The MeatEater Podcast - Ep. 789: A Bad Road, Rutty Bucks and Cookbooks | MeatEater Radio Live!

Episode Date: November 7, 2025

Hosts Brody Henderson, Janis Putelis, and Maggie Hudlow recap some recent fall hunts, chat with Tim Fullman and Matt Jackson of the Wilderness Society about the impacts of an Ambler Road, have a crew-submitted Hot Tip Off, and get another round of Rut Reports from the field. Watch the live stream on the MeatEater Podcast Network YouTube channel. Subscribe to The MeatEater Podcast Network MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YouTubeSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Welcome to Meat-eater trivia. Meat-eater podcast. Welcome to Meat Eater Radio Live. I'm your host, Brody Henderson. Joining me today, we've got Janus Patelis and Maggie Hudlow. Good morning. Morning. Happy?

It's 11 a.m. Thursday, November 6th here at the Meteeter World Headquarters in Bozeman. But no matter what time zone you're in, you should probably be out hunting right now. That's right. Instead of listening to this stupid show. Yep. But, you know, if you are listening to this year, podcast. It should be from the stand or a glassing knob because this is a week the rut kicks into high gear for white tails and the mule deer bucks are also starting to get pretty

frisky I hear. So whether you're doing an all-day sit, you're stuck at work or you're already tagged out. We've got a great show for you today. We have an interview with a couple folks from the Wilderness Society up in Alaska regarding the recent federal approval for building the controversial Ambler Road. If you don't know what that is, we'll we'll fill you in. We're also going to be checking in for a rut report from a few of our crew members who are out hunting right now. Me and my charming co-hosts are going to be competing in our own hot tip-off segment for which you, the live chat audience, is going to decide the winner. And we're also going to share some recent hunt stories rather than some, you know, weird segment that

Spencer would do. We're just going to talk hunting. And finally, we're going to try something new. I hope it works out. It involves the folks in the live chat. And it involves one of those folks getting a sweet prize to celebrate the release of our brand spank a new meat eater cookbook box set. Right there. Can you see that, Phil? There it is.

Two cookbook box set that releases next Tuesday, November 11th, which is all. also Veterans Day. We're going to give away a copy of that thing that's signed by Steve. All you guys have to do while we're doing the show live is you got to write a comment in there in the chat, and it has to be the most convincing reason why you and you alone should deserve to be the winner. Phil's going to weed through those as we go. He's going to pick out a few of the best ones.

And at the very end of the show, we'll vote and decide who, gets a copy of this cookbook. Who came up with this game? I did. You don't like it? Well, I just don't really understand. Are you expecting to be entertained by their comments?

I want to be entertained. You don't want genuine heart-wrenching stories about why they desperately need cookbooks. Well, you know, something like that too might work. But yeah, we just want to get people involved and having fun. All right. You guys better be entertaining. Yeah, yeah. I'm sure they already are.

We probably already have our winner. already there was there's been a chat discourse happening here i mean an hour before the show even started there's people in here talking away i'm gonna sweeten the pot too if you make a really strong case for why you deserve the cookbook you're gonna get the effed up old trucks calendar that's also signed by the crew so there you go little extra something fancy um yonis maggie before we get really going. What do you guys been up to and what are your plans

for the November rut? Well, I'm just really here for the rut report since I leave for Wisconsin tomorrow and as long as I can get these rut reports in, then I know what to expect. I think we have a Wisconsin

Rett report coming in, don't we? We do. And I don't think we're going to play Mark's Rett Report, but I got a picture this morning from Mark and he put down a bruise Is that right? Mm-hmm.

A little teaser. Maggie? Admittedly, I don't have deer hunting plans. I got a freezer full of elk meat right now, but my... Got your meat. My bird dog bill has been real bummed when we've been leaving every morning to go elk hunting without him. So the gears are shifting, and we're going to go try and shoot some birds now. What do you say in birds?

What kind of birds? Ducks around where we live. live, and then we're going to venture to the other side of the mountain and start dabbling in some upland hunting, which is some new grounds for me, so I'm excited. Why don't you bring that dog up here to hunt pheasants? It's like a banner pheasant you're around here. Really? Yes. I will.

And I saw it in the other day, mule deer and antelope, and I must have seen, I don't know, a couple hundred sharp tails. Like they were just everywhere, man, where I was. So I'll tell you where they were if you don't tell anyone else. I know how to keep my mouth shut. Man, on Saturday, I had a good lesson, I feel like. A lesson that everyone needs to get now and then. I found, I killed an antelope Saturday. Sunday found a, like, for Montana, a very, very nice buck.

and I wanted them really, really bad. But it was windy and it was like I had to sprint to get into position and I think I made the right choice not to shoot and I think you need a reminder like that now and then. Like I wanted that thing bad and I was a millisecond from squeezing the trigger and held off. Tell us just because it was windy? It was rushed.

Like I had to sprint. I was breathing hard. It was a small window to shoot through. Like, culminate windy. This wasn't right. He wasn't right. He wasn't big enough for that kind of a shot. No, he was too big to make that kind of shot.

So you're saying, I'm guessing he was like a solid 160s, maybe even a 170-type buck. Something like that. And if he was a 200-incher, you don't think their lead would have been flying? No. No, I wouldn't have. shot because i was telling my kids last night actually at the dinner table that personal ethics usually tend to as the buck gets bigger the ethics tend to sort of slide down down but i like i've been talking to my kids lately like about there's just no reason to do that shoot and see

what happens thing like if you want like you shouldn't want something that bad like you need to be like not that you would say i don't care if i get that thing or not but you need to say like you know it's okay if i don't get that thing and i think people need that reminder now and then i respect anyway you look you look like you're doubting me honest no i'm not not at all it's just i i like struggle with this uh the whole uh the theory of the conversation around it because i know if like if it was like a 150 i was kind of like yeah i don't really need that buck you know i'd be be like yeah you know it was too windy i was rushed we don't ever really need any buck no i know but

when they get huge yeah like it's it's like a drug well that's what i'm saying people do stupid shit that's what i'm saying it was a 200 incher i'm gonna be like well if i can just get one in him then i can probably get two more in them later okay just saying it was a different way to think about i mean i'm happy for you that you you know you had that experience and you made that decision um but uh you know it's such a personal thing it is it is you know we'll see what happens i'm heading to colorado like today mm-hmm 200-inch or pops out i might be shooting over the horizon that's right you'll be like 800 never tried it but this buck is worth it yeah all right moving on to the the guts of the show um as always this

There are a lot of important public lands issues going on right now. One you got to know about is this is the last few days of a public comment period where you can weigh in on the plan to – there's a plan out there from the federal government to rescind what's called the BLM public lands rule, which essentially prioritizes managing BLM lands – like multi-use but prioritizes wildlife conservation. the plan would throw that out the window that are rescinding the plan would throw that out the window so you can go to regulations dot gov and leave a comment supporting just leaving the public lands rule as is um go on there and do that i think you've got what'd you say maggie till november 10 November 10th oh only a few more days um so go do that the public lands issue we're actually going to talk about today um is the ambler road and if you're not familiar the ambler road is uh will be a 210 mile long east to west route from the dalton highway which runs north south almost all the way through alaska isn't that right you're honest yes um it runs east west from the dalton highway over to Ambler, and it's going to cut directly through this, like, massive, pristine roadless wilderness of the Brooks Range to Ambler. The Trump administration recently had been, it had been

nixed. The Trump administration recently reversed that and approved construction of the road, despite serious concerns about destructive impacts of fish and wildlife habitat, including a major caribou migration corridor. Now, there's proponents of this and there's people, and there's detractors. But what I would say is like Alaska is the last place in the United States that still has these like vast swaths of largely pristine tracks of roadless wilderness. And like that's what makes Alaska special. And it's the only way it's going to stay special. Those in favor of the road are site job creations and other economic benefits.

for local communities. But you got to keep in mind that the road is being built almost exclusively for foreign mining interests, which are trilogy medals of Canada and South 32 of Australia. So, yeah, there's going to be some local jobs that are going to get created, but the bulk of the financial kind of winnings are going to go to foreign mining companies. So we're going to dig into that. today we're going to talk to Tim Fulman from the Wilderness Society. He's their senior ecologist.

