The MeatEater Podcast - Ep. 628: MeatEater Radio Live! A Goose Calling Champ, Tapeworm Cysts, and Toxic Sludge

Episode Date: November 22, 2024

Welcome to MeatEater Radio Live! 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, Cory Calkins, and Phil Taylor.  Guests: 3x World Goose Calling Champion John Walls and author of Valley So Low, Jared Sullivan. Connect with The MeatEater Podcast Network MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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

You can even use offline maps to see where you are without cell phone service as a special offer. You can get a free three months to try out OnX if you visit onxmaps.com slash meat. Meat Eater Radio Live is the newest addition to the Meat Eater Podcast feed. Every Thursday at 11am Mountain Time, we'll be going live from Meat Eater HQ on the Meat Eater Podcast Network YouTube channel. This one hour variety show will feature call in guests, segments and live feedback from

the MeatEater audience. Then on Friday morning, the episode will be available in audio form on the MeatEater Podcast feed. So come hang with me, Steve, Yanni, Cal and the rest of the MeatEater crew every Thursday at 11am Mountain Time on the Meat Eater crew every Thursday at 11am Mountain Time on the Meat Eater Podcast Network YouTube channel. And remember, it's live, so anything can happen. Well, almost anything. Welcome to MeatEater podcast.

Welcome to MeatEater Radio Live. It's 11 a.m. Mountain Time on November 21st and we're live from MeatEater HQ in Bozeman, Montana. I'm your host Spencer Neuharth, joined today by Yanis Poutelis and Corey Kalkins. On today's show, we'll interview the three-time World Goose Calling Champion John Walls, then we have a Rutt Report from Mark Kenyon, followed by One Minute Fishing with Seth Morris. After that we'll have a Chedek Mark Kenyon followed by one minute fishing with Seth Morris after that We'll have a chetiquette about finders keepers rules Then we'll interview Jared Sullivan about his new book Valley Solo and finally we'll look at a listeners drunken tattoo of penguins

But first Corey is going to regale us with tales from his recent elk hunt. Well, yeah, thanks Spencer Finally harvested my general Montana bull elk last week. Hell yeah. How many years did that take? Felt like multiple, but it was a long archery season. I passed up a lot of elk and had a lot of close encounters with my bow, as you did as well. You got one last year, didn't you, with your bow? I'm two years in a row filling my general elk tag with a bowl, yeah.

Nice. But yeah, I went out with a couple colleagues, actually to try and harvest a cow for a non-resident colleague of ours who had a cow tag. And all we saw were bulls. Saw three bulls come up over the hill and I was able to drop one of them that stopped at 400 yards.

In a new spot for you? It a spot. I've hunted before but it's one of our colleagues Secret go-to late season elk spots that he was that he's told a few people in the office Yeah, we were blindfolded until the Sun came up okay, and then as soon as the Sun came up Looking through the snow I saw three bulls come over the hill and it was pretty hard to say no this late in the season Okay, so my freezer. What was the one that you killed his size versus the other two? You know, I didn't get a great look at any of them. It happened so fast. They came up over the hill at first I thought they were other hunters. Mm-hmm on the skyline it was just it was dark enough and there was a blizzard happening snow was blowing sideways and

They were probably 550 yards at one point. They saw us and they actually skirted across the mountainside closer to us and I shot mine at like four or 15 or something uphill, 20 mile an hour wind, felt great about the shot. Just had a window and the one in the back, the elk in the back stopped to look at us one last time and that was the last decision he ever made.

Yanni, you should close your ears. You should close your ears you should close yours for this But I recently declared Corey the best elk hunter in the office You think that's true. Oh, we kind of oh look at that face. Yeah, you didn't agree I mean, I don't want to I don't want to make the guy feel bad if you gave him that Title then you shouldn't you know take run with it make a counter argument oh I don't really want to do this right now because who would you say okay if Cory's one is better is to what makes a one B kills elk themselves and to be clear Cory didn't make this declaration I know I made this declaration

on this now you're asking me to tell you why he's not the best one in the office. Yeah, I am I'm gonna pass. I like Cory. He's my buddy Okay, well who's who's 1B if Cory's 1A? Oh boy. I haven't thought about this Uh, I think we have a lot of good elk hunters. Okay, the thing about being a good elk hunter Or what can it make you seem? What was that? What was going on over here? We're live folks. Yes Crenn put your headphones. Yeah, actually here. I never cut to this camera I'm gonna cut to Corinne's camera here for a sec so she can explain herself there. She is I Was a on Instagram looking at our meat eater live promo

Just working and Jimmy's first out congratulations Jimmy and Corinne bailed out Yanni from having to talk about the best elk hunters. No, but I'll tell you. I mean, it's just so gray and subjective because what can often seem like someone is a great elk hunter is because they have extreme knowledge about a certain area, right? Like I know a guy that kills a bull every single year and he probably kills that bull within 500 yards of the spot he killed the bull the prior year. You know what I mean? Does that make him a great elk hunter? He kills a bull every year. But does it make him a great elk hunter?

You know what I'm saying? Sure. So I think you just really have to look at like a wide, you know, like what's the entire, you know, elk hunting sort of repertoire experience. Like how many different states has a guy killed a bull elk in? You know, how many different weapons? I don't know.

A lot of things to think through about that. But you think Cory's a good elk hunter. He's a good elk hunter for sure. I mean, I've hunted elk with him for a couple weeks now my life. Yeah, and you were successful on one of those outings That's right. Good point Cory. Yeah Spencer I heard you just harvested a big game animal interesting, you know Tyler says congratulations. Oh, thank you Tyler words Thank you. Yeah, who's he saying? Congratulations to well Well, it says Spencer comma congrats on the Nebraska mule deer I just killed my biggest mule. Was that placed? That happened while Cory was saying Hey, I heard you just killed a buck and there was already a comment. I

believe Tyler probably saw it on Spencer's Instagram and Tyler probably saw it on Spencer's Instagram and Six I see it was a nice buck. Thank you. That was my biggest muley ever hunting Western, Nebraska I I haven't gotten many days of the mule deer rut like that Where it was just like bucks were on their feet all the time every group of does that's had a buck very reckless And sometimes like deer hunters can curse the run that it makes things too random where it puts deer in Places you wouldn't expect to see them Not for mule deer though, maybe not for mule deer And I'm not nearly as experienced in hunting mule ease as I am white tail

But there can be a point in the whitetail rut Where you're like all all the bucks are somewhere else in a place that they aren't normally found. They're bedded down in a grassy fence row right now with some doe. They're sitting in a wide open egg field that was just cut, and it just doesn't make sense because it's the rut.

