Tooth & Claw: True Stories of Animal Attacks - Grizzly Bear Attack - In Deadly Pursuit of the Perfect Picture

Episode Date: June 24, 2024

The chance to finally get the shot of a grizzly bear he had always dreamed of quickly turned into nightmare for outdoor enthusiast and photographer Bill Tesinsky. Watch this episode here: https://youtu.be/_BoJ_1rX7LM ~~ To advertise on the show, contact us! ~~ Tooth & Claw is brought to you by QCODE. Support the show and get access to an extensive library of exclusive episodes like this by supporting the show on Patreon or joining the Grizzly Club on Apple Podcasts. For the latest updates on the show and all things wildlife, follow us at toothandclawpod.com and social:  Instagram: @ToothandClawPodcast Twitter: @ToothandClawPod Wes: @GrizKid Jeff: @jefe_larson Mike: @mikey3ds Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome back to another episode of Tooth and Claw podcast. We have our wildlife biologist and Dior model, Wes Larson, with us. Yeah. I hate that intro. I love it. And then we got our beefy boys, Mike Smith and Jeff Larson. I'm Jeff Larson. It comes the beef.

Packing a Don. That lady in that Wendy's commercial in the 80s. Where's the beef? We know where the beef is. It's right here on Teeth and Quah podcast. Yeah. I was thinking about something funny today. What was it?

Have you ever had like a standoff of just being stubborn with someone that just like gets you into a really interesting situation? Yeah. Like the three of us have done that so many times. I was just thinking with our cousin Brent once in a roundabout. We like went in a circle. in the roundabout for two hours. I remember that. He just kept doing it and I wasn't going to tell him not to.

Like one car even followed us for half an hour and then gave up and like... Two hours. If a cop sauce doing that, could they like say... Could they just be like, hey, stop driving in circles? Yeah. But like it's not illegal. You're not breaking. Maybe. I don't think that's a law, right? You can do that. Cops will enforce things that aren't.

laws all the time. Like, we almost ran out of gas. I mean, I would agree with him in that case, to be honest. Like, we were going to run out gas. And I was like, dude, let's go. And I lost. Like, he would have gone until we ran out of gas. That's the Brent we know and love. It does, that's very Brent. Because when we play Uno 2, he'll do this thing where he'll deal cards. Like, he'll take a chunk of cards and then he deals until he lands on like the perfect amount. So if like he doesn't end on him with that chunk of cards, then he pulls out a other chunk of cards. And by the time he's done dealing, you have like 60 cards in your hand.

And there's like four left in the deck. It's so annoying. But, you know, I respect the hustle. That's great. Yeah. I just got back from Yellowstone. I had a pretty good couple weeks there. Dude, your video went viral.

Yeah. That's like my first truly viral video, I think. Do you guys want me to tell us? Coyote Peterson just started following us. I hope he doesn't listen to that. Everything. We've only said nice things on this podcast. I know I saw that and I was like, oh.

Yeah, do you guys want me to tell the story that video really quick? Yeah. I wasn't listening the first time. Yeah, I called both of you because I was very excited. Jeff picked up. Mike didn't. I did not. I was guiding in Yellowstone and we were staying in Cook City, which is on the northeast entrance of the park.

and it was late in the evening my group was all I was done for the day essentially but I had to go fuel up the car but Mike you understand this Jeff I think you do too I'd spent the entire day the entire like week and a half up to that point like being on and having to talk all the time and be like really cheery and so when I drove out that night I realized like oh I've got this car all to myself I can kind of do whatever I want and the music just sounded really good and it was a beautiful evening and I was really enjoying being alone. So I decided, okay, I'll just go drive around a little bit. And I was driving back and forth, looking for moose.

And then I thought, oh, the Sodebute campsite is right here, the campground. We did a story on it. It's something I thought about a lot because me and Jeff go to the Hogo Zoo a lot and see those bears quite a bit, the cubs from the mom that killed the guy. And I'd never actually gone into campground. I say, if you guys hadn't killed that guy, you'd be free right now. you'd be fine. Yeah, it's because you got a bad mom.