We're also going to talk to Matt Jackson from the Wilderness Society, who's their senior manager. And we're going to see what's going on and check out the potential impacts with those guys. So guys, if I can add, Rody, too, if you want to hear more from someone that's opposed to the Ambler Road, we did a great podcast with author, Seth Cantner, probably a year ago. um he wrote a book called a thousand trails home living with caribou um but basically where he lives uh would be greatly impacted by this road right at the end of the road yeah and his his his caribu that hit that he hunts and that the villages all around their hunt would be impacted by this road and um i'm sure if you just search seth cantner meet your podcast you'd find the episode yep uh you got those guys in there yep there they are okay uh

Thanks for coming, guys. We appreciate you talking to us today and informing the audience a little more on the Ambler Road. Matt, I want to talk to you first. It seems like this is a situation, at least to me, that in many ways mirrors the Pebble Mine situation that was going on a little while ago down in Bristol Bay. you know it's really controversial it involves like really good wildlife habitat also fish habitat so why don't you talk about the wilderness societies number one what you guys do holistically and your role in the ambler road situation and then after that after that we'll get in and like more of a feel for who in Alaska is for and against but let's let's hit the big

stuff first. Yeah, thanks so much for having us on. My name is Matt. I'm born and raised Alaskan. And the Wilderness Society nationally, we help write the Wilderness Act. We advocate for public lands, fish and wildlife habitat. And so we're working on this issue of the Amble Road in Alaska because of its impact, not just the federal public lands, national public lands, but this huge swath of the Brooks range, the proposed road would cut through gates of the Arctic National Park and Preserve, also public lands right around the Dalton Highway corridor that you mentioned. And the parallels you draw with the pebble mine are really accurate. You know, what we've got here is we're looking at the short-term profits of foreign mining companies versus the long-term well-being of public lands, of wildlife, and most importantly, the communities that rely on them for their way of life.

And so that's how the Wilderness Society started to get involved in the Ambler Road is through listening to local communities and looking at the impacts that it would have on those public lands in the Brooks Range. So it's been kind of a roller coaster because not that long ago, the road had been shut down. And then just recently it's back on again. So that's like it's got to make your job harder, you know, when things change. So and the same thing with with pebble mine too, right? Like it's up, it's down and, you know, now it's back again. It's been a little bit of a roller coaster, but what's been really consistent from within the state is actually the opposition.

You know, we've been through multiple public comment periods where communities have gotten to speak up on this, you know, 88 tribes across the Yukon, Kuokukuk and Obuck Watersheds have opposed this project. So, you know, what the feds are doing is a roller coaster. But here in the state, the pretty level, we know what we want and we've said no to this road a bunch of times. So I just try to focus on that local perspective to protect the land because that's been consistent. I want to get in some like nitty-gritty stuff for the road. Like who's paying for the road? That's a question. We don't know the answer to.

The cost estimates for the road keep going up and down. I think it's upwards of $350 million. to build dollars to build the road is the estimate right now. And nobody's agreed who's going to pay for it. I think one thing that's really important for folks to know is this is not a public road. You know, it's not a U.S. highway. It's going to be a private mining road for industrial scale mine trucks, hauling ore back and forth.

When you have trucks like that driving, they're what's called fugitive dust, mine tailings escape from the trucks. And so there's kind of some rough drafts to have. have it be a toll road and the mine company will pay the toll but nobody knows who's going to pay to build it is there any chance like american taxpayers end up on the hook for some of the costs we're certainly going to be on the hook to clean up the mess afterwards that's to play how it works it's not sure who's going to be on the hook to build it um it's a risk is there is there a timeline for construction or is that or is it too early um you know some of the boosters

these foreign mining companies, they say they want to start as soon as next spring. Yeah, I think that's unrealistic financially and, you know, weagely for them. Right. That's what they're trying to do is start construction in the spring. Normally when something, you know, a road like this gets built, there has to be all these like assessments done beforehand, like impact studies and things like that. Has that work already been done or is it going to be done?

Well, yes and no. You mentioned the roller coaster. All of the federal roller coaster, all of that work was done. And in 2024, the Bureau of Land Management said in a record of decision that based on all that work and permitting, there's no way you can build this road legally because it would impact wildlife. It would impact subsistence habitat or subsistence communities. It would impact water quality, you know, all these issues with it. And so that's why the government said, no. in 2024. What the administration did at the beginning of the of October is by proclamation, they're just trying to say that none of that matters and to force the agencies to issue permits that contradict what they decided in 2024. And so that's what we're seeing happen right now, is that by proclamation, they're trying to say, none of that science that happened in 2024 matters anymore, just bulldoze the thing anyways. And that's what the Wilderness Society and our, more importantly, the frontline communities here in Alaska are trying to stop right now.

What, um, what, are you guys working with, with a bunch of other conservation groups to fight this? We are. I, there's a big coalition, you know, I mentioned those 88 tribes. Yeah. And so, you know, Tannen, a chiefs conference is a, is a consortium of tribes in kind of the central interior region of Alaska, and we work with them. National Parks Conservation Association also deserves a shout-out. What they do is in their name, National Parks Conservation. And they've been a leader on this for a while because of the impacts to gates of the Arctic

National Park. It's definitely a team effort. But really, the stars of the show, and I tried to bring some of them on today, but they weren't able to make it, are the tribal members from the region, who from the beginning have said this is not going to work for our way of life. Great. I got a question, bro. Where does Alaska's governor stand on this? Our current governor has spoken in favor of the project.

I don't want to speak for him, but he tends to be pro resource extraction. Which isn't, I mean, resource extraction itself, isn't necessarily bad if it's done in the right way, but, you know, this doesn't sound like the right way. Tim, I want to move on to you. The Amler Road, as I mentioned earlier, is going to bisect kind of the core range of the western Arctic caribou herd and go right through their migration path. It's also critical habitat for doll, sheep, moose, boreal birds, salmon, etc. but if you could let's let's start with that that caribou herd because it's already as far as I know

kind of in a downturn so just give us a brief history of that herd and how they're doing right now and then crystal ball at what could happen you know if the road goes through sure yeah I mean I guess zooming out even a tiny bit more caribou and reindeer as they're called over in Europe and Asia, all the same species. Across the globe, we're seeing declines in many populations. It's true across a lot of Canada, and it's true here in Alaska. So when I moved here 11 and a half years ago, there were more caribou than people in the state of Alaska, and that isn't true anymore.

And the Western herd occurred is a prime example of that. It used to be the largest herd in the state with nearly half a million animals as of the early 2000s. But over the last two decades, it showed a nearly 70% decline in numbers. Now, as you mentioned, the proposed area in which the road would go would cut through migration and winter habitat, other important areas that are used by the herd. And the concern there is that caribou are an animal that needs to be able to use big intact areas. They live in a really variable environment. There's lots of changes from season to season.