This was the best mule deer rut though that I've ever gotten to experience. It's like just what you want. Every group of does had a big buck. They were they were reckless. They were on their feet They were visible at all hours of the day And it was just a ton of fun. So I was happy I got to experience that. Killed the biggest mulee. One of the biggest mulees I've ever seen. Now, was that the first decent buck you saw? Because you're not much of a passer And so I'm wondering like was it so good that you were like You know, I'm gonna let a few of these medium bucks go that day. I'd seen about 50 deer

I killed that buck probably 15 minutes into shooting light It was it happened quick and I saw a handful of other bucks I wouldn't have passed on some bucks that were a little smaller than him That that was an easy decision to make I passed on a few smaller bucks the day before But it's also I I have permission from a rancher in Nebraska who has a lot of ground So I'm fortunate to look at a lot of deer when I'm there So I know that that bucks like this exists in places where I can hunt and in that case it makes it easier to You know wait for a big one That bucks like this exist in places where I can hunt and in that case it makes it easier to you know

Wait for a big one You want to talk about some lockdown going on if you live in Bozeman, Montana right now You can drive just about anywhere in this town and find a whitetail buck locked down on a doe Give me an example of where you've seen him where yeah pick a golf course in this town. You can see it there I don't know. What's the one on keggy? Is it Valley View oh yeah, that one's like kind of private. That's a weird golf course. But it's like private. Yeah, but I got an invite actually yesterday to go play. And when I get invited this summer, I'll have

you, yeah. Not to play yesterday, but I got the invite yesterday for next summer. But when I go play, I'll be like, hey, can we bring another guy? I'll bring you along. You do that. There's a nice 10-po here. I would just say keggy Yeah, just if you just run keggy if you don't see a buck locked down on a dough then your eyes don't work Last thing here Yanni before we do our first interview your dad You can make correction or something to add about thermals from the thermal discussion We had when he called he was pretty fired up. He's like, you guys almost had it right.

Oh. And I'm like, okay, well, what did we miss? And like I said, this is the reason that I was fussing at Phil a little bit when he picked the thermal thing, because I said, well, this is like a three hour show so we can discuss thermals. But my dad said the important part that we missed that might help people understand

why this whole thermal thing is working and why it actually does happen on flat ground and you don't miss that he got me for saying it really only works when in hilly country or on mountains which which isn't quite correct. You've maybe experienced this hunting white-tailed deer in flat country. But, so the first part is that, what is it that's actually getting cold? Or when the air gets cold, why does it sink, right? Well, it gets denser because the moisture in there, right? That's what's causing it to sink.

When it warms up, that moisture in there is becoming less dense and causing it to rise. Which is why if you were in a tree stand on completely flat ground with zero wind, you might experience it where on a super cold morning before the air has started to heat up, that your scent would be dropping straight to the ground. Not good. But then maybe later in the morning, just you know an hour later, as the day starts to warm, the air is actually just moving straight up above you. And so you'd almost be invincible when it comes to like scent because there's no wind blowing it northeast, west, south.

And the thermal would just be picking it straight up and taking it up into the atmosphere. Okay, you think we covered it now? I don't know do you is pop is Papa Yanni listening right now you? Know he's in deer camp in Wisconsin right now, and there's poor service there So Papa Yanni when you hear this you let Yanni know if I got it. I got it. Yeah, yeah all right moving on Joining us on the line first is the three time World Goosecalling Champion, John Walls.

John just won the Super Bowl of Goosecalling for the third straight year. John, welcome to the show. Hey, guys, thanks for having me and really appreciate it. John, first thing, tell us about the competition. How do you get to the World Championship? How are the callers judged? How do you prep for this thing? get to the World Championship? How are the callers judged? How do you prep for this thing? So the the World Championship goose calling contest is open to any caller. You don't have to

be invited, have an invitation, or win a contest throughout the year to be entered into the world goose. Anybody can show up and blow in it. How it's judged, you got five judges you have to tell a story to. The judges are sequestered, they can't see you. The contest is made up of three rounds and they do the Olympic scoring system. So the first round's judged 70 to 80 points, second round is 80 to 90, third round is 90 to 100. Each judge will give a caller a score

once all five scores are tallied they'll throw out the highest and the lowest score keep it three in the middle and Those points accumulate through three rounds and at the end of the third round if you're lucky enough to make it If you have the most points here the winner Yeah, pretty pretty cool. And for the judges, do you think that their ear can pick up on who that caller is? Do you think they know this is John, that's Tim, that's Bob? Or does it all sound very different to them? It depends. So for the world contest, you have judges

from all across the country, kind of. But there was a few local ones, and they've been doing it long enough to where, you know, certain callers have certain styles, certain sounds. They can pick up on it. Um, as me, as a, as a competitor, I know if I was judging the world goose, 75% of the callers while they were doing their warmup, I can tell you who they are. Wow. It's, uh, you know, it kind of throws a curveball into things.

You deal with a little bit of politics there with judging a little bit. But I mean, with social media and just all this content and stuff, you know, people blowing goose calls, it's become that way, unfortunately. I got a question. How close do they put the judges from the callers? Because my gripe sometimes with some of these Contests is if the caller is blowing like towards the audience and the judges are behind them or if even if they're directly in front of them versus

Like I always feel like the judges should be at the back of the room Which is sort of the distance that a goose would hear you're calling from right and and adding that More air between their ears and your call would sort of, I don't know, I think it would help for them to pick out the nuances. So where do they put the judges? So that's changed over the years. The World Goose Calling Championships

held in a high school auditorium. And that auditorium was built for acoustic sounds. But to me, I swear that stage was built for contest goose callers because it's just absolutely incredible in there. The sound, the echo, just everything about it. It's awesome. For the longest time, when you walked out on stage, the judges were sitting behind you. And then up till this year for about four years, the judges were right on the other side of

the stage so you're you're pretty much standing right in front of them. Obviously they can't see you but this year they put the judges in the far back corner of the auditorium and there's pros and cons to it but overall I think it was better like you said you just get a better overall sound the way the sound echoes off the walls in the room. It's just a little bit better. But yeah, the judges were in the far back corner of the auditorium this year. And do you show up there knowing the routine that you're going to do note for note and call for call? I do. Yep. Up to my warm up. I mean, everything about it. I know every single note of my routine. I know exactly where I need to take my breath,

how much of a breath I need to do. I've been doing this for 18 years, so it's kind of like second nature to me now, but I'm definitely a note for note caller. There's certain callers that are, you know, sequence callers or just kind of, you know, wing it when they're up there. But me, I know exactly where I need to be and when and what I need to be doing. Now Phil Robertson once said, it's one of my favorite quotes that revolves around hunting.

He said that a live mallard wouldn't place in a duck calling competition. Can you explain what he meant by that and how calling in a competition is different than calling in the field? Sure, yeah, he's absolutely right too, especially with the duck calling. It definitely has its place in the goose calling world too.

