The MeatEater Podcast - Ep. 658: Are Governor's Tags Un-American: REDUX

Episode Date: February 3, 2025

Steven Rinella talks with Gray Thornton, Brody Henderson, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider. Topics discussed: Governor’s tags vs. conservation permits; the one thing Steve doesn’t have an opinion on; the class/economic aspect; Dave Chapelle on SNL; the average male sheep off take; suspiciously philanthropic; when the four biggest sheep are killed in an avalanche; 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.

Hey American history buffs, hunting history buffs, listen up, we're back at it with another volume of our Meat Eaters American History series. In this edition titled The Mountain Men, 1806-1840, we tackle the Rocky Mountain beaver trade and dive into the lives and legends of fellows like Jim Bridger, Jed Smith, and John Coulter. This small but legendary fraternity of backwoodsmen helped define an era when the West represented not just unmapped territory, but untapped opportunity for those willing to endure some heinous and at times violent conditions. We explain what started the Mountain Man era and what ended it.

We tell you everything you'd ever want to know about what the mountain men ate, how they hunted and trapped, what gear they carried, what clothes they wore, how they interacted with Native Americans, how 10% of them died violent deaths, and even detailed descriptions of how they performed amputations on the fly. It's as dark and bloody and good as our previous volume about the white-tailed deer skin trade which is titled The Long Hunters 1761 to 1775. So again, this new mountain man edition about the beaver skin trade is available for pre-order now wherever audiobooks are sold. It's called Meat Eaters American History, The Mountain Men, 1806 to 1840 by me, Stephen Rinella.

["The Mountain Men, 1806 to 1840"] This is the Meat Eaters podcast coming at you. Shirtless, severely bug-bitten, and in my case, underwearless. We're hunting. 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. F-I-R-S-T-L-I-T-E.com. Okay everybody, welcome to our governor tags, our governor's tags on American Redux. Is that the right use of Redux? Remember they did Apocalypse Now and they recut it and called it Redux?

I do. I don't know. It's a redo. Do over. Well, where we ourselves are in the hot seat, we, uh, we did an episode, our governor's tags on American and, um, and you know, the, the, the, the episode was phrased as though it was a question, but I think there was an overriding sentiment in the room about, you know, it's hyperbolic language. Overriding sentiment in the room of, I would say, a tipping, that the governor's tags,

the sentiment in the room is that governor's tags tipped on American. We were called out on this by Gray Thornton from the Wild Sheep Foundation, which is the preeminent wild sheep conservation organization in America, and in all fairness does more than any entity in putting wild sheep back on the mountain, keep them wild sheep on the mountain. So we had to hear him out and he's here today to tell us where we went wrong, in his opinion. Gray, I want to keep all this fair. So I want to, who gets to say, just to bring people up to speed, who gets to say, who gets to describe

what a governor's tag is? I'm happy to give it a shot. Give it a shot. And then if you do it and I don't like it, I'll give you a thumbs down. You know, here's a good thing is, Stephen, this is your show. So I'm just honored to be here.

No, thank you. I don't know if I called it out. We just wanted to point out some things that we would have liked at least, least had stated. So- I get criticized about something or another every day. Okay. You and I both.

Now, most of them, I kind of like laugh laugh them off But your criticism of some of the comments that were made on that episode Struck me so much that I emailed you within seconds of reading them So like you know when you get you know if you get called out in the way where you're like, okay All right, you know No, I get a mean email every day for my friend Doug and um You know, I just ask him I'll usually reply by asking if he's seen any turkeys around. How's the turkeys looking? In other news, but no, I tell everybody what a governor's tag is. Well, let's talk about what it is before we talk about what it ain't. Well, first of all, where did they come from? And so the first governor's tag was actually

given to what was then the Foundation for North American Wild Sheep, now Wild Sheep Foundation in 1980 by Governor Ed Hershler from Wyoming. And a lot different than they are today, but the idea from Ed's perspective was, hey, we have these highly coveted tags, opportunities. We've got this fairly new organization, Foundation for North American Wild Sheep was founded in 1977, so three years later. What if we gave one of these tags, they sold it at auction, and we just mandate that they dedicate all the funds to wild sheep conservation in Wyoming. So that's how the whole process started. And so back then, yeah, it was a governor's tag. Because the state wasn't able to,

the state didn't have the mechanism to sell it themselves. No, so they kind of look at a, you know, at a NGO as, you know, we're the ones that can put on the party, put on the show, and there's a number of us out there that are doing it. But it was kind of a changing point for wild sheep conservation funding. Bottom line, FNAWs, or now Wild Sheep Foundation, is in existence because sheep weren't a priority. They didn't pay their way. Too few, and unlike elk, unlike mule deer, unlike whitetails, unlike even turkeys, not enough of them to fund their conservation.

So for many agencies, they really weren't a priority. Do you mind explaining what that means by not enough to fund their conservation? For example, let's look at Montana. We'll look at 2023 data, 2024 data. 656 tags made available. Uh, 558 to residents that brought in, and this is, this is 2023 data, 69,750 bucks. You're talking sheep now, right?

Sheep, Bighorn sheep tags. Okay. Um, 98 non-resident tags brought in a little over a hundred and twenty two thousand dollars so a hundred and ninety eight thousand dollars total for bighorn sheep conservation from the sale of tags for the sit from the sale of 600 tags yeah not not a lot of money you know I started really looking at this 10 years prior, back in 2014, and looked and thought because I was fortunate enough to take a Bighorn in our limited area in 2014.

I paid- Congratulations. Oh, sure. Crazy. I was a non-resident hunter. I paid 750 bucks. Coincidentally, that year at our show, the Montana tag sold for $480,000 in 2013. So I was looking at the funding model going, this is kind of interesting, you know, how relevant are these tags to wild sheep

conservation? How relevant is Wild Sheep Foundation to the wild sheep economy? Because we're one of the organizations that sells the most. So I did kind of a deep dive and I had a couple of our biologists look at WAFWA data and you know I think back in 2014 it hasn't changed too much. I think it was about $120,000 came to the state on the non-auction or raffle tech. Well, hell, you can't buy a pickup truck and fund a biologist for that. So how the hell are we going to fund wild sheep conservation? And that's really what Ed Hershler was looking at back in 1980, is that they don't pay their way. They're just, there's so few of them and the revenue so stream is so small from the whether they're LEH tags or not.

What's LEH? Limited entry hunting. Okay. You know, what most of us in North America see is, well, we got to apply for a sheep tag. You know, we're blessed in Montana, the only lower 48 state that you can in effect buy an over the counter sheep tab.

Pretty fricking cool. We've got to protect that. Um, Alaska, obviously you can buy over counter, um, dolls tag, although now that's every third year for a non-resident. Uh, Canada's where you can, you know, just buy over the counter for Canadian residents. You know, we obviously have to have an outfitter.

Um, so it was a unique funding model and it's certainly grown. You know, and Wild Chief Foundation quite frankly has been, you know, kind of the premier governor's tag and now we like to call them conservation permits because that's really what they are, because they're not only governors. permits because that's really what they are because they're not only governors. British Columbia has a minister's license, Alberta has a minister's license, tribal tags, we sell we sell tags for the Taos Pueblo for the Navajo nation, we've sold them for the Wallopi, we've sold them for the Kwanee First Nation up in up in northwest, oh I'm sorry in Yukon. So it's you know we we

lump them into a little I think more descriptive definition called a conservation permit which I think really identifies what they are and Stephen back in 2014 when I when I asked our conservation guys to do this deep dive they used Western Association of Fish and Wildlife Agency data, WAFWA data, and found that 73% of all wild sheep agency funding came from either a auction tag, conservation permit, or a raffle tag with the majority of the money coming in from an auction tag. Fast forward 10 years later we're still, you know, still quantifying the data. Right now it's about 83% in the United States. Of sheep. Sheep conservation funding at the agency

level come from either an auction or raffle tag. So is it like when one of these tags, conservation permit, governor tag, whatever you want to call them, get sold, is it mandated that that money goes to wild cheap conservation or is it diluted at all? Brody, that's the million-dollar question. The easy answer is yes. Now it's, you know, the proof's in the pudding and in the implementation. You know, one of the misnomers is, you know, I mean we just, we just had our convention in Reno. We sold 30 tags. We're gonna direct about 6.8 million dollars to state, provincial, tribal, territorial, and federal agencies through

the sale of those 30 tags. By statute, Wild Sheep Foundation has to direct those monies to the agency. What the agencies do for it, a little deeper dive, and I'd like to jump into that, but a misnomer is, oh my God, while the Chief Foundation got all this money. No. Arizona, 100% of the proceeds from the sale of any special tag conservation permit that we sell go back to the state. Arizona Game and Fish. Nevada, 100% goes back to Nevada Department of Wildlife. The average that we would retain is about 10% if you look at all the agencies.