And then caribou need to be able to be free to roam across their habitat to access the different resources they need at different times of the year. And yet, studies have shown that caribou also are sensitive to development. And we see altered move behavior at certain sensitive times of the year, like calving and post calving. They displace away from roads and activity. And so there's a concern about at a time when the herd already is in decline, what the impact of adding on extra stressors might be for the caribou. Yeah. Yeah. Can you give us some other more specific examples of potential impacts like on wildlife, but also on local subsistence communities? Sure. Yeah. So earlier this year,

we published a study looking at the Western Art occurred and looking at how they responded to roads. And we found that it wasn't every caribou every time, but over time impacts on the herd accumulate. And it's much more than you might expect just based on the footprint of roads. And so we saw that caribou were being affected throughout the year with altered movement. They might delay their movements near a road, spending more time near the road than otherwise expected. They might not even be able to cross at all. They approach a road and they bounce back away and they can't make it past those roads. Other kinds of things like that. And then you mentioned the impact for the people who rely on caribou.

There are concerns about the ability to access caribou herds to be able to carry on the traditional subsistence way of life that people have been practicing here for thousands and thousands of years who rely on caribou. And so there's real interest among groups like the Western Arctic Caribou Herd Working Group that I'm a part of, which brings together subsistence hunters from the range of the herd, hunting guides and transporters and myself representing conservationists to try to come up with the ways to encourage conservation of the herd and its habitat so that it can stay around to sustain future generations.

Has the Western Arctic Kurds, is it already in a situation where quotas for the number of animals that are allowed to be taken have already been reduced before the road? it was i believe it was just about a year ago that because of the ongoing decline in the herd the bag limit the harvest level four residents was dropped they've also put in restrictions for out-of-state hunters and what they're able to access from the herd because of the decline and so that's exactly why you know with all these things going on there's a question of does it make sense to add additional pressures to the herd yeah hunting big country isn't for the faint of heart. You got steep ground, long distances, and miles of crown land that aren't always easy to

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I think they just thought he was a pretty normal dude. We thought he was kind of a quirky guy, but he was ex-military and a wildlife biologist background. So we just always thought he was kind of a different guy. His name was Paul Hutchinson, a husband, father, and passionate outdoorsman who spent decades, lying about the festering atrocity hiding in his past. You never think you're going to be on the villain side of the story.

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culverts with this road, um, things like Dolly Varden, she fish being impacted, um, mine tailings. I mean, it's kind of expansive how much the impacts go. We definitely are hearing concerns about the impacts to fish from people out on the land and in the communities nearest to where the road is proposed. And, you know, we have an aquatic ecologist who works with us here at the Wilderness Society. And, yeah, he's much better able to speak to some of the details of that. But, yeah, there's concerns about what the impacts are putting in a road, putting in the culverts, all those things might do to fish and to.

to fishing opportunities. If you guys don't mind. Yeah, you're exactly right. It was 4,000 culverts. Yeah. Would be required to build this road. If you guys don't mind, send us his contact info, because we might want to talk about that more.

All right, we kind of got to wrap things up and move on, guys. But before we go, is there any hope of a reversal, like, in the courts? And is there anything people can do to fight it right now? There's always hope, especially when they're so. much unity around protecting this landscape within the state, within the communities that live there. Unfortunately, by design, there's not a lot of public engagement. There's, you know, there's not a comment period. There's not a chance for people to speak up at this moment. But the Wilderness Society and our friends here in Alaska, we're working to create that opportunity to make sure we have

public comments or a chance to speak up. So what I can tell folks right now is to just follow the Wilderness Society on social media or sign up for our email updates. And also the Defend the Brooks Range Group. You asked earlier, if we were working with lots of other groups in Alaska, that group is called Defend the Brooks Range, and they're also on social media. You know, the Wilderness Society, we work on a bunch of things. If you follow Defend the Brooks Range,

you're going to get content on the Brooks Range, you know, learn more about the people that live there, the kind of wildlife that's there and how to stay involved. Yeah, and just look at Pebble Mineas as an example. Like, that was a big win. So hopefully we get one here too. well thanks a lot guys um i'm sure you're busy so we'll let you go thanks thanks guys thank you okay you guys got anything to say about that oh it just it makes me sick you know

to think that but you know the whole thing is people are always like yeah we need to we need more energy here well this isn't even energy this is sure just minding but you know when they talk about doing more, you know, resource extraction on the north side of the Brooks range in the, um, uh, in the, in the, in the park there. Yeah. Right. And why are you mean? Yeah. It's like most of our resources now are exported. Sure. People don't understand that. Like, we have plenty. We export it. We don't, we're not always buying oil for some other place to, to, you know, make our cars go. Um, we have plenty. Um, we have plenty of it. We don't need to pump more out of it. Like, it's a reserve for a reason. Let's keep it there until we really need it. You know, for when it's like dire. In this case, like,

it's foreign mining companies. Like, it's crazy. Well, and there's this frantic need. Like, we have to do this now. We need to get these industries going now. And when there's this push to get things done so fast, you know, environmental protections aren't taken into consideration. things are just, they're jumping through hoops and it's, you know, it's really a like reversal in time of like, we've seen the damage that mines can do yet we're so willing to just go right back to this, cause all this environmental damage without a second look

just for, you know, make the rich, richer. Yeah, there's no doubt there'll be a few Alaskins that have some jobs there for a few years, you know? And it could be 20 years of, jobs but like the real winners are not going to be Americans no no no and and think about how much time they would have to be spending cleaning up mine tailings cleaning up the water cleaning up the land the thing is is like like you can't like you never truly clean that stuff no either it's it's it's it becomes part of the land and it's when you have a place like alaska it's just

such a shame that some people are so willing to sacrifice sacrifice that for the sake of the dollar. Yep. Let's move on to something fun. That's right. Let's get this thing. Our smiles turned around. Yep.

Um, upside down. We got an in-house hot tip-off contest we're going to do. Um, so you got to follow along and place your vote in the chat. Make it real easy for Phil to figure out who the winner is. Um, yeah, I'm going to start a poll here as soon as the tip-off's end. Um, it.

Before we get into it, if you've got a hot tip-off that's so hot, it has to be shared with us, because we do fan hot tip-offs also, send it to, I think it's radio live at the meat eater.com. I think it might just be radio. I'm a horrible engineer of the show, but maybe our producer, Jake will pipe in here. Or send it to, like, info at the meat eater. Someone will get it. Meat eater at the meat eater.com. Yeah. That works.

Send it to Janus at the Meteeter.com. DM it to Maggie on Instagram. Yeah, yeah. Someone will get it. But, yeah, send us those. We like doing those from the fans, too. Phil, you ready to tee them up or you still work? Yeah, it's team up.

We've got some video tips from Brody and Janus. And then Maggie is going to do an in-house hot tip off. I thought that's what Janus is doing. So that's what I rolled with. No, Brody said I couldn't do it. I didn't say he couldn't. well anyways depends on like i couldn't have done mine that way yeah all right let's watch the tips welcome to another hot tip off yon has pettel is here and here's my hot tip during the year

prepare for hunting season by making large amounts of things like chili elk stew breakfast sausage meatballs slow-cooked meat for barbecue sandwiches from a deer neck bear beeria here's enough for three meals I want some of that stuff

more slow-cooked meat more breakfast sausage if you do this and every time you have dinner you just make a little extra and vacuum seats put it in your freezer, no it's time for hunting season. You just throw all that stuff in the cooler, go to camp, and dinners are pretty much done.