For competition style duck and goose calling, it's not really trying to sound like the real bird. It's an operating contest, how well a caller can operate the call, push the call to the limit, have confidence in it, having flow and speed. And just showing your overall, you know, ability to do everything you can on a call. But there is contests out there that are called live contests.

They're a little bit shorter in time and the main goal in those contests are to sound like a live hen-mow or a couple of Kennedy geese. And do you still get humbled by geese when you go hunting or do you fool them every single time? Now there's days man well they'll just fly right by and flip me the bird literally. Alright three straight wins at the World Goose Calling competition for short read that is something that has never been done before. What do you do next then? Are you gonna go win a fourth next year? So

I'm officially retired. Part, part of the, the, the world duck and goose calling championship rules is if you win three, you're retired. So I'm officially done. Um, you know, people have their opinions on that. I think it's pretty cool. It's been that way forever. You know, you shoot for, for winning three and then you're done, but I'm going to miss it, you know, obviously, but I am able to blow in the Champion of Champions Contest.

So everybody that's won at least one World Goose is able to blow in this contest. And they hold that every five years. And actually it's next year in 2025. So I'll be able to compete in that. And then if I'm fortunate enough to win that, I'm officially done competition goose calling on the world stage. Okay. We're going to be cheering for you. Now what,

what makes you better at calling geese than everyone else in this competition? You know, I don't, I wouldn't say how I'm better. It's just how I've convinced those judges that, you know, I sounded the best that day, It's subjective, opinion-based. So it's just, I try to stand out a little bit more than everybody else. Like I said, the judges are from all different parts of the country and they're used to hunting different

subspecies of geese, which sound different. Geese are different from all over the world, even though they're all goose, they're a little bit different. So just having different cadences, different tones and stuff, I just try to throw a little bit of everything in my routine just to cover all the bases

and try to convince them that I sounded the best that day. John, we got a lot of people in the chat today who were asking for tips. So give us some tips that goose callers of all skill levels could use. You know, if you're trying to advance, I would definitely try to get one-on-one lessons

from somebody. There's tons of stuff on social media, on people showing you tips and tricks on how to blow a goose call, but listening to a video, it helps, but having somebody one-on-one there that can see what you're doing, give you little tips and tricks right in person is so much better. And, you know, even me, I mean,

yeah, I'm the world champion this, you know, for the third time, but, you know, I'm no better than the next guy. I'm still learning stuff on a goose call to this day, you know, different cadences, different notes, different, just all sorts of different things. This thing's an instrument. It's like a guitar, you know, there's so many different things you can do. Just try to be as proficient as you can on a goose call. I mean, you're cheating yourself if, you know, you're just kind of hanging out and being mediocre, you know.

Can you play for us an award-winning goose calling sequence? Before you do that, explain what we're about to hear. Yeah, so I'll do a little sequence for you. I'll start off kind of going slow. So In a route in the world goose You're telling the judges a story in a minute and 30 seconds of a flock of geese off in the distance You get their attention the geese come to you Say you or your buddy moves in the blind the geese flare

You got to call him back and get them back into decoys and get them to the ground. So I'll kind of start off slow, get fast, get slow again. I'll do an abbreviated part of a routine for you real quick. Might be a little loud. Oh, Oh Wow beautiful, that's amazing. That's how like multiple piece at once. I don't know how you're doing that Yeah, pretty cool. I feel spoiled. We just got an exclusive show from the best goose caller in the world.

Congrats again for doing something that's never been done before by winning three straight World Goose Calling Championships on the short read. Enjoy your retirement and thanks for joining us. Appreciate it guys, thank you very much. Y'all have a good one. Thanks John. Thanks John. People in people in chatter saying that they're gonna take this part of our

podcast play it outdoors make sure that's legal in your state before you do it that gave me goosebumps oh got a lot of honking for a bonkins shoutouts in the comments as well. I was disappointed I wasn't here that day for that tattoo. That was so good. It's great. Every time I see a goose now just walking around town, that's the only thing I think of

and it's the only thing I'm gonna think of for the rest of my life. Oh, I'm sad I missed it. What episode was that? Somebody had a tattoo that, I don't know if they said they regretted it, but they shared it with us.

And it was like a crudely drawn, childlike effort at making a goose and then it said honkin' for a bonkin'. I don't think you need any context. I think people wanted context, but you don't need any context for that. It's just downright funny. I love it. 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 sweepstakes.

And our raffle and sweepstakes law makes it that they can't join. Whew. Our Northern brothers. You're 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 Meat Eater 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 hand-picked 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. Meat Eater Radio Live is the newest addition to the Meat Eater Podcast feed. Every Thursday at 11 a.m. Mountain Time, we'll be going live from MeatEater HQ on the MeatEater Podcast Network YouTube channel. This one-hour variety show will feature call-in guests, segments and live feedback from the MeatEater audience.

Then on Friday morning, the episode will be available in audio form on the MeatEater Podcast Feed. So come hang with me, Steve, Yanni, Kel and the rest of the MeadEater crew every Thursday at 11am Mountain Time on the MeadEater Podcast Network YouTube channel. And remember, it's live, so anything can happen. Well, almost anything. Our next segment is the Rot Report. Holy shit, the fight's a tail run, can't believe it's already here.

Kevin's gonna tell you what you should do. Think about the decks you buy, kiss your wife and kids goodbye. We hope they don't decide to desert you. Wow, thank you for that rut rule. The rut report is where Mark Kenyon gives us a whitetail hunting forecast for each region. Take it away, Mark. Hey guys, Mark Kenyon here from Wired Hunt coming at you with another whitetail rut report. And as you can see, I am reporting from my home office and that's because my own personal

rut marathon is tailing off as is the rut for many parts of the country. Now the southern United States is a little bit unique, but for the northern two thirds of the country, we are now coming down off the bell curve of rutting activity. Over the last two weeks, there's been a lot of seeking, a lot of chasing. The peak of breeding happened for most states right around the middle of November. We are tailing off of that. So, there are fewer does available to breed now than there were and because of hunting, especially gun

season's opening, there's also a lot fewer bucks out there to do the seeking and the chasing and all that kind of good stuff. So, the key things to know about the rut for the next week to two weeks is that it is slowing down. You're not going to see as much activity as maybe you saw the first week or second week of November, but it is still happening. There are still some does and estrus and the key thing here is that the big old bucks know that. So this last week or two right around Thanksgiving, give or take, is a notorious time to catch a very big, very

old buck on his feet doing the zombie walk, just cruising from bedding area to bedding area. So here's the thing to think about. Spend as much time as you can out there. Be out there midday if possible and be in thick cover away from hunting pressure in bedding areas. That's where it's going to be here for these final weeks of the rut. Good luck.

Yanni is heading out on his second rutcation to Wisconsin this year. Does that sound right? You think that's what you're going to see this week when you're out there? I sure hope so. Some people in Wisconsin, I've heard, have the attitude of like, man, every minute that goes by after opening, the opening bell of the opener. Like your odds just go down, down, down, down, down. But I don't really believe in that.