Anyway, I figured I'll go check it out. And as I was driving up, you can kind of see the campground from the highway down in the thicket, the trees and the willows and stuff. And I realized like, oh, there's no one down there. It's probably closed. I'm not going to be able to go in. But as I drive up, I see that the gate is open. It's only like halfway open.

It looked like it had just gone unlocked. And so I thought, oh, cool, I'll go down there. So I drive down, the entire thing's empty. and I remembered that the guy Kevin Cammer, who died there, had been killed on the second loop. So I was kind of driving toward the second loop. And as I was doing that, I see a dark shape in the woods. And I'm thinking, oh, that looks like a moose. I'll go check it out.

My group really liked moose. And I really wanted to find one with antlers. So I thought, oh, if it's one with antlers, I'll go wake them up and bring them over here. So I drive down. And sure enough, it's a bull moose. And it's looking a little agitated. and I figure it's because I'm playing my music so loud. So I kind of back up to give it a little more space.

And when I do that, it charges out at me. And in my mind, I've been charged by moose a couple times. I think, oh, this is just a pissed off moose. It's trying to create some space. And then all of a sudden I see it look over its shoulder and run. And I'm like, oh, shit, there's something behind this moose. And my first thought was another moose or wolves, because those are the two things that you would expect to see them,

the most pissed off about or scared of. And all of a sudden, this big grizzly bear just runs out of the forest and chases the moose right past my car and down the road. And it's funny because in the video you hear me go, Jesus, when the moose runs out and then the bear shows up and I'm like, oh, fuck. And they run down the road. I back up really quick, which isn't in the video. And by then the bear had already given up.

It was grazing in a field nearby. and I sat there with it for a while and then I actually did go get my group and bring them so they could see the grizzly bear. So how would that... How would that fight have gone? It's likely the bear would have killed the moose had it caught it.

So I actually dug into the literature a little bit after this because I knew I was going to get that question a bit. And there are places where moose are a major food source for bears and even adult moose. And in the spring especially because all that testosterone and like sex hormones haven't hit in the, those moose yet so they're not all like jacked up and huge and they're quite a bit less muscular and whatnot so the bears can take them down so i fully think this bear was trying the moose just

had too big of a lead on it and honestly i might have kind of given that moose the out that it needed had i stayed parked there i wonder if the bear would have gotten it right in front of me because the moose didn't have anywhere to really run oh interesting yeah but the crazy the craziest thing for me is after that whole thing happened, I was really curious what campsite they were in. And I went back and I saw it was campsite 26. And then I went back to my hotel room and reread the story. And it was 26 that Kevin Cameron was killed in. So this whole thing happened in the exact campsite that he was killed in, which was wild.

That's crazy. Yeah. Yeah, you sent it to me and like I knew it was a cool video, but I didn't know it was going to take off the way it has. Neither did I. I mean, a big part of that is thanks to the nature is metal guy. because he shared it too. Yeah. I keep it.

Thanks, man. Quite the boost. Yeah. That's the best. Yeah, lots of wild comments on that post, too. Like, the second you get into a bear and man in the woods talk. Oh, yeah. Yeah.

A lot of that, a lot of just political stuff or people telling me I should have gotten in the way of the bear to block it. There's no way that guy was serious. And if he was, I kind of respect it. Yeah. That bear, though, it was really big and round. It was pretty big. I think it was a male. I would guess it was like somewhere around 400 to 450.

But like male bears in Yellowstone can get up to like 700 pounds. So they can get quite a bit bigger than that bear. That bear's about to gain a few hundred pounds. If it ate the moose, it would be up there. Yeah, it'd get bigger for sure. Because what, moose are like a thousand pounds? Yeah, but it would. would have been like 1,500 pounds.