All you gotta do is reheat it, hit the grocery store, buy tortillas, some buns, whatever you need. Makes life super easy, and you get to continue to be living the meat eater lifestyle and eating game while you're hunting game for next year. So there you go. Beat that hot tip off, Maggie and Brody. Hey, hang, aggressive.

Note to future Yanni from past Yanni. Shoot straight this week, okay? Aim for the top of the heart. Hell yeah, Yanni. Thanks, Yanni. With a hot tip from antelope season here in Montana. My son just got this buck like an hour ago. And we're ready to take the head off of it for years and years when I was taking the head off of a buck or a bull.

I would always come in from the top, like back behind the ears. through all that heavy muscle and tendon that's down here. And I learned that if you flip them over and come in from the throat down, it's just way easier, way faster. You come out right where you want, where the skull meets the spine, and slip your knife right between the skull and the spine,

and it takes like less than half the time of coming in from the top. So you just go down, cut through the esophagus there, and follow those jaw muscles, or jaw bone down right there. And you get through that stuff, and you're there, like, it's right there.

And you'll find, that if you get it right, you can you execute? That if you get it right, you can just kick it a little bit, and you're right where you're at, and you're through, just like that. Like, it's, like fast, way faster than coming through all the heavy muscle and tendon from the top.

So that's your hot tip. You know about your hot tip, Brody, if you're getting lymph nodes for CWD, you've already made that first cut. You're already right there. Yeah, I don't do the whole like skin in the head and all that when I take a skull out or take a head out. No? I'll leave all that stuff on. you do have to be careful though cutting them that close like that

because some SWD test check stations will be like hey you're a little tight we like to leave a little bit more neck on here well uh Wyoming you just have to get the lymph nodes out can you bring them in personally yeah they're like yeah all right maggie let's let's hear yours oh okay this is this is kind of a lukewarm tip but uh it was extremely convenient it this year, Phil.

You got the picture up. So processing my elk this year, we just laid out butcher paper on my kitchen island. And we could label all the pots and everything because we've got like a grind pile, a jerky pile, a dog pile. So when you're shipping Miller lights, you know, and you don't get them confused. Actually, that's a high life. And it just made cleanup really easy. because I don't have big enough cutting boards for a whole quarter.

So you could just kind of flop whole muscle groups there, get ready to clean it up a little more. And, you know, it's kind of a lame tip. But, man, it made clean up a breeze this year. You're not cutting on the table, though, right? No, I mean, I've got, it's just like a walnut butcher block. So I could if I wanted to, but trying not to patina it up that much. I do the same thing, but without the butcher paper.

Yeah. Yep, just spray and wipe. Well, see, that's the thing. I can't really, because it's an untreated butcher block. Oh, I gotcha. So I don't have a way to, like, really disinfect it that well other than, like, dish soap. You should just, like, rub a bunch of mineral oil into that world. Well, I keep doing it, but it's, like, not even a year old, so it doesn't quite have, like, it's not quite there yet.

I don't seem like I'm bagging on your hot tip-up. I think it's great. It's a good tip. It does make cleanup super easy. It made cleanup real easy. And Brody's tip is good, too. He told me about it. I forget when.

Maybe on the youth hunt. Yeah. And I've used it on two different animals now. You're going through the same stuff as you would go from coming in from the top. It's just easier to bind. But yeah, it's easier to find the gap that takes you there. Something about coming in from the top where you're just not lined up right a lot of the time or I don't know. I just think that, yeah, the top, it just takes way.

more experienced to like hit the spot exactly right because when I hit it just right I can do it that way fast too and it's also like the way that the joints come together the skull and the spine come to if you turn it over and it's like they're coming apart almost like you stretch that throw it out and it's you know like that it's hard to explain all right poll is live everybody I'll give you another 30 seconds or so and then we'll we'll call it I remember that conversation because that was when I was up here last time for meat eater roast you guys were talking Yeah, we were. You stick those antlers in the ground or whatever and it lays there just right.

I like your tip too, Yanni, because I do that all the time just for my sanity, not even just for hunting. Like, I love having stuff ready to roll in the freezer. Oh, I'd like to just roll that way all the time. Yeah. My wife would like it too. We use some of it throughout the year, but what happens is the kids get overeaten something or, you know, they're like stew again.

And so this worked out perfectly because. You know, I had to cook for myself for the next week. Yep. And my dad. And to have basically seven or eight meals done, it's going to make it easy. Where'd you get that buria recipe? Probably New York Times, I'm guessing. New York Times is that.

Have you gotten into the little freezer mold things, a little square things? Like they do for baby food? I don't know. They used to be like ice cube trays, but you can freeze like stock and stuff. stuff and like a square thing and then you just stick them in a freezer bag. Those are slick. That was going to be my other hot tip option.

Phil, where are we at with the voting? I will let you know right now with 21% of the vote in third place is Maggie Hudlow's. But we have Maggie has a lot of supporters in the chat. Thanks, chat. Yeah, someone said that they've been

doing it Maggie's way for the last few years. Game changer. That's what he said. But then the winner with 44% of the vote is Brody Henderson Thank you everyone You know to try this weekend when you kill a great big buck If you're not going to get it mounted I'm just going to do a free to mount

Well Phil let's uh we should do some like questions and comments Yeah sure I mean it's is I have I've been book flagging bookmarking all of the the cookbook, um, submissions. Um, yeah, but we, we have, we have a few just straight up questions, but I kind of have to like sort, sort through them here. Oh, I get it. Uh, and Andrew was in the meat eater store this morning and saw Maggie in the wild and was starstruck, but that just, that just goes to show you that even, even our crew members go shop at the meat eater store for the, I needed a new hat. Hi, Andrew. I can't believe you didn't buy this one. Get this one. I almost did. And then I thought we'd be matching.

if I came in with that hat. This is the luckiest hunting hat I've ever owned. No kidding. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I think like five or six big game animals have fallen while I've been wearing this hat. So when you're going to hunt now, like you feel weird if you don't have it on? I'm going to wear it through the end of this season and then I'll retire it.

Yeah. Put it in the auction house oddities or something. But I'm telling you, if you're having a rough season right now, go order yourself one of these wired to hunt. Buck hats. That's what everybody wants is a stinky hunting hat. Nathan Stillwell says, with the deer, I am putting the rib meat into the grind for burger. How much would you worry about having the fat tallow attached to the meat going into the grind? Will it affect the flavor or texture?

I think it depends on the deer. Like a big buck with a bunch of that tallow on the outside of his chest. It's going to be a little waxy. I mean, I've gotten away from using that type of meat in my, I'm not saying there's anything wrong with it. I am. But that rib meat is just full of. gristle, and the more gristle your burger has, the shittier your burger's going to be. I know people don't like sacrificing, like, big whole muscle roasts off the ham or off the

shoulder, but, like, that's what I use for burger. It makes better burger. Yeah. Like, I would just save the ribs to cook as ribs. Mm-hmm. Agreed. Or debone them and then chop them up real small and make stew or any other slow and low preparation like you would do with the neck or the ribs.

shanks, melt that stuff, where that stuff that you're, like, worrying about what to deal with, deal with it and how it's going to be negative to your recipe, if you slow and low those ribs, it's going to, it's going to add to the flavor and the consistency in the recipe. I mean, he's specifically asking about fat and tallow. I would get rid of as much of that as you can, but you can't get rid of all that gristle that's in the rib meat. You just can't. Uh, great. Most of everything else has been, um, cookbook stuff, but I'll, I'm just going to, this is a Phil question that Brody loves to. John's asking if I'm playing Battlefield 6. I am not, but Alex Plokta, who's our social guy, who's plays trivia occasionally, is playing RedSec, and we might play together soon. So that's fun. Oh, you guys can have a little video game play date. Little video game playday. No, John, I just rolled credits on Hades 2. I'm in the act three of Hollenite Silk Song, and I'm playing Ghost of Yote, which I'm kind of bouncing on. off of. I've got open world fatigue.

