me, like in its head, because I don't know what I hit to stop the bear from mauling you. As you know, when you go hunting and you shoot a bear, you can shoot it through the lungs,

and it can run a mile, right? And you got a pissed off sow, you can shoot it through the lungs and it can run a mile right and he got a pissed off sow you can shoot her in the chest 15 times and she'll still try to you know maul you um but that seventh shot i saw her give up or fall over it's kind of hard to describe but then my dad has 40 i think it holds 20 rounds so he emptied it into the head. But she fell over. He came over. She was still breathing. 20 rounds. Finish her from her to me. 20 rounds that he put into the bear's head. What's that?

20 rounds is how many times he shot the bear? I believe so. With an adrenaline-fueled father, pissed-off father, you can imagine that. Yeah. He's probably clicking until it wasn't firing anymore. That's incredible. Now, Tyler, do you think you'd be talking to us today if you guys just had bear spray with you? No.

Absolutely not. Not, okay. I will say bear spray does work in certain situations, but this one would not have worked. I would have been pepper, or bear sprayed myself and getting mauled at that time. She would have went right through that. It was four seconds. I probably could have got the canister out and sprayed, but it would have been boom.

You know? Yeah. It's hard to say if it would have or wouldn't have. At the end of the call here tyler i'd like you to show us our wounds but first let's talk about them uh how did the recovery go immediately afterwards and how did you get out of that situation uh immediately afterwards so we went straight into triage um we have we bring a trauma kit whenever we go hunting um you know has the quick, tourniquets, chest, all that stuff that really comes with a trauma kit.

Looking down at my leg, I remember looking at my dad and saying, I think I shot myself. Ripped my pants open, realized I have a bolt hole in my leg. We got the quick clot out. So we were fully addressing that issue right away because you know a ball hole isn't no joke right so we put quick clot on there i have rubber band pulled it tight that way it stayed there and then we started going down triage on my body notice that my right leg was filling up with blood um ripped my pants i couldn't see the injury like very definitively

with all the blood around there so we just just grabbed more quake clot, wrapped my leg in that, wrapped it in a wrap, grabbed the tourniquet, tourniqueted my leg. I didn't even know the bear clawed me in the side of my leg until a half hour later. The adrenaline was still going through me. And I was just focusing on keeping my heart rate down, just trying to be in that situation very calm. Because panicking doesn't help anyone. And when you panic panic your heart rate goes up and so on so forth so um i didn't move from that situation right where i fell and the bear fell we were right next to each other for an hour and 45 minutes so we stayed put and did you guys have an in reachreach with you? We did. Yep. Oh, yeah.

So they come in with a helicopter then and took you straight to the hospital, I imagine. Yep, that's exactly what they did. We had multiple helicopters come to get me. RCC, they're PJs, and the troopers, they're just, you know, as a contingency, if one were to not make it, the other one would pick me up. So the troopers got there first, dragged me out of there on a tarp, kind of like pulled myself in there. They're like, do you want to wait for the PJs? I was like, no, man, let's get out of here. Right. So I remember the helicopter ride. It was a beautiful day. I even said in my video, I mean, in Alaska, 65 degrees, no clouds, like looking around, I have a hole in my leg.

It's beautiful out. The helicopter ride, I remember looking out like, oh, that's beautiful. That hurts. That's beautiful. That hurts, you know. It was just, yeah, helicopter ride there. Tyler, you got to experience something that few people will ever know do you now have any advice going forward something you've learned uh from this encounter

that you'd like to share with our listeners yeah um you know some people go hunting alone they know the dangers of that personally if i didn't have the partner i had at that time i wouldn't be here right now. There's actually a few factors that lead up to me talking right now, and that's having a good partner, knowing how to operate and reach trauma kit on top of that. A lot of people just carry that Walmart red mule skin for your heels, Band-Aids, iodine. That tourniquet potentially saved my life, and quick clot and everything with that. And, well, having a firearm saved my life too.