Yeah. Yeah, pretty crazy. I really wish both of you had been there. Jesse was the first person I called, and then both of you were the next two people I called, because I was so pumped and excited about it. Who did you call first of us to? You, Jeff.

Yeah. I called you first. I'm not even offended. You're my brother. I also knew that if I called Mike, he would just wait three minutes and then call me back. Yeah, that works. As is his custom.

Yeah. Your phone's always on like, do not disturb or something. I know you're just looking at it and then mentally preparing yourself to have to call back. Because I do the same thing sometimes too. So I get it. Don't worry about it. Thanks. All right.

Well, that's it for that little story. You guys got anything else you want to talk about before we launch into our main story? Let's get into it, dude. Yeah. Let's go. Let's do it. Okay. Well, it is another grizzly story.

Definitely have grizzlies on the brain since I've been in Yellowstone. I know you guys both love grizzly bears. Mike, I think at the end of the episode, we'll see where they're currently at on your claw scale. Sliding scale. Yeah, when I was working in Yellowstone, this was a story that got brought up pretty often. My supervisors, coworkers, people that I worked with would talk about this one. I think it was like a pretty famous one in the park's history. There's some really interesting little tidbits about this story, but it's one I've been saving for a while and I'm excited to finally tell it.

So, grizzly bear 59 wasn't any stranger to human activity. In 1980s, she was only roughly two years old, and she was caught when officials were trying to catch another bear in the canyon area of Yellowstone National Park. She was caught close to human areas, in quotation marks, because really no part of Yellowstone is like super urban, but it definitely, you know, Canyon has a lot of infrastructure. And she was relocated 32 miles away to High Lake,

but she quickly returned back to the canyon area. Jeff, can you describe the canyon area of Yellowstone really quickly? I don't know if I can. Do you know what? I don't know what the canyon area is. It's where the falls are. Okay, yeah. Well, there's like a road along most of it,

and then the canyon's huge, yellow rock. I think that's kind of where they get the name Yellowstone from is probably that canyon. And then. Ospreyness. So far, the coolest waterfall I've ever seen as far as just like amount of water falling from like a high distance, which I think is what you're looking for from waterfalls, you know? Yeah. How about, do you remember where the actual like canyon buildings are though?

There's like that gift shop and the visitor center and stuff, that huge parking lot. Is that where we saw those two black bears or those black bears last time? Maybe I can't remember. Is that where we got fined, Jeff, for dropping a rock off the ledge? We got fined at the waterfall. Unbelievable. I'm never going back to yellow stone. We're trying to kill that Osprey with a rock.

We could have killed it. It was like eight miles away. We were like tossing rocks off a cliff and then we got the Rangers called on us. And some dude told them we were throwing rocks at an Osprey. I still never saw an Osprey. You had to have like binoculars. We needed to be like Tom Brady to even have a chance of hitting it. Well, every time I go there now that Osprey nest is empty.

and I think it's because of you guys. So, yeah, that's kind of the canyon area of the park. And then there's Canyon Village, which has a lot of stores. It's not actually there. It's not actually there fall. There's stores there. There's a visitor center. There's park housing.

There's a little village there. And this bear, Bear 59, really made that area her home. So she was translocated, removed back to High Lake, which was 33. miles away, but then she went right back to Canyon. Then she was captured again the following August in 81. She was relocated 25 miles away in Saddle Mountain, but then she was back in the canyon area within five days. Really?

They can just like find it again that easy? They have a homing ability, just kind of like the pigeons and stuff that we talked about. They can find their way back to their home. So her next captures were in 1984, and then she was captured twice that year from IGBST long-term monitoring efforts. So IGBST is the interagency grizzly bear study team. It's kind of this big study team that's constantly collaring and looking at what bears are doing in the greater Yellowstone. So from 81 to 85, she's monitored closely as part of these regular research efforts. The reason I bring this all up is this bear was pretty well known.