Yeah, Brody. What? Maybe you're not willing to share because you don't want to get attacked online, but what's your like online video game plan handle? Oh, well, yeah. You don't have to share. I'm not going to share it. Okay.

You got to tell me after the show. I shared it once before on Ben O'Brien's old podcast. And even then with his smaller audience, I got inundated with a bunch of requests from, I'm sure, fine people. but I like to have a clean friend. We should run a contest to have people guess your handle. Oh, okay. I think some people know.

All right. Is that all for now? Yeah, yeah, that's all for now. Please send in some more straight up questions for the end of the show because we're a little light on those. Questions and a good reason you need their cookbook. Okay, next up, we are going to be checking in with some hunters around the country for some boots on the ground rut reports.

But before we get to them, I just want to check in with you guys. Janice, you got some exciting stuff showing up on your trail cams. I wouldn't say exciting. It's kind of what you expect. Deer movement, lots of deer movement, more daylight movement than a month ago. It's not like the cams all of a sudden are just lit up with, you know, Boon and Crockett type bucks. And I try to remind myself and my dad, especially a lot all the time,

is that, like, you cannot make hunting decisions based on cameras. And we have a lot of them, you know? We're, you know, partners with poultry, so basically I have as many cameras I want to run. There's probably two dozen of them out there right now. But still, deer walk behind them. They walk sometimes in front of them and don't get their picture taken. You just, like, I like them have them for, like, a general inventory. I know where there's, like, a bunch of doze are hanging out right now.

That's a good thing to know for the rut, you know? like where they're hanging out. So, yeah, that's my trail cam report. Maggie, you said you're not going to be... I'm not, but I have seen more mule deer running around. Yeah. Which is cool to see. Except for, you know, I was driving up from Wyoming last night,

so I was driving pretty slow the whole way because I saw quite a few deer running around, especially driving it, you know. I think the way to avoid them is drive faster. Yeah, take a look at my truck and then, maybe you'll reconsider that. Yeah, I just, I have one day of mule deer hunting in this year, just a few days ago. There was some small bucks, forkeys that were like hanging with those, like getting their nose up near the doe's butt. But it's just like that mule deer rut, I feel lags behind the white tail rut a little bit.

I did have that big buck that was checking. a dough but he was like not ruddy he was like i'm going to walk over there and see what's going on and then he walked away so like i'm hoping because i'm heading to colorado um i'm hoping that it's it's going to start kicking off good um let's uh let's check out the actual uh in the field reports phil hey spencer newarth bringing you a rut report from november 3rd i am in eastern Montana hunting a place that is almost exclusively mule deer so that's the kind of information you're getting from me last night i saw 30 to 40 muley doze um broke up into like 10 different groups and not a single one of them had a buck with them i think if it was a week from now two weeks

from now that would have been a different story but clearly the mulees out here are not at a stage in the rut where the doves are getting too harassed quite yet. Otherwise, I would have seen it last night. This morning, I saw a bachelor group of three bucks together. They were leaving an egg field headed to bed right at about shooting light. And those three bucks seemed kind of irritated with each other. A couple of them postured. Look like they were going to lock antlers at one point. A different buck. I saw him rubbing his antlers thrashing around in one of those. draws and one of those bucks I killed right at sunrise and I'll go show him to you in the back of my pickup here right now here he is I was doing that rot report from inside of my truck because

it is so damn windy out here and I care about our listeners this buck was the biggest buck in that bachelor group and if I'd have been out here a week later he might have been in a different county because he seemed like he was getting amped up to chase some tail all right i will be hosting meat eater radio next week i'll have more on this story then back to you brodie nice book tony peterson's got your rut report right here uh as you can see you should probably be in a tree right now not a huge surprise since it's the first week of november but in all fairness he killed it four minutes into his first sit so he has really no idea what's going out i I did sit there for two extra hours.

Afterward. Right. Did you see Rudd Act, like after you were done hunting, did you observe any Rudd Act? I was drinking a Starbucks energy drink and eating a protein bar, and I did see a little buck come through cruising. He was rut.

This dude was looking, that dude was looking, and we had doughs going between, and they were not together. So it was just like bucks were roaming, do's trying to avoid them, but it's definitely, even being 65 degrees, 70 degrees today, they were going. I'd like to return to something in case people missed it.

Four minutes into his first set. Right. But I would like to wrap this up by asking Steve what he was doing when I shot this buck. I was trying to help the deer herd by doing some coyote wood on November 4th. That's why that buck was free to be who he was, you know? Right. Because the real threat wasn't in the woods. So get out there.

Oh, you know what? Tony had found him on a camera and his name. was uh you might not have heard it before his name was old split time yeah pretty we called old old tri split is what he should have been right right there pretty derivative deer name here we didn't go too far outside the lines um I'm trying not to seem jealous chilly I seem good I seem like I seem like I'm not like I don't care right I don't think a jealous man would go coyot hunting on November 4th I was before it happened it was like I didn't know I mean Who could have foreseen that on November 4th, you should definitely not go to your tree stand and go run a trap lane out on the moonscape of Nebraska.

I can see where you're coming from on it. Anyway, get into a tree right now. Oh, look, I didn't even notice that. He's been rubbing. Rubbing big time. These guys need to work on their porting skills a little bit. East Nebraska. Rudd is rutting.

Coons are running. Coyotes are running. Give me a pause room Oh no after no it's Is it over? Oh no it's still going It's still going Go to the next one

Well wait Before you go to the next one I got an addendum to this one Our buddy Pat Was also out there hunting With those guys He got a buck as well So it's happening out there

And Steve's chasing coyotes Well now he's in a tree Trying to kill a deer Now that everybody else has killed one All right back to the rut report I don't think we need to finish this one Disney movie out there. What's up, Meteor Live?

I'm Bear Newcomb, coming at you with a rut report for the southeast. I've been hunting a lot the last two weeks, and I've really seen the rut activity start to pick up the last couple days. The first chase I saw was the last couple days of October, but this week I've seen two big shooter bucks that I haven't seen before, both chase and does. So the rut, I would say, is coming into its peak over here. Next week we've got a big cold front coming, and so I'd imagine that that will be probably the peak of the rut, but I've been seeing a lot of chasing.

I've seen three or four chases alone this week, and the big bucks are starting to come out of the woodwork. But I'm switching over from food sources right now, switching more to travel corridors and other pinch points, and have been having a lot of luck that way. There's also a few spots where I saw a lot of doughs in the early season, and I went into one of those spots the other day and instantly got in on a chase. There were three bucks chasing one dough. So the rut is in full swing. If there's ever a time to be out in the woods, it's right now. So good luck to all of you guys who are getting out there. Hello everybody.