If you look at just this last two weeks ago at our sheep show, 7.3 some odd million. We're going to keep 600 and some odd million. We're gonna keep 600 and some odd thousand. It's 8.9 percent's coming back to the Wild Cheap Foundation from the the sale of those tags. Again, some of them are 100% to the agencies. Most of them are on 10. British Columbia is 15% that we can retain. Alaska, interesting enough, has a different kind of a rule, but the monies have to go back to an Alaska NGO. So we sell the conservation permit, 100% goes back to our Alaska chapter. I think they keep 15% and then they direct the rest to the state of Alaska. So I could certainly show

you where Wild Chief Foundation directs our monies. I mean this year we're budgeting about 2.7, 2.8 in grant and aid going out of a 3.7 million that will fund education, conservation, you know, education, youth education, engaging women, disease research, but so much of what we do is grant nade out. An agency or a chapter applies for a grant, we give that money away. We keep six hundred and somewhat thousand dollars from these permits, we're giving away 3.7. You know, it's not a moneymaker for us, but it is a hell of a moneymaker for the agencies. And that's what we're trying to focus on.

And you know, if there's a better way to do it, we're all ears, because our focus is that ram, you, or lamb on the ridgeline. And how do we put money into the agency to affect their conservation, their enhancement, their repatriation, the restoration, habitat and all that. So did I pass? Do we call it a conservation permit? Yeah I'm happy with the definition of a conservation permit. One of the things, so this is something I said if you look at our thing Corinne, there's a quote, they made an extra tag. Yeah, you were, you were, I think you were trying to figure out like, I think what you're saying is it wasn't coming out of the same pool that people drop.

Whose side was I on when I said that? There, I think it got suggested. You were on the right side, because that's absolutely correct. There, I think it got suggested. You were on the right side, because that's absolutely correct. You qualified that you were like undecided and split down the middle. Oh no, I said this is one of the few things, no I remember, I said this is one of the few things in life I don't have an opinion about. I'm too torn. We can bring in some Macau's arguments later, I think that's interesting. Okay, so let's dive into one of these aspects of Governor's Tags that gets people riled up.

Conservation permits, you mean? Sorry. Conservation permits. I'm going to call them Governor's Tags. Just because that's... Well, no, I'll try to... Maybe we should be thoughtful about that. We're in the US. Because if I say Governor's Tags, other guys know what I'm talking about.

If I say Conservation Tag, they're not going to know what I'm talking about. The rebranding is kind of like the Gulf of Mexico and the Gulf of America. But then it doesn't mean that we should stick with. Stick with governor's tags. But when we go to when we go to BC or minister's permit where we're talking tribal, I'll call it a tribal permit. Okay. You know, there's an outfitter, there's a guide that, so, I'm talking about Gulf of America. I kind of felt like you wouldn't let that just go.

There's a, so sometimes when we spearfish down in Louisiana, we stay in this place and next to the place is the, the, the Gulf of America charter, you know? Oh, that's the name of their outfit. That was the name of that. That was my first, cause this is years ago. That was my first awareness. I just like chuckled about the Gulf of America. He was ahead of the game. Yeah. He's way ahead. So it must've been brewing a long time. I got like, I'm totally fine. Gulf, I'm totally fine. Gulf of America. Denali, I feel like that's pretty solidified in Alaskan culture. Yeah. Even the politicians in Alaska are like, what? I didn't know there's a problem with the name. I do remember it being McKinley Okay, here's one here's a governor's tag argument that folks make when they're arguing about this Oh, you know, you know, it was made me they want to think about this in all fairness

We have to get into the fact that there is a class there's a there's a class issue here Yeah, without question question so the other night Saturday two Saturdays ago I didn't watch about I watched on YouTube David Chappelle did the opening monologue on Saturday night live and Chappelle was talking about the LA fires and he was talking about reading commentary and news articles of people saying, uh, you know, I'm glad those rich Californians or houses are getting burned down. And he said, Chappelle says, uh, that's why I hate poor people.

They can't see beyond their own pain. So there, there is a, there is a class issue to this, like anything to do with wealth, access, any kind of financial privilege, right? Is going to generate animosity, right? You hear someone went to Yale, there's a judgment. Like if that's not part of your family trajectory, there's a judgment. If someone has- It doesn't matter, in America, it doesn't matter if you're talking about sheep or like real estate or whatever.

It's like, doesn't matter. He paid blank million for that house, boom. Right. Like there's a judgment. Right. Right. You. And so we need to get there. Like I'd like to get there on the issue of just like a per a perceived sense in America, like I guess globally, historically a perceived sense that there's like two playing fields and that, that, that, that people of wealth have access to things

that people don't have and implied in that is some sort of sense that most people that have wealth don't deserve it. So that's just burning, that's simmering underground and we'll remember to get to it. But let's start with another, let's start with a less philosophical point because this is just like a factual point.

a less philosophical point, because this is just like a factual point. Give me a, how many tags did Montana issue for Big Horns? One for auction, one for raffle. No, no, I'm sorry. In 2023 it was 656 total. Okay. There is a perception that, right, that it would have been, sorry show me the number again. 656. 656, yeah. So through the public draw they issue 656 bighorn tags. There's a perception that the number would have been 657. Correct. So that one other, we should use a state that doesn't have nearly as many because there's so many, it seems like there's a lot of money. What's the state that doesn't have shit for bighorn takes? Nebraska. Well, I don't want to go that extreme. Texas has a bighorn take? One or two maybe. All right. But yeah, no, I see your point. There's a perception that it should have been 657. Right.

So some lucky guy, some would be lucky guy that would have gone down and did the draw got screwed out of his bighorn tag. Okay. But they auctioned it off to the highest bidder. Right. So we've seen a diminishment of the public pool. Now, I want you to tackle whether that's true or not, but then that's going to bring up a broader question. If they create an

extra tag to facilitate a conservation tag auction, that makes me feel like the number of tags they're issuing becomes kind of arbitrary. Like how do you create an extra tag if the number of tags that are being distributed is like a biologically driven reality? Meaning if it, how did it go from 656 to 657? So I got a, I think an answer that you're gonna appreciate. You know, again, I'll go back to the unlimited area. You know, we've got three to four to five, kind of depending on the year, unlimited areas. You know, our guru in this state, the biologist, Sean Stewart, you listen to him talk about the allocation, the quota for those, used to be three in some,

now it's pretty much two. We all know there's some years that they take three, four, five, sometimes six, so you might have a quota of two, but there's six taken legally. Yeah, can you explain how that happens? Just for people to... That's it, well, so there's a 48 hour window

when the season closes. In my particular case, I took a ram. I was the second ram taken in 2014 in the unit I was hunting. Tried to close the season by sending an in-reach in. They don't accept that, so you know, went through my wife, we then called Fish Wildlife Park. They go, no, Gray's got to call you. I don't know cell signal. I don't have a cell signal. I don't have a sat phone, so I'm using in-reach. And you know, long and short, Sean finally went, oh wait a minute,

I know who that guy is. And oh, by the way, he's with Jack Atchison. If there's anyone that knows sheep, it's Jack. And, uh, yeah, we're going to close the season. But in that case, there was another 24 hour delay and another sheep was taken. So three sheep were taken legally in the unit on a quota of two, there's been times where, you know, five people shoot a sheep in one day. You've got 48 hours to report that to either a conservation officer or a game warden or

a biologist. So there's that lag period. You listen to Shawn Stewart, he'll tell you it's biologically insignificant. So that third, fourth, fifth, even sixth sheep is biologically insignificant in the overall scheme of the unlimited units that he's responsible for. So we take that, Stephen, go back to the state of Montana and you were absolutely correct. It is by, typically by the legislature, an authorized additional tag to what Game and Fish is gonna say, hey, this is what our off take is gonna be. The typical off take for bighorn sheep males

that's considered sustainable is, from an allocation standpoint is two to three percent of males. Super conservative. Wow. That's low, right? Super conservative. So that's what the state's going to allocate or the, or the, yeah. Cause I know what, like there's like a, I know what this is, this is really hard, people are gonna argue about these numbers all the time. Sure. But I've heard with deer management,

13%, 20%, not just the males, but the herd. Right. And now think of recruitment. You know, to increase a herd, you need recruitment of 20, 22, 23%, whether it's bighorn sheep, whether it's elk, whether it's mule deer, whether it's whitetail. Okay.