And this year we're spending Thanksgiving there in camp. Like my family's joining us next Wednesday. So I'm gonna hunt pretty close to every day of Wisconsin's nine day gun deer season and Yeah, I'm looking forward to exactly what Mark's talking about like I won't be hunting, you know dawn to dusk every day But I'm definitely gonna be putting a couple hours in and it doesn't matter if it's gonna be a daylight or at noon I'm gonna go out there and you know peek around and hopefully find zombie buck I think those pessimistic hunters you're talking about that would be true if you're hunting on public land

40 minutes from Milwaukee But if you have a private piece of ground to yourself that is well managed Yeah, you can feel optimistic for that whole week of Thanksgiving. Yeah. Well, I mean Yeah, right next to a big metropolitan area, maybe, but there's other public land around and according to the people I like to listen to, they're like by Thanksgiving, the deer pretty much are back to normal. Well, hope so for your case. Thank you.

Let's take a break for some listener feedback. Phil, what's the chant have to say? Yeah, we've got a couple things. I just wanted to shout out first Joe Just had a baby with his wife did he's also there. He's listening from the hospital. Congrats Joe Congrats Joe We've got another hospital listener from ant man So she's listening from the hospital because his spouse just got done getting her gallbladder taken out So shout out to the husbands out there supporting supporting their wives, but not paying attention them to listen to media radio. You're doing great Let's see a Garrett's wondering Spencer. Why why you strongly favor deer hunting? I

Don't know. It's just like what I'm familiar with. It's what I grew up doing I also like to solo hunt a lot and it is daunting to you know Going out trying to kill an elk when you're by yourself. Deer hunting is also, what I love about whitetails is you're hunting the same animal whether you're in Maine or Saskatchewan or Texas. And I like to travel around and hunt and so I think those are my favorite things about deer hunting.

I'm not going to put any of you on the spot to actually do a call, but Jeremiah is wondering what's the best call each of you can do if you're proud of anything, any skills you have, and you can show them off if you'd like to, you don't have to. Ooh. Yanni, you got the far away elk call, right?

He can do a spot on weed eater call, but it doesn't help much in the woods. I'd like to hear that. What's my best call? I don't know probably Steve always hipes up your faraway out call. Oh Yeah, but that's it's just like a fun Yeah, well I think Doing a spot on weed eater. That's just a fun thing as well one time I called in a herd though by whistling but It only happened once. I've tried tried since but no results.

I don't know probably an elk or a turkey would be my best call. I feel like I can do an okay hen turkey call with with just my mouth with no calling. Yeah that's good. Yeah, there we go. Cory, you got any calls that you're best at? Man, I feel like just estrous cow calls. I can't do it with just my mouth, but I need a diaphragm. And I have called in a pretty sizable bull elk with a blade of grass. I didn't have any calls on me.

Hell yeah. And then what happened? It wasn't season yet, unfortunately. It was too early. So we just watched him walk five yards. That's why he's the best elk hunter in the office. Chris is asking if you would cut around suspected tapeworm cysts in a deer liver or just pitch it.

I don't know enough about tapeworm cysts, but yeah, I'm probably not keeping that. You know, that's funny. We just got a text from, do I have enough time to find it? You can address it later in the show. Okay. You can look for the text now. Yeah, I'll look for the text now.

Cory, any thoughts on- Man, get rid of that thing. Yeah. That's it. I'll risk it. A lot of Yana Central content people are asking about. We're getting some fuzz here. I don't know if anyone's phone is near the mics.

Janus. We're live, folks. We're getting something. I'll try to find that. I'm just on internet. We'll troubleshoot. Great Danish, I'm guessing, is asking if we could get some gear talk segments on Radio Live.

And I'm mainly throwing this out there because I think it's a great idea. That is a good idea. Yeah, I don't know if you're aware of this, Janis, but we actually talked about maybe doing something like this. We were pitching this show, is bringing gear talk stuff back. So is that something you'd be interested in?

Sure. Yeah. Future segment, we're gonna have Yanni talking gear. Quick five minute gear session. And we will do one more, mainly this is gonna be a promo, I'm setting you up, Janis. Janis, what's the hunting fishing like in Latvia?

He's visited family in Lithuania before and they got a few yellow perch. Is there anywhere this person could go, Viljas Vilja, to find some quality Latvian hunting content? Oh yeah, well I've made two episodes about hunting in Latvia, which are on Meteor YouTube channel now. And there's also an upcoming episode,

I don't know, it'll probably be out sometime in 2025, where I hunted this past summer, but it's great hunting. It's not as difficult, I would say, as most hunting here. I don't know, it's just, it's a small place and critters just don't seem to be able to get away from ya. They're allowed to use thermals.

You described it for like, it's some gloves off situation. Yeah. Like the goal is to kill an animal. Yeah, for sure, for sure. But yeah, I've hunted red deer there and pigs and raccoon dogs and roe deer which I killed one this summer which is cool kill a full-grown buck that was only 50 pounds you can do that Cameron Haynes thing you know you throw

them on your shoulders and walk out really easily with those little roe deer did you do that? I did. The other thing I know about hunting in Latvia is that Yanni smoked a cigarette there. Mmm. Was that a celebratory cigarette or was just like it was part of the culture so you thought you should have one? So that was my first trip ever there. It was literally my first five hours, maybe three hours of being in Latvia and so yes I was celebrating sort of a homecoming in a way and you wanted to smell like a Latvian We were sitting outside of this, you know late night pizza joint and joined some beers with some friends

I hadn't seen in a decade or more and You know my crew from meat eater was there We're having a great time and some gals next to us are smoking up cigarettes one after another and I just thought you know When in Riga, uh-iga have a have a ciggy was it satisfying? No it was a bad decision. I also told you it took me four days to brush that taste out of my mouth. He might get mad at me for bringing this up when we went to Venice for the for the meat-eater experiences Randall was technically on vacation so the first thing we did on the way to the marina

was stop at a store so Randall could get a pack of cigarettes. I think he told me he smoked two and then threw the rest of the pack away. That's good content. That's vacation Randall. That's the behind the scenes stuff we need on Mediator Radio. I'm just gonna chime in for two things really quickly.

Villius, shout out to you, my paternal grandfather's Lithuanian. And then also I wanna go back to the tapeworm larva cyst. So a friend of mine, Kristin shot a deer and sent me a photo of, you know, it looks gross, little white cysts like rice looking things in her liver, and she wasn't sure what that was So I sent a picture to Jim Heffelfinger, and he said that this the

Tapeworm larva cysts are harmless to humans, but don't let your dog eat it Okay, I mean you may not be wanting to eat that stuff But if you trust the world's best-year biologist then go ahead and enjoy that liver but don't let your dog. Alright moving on our next segment is one minute fishing. Do I feel lucky? Well do you punk? Go ahead make my cast. 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 on the Gallatin River in Montana and he's fishing for a donation to Walleyes Unlimited. Seth welcome to the show! How's it going guys? Going good. Seth had to go to a river today because all of the still water in Bozeman is now frozen up. Seth, what's the tactic we're using today to catch a trout? Well, I got the old trusty spinning rod again. I got a spoon on it's called a nitty one.