Good morning from central Wisconsin, giving you a little rut update. Let's go, Chester. Sitting at the breakfast table this morning. coming up with a solid hunt plan for the next few days. And I think we've got a good plan. Anyways, what I've been seeing is a lot of the mature dominant bucks have been pretty locked down on doughs. So the rut's obviously happening right now.

It's a good time a year to be sitting all day. Once those bigger, mature deer get off that dough, they breed her, they start looking for another one. They're going to be cruising. So what I'm focusing on is bedding. areas, so downwind side of bedding areas, pinch points between bedding areas, and then also in the evenings and mornings, transitions between, you know, the bedding area and food. Wherever those doughs are going to be, those bucks are going to be checking them out.

So be careful on the roads, driving at night in Wisconsin, you know, it's a hazard, so deer are running around. Good luck to everybody and I hope you get out there and I hope you shoot a big buck. what a cutie there you have it sounds like things are happening does that get you real excited you honest uh you know i was kind of joking about being here for the rut report the thing about a rut report is like it's never going to change because what one person sees doesn't really make a difference well you could be the next ridge over next valley over county over it could be a completely different thing just depending on if you're where the high

hot dough is or chester there has got some cool video like he's been in them like they're obviously have a hot dough that these bucks are around but like mark just did a great podcast with about like what science says about the rut and those fauns are all they try to be all born or the i should i should say their moms all try to give birth sure on the same day so that they have the fauns have the best chance survival. It's called Predators. Well, that's one reason, but the other reason, too, is that, like, if it's Memorial Day, which is from, like, Pennsylvania, just take that Latentudal line across the Midwest, like, you have the most food on the ground. They try to time it with the green up. Yeah. So you don't want to be too early, because you don't have enough food.

You can still be, get some cold nights, and you could die when you're only weighed two pounds, you know, as a deer. And so, like, the peak breeding is going to always be sure it just might happen at night or that gestation period before you know whatever that is 200 some days before memorial day right yeah so it's fun to hear about what people are seeing and what's happening but every single year for the rest of our lives across like the Midwest right like roughly November 1 to November 15th 20th it's gonna be pretty good hunting yep you know yeah but you know It's good to know what's going on around some different areas. It is.

It's fun, like I said. It's entertaining. It's about the hype. Yep. I'm hyped. The run. Hunting big country isn't for the faint of heart. You got steep ground, long distances, and miles of crown land that aren't always easy to navigate.

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Oh, yeah. I was elk hunting this year. I'm going to pull up the pictures, Maggie. Sure. Is that not something you do every year? I mean, it is. So I kind of been like year on, year off for the health reasons. So like last year I was just, I was packing out.

So I was hunting. I just wasn't pulling the trigger because my eyeballs were messing. stuff right um but so yeah this year it was my turn to pull the trigger and uh we had a real slow october we uh we hunted every weekend in october and did not have a single opportunity to shoot and the thing about wyoming is their rifle season starts like october 1st so the doors are still rutting you know well they're real high up too we don't have pack animals or nothing so and I just had a general tag so we're kind of hopping around because it's like one place will be open for a couple weeks for a bowl and then another place will and so it's like

sort of just hopped around for where we could hunt because I was like you know I'd like to shoot a bull if I can I'd be cool you know it's uh I'm I'm a meat hunter but I also can't help it that I want to shoot something with horns um so I think we ended up hunting four different areas in total and uh this last one is like all right there's a cold front coming in feeling good about it we're going to hunt this new spot we're scouting out on onyx and like we're both from the area so we're pretty familiar with you know where to go it's just a matter of where there's going to be people where there's going to be elk um and so uh usually there were where the people aren't yeah yeah and that was we got pretty lucky we um we

we saw these elk first thing in the morning, but it was just dump in snow. And it was like, they were like 500 yards away. So we were just kind of tromping around, following tracks all day, like trying to... Oh, you saw a bunch of elk, but then didn't go after them? Well, we did, but they, we just, we kind of lost them in the timber. We, we were, uh, we were trying to get after them.

We eventually got back to those elk. It was the same group where I shot that bull at, like, three o'clock that afternoon. So it was just a matter of, like, looping around, crawling around in some downfall hellholes, and finally coming back to an open meadow where we could get to them. Were you tracking them in the snow or just looking for them? It was both. And then we had a pretty good idea of where they'd be. We kind of gave them some time in the afternoon, went on a little side quest, saw some real big bull tracks, and I was getting it really excited.

We were going to see a bigger elk, which we didn't. I'm still happy to shoot little four by five elk. He's real tasty. Listen, those young bulls are the ones to shoot if you want to eat them. Oh, my gosh, young bulls, I don't think anything can top it. You're rolling a dice with those cows. man they could be like 18 years old yeah I never know with a cow totally I was just explaining that to my mom like just the other night um I was like I don't know I feel like I'm kind of a cougar hunter mom

I like the young bulls um and then oh that's bill that's uh that's my bird dog bill he's he's happy all season's over he is he's ready to spend some time he got to fetch like one duck that day We were kind of just tromping around. It was a quick morning hunt because we had an elk to cut up that afternoon. We just wanted to get them out. So Bill is happy to get some elk scraps and happy to be the star of the show from here on out. Nice work, Maggie. Thanks.

It was a fun hunt. Yonis? Oh, I forgot. I brought you guys a little treat, some elk jerky from my bowl, but I've been told it is not a fun. Auditory experience to listen to people eat jerky. I could eat jerky and tell my hunting stories at the same time. So we'll save it for after the show. I mean, I don't give a shit.

I'm looking forward to trying it. If you haven't tried Daniel Pruitt's smoked venison jerky recipe. It's heavy on the smoke. It's my go-to favorite. It's worth trying out. I tweak it a little bit. We'll try it here in a few minutes. I'm getting hungry

All right I started with this first slide Because it turns out This is my biggest bull to date Boer rifle Yeah Yanni And didn't really know what I had Until I walked up on him

And found him So yeah That's exciting Corey It's taped him for me the other day 310 inches on the dot Nice Pretty stoked

Next picture shows speaking of eating bulls the backstrap was very surprised i've actually sort of reorganized my freezer and my plant because i've got a lot of meat this year caribou deer lots of deer with the kids shooting deer this bull and i was going to give away a lot of elk steaks but this bull is eating extremely well like even the hind quarter uh stakes have been very tender um just delicious so I'm actually starting to hoard this bull's meat a little bit more Well you can keep that

Like people think it's like a year Like you can be eating that bowl three years from now Oh for sure for sure Let's see next There's a balka guy in Idaho Whatever nice buck fun hunt What made it super fun was hanging out with our buddy Max Barta

Who you can see in the next photo Oh no we had we had an awesome tent site where you could literally glass for bucks right out of the tent door. Is that snow? Do you have some snow up high? Yeah, there was a little bit of snow up high. And it was not,

that was kind of probably the last camping trip of the year. You know, we got to spend three nights on the mountain. Pack some pizza in there? Yeah, well, we made a pit stop on the drive down and we were having some pizza. And I'm like, you know what? Let's add a few more slices to this order.

And then we can have some in the mountains. So we packed some up in there. into the mountains with us. And yeah, it was great to share a week with Max. All right, here's the exciting stuff. Here's youth hunt with my daughters. We are 350 yards, maybe a little bit less, from a bedded buck. Mabel was the one to be shooting.

Mabel laid there on that buck for nine hours. We got there to that spot right there at 10 a.m., that buck never stood up. We yelled at it. Ina, my other daughter, shot bullets, 10 feet. Wait, how long? Nine hours. Really? 10 to, what time did it get dark out there?