Tyler, really quick, we've got a question asking how long you kept your tourniquet on. Two hours. It sucked. Wow. But, hey, pain won't kill you but blood loss will right yeah tyler uh this happened 12 days ago can you tell us about the recovery process and then show us your wounds or what you can show yeah yeah so um they let me go on good behavior from the hospital that night uh i have family that live nearby. They were taking care

of me. So I was able to leave that day with a huge bag of bandages and everything. They wanted to keep everything open because infection, bears don't brush their teeth or wash their hands, you know. So they carry a lot of bacteria in that. So I had to take antibiotics. I had pain meds for a little bit, but I stopped taking those on Saturday. You know, ibuprofen's been working just fine for me. I'm a little bit stubborn, so I found myself going out to the fair and just walking around with crutches.

I'm familiar with them, so I was moving quite a bit on that, and I actually think that's why i'm healing so fast with the blood moving being able to move my body and everything like that right now i have uh my walking stick and i can barely get around but you know i'm walking with the walking stick right now so and can you show us the wounds real quick yeah yeah they're they're covered up i can't take them off because they're open wounds right so this is my leg where she bit into i got punctures here on the front on the back

my leg right here a shot let's see if i get the bullet went into here exit out my leg down below here and uh there's just like black powder on my leg it was so it's probably like the muzzle was probably touching my leg and then I got the claw right around here lower and yeah those are my extent of my injuries I feel pretty lucky that that's it because I know they can touch you and then oh and she she actually tried ripping my face off I think my backpack actually because I know they can touch you. Oh, and she actually tried ripping my face off. I think my backpack actually, because I have a frame that goes over my head. I have claw marks on my shoulder.

I think the first thing she tried to do was bat me across the face, and I kind of went down, and she hit my backpack and went across my shoulder. Crazy stuff. Steve Brunella is going to be jealous that you have those wounds, and he doesn't. I don't recommend it. You can read our story and see pictures of Tyler's wounds at TheMeatEater.com. The article was written by Jordan Sillers and it's called Brown Bear Attack Leaves Alaskan Hunter with Bite and Bullet Wounds.

Tyler, thanks for joining us. And next time you get scratched by a grizzly, let us know and you'll be on the show again. Right on. Thanks, guys. Thanks for having us. Thanks, Tyler. 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, sucking a 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. Yanni, you had a close encounter in Alaska.

It's one of my favorite podcasts ever, The Meat Tree. How close do you think that situation was to being like what Tyler experienced? As close as you can get, I guess. If that bear just had a slightly different attitude that day, it might have went the same way? I mean, it's just so hard to say. But, I mean, we had a bear literally in between six humans that was most likely trying to run us off of the meat that we were, I don't know how to put it, milliseconds or just, you know, one not connected swing of the poles to the bear's head maybe. I don't know. Hard to say, but yeah. And it seems like he agreed with the gray there that the bear came in loud and the attack was like quite audible.

Yes. Which is something I critiqued in the gray there that the bear came in loud and the attack was like quite audible. Yes. Which is what something I critiqued in the gray. Now we're going to move on. The next thing we're doing is giving our top three states that we'd like to own a hunting property. And this is the last segment that we'll do for today. And boys, I'm going to go first. The number three state that I'd like to own a hunting property in, Illinois.

Oh, hold on. You're ranking them? Ranking them. That's right. You just had a random list over there? Well, I picked the three. The three. And I have reasons for each three.

While I tell you why I like Illinois, you figure out what your one, two, and three are. Illinois is a two-buck state, which I love. They have the second most Boone and Crockett entries in the country. Two of the six biggest whitetails of all time were killed. Their average price per acre of land in Illinois, $9,580. That makes it some of the most expensive ground in the country. For context, the average price per acre in Texas is $2,500, and in Montana, it's $1,000.

So you're just like, good bank for your buck if I'm picking somewhere to inherit property at. It's going to be Illinois. And their gun seasons take place after the rut, which for a state managing for giant deer, that's the right move. So I really like that their gun seasons don't start until late November. It gives bow hunters a chance to hunt the best days of the rut. And if I could put my hunting land anywhere in the state, I'd put it right in the golden triangle of White Hills in western Illinois, which is the intersection of Pike, Brown, and Adams County, number three, Illinois. Yanni, what is your third state that you would like to own hunting property in? Mississippi, for the sake that I just want to extend my turkey and deer seasons.