I don't know if you can see that. Made in Pennsylvania. I used to catch a lot of trout in Pennsylvania on this thing so we're gonna give it a shot I will admit we have been fishing here for the last 20 minutes and haven't caught anything so you're gonna keep doing the same thing or you're trying something different for one minute fish well I just recently switched up to this made a couple casts so okay we'll see there's actually risers right now but um yep heard that yeah we see what we can do Cory it's now winter in Montana you've got rising fish there on the gallatin

what would you be doing if you were trying to catch one of these things Oh tie on a little size 20 blue wing olive okay dry fly mm-hmm I will say there there has been fly fishermen here the whole time we've been here and they haven't caught anything. Oh, all right. Well, Seth is gonna show them up right now. Seth, your one minute of fishing starts

when you make your first cast. Go ahead. All right, let's do it. They're getting fooled by those risers. There's like 10% of the fish are eating those bugs on the surface. The other 90% are eating the emerging bugs in the water column. Yeah, they're just seeing the tails go back down perhaps.

Maybe he'll hook a big old mountain whitefish. There you go. Snag it in the tail. 20 seconds in, one cast down. He's not jerking at all. Looks like he's fishing a little slower water off of the main current here. Nice little back, Eddie. 25 seconds to go for you, Seth. He's efficient, he's not like Randall getting his lure hung up in the trees. Ten seconds to go, Seth. That's a good angle.

Oh, God, it's tough, man. Time is up. No donation today for Wall eyes unlimited. I didn't have a whole lot of hope but Well next time we're gonna send Cory out there He's gonna have his fly rod and he's gonna show you and those other fly fishermen how it's done No, I think next time we should punch a few holes in some ice There you go. I imagine on the meteor pond. there's like what an inch and a half of ice right now so we're gonna have to wait another couple weeks probably. Yeah it'll freeze up quick. All right thank

you for joining us Seth maybe catch one of those and send us a photo. Will do thanks guys. You made that look way too easy in Louisiana a couple weeks ago Yanni. You were definitely chumming the water before that right? Oh, I mean that's we're fishing at a fish cleaning station, so the water is constantly chummed Uh-huh. Yeah, yeah, that'll probably the only time we have somebody catch like six fish in the one minute fishing segment Oh, we also had two anglers going after it, but Yeah, if there was a place where it was just about guaranteed that was it. All right our next segment is from Chester Floyd This is Chetikit

Take care of C-H-E-T. Soccatooey, sockatooey, sockatooey, sockatooey, sockatooey, sockatooey, sockatooey, sockatooey. This week Chester is answering a listener's question about finders' keepers' rules in the Alaskan back country. Take it away Chet. Hello everybody. My name is Chester Floyd and I'm coming at you from a basement in Wisconsin. And this week's Chet-A-Kit comes to us from Cooper. Wisconsin and this week's Cheddar kit comes to us from Cooper and Cooper writes I've been an Alaskan hunting and fishing guide for 12 years And I'm generally against do-it-yourself moose hunts for various reasons in September of

2023 a group of three men did a DIY moose hunt on a remote river They successfully harvested a legal bull, but due to their inexperience navigating, they hit several log jams and in the end had to call for a helicopter rescue. In Alaska, that meant leaving all their gear and even the moose behind. In August 2024, I took my jet boat up the same river, found the rafts, and even spotted the moose rack still attached to one. Just as I was about to give up, I noticed something red sticking out of a log jam, and after scavenging the area, I recovered about $10,000 bow my size, and other equipment, though no rifles. Most items were still in working condition and I split them up amongst the guides and

packers. Now, I'm wondering, should I have made an effort to contact the hunters and return their gear or does finders keepers apply here? Love, Cooper. Cooper's getting tired of moose trip guys saying that they can roll. Told me DIY float trip guys are always rolling rafts in the river holes Trooper is a hunting guide who went for a jet boat ride Believe it or not, he found those rafts and I'll be damned the moose rack still attached

When you're on a moose trip boat, you better keep the damn thing afloat or you'll pile a ride of tears and some guy named Cooper will be drinking your still cold beer. Oh, brilliant. Cooper, I think it's wonderful that you went in there and got all that inevitable trash off the river. I think if you want to keep that stuff, you shouldn't feel bad. But I'm going to tell you what I would do. I would call that guy or try and contact those fellas and let them know what you got. There's a chance that those guys might say keep some of it. There's a chance they might say they want it all back.

Who knows? They were inexperienced. They probably shouldn't have been doing what they were doing. But I don't know if I could live with myself with all that stuff of theirs and not be thinking about it for a long time to come. If I found a wallet in a bar, no matter how drunk the guy was or something, I'd call the guy and try and give it back. This is way different and it was like a year later and it would have been just left there for trash. So like I said, you want to keep that stuff. I don't think you should feel too bad about it. They left it there, but I would call them personally.

Thank you Chasier, a beautiful and clever song from him. To recap, we had some DIY moose hunters in Alaska who got in a bad place, had to call for a helicopter rescue and then it sounds like a year later like a year later a Guide went in there and found their gear and moose rack and took some of it with him. Yanni thoughts on that Um, I pretty much agree with Chester But if I was gonna call them and they're like, oh we'd like our gear back. I'd be like, okay Well, this is what it's gonna cost you. Mm-hmm I'll be like okay. Well. This is what it's gonna cost you mm-hmm Otherwise I wouldn't give it back to him

Cory you are you guided some days in your life. What do you think about this? Yeah, I found a lot of river booty in my time on the rivers and I've always examples Well, let's see I used to guide in the Bob Marshall wilderness, and we would do seven day pack trips and Saw a guy lose all his stuff He He slipped on a rock, lost stuff, including his rod. And he was like flagging us down like, Hey, help me look for my rod. And we never found it that day. But a week later, when we came back in and threw down on the river, we knew that there was going to be fishing stuff

there. The river had dropped quite a bit late summer. And so between myself and another guide, we were kind of racing to get down there to see who could find anything. And sure enough, there was the tip top of a fly rod sticking right there. And I was able to grab it, beautiful Sage rod. I still have it to this day.

Hell yeah. And I did put out a Craigslist notification that I found this in the middle of the Bob Marshall wilderness. If anybody wants it back, I got it and never heard anything. And then I found rods in the gallatin, or along the gallatin on Highway 191, and put out a Craigslist ad, and the guy got back to me,

they gave me $50 for finding easily $2,000 worth of gear sitting on the side of the highway. Yeah, I think in all of those instances, that's the right thing to do. This one's different though. But again, here, it's like, these boys should have, like the right thing they should have done is to hire somebody to go back in there and get their junk out of the woods. They just left it.