I don't think it was that late, but a long, yeah, eight hours, maybe. Well, 10 to 6 would be eight, I guess. All right, eight hours, long time. And she's, like, staring through the scope? Yeah, on a bedded buck. And the one thing Brody later told me I should have tried is to, I didn't have with me, Well, I'll get to that. A fawn and distress call.

I'll get to that. Brody's going to talk about it. Anyways, yeah, the next slide shows that when you're waiting for eight hours on a buck, you take some nass. My girls have become extremely good at napping because they're both napping. I'm like, who's watching the deer to stand up? I'm like, you. So I'll gladly do it. Did that sun get behind you?

Like you weren't having to stare into the sun to watch that buck? No. That's good. No, no, we were looking kind of due east, actually, so it got behind us for sure. And then, let's see, was that it for all my pictures? That was it. That was it. Okay.

Oh, well, I was going to mention last night, Mabel, who did not get a shot off that day. We went on a hunt last night to a very target-rich environment, not far from Bozeman, a lot of white-tailed deer. She kind of, I asked her, I thought this was a clever answer. I said, are you going to shoot the first buck that comes out? Which I thought she would say yes, you know, to be successful, put some meat down. She goes, uh, depends on what he looks like. So then we had to look over. We had to look over.

We literally saw more deer yesterday than I'll see on my entire Wisconsin hunt. I mean, I don't know. We saw probably close to a hundred white-tailed deer. And, uh, multiple bucks that we were like, okay, too small, small to medium, two medium, a little getting a little bit better. and then we finally got, we saw a few that were like big enough and the one big enough buck came to us, got to within 200, like with 20 minutes of light left.

And we were like safety off, ready to shoot him, and that sucker had been feeding all evening, not running doze nothing up until that point, like just out of range. And then once he like came into range within the doze, he just got full on ruddy and he would not stand still long enough for an 11-year-old to make the shop. And it was funny because I was like talking her through it the whole time. I'm like, okay, he's the one facing left.

He's the one facing right. He's the one facing right. He's running right. And all the time, she's like, yeah, okay, I'm on the right buck. I'm on the right buck. Okay, he's got a dough going right to left behind him. Yep, I'm on the buck. I'm on the buck.

And then as light was fading and they were getting a little bit farther away from us, I could like hear her answers and her voice starting to crack a little bit as in like, oh, I know it's not going to happen. tonight. I'm going home buckless. I got to tell the story about not shooting one and multiple times she's like I think I'm looking at him but there's

also some grass and like I want to be sure and I'm like yeah you can't shoot if you're not sure you know you got to be sure and so we had that a bunch so anyways it's like it would have been great to kill a buck last night but the same time I'm like she's killed I guess she's only killed one of the buck but she's got like three gobblers

now it's all been pretty easy for them. Right. It's good to have a couple hunts where she's having to work for it and not have just success, just laid in her lap again. Definitely, definitely. She'll get one this season. I guess that leaves me. Phil, can you pull up the antelope one first? This is my kid Hayden. This was opening day of antelope season. The reason, like, he's shot in antelope before. He shot bucks. He shot a elk. the kids killed some animals um the reason i'm showing this picture is because this year i kind

of decided i was going to let him make most of the decisions like on how the hunt went and it started like at first light like we were parked on a high spot on a road to glass as you do for antelope and i was like let's check what would be the north side of the road because we had in the past seen a lot of antelope in that zone and he's like no We should glass the south side of the road first because pretty soon we will be staring into the sun over there and we won't be able to glass it. I was like, man, kids got a point. So we like hike in a little ways, get on a knob, start glassing. And he found five antelope, like within minutes.

And I was like, it's great. There's a, like, I couldn't, I couldn't tell if like with my eyes and it wasn't like quite, you know, light light yet. if there was a buck or not but he's and he's just free hand in a pair of those sig uh image stabilizing one he's like one of us buck like cool um but and i was like we can't there's like no way we can't go straight at i'm like they're going to see us you know so i'm like what do you think we should do and he's looking around and he picks a route like a circular you know half circle route around like sounds good to me and we kind of eventually get up into that zone

near where they were we had a little like pointy like dirt mound kind of thing we were using as a landmark and we man we got in there and just like where are they because you get in that antelope stuff and it's broken and there you realize they were in a low spot you couldn't really tell from the road um and we're sitting there for a while and i was like man i think we should like creep forward like 50 yards and get a look into that low spot he's like no let's stay here and sure enough a few minutes later we see some ears and some horns and eventually they feed up out of that low spot and I'm like 250 and you know he took care of everything else it was cool because it was like really like his hunt for yeah for the first time yeah sounds like from the at least the details that

you share that you might just want to let him continue to do that and start guiding you a little bit slow you down a little bit look in the right direction exactly exactly I like that you are doing that with him because I told both my girls too at the end of this year's youth hunt I'm like next year I'm not glassing I'm gonna glass I'm gonna glass I'm gonna glass because I like to glass and I'll be like oh I see some bucks find them but yeah I'm like you guys are gonna have to find them yeah because otherwise they just like they like to hang out while while dad's glassing up the critters eat candy yeah and now I'm gonna I'm gonna make them find the deer yep we can do the next one there Phil all right that's my younger son uh this year he turned 10 so he first year he's able to hunt in montana um and you know same thing youth hunt we all we do a youth hunt together group of us um and this was opening morning and he definitely wasn't like looking for my other kid was looking for a big one the one that got got the antelope but conley the younger one was like any buck And we went kind of in a zone.

We had hunted in years past. And his brother was a little bum because that was like his brother's zone. But just me and Conley went in there. And it was windy and cold that morning. He was suffering a little bit while we're glassing around. And things calmed down like maybe an hour after shooting light. Like 8.30, it kind of got a little warmer. The wind calmed down.

and I glassed up two little teeny bucks. Like one of them might have been a forky. The other one was probably a spike. But it was like, all right, it's on. Let's go. And we had to kind of hustle down this drainage to get into shooting position. And these two bucks were like oblivious to what was going on. We were out in the open and they just weren't looking our direction.

And I got Conley set up for a cross-canion shot that was a little over 300. and you know get him he's laying down he's shooting off a bipod and kaboom like i say are you steady all all that stuff we go through the whole thing and he lets one fly and misses and uh one of the bucks continues to stand there the other one runs i was pretty sure he had missed but the other one ran in a way that i was like we got to check um we went down there and we he's like can I shoot at the other one. I was like, no,

buddy, we got to make sure you didn't hit the first one. So we went in there and we spent a good 30 to 45 minutes looking for blood and hair. Nothing. And he was down,

man, like bummed out. First time, first opportunity. He was definitely like, bummed. Like no tears, but like close,

you know? And I was like, man, we got to both hold it together and just go find another one. Um, and, an hour later we found a buck bedded down

uh and the train laid out nicely for us to get set up but it was still 300 yards and he was bedded like on a timbered hillside and i forgot to mention that earlier that morning when we had first sat down to start glassing we'd heard some like hootin and hollering way off in the distance and uh humans well conley was like is that a coyote and i was like man i don't like think it was people and the first thing that came to mind is like there might be some cowboys in here because there's cattle in the area we're hunting anyway we're laid down on this buck he dry fires on it a couple times like he's comfortable he's solid everything's looking good and I tell him like we might have to lay here for a while you know before he stands up and he's cool with it

and then we hear that hooting and hollering again and I look off that direction and maybe a thousand yards away, here comes two cowboys with a couple dogs, pushing some cows. And I, like, know that zone well enough to know where they are, that that cattle trail is going to go right under that buck, like, right under him.