Yeah. So I would get to start hunting turkeys a little bit earlier, and then I would hunt deer a little bit later. Yeah, they probably got a deer season into like February down there, Mississippi. And I think ever since they went to their antler point restriction, they were kind of like one of the golden examples for the rest of the country. It made a huge difference for the quality of deer that they harvest there. Randall, your number three state. Going out in left field here. California.

Whoa. Explain. Just trying to be provocative, but the season, it would expand my season. Pigs. I would love a place where I could hunt pigs. Do a little wine country. It would be good for the whole family. Would your hunting property have an orchard on it?

I'm thinking so, a vineyard. Okay. Yeah. But yeah, I mean, it's a lovely place to visit. You can maybe be strategically located, so you could do a bit of fishing as well. I don't know. I could see you in a big old vat of grapes,

maybe stripped down to not much and just jumping up and down. You can really see that mashing them with his toes now phil i'm about to read my number two do you have a little sounder to play over there after i announce uh what my state is you know i was i i made one well and it's it's too long okay so i can i i can just do the other trivia winner sound if you want. No, no, no. The number two state I'd like to own a hunting property in, Kentucky. Kentucky has an amazing mix of ag, timber, and topography that's pretty unique to that part of the country. The hill country is awesome because 80 acres in Kentucky, like in that part of the world, it hunts way bigger than 80 acres in most places.

It's sort of where the Midwest ends and the South begins. You happen to be getting the best of both worlds there, in my opinion. They have one of the longest archery seasons in the nation. It goes from early September to late January, just similar to what you liked about Mississippi. Because of that early September opener, you have a chance at a velvet buck. They have some of the best fall weather in the country. I'm convinced of that. You still get like frost in the morning, but you're not going freeze your butt off They have the sixth most Boone and Crockett whitetail entries in the nation Which is more than states like Texas, Missouri and Kansas and you can kill multiple turkeys there during the spring and fall seasons They have the sixth biggest turkey population in the United States. My number two pick is Kentucky

Yanni your number I'm gonna go with Montana. The reason it's not number one is because one of the reasons I live here is we have so much public land to hunt. Right? And it's true for a lot of western states. And so if I was to get some hunting property, I wouldn't even really need it so much to hunt the property, but I would make sure that it backs up to some hard-to-get-to public. Some sneaky access. So just give me a little bit of a head start, maybe by five to ten miles from the nearest trailhead.

And of course, you'd offer that access to any interested member of the public. I'd probably trade you for some wine. Okay. Oh, I like that. Okay, we're bartering. I got corn for you boys. Now, Randall, your number two state you'd like to own a hunting property. Well, this is a little embarrassing, but my number two state is also Kentucky.

Wow, okay. Tell me why. Grew up in Cincinnati. Kentucky's just across the river. I think one of the great things about owning a hunting property is you can share it with people that you know. And so I would say Ohio. There's too many people you know there. I love centerfire rifles

shooting bottleneck cartridges. And Kentucky's modern rifle season allows that. Ohio's a straight wall state. And as you said, the hunting I've done in Kentucky on 80 acres killed a couple nice bucks. And it's just like, in my mind, when I picture deer hunting, it's like those days in Kentucky. We have a bunch of people chiming in in the comments about their top threes.

I don't think a single person has said Kentucky. Okay. Well, me and Randall, that land will get cheaper then for us, Randall, there, because there's less competition. Now, before we do number one, I'm going to tell you my honorable mentions. Texas, it's just a great state for whitetails. They've got the hog or other exotics that may walk by at any given moment. The entire Great Plains, the Dakotas, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, it's just like my favorite part of the country to hunt whitetails.

I'd love to have a hunting property there. It's also America's duck factory with the prairie potholes. And then Tennessee, for all the same reasons, I love Kentucky. Great weather, one of the earliest year openers in the country. It's just overlooked for big bucks. But here is my number one. Yanni, based on what you know about me, what do you think my number one state is? South Dakota.