Well, I think this guide said he came back in August to get it. And we don't know when those moose hunters were there, but probably the fall before. Yeah. So he, you know, those guys had all summer to either come back themselves or send someone else in there to get it. Yeah. So he, you know, those guys had all summer to either come back themselves or send someone else in there to get it. Yeah. That's pretty frustrating. Little wanton waste too, leaving all that moose meat back there. Yeah. That was a unique Chettikit, right? And normally the Chettikit questions are like, what happens if someone sits 100 yards from me on public land? We're never gonna get

another one like what we just had. I do I do think, I would like to add that, I don't think that the guy should be too upset or not pro DIY moose hunts because of events like this. I mean, it's events like this that actually make a DIY moose hunt the adventure that it is because there is the chance of this happening and you have to go in there and face those hurdles,

and face those challenges, and some people may not be prepared for it, and they're gonna have to get airlifted out or whatever. But I hope that people go and keep trying to do adventures like that forever, and that hopefully some will fail. I mean, like the guy we interviewed the other day on the Meteor podcast, dude tried to live in the woods on a river near him, and he found him dead.

Oh. Not everybody's cut out for it. Sneak peek for an episode that won't be airing for several weeks. All right, thank you, Cooper. Thank you, Chester. Hey folks, exciting news for those who live or hunt in Canada. And boy boy my goodness do we hear from the Canadians whenever we do a raffle or 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 On X

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 On X 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 hand-picked by the on X hunt team some of our favorites Our first light schnaz vortex federal and more as a special offer

You can get a free three months to try on X out if you visit on X maps dot-com slash meet on X maps dot-com slash meet Welcome to the to the on X club y'all Joining us on the line last is author Jared Sullivan who just released his new book valley so low It's about the Kingston, Tennessee fossil plant disaster, which was the worst coal ash spill in American history. Jared, welcome to the show. Hey y'all, thanks for having me, I appreciate it.

First thing, Jared, give us some background on the Kingston fossil plant. Yeah, it's a huge coal-fired power plant built by the Tennessee Valley Authority, which is like a cornerstone of the New Deal, created by FDR. TVA helped lift the South Island poverty during the Great Depression by basically throwing up all these

hydroelectric dams, then coal-fired power plants brought industry here. So over several decades coal ash is like what's left over when you're burning coal to produce electricity. It's like a sooty, sandy, gross stuff. It's full of arsenic and silica and radium, just like nasty, gross stuff. So this big pile of it had accumulated over five or six decades, and this pile was six stories tall and 84 acres around. And in the middle of the night in December of 2008, this big thing just collapsed into the middle of the river or into a river but also covered a bunch of land. It covered 300 acres in this gross coal sludge. So my book, that's kind of where it starts, is this big mountain of coal sludge collapsing.

It kind of goes from there and follows some of these workers and an attorney who get involved in the fray. And with this coal ash, what impacts does that have on soil, water, plants, animals? Oh, it's not. It's like nasty stuff, man. It's like you wouldn't you don't want to anywhere near you. I found old newspaper dispatches from our local paper here in Nashville, where fishermen back in the 60s are complaining that it's killing fish could tied to their stringers as there is they're going

Down the lake and fishing and stuff. Yeah, it's like it's it's just full Gross stuff. So basically what happened after this big mountain of ash collapsed 900 men and women from across the country to send on the site to help clean it up these blue collar workers And tba tennessee valley authority And one of the contractors basically just didn't supply them with respirators and dust masks. And so these workers over a number of years are just as are just inhaling this coal ash stuff that's in the air. It started off really mucky and sludgy all over the ground. But eventually in Tennessee's hot, this stuff after a year or so under the sun, it started blowing around the job site.

These workers start inhaling it. They're inhaling arsenic and radium and all this really, really nasty stuff. So they fall sick really, really fast and they approached this local personal injury attorney in Knoxville named Jim Scott, who was kind of the only person who would hear them out. He's not like a big hotshot lawyer by any means. He has a little office in Knoxville,

like in a strip mall. And he's not the most like organized of strip mall and he, uh, he's not the most like organized of attorney, but he had a lot of heart and he listened to these blue collar workers and, and went, went to bat for them to try to get them damages. So my book's kind of like a legal thriller in that regard. Give us some examples of the fallout for these people who worked to clean up that coal ash. Oh man, I should say a lot of these people were sportsmen. Like one worker I follow in particular, his name's Ansel Clark, he's passed away.

He's like a big squirrel hunter. He liked to go shoot squirrels like a 22 Magnum on the Cumberland Plateau here in East Tennessee, or in East Tennessee. Within a couple years, Ansel, heart failure, congestive heart failure, lung problems, he eventually got this really rare form of blood cancer and He had a stroke in 2021 and died so More than 50 of these workers who helped clean up this this this big mess are dead now So I really think it's American tragedy TVA has done a lot of good for this part of the country It's created a lot of beautiful reservoirs are great for fishing and all this stuff. But it has

not been, in my view, a very good environmental steward in recent years, which is a real shame. And why wasn't this a bigger story when it happened? If this was the country's worst coal catastrophe ever, why 16 years are most of us just hearing about it now? Yeah, I mean, it wasn't only like the largest one, the largest coal disasters. One of the largest environmental disasters, full stop in the United States, 100 times larger than Exxon Valdez. This coal last sludge was a billion gallons. It could have filled the Empire State Building four times over. I mean it was biblical in scope what happened. But it was Christmas, it was, this happened

days before Christmas 2008. Then I think the news media was slow to respond. Also like the, there's a lot other stuff happening in the country. The economy was on its knees because of the financial meltdown. Barack Obama was about to become president. It was people, I think people were just distracted, right? I mean, it just, the people didn't have their eye on, you know, just weren't following with that closely. So it also like TVA, they came out and said after this big, after this, all the sludge got everywhere that it was not, it didn't pose a threat to the public. So I think the media kind of went, okay, great. Like, this isn't, this isn't that toxic. We won't worry about it. Well, turns out that was that was not truthful at all. I found memos from the National Archives that show that TVA has known since 1964 that this coal ash slough stuff

can peel the paint off your car and get you to eat away at vegetables and your vegetable garden falls over it. So it's just nasty, nasty stuff, man. And you're a local to that area, Jared. What do you remember in 2008 when this happened about the coal catastrophe? Yeah, that's a good question. I grew up in south of Nashville and I remember watching

on the news and I would recommend your viewers go listen to the helicopter footage from that day man. It will stick with you. A billion gallons of sludge over 300 acres. So I remember watching this footage. I remember TVA people coming on television saying, this stuff, yeah, it might contain some arsenic, but it's not a big deal. I remember them saying that. Then, jump ahead, 10 years, I was an editor. First I was an editor at Film and Stream,