And I'm like, oh, my God, really? Like, what do we do here? And I told Conley, I was like, we can lay here and see if that buck just lets them go underneath them, and nothing happens, which and I was like I think the buck's going to spook because they're going to get too close to him or I can hit this font this fond bleat real loud a couple times and try and get him to stand up

there's a chance like he could run but there's a good chance he'll stand up and he didn't even think about he's like hit the fond bleat like I don't want the horses running underneath that deer and I did it the buck stood up I was like are you solid aim you know and 10 seconds later boom He kills the buck. Nice. Yeah. And then like, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, we're going to, like, walk over that direction and talk to them before we go look for

your buck. And we went over there as young couple very nice. I was like, you know, he just shot. They're like, we heard the shot. Hope you get. I mean, and then the guy's like, did you see any cows down the hill? I was like, yeah, there's a bunch down there. So they just took off.

and looked for their cows. We went up there and found the buck, and it was all smiles, you know. It's fun. Heck, yeah. Yeah, he was fired up. Yeah. That's great.

All right. Thanks for listening to our stories, guys. It's always fun to talk hunting. We're going to move on to the cookbook box set contest here. If you don't know about this thing, can you see that thing, Phil? I'll move it over. I'll move it over. we go. If you don't know about this, this is like a special edition kind of limited run.

We didn't print a million of these things. It's got both of our cookbooks in it, the original mediator cookbook, fishing game cookbook and the outdoor cookbook. Their paperback, which is kind of nice, you can fit them both in there. It's a really good Christmas gift, a pretty economical way to get both of them. You can pre-order them now. uh if you really want to they go on sale next tuesday um if you want a signed copy like this one we've got a limited number of them that are only available on the website or you can you can our two retail locations in bozeman and milwaukee also have some so you could pick one up there um but not until tuesday when the book releases um you got anything to say honest about like these two

cookbooks, making of them, what you think about, favorite meals, recipes, anything like that? There are a lot of fun to make. Yeah. It's always a fun project. Yeah. Especially because we plan them not in hunting season, which is smart of us. Yep. Get to eat a lot of good food.

The one I keep going back to in the original cookbook is the fish stew. Yeah. Love that recipe. We've got a bunch of halibut now, which tends to do very well. Is it a chowder? remember yeah i mean it's kind of one of the same and yeah well no stew and chowder aren't the same thing no i think it chowda is like creamy yeah oh yeah it's got cream in it yeah yeah yeah but i feel like we call it fish stew in the book anyways yeah no don't matter get the book try it out it's a good

um maggie is the osabucco recipe in there oh yeah the original what is the original i love that It started a nationwide Osabucco movement, I feel like. Yeah. Save your damn shanks, folks. Yep. Drown that thing and some red wine for several hours. Oh, hell yeah. Yeah, they're both great.

A lot of, like the original for like beginner hunters, wild game chefs, like it's got great butchering tips, fantastic butchering tips. The outdoor cookbooks got some great like gear and equipment information. You'll love it. them um but let's move on phil to see if we can actually pick a winner okay yes i'm just going to rapid fire through a bunch of these and then you guys just kind of flag them in your head yep uh by far the most um the answer that came up the most was that my my wife or my girlfriend thinks my cooking is terrible and this would help me there were so many of those that i don't think i picked any

of them uh you guys step up your game yeah you guys are going to have to buy this thing so yeah sorry Let's see. Okay, I'm just going to run through these. Welcome says, Brody, if I went, I will put the recipes into the fall menu of the kitchen I manage. Is that a copyright? Yeah, that was going to be my next question. Also, you can't do that with Wild Game if it's like a restaurant kitchen. Yeah.

Yeah, I'm sure he's just talking about the recipes anyway. Okay, that's going to be a no-go. Ben says, need a new recipe for my tag. Tag soup's getting a little stale. Kevin says my seven-year-old daughter's favorite show to watch together is a meat eater Her favorite way of helping in the kitchen is cooking wild game with me Having these cookbooks would give us infinite memories Getting better

Mogor Our dude Why should I win this book? Because I've already cleared shelf space and trained my cat to turn pages I don't win I'll be forced to read cereal boxes again Don't let that happen Mogore Where does Mogore live like shipping this thing to him?

I know it could be expensive Let's see Brian says contingency plan for acquiring the cookbook, Phil, do you accept bribes? My Venmo is Phil Taylor 6. Let's see. He won't share his video game handle, but I'll share that. Yeah, duh. Ethan, anytime I cook a wild game, I truly feel like I'm disrespecting my harvest unless I'm using one of Steve's recipes.

No others come close. Just ask my wife how many times I've said this. I feel like that's sucking up a little bit. Yeah, a little bit. Speaking of sucking up or, well, that sounds mean. I'm just going to read it. Uh, Ritzman says, I'm a young adult who recently got married, had my first baby, and I'm hunting, butchering and cooking solo for the first time in my life. And then he's got a part two. My dad was my mentor for years, but a devastating shattered pelvis left him unable to keep up the tradition. The cookbooks would be one more arrow in my quiver and bringing the hunt tradition into my family. Um, another one from Brian, he says, Max Bardo would want the cookbook to go to his favorite native North Dakota. Um, Brian, when Max wins a game of trivia, I will send you so many cookbooks. There you go. To be honest, you getting excited about any of these?

Not really. Yeah. Apologies. I flag the ones that jumped out to me. Remember Brody? I was looking for entertainment. I know. Mogor was entertaining, but he lives halfway across the world.

There's a guy named Adam who has been just typing out verses from the wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald and replacing random words with cookbook. I'm not going to select yours, Adam, but you're going to love the meat eater podcast on Monday. Stay tuned. Phil, we got to find a winner here. This is dragging on too long. Listen, you guys can jump into the chat. Honestly, out of all of them, when Mogores popped up, I was like, I thought that he

would just take it because it was funny. We love Mo Gore. Yeah, we'll get it. We'll ship it to Moor. There was one that kind of made me laugh, but it was just how it was written. And it said, this is my favorite one, and I'm not going to put it on the screen because of the profanity, but I will read it and censor it. Steven says, cookbook, I don't want or deserve no stinking.

and cookbook, but an effed up truck calendar, that I deserve. I deserved an effed up anything for that matter. That's him, Stephen. All right. Well, let's do this. Mogor gets the book and Stephen gets the calendar. Sounds good to me. That sounds good to me.

Wow. How's that? How's that? That's some great negotiating. Nobody was good enough to get both. No. Morgor, send, uh, don't send your address and stuff to me. Send it to like,

Radio at the meat eater.com. Which is the correct email address. There we go. Radio at the meat eater.com. Do we got any other, like, comments and questions? We do, but I've got a plane to catch soon, so let's wrap this baby up. How about that? All right.

We'll shutting you guys down. We'll, uh... Get them, Phil. I mean, this is already on the longer side of the show. We'll see you next week. Thanks, thanks everybody for tuning in and get out there in the woods, the ruts on. Take it easy. Thanks, guys.

Bye. This season on blood trails, each story begins with a hunter stepping into the wild, but not all of them come back. I'm Jordan Sillers, a journalist with over a decade of experience investigating stories about hunting, fishing, guns, and crime. Join me as we track the truth through tangled cover and cold case files, where every trail tells a story, and every story leaves us. its own trail of blood. Blood trails. Listen now on Spotify. This is an IHeart podcast.