No. Yanni, you're taking too long. Judging by the fact that you've been so one-track minded with your first two, with Whitetails, it's going to have to be a Whitetail state. Okay. Maybe it will be Texas. My number one state is Iowa. Texas was an honorable mention, though.

Now, a lot of things that I loved about Illinois are the same for Iowa. It's a two-buck state, which I'm super jealous of. I wish Montana was that. They have the third most Boone and Crockett whitetail entries in the country. And that's so impressive because when you consider that Iowa isn't even in the top 20 states for harvesting the most deer. So they're like 22nd overall in deer harvest, but third overall in Boone and Crockett deer harvest. Three of the top 20 Boone and Crockett producing countries are in iowa just like illinois their land prices are outrageous over ten thousand dollars an acre and if i could put my land anywhere it'd be in southern iowa so that it could be i could be neighbors uh with some of the most famous big buck killers in the world like the drewries the

lakoskis and bill winky um have little picnics with those guys. That's right. That would be assuming you're a resident, right? Because as a non-resident, you might not get a tag too often. You don't hunt every four years. Details, Randall. If I win the lottery, first thing I'm doing is buying a big old farm in southern Iowa. Yanni, you're number two. And moving there. You have to.

I could live in Des Moines. Yeah, I like Ames. Sure, I could live in Iowa. You talked me into it. Yanni, you're number two. I'm just saying, it'd be crazy to own a farm there and only hunt there every six years. Sure. It'd be nuts.

They certainly have non-resident landowner permits. That's a thing. I'd be guaranteed one. Maybe it's not a two-buck state anymore if you're a non-resident with land. But if you're a non-resident with land, you're going to get some non-resident tag. I'm certain of it. Yanni, you're number two state. No, number one.

Number one state. I'm sorry. You're number one state. I'm going with Wisconsin. I already have some land there. I don't know where they rank on the number of Boone and Crockett. Number one. Okay, there you go.

So good reason there. Yep. A lot of reasons. I already own some land. A lot of nostalgia there for me. I've been hunting there since I was 10 or 11 years old. I would love to add to it. We're in what I would consider hill country.

So just like you said, it hunts bigger. What else did I have for reasons here? And if I'm not mistaken, Yanni, they're also number one for black bear, boon and crocket entries. So number one for black bear and white tails. Big old bears. Yeah. Yeah, I don't know.

I just have a lot of connection to it. And so I would just like to expand with what I would own there and just really get into the deer farming. Practical Yanni over here wants land where he lives and where he hunts. Randall, your number one state. Gosh, you know, going last, I feel like all my thunder's been stalling. My number one state is Montana. Okay.

Honorable mentions would be somewhere nearby in Idaho or Wyoming. Because when I think about having a piece of land, the number one thing I'd want to be able to do is go to it frequently and have a relationship with it and visit it throughout the year. So I wouldn't want to be an absentee landowner, et cetera, et cetera. It could either be like a cabin as a base camp.

It could provide some access to public. It could be a river bottom spot where you can do some fishing and go swim the dogs in the summer and then hunt whitetails in the fall but there's just you know if i had something i'd want to use it so montana preferably within three and a half hours of my house yeah now like like yanni had said before the reason i left any western state off my list is we're just blessed to live in a place that has a lot of public land. So I'm going to take land some other state that doesn't. Those were our top three states that we'd like to own hunting property.

And let us know in the comments if you agree or disagree. Or if you'd like to help us invest in land in any one of these high-priced states. Or if you've got a sweet property in Kentucky that you'd maybe let me come hunt. I don't know. It's worth a shot. That's it for today's show, but before we leave here, Phil, let's go over some listener feedback. Yeah, just to piggyback on that last one. I don't know if you guys want to

give us your top one. How about fishing camp states? Fishing camp states? I don't know. Steve's is pretty convincing in Alaska. I don't know if I could argue with that. Yeah, although he's been talking about, he calls that place Fish Shack North, and I think he's been recently talking about

Fish Shack South out of Venice, Louisiana, which, you know, this would be a great time to drop in that we still have spots available for meat eater experiences. Today's the last day to book. If you want to fish with folks like Randall, myself, are you coming down? I won't be there. Spencer's not coming down.