Not only had she been caught a number of times, but she was also really common in the canyon area. so photographers, park workers, visitors would see this bear pretty regularly. She was a well-known bear in the park. It wasn't that she was doing anything wrong, is it? She was just a bear of interest that would be worthwhile to research and track? So far, no. So far she hadn't really done anything wrong. But I will say at that point in the park's history, bears that were really habituated

and hanging out near the road or near these villages and stuff, they didn't really know how to deal with them yet. It wasn't as large scale of a thing as it is now. And so often those bears were moved just because they were worried about them being that close to people for so long. And nowadays we kind of- They hadn't figured out to shoot them with shotguns like you guys did. Hit them with beanbags and paintballs and stuff. They actually hadn't.

After getting caught on like trumped up charges, she hadn't really done anything yet. She's probably like, well, I might as well do something bad if I'm going to get caught anyway. So I don't really blame her for whatever she's about to do. Yeah, any more in Yellowstone, they do tolerate. And when I worked there, we tolerated a lot of habituation. So bears are allowed to kind of be habituated now, but not food conditioned. And if they're too close to the roadside, what Jeff just alluded to, bear managers will go in and haze them.

So we're going to talk about that a little bit as we go into this story. Okay. You could get canceled for that nowadays. Yeah. You can't get cancel. You can cancel for all sorts of stuff. Taping them to goalposts and stuff. The celebrity. John Ham had a really bad one, right?

Yeah, he hazed. Someone's testicles or something. I drove him once in Sundance, and I really wanted to ask him about it, but I didn't because I'm a coward. I wrote a little song to remind you, choice hotels, get you more of the experiences. You value. The Cambria hotels got it all. A rooftop bar, have a ball. Cocktails up here feel just right.

is Cambria amazing Bring a date, your teen, or even your mom Book direct at choiceotails.com. See you on the roof. All right. So early in 1986, she was seen with two cubs of the year, or coy as they're commonly called in the ecosystem.

Throughout 1986, she was seen in both the canyon area, the Antelope Creek area, not too far away, and she was seen preying on elk in Antelope Creek or eating a bison carcass near canyon she was photographed in a softball field and near buildings in canyon as well. Lots of visitors had seen this bear with their cubs and she had displayed habituated behavior to their presence which means she essentially ignored them as she led her cubs around in search for food. So she's very habituated.

You can't even just ignore someone without getting in trouble? Like what's she supposed to do? No, she wasn't getting in trouble for that. That was okay. That was fine. We're going to talk about what got her in a little bit of trouble. So in the late summer of 86, well, we'll get to that too. Bear 59 started getting a bit more bold around humans,

and she had several run-ins with people as she was seeking out anthropogenic food sources. So anthropogenic just means human. Like anything that's human is anthroposg- She can't kill one person. We're still going to get to that. You guys are really skipping ahead here. Okay. All right.

So one night a park employee left a freezer outside their trailer and she attempted to break into it. The employee heard her outside and sprayed her with a fire extinguisher from six feet away and she and her cubs ran off. She didn't display any aggression toward this person. She didn't get any of their food. But this person was like six feet away, which is pretty close to a grizzly bear.

Especially with a fire hose. It's not a lot. Yeah. Well, it was a fire extinguisher. Not a hose. Yeah. never mind. That's not that bad. Fire hose.

I feel like I'd rather have a fire hose. Yeah, fire hose is powerful, dude. Her behavior was starting to approach that of a problem bear or a food condition bear. So once again, park officials make the decision to trap Bear 59 and her cubs and relocate her. So on September 4th, 1986, the whole family was trapped, and they were moved to Cub Creek, which is about 22 miles away. and on September 19th, so 15 days later, she returned to the canyon area,

but her cubs weren't with her. So it's possible that when she got translocated or relocated, she ran into a resident bear and that her cubs were killed by a male, or that the stress of the relocation and this return trip to canyon was too much for her, and the cubs were either separated or abandoned. Whatever the case was, the cubs were gone, and her general demeanor toward people,

may have changed during that time. She blamed people for... Yeah. I did read that people had... What year was this again? ...seen her cubs, 86. That afterward maybe people had seen her cubs, and then they were like saying, oh, they're starving.