but in 2018 I was an editor at Men's Journal. I remember I came across these courtroom dispatches where these sick workers went to trial trial try to get damages for their illnesses Yeah, so I when I read those dispatches, I knew exactly what the story was I mean, I knew I remember the spill happening and I just thought this is the story I want to dive deep into so yeah I spent five years reporting a book about what happened I kind of wrote it as a like it's like a legal thriller following this kind of like, uh, small town lawyer trying to do right by his, by his neighbors and by his community and trying to seek damages for these, for these workers. So yeah,

the book's called Valley Solo and I would hope y'all, uh, for real listeners, check it out. And when viewed through the courtroom story that plays out in the book, do you feel saddened, uh, by our country's legal system or was it the opposite and and you're encouraged because people like Jim Scott exist? No I was already pretty cynical when I started this project. It made me very cynical about the EPA, about their ability to monitor, protect folks from hazards. The EPA has had a good idea for a long time that this coal ash stuff is toxic too, but it's not technically considered a hazardous waste

by the EPA, which is a shame because this stuff is nasty. It hurts the environment. It hurts people. It contaminates thousands of miles of American rivers each year, this coal ash stuff. There's 750 of these ponds throughout the United States. It's not just a Tennessee problem, it's a national problem, but EPA hasn't regulated it well enough to the detriment of wildlife and to people. But yeah, it's also just a tragic legal tale. I mean, this is not a shocker, I guess, but blue collar workers going up against huge

billion, multi-billion dollar organizations, you know, that billion dollar organization is going to win. Even if they, even if the workers, even the jury sides with the worker, these billion dollar companies, they hire these slick lawyers and they can just appeal and appeal and appeal and appeal forever and basically, and force you to capitulate basically. Like force the, they forced the workers in my case

to take a settlement that was in my view way below what they deserved. Because they can strike the case out forever. That's what happened to Exxon Valadez too. You know, the Exxon Valadez wrecked that Alaska fishery. Well, a jury ruled against Exxon in that case, but Exxon went out and hired these slick lawyers, the same lawyer, and they could just

drive the case out forever. So eventually these Alaska fishermen just capitulated and they just took whatever because after a decade or so, they're like, we have to move on with our lives. You know, we have to, I can't keep fighting exile in court in the same very similar story would happen with my book. Our system is not set up to deal with disasters like this, in my view. I saw a lot of reviews from people from Tennessee who thanked you for writing this book because it was a story that needed to be told. So we want to thank you again for giving a voice to those people who were impacted by

the disaster. Valley So Low is available right now wherever books are sold. Jared, thanks for joining us and congrats on the book. Thanks y'all. Good to see you Spencer. Thanks Jared. All right our next segment is Tattoos I Regret. Hello darkness my old friend I've looked at my tattoo again my tattoo again. It really seemed like such a good idea. When I was drunk last summer

in Ibiza. The tattoo says a puss and a pot will always find more beans. What the f**k does that mean? It's a tattoo. I regret. I regret. I regret. Oh, well done. We just need to come up with more segments so Phil can make more jingles. That is just amazing. No, you just gotta put every single jingle in one audio record. That's it. Phil said he

had people complaining about the usual sound that we use for tattoos I regret so I mean it was mainly one person I'm not gonna name him uh-huh yeah that was beautiful. Does his first name start with S and last name start with R? It's very possible. Today's regrettable tattoo comes from Austin Tarby. If you have a hunting or fishing related tattoo that you regret, email us at radio at the meat eater dot com. All right. Phil has now pulled up the picture of Austin's tattoo. Here is his story.

I have a hunting tattoo that I regret. This tattoo was done on a drunkenunken irresponsible New Year's Eve. For some reason my buddy Kyle's parents thought that it would be a great idea to get him a tattoo machine for Christmas that year. Kyle, who is one of the worst artists I've ever met, suggested that somebody should get new ink that night. His girlfriend then piped up by saying that she would love to tattoo somebody. I, being drunk, young, and dumb, that's a dangerous combo, decided that I wanted a tattoo. Here I present to you my seagulls or penguins which were supposed to be cupping ducks. Luckily this tattoo didn't cost me

anything but it gets a lot of questions. Wow, where's the placement guys? I? Was describing this beforehand. This is like a very Masculine tattoo to get of cupping ducks that you're about to shoot in the face in a very feminine spot It's like kind of on his hip on the front side Lower than his name really appendix is that about the spot sure yeah Yeah, between the hip bone and the belly button leaning towards the hip bone a little bit Yeah And he's got four ducks there that are supposed to be cupping but as Austin described it

It looks more like penguins or seagulls. I don't think the tat looks that bad just the placements I don't think the tat looks that bad, just the placements. I don't, I mean, I don't know, there's a lot of negative space that isn't really working. Like the one on the top right especially looks like a deformed penguin. Yeah, it kind of looks like a petroglyph, which, you know, like those people,

those people were taking rocks and carving things into other rocks. And then that's sort of- But it's close enough that if you didn't know the context and someone just showed you that, you would say, hey, it's bad, but it's cupping ducks, right? Sure. Someone said the tattoo cost him his dignity. Yeah that's pretty expensive.

Kyle is exactly the kind of person who would get a tattoo gun from his parents For Christmas if I were picking one name it would be that's totally a Kyle thing to do the nice thing about his cupping ducks, I think that he could probably go to a Another tattoo artist with maybe some better art skills and fix them up a little bit. Add the feet dropping down, you know, maybe widen them out a little bit and maybe add another one to fill in that negative space that Phil was talking about. And I actually don't mind the location. I don't, I think when you like hide a tattoo, it's like, why did you get one when it's in a place where it's hidden. It's pretty hidden

Well, I don't know if he lives in a warm Place we spoke around without a shirt on all the time plays a lot of shirts and skins basketball It would be worse if he had it like above his butt crack. Yeah, you know on his back Yeah, you had to yeah girls get butterflies and flowers mm-hmm I think if there was a shotgun maybe on the other side of the hip I was sure with some you know scatter blasts even better below the waistline there'd be a dude coming up out of a blind yes this is free advice for you Austin So if you know other folks out there have to do the bush like you would say yeah If other people have tattoos they regret we're just handing out wisdom here on how you can make it better

Yanni had some silver linings and and Corey pointed out before the show that Santa Claus isn't carrying around a lot of tattoo guns on Christmas Eve. So good on Kyle for asking for that that year. Yeah, unique gift. There's some funny comments from the audience. There should be reeds coming up out of the waistline, and Nick says get appendicitis and have the doctors remove the tattoo. Oh yeah, that's good.