Well, now we're harvesting, and if you look at the, again, WAAFA data, it's like 1 to 3 percent is the average male offtake. No kidding. So we're already managing to a super conservative harvest. Yeah. So Montana does, then the legislature comes through and says, hey, we're gonna, to raise money for Montana Fish, Wildlife, and Park, we're gonna authorize one auction tag, one ravel tag, and add two. So if we

can go back to Sean Stewart's presentation where he's saying, hey look, even in the three to four to five unlimited areas with a quota of two per unit, if they go over one year by two or three or four, biologically insignificant, I'm not concerned about. So to your point, we're already managing super conservatively on bighorn sheep. Those one to two, Wyoming's got five Nevada, you know got five Nevada, five Bighorn sheep permits they authorize on auction. They then have, they have their commissioner tags,

but those aren't for Bighorn sheep. Those are elk, mule deer, pronghorn, moose, I think. There's a moose tag, not a commissioner. So you were absolutely correct that these are additive. And what's amazing is when you look at, you know, and you, we sold, you know, we're $192,000 in Montana in 2023, we sold the tag, we directed $288,000 on the auction tag to Fish, Wildlife and Parks.

That adds to their 192. We did a raffle back then too. It was 125,000. So 125,000 for raffle. We double it more than double it for the auction tag and then add that to the resident license. Yeah. Still not a lot of money.

Hey, American history buffs, hunting history buffs, listen up we're back at it with another volume of our Meat Eaters American History series. In this edition titled The Mountain Men 1806 to 1840 we tackle the Rocky Mountain beaver trade and dive into the lives and legends of fellows like Jim Bridger, Jed Smith and John Coulter. This small but legendary fraternity of backwoodsmen helped define an era when the West represented not just unmapped territory but untapped opportunity for those willing to endure some heinous and at times violent conditions. We explain what started the mountain man

era and what ended it. We tell you everything you'd ever want to know about what the mountain men ate, how they hunted and trapped, what gear they carried, what clothes they wore, how they interacted with Native Americans, how 10% of them died violent deaths, and even detailed descriptions of how they performed amputations on the fly. It's as dark and bloody and good as our previous volume about the white-tailed deer skin trade which is titled The Long Hunters 1761 to 1775. So again this new Mountain Man edition about the beaver skin trade is available for pre-order

now wherever audiobooks are sold. It's called Meat Eaters American History, The Mountain Men, 1806-1840 by me, Stephen hit me with the amount that went in the tag and license fees for the public draw versus like the $192,000 250 and 2023 for 656 tags and then the auction tag then we add one more auction tag. We added another 288 added one raffle tag

125 added another 288, added one raffle tag, 125. So I guess the, but you're so right. I mean, so here's the thing that I guess frustrates us on this side. There's not a financial argument that you can make to say that it's the wrong thing to do. So it really is a social justice argument. And so, I can show all the statistics that'll say that, look, and you know, it's additive. It's not, you know, I'm a regular guy.

Am I going to be able to buy one of these tags? Not unless I rob a whole hell of a lot of liquor stores or win the lottery. But I'll tell you what I'm thrilled with and that is that somebody is willing to do that. And because of that money, it's offering more opportunity for regular guys and regular gals like me. So you know that's that's the crux of the argument and then I you know when we dive into the social side of it because there is it's a it it's sad I mean if you know if I mean I if it, you know, if, I mean, I drive a 2017 Toyota pickup truck, you know what?

It works. Got 156,000 miles on it. I drive by somebody who's got one of those new GMC AT4s, boy, that looks slick. You must have been looking at that. Do I have to have that? Am I, you know, am I envious? Well, I don't know.

It's like, well, maybe one of these days, but my truck still pulls my trailer. I'm okay. So I look at these guys or gals that are buying these tags and I'm, I'm grateful because it's financial, if it's strictly financial, how far would you extend that logic? Like, if there's 600 tags, would you start to feel uncomfortable if we auctioned 500 of them? You know, what you're going to have is law of diminishing returns. And we saw that in Alberta, where they thought, you know, Alberta was, you know, that's where the big sheep were. And so... Pete Slauson Like in a very specific place too, right?

Pete Slauson Yeah, well, yeah. It was, it was catamom, you know, it was around the catamom mine. And so, they're basically, you know, park sheep coming out, if they come out, or they can just hang and you could sit there and there are guys, there's, you know, there's a specific rock, I think it's called hot rock or something like that that these people would literally beeline from the trailhead get to hot rock and then just wait and see if these big rams would come out of the park and he's Jasper and sometimes they would sometimes they wouldn't but they're big sheep and you know the the prior, uh, 100 world record was taken there.

And so that's where people were chasing that tag and that's where those dollars went. Well, Alberta at one point thought, Hmm, you know, maybe we can, uh, maybe we can make even more money. So they started adding more and more auction tags and even some more LEH tags to that same area. And then you had a hunting experience. It wasn't exactly the most enjoyable. Everyone's making a beeline for hot rock. And then they're all sitting around the rock waiting, you know, for a big sheep to come out of the park. So I'm being a little facetious, but that's basically it.

So you can have a law of diminishing returns. Really interesting this year. Arizona last year chose their commission. That's my next question? You're doing my next question? Yeah, Arizona commission chose. Did Arizona get rid of governor's tags? They did. They did. Take it away. They got rid of governor's tags and they're going to a raffle. Okay. So while Cheap Foundation was given the last desert bighorn sheep tag to sell on auction, unless there's a commission change and you know I mean it's politics at this point, we were also given a pronghorn analog tag. Last year we sold the Arizona tag I think it was for 420, 430 thousand dollars. 100% of those dollars go right back to Arizona Game and Fish. This year we sold

it for five, five hundred thousand dollars. Crazy. You want to really go nuts. We sold the Arizona pronghorn tag in 2024 for $95,000. A pronghorn tag, the last one going to be on auction sold for $215,000. 100% of those dollars go right back to Arizona game of fish. Now, now it's going to go to raffles.

We all know that you're not going to make the same amount of money. Organizations, NGOs in Arizona, um, balked and didn't even apply for these tags while chief foundation looked at it and said, you know, I mean, we could, we could thump our chests and go, aren't we great? You know, we're, we're selling these tags for unbelievable amount of money. You're not doing what we want. So we're not going to play your game. We didn't. We thought, no, let's, let's have a seat at the table. We'd rather be at the table and talking and doing something good for wildlife. So

we applied for their bighorn tag and we're going to raffle that off. I think it sold at Arizona Desert Bighorn Sheep Society, who we partner with in Arizona, on the desert big horn tag, on the Arizona pronghorn tag. Arizona Desert Big Horn Sheep Society sold the big horn tag last year at their banquet in May, $350,000, $360,000. We'll probably, $150,000, $360,000. We'll probably through a raffle be able to direct $125,000, $150,000 to Arizona Game of Fish versus the $350,000 or $360,000 and then you compare it to the $500,000. And then we get into the equity of raffles and that's a question I'd love to ask is, you know, those that think that raffles are

equitable need to look a little deeper dive there. A Washington resident can't purchase an online raffle outside of his or her state. Because of gambling law? Gambling law. Steven, is this a similar thing what we went through and we both perched, we weren't physically in the state of Arizona? I don't know if that was a gambling law or just a rule. No, so in Washington it's their state gaming commission.

They regard that as gambling? Yeah. Now if you're in state you can do an in state, but if we're out of state we can't sell. Arizona got burned on this. Arizona has a Super Tech. And they've pretty much, they used to sell that. They did exceptionally well on those.

They were selling them out of state. They got a call from the gaming commission of Washington state saying, hey, you're selling to Washington residents. Yeah, we sure are. Great opportunity for them. We're raising money for and it's a nonprofit and they said uh-uh you're violating our state gaming laws you got to refund that money. Corinna and I were talking about the pandemic. Wild Chief

Foundation got kind of clever during the pandemic we're all fighting to figure out how the hell are we gonna raise money? We actually sourced out of Doha, a virtual- Doha, Qatar? Yeah, a virtual expo thing. Rather interesting, we had to change all the avatars. There were no blonde people in this expo.

But it's a whole- Shocking. And no cowboy hats, no ball caps. So, you know, Brody, you know, we could not find a ball cap in this cutter application. But I digress a little bit. But what was really interesting is, so we said, okay, we're basically selling a ticket to sit in front of your MacBook or your PC and watch our show. Our auctions online, those are easy to do. Expo a little more difficult. And you know what, to incentivize you to buy this ticket, we'll put you in a drawing for a

Desert Big Horn sheep hunt. Fair enough, you know, all you have to do is buy the ticket and you're in the drawing. And somebody is gonna win a Desert Big Horn sheep hunt. I get a call from Washington Gaming Commission and they said, hey, you're conducting a raffle. And I went, man, we're not conducting a raffle. I finally figured out what I said, oh, wait a minute. Yeah, no, you've got some registration thing. You're giving away a Desert Big One sheep hunt.