Often cubs will actually be fine once they're separated from their mom, as long as they're not killed by another bear. There's plenty of food for them to find and stuff. So they don't usually starve. It's more that they're at much higher risk of being killed by another bear when that happens. Anyway, she doesn't... have her cubs with her. So being handled again, being translocated, losing her cubs, all of those

things could change the behavior of a bear. It could make them grumpier. It could make them more aggressive. Who's to say if that's what happened with this bear? But this is kind of her history leading up to the event that we're going to talk about. And I think it's important to know. So quickly, we're going to talk about some of these management options that people have with bears when they do start to become a problem before we get into the story of our victim in this case. So we just brought up habituation. Habituation is pretty much accepted now in Yellowstone and Grand Teton,

but it can lead to some problems. So there's actually never been a mauling at a bear jam in Yellowstone or Grand Teton. So when I say bear jam, Jeff or Mike, do either of you want to explain what a bear jam is? Do you know what it is? Yeah, it's pretty much the same as human jam. You can use it on toast.

You can use it on babies. Soil and green. Basically, it's people. It's like a traffic jam around a bear. Like someone spots a bear and cars start piling up and make things difficult to, you know, navigate through and around. And then inevitably a park ranger starts yelling at everyone. That's pretty much true.

Except for when I was a park ranger, I never yelled at people. You know why? Because of that ranger and glaciers ruined our night. Holy cow. She was out of control. She was. She was freaking out. Anyway, yeah, it's exactly that.

It's when a bunch of people park on the side of the road. It creates a traffic jam. It creates some issues. But those happen commonly. They happen every day in Yellowstone. And no one has ever been injured by a bear at one of those things. And that's because these bears are habituated. That's normal human behavior to them now.

When they're in a meadow, they just expect cars to pull up people to get out and take photos. For them, they've seen it now dozens of times. and they know that it's not a threat. So they don't tend to like really interface with people as long as people are obeying the rules. I think if someone walked out to one of them, then suddenly that's novel behavior and they might hurt that person.

But as long as people are keeping the rules at a bear jam, that habituation has kind of been accepted. So Jeff brought up hazing. Hazing is another management tool. It is an immediate lesson that's taught to discourage a bear. It probably won't change their long-term behavior. but it will change their behavior of what they're doing then and there. So if a bear's like right by the road or doing something that puts its life at danger

because we don't want them right by the road, a bear management official can go in and haze and that can be anything from like honking a horn to shooting the 12 gauge with rubber bullets or beanbags. Beanbags are a lot more common. That's just to kind of change the bear's immediate behavior. Aversive conditioning is when you continually haze a bear in order to try and change its behavior long term. The jury's kind of out on whether or not that actually works. Some people think it does. Some people aren't sure. This is all to get us to our next point, which is translocation or

relocation. So it's kind of what you guys would imagine, but that's essentially catching a bear and moving it to a new location. But just based on what you guys have learned about bears through the podcast, through your own experience, Jeff, do you think if a bear's already, you're getting into trouble, moving it to a new location. What do you think it's going to do at that new location? It's going to probably get all the other bears in trouble too. Make friends with them and be a bad influence on the bears that weren't doing anything bad. Yeah.