Nah, keep it. And you can see a picture of this tattoo on YouTube. So if you want to enjoy looking at Kyle's waistline, excuse me, not Kyle's, Austin's waistline with us, you can go over to the MeatEater YouTube channel. Alright, that brings us to the end of the show. Phil, what do we have from the live chat today? Yannis, this guy Troy has asked multiple times if you specifically are coming to Wisconsin for the Whitetail opener on Saturday.

Yes sir, Troy, I'm flying there tomorrow with my oldest daughter. We'll be getting into camp about 8 p.m. and quickly packing our bags, making lunch, and hitting the sack, and we got a 30-minute walk to our stand. So, yeah, we'll be there, bright and squirrely. As they say on the internet, username checks out, Canadian Hunter says,

listening to trivia is great, but sometimes, as a Canadian, it's hard to answer a lot of the American questions. I would love an episode or two of Canadian-focused questions. Ooh, I like it. Is that something you would do, Spencer? Canadian hunter, I recently wrote a question for an episode we'll record in a few weeks that is all about Canada so I think you'll get that one right. Another thing is we have crossword puzzles on our website now and I did one that was just for Canada so

Canadian hunter 21 you should go play that Canadian crossword puzzle, but to answer your question About a Canadian episode probably not going to happen, but I'll throw you little bones every now and then Brent Reeves is bragging about some chili he made and disappointed that he couldn't Enter it into the contest we had at the office yesterday Yeah, we had 12 entries yesterday, and our winner was Bree. I think we had Logan get second and Tressa get third. So I came back to defend my title, and it did not happen this year.

Brent would love some of your bourbon cornbread with the chili. Would have been delicious. That could have won it for him. Luke is asking, Yannis, since you're in the process of creating deer habitat, what trees would you recommend planting to balance both longevity and habitat,

or longitude of the, longevity of habitat and timeliness of production within your own life? Longevity, that's a tricky one. Boy, I haven't gotten that far along in my deer habitat creation process. Man, but if I had, I think just the little bit I know, and we've certainly talked a little bit about it, is I'd probably just go with some fruit trees of some sort and probably some apples and find some apple trees that grow well in my part of Wisconsin. Yeah. White tail hunters,

habitat managers always talk about plugging the lowest hole in the bucket. That is your property. So if your property is lacking fruit trees, then that's probably your answer. If, if your property is an area that historically has acorns, but you don't have any there right now, plant some oak trees, liquidate, whatever you're lacking. that would be my advice Was I saying? Longitivity you were I didn't even realize I was saying that wow okay That's it. I think I might just keep snow also stick with that see how it works. I

Wasn't gonna bring it up Phil. That's fine. Please correct me I'd rather have someone correct me on the spot than me look like an idiot for the rest of my life someone correct me on the spot, then me look like an idiot for the rest of my life. Let's see, Mogo is asking if we're gonna do any more Meat Eater movie clubs, because it's been a while. Who likes the segment? Yeah, next week, we will not be live on Thursday,

because it's Thanksgiving, but we will still drop an episode of Meat Eater Radio on Thursday at 11 a.m. Mountain Time on YouTube with the podcast coming the next day. And on that episode, there will be the return of the Meat Eater Movie Club. Randall and the crew will be reviewing the 1997 thriller The Edge, which you can stream on Amazon Prime. So Mogor, go watch it before Thursday's episode if you want to join in on the discussion.

Yeah, and really quick, unlike the last pre-taped episode we did when we were in Louisiana, we couldn't stream that one live. Even though this is going to be pre-recorded, we will be streaming it live. So the live chat will be active, it'll be treated like a normal show that's happening currently. So I'm going to try to be in the live chat if I can get away with it. So I was going to say, if you don't like your family, that would be a good place to hang out. Well, you know, come to your own conclusion. We're kinda telling on ourselves.

We're also gonna have a very special guest. Oh, okay. A very special guest. Not from the human species. For the Thanksgiving episode, what could it be? Bart the Bear? Probably a monkey. Anything else, Phil?

You know what? I kinda use that as sort of a way to transition to the outro here so also you know Black Friday is happening right now at meat eater it goes through December 2nd it's our biggest sale of the year at first light FHF Phelps Dave Smith decoys meat eater and and this is new for this year. There's a photo contest starting on Monday, November 25th, where people can submit their favorite hunting photos for a chance to win a bunch of sweet gear.

So Black Friday sale's happening right now. Go over to- I think this very shirt I'm wearing right now is half off. Half off? Okay. Is that right, Cory? I believe so. 50% off. It seems like a heck of a discount, but yeah? I believe so it's a discount But yeah, I believe you're right and he got a real compliment from that before we even knew it was it was half off

It's a slick shirt slick shirts. I like sale right now for Black Friday Anything else today? I Don't know no you want to talk about anything else you guys feeling? Big football game in Montana this Saturday cat gris go gris right everybody. Oh, no. I'm a cats fan. Yeah Yeah, I'm from Western, Montana, so mm-hmm gris or die, baby. I'll be there. I'll be there first row I'm gonna storm the field when we win again Are you really cats? Every game on there they win the storm the field well. I don't start storming of the field right

It's like the student section that floods out there and then I'm like yeah I'll get in on that so I think a little too old for that Spencer now no wonder if you'll be tearing down the goalpost and take it down to downtown I've been to three games where they storm the field I think to brawl of the wilds and did they beat SDSU in the playoffs a few years ago mmm fun time yeah I've never been that into the college football thing, but when we were in for the live tour, when we were in Penn State, in State College,

I interviewed a couple folks, and I really got to experience just the level of fandom and the passion there. One kid told me, he's like, we're gonna win, and when we win, we're gonna storm the field, then we're gonna pull down the goalpost, and then we're gonna carry that goalpost downtown. Yeah.

I'm like, man, I love the passion. That's what's fun about college football, best fans in the country. What happened at that football game? Ohio State beat them. Yeah, it was bummer. But it was still fun to see. Well Montana we don't have a professional team of course so this college football brawl of the wild is as big as it gets. Yeah I'll see you there on Saturday Cory. Good day to go hunting too because a lot of people be watching the football game. You boys have

fun. Alright that brings this to the end of today's show We'll see you back here in same time and place in a week watch me either rough cuts Mediator radio live is the newest addition to the Meat Eater Podcast feed. Every Thursday at 11am Mountain Time, we'll be going live from Meat Eater HQ on the Meat Eater Podcast Network YouTube channel. This one-hour variety show will feature call-in guests, segments and live feedback from the Meat Eater audience. Then, on Friday morning, the episode will be available in audio form on the Meat Eater Podcast feed. Then on Friday morning, the episode will be available in audio form on the MeadEater Podcast

feed. So come hang with me, Steve, Yanni, Kel and the rest of the MeadEater crew every Thursday at 11am Mountain Time on the MeadEater Podcast Network YouTube channel. And remember, it's live, so anything can happen. Well, almost anything.