Steve's at Ronella's going to be there. Maybe that's a bonus for some people that I won't be there. Corinne and Phil will be there. Podcasts. Yeah, we're going to be doing anyways, meat eater experiences. If you're looking for a good time early October, we're going down there where Steve is considering having Fish Shack South at some point in his life. For me, fishing, jeez, I don't know.

Maybe North Carolina, like Outer Banks. Okay. I know that a little bit. Yeah, I would have to say Alaska, but if that were off the table, lower 48, I'd go Northwoods, Minnesota. You know what? I talked myself out of Alaska in the last minute. I was going to say Minnesota. Big mosquito guy.

Yep. Big mosquito guy. That's their state bird. Now that Corinne has made her presence known, let's see. Saxton asks or says, it would be cool to have segments on the show where they use the Werner Bratzler shear test machine. My man. My man. Because there are plans in the works for that.

It's going to happen. It's going to happen, Saxton. And for those of you who are unaware of what a Werner Bratzler shear is, it is an instrument used to measure the toughness of meat. Right, by official meat scientists. What else you got, Phil? Let's see. This is going back to Chet's Chetiket question. We've got a comment

from a Steven Rinella setting a great example. Steve says, I tell young folks that they need to set a strong precedent when starting a new relationship. Even if they don't have anywhere to go, just sleep in a buddy's garage to show your partner that you're gone a lot. What do you guys think about that? I have a feeling that's actually

earnest wisdom from Steve that he would suggest you do. I maybe wouldn't. What do you think, Yanni? No, I've heard him give that advice many times. Yeah. It's a tricky one because hopefully you just are gone a lot because you're doing

stuff and you don't have to be attached at the hip with your special other person. But so I guess if like in the future you plan on being around more, then yeah, you should do what Steve says. An easier solution. It's what me and Randall have done. Don't have children. There's less pressure to be at home when there's no little people there who rely on you. And take your wife

hunting. That's right. That's very true. Hey, Nix asks if you guys are going to do any hunting during the tailgate tour. Yanni was fixing to do some squirrel hunting. Randall and I are fixing to do some squirrel hunting randall and i are fixing to do some fishing maybe for bass or walleye and i i am so jealous i have heard that clay newcomb and

brent reeves are getting on a very special boat uh when they go to i think it's tennessee i don't want to say who it is in case that falls apart uh let me tell you it's like a childhood dream uh to think about fishing with that person. I think we'll find out soon enough. And we will be in Ann Arbor. We fly out a week from today. That's right. So we will be in Ann Arbor next Saturday.

Yep. Football season's already started? It started last week, was week zero. And tonight, there are a handful of games on including a big one between uh north dakota state and the university of colorado uh highly anticipated yanni i think it's on espn tonight so we will be in ann arbor texas at michigan spence and i'll be there we'll be playing some trivia we'll be hanging out recording trivia we'll be recording trivia and yeah please stop by if you're in the area or if you're just outside of the area and you feel like making a drive.

Because I think we'll be having a good time. Last question for Dr. Randall. Daniel's asking, is there a bear on the highway? Not today. It's been rough out there for the fawns. In all seriousness, it's pretty tragic how many animals get killed on my commute to work. But yeah, haven't seen a bear since the one last week, which is good by me. Maybe Randall will hit one on his way home.

I'll let you know. That'd be really good content, Randall. So, I don't know. Maybe don't swerve if it happens. Don't do that, Randall. No. That's your hush. No, that's it.

I got a new truck. I can't mess around with that. This is the end of Meat Eater Radio. We'll see you guys same time, same place one week from now. Hey, folks. Exciting news for those who live or hunt in Canada. You might not be able to join our raffles and sweepstakes and all that because of raffle and sweepstakes law, but hear this. OnX Hunt is now in Canada.

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