That's actually maybe a little bit true, but I know you're kind of joking. But you're hinting at the right thing, which is that you're just moving a problem. You haven't changed that bear's behavior. You're just putting it in a new place where it can then display that. behavior and unfortunately there's just not enough wilderness to where you can put a bear that it isn't going to at some point run into some kind of human development whether that's roads or cabins or anything they patrol large areas they move a lot sooner or later that bear might get into trouble in its new area even like human bears if you watch man versus wild yeah you can't put a bear anywhere

where they where he doesn't find civilization they've tried it's in trouble everywhere. And he finds people every time. He does. So that's translocation. There's a lot of cons to it. It's expensive. They have this homing ability so they can generally just get back to where you took them

from anyway. It's really hard to find areas that are far from human settlements. And it also can be really difficult to know the dynamics of the bear population where you're dropping that bear. So if you put it in a place where there's already like a really dominant male or something,

you might just be dropping into a really bad situation where it gets injured by another bear or kicked out of that area. So it's really tricky. And because of that, it used to be used a lot and really it's not used much anymore. And we're going to get into that in our conservation part. So the last management thing, and this is kind of the biology part of this episode since we've talked about Grizzlies a lot, this last management decision is removing the animal from the population or euthanizing it.

And that's typically last case scenario, but luckily we are at a place with grizzly bears where that is an option now, because when we didn't have many, that was something that we really wanted to avoid at all costs. We'll talk about that a little bit in the conservation part as well. So just quickly to end that thought, there are multiple papers that have looked at relocations or translocations, how well they work. For the most part, they point at it as a pretty poor management tool with only about a 30 percent success rate.

And I'm doing success in quotation marks because really it's even hard to measure long term if the bear survived. So it's really not that helpful of a tool anymore. I feel like in Bryce there was a black bear that was relocated that actually did all right. Yeah. The nice thing about a place like Bryce is that that, well, it's not a nice thing, but it's like a thing. The habitat's so fragmented there, the black bear habitat that if you take a bear from

Bryce and put it in the most like close black bear habitat there's not really a way for them to get back because there's too much like development and roads and everything in the way so they kind of have to stay in their new area um so it does tend to work a little bit better with black bears but for grizzly bears it doesn't really work that well got it when yellowstone closed their dumps and stopped feeding bears translocations were kind of necessary um they had to kill a lot of those bears but they wanted to give these leftover bears the best possible chance to remain there and repopulate the area with wilder non-food-conditioned bears. So they had to move a lot of them. And bear 59 later was one of those bears. And we're going to talk about that a little bit more in our conservation section again.

So when she made her way back to the canyon area, she was by herself. It's impossible for us to say how it affected her behavior. But the way that she treated humans in her radius was about to change. very drastically. On October 3, 1986, wildlife photographer William Bill Tizinski was feeling a bit restless. Bill had an appointment to travel from his hometown of Stockett, Montana, near Great Falls, down to Clyde Park, Montana near Bozeman. He was planning on meeting with a rancher in the area to try and sell some of his wildlife photographs, and then he was going to do his best to find some elk in Clyde Park

and create some new photographs for his portfolio. He's 38 years old. He's doing his best to make it as an auto mechanic and then part-time wildlife photographer. He had photos and galleries in Great Falls, and he'd managed to sell a number of his photos, at least enough to make his passion a worthwhile pursuit. So his specialty was really wild animals.

He actually avoided national parks because he didn't like how habituated the animals were. He wanted to get like truly wild animals in a wild environment. And you know what? National parks do have truly wild animals, but they are a bit habituated. It's kind of like our first orangutan versus our last ring of ten. You know, it kind of feels different when you're in a place where you really have to search for him. But that doesn't make us think any less of boogie boy. We still love him.

It sure doesn't. Yeah. So he's 5'7, 160 pounds. He has a dark, bushy beard, and he was actually essentially blind in his right eye. But he was really used to navigating difficult and potentially dangerous. terrain in order to get the shots that he wanted. I wonder how many times he left his lens cap on because of that? Because he was blind.

Because he couldn't tell if the lens cap was on or off. Oh, because he just... Or he probably used his other eye, huh? Probably. That'd be my guess if he's blind in the right one. But it's a good thought. So he left his home on a blustery October 3rd morning. He told his girlfriend that he'd be back the next day.

and they had planned to eat dinner with his daughter and his daughter's husband. Even though he was a bit of a wild man and he'd go off on these solo expeditions alone, he was a really good communicator and he always found time to let his girlfriend know if he's going to be late or if there are any kind of problems with his itinerary. He had a total of three children from his last marriage and he did his best to be a really constant good presence in their lives. But something happened in Clyde Park that made him get a bit of a wild hair and he changed plans and decided to head down to Yellowstone instead.