Yeah, yeah. I said, well, you can't do that in Washington. You're based in Montana. I said, well, actually we're kind of clever. We run our programs for a raffles out of Wyoming, but this isn't a raffle. So this is just a registration thing. He says, you're still breaking our gaming laws. You've been, there's been a complaint against you.

Oh my God. Really? We had, we had to refund $27,000 in registrations. We had to make it at least fair to our Washington folks that wanted to participate. We just said, hey, we're refunding your money, and if you want to attend our virtual convention, you can do so for free. Well that happened in Arizona. These are the people that banned fishing during the pandemic.

Yeah, go figure. So, the laws are so crazy. You know, look at, Montana's an interesting one. We accept on raffle, checks, cash, debit cards, not credit cards. So, if you're conducting a raffle in Montana you got to make sure that your system knows that that that visa that somebody just sent you was a debit card not a credit card. And we've

been stung on that one. Arizona got stung, their super raffle got stung really really bad by Washington. So now, and Brody I think you touched on it, now Arizona is only conducting their, I forget what they're calling it now, and Brody, I think you touched on it, now Arizona is only conducting their, I forget what they're calling it now, it's not the Super Tags, but in-state. So now you have, and Steve, you touched on that, you know, now you have- Me and Corinne got boned out of a hundred bucks a piece.

Yeah. Yeah. Went towards conservation, quit your complacent bone. Raffles are not as equitable- Donated. As they may sound. Let's back up to Arizona. Because really this decision that came out of Arizona drove this whole conversation.

Yeah. Right. I mean, we've definitely over the years have touched on it. I have always been like, I've always been torn by the issue, recognizing the money, but then also, you know, like I recognize the tremendous amount of money that goes to conservation. And I also recognize the kind of populist rage against like who the hell has $400,000 to buy a sheep tag and why does he get one, but I don't. I recognize both sides of this. But what really fueled this renewed conversation was Arizona's decision,

the commission decision, and it came to a vote and they said that going into the future we're gonna step away from doing auction tags. Right. Like what's your understanding of that process? Like what were the inputs they were looking at? Was it primarily social pressure? I would say it's social pressure is probably the biggest one. The revenue side was certainly expressed. I was actually asked to do a video for their commission by the chair. We did. We did a six-minute version. We did cut it down to a three-minute minute version talked about you know

How much money is raised for Arizona? You know what will happen to a big horn sheep, but you know now you look at that pronghorn $215,000 what will happen to pronghorn conservation? What's gonna have you know is there anyone in this room that can tell me that there's an agency that has too much money From a wildlife agency standpoint, you know, maybe a few government agencies we'd like to cut out, but you know, from a wildlife agency in the United States, everyone's clamoring for more dollars. You know, we need more biologists, we need more trucks, we need more uniforms, we need more habitat improvement, you know,

all of that. So it wasn't a money thing. It was a, it was a, there was some pressure from some groups that really do think the raffle, uh, is the way to go because of Steven, exactly what you said. It's a, it's a, it's an envy thing. It is a, a polarization thing. Um, and we see it in all walks of life, whether it's a guy that's lauding and applauding somebody's home and Pacific Palisades being burned because he or she is pursued to be rich and I'm not.

I don't buy into that, but I recognize it. There's also, and it's been said, well, this is against the North American wildlife conservation model. Shane Mahoney and I are really, really close friends, and we share a stage around the world on giving speeches and the like. I used to, in my presentations, call this auction you know, this auction tag, governor's tag,

special permit, conservation permit. I used to call it a bastardization of the North American egalitarian model. I said, ah, you know, this is, but it raises all this money. You used to say that. I used to say it. And I said, ah, it's a bastardization of the model, but it works. How long ago was that? Shane and I were in my drift boat on the Yellow

Stone eight years ago. He and his wife, he's, you know, said, hey, let me float you down the Yellow Stone. You're such a busy guy. I want you to fly fish a little bit. And, you know, typical, typical Shane, he just kind of puts the rod down. He's looking around and then that voice of Moses, you know, great. I want to tell you something. You're wrong. I went, all right. Wrong a lot every single day. What am I wrong at this time? He goes, you know, I've heard you on stage call this governor's tag conservation permit model a bastardization of the North American model and you're wrong. I said well you being the foremost spokesperson for the model tell me why and he says you know

one of the pillars of the model is state and agency determination of how is the most efficient way for them to raise money for wildlife. If a state determines that a auction tag or a raffle tag or come up with whatever program it is, is the most efficient mechanism, well then that's consistent with a model. We just did a permit discussion at our sheep show in our full curl cinema had Shane my EVP of conservation Corey Mason myself doing a Q&A afterwards and Shane said it again he goes you know this is consistent with the model the challenge is the social license and Steve it's what you said and you cannot discount that. You know I

could certainly talk about a way to look at it that maybe will sway some views on it but there is just a built-in you know even though it's additive even though it's driving 83% of the conservation dollars for wild sheep at the agency level in our country. There's still this, well, so what? I don't care about the money. It's just not fair. Somebody is able to buy something that I can't. Well, I guess I look at that and I mentioned the term wildlife philanthropy.

You know, you look, you look at a high net worth individual and we applaud when there's a name on a hospital wing because they donated a potluck of money to that hospital or they donated to feeding the hungry, or to the welfare of pets, or a football stadium, or an art museum, and we applaud that philanthropy. Well this, in my opinion, is wildlife philanthropy. Why don't we applaud that? Because they're getting, because they would get universally applauded if they weren't taking the tag. If some guy got up at

sheep at your convention in Reno and some guy said, hey man, no strings attached, I don't want shit for it, here's $500,000 from Wild Sheep in Arizona. $500,000 for raffle as opposed to the tag. That'd be the response. I mean, like, if you're actually asking the question, that would be why. And again, it's like, that's what's in people's heads. So the name on the building isn't an accolade too. And I get it. I mean, it is.

But when it's in a market, but I don't think like if Verizon underwrites a sports stadium as a marketing play, I don't think that Verizon has applauded. No, they're recognized. It's like, it's like sort of, there's a, there's a quid pro quo to it. That's like, yes, they're underwriting the sports stadium, but it's like a marketing expense. So if you could somehow get into a guy's head, who's buying a sheep tag for $400,000 and he was going to go write the check anyway because he believes that much in wild sheep. But then like as a little added perk, got a tag too, I think that that would, that would diminish some of the social condemnation.

But I don't think people are looking at it. If talking about people who feel burned by governor's tags, I don't think they're looking at it that it was a donation. I think they're looking at it that it was a purchase. I think you're looking at the psychology of it. Yeah, like right, and they are certainly getting a benefit back. Yeah. Even if they don't take the sheep, and that certainly happened. I mean, I, you know, a good friend of mine from Texas, you know, back in the day in Alberta, I think he bought the tag,

he bought it two or three times and didn't take a sheep once. There was another guy that was always chasing him since past, and I think he, he bought it at least three times, didn't take a sheep twice. So I see your point and it's, and it's, and it's presumably had opportunities to get ocean. You know, well, you know, but you're getting an

opportunity, well, you're getting an opportunity, um, with no, with no guarantee. And I, I look back, you know, I look back on the guy that ended up buying that record Montana tag in 2013. Because I felt that my $750 tag back when Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks had $120 in revenue coming in from me, you know, and others, us regular folks, and they got 90% of $480,000 that my ability to hunt sheep in Montana was because some crazy guy was willing to spend that money. He made an interesting comment to me. I, you know, I thanked him and he says, Gray, here's the deal. I give to my church. He had another kind of pet charity he gives to,

and he goes, and I give to Wild Sheep Conservation. Yes. Now, does he get a spiritual benefit from giving to his church? You bet. Um, does he, you know, it's a little bit more than my 20 bucks in the, in the tray. Um, does he get a benefit satisfaction out of giving to, you know, in this case, they were homeless shelters or something like that? Sure. Uh, does he get a benefit from buying that sheep tag? Yes he does, but I know I did too. As the regular guy, I benefited because he chose to direct his philanthropy towards conservation, not a

football stadium. So, that's a good point though Steve. stadium. So that's a good point though, Steve. Let's change course a little bit. In conversations with people who are suspicious of, critical of, of auction tags, a common thing people point out is, and I've pointed it out myself, is that in some cases you get a season that's way longer, like potentially 365 days long. You sit outside of the unit thing, so Joe Blow draws a tag and he might have, he might have an area 10 by 20 miles, whatever the hell, smaller, that's his hunt unit. The auction tag holder can hunt any unit that's open

in the whole damn state, right? Right. And so people look and they'll be like, why is that? Why this amazing perk to wealth? Like even once we have the tags, I won mine on the open tag allotment, he bought his, but his is better than mine. And something to build on what Steve is saying,

like I once listened to a conversation at a Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation thing in Colorado, where someone had drawn a Bighorn Ram tag in a unit where there was only one tag and he spent a bunch of time scouting and there was a real big one. I was gonna ask you tell the story. Yeah. He on his on his way in scouting one day kind of a policy of dudes are coming down the trail and he's like hey you know they strike up a conversation.

He's like, I got, I drew the tag. I'm looking for this Ram. And they were basically like, don't bother. Like we're w we're guiding the governor's tag guy and they know when the season opens and they're like, we're going to get that thing before you ever have a chance to get it. It wasn't like an impolite conversation, but it was like, yeah. Cause he had his team of, he had his team of guys.

Yeah. So there's like a social conflict there too. You bet. And, and, and that, that in my opinion is the dirty underbelly. And is something that if we are to retain the social license to have these, we need to be able to answer those. And I would say right now we don't. Well, why can't you answer it this way? Well, go ahead.

Let me provide you with a hypothetical answer. Not hypothetical, but I mean, wouldn't it be if we as hunters are agreeing that auctioning off a tag for several hundred thousand dollars creates more sheep opportunities for everybody, potentially leads to bigger bighorn populations, so that there's more tags available in the general draw. We got healthier sheep herds, we got healthier sheep hunting. If we can make that tag even more valuable,

and it's still only costing us one sheep, why not do everything we can do to make it more valuable? Well, like, if you said, if you auction a tag off and you go, you got seven days, right? All of a sudden, the price is probably going to plummet. Without question. And so, So, I mean, but I feel like I'm not saying that that's ultimately the answer, but that's kind of how I look at it would be, well, if we're going to do it, we're going to give away a sheep tag. Um, I don't know, get the most money you can out of the sum of bitch. And if you need to make the season longer and that jacks it up by a hundred thousand

dollars. Okay. Well, and, and you nailed it. And if you know, going back to the prior podcast and the, and the title, you know, our governor's tags on American. Well, um, Well, no. That was a good title. No. You know, these conservation permits and these governor's tags are absolutely

American because it's based on supply and demand and an interest in capitalistic process. Now, you know, that, that was my argument as well. It's against the egalitarian North American model. Shane, Shane corrected me. Um, but Stephen, you're absolutely right. But the, the, the dirty underbelly is perception. Yeah.

And, and if, you know, Arizona is a 365 day, um, you know, being intellectually honest, um, you know, we, we like to give breeding populations time off, you know, now Montana hunts during the rut for mule deer. Uh, we off, you know, we are tree hunt in the rut for elk and others. We are tree hunt in the rut for elk and others. Typically, bighorn sheep are not in the rut. There's some that seasons that there could be. Certainly these conservation permits that either are extended season, earlier season,

or any unit opens it up to going right back to that social question, social license question on, well, how come it's that much different? Well, why is it that much different? Because that's what increases the price. Classic example is Alberta. They made, which some could say were some mistakes, you know, back in the 90s and they were just offering too many tags, price started to go down and they're going,

geez, you know, we used to be the big dog. Now Montana is, now New Mexico is, Arizona was, I mean, Colorado was last year. I mean, it's kind of amazing when you look at, you know, where the big dollars are coming in on these conservation permits. But two years ago- Can I stop you for a minute? Does the dollar, does the amount change

based on where the big ram is that year? Without question. Yeah. That's on my mental list of things to bring up. Which is a dirty underbelly. That's on my mental list of things to bring up. Which is a dirty underbelly. Can I also ask with the fewer, a lower number of available tags per state, does the number also go up?

Probably I couldn't, I couldn't, you know, what we're seeing now is, um, just kind of, you know, you look at, you look at what's, what's, what's been really interesting is, um, you know, kind of ground zero for disease, uh, has been in the Tri-State area, Idaho, um, Washington, Oregon, um, our chapters in the region, the agencies in the region, Wild Sheep Foundation has pumped millions of dollars into disease research, into kind of some novel separation policies, and some draconian policies like test and remove. We kind of call it-

You're talking pneumonia, correct? Yeah, yeah, microplasmo pneumonia is a set up agent, it's a pathogen, and what it does is it can lead to pneumonia. Primarily comes from domestic sheep, also domestic goats. It can be within a wild sheep population, so it can be endemic once they get it from a vector, a source, domestic sheep or goat. Well we've done collectively a pretty damn good job of, at one point we eliminated microplasma ova pneumonia from the Hells Canyon complex.

Better lamb recruitment, big rams, and that's just healthy sheep. Now Oregon tag selling like crazy. Idaho tag selling like, you know, new state records taken in Oregon, Idaho, Washington. So, you know, there's just this dynamic. The buyers are there. Like, this is a point I think that is important to cover because it's part of what it's part of the social conversation being, when an auction tag comes up,

oftentimes the buyer is basically buying an opportunity to go get a specific sheet that he has been made aware of by his outfitter. They're like, look here, we got a 200 inch Ram. You'll get to get it before the public. We, here's a dossier. Here's all the photos of it. You buy it, you hire us.

Our guys will keep an eye on it. We'll put six, seven guys out and watch it. You show up, boom, it's yours. Cause we're already on it. And that burns people's ass. It does. And that, and, and I would call, you know, in that scenario, that is a dirty underbelly belly.

Now you've got another scenario. And. But is that the tag, but that, but again, is that the tags fault? No, it's not. It's, it's, it's not. It's our fault. It's the, you know, let's push the envelope on fair chase, which we need to clean up. Now, here's a flip side of that.

And I'll tell you a little bit about the guy that bought the $1.3 million New Mexico tag two weeks ago. What? 1.3? 1.3. A New Mexico sheep tag, went for 1.3? Desert Big Maw, right? Rocking Mountain.

Oh, it was Rocking Mountain. Was that a new record? Absolute new record. Holy cow. Is he gunning for a specific sheep? Yeah, he's gunning for a specific sheep, but I'm going to tell you a story about him and what he said. Holy smokes. 1.3 million.

Now that's at a point where that's getting suspiciously philanthropic. So, yeah. Almost. So there was a period of time where everyone was chasing very, very large stone sheep. So the BC minister's license, which is kind of a unique license because, and there is a raffle tag too, but there's one, there's a minister's license on auction, there's a minister's license on auction, there's a minister's license on raffle. The minister's license in BC, you can hunt, they've got four, you know, subspecies if you will, but you know, three species. They've got doll sheep, stone sheep, bighorn sheep, but a bighorn

sheep, they've got California bighorn and Rocky Mountain bighorn. Oh, I got confused, I'm sorry. So there's a subspecies of bighorn sheep called California bighorn. Yeah, but hold on, who has all of them? British Columbia. They have those? The only thing they don't have is desert, but they have four wild sheep species. Dolls, stones, dolls in a teeny little area up in the far northwest corner, adjacent to Alaska, lower part of Alaska. So they have dolls.

They are the location for stone sheep, other than Fanin up in the Yukon. They have California bighorn that's primarily- That's what I was unaware of. Is that like on the west coast or something? It's in the Fraser River Valley. Got it. And then bighorn sheep.

Oh, okay. Around Fernie and the like. I have no idea. So you can buy that tag and you can choose, you can choose which sheep you want to hunt. So, you know, years past it used to be that chase a bighorn. Now it was, hey, we're gonna, you're gonna be able to hunt early and late for, um, stone sheep and stone sheep was the hot item. Uh, that, that permit went for 300, somewhat thousand dollars.

Um, there was a sheep that, you know, a couple of big ones that people were known, you know, knew that were around. This guy knew that they were around, um, all killed in an avalanche. Seriously? C'est la vie. So now let's go back to the, let's go back to the, yeah, it's like a pile of four sheep killed in an avalanche, all four of the big ones. It's like, hey, that ram you were chasing no longer. No way. But congratulations, that's philanthropic. So now- Did now petition for a refund. You gotta be kidding.

Don't no refund. Can I, can I, I gotta explain something to folks. So I'm, I'm trying to keep this real one on one. Uh, just to point out something obvious, the reason 365 days a year is enticing for sheep is cause they don't shed their antlers, which pointed out. So like, if you're, if you're hunting elk, let's say you're buying a governor's tag for elk, like that elk's gonna get maximum size and get hard antlered in September, late August, early September, and he's gonna drop his antlers down the road in March, right? So if you had 365 days and maybe you do, it doesn't really matter matter because you're chasing a how many months is that?

September, October, November, December, January, February. You got half the year he's going to have. That and any antler species could just bust them up. That's, yep. He could also snap them. Yeah. And a lot of those big bulls, especially in the desert Southwest do snap them off. So like, but a sheep, I mean, by the time he's

the kind of sheep we're talking about, this sheep is nine years old, 10 years old, 11 years old, but he's got him, he's carrying his rack year round. You shoot him in April, he's got the same, he's got- That's right. The same attributes as if you shoot him in November. They're horns, not antlers, so you know, they wear their life on their head.

Yeah. So let's now go to the gentleman that bought you know which is now the record for any any permit. Okay. 1.3 million. I was visiting with him last week thanking him you know wow incredible you know how the heck did that happen I mean 300,000 is a lot of money 1.3 is is I like what you said That's start to film for Robert Pretty close to you want a wing you want a wing on that hospital?

And he says, you know, I knew it was gonna go over a million dollars I Wanted to go over a million dollars. I'm happy. You know, season opens August 1st for me. I sure hope a mountain lion doesn't get it, but it is what it is. That's philanthropic. That is a guy and he's done very, very well, obviously in life.

And crazy enough, I think there were three bidders in at 1.2. So. And at one point those guys like enough is enough. Just amazing. I mean you can imagine the energy in the room when you see that. Tell me about the sheep. Yeah I was like what's the sheep they know about. Why so much of this year not after that sheep last year. There's a you know 200 points is kind of the the holy grail and so there's there is a yeah you know there is the thought that the largest bighorn in north america is in new mexico is alive right

now so there you go yeah now he's got a price on his head and and so okay let me ask is that unseemly well i guess but you know steve you pointed out that hey if the if the goal is to raise the most money for the resource Well, this is how we're gonna do it now. We just need to make sure that It's ethical, you know the the view and Brody. I think you you touched on it There's like ten guys, you know out on a mountain and they're you know, there's camping on the sheep like 10 guys, you know, out on a mountain and they're, you know, there's camping on the sheep. It doesn't smell right and it doesn't look right. But it's not illegal. No, it is. No, you're never going to get there. You're never going to enforce. You're never going to create a, you're never going to create a secondary set of laws that someone's going to have to apply to.

Now, let me give you, for instance, me and Brody go home with our little kids. Okay. Um, some of them at a certain age that they can shoot before they're like terribly helpful, right? They don't know. Even when we leave home, a 10 year old, they're not even really aware of what direction you're headed. Okay. So we're out with our kids. So-and-so sees a buck. He tells another grown up, he sees the buck. You know, we tell the kid, you know, you drag the kid out of their sleeping bag. We got to start walking. They don't really know. Right. And eventually you're like, there he is. get him! Okay. So someone go, that's unethical. That kid, that child didn't glass, they didn't scout, they didn't glass

that buck up, right? So you're never going to get there where you're going to come in and be that operating within the confines of the law, we would expect it to be different. Meaning if I apply for 25 years and I draw a Bighorn tag and all my buddies at work, and I could see this happening. Oh yeah. All my buddies at work are like, Oh man, what a riot. And three of us go up in jet boats, right? And we pour the coals to it glassing for sheep. And one of my buddies comes into camp. He's like, we found a giant. You're not gonna be like, I want to find it myself.

I'm not gonna wind up being like raked over the coals about it. It would be like, no, they went up. But there's a thing that happens where it was like, there's already a financial bitterness. And then on top of that, there's a thing that happens where it was like, there's already a financial bitterness. And then on top of that, there's a added bunch of what seems to be like shortcut taking, right? And it tarnishes the thing. But, but in people's eyes, but then in all fairness, like are you really going to make a separate set of game laws for,

for an auction tag holder that you wouldn't make for a guy that bought a, but that bought an Elcon from an outfitter. Well, they do. And in some cases they do make a separate set. Yeah, they extend, they extend the season. Sure. Like, but you know, and, and, and that does it, it just, it gets back to this, you you know what is the public perception and what's what's you know what is the real grind and again I you know there's organizations that are well we just have to go to you know raffle tags because that's that's more equitable well so then the person wins the raffle tag is

there also a team of guides that go in? Probably so. Yeah? In some cases, yeah. So what's the difference there? And there are crazy things that have happened. I've heard of the raffle tag winners outfitter calling the conservation permit outfitter saying I'll tell you what if your guy writes my guy a check for X amount of dollars we'll let you go

after that guy and we'll go after a second. No. Now that to me stinks and that's almost extortion. Right. And so you know, you know, and it's, it, it, and this gets back to the social thing too. You know, anytime that, you know, a super high price is put on a resource, there's going to be challenges to that, you know, and, and we, we know it. So, you know, where the wild sheep foundation looks at this is okay. We're raising the most money for a resources resource. That's got challenge, you know, whether it's disease in the lower 48, whether it's drought in the Southwest, whether it's super heavy, wet snow falls up in Alaska in the Yukon and

the Dall sheep are starving and in some mountain ranges we've lost 40 to 50 to 60 percent of the population. How do we bring them back? You know we're always looking for okay how can we raise the most money to do it? How can we put that money on the mountain? How you we going to fund disease research? So we see it, we do it. You know, Wild Sheep Foundation's directed since that first governor's tag, Ed Hershler's Wyoming governor's tag that sold for $23,000 in 1980. We have put about $89 million back into agencies for wild cheap conservation, just on the sale of conservation permits.

So it's very, very effective. What I think we should be, instead of us arguing on the, well, you know, that guy or gal gets a privilege that I don't, I would like us to do a better job of making sure that the dollars that are directed to the agencies are going where they should. And Steve, I think you asked that question early on and we didn't touch on it because there's some agencies that do an exceptionally good job and are very transparent of where that money goes and there's some that

aren't so Wyoming Wyoming has the Wyoming governor's big-game license coalition So all the you know, the five cheap tags, you know Any of the the elk tags any of the moose tags go into this pool? But they're separated out by species and then and then stakeholders, you know Wyoming wild sheep foundation has a seat on that Rocky Mountain Sheep Foundation has a seat on that. Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation has a seat on that. Mule Deer Foundation has a seat on that coalition. The Pronghorn guys, all the little critter groups have a seat. or the big game license coalition to say, hey, we want to fund a sagebrush habitat project that's gonna benefit mule deer, certainly sagehands, maybe less so on bighorn sheep.

Well, sometimes those stakeholder groups will go, you know, we got plenty of money on the bighorn sheep pool, let's pull a little bit out, and collectively we agree, we're gonna fund mule deer conservation. British Columbia does the same thing with their habitat conservation trust. You know the monies that we raise for the BC ministry go into this pool. There are a group of stakeholders, Wild Sheep Foundation has a seat, but we have a representative that's from BC, and they make decisions on where those monies are spent. Oh, that's transparent. Very transparent. Nevada, another one that does it really, really

well. Some of them not so well and with all the challenges. Can you say, can you give an example of a bad one or is that not? Probably not a good thing for me to say because we partner with all of them. So let me just talk about the good ones. But there's some that could do better. We could do omission. We could bleep it maybe. But you know, the fact of the matter is, you know, again, I can show your Wild Sheep Foundation spends our dollars. I mean, we do these conservation impact summaries, you know, we're absolutely transparent. Agencies not so. So that's something that I think, you know, we as NGOs, whether it's Wild Sheep Foundation, whether it's Mule Deer, whether it's ELK,

whether it's, you know, any of the organizations that are selling these conservation permits and driving the money back to the agency, we need to do a better job of holding our agencies accountable, going, okay, where is the money mm-hmm where is it going and it is it going to the the resource that it should yeah I think that's important like something you said that there's not enough sheep to pay for themselves I think a lot of people don't think about it that way right but it makes total sense. Like a state like Montana or Colorado, you talk about elk, like

those things pay for themselves and more, right? Brody, I wrote a paper back in the 80s before I was in the nonprofit, and it was kind of the economics of hunting. And at the time, and I don't know what it is now, but at the time I was looking at Colorado. I used to live in California, drive out to Colorado to hunt elk. And at the time, I think non-resident Colorado elk tags funded like 80% of Colorado fishing game back then. Now it's Colorado parks and wildlife. But, you know, I mean, elk paid the way. And as we all know, you know, the non-resident tags, you know, pay the way. Primarily, you know, Montana,

you know, what was it? $69,000, you know, $69,000 comes from resident bighorn sheep, $122,000 from non-residents. So, you know, much smaller amount of tags. Yeah, almost double. I mean, you know, it's, it's, we pay a hundred and what? 125 bucks for a, for a sheep tag. You know, we can, we can buy an unlimited, you know, so we, we, we can have that tag in our pocket, but if you draw one of the limiteds, 125 bucks, it's 1750 for a non-res. You know, so that gets back to this, this social thing. And Steve, I, you know, I love it when you talk about it because.

You know, look at, look at what's happened to our country. You know, we've, we've become so polarized, you know, we identify with pretty asinine things. Um, you know, we, we allow the media to fester that polarization, even within our own community. We, you know, we, we identify by, by what rifle we use and we criticize others that don't, you know, we, we identify what fricking

camo we use and we create communities that if you're not a part of it and you don't wear my camo, you're a bad guy. Boots, you know, whatever. We're so basic. And it's like, yeah. I'm not hanging out with no 300 win-made guy. Good God. But do we have like a name for the guys who have 6'5 Creedmoors?

Oh yeah, the 6'5 Needmoor. The man bun, the six five need more. And it's a great caliber, but I mean, it's, you know, we've taken the around the campfire arguing on whether the 30 out six is better than the two 70 to this level with just fricking asinine now. And, and so, you know, we fostered and now we're doing, you know, we do the same thing on the funding. And I guess, you know, I would just hope that we could change the narrative, you know,

and start, you know, let's deal with facts. You know, okay, the facts are auction tags bring in more money than raffle tags at a far more efficient way of, I mean, for Wild Sheep Foundation is going to raffle off an Arizona Bighorn Sheep Tech. We get zero dollars for doing it, but we're going to do it. We're going to pay all

that money to do it. We're going to raise $125,000, $50,000 directed to Arizona Game and Fish. Well we held an auction now, you know, yeah that's expensive for us, but we're, you know, we're four nights of auction and we raised 500,000. So we know that it's the most cost effective is an auction tag, but we still get caught up in this social narrative.

So what I want to really dive into and that is that how, how do we get beyond it? How do we get beyond criticizing that guy? Cause he wears camo or we don't like his brand or that gal because she's shooting a 6'5 Creedmoor and we don't like that caliber to why don't we just focus again on that ram lamb or you on a ridgeline and go what's best for wildlife? What would the the bighorn sheep landscape in North America look like without this money? Nailed it. Mic drop.

Can I? Mic drop. Like, we wouldn't have them. Right. 83% of agency funding right now in the US comes from the, what happens when 83 comes from an auction tag or raffle tag, most of that, what happens when 83% of that funding goes away? Where is it going to come from? Question, do we have over time, let's say the past 10 years from states that have sheep, the amount of money, let's say, collectively across these states from licenses, both in state and out of state, and if that has gone up over the down as a sign of general hunter commitment to conservation of sheep.

Absolutely. Now, are you saying total? Because we all know that revenue is generally going down because generally hunting numbers are going down. Right. Yes, we saw during the pandemic a bump up. Yes, we see a, you know, the largest percentage of new hunters are women. Is, you know, is that a significant percentage of the current? You might be

able to argue it, but it's significant. But here's the sad fact, and this gets back to impact. I can show you a nice linear upward trend on dollars going into wild sheep conservation. Collectively? Collectively. Across? Okay. Collectively. But the percentage of that that is?

Oh, auction tax? Right. A 10% increase over the last 10 years. It was 73% in 2014, 83% in the US. So a 10% increase in auction tag revenues going to the agency. And licenses? Licenses not so. That you could get US Fish and Wildlife Service data

And you know again, there's been slight increases and then it kind of plateaus and then dropped My concern is There's a linear growth in revenue going to wild sheep conservation sadly over the last say say, five years or so, because of huge die-offs in Alaska and the Yukon. Some die-offs during disease, you know, from in Texas. I mean, Texas had 1800 desert bighorn sheep five, six years ago, little over 500 now, all because of

disease from Audad. Um, you know, there's 40,000 plus Audad in the state, free ranging. I'm not even talking about behind wire. And we've gone from 1800 desert bighorns to less than 600. That scares the shit out of me. Um, and so, you know so you know the point there is

it gets back to impact and what are we doing with it and are we holding the agencies accountable. We can drive this money to them are we getting the bang for our buck and and that's for all of us to work on to ensure that we are and and and money isn't everything. I mean, it's certainly a driver, but we have to make sure that we're doing as much as we possibly can effectively with that money if we know what to do.

How are we gonna deal with snow load in March, April in Alaska? I don't know. That I don't know. I mean, I don't know, you know, I, I mean, it gets back to even some crazy ideas. We grow desert bighorn sheep. We've done it in Texas. We've done it in Arizona.

I mean, just by putting water. Water, but we've actually, we actually intensively managed them in Texas to bring them from zero to 1800 to 2000. We did the same thing in Arizona. I mean, like with, with release, with using release sites. Captive bred and release. Yeah, I got you.

Done in Mexico. Literally growing them. We're growing them. Sonora, Sonora is about 15,000 desert bighorn sheep in the state of Sonora alone. 50% of them are behind wire. We have an initiative to say, Hey, look, you know, let's use market forces to incentivize you to release them and not a put and take scenario, but release them and create free-ranging desert big horn sheep in suitable habitat.

And we've got great examples of people doing it. They're doing the same thing in Coahuila. They're doing it in Sierra Leone. They're doing it in Chihuahua. So we can do it with desert bighorn sheep with some caveats or some challenges to it. This isn't raising white tails in Michigan, but it can be done. Is that something that we could do in the northern climes? I don't know.

But you have a 40 to 50% drop in doll sheep, you got probably a 10 to 15 to 20% drop in stone sheep populations for a whole variety of reasons. It's not over harvest. You know, it's more environmental factors or disease. What are we going to do? I'll tell you what we need. We need the whole other, this is a whole other episode.

But I think that if someone came in and proposed in Alaska What are we going to do? I'll tell you what we need. This is a whole other, this is a whole other episode. I think that if someone came in and propose in Alaska doing like captive breeding, they'd be shot to juice, to juice, doll shoot numbers. I think that that would be like, uh, you know, you'd have a bigger controversy on your hand than conservation tags. And your question, like, how do you find peace with it? There's a thing with there's a thing in rhetoric that I've just that there's an observation of mine when it comes to debate and rhetoric that I've pointed

out a handful of times around conversations having to do with with the impacts of a of a border wall between US and Mexico. And when there's talk of building an impenetrable barrier between the US and Mexico to try to get a grip on illegal immigration, there's this thing you bring up that one would bring up. You'd say that would be detrimental, that would be detrimental to wildlife movements. You bet.

So jaguars, desert bighorns, okay. Like that's a thing to consider. Now someone can bring up, hey, let's consider this. And people that are like vehemently supportive of a wall would be angry that you brought it up, right? They'd be like, well, you haven't lost your job, okay, to an illegal immigrant. So they're angry that you're laying out all the facts for consideration. But in your own family, if you're proposing like, hey,

should we go on vacation this spring? In that conversation, someone can say, well you realize if we go on vacation this spring, that's going to mean that we are going to forgo painting our house because it costs money. Now the person that brings that up isn't attacked. It's like you're all airing the pros and cons, right? And then you come to an agreement. All the pros and cons considered, we come to an agreement. Even though it's gonna be detrimental to the wildlife movement, it is net positive to make an impenetrable barrier between the US and Mexico, let's say. Or even though we'll forego painting our house, we're determining it's a net positive that we

go on a family vacation. I think ultimately the answer might be arrived at similarly around auction permits. It'd be like, it's imperfect. It's imperfect. One could argue that by auctioning off a tag, we're removing a, we're hypothetically removing a sheep from the pool. That's not perfect. The individual might use some hunting methods that aren't available to everybody else. That's not perfect. The individual might use some hunting methods that aren't available to everybody else. That's imperfect, but net-net, all things weighed in,

the money is worth it. That's probably the best you're gonna do. I don't think you're gonna get it to where some guy reads online that someone bought a tag for 1.3 million. I don't think you're gonna get it where 100% of the hunters are, you're going to get it where 100% of the hunters are, you're never going to get there. Right. It's going to be that like the general sentiment is,

hate them rich guys, but that's a shit load of money for bighorns. Yeah. And in the long run, it's probably going to mean more tags. Right. There's one more net positive impact. And Steve, you're right. You're absolutely spot on. There is another little thing that we have in this country that's not in others, which is the Pittman-Robinson Act. And these tag purchases are non-federal dollars. So they're subject and eligible for a three-to-one match with PNR Act. dollars so they're they're subject and eligible for a three-to-one match with

PNR Act. So you know we can we can draw you know we can send 1.3 million I you know we're gonna we're gonna get 10% of us 130 you know 1.3 minus $130,000. We send that to New Mexico Game and Fish they can apply for a three to one match from PNR act dollars for wildlife restoration and turn that into, you know, five, five, a $5 million bump. So yeah, it is imperfect. Um, it works.

And I guess until we find something that works better, well, why don't we live with what does work and it has worked really, really well from 1980 and the dollars are there, um, and argue over what calibers better or what camo you wear. That's a little bit more, you know, productive. I think one of the, one of the final points we had arrived at when we had this conversation was a sense

of hope or a call to action that people would open their checkbooks up, open their credit card balances up to support raffle tags And that you would arrive at a point where these raffle tags were netting equal to or more than auction tags and I think You kind of touched on this early, but if we You don't think we're there not yet, but you know we during our during this seminar There was a guy adamant on well. You know are you are you working on it? Well? Yeah, we are We looked at we looked at our raffles that we do at the convention.

Um, and you know, we were selling $40 tickets. We could not physically sell enough tickets in three day of expo to cover the costs. It really, you know, really, really make a profit, if you will, which our profit goes right back into sheep conservation on doing it that way so We you know we we played the capitalists again. We go okay. Well, we're gonna sell these not for $40

We're gonna sell a thousand tickets at $200 and then for the stone sheep. We're gonna sell 500 tickets at $500 is that too much? I think we figured out that it was, but you know, we increased our raffle take. So what I pointed out in this seminar... That helped the raffle take. Big time. Big time. That helped us. So five bucks a pop doesn't work. You can't process it. You can't process enough. And you know, $40 for us. We couldn't sell enough physically in three days to make it

Really profitable, you know what you want to do is you want a keystone or you want to double your money on each one? Of these things well, you know very very rare these days for anyone to donate There's a few but donate a sheep hunt, you know You've got stone sheep hunts now selling for a hundred thousand dollars big horn sheep hunt selling for you know 110 Stone sheep hunts now selling for $100,000. Big horn sheep hunts selling for 110. Doll sheep used to be- You're talking about outfitted hunts. Yeah. $45,000.

So, on a doll sheep hunt, we need to sell, we need to make, we need to sell at least $100,000 worth of tickets to double our money. A stone sheep, if we're buying it at face value, we gotta sell $200,000. So, we went to a different way. As I said in our seminar, if we can figure out a way to do it, again, let's be intellectually honest, if our goal is to raise the most money, if we can find

a way to raise the most money with a raffle, we'll do it. Because the objective is to raise the most money for the resource and for the habitat. Can you humor this question for a minute? The one that just went from 1.3 million. Walk me through what would have happened. Walk me through if you had done a raffle. In your mind the best way to do a raffle from your learnings, what would that sheep tag have generated? Well, that was a bighorn. So we sold a bighorn in Alberta. We bought the tag for $80,000. It's a hunt, it's not a tag. I mean, we actually bought an outfitted hunt for $80,000 and our objective was to sell $200,000 worth of tickets and net $120,000.

So you know if we pay the outfitter $80,000, we net $120,000, you know theoretically we could direct $120,000 into big horn sheep conservation. We're, you know, we're gonna direct $1.3 million. So I- But what if you take, but just take, I mean, I know you're trying- I can't figure out how to get a 1.3 million out of a raffle. Unless it's a nationwide lotto. But take a stab, that not the hunt, not the guided hunt,

but take a stab that had there been a raffle, just in your, not the hunt, not the guided hunt, but take a stab that had there been a raffle just in Europe, just the best year, because you're probably more qualified to answer this imperfect question than anybody else on the planet. Had that been a raffle, that tag, that New Mexico tag, had it been a raffle, what would it have brought in? $250,000. You think so? Yeah. Yikes. Yeah.

Darn. Really? Yeah. Cause you've done a bunch of raffles. We do a lot of raffles, but you know, I mean, we could, yeah, probably 250, you know, maybe, you know, if, if, so if you could get people, hey, this is the biggest sheep in North America.

This is what it's going to be. How long are you going to run the raffle? You know, I mean, my hip pocket is 250, 300,000. Could we get a half million? Maybe. That becomes a little obscure though, that you'd be notifying raffle buyers about this sheep. Win a chance at the biggest sheep in the world. Yeah.

And so, I can see you're getting a real call from the Washington gambling commission at that point. And oh by the way, Washington residents, Hawaii residents, you know if we were gonna draw, this is a funny one in Nevada, if we were gonna draw the the hunt in Nevada, Nevada residents aren't eligible to do it online. They have to buy it there. So I mean, the laws are Pennsylvania's got crazy laws. I mean, everyone's got interesting laws. We run our raffles. When we do a raffle, we run it out of Wyoming.

We have an office in Wyoming. We run our raffles out of Wyoming because it's a little bit more generous on the, uh, our little, um, liberal, I guess you could say on the, on the raffle laws. But we, you know, we have run a foul on Washington and got called out on it. We've run a foul even in Montana where one of my employees was trying to do the right thing.

She thought about, well, shoot, you know, I'll just, if you want me to run your card right now, I'll just run it right now. She didn't know it was a credit card, not a debit card. I then got a phone call saying, Hey, one of your now, I'll just run it right now. She didn't know it was a credit card, not a debit card. I then got a phone call saying, hey, one of your employees, I'm with the Montana Department of Revenue,

one of your employees just did an illegal raffle purchase for me, and I went, ah, you know. Now, do the right thing, get burned. But, you know, those are the things we're up against. But, there know, those are the things we're up against. But there we go. Now, it was good to hear you about this. Yeah, this was, I, you know, I appreciate it. I'm honored to be on the program. I really appreciate, you know, listening, looking at the facts. Um, what we have to really look at is, is the why, you know, why is it, why is it deep down inside

we're envious of some, you know, something that somebody else can buy that we can't. And that's really what the nut cutting comes down to. You know, it's just this, that's human nature. So all we can do is provide the facts, do our best, focus on the resource, and be open to ideas. Come up with a better idea of how to fund it,

or all ears. Yeah, no, I could see that if someone, if some mathematician came to you and said, great, that tag should have brought three million by my formula. I would. I appreciate you coming on. Thank you very much. I appreciate you all. Yeah, thank you. People can buy a raffle ticket perhaps next year? You bet. In Reno? You can buy, well you have raffles year? You bet. In Reno? You can you can buy well we have raffles that we're offering online all the time so are our chapters

we try to obey obviously all the laws but you know if you look at if you look at sheep hunting right now and how expensive it is raffles are the best deal going from a from a numbers standpoint from an odd standpoint so you know get in all the raffles you possibly can you know and then also treat it like a portfolio put some money away every month to buy that sheep hunt someday. You know I forgot to mention you're the CEO of Wild Sheep Foundation yes okay and then tell people real quick if they want to get checked out on Wild Sheep. What's the best approach? Yeah, come we're based here in Bozeman

World headquarters, but go to wild sheep foundation dot o RG wild sheep foundation dot org and you can see what we do Last year we directed eleven point one million dollars to programs benefiting wild sheep Pretty impressive for a organization with only eleven thousand members So, is that right? Yeah, you know, we're, I like to say that, you know, we may have a relatively small footprint, but we cast one hell of a long conservation shadow and we're proud of it. Great, man. Thanks again. Thanks a lot, Steve. Appreciate it. Hey, American history buffs, hunting history buffs, listen up, we're back at it with another volume of our Meat Eaters American History series. In this edition titled The Mountain Men, 1806-1840, we tackle the Rocky Mountain Beaver trade and dive into the lives and legends

of fellows like Jim Bridger, Jed Smith, and John Coulter. This small but legendary fraternity of backwoodsmen helped define an era when the West represented not just unmapped territory, but untapped opportunity for those willing to endure some heinous and at times violent conditions. We explain what started the mountain man era and what ended it. We tell you everything you'd ever want to know about what the mountain men ate, how they hunted and trapped, what gear they carried, what clothes they wore, how they interacted with Native Americans, how 10% of them died violent deaths, and even detailed descriptions

of how they performed amputations on the fly. It's as dark and bloody and good as our previous volume about the white-tailed deer skin trade which is titled The Long Hunters 1761-1775. So again, this new Mountain Man edition about the beaver skin trade is available for pre-order now wherever audiobooks are sold. It's called Meat Eaters American History The Mountain Men 1806-1840 by me, Stephen Rinella.