The MeatEater Podcast - Ep. 646: The Future of American Duck Hunting

Episode Date: January 6, 2025

Steven Rinella talks with Karen Waldrup, Ryan Callaghan, Randall Williams, Brody Henderson, Cory Calkins, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.  Topics discussed: Everyone’s pintails; harvest information program; duck energy days; complicated waterfowl regulations; draining wetlands; the amount of Ducks Unlimited work done north of the border; a reminder that waterfowl migrate; the Duck Stamp; wetland before golf course; Waters of the United States; the important-for-ducks-zone; if you don't want to clean it, don't shoot it; and more.   Connect with Steve and The MeatEater Podcast Network Steve on Instagram and Twitter MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YoutubeSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is the Meat Eater Podcast coming at you shirtless, severely bug-bitten, and in my case underwear-less. We hunt the Meat Eater Podcast. You can't predict anything. The Meat Eater Podcast is brought to you by First Light. Whether you're checking trail cams, hanging deer stands, or scouting for elk, First Light has performance apparel to support every hunter in every environment. Check it out at firstlight.com. Joined today by Karen Waldrop. Am I saying that right?

You are. Chief Conservation Officer with Ducks Unlimited and more important to me. I'm joking about that Big time squirrel dog. I am squirrel hunting dog hunter. Yes. How do you say that? So squirrel hunter with dogs or dogs. I like that's clean. Yep. How'd you get into that? Oh goodness it was in college and I was I went out with a buddy one time and fell absolutely just fell in love with it. Was the buddy a guy or a girl? It was a guy. Okay. And it was, what I love about it is you can go out like well after deer season and everything else is over duck season, you can still go out until the end of February in most states. Yeah, I should get a shirt that says it's usually squirrel season.

Oh my gosh, it's always squirrel season somewhere. You can get spring squirrel season, fall, winter, it's great. You can normally go squirrel hunting. You can normally go squirrel hunting. So you got turned on to it, but that's like a whole commitment to get the dogs along. Yeah, so I got into it right away. I got my first dog in college. I trained Feist in college and had her for 17 years and she hunted hard for about 10. That's who's on your phone? That's who's on my phone still.

It's terrible. Not my kid, not my other dogs. My dog is on my phone. Where'd you go to college? Well that's a long story and I don't... I'm just curious where you were at that made it plausible. I was at University of Georgia at the time, but I started at Florida State, went to University of Georgia, got my bachelor's and my master's there, and then went to Clemson University for my PhD, and then University of Kentucky for my postdoc. See, oddly enough, your reaction was the same as a friend of mine who was asked not to return to college. There are different endings there.

I really say we'd prefer if you didn't come back to college. Yep. Didn't want to get a job, enter the real world, just stay in school. But you were brought up in Kentucky? Actually, I was brought up in Florida. And, but Kentucky is where we raised our family and was there for a long time. So, but, um, I was born in Mississippi. But you're from Florida.

Yep, born in Mississippi, raised mostly in Florida. I understand. North Central Florida. But then you spent a lot of your career in Kentucky. Yes. So actually, when I was working on my PhD at Clemson University, I was working on the elk restoration project for Kentucky.

So we came out west, grabbed 1,500 elk from a bunch of Western states, and started a restoration program. And that's why I actually went to Clemson, was to study the elk restoration work in Kentucky. And so I went to Clemson for the professor, and then did all my field work up there. Did you know I later killed one year elk? Did you really? What year did you come out? Man, a long time ago. I had to have still been there. I actually year did you come out? Man, a long time ago.

I had to have still been there. I actually, I remember it now. Yeah, a long time ago. That was fun, man. That was a lot of fun. It's not... The elk in the hardwoods, seems so weird, dude,

to see an elk standing in hardwoods. And let me tell you, it's steep. Like, it's not forgiving country. I mean, you're used to this out here, but East Kentucky can be pretty rough to hunt an elk in. Yeah, you're hunting elk in hardwoods, and we were finding a hand of the woods mushrooms. Pretty fun. Oh, super fun. So the reason I was asking about where to call it, so you would as a college student move around with that little squirrel dog.

I did. She actually was, we would camp out on reclaimed coal mines, so the elk came into East Kentucky because there's a lot of coal mining. So the reclaimed coal practices actually makes it really conducive for elk and elk habitat. So that's where the elk came into, plus it's out of horse country and cattle and everything else. So she would, when I was doing all my field work, I camped lived lived in a tent for about three years and my dog was me and my dog Camping out my tent for three years. And so since it's almost always squirrel season You just squirrel hunter your ass. I just squirrel hunter ass up. We ate a lot of squirrel She and I both

You got new ones to replace the dead one. Of course. Yeah, how many got no well I only have two right now, but I've had, I've had quite a few at any one time, but, but she was still probably the one that, you know, is the bar, right? And all the others have to have to match up to it. I've got one right now. His name is Oakley. He's about four or five years old and he had a good season last year and this year is going to be, it's going to be knocked out.

He's he's a, he's a killer. Well that's exciting, good. Uh, uh, you'll appreciate this. This is a listener feedback, but it has to do with Kentucky. Alright. So you have some subject matter expertise. This guy in Kentucky writes in and he was kind of underwhelmed. I can't tell. I would think he'd be happy, but it seems like he's not happy I can't tell I think it's happy at the end. He's just kind of happy at the end He took hunter safety

Which in Kentucky there's a field day requirement Yes, it seems like like they used to be not that and then it kind of got a lot of field days And then kovat happened and it kind of got a lot less field days, but he had a field day in Kentucky. And he goes down there to do the field day. And in the end, what it amounts to is him waiting in line. And he goes 40 miles, starts at 9 a.m. He thought he'd be there till noon. When he gets there, they tell him to get in line.

They give him some earplugs and some eye protection. They hand him a 22, he calls it a little pea shooter. They give him a single 22 long rifle round and a pea shooter. And he's supposed to put that round in the pea shooter, flip the safety and shoot a target at 10 yards down range, rack the bolt, and he's passed. Yeah. And he's wondering, is the reason,

is there more to it out west or less to it? It's not a west-east thing. Not at all. No it's a state-by-state. Some states have made it state law where you know you don't have to have the field portion of it. And in Kentucky they've they've kept that and it really depends on your instructor that you get. So your you know hunter-ed instructor some of them they'll bring out every different type of weapon and let you shoot them and muzzleloaders and shoot multiple times and but then others it's the requirement can they safely shoot a pea shooter, can they safely shoot a 22 racket not pointed at anybody,

put it back up safely, meet that check you know so it just really depends on the instructor that you get. I feel that they could safely do away with that safety part. Yeah. The field day. The field day, well if you think about it a lot of them that most people, not all, but most of them are either somebody that's a kid that's been hunting with mom and dad, uncle, grandparents, somebody for a long time before they come there, or it's you know an adult that's getting into hunting, a young adult or older adult, and they've been going with their friends

for several years because you have in Kentucky and several other states where you can hunt if you're like an apprenticeship. So if you're hunting with somebody else, you know, you can go out. So that's where they're getting their hunter safety training. They can probably pass that field park. So to answer your question, no, it has nothing to do with West-East. He wondered if it has to do with that Kentucky's more flat. No. And it's not like difficult to traverse. But no, because in Idaho it's all online. Yep. Well, yeah, there's a big stir amongst the Hunter's education instructors. Because this last like 10 years has seen a lot of importance put on Hunter's education

and then out of convenience and starting with a lot of the COVID protocols, you can just bypass Hunter's Ed basically entirely. Like Montana is a great example. We require Hunter's education. We don't require Montana Hunter education. So I don't want to get my kid down to a class. I don't want to take that time. Let's just hop online. Kids in Montana have to take it and they have to take it. They don't. Not Montana Hunter's education. No, you in Montana have to take it and they have to take it. They don't. No. Not Montana has that education. No, you can do, you don't, you have to provide.

I'm saying if you're a kid, if you live in Montana and your kid takes Hunter Ed here, they have to do a field day. Yes, but they could bypass it by doing, I don't want to give dirty secrets. No, that's the thing. Yeah, there are some ways. Bypass it by having your kids do a different state online in Montana. Except that's right. Online Texas, 20 minutes versus all that hassle.

Well, but also a lot of people say it's a barrier, right? Yeah. Like they say it's a barrier to get people into hunting. And so making it easy where you don't have that field day. But if your kid does the two-year mentor program, like that's two years of field time. If he's got a good mentor. Right. Okay, but the mentor has to be someone 21.

Yeah, or is it 21 or 18? 18. Is it 18? So the mentors gotta be of good standing, licensed and 18. I'm saying if, well, yeah, they could never go out. But if you go out and do a lot of field standing, licensed in 18, I'm saying, if, well, yeah, they could never go out, but if you go out and do a lot of field time, and it's a lot of exposure,

that's gonna like supersede what... Yeah, but you know, it's very, I get very impassioned about this subject. Well, yeah, but it's like, yeah, this is not specifically saying, Steven Rinelli, you don't know how to teach your kids in the way that, right? But every year we also have this big other to do

of like, oh my gosh, the people who misbehave while hunting are jeopardizing all these awesome programs that provide opportunity for hunting. It must be our hunter's education program that is failing. It's like well I don't know nobody has to take the hunter's education program. I don't think they should be looking to get out of field days. It's like getting a driver's license without taking a driving test. Come on. Yeah and you shouldn't be able to get a driver's license if you

just drive with someone who's 18 in the car Right a couple years. Let it give it a try. He's been driving I did a hunter's education in Missoula and you know, like the Missoula hunters or the Fish and game facility out there is big out on Spurgeon Road Mm-hmm. And so that's where they did the the field course out there is big out on Spurgeon road. And so that's where they did the field course out there. And they had all sorts, I failed one portion of it because they had adults that would come up to you and be like, hey, can I see your gun?

Oh, will. And you're like, yeah. Like secret shopper kind of stuff. Yeah, exactly. And they're like, well, you know, you shouldn't just let anybody come up and, and you're like, whoa. It was a trap. Yeah, exactly. And they're like, well, you know, you shouldn't just let anybody come up and go like, whoa! It was a trap. Yeah, it was brutal. But yeah, they had, you know, because there was like, it's relatively hilly, you know, so they're like, do you carry your, how do you carry your gun in this

situation? Stuff like that. And it's like, absolutely not mistakes that I don't see adults making. And I don't every single season say, hey, point it this way, you know, to adults. I did my Hunter's Ed in Ohio, and it was actually like a very substantive class. We had to drive a long way to do it. But then at the end of it, I got the card and it was written on like in pen, you know, just on like the card it said Randall Williams and whatever date. And probably a year after

I did that, the date and my name had rubbed off the card. And I don't know if there's any other record of it, so I rewrote my name and tried to remember the dates. And so now whenever I buy a license online like in Idaho or something and it's like enter your the state where you took it and what dates and if you have an ID number and I'm like oh I hope they don't catch me because I'm just sort of making this up based on my my my clearest recollection of being 17 years old and well if you want to have more dirty secrets out there there's no standardization for hunter's education so if you type in one two three four five yeah yeah right well that's what i feel like i'm doing

that's a great point man yeah that's a great point yeah the numbers are silly. What? Right. Cause like Montana's numbers, right? It starts with like a letter and then, and then the date. Yeah. Not like a social security number. If you go to California, completely different. It's odd that Cal with no children has such an in-depth knowledge of, um, not just knowledge, but opinions about, uh, hunter safety program. Well, cause it know just a concerned citizen I participate in the program people want to because he's like it's one of these people that's gonna shoot me something

Exactly or you know it's like the giant pile of human feces and toilet paper next to the sign-in box that block management Right. It's like just someone on their way to work right we're not no proof that's a hunter you know like my big chip on my shoulders I feel if you're an hunter's education instructor out there you are doing the Lord's work absolutely you're taking a lot of time for those children who have parents that are willing to get them to those classes to make better first-time hunters out there, and I think it's incredibly important. Unfortunately, I think a lot of the people out there making mistakes are ones that are just, you know, they're not paying attention to the Fish and Game website. They're not reading the regulations. They're not, you know, it's like, we need to find a completely different mechanism

to reach out and educate these people, because they're not tapped into the traditional information lines. But I think if you like take those hunter safety courses and you maybe have let fewer of them, and you take those best instructors, and you make it where, okay, so if you're not somebody, you know, a 12-year-old that's 13-year-old's been hunting with dad

a whole bunch and knows everything really well, then maybe you can kind of opt out by taking a test or different things, but make it to where it's more than just going out driving, you know, for a couple hours and shooting a 22. Like, make it fun, make it interactive, make it educational to where somebody doesn't feel like they just wasted their time. Yeah if there's a driving portion there should be a deer on the side of the

road and your instructor jams on the brakes, skids sideways on the dirt road and goes what do you do? See interactive and fun. Yes. I like it. Oh, you know what was making me nervous yesterday is speaking of gun handling and they didn't I had no problems but I took two my kid who's a freshman in high school and his high school buddy we went out and lay out blinds. Yeah. Because we had a guy on the podcast one time that blew the middle toes out of his foot in a layout blind. I had a guy not long ago that was hunting with us that shot the end of somebody else's barrel in the layout because they didn't, they didn't keep with that. You know, it's like you shot the end of the barrel.

That was stressing me out, man. No one did anything dumb, but it's just a lot going on. You're like, okay, like you're going to burst out of this box. Well, that we have, we have no idea where anything is and burst out of this box. Yeah, well, yeah, we have no idea where anything is and burst out of this box and start shooting, but don't and don't shoot the dogs. Don't shoot. Right. And that's yeah, layout blinds are yeah, they're they're stressful for sure.

But you know, we just hunted with a group, big group of folks. And on day three, one of them finally spoke up and was like now what do you mean by shooting lanes right and it just it man adult man it takes time yeah to like be like okay this is a safe group to ask questions you know he's like so let's say there's duck all the way down here all right you don't shoot I'm, there's five other hunters down there. Yeah. It's like, oh, interesting how you people do this. I've been working on that trait, that trait of men where now when someone tells

me something and they go, you know what I mean? I'll say, I don't know what you mean. Or they'll use like a technical term about something like with a vehicle that I'm not And now you know I'll say like I'll be like explain the Turbo in your right actually I don't know what that yeah right and normally go like I'll just say I don't understand but that's fine I don't think I'm not putting it on you yeah I understand it's but it's

people do that but I can yeah it's a very male thing to do especially talking about vehicles I just own up to your lack of knowledge yeah although I I got over it when I working Construction and working like with a Finnish carpenter and he would just ask me something he'd be like get me this and It was like the first week I would do three trips and get him the wrong thing the first two times and then the third time and bring him what he Wants, you know, and then all of a sudden it was just like, if I'm gonna save myself and save him a lot of frustration and anxiety if I just

clarify things right off the bat. Sure. I'll say this about hunting with kids and layout blinds, like at that age the reflexes are so freaking fast, man. They'd shoot the geese before I could get my box open. How are they so fast? And I'm like getting so slow. Man, they're fast. They're just like wired fast. We're gonna do one more bit of feedback. That's fine. Can you hang tight a minute? Oh, plus there's this. Randall this morning, he comes in all... We found over the weekend

the greatest free range Christmas tree ever found by man. And by we, he means his family. My family. The greatest free range Christmas tree ever found by man. And by we, he means his family. My family. The greatest free range tree. Mine did not pass judgment. And Randy, he's like talking about, oh, I got a real booner. Tell me all about where he went,

how snowy it was and how rugged it was. And like, and he shows me a tree and he tries to sell me on the fact that only like half the tree's there. Cause that's like one of those trees that was nestled up to his neighbor. I think so it didn't grow any limbs on that side and look, just put it right against the wall. It comes with a flat side.

You know what I don't like doing is decorating the backside of a tree. Well, you don't have to. If I want to look at all my ornaments, I like my trees to have sort of a flat wall It doesn't stick out into the room as far It goes right up against the wall and you don't have to waste your precious ornaments on the back end on your way up Were you telling your wife like what we're looking for is a half do you rotate your tree every few days appreciate all sides trim that I flushed that backside up with a sheer but I don't look for one oh I don't look for one with mine well

Randall's permit was for a management tree I think he's on to something I think it's gonna be like the new thing. Everyone's gonna be trying to grow these flat trees. Totally. Especially, you know, if we had a smaller house, I'd want one that fits into a corner. Just a right angle, two flat sides, just slide it right in there. Well, if you think about it, the ornaments you put on the back are all the ones that you know The kids might have made or that wax. I mean those for me go on the front. Sorry kids other people's The really old crappy ones you put those all in the back so you see all the we haven't accumulated yet enough Ornaments as a family to you can cap some are

Castaways to you can cap some hours have some castaways. Yeah, I know, I know a way to fix that and hurry. And all you got to do is stop trying to make it not happen, which is have having children. Last piece of list or feedback. This is a good one. This fella says this, his name's Logan. I recently ran into an issue with a new neighbor hunting the property next to the one I have permission to hunt. Well, it says this, his name's Logan. I recently ran into an issue with a new neighbor hunting the property next to the one I have permission to hunt. Says everything around here is privately owned land.

He's clarifying that. While I generally try to stay on good terms with the folks around me, this new neighbor decided to place a trail camera on the fence line facing the property I hunt. I'm sure that the only reason for doing so is to monitor the deer activity on my side of the fence." Well, you remember that Robert Frost, he

was the poet laureate. He had that fences about the two neighbors that get together every year to like to reinforce the fence between their properties. Good fences make good neighbors. But he's kind of dogging on them. Yeah. Anyhow, I normally wouldn't care who puts cameras where, but the fact that it's placed less than five yards from the fence and pointed directly on the trail I used to get in and out of my bow stand really bothers me. He's wondering, should he moon the camera?

Should he give it the camera the finger? Or should he get a big taxidermy deer and start jutting it out in front of the camera now and then to create the illusion of a giant buck in the area that isn't actually there? I personally like option three, but it's fun. I'm kind of a prankster. Oh, you left it out. Or, um, he might grab his own camera and point it back at that camera.

That's what I'd do. I would do, I would do, I would hold all those and I would say to the guy, maybe say to the neighbor, do you mind not aiming your camera? Do you mind not aiming your camera like deliberately onto my place? Because I walk through there and it bothers me. I remember Doug Dern, they had a place out there and there's a neighbor had this wood lot and there's this huge sign painted on plywood that said, oh do not shoot into these woods. And Doug

wanted to put one on his side that said do not shoot out of these woods Doug's place is man if you climb up Just about any tree stand and look hard enough you can find a little bit of orange sticking out of Crazy crazy and Some stone-faced people out there too. They don't even they're like nope you don't exist I'm just looking at the 25 yards between me and you and that's it Wild another thing this guy could do is put a tarp up. Oh Yeah, it's a little brush privacy like a privacy screen. Yeah, that would bug the hell out of me to be honest with you Yeah, I would definitely call for sure

But and you know there's always something good that you're gonna get out of a conversation with the neighbor But yeah all the funny things that you could do would be awesome Just yeah have a little screen that you put up there and have like a deer you know have something that'll trigger the camera every five seconds yeah so much noise that he'll never get through it to find you walking around kills the battery so when he pulls his card it's like you have 3,000 yeah you know just a CD spinning out of a tree. Here's what we're not going to talk about, because the same people do this all the time. Some hosers in where Netherlands where the set.

Sorry, what they that buddy of mine that we were talking about the other day, he's got all the grizzly bears and wolves and stuff on his camera. You know, things that just set cameras off. This is an observation that I made he's like yeah this camera, this squirrel keeps setting it off and he starts like going through and through and through see him there see him there see him there see him there and eventually it dawned on me I'm like you know this squirrel's giving this guy a lot of enjoyment. Netherlands. The authors are from Germany. I don't care where they're from. And the editors from Colombia. The research is based in Germany.

Okay so these hosers in Germany have determined, they've done a map where they look at the more wolf attacks there are in an area, the more the area's prone to vote right wing. Far right. Yeah. Aren't you kind of saying rural people tend to vote far right? Because Ian Fraser did the same thing in the US where he's like, the more wild hogs are in the area, the more you're likely to vote Republican. But every election you prove this over and over again, that generally, I mean, there's many, many exceptions, but generally rural areas generally vote right. Urban areas, generally true.

Urban areas generally vote left. So I feel like you're just finding new ways to say the same thing. You'd be like, the further apart houses are, the more pickup trucks there are in an area. The more squirrel hunters. This is based on livestock attacks too, right? Not human.

No, yeah, but I'm just saying, it's like another way of expressing, like I'm guessing that wolves attacking livestock is happening in rural agricultural areas in Germany. And those people are voting different than people that are in Munich. So great work guys. Well, maybe they're having trouble identifying rural areas.

So they found a new indicator. What would be the epitome of ruralness? And some guys like, I guess it'd be like a fucking wolf attacking a cow. That feels rural to me. All right Karen, how are ducks doing in general in the United States of America? Yeah, so our North American waterfowl population is, so I don't know if you guys follow, you know, when US Fish and Wildlife Service, Ducks Unlimited, it's a big day when the breeding population survey Habitat Survey comes out, you know, it's always a

fun day to see. How about calories? Yeah, it's a big day, right? You look for that every year. It's kind of like Christmas. But so what we saw for this year, I mean, numbers are still down, but they came up. So for the first time in ten years, waterfowl populations went up about 5% Okay, so of course that's gonna be a lot of that's gonna be dependent on the the pond surveys, too And there was a lot of difference in pond surveys in the prairie pothole region And I'm sure all the listeners know that or understand that waterfowl You know for for waterfowl for, the prairie potholes is like

60% of waterfowl nests there. And then a lot, 25, 30 percent or so in the boreal and in wet years you have a lot more in the prairies, in the prairies of US and Canada. And so the surveys... Can you tell people basically what you're talking about when you talk about the prairie potholes? Yeah, so the prairie potholes are going to be in southern Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, and then into the U.S. prairies of North Dakota, Montana, the eastern part of Montana, the northern and eastern part of North Dakota, eastern part of South Dakota, and goes down into Minnesota and a little bit into Iowa, but most of the wetlands are gone there. But that's the prairie pothole region, And it is a critical landscape for waterfowl,

for Ducks Unlimited and another waterfowl enthusiast. It's like the priority landscape for federal and state partners as well. So what we're seeing this past year with pond counts is it's a pretty diverse and dynamic landscape. So the US prairie potholes were wetter than they've been in the last 10 years. So they actually had a big increase,

like a 50% increase from last year. But then the prairies in Canada were the driest they've been in 30 years. And so just shows that dynamic landscape and they were down. So overall, the pond counts was like 4% higher than last year, right around the long-term average for pond counts. And so you take those two things and that's how the seasons are determined as far as how the population is doing. Well for the central

Mississippi Flyways you look at the pond counts and then the mallard population and that determines what the seasons are going to be. So we look at that every year to look at what the seasons are going to be. So we look at that every year to look at what the seasons are going to be for the following year. So waterfowl populations, you know, there's a little bit of good news. Mother Nature's been helping us out a little bit. It's still, we've been in a long-term drought. It's going to take years of good weather at the right time, right amount of moisture, you know, cold up north, get a lot of snow cover, and then some

good rains to keep that going. But you know, potholes, it's a normal cycle. We have, you know, every however many years, 30 years, whatever it might be. Remember the 80s were really bad, but droughts are important for wetlands to recharge themselves. So while we don't like it as waterfowl hunters, it makes us nervous. You know, we should be coming out of that drought cycle and hopefully seeing some increased populations.

But we'll see. You know, the problem with the, the only problem with when the water came in the prairies in the US, it was after a lot of those early migrants came through. So a lot of your mallards and everything. So they flew over because it was dry and they went to the boreal, which it's great.

The boreal landscape is kind of like, it is good to have that because it does provide a lot of nesting and production opportunities. But typically waterfowl don't produce as well up there. So the reproduction's not as well because the habitat's not as rich and invertebrates and everything that they need for laying eggs and it's just not as productive of a habitat for waterfowl.

But it's pretty darn good and it's vast so it's good to have. But typically what we see a lot when waterfowl fly over the prairies is not as many young birds in the bag as far as the ratio of juveniles to adults in the harvest information reports and everything else, that it's not usually that ratio is not as many young birds. But we were seeing from biologists were saying that those birds that did stay in the prairies or that came later, man they had great habitat so we should have really good production and they were actually seeing that a lot of young birds coming out of the coming out of the US prairie puddles so it's a

mixed bag. Yeah. Is it that if a duck's coming from he goes south for the winter and he's flying up he's not like a salmon where he doesn't know exactly where he's going. Well I don't know. They have done studies, she I guess, transmitters, and showing birds coming back like so close to where they had been previous years. You said they would shoot past. Oh yeah, if there's no water they'll shoot past, yes, and find another place. So they want to kind of go where they came past. Yeah, and find another place. Yeah. Got it. So they want to kind of go where they came from. They want to go where they come from.

So it's pretty neat. It is. There's actually, just to do a plug for it, the movie Wings Over Water, I don't know if you've heard of it yet. Yeah. It's been out a couple years. It's an IMAX. It's really geared towards kids.

So, but not just kids, but it's talking about the prairie potholes, and it's not justMAX, it's really geared towards kids. So, but not just kids, but it's talking about the prairie potholes and it's not just waterfowl, it follows a duck, it follows a sandhill crane and a yellow warbler and shows their migration from south all the way up to the prairies and the importance of prairies and all the landowners there and farmers and ranchers and why the prairie pothole region is so important for all sorts of species of birds What's the major thing besides that water level? What's the major thing that drives duck up and down drives duck numbers up and down in the United States?

So I mean habitat right so it's it's all tied to habitat And you know pond count is is good way. Of course it's been going on since the mid 1950s and it's the longest running waterfowl population survey. It's missed two years because of COVID but other than that, longest year, longest survey. And so you know it's a good indicator the more wetlands that are on a landscape, which is what waterfowl need for in the grasslands, so for nesting and everything as well, and then for brood production and brood rearing. But the more wetlands and smaller shallow wetlands

are preferred over, you know, I'd rather have a hundred, you know, one acre wetlands than one 100 acre wetland because they're very territorial as well. So the more water you have on the landscape from wetlands, the better production you're gonna have for waterfowl. And it follows it pretty pretty closely. You can see waterfowl populations up and down, up and down, and it being with, you know, the previous year's wetland production. Got it, got it. So wetland conservation, ducks unlimited, that's what it's all about. And you know,

our priority landscape of course is the prairies. That's our number one priority landscape. We work all throughout North America. We have a lot of landscape conservation priority areas that are important for waterfowl. Because wintering habitat is really important for waterfowl too. You have to get those, you have to have enough energy and carbohydrates and everything that they need

for fat storage and everything else to make it through those cold winters and be able to come back up north. But now that you hear about people say like changing agricultural practices will really impact. Sure. Yeah, so there's a study we actually just finished using band return. So from the 1960s until 2019, one of our biologists, Dr. Mike Brazier, along with Dr. Webb with the Missouri co-op unit, and then also US Fish and Wildlife Service, looked at bands from 1960 to 2019. And we looked at three different species of birds, mallard, pintail, and

blue-winged teal. And then looked at different subpopulations of where they came from, whether it was Canada and the boreal, Canadian prairies and the boreal, U.S. prairies, and then the Great Lakes and eastern Canada. And then looked at different months, October, November, December, January. So getting to your point. So pintails, if you looked in 1960s, pintails were all along the coast in the winter. Rice in Texas was big. So all those pintails in January and the 1960s and 70s were all there. Now in 2019 and 10s to 19s, that population shifted, you could see, in January, bird band returns to Arkansas, the Mississippi,

alluvia valley where the rice is. So, yeah, it's really cool. It's not, you can check it out. We've got a, it's on our website, but part of that, it was actually in the last magazine too. It's really neat. So looking at those. So they just found the rice production

and now that all that rice is down in Texas and Louisiana and stuff. Right, on the coast, yep. Still out in Louisiana. Yeah, the Californians are super happy because they can shoot two pin tails a day. No, no, no. Right? No, no, no.

It's one right now. But next year, it'll be three. Oh, okay. And both the Mississippi, Central, Atlanta, all four flyways will be at three next year. Not this current year. I have to be really careful. What happens to that lady? Why is it going up?

So, US Fish and Wildlife Service, again, okay, there's adaptive harvest management models for all sorts of different species and we could spend a lot of time going into it. It's really cool. We could geek out in the science of it. But, you know, pintails, like you said, Pacific, flyway, they're seeing so many pintails. Well, the thing is, they get their pintails not only from Alaska, but also from the Canadian prairies and the U.S. prairies, and where those pintails aren't doing as well.

We have a lot of pintails in Montana in the spring. Oh yeah. It's super cool. Heck yeah you do. You should. And so what it is they mix, whereas mallards they have, you know, the mid-continent mallards, the Western mallards, Eastern mallards, they don't really, they stay in their flyways.

Pintails, it's a little bit different. So they've been restricted to one. But the reason for looking at it is trying, it's an experimental three, I don't know if they're calling it quote unquote experimental season, but it's a three year trial season. And if the numbers don't drop below,

I might get this a little wrong, let's say I think it's 1.2 million that will be open for three birds. If it gets below that, it'll drop to 2, 1 or close season depending on where that population is. And so this year from the breeding population survey, it's over the 1.2 million mark or whatever that is, it's around there. But the reason they're doing this is they're trying to really see what are the effects, is there an effect of shooting three pintails on the population? We try to set our populations, we, US Fish and Wildlife Service, Ducks Unlimited is not

part of it, I should make that clear, but US Fish and Wildlife Service and bi scientists try to make sure that you're not having the additive impact of mortality in hunting. So what they want to see is, is there an impact from harvesting three birds on that population or is it not additive, is it compensatory, that hunter harvest? Do you mind walking people through what that means? Yes, no I do. Good job, Steve.

Additive, just so people understand, additive and compensatory. Yep, yep, yep. So if it's additive mortality, those birds would have made it back to nesting and had a successful nesting and had more production the following year if it's additive from that harvest. And if it's compensatory, then those birds wouldn't have made it anyway to a certain number of birds aren't going to make it back to breed because of their their life cycle.

Got it. And that's like when I go love hunting in California and you do see it seems very consistent that you see more pin tails than anything else and so of course you get more complaints about only being able to kill one pintail per day. They're just flying over you. Just sitting there flying over you. Yeah. And they're a myth because what's going on is that all those Sacramento rice field pintails are all hanging out in Arkansas now? No, no, no, no, no. This is a different flyway. So I thought she was saying they shifted over. What the hell are you talking about? What the hell are you talking about, lady? So no, so the birds coming from the Canadian U.S. prairies,

some of them will go down to Arkansas, some of them will head over to California, and so it's not distinct where they come from. So in other words, the birds, the pintails in the U.S. and the Canadian prairies aren't doing as well. The ones up in Alaska are doing well, but they might they all come down into California, but some of these from Canada. So the Alaska ones aren't going to Arkansas? Correct. I understand now. But you always have to tell those California folks, it's like well they're not California pintails. They're kind of everybody's pintails. And me in Montana, I can shoot one per day and we're growing them. They just end up here.

Yeah. Yep. That's the thing about waterfowl. It's, I mean, it's pretty impressive to understand how US Fish and Wildlife Service and the states because they have part of that through the flyway councils. When I was in Kentucky, I was on the Mississippi Flyway Council, and manage waterfowl populations for everybody because they are a migratory species. The amount of time and effort that it takes to determine the models that are going to

be best for those waterfowl populations to sustain them and to not cause harm to those populations. It's a pretty important job that the service does and that survey is critical and the reason, one of the reasons why we can make it happen. And also hunters, right? With your harvest information program, doing the HIPP survey every year, answering the US Fish and Wildlife surveys, all of those things are critical to help manage that population of birds. Have you ever done an onus check on the hip survey? Has anybody ever done that? Yeah, actually, yes. So here's- I give it straight on mine.

Right, so here's- But I can see some of them being like, wow, shit, I must have got 40. Yeah, like, you know, do you want to, like, you've got some hunters that, well, I don't want to tell everybody that I'm killing a whole bunch Yeah, like you know do you want to like you've got some hunters that well I don't want to tell everybody that I'm killing a whole bunch of birds you know. So they put down zero, you get other guys that want to look like they get more and they're getting. But here's the thing about it if we don't have the correct survey information then you know we're not doing our part as hunters right that that science part of it. So what was happening in Kentucky, I'll give this example, we had some of the worst hip survey data results because what was happening if we

think is everyone was going to the Walmart to do their hip to buy their license, right? I'm just saying Walmart, sorry. Any hunting store to go buy their license and the kids... I've bought more than a few at Walmart. Well I didn't want to pick on Walmart, right? It could be any place. It's a great place to buy a license. Yeah, so it is a great place. Walmart's great. Yeah, get your sliced deli meat, your AA batteries. Deodorant, pick up a hunt license. I didn't want to say it was Walmart employees were not doing a good job. So, but you know, got the 18-year-old behind the counter that's selling the license and they get to the hip survey and they just go 0000. Here's your license, right? And they don't ask them, are you a waterfowl hunter? Are you a dove hunter? Are you this? Are you that? They don't ask them. They just go blah blah blah. And so then you don't know as the hunter that you're not complying with the law and you're not doing it right. You're

thinking everything's fine. You get your license. Well, so our data in Kentucky was terrible. So what we did is we instituted, it was a law that you had to go online. You could no longer at point of sale, even if you bought your license point of sale, you had to go online and do your hip survey. And so then our data went from one of the worst in the country to one of the best that we're providing the service to. But how do you know it's good or bad? So there are ways you can fact check year after year after year of certain hunters to see if it's pretty normal. Oh, they killed 20 birds here and zero here and 20 there. So you can kind of see.

Yeah, Randall's still not killing any birds. Oh, that poor Randall. Looks like Randall didn't get out again. He tries real hard though, doesn't he? Yeah. Every year they goof on Randall. Let's all have a laugh, but Randall's survey. Poor Randall.

I got a question on the hip surveys. So, last year would be a good example. I guess, or still this year I guess, but hunted Missouri, hunted California. Got to do it twice.

And that's another thing people don't know. It gotta do it twice. You gotta do it twice. And that's another thing people don't know. It's an education thing. Is the expectation that it doesn't matter where you are, you're filling out the number of birds that you got in aggregate. In that location. No, in that state. If you need a takeaway, folks. Yeah, you might have to retract that statement earlier about always filling out your hip survey. Yeah.

Well, my intentions were pure. When you buy, well, so it should be, if you buy it point of sale, they should ask you. But I didn't know they were asking about that. But you know what? I don't know, I'll have to go somewhere. I just never, I didn't know that. Like, I don't know if you go to Alaska and hunt for a day.

Every time you buy like, you gotta do it. All in. Whatever you've been up to. Oh, yeah. Collectively, right? Yeah. It's not all in. No. Because they'll do, they'll take it state by state and roll it all up. That's not clear. They should fix that. They should definitely clear that. Well, you know, we are trying to-

What's hip stand for anyway? Harvest Information Program. Okay. it all up. That's not clear they should fix that. Well you know we are trying to harvest information program and so we're actually we're actually trying to help state Fish and Wildlife agencies and trying to collect the most accurate data working with US Fish and Wildlife Service in order to do that but huh interesting. Well what was your question about it? Oh no that's it. It's like are you filling it out for your Harvest information in that specific state. Yeah, or are you saying? This is me. This is what I did last year. You might later later today You might send an email to the higher-ups

In the HIP program and tell them that they should clarify that point and it would create incredible efficiency Did you hunt Missouri last year? Nope. Okay. Zero, zero, zero, zero, zero. And so then of course, you know, if you just go there one year and hunt, you don't go back for a couple of years, right? So then you're not collecting whatever, but they have, they've got all sorts of data management behind the scenes to figure out things like that. So they work through those things. They, it's a pretty good system, but they are working on improvements to the harvest information program so we can collect the best survey data possible.

Let's say you're a hunter, we can move on from the hip survey. I want to know who kills the most snipe. When I lived out in Seattle, I was hitting big snipe numbers. There was good pin tails and good snipe. For those years I really liked it because I could get in there. Because normally you got to skip through all the coots and rails and snipes. I was like, I really just got to go zero, zero, zero, zero. But I got to hit some snipes. That's pretty cool.

Felt good, man. Yeah. The kid at Walmart was duly impressed. Back up, back up, back up. Put me down for three. Not so fast. Put me down. And then oh I should also mention so when you do that hip stuff so that just puts you in a category so that puts Randall will be in the zero to whatever category. You would be in the max category, right? I was pointing to Steve, by the way, everybody. Brownie points. But so once they do that, then they select a certain number of people from that grouping and then they send out

the more intricate survey. So the individual one doesn't really matter as much. That puts you in a group and then that's when you get that big survey and they made it online last year used to man I got for years. I got roped into that. Yeah all the wings and yep And so then that's when they asked I can't really present those people I was into it for a year or two, but I was like good lord man Yeah, yep, and so they'll figure out like they'll ask you which states did you hunt in so you'll get Yeah, how do they get how do you pick for that that got to be a lot?

Yeah, so it's a it's a random it should be a random generated in each of those categories But they don't have as many in that top-end category that you find yourself in so I do a lot of like, you know my geese numbers, I'm using the zero to tenor, you know, ducks I get out, I'll climb up into the 20 to 30 now and then, but I'm not a big waterfall guy. Yeah, no, it's a water. I appreciate it, but here's a waterfall management question to move away from hip surveys.

People will point out, like, I think it it's widely understood there's some kind of arrangement between states and federal, right? You can be duck hunting, you can get checked by a Fed, but Feds don't check you on your deer hunting, but there's also like this, there's like an international component. That's right. But does that have any teeth? First, can you explain like what is the international component and then does it have any teeth? First, can you explain what is the international component? And then does it have any teeth? Meaning, would Mexico ever be like, damn it, we're not getting any ducks down here, you need to change your bag limits? Or would we just be like, mind your own business? What would our attitude be? Yeah, so the North American Waterfowl Management Plan,

and it takes Canada, US, and Mexico. Now, this from a Habitat standpoint, right, the NAWAMP or North American Waterfile Management Plan, and try to identify what are those most important places for Habitat and structuring it that way. But then from an enforcement, so you all three have their own regulations and laws and how they set that up. And they don't cooperate on those laws. No, and so if you think about it in Canada Canada everyone's like, man, how come you can shoot so many up in Canada, but when they cross that line and into the United States, you can't.

How many can you shoot in Canada? I'm trying to think of what the... Like is there anything, like we're at seven right now in Montana. Is there anything more than seven in Canada? Yes, yes, absolutely. More than seven. On ducks? So yes, absolutely. More than seven. So it's eight I think, in Saskatchewan. And do they have the three day

possession limit? I'm trying to think of what their possession limits are in Canada. I'm not sure, we need to look it up. Well there's an eight bird limit there. I think it's an eight bird limit. No, I'm trying to think of what it is. But, you can harvest more birds in Canada,

but there aren't as many hunters up there. So you have a lot more waterfowl hunters in the United States, so we're going to have a much higher impact. Same with Mexico. Not nearly as many waterfowl hunters in Mexico, so their daily bag limits can be higher in Canada and Mexico. The pie is not getting cut up into as many pieces. So this is the AI overview.

I'm sure it's right. I'm not sure if it's right, but eight per day. This is ducks with four being pintails. Ooh, take that California. Dark geese, eight per day with no more than five being white fronted. Wow, so that's double our geese. Yeah, yeah, that's a lot. White geese, 20 per day. Not as much pressure. It's fairly close. And a much shorter amount of time too, you know. Five Sandhill cranes per day. That's a lot of meat. Is white geese, uh, snow? Snow, yeah.

Normally when people say they're moving to Canada they're making some kind of bitchy comment about the election but you'd be like no I mean because ducks. I was going to say this might make some of those Californians make good on their promises. Giant mule deer and ducks come on. Can't go wrong. How is it that, how does it come to be that different states have different regs? Okay. Like, how do they weigh that out? Like I said, right here, I don't know what it is in other places. Right now, I mean, for years it's been like, there's all kinds of restrictions, but like you're allowed seven ducks and then we have all of those like, uh, no more than blank.

So seven ducks, but no more than two can be a hen mallard. No more than on a pintail. Yeah. Well, there can be huge discrepancies. I remember a season or two where you could kill seven ducks in Montana. But if you were in a Stuttgart, Arkansas, waterfowl capital of the world, you could kill seven ducks in Montana, but if you were in Stuttgart, Arkansas, the waterfowl capital of the world, you could shoot a duck. A duck. A duck. A duck. Yeah, that's how, like, I can't remember the exact situation, but it was like very, very dire over there. Yeah. Okay, so

yeah, how's that all divided up? So I mentioned briefly earlier, the flyway councils. And so because they are migratory and international and everything, you have the federal regulations, and then you also can have state regulations. So whatever the feds come up with, you can have like next year, three pin tails, and you're in the liberal season, with, you know, you can have like next year three pin tails and you're in the liberal season. States can be more restrictive than the federal rule, but not less restrictive. So a state like Arkansas can make the decision because they have a ton of hunters there putting a lot of pressure.

They can be more restrictive trying to keep more ducks in that area. But then there's also packages that come with the liberal package and you can have a certain number of zones and splits in your seas and in everything. But there are federal regulations of if you have one split and two zones, it can only be this and that. So in each area and each flyway is different and I don't know them all.

So it is a state and federal and the fly the Flyway Council has one state representative from our one representative from each state on the Mississippi Flyway Atlantic all the flyways and they serve as a vote for you know we as a flyway do we agree with these particular regulations for our flyway and then that goes up and goes back to the feds and it finishes that system. But then a state can take what was in the federal register and then they can make the decision to you know take their packages however they want to and be more restrictive. So Arkansas could come home from that meeting and they were pushing for greater restrictions, didn't get them, but they could come home and

just impose greater restrictions at home. Well, it's their commissioners or their board, however they're set up, that vote on their regulations. Each state, again, is different how the regulations are set. Some might be from a legislative set, some it might be from a Fish and Wildlife Commission. And so they vote. They take typically what you want, system to work correctly, is the biologist, the waterfowl biologist will give the recommendation to that board and say, look, this is what we think because

our green tree reservoirs aren't doing well or this or that, whatever reason they might have had. I don't know that situation, but, and we think this is our recommendation. But sometimes commissions will make their own decision and it'll be contrary sometimes to what the biologists think, to air in the side of caution or something. Man, what were the conversations in Arkansas when it got as bad as one duck a year? People had been like just complaining. Yeah, because you know it's a big... duck hunting is very social compared to a lot of other hunting

activities, right? So a lot of folks get together in blinds and yeah, you can only shoot. Duck amps, yeah. Yeah, I think that was where you really saw the rise of cooking and accoutrement in fancy duck blinds because you had to make more of a day out of it. Because it wasn't just all shooting anymore. Right, yeah. And then, yeah, so then we saw, you know, then you see like your

duck hunters that really want to keep hunting ducks, see them traveling a lot more when their their home water restrictions get tighter and they're searching out those liberal regulations, right? And then you're putting a lot of pressure in that area, and you have enough, you know, nutrition, duck energy days, enough habitat to support. Duck energy I really want to get into because I was trying to explain that to somebody, because that's fascinating stuff.

That's how much energy you get from eating a duck. It is super food, man. It is, yeah, big, we cooked up a couple, we were hiking our butts off over the Thanksgiving weekend and I took big rice field ducks and cooked them up in the camper and yeah. Good stuff. Oh, so good. So that's what duck energy is?

Uh-huh, no. Big duck energy. Big duck energy. But like state like South Dakota, right? That's where it's a, it's a major recreational, uh, traveling tourism economy for hunting and in order to try to balance out that pressure, right? They, you have to draw for a specific week, uh, as a a non resident to go, which we've we've done in the past. And it's well worth doing. Super fun. But yeah, waterfowl complicate or waterfowl regulations.

Can get pretty darn complicated, right? And it's like, OK, you can only shoot five. We were just in Kansas. It's like you can shoot five mallards and an odd duck. You're like, okay well what do you consider odd? That one had one eye. So I interpret that as it's a six duck limit no more than five can be mallards. Yes. Yeah., and then I think it was two hands as well, so, or mixed in there. And then if you're hunting public land it could even get more, you know, complicated because they might have specific

regulations for that wildlife management area or something too. So it's, it, unfortunately I think sometimes people get really nervous if they're new to waterfowl hunting There's a lot that could maybe try to keep you from waterfowl hunting So that's where apprentice and going with friends is so important because they're gonna know the rules and there's a WMA in Arkansas that we were right next to and Yeah, I want to say you could only have Was it 12 shells in your possession? Oh, yeah, they'll limit however many

I love because it's like an anti sky busting type of regulation sure man Yeah, every every shot dude you shoot a lot different then don't want that Shot that'd be a good program. Yeah You don't want all your ducks leave in that area right? program yeah yeah you don't want you don't want all your ducks leaving that area right shells yep I loved it a lot of them do it I wouldn't after my Wyoming hunting experience I thought that would be a good regulation to have for rifle hunting too but yeah I had a trap I had a trapper recently telling me that when he the guy that taught him to trap he said the most valuable lesson he ever

gave me is he says I treat every trap like it's my only trap You treated every shelf like it was your It'd be a lot different experience. Well. Yeah, I want to know what the psychological impact would be even on a on a Somebody who's a fantastic shot if it's like okay. Here's your five. Yeah, yeah Just like how that would change that actually be a fun game to do man it would yeah everyone will start yelling at each other why didn't you shoot I don't know why didn't you well I don't know it's a little too far have you waited too long yeah all these ducks

would be flying by and everyone be mad that'd be weird to have conversations like why didn't you shoot rather than why did you shoot? Yeah. Yep. That's the normal conversation. What the hell are you doing? So, end of the season, around here especially, right? My goal, one of my recurring hunting goals is always to end the season with my maximum possession limit of ducks. So I can carry through. Feel good about it.

Yeah. So your freezer's got 21 ducks in it. Yeah. And I want them all to be fat, you know, like, um, that, that would be like the, the way to hit it perfect. But, um, and you typically you're like, okay, cold weather, the ducks are going to be putting the feed bag on and, and and but you can time your timing matters To where it's like, okay all of a sudden there's a ton of birds in but they just got there and they're really skinny

Yeah versus If the birds have been there for a few days You want to get them right before they head out because that's when they're at maximum Duck energy maximum fat. You you know you have fed them well Yes, yeah, yeah, and then so can you go into that cuz that's super fascinating like how fast they burn Oh, yeah, I definitely do and and like again. I was talking about that North American waterfowl management plan There's different plans that that waterfowl managers use and they have a lot of state and regional requirements for like North American Waterfowl Management Plan, there's different plans that waterfowl managers

use and they have a lot of state and regional requirements for like, I don't know, it might be 400 million duck energy days in the Mississippi alluvial valley is what's needed to sustain those ducks. So a duck energy day is the amount of energy that one duck needs for one day, right? And so a duck energy day, and how much, like an acre is by like the acre. So it's like how many duck energy days are on this acre of land and providing how much energy.

So if you had a thousand ducks and you wanted them there for one day, you need one thousand duck energy days in that one acre. So it's different. In the form of what? In the form of whatever. Yeah, the high, well, and each, and they'll do it by groups of species, by dabblers or different, different individual species. It's not, you're not talking about like spreading food out. No, it could be like water celery or soybeans or.

Yeah. But it's the caloric. It's the caloric, yes, exactly. Some kind of food. That provides. Regionally, like regionally available food. That's right. Yep. Yes, exactly. Some kind of food. That provides. Like regionally available food. That's right, yep.

And so how much, and so they have targets. So 110 days I think is what they typically keep for what they wanna provide the food for ducks in Mississippi Aluvia Valley, for example. And so then you have to have in that whole area 400 million duck energy days to be able to support the waterfowl population that you're expecting to come into the Mississippi Alluvia Valley.

Or a lot of states will do it in smaller regional areas too. And they might do it for wildlife management areas, different things like that for what are the deck energy, what's the requirement of the duck energy days to make sure those animals have lots of carbs, lots of other things to store that fat for their you know migratory journey north as well. So it's it's analogous basically to like a grazing unit if you're thinking in terms of like no cattle cow calf unit yeah it's like an AUM basically like what is this what can this landscape sustain? Right what can it sustain what can that ends by the acre so what can that landscape sustain? Right. What can it sustain? What can that inspire the acre?

So what can that one acre and how many ducks can it support for that time period? I was curious about this when you were talking about the variability in migration routes earlier and talking about if there's no water in the potholes, they go up to the boreal. And when I think about animal migration, I think about the

like caloric tacks on the animal, especially when we talk about big game or the thing about like salmon, you know, like it's something that I hadn't really considered in the waterfowl realm, but considering that their migration route could vary by hundreds of miles season season to season. It's kind of striking. And then of course, you know, what kind of condition are they in when they get there? Now they are feeding along the way, obviously, and depending on the species, you know, they'll start switching over maybe to invertebrates right before they get there to the, you know, to the nesting areas and to the

prairies or whatnot. So they'll ship their diets and everything based on the cut type of food they need. But you want them to have in some of those southern states that high energy food, carbohydrates to get them there. But yeah, so it puts a tax on them when there's not water in the prairies. When wetlands are gone, I think in the prairies, depending on certain areas, it could be as high as 90% of the potholes or the wetlands have been lost.

But in a lot of the prairies, you know, over 50%. 50% of the, by the mid-1980s, you know, 50% were lost, which is why the North American Waterfowl, one of the reasons the North American Waterfowl Management Plan started was in 1984, but in the mid 1980s, you know, like half of all the wetlands had been lost. Of course, the United States in the lower 48. How much does like agricultural food sources offset that? Like, is there... It's important.

Like, is it possible there's more ducks now because of agriculture than there was, say, 200 years ago when the middle of the country wasn't covered in corn and soybean and like, well, let's not do 200 years ago, but pick a number like pick a known number. Cause that's a good question, right? Like there's more like when grain prices are high and everybody's producing grain and all these farmers are switching to grain. Yeah. That doesn't make up for all that lost ground? No, no.

Because waterfowl need, they need wetlands and if the wetlands are gone, and you know, and because they're- You have all the grain in the world. And that time of year, they're feeding a lot on invertebrates, right? Because they're trying to, eggshells and everything else and that protein, so they're really moving to protein that time of year and that's what wetlands are just they are just wonderful little soup just so there's not like around here like there used to be a lot of wheat production around here and it's a lot of fields are getting covered up in condo

like yeah now that's absolutely and so we work a lot, you know, because we want agriculture on the landscape and because we don't want it to turn into condos and this and that. And so we work with NRCS, USDA NRCS, and we work with landowners and farmers and ranchers to develop programs, both with federal partners, state partners, and then we have our own programs because we want to keep ranching and farming on the landscape and then working to keep wetlands and important grasslands in that landscape on there, right? Whether it's through incentives, through education, because soil health practices, a lot of soil health practices and other things that we can work with landowners and farmers to improve, it's gonna be better for them economically. They're gonna have

a better crop. It's gonna help with you know sedimentation, runoff, all of that. And then it's also you know putting in cover crops and other things for waterfowl is beneficial again for them and then also for wildlife. So there's a lot of practices that we can work on with farmers and ranchers. So we want them on that landscape and they're critical partners for us. There's not a lot of duck energy in condos. Not a lot of duck energy in condos, no. When you talk about losing half of our wetlands, can you put some numbers around that? Like what's a starting point?

You're not talking about European arrival in the new world. Like there's like, no, no, since like a lot of development in the U S right. And so like the Mississippi, um, you know, Mississippi river basin, I think it's estimates of almost 80% been lost of wetlands. Um, and if you think about it, you know, flooding along the Mississippi. Over the last what? Just ballpark it. I'd say, what would be the year, Mark? I mean, last... Like post-World War II or something? Yeah, yeah, you know, 1900s, early 1900s, you can say. What percent? Like in the Mississippi River Basin like 80 percent, but what I think a number

I read you know by the mid-1980s, believe a number I read is that like 50 percent in the lower 48 were lost. And think about it you know draining a lot of wetlands to for building for farm ground, it can be for you name it. I mean it's. Reclamationclamation districts, right? Yeah. Everything. So they're constantly under attack and people don't understand the... not everyone understands the importance of a wetland and that they can provide so many other things other than just waterfowl habitat and habitat for lots of other, you know, fish, bird species, everything. But also it helps with, you know, flood attenuation if you're talking along the Mississippi River. It helps with storm resiliency on shorelines.

It helps with clean water filtration. I mean, they are nature's kidneys, they're nature's sponges, they filter out phosphorus, nitrogen, all these. And then they also help store water during heavy rain events to keep from flooding issues so wetlands are really important to people and wildlife. And that's what when I started hunting Saskatchewan and Alberta a long long time ago I haven't been up there in years for waterfowl but the amount of DU work north of the border,

which was interesting too, because also you would hear from people like, oh, I don't contribute to DU because they just spend all my money in Canada, right? But that's where their own ducks. They spend all my money right where all my ducks come from. That's exactly right. So until the mid 1980s, we did not do work in the US.

We did only work in the Canadian prairies in Canada. Seriously? Because that's where the majority of waterfowl were. And it was in the mid 80s, again, that waterfowl management plan that I was talking about started looking at, okay, well, we need to start, and not just Ducks Unlimited, but federal, state, provincial partners, everybody coming together and saying, we need to start, and not just Ducks Unlimited, but federal, state, provincial partners, everybody coming together and saying, we need to look at all of these important landscapes.

And there's a lot in the US as well. So we started work in the US prairies in the mid 1980s. And then of course, other priority landscapes from there. And also down into Mexico. So that really didn't start until the mid 1980s. But like you said, putting the most money we can from there and also down into Mexico. So that really didn't start until the mid-1980s. But like you said, putting the most money we can into those highest priority landscapes, which is going to be your Canadian prairies, US prairies, the boreal, but there's other critical

landscapes as well that we just were talking about as far as the importance of wintering habitat as well. So it's a lot of great programs out there. And I should go ahead and make a plug for hunters that every time you buy that duck stamp, that duck stamp goes to protecting, permanent protection of wetlands in the United States. And there's a major portion of those dollars that go into the U.S. prairies. And so that $25 stamp, you're protecting, putting a permanent easement

on a piece of property on land that is held by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. It's part of actually the Refuge System. But we have now, through this program, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, JV, the joint venture partners, and others have secured protection of 30% of the breeding pair habitat that's necessary. So that's pretty impressive. 30% of that nesting important critical habitat through duck stamps. So hunters are doing their part. We always say hunters pay for conservation. I mean this is a very clear point A to point B. 98% of the duck stamp sales go right into on the ground conservation easements.

And so anybody, any enthusiast that buys a duck stamp for art or other purposes, just because they like them, they are putting that money towards conservation on the ground and it's made, I can't think of another group of species or species of that size where we have been able to protect that large amount of through something through an effort like that. The guy that painted this year's duck stamp was sitting right in that seat

you're sitting in. No way so I judged I was the judge for last year's duck stamp. There's five judges so I was one of them. But yeah, cool. How does Ducks Unlimited preserve, save, protect wetlands? I mean, do you guys, is there a lot, do you have a lobbying arm that does policy? We definitely do. And then you also have like- On the ground. On the ground money, like money spent.

What, like explain those different ways. Sorry to jump in, but will you also say like, the public ground and private ground, like what the, kind of the split is. Almost like where the money goes type of thing. Lobbying, public, private. Yep, so we have, we get a lot of public dollars that we apply for, whether it's the North

American Wetlands Conservation dollars, those are wetland dollars that was enacted in 1989 to help support that waterfowl management plan. So we get a lot of money through that, but we also work a lot with NRCS and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to work on refuges, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, we work a lot with state agencies on public land. But we now have about 400 conservation staff. So InduX Unlimited, about 400 staff are biologists, scientists, GIS, I've got a lot of engineers, engineer techs, all doing this work on the ground. So on the ground habitat work work on private and public land.

From a public land perspective in the last several years we've probably had conservation practices over maybe close to 600,000, yeah about 600,000 acres on public land, so on national wildlife refuges, state agencies, and a lot of those are more intensive projects. Those are going to be your wetland enhancement, wetland creation. Rehabilitation. Rehabilitation. Pulling out drain tile. Or building some of that infrastructure and so

you can have manipulate water levels and everything else. So there's a lot more work that goes into it. A lot of the work that we do on private land is going to be more your technical assistance or the money with that we apply for with USDA and RCS to do farm practices that benefit you know conservation practices on farm and things like that. So it's a lot more on the private land, it's a lot more of working with farmers and ranchers and things like that is more those types of acres. And the first part of your question though, I was trying to go back to real quick, you were talking about?

Lobbying. Lobbying. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, so what are the different things that we did? I mean, like how do you influence the loss of wetlands? So a lot of that, we have a group of folks that are policy specialists, we have some in DC, and then we also have some regionally,

because there can be regional instances as well that we're gonna have these policy experts. But we work a lot with policy makers on, Farm Bill is a big one that we work on to make sure that there's conservation practices in there. Another one is to ensure that we have complete full funding for NACA, the North American Wetlands Conservation Act. It's enacted and it's about 50 million dollars a year for that. So they they work really hard to ensure that we have those types of dollars available to

put on the ground for conservation. So they spend a lot of time working on that. And then our teams in the field, they are constantly looking for new funding sources or new partners to work with because the more partners that you work with the better like With Nauka they've now north through North American Wetlands Conservation Act Though I think it's 32 million acres have been conserved not just by ducks unlimited But 32 million acres have been conserved through that program and it has spent two billion dollars But it's a one-to-one matching program, so it requires, for every dollar spent, a federal dollar, it requires a non-federal dollar.

And so there have been over $5 billion raised to match that $2 billion to put those 32 million acres on the ground, and it takes a lot of partners. I think through that program, there's over 6,000 partners that have participated in that program. So every our teams are constantly looking for federal, non-federal, nonprofit, you know local organizations to partner with to get that habitat on the ground. It is a daunting task. And what's the way that it might happen? Meaning let's say I'm a farmer, okay, and I have a thousand acres and I have some wetlands, and I'm like, man, I also love to hunt ducks and I like to make money on my farm.

And I come and say to DU, how can I be of assistance or what can I do? What measures are of someone's disposal? Lots of things. Everything from permanent protection, putting a conservation easement on that property so that it's, you know, always in whatever that is as far as the number percentage of wetlands and grass. And you guys help with that process. And we help with that process. And those easements are held by the US Fish and Wildlife Service. And those are some of the duck stamp dollars I was talking about earlier. Other things might be, well, they might be interested in a conservation reserve program

where they take out, and that's through NRCS, and so they take out a certain percentage of their production and they plant it in grass or in something else, and so they might do that. Or, so it's like a rental payment, or they might do EQIP, E-Q-I-P, and they might do that or so it's like a rental payment or they might do EQIP and they might do rental payments for not rental payments they might do different cost share to try to improve their property for the conservation values on there so there's all sorts of different farm bill programs that they could be interested in and so our team will walk through all these different programs that they have and again Ducks Unlimited has a lot of programs as well that as long as

they're doing these activities and we're cost sharing for those those conservation activities as long as they continue to do those we're in that like annual year-to-year contract. But that permanent protection is the best thing we can do. And our Director of Operations in the Prairie Pothole region, Johan Walker, he's always saying, all right, we've got to slow down the pace of conversion and increase the pace of protection. But there's lots of other tools, you know, in between that we can use that benefit farmers and ranchers and help improve their, what they're getting out of it, but then also for wildlife

and waterfowl as well. Is currently the number one risk to wetlands cropland conversion? In the Prairie Pothole region, yeah, absolutely. Okay. It's a land owner. A farmer is incentivized by prices, whatever to convert, to increase and convert land to egg. And so that's why you have a way to try to soften, absolutely. Like be the same thing. Like, sorry, Ducks Unlimited, farm bill programs, NRCS,

they are gonna also try to make sure that that farmer knows the available incentives to not produce crops on intermittent wetland. So it doesn't need to just cost. Ways to make it that it doesn't just cost the landowner. You can do the right thing for wildlife without affecting the bottom line. Yeah, because a lot of times the wetlands, even though it might be dry, might look dry

that year kind of thing, that's not going to be your most productive soil for crop. It is going to be your most productive for wildlife, but not necessarily for crop. Those are usually not the same thing. And so the education and working with them and a lot of our farmers They love seeing the ducks on the landscape and they love being able to help and it's like Okay, you gotta get out my bottom number that as much as driving in a straight line To go around that wetland you're driving this big equipment and everything it's a pain in the butt to go around those wetlands So yeah we have to find ways to incentivize landowners to want to keep wetlands and certain grasslands intact and there's there's lots of ways

to do that and it's it's through these great partnerships our federal and state partnerships and partnerships with the landowners that make it happen. What do you think about North American Grasslands Conservation Act? You think that's getting towards a workable state? Yeah, it's interesting because it's gone back and forth, back and forth, and I know that a lot of it's being modeled off of North American grasslands, off of Nauka, and what works necessary in this program, will it work here, and so I think it's definitely evolving and becoming something that, I mean, it's critical.

There's lots of grassland species that need protection. And you can see, I mean, the 3 billion bird report, right? You have a lot of species that have been declining since the 1970s, and a lot of them are grassland species. Now, Nauka, there's a lot that goes into grasslands as well through Nauka funding. And when we look at some of those priority landscapes that we want to protect, a lot of them we look at duck pairs, right? How many pairs of breeding ducks are going to be in that landscape? And we want to target the highest numbers, the highest, the 100 duck pairs.

But with that come like 15 to 20 different other grassland bird species that use that same landscape. So it's not just one thing that we're looking at or the other. Any kind of conservation funding opportunities that we can provide that have these great public-private partnerships associated with them for conservation, the more of that that we can get, I think the better off we're going to be. That's where some of the social cost of using wetland comes in because most people are like, well, wetland is only a wetland if it's wet.

And then also that fringe area around the wetland with the grass, like there's a lot of waterfowl species that nest in that. That's right. Right? So how far are they gonna go? Yeah. But it's like, well it's not wet. Conservation is not a simple, it's not a simple thing and it really takes a large group of people kind of pulling in the harness together to make it happen. You know who I think deserves a little credit? I make a lot of jokes about golf. Well, a very famous golfer sat in that seat. Really? Which one? My husband. Brian Harman. All right. The butcher. Brian the butcher Harman.

Anyways, you know who deserves some credit? Is the golf course by my house. Yeah. It's a duck factory. Really? All those little ponds they made. Yeah. Every one of those ponds. And they have like some great nesting success. Every one of those ponds full of chicks also.

Do they fake ponds? Do they put a lot of like edge around that pond? Do they, are they shallow? Did they, did they do that specifically? Or is it just by chance? It's probably a wetland before it was a golf course. There's a bunch of spring-fed ponds and they do they kick off a lot of ducks Yeah. Yeah.

Kaboosh! Right in there. Did you guys weigh in on, did Ducks Unlimited weigh in on this, the sort of political ping pong ball of Wadis, waters of the United States? Yeah, waters of the United States. So it's-

Can I take, try to, can we test my ability to explain this? Okay. Go for it. The United States, the federal government declares like sovereignty over certain waterways, meaning like, like for instance, if a private landowner owns both sides of the Mississippi, they can't say no more shipping up and down my river, right? Because the US has jurisdiction over the waterway. And there's a political ping-pong about how far up a river into non-navigable or barely navigable water does the US have jurisdiction and could there be a thing where US jurisdiction extends all the

way up into the headwaters in the wetlands and they could exercise the federal, the federal government could exercise some management rights over marshes and wetlands that form the rivers. So extending up the Mississippi beyond navigation but up into the sources of the Mississippi and use that as a way to preserve wetlands. And when I say a political ping-pong ball, it seems to like always be in the news of a new administration interpreting it differently. One administration would be like, oh no, it goes all the way to the marsh and the other next administration. No, it ends at navigability and it seems to be always in the news. It's never quite

resolved. This is a political hot, this is a hot issue. What's been your guys attitude about this conversation? So what we've been trying to do is working with the states on what their wetland regulations and laws and rules will be. Because that's really where at the end of the day, because you're right, it's this ping-pong back and forth, back and forth, but if you're working with the states and working with the you know the landowners and those rules and those states that's probably how we're going to be able to to kind of get through this as far as so you can

take action now that doesn't get done or undone right every time the political winds change that's right yeah yeah because states have their own you know regulations now especially with the the latest change. That's right. Yeah. Yep, because states have their own, you know, regulations now, especially with the latest change. So you, when I was talking about lobbying earlier, Ducks Unlimited will at times try to influence regulation about wetland development. Yeah, we work a lot more, I'd say, on the funding for wetlands conservation and from that standpoint. So you spend more time with the carrot than the stick? Yeah, a lot more time with the carrot than the stick because it gets you a lot further.

We've in the last five years developed an ag strategic plan. If you look at everywhere that is important for waterfowl, if you take our landscape conservation priorities and I put that map down in front of you and then you took an ag map in the United States and you laid that over it, it's almost exactly the same. It's like if you take wolf attacks on cattle. Exactly, more rural people. Yeah so it is critical that we have strong relationships and partnerships with the ag and ranching. So, Metro Chicago doesn't pop up on your important for duck zone. I'm sure there's a strong DU chapter there.

There's a lot of strong DUTA chapters. That's a good point about, it's an interesting point about the need to, the need to have the ability to work with agricultural interests. Yep. When you, if you, yeah, you're right. If you look at like where birds are coming from, it's agricultural landscapes. So I imagine if an organization was just sort of perceived

as being vehemently anti-ag you might wind up having a hard time to work in ag country. Might be hard to work in ag country. So you know there are there are disincentives that I think are important to keep you know and incentives that are important to keep and I think it's a balance of those two things to ensure we get that right. So there are there aren't disincentives in place, like Swamp Buster and everything else that are important, but what that is, is it's keeping, if you're a farmer and you're in farm bill programs and you're getting something from a farm bill program, you can't plow under

a wetland or drain a wetland. So that's a type of a disincentive, but then incentives for some of the things I was talking about with Conservation Reserve Program or EQIP or Wetland Reserve Easement where you're putting your land permanently in an easement protection or, you know. Well, there's, it's like, there's it's like there's not oh

Necessarily like a one-size-fits-all never deal too because between like the state and the federal programs you could have the ability to Leave that intermittent wetland alone most of the time But you could you could take hay off of it You could graze it but at certain times a year that that fit in of it, you could graze it, but at certain times a year that fit in with the grading nesting program. Got it. Great example. Glad you brought that up. And it's not a one size fits all.

I mean, that's a really good point. And so each state is going to be different. So North Dakota, South Dakota, what programs are available, what's allowed, not allowed. And sometimes it's your flyway too, right? Like if you're in an area that's trying to bring back Sandhill Crane, certain properties along that flyway are going to pay more for all these programs. Yep. And the great thing about these programs and even in easement, you know, they're voluntary, of course, but if you put an easement on your property, the landowner can still use the land and it's, but then it's that being able to be there for habitat for water found other species for generations.

Yeah, a buddy of mine, big farmer in South Dakota, he, like it's the most awesome feel good story ever. He started just getting into these programs because it made more financial sense than trying to farm this stuff. And he's like, yeah, we remove the diesel fuel or we remove the Seed cost the nitrogen costs all these costs to farm something marginal

Did not get a return but we also don't have to turn our steering wheel Started picking up a couple of bucks for different things, saw some good improvement, saw crazy stuff happen. Like all of a sudden they had prairie chickens on the ranch. And it's like, it's because we were in the state program. Oh, super cool. That incentivized native grasses. So you saw good drought tolerance increase, fire tolerance increase.

And then the other cool thing that they saw increase was just family interest in the farm, because it's like, well, 20 years ago there was nothing else to look at other than the row you were hoeing basically. And now there's like deer running around, there's lots of birds, there's raptors, all sorts of wildlife increase. And the interest level from the small family members who don't really care about the financial part of things. They're like, oh this is a cool place to be. But then you get one of those guys drives around pissed off all the time. They're paying them not to farm!

Yeah. Well, it's the farm the best and leave the rest, right? But I love coming to the prairies and listening to the stories. So cattle and ducks go really well together. They both need grass and everything. And so I come, I love coming to the prairies and listening to the testimonials of some of these folks that drained a wetland years ago with their great grandfather, but then are putting it back. And they love the family interest and the kids are enjoying it. But then, you know, or some of them that decide I'm gonna work on one to end a ranching and they convert

You know from farming from crop to to ranching and takes a ton of money for them to do it And they're probably losing money and not always in the best spot but then there's programs that are available to help them out or putting in practices on that working farm that are going to protect wetlands. And so it's pretty fun to listen to the testimonials just like you were just saying to your buddy that of what happens too when they they join some of these programs. I got two quick Ducks Unlimited banquet stories for you. Oh I love these. I can't wait. One time I was in the market for a new fish finder

yeah and I was able to buy a I I was buying it anyway, buying it anyway, but I was able to buy a thousand dollar gift card to Bass Pro Shops for $700. Isn't that great? It was like I basically bought a thousand dollars for $700. Don't you love it? My other story is this. And you got a bottomless beer for $10. My story is this my buddy Ronnie was at one of those and he was drunk and he was bidding on something But he was in his mind. He was buying what was up next So he's looking at what's up next it's like I can't believe nobody else is going I'm sitting and bidding and he wins and his buddy's like what the hell you want that cuz they're like in another state He's like we want that picnic table for so bad

Oh my gosh. Whatever it was. He's like oh I was bitten on that! That'll happen. I love our banquets and really get so many supporters through them. Oh man. It's like a carnival. Well they come for the party but then they stay for the ducks.

It's like a carnival for adults. It is, it's a lot of fun. Is that still functioning good? Oh yeah. Because COVID probably killed it for a while right? You would have thought man, that team, they are absolutely incredible. David Schussler, he's the chief of that team, they pivoted so fast. They're like okay guys, guys, we're gonna be shut down. I'm thinking, oh, we'll be shut down for a couple weeks and I'll come back. He had different ideas. So they went to all this online stuff almost immediately.

And everyone's sitting at home looking for something to do. And we had all sorts of different interactive ways for people to join online. And then as soon as we could go back outside, they were setting up big tents and going state by state. interactive ways for people to join online. And then as soon as we could go back outside, they were setting up big tents and going state by state. I don't know if they slept much during that time, but they were actually able to keep our event system rolling.

And then we had our major donors. I cannot tell you how important our volunteers and our major donors are. Like I was talking about all the match for all these programs. I think we had $176 million in public dollars last year that our team brought in. But that takes a bunch of match

and our donors are incredible and how our philanthropists that give. But then also everybody that goes to an event and the money that that first dollar comes in an event and the dollars that they spend there, how that goes to an event and the money that that first dollar comes in an event and the dollars that they spend there How that goes to conservation. It's uh, it's a pretty incredible uh organization it's been a lot of a lot of fun the last five years and um Looking for many more but I didn't realize before I came to work for ducks unlimited

That passion that is with all those volunteers with the staff with our major donors that passion that is with all of those volunteers, with the staff, with our major donors, and they really came through in COVID. Our major donors stepped up like they never had before to make sure that Ducks Unlimited was going to be able to make it through it. My friend Mark here in town, he made a rule a couple years ago that he left a lot of people hung on his place, but you can't own his place unless you're a DU member. I like that. That's great. He's got something there. No, I know, which reminds me, I took a, I gotta make sure my kids are still up, because I kind of extended it to my kids, but I gotta make sure I didn't violate his rules,

because we went out there for the U.S. season. I better double check. You might see a couple of memberships being later on in the day. That's why you just gotta get that lifetime membership right now. I have to have a membership form right here. You'll never have to worry about it again. I did lifetime at Turkey Federation. I did lifetime at Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation, but I should do my lifetime at DU.

My next lifetime should be DU lifetime. Well, or you can just annually support Vex on you know support that's the caveat of the lifetime membership Yeah, a lot of people think they're done. No, no, there's no lifetime membership. It's you're never done. Yeah How much you guys get how much public money from all you guys efforts that's last year was around 175 Our team spends a lot of time writing a lot of grants and it's like I said it's diverse we don't just one type of funding and that's that's something that we all need to be thinking about our what are those funding opportunities like like all the other benefits that wetlands provide

what types of funding opportunities and streams can come from that as well? Because we need to be able to diversify. Unfortunately, we probably aren't going to have as many hunters sitting around the table in however many years. I hope I'm wrong, but how do we get other people to understand the importance of the conservation work? Because I do think, you know, sportsmen are our first conservationists and so how do we encourage other people to have that same

interest in the like whether it's turkeys or mule deer or National Deer Association whoever it is. That's a lot of interest because there's only a million duck hunters. Right. You guys did a hundred seventy five million public dollars. But yeah. What's that? Well, I mean, as far as duck hunters, you know, and how many members we have, there's probably more duck hunters, but you're right. What I'm saying is it's like a lot of, it's a lot of per like, cause you know how many dark stamps get bought. I was going to say like, I've, you always hear people talk about, Oh, anybody can buy a duck stamp. I'm curious how many five people buy them. That's my suspicion,

but I'm wondering if you have any insight into it But that's well, that's my suspicion. But I'm wondering if you have any insight into. Well, Max Bartabai is one for his dog. Yeah. Well, there's people that buy. I buy several. Yeah. Because I want one to keep and then I want one that I've got. I buy multiples because I forgot I already bought one. Yeah. I lose them.

Or yeah, that's it. But I think it's probably I mean, there are exceptions. I feel like it's a probably a pretty clean I don't know because there I was really surprised when I did the duck stamp judging last year Which I thought was like the coolest thing ever by the way. I didn't realize how cool it was But there were a lot of art enthusiasts Yeah, that were kind of like chiming in on the online thing and went looked at it later Really that not are that are not hunters now Now I don't know what the percentage is.

So we'll count all ten of them. We'll count all ten of them. But it is, I mean, it is, the majority is going to be hunters and have been doing it, you know, for, since, what, the first one, Ding Darling in 1934. Should have that off the top of my head. But it's mostly going to be your duck hunters. You know what Cal and I are going to do? He doesn't know this yet, but when we retire, I got a couple things on my list that I'm going to do with my retirement project. We're going to get you a dog?

No, I'm going to try to establish a universal blaze orange requirement of a hat. No more than a hat. No more than a hat. A hat. Orange hat. I've seen quite a few Montana hunters out there already are on board with that. A hat. Not because, because when you're wearing a vest and you're trying to change your

clothes, it's just too much. It's a hat. A hat's great. See that hat. Orange. I know the hat's got the same issue though. It's like every time I'm always turning your hood up when you get my hold. Yep. Yep. Putting something else on. I'm gonna write a book about how it's okay to hate Shakespeare.

Okay. And then I wanna then then I want to work on Cal and I want to work on a public service thing to get the waterfowling community to take field care of their ducks more seriously. As you demonstrated today, they are exceptionally generous with their conservation dollars, but I think that as a group, I have like, as a group, I can't think of a more egregious and I'm like I like the 100 ducks yesterday. Geese and ducks. I can't think of a more egregious group of people when it comes to utilization of the resource. Really? Well you remember the dinner? I can't think of a more egregious group a more

generous but egregious group of people. The dinner that we had? I can't think of a more egregious group, a more generous but egregious group of people. The dinner that we had when we came out for the survey release two years ago. Like if there was just more of that going on, like people are like, oh, here's my recipe. Here's what I do. More of that type of sharing. That's pretty darn limited

in the waterfowl community. So are you saying in the field or are you saying once they don't eat the duck? I'm saying utilization of... You gotta like explain. Okay. Come on. Yeah. Well okay for instance. Well not for instance. Here's the thing that I couldn't... Looking for ways to use the duck versus not use the duck. I couldn't believe that our state did this. Our state used to have salvage... We have salvage requirements in this state. Okay. Many states have salvage requirements. They actually lowered the salvage requirement, meaning on a mallard size bird, you were required to keep the thighs. You're required to keep the breast meat in the thighs. And one day they all of a sudden said like, you know, like now it's okay just to throw that in the garbage.

Got to keep the breasts. Don't throw that in the garbage. You got to keep the brass. You don't have to retain the size. But I'm saying like, among, I think it's triggered by a bunch of things. There's the strictly enforced, and I'm not saying you should get away with it, the strictly enforced possession limit thing. Where people, like, if you're out hunting ducks for a week, but you can only have three days of possession. I think it inspires a lot of

people to try to find ways to offload ducks. And there's just so many stories of guys looking off bridges and there's hundreds of snow geese carcasses. Like it's just like, it just, I like as a community, I think the waterfowl community as a community is very poor about Utilizing the meat from the birds And I have not not wanted to do like not wanting to do any kind of work You shouldn't feel compelled to to agree with him. No, no, I'm not going to you know, I have not seen that However, what I will say no, I haven't honestly you should read the comments

I'll pluck a duck and put it on Instagram, and you should read the hateful comments about how much time that takes. The offense that someone would take the time to pluck a duck. Why do they care if you pluck the duck? It offends them. It's the internet.

No, no. Yes. But you know, there are things that I think, to your point of recipes, and we do a lot of stuff in the magazine and online. Always in the magazine. We could do it probably with our podcast. I'm not blaming DU for this.

Someday I want to do like a public service thing about like how it's going to be called, Dark's Tastes Really Good. Legs and wings. Well, you know, there used to be the old joke of you know the best way to cook a goose you know you put it on this cedar board and then you throw it in and then you keep the board right yeah yep so which is totally not true I have eaten some damn good geese and some damn good ducks over the last however many years of my life. And it is in the preparation of it and everything else, just like, I mean, you know, I hear a lot of, you know, even deer hunters,

well, there's a lot of stuff they've got to cut through on the, on the shoulders. So I don't keep the shoulder meat. Now hold on a second. So you could do this, you could grind it up. So there's all sorts of things that we could all learn from each other. If maybe we had that better community of here are things

that you can do. I mean squirrel hunters, a lot of squirrel hunters are like, oh it's a lot of work to you know clean a fox squirrel. They're so much harder than gray squirrels. I'm like, well then don't shoot the damn fox squirrel. You know? You don't want to clean, don't shoot it. Go down to the butcher shop, spend $60 on the nicest ribeye steak you can find, and then cover it in hair and bile and let it sit out. You're in good shape, yum. And then tell me what you think of beef.

I mean, you know what, I regret, I regret bringing that up and acting like that's your problem. I feel like I ruined the whole show. No, you did not. I want to re-approach it. I'm just saying it's probably, you know, but. I want to re-approach it. I want to say this. I want to have Phil remove all that and it'll just be me saying that

man a well-handled duck Is damn good is just really good. It is is really good. Yep It is it is phenomenal and when you take geese breasts and make pastrami it is phenomenal. And when you take geese breasts and make pastrami, it's really, really good. That's all. That's all. Take all that out, Phil. Ruben Sandwiches. It seemed like I kind of ruined the whole show, didn't it? No, no, no, no, no. No, just picking on duck hunters. That's all I'm saying. No, but I was praising duck hunters. I'm just teasing. But I was praising them about how generous and dedicated they are. Yeah. My is though like when somebody's like oh, yeah You like to hunt ducks. We should come huh my cool. How do you cook them?

Yeah, and and to this day one of the best duck hunting connections I've ever made was from that exact conversation guy being like well. This is what we do and I was like okay We can talk more. Yep. Yeah conversation. Guy being like, well, this is what we do. And I was like, okay, we can talk more. Yup. Yeah. So duck is really good. Far be it for me to stereotype, but I'll tell you, you want to see some, the ones I know, the Cajuns are some duck eating. Yes, they are. Duck preparing sons of bitches, man. Yes. I mean, they eat the beak. Yeah. Yeah. That's, that's, see, I'm trying to go positive. Yeah. I'm trying to be like D-U and go carrot, not stick.

That's right. I'm trying to go positive. That's right. Yeah. God, I ruined the whole show. Was that bad, Phil? When I brought it up, does it seem like a bit like kind of deflated everything?

Well, there have been occurrences in the past that I think you probably should have had that reaction to. I don't think this is what happened. I actually think saying that you- You're going this? This time? This was the one? Calling this for the eighth time

saying that you've ruined the show, I think, is doing more. It's adding more. Probably. Christmas is coming up. Oh my God. Just dig a hole deeper. As we were on the way down here, Cal and I were talking about this issue.

Yes, yeah, that was the deal. That's what I came in the room with it on my mind. You know, there's just like cultures. Someone had shared an anecdote with Cal. And I wonder if it's a local thing that you're seeing here. There is, yeah. I think it's a local thing. I promise you, I hunt mostly in the South,

but I've hunted other places as well. And I, I don't see that. I see it as like, everyone comes back to the duck camp and what are we going to have? It's going to be duck. I mean, you know, that's awesome. And it's cooked a hundred different ways. But I think it's regional cultures, right? And there's, you know, like, you know, it's like people who don't have the experience or they're trying to get into it and they don't already even do what a lot of us would, you know, they're preparing

things out of the box versus cooking something, you know, they're very instruction based. Like they have a very hard time grasping any sort of bird. Right? Last time I checked, everybody wants to be like MeatEater. They have a very hard time grasping any sort of bird. Yep. Right? Last time I checked, everybody wants to be like meat eater. They want to, you know, I mean, I'm joking aside, you guys do a really good job of bringing that to the table, right? Literally to the table as far as, you know, that importance and that full cycle in what

you do. I think, you know, you, Ducks Unlimited, other people like that, whatever the game species is, talking about that importance of being off the landscape and it providing that wonderful protein that we all crave so much. That's good. See how I made it positive. No it's good. We were talking about the other day what someone needs to make an invention of is that besides the flat tree. Oh besides I already invented that. Is a machine if you could come up with this if you machined you put ducks into okay and you turn the machine on in the morning you

got duck sausage sticks waiting for you on the other end. Good luck with that one. I like it. I'm trying to figure out how you make that happen. Can you imagine, like you wake up in the morning and just the machines shut down, and it's just pepperoni sticks. Man, let me tell you, I am the most popular person at Christmas right now because I have a lot of duck sausage, and it is so freaking good.

When Cal and I were talking, we were talking about this very thing and I was saying like, it doesn't matter any idea about whether you like ducks or not, everybody likes pepperoni sticks. That's right. So if you go duck hunting, get all your duck breasts,

put them in a pile and make a bunch of pepperoni sticks. They're damn good. Cause like everybody likes those. Put a bunch of you know honey in there, make them sweet. So then at the end of the duck season you got like 20 pounds of pepperoni sticks. You drive around eating. Do that. There you go. They make great Christmas gifts everybody wants them. There you go pepperoni stick. You want to get crazy, put them in a pickling brine afterwards. Oh I never heard of that. gifts everybody wants. There you go, Yeah, good stuff. Stick your whole hand in the south. It's chicken feet. Since I quit drinking, I forgot about that. And the really good bar would have eggs in a pickle jar.

They'd have sausages in a turkey gizzards. And the Zula Club did not have chicken feet and stuff like that. Not where I grew up. No, no. We had a lot of smoke stuff. But pickling wasn't huge in the Midwest. Yeah. No Great anything what else is there anything I didn't ask you about? I don't know. There's all sorts of neat things we could Play this game all day. Yeah, probably a lot of things

I didn't ask you about but there any like super pressing thing that I should have brought up No, I think we covered a lot of great stuff. Yeah, and fun. It's been educational. Yeah. Because man, I hate any kind of story about, you know, wildlife going downhill over the years and it's distressing to think of all that wetlands loss. It is, it is very distressing and so I think it's obviously what we do at Ducks Unlimited. We think about it every day because it is part of our mission and our vision is to make sure that it's here for, that waterfowl are here for many generations to enjoy. When you crystal ball it, do you think what's your prediction?

You know, like in a hundred years are people going to hunt ducks? Heck yeah, they're going to hunt ducks in a hundred years. Absolutely. And we're going to have waterfowl fill in the skies too. And it's because of hunters, it's because of conservation enthusiasts, a lot of reasons. Organizations like Ducks Unlimited and many other conservation organizations, we're gonna have it. So in 100 years, they'll be driving around eating duck pepperoni sticks?

Hell yeah, you are. And brine, you're gonna love it. Four pin tails, yeah. There's a great article, this came out a long time ago. You've probably read it, but, um, there's, this guy's talking about his lamenting, it living in a big city and he's missing waterfowl season. Uh, but you know, life has him working in a big city and he steps out onto the, um, subway platform and there's a via geese going over and

He's looking up at this via geese Then he for whatever reasons kind of scans the crowd out there and finds the one other person going like this He's like that that was my waterfowl hunter But you know we need folks in the in the big cities to clue in on stuff like this too. So let's do a checklist. Like if you're a duck hunter you gotta buy your duck stamp. Gotta buy your duck stamp. So you gotta do that anyways and that's like that's a lot of funding for wetlands. Absolutely.

If you're a duck hunter you should probably join Ducks Unlimited. 100%. Because if you go and duck hunt and you want to get ducks, if you want to get ducks, you need wetlands, and Ducks Unlimited does wetlands work. You got it. So there's that. If you like to have fun, go to the banquets. They're a lot of fun.

Like I said, it's a carnival for grownups. And you can win a picnic table. Dude, you can win like a truck. I mean, how many guys you know have been hunting their whole lives don't have guns from the du Banquet yeah or prints or whatever my silverware is ducks unlimited silverware sure My old man had an Ithaca. He had an Ithaca feather light 20 gauge and guess where I came from So do that go to the banquets and hang out and then if you got it, if you

can swing some extra jingle in your duck hunter, like make some donations up above and beyond your membership. Because the membership is pretty inexpensive. Yes, it is. It's like a foot in the door. It's a foot in the door and it's critically, it's very important. But you know, and it's, we leverage those dollars three four or five times To try to get as much conservation on the ground so our our leverage rate on on Donor dollars is very high. Yeah, and um and as you mentioned like for a lot of these programs It's good to have private money because it helps you it helps you activate Great dollars. Yeah without those private funds

We can't go after knock the dollars or any farm bill, any of those other dollars because it takes that private match as well. And one thing I'll tell you we didn't talk about that I know is really important to you is from the land conservation standpoint, our lands program is very robust. So we do hold conservation easements, most of them, and a lot of them go to the US Fish and Wildlife Service, but we do hold easements as well. But then we'll also buy land and sometimes it's to, you know, conserve it as far as from a standpoint of restoration efforts and everything. But then a lot of it is for facilitated acquisitions for public hunting. And so just in the last five years, just shy of 50,000 acres that we purchased and then are conveying to state and we've conveyed to

state agencies. For wildlife management areas. For wildlife management areas or to US Fish and Wildlife Service for refuge for hunting. So a lot of public access opportunities. And that's like that's willing seller, willing buyer. That's right. You're buying land that's for sale. Yep and and it's a facilitated acquisition because a lot of times states if they want to add it to there's a piece of property for sale and they want to add it to their wildlife management area, the refuge, they can't necessarily move as quickly as we can and the sellers wants to get it sold so we'll buy it, hold it and then convey it to the public agency. That's a really great thing because I've been, over

the years, I've been made aware a number of times of like Cal will send me something like really great strategic conservation purchases but it's hard to be that nimble. It is. It's like for sale and then you're trying to get some agency to figure it out and then they gotta value it in a way that isn't realistic or whatever. That's right. And then to have people that can identify like a real conservation hotspot and boom,

get in there and know how to make deals. Yep. And then have the time to then facilitate. And because we've got great donors, a lot of them are interested in that land conservation and getting it into public hunting access and so while we're holding it they'll help with the costs of holding that property before we can convey it so there's it's a it's a really it's a great

service that we can make sure. That's kind of a sticky thing too sometimes with membership right because like we were looking at a really cool project DU is doing in Iowa and it's like well yeah we're buying the land and then eventually we're gonna turn it over into I think it was a WMA but first we're gonna pull out this drain tile, we're gonna do some noxious weed work, we're gonna really like get it up to good quality. And so you're always kind of like balancing out like, yep, we did it, but land management takes time. And you know, sometimes membership or just the public's like, well

where's the public access? We just bought it. Where is it? Yeah or like for example with Kenizania it's a refuge in or it's going to the Red River National Wildlife Refuge in Louisiana. There's a piece of property I think it's a little over 3,000 acres and we've had it for several years but we haven't been able to convey it to the US Fish and Wildlife Service because they had to get an expansion of the refuge in order to

then take it so that's like a federal thing you have to go through that so we've had to hold it for several years before we can convey it to them so and it's not for people to understand. Can I hunt that place while you're holding it? Yeah, hunt that place and yeah and so it is it's not for people to understand. Can I hunt that place while you're holding it? Yeah, hunt that place. And yeah, and so it is, it's not just an overnight sort of thing. And so to have that patience for people to realize that, hey, we might have to have it for a little bit before we're able to convey it is an important note. But it's a, I think it's an important program and I think it's something that's really good to be able to do for public hunting access. I got one last question for you. If God came down and he said

you can either hunt only squirrels or only ducks for the rest of your life, what would you pick? I'm going to pick ducks. Did you just say that? Did you just say that? I'm just saying that. I'm just saying that no. I'm saying that alright my CEO Adam Putnam I love the ducks.

Let me know that I said ducks. I said ducks not squirrels. No. I absolutely love squirrel hunting. It's uh you know it was it and I know it sounds funny like how can you be that passionate about squirrel hunting. It's the fun fondest thing in the world. It is a blast.

And with dogs, man, you're out there with your dog, but you also can take kids. And that's my son. It was the first thing I did with my son. Oh, it's squirrel hunting where you get to bullshit. Yeah. Squirrel hunting, I mean you get to walk. You still get to talk. You can make as much noise as you want.

No one's yelling at you, you know, blowing their duck call just so you'll quit talking, you know, that sort of thing. I mean, it's just so enjoyable. quit talking. You know that sort of thing. I mean, it's it's a it's just so enjoyable We kind of introduced the technology into squirrel and a couple of our friends that do it mm-hmm with dogs But they were slow to adopt the binocular Do you bring the binoculars? I bring binoculars, absolutely. Yeah, they were like, what? I'm like, man, to finding the squirrel in the tree. Man, they are so good. So I'll train my dogs to go to the other side of the tree from me. They'll push them

around because they will hug on that tree. And then you're trying to go around and it's going around the tree with you, you know, going, staying out of sight. Well, get my dog, chase it to the other, send it to the other side to chase the squirrel around. I hunted blue grouse, spring blue grouse with a woman that it's kind of very similar. They're way up in the tree and you try to find them in the spring and she would lay down on her back in the woods. She would kind of like, it was mostly on hills, like steep country, so she'd go up a little way. So she's more like eye level with the canopy and she would just lay on her back with binos and she'd lay there 10 minutes and also be like, got it. And so when we go out with our friends that had squirrel dogs, I mean, it wouldn't take a, well, no,

but I'd bring binos and now we would just lay there and after a while, because my buddy Kevin, he'd always just look through his scope. And after a while, we got a couple of them to like give in to the point that binos are not, that binos are helpful for finding those suckers. What I was getting at was there's no better feeling than when you're just getting ready to walk away and all of a sudden someone's like, got it! Yep. It was that little tail hair glowing on top of the branch or something. God, that's fun, man. Mo zero just enough for someone to catch it. That's a good time doing that stuff. So you 22 or shotgun? So a lot most of the time I'll take a shotgun

I do bring a you know a 22 as well But a lot of the places that I might go in on are smaller properties And so I'm usually taking a taking a shotgun But if I can get a nice clean shot with a 22 It makes it a lot easier getting that Getting the shot out of I got a hook up my buddy Kevin Murphy to go out with him. He's a squirrel dog Yeah, he's in Kentucky. Yeah, but he right like he calls out. He he's got what he calls a warhorse When he rides out if he's hunting squirrels for real. Yeah when he rides out

He's got a 22 a a shotgun, a baseball bat, and an axe. Oh damn. And a bugle horn too, right? So you know Kevin Murphy? Like the Kevin Murphy, West Kentucky Kevin Murphy? Small Indian Nation. That is awesome. Oh no, that's who I'm talking about with the binos and stuff. He's a woodsman. Yeah, I bet he wouldn't take binos.

I was talking with him, and we had a swamp rabbit going into a hole in a tree. Yeah. He goes over and cuts a sawbriar. I'm not kidding you. I've watched this my own two eyes. Cuts a sawbriar and snakes it up that hole and he starts twirling it. Like a plumb tree soon pulls that rabbit back out of the hole. Lots of... Pulls that rabbit back out of the hole. But what he uses that bat for is now that if there's a squirrel in a hollow, he'll just come up, he'll get the bat off his war horse and go over there and just wallop that tree with a bat.

Chases it out. And then the ax is if all else fails, just cut down the tree. He just has it with him, you know? But yeah, he gets real serious and he got into riding those horses because he says one time he was just hunting on foot like an idiot, you know, and he sees some guys coming up the road on horses and he said their saddlebags were just stuffed. He says just squirrel tails

hanging off the saddlebags and he thought to himself, I need to get one of those. You know, those dogs they'll go up one mountain like up one hill, down the other, up another, and then all of a sudden they're striking. And they're like, get here and get here now, and you're, you know, hoofing it up and down, up and down. So the horse, yeah, it's not, I'm one of the idiots on foot, but you know. Man, you gotta hunt with Kevin, because you guys have, you guys be like two peas in a pod. Yeah, yeah, Kevin and I go way back, way back. Oh, okay. Oh, I know Kevin. Oh yeah.

Own him for years. Yeah, butchie bad toe. He's got all those famous dogs. He's got some, he has some good squirrel dogs. Some really good squirrel dogs. All right. All right. Well, thanks for coming on the show.

It was a lot of fun. Everybody good? Thank you. No, thanks so much. Thank you so much. Thank you.