The park was tantalizingly close to Clyde Park, and inside Yellowstone Bill would have the chance to find elk, bison, and potentially grizzly bears. So photographing a grizzly bear had always been a goal of his, and this is before the day of thousands of photographers, all armed with really intelligent digital cameras. So getting a compelling photo of a grizzly was a lot harder, and the right photo of a grizzly could actually potentially alter your career.

And he saw it as a big gap in his resume, and he really wanted to fix it by getting a grizzly photo. So he drove into the park sometime on Friday, October 3rd, and he likely spent the night somewhere in his car. So there's a few places in Yellowstone that are famous for wildlife. And Hayden Valley is one of those places. It's sandwiched between Yellowstone Lake and the canyon area, and this huge valley provides perfect habitat for large herds of elephants. elk, bison, and a good chunk of the park's grizzly bears, and currently they're wolves, too, but not at this point. A road cuts through the eastern edge of the valley, and it gives visitors great access to these large open vistas and the wildlife that you might see within them.

So I love Hayden Valley. Jeff, just to remind you where Hayden Valley is, if you don't remember, it's like where we had the argument over whether we saw an otter or a muskrat in that big open valley. You know where I know where it is. You know that I know where it is. You just want to bring that up. I honestly didn't want to. It was an otter, dude. Sure.

It was an otter. Mike, do you remember... Oh, you win, Jeff. You won. Do you remember the Hayden Valley at all, Mike? Named after Hayden Christensen, right? No, not after him. It's one of the more beautiful valleys than Yellowstone.

I absolutely love it. It just opens up into these rolling hills. You're kind of stuck in trees. all of a sudden it's this huge opening and it's just beautiful it's like a really great place to see a lot of different animals you can get as close to the bison there as you want you probably can but you might get gourd don't um i do remember though i think i do remember that stretch is just a beautiful sunlit basin in a valley with tons of bison everywhere very green at least the time of year we were there we were still reeling from getting fined but that was that was when my anger started

to wear off. We got a huckleberry milkshake and everything was right. It very much feels like one of those places where if you hike up to a hill and just look around with your binoculars or scope, you're likely to see a bear or a wolf. Like there are a lot of animals out there. It's like a place where you'll probably see a bear

but you need like a nice telescope. Exactly. Because you got like a really long range. All right. So early on the morning of October 4th, Bill Tizinski woke up to foggy. Telescope spotting scope. Spotting scope. Yeah, spotting scope. Yeah, telescope would really get you in close.

Spyglass. Bill Tizensky woke up to a foggy overcast morning. He put on his clothes, including some blue jeans, tennis shoes, and a belt that was clasped with a large belt buckle that had his name Bill on the front of it. That's awesome. And drove down toward Hayden Valley. It is pretty cool. We should get one for Braxton. We should.

That's how I actually, I know I'm not cool because I don't have the confidence to pull that. kind of move off. And I feel like if you're, if you're cool, you can. That is pretty cool. It is a cool move. I don't know.

It just doesn't work for a belt buckle, for me at least. Yeah. Bill is a better name for belt buckle name. Yeah. It's almost like his dog tags if he does end up dying. That's a good point.

Yeah. It's funny you should say that because that's actually going to come up. All right. So at 7 a.m. that morning Bill parked his car in the Cascade Trailhead, pull out and pulled out his binoculars to scan the surrounding.

area. He saw a large herd of bison and he snapped a couple of photos, which were photos 19 and 20 on his role. While majestic and iconic bison photos were a dime a dozen, Bill was here to find much more elusive camera fodder. So he pulls out of this pullout, he continues down the road, but not before one of the park rangers had time to clock his early model Chevy Impala with Montana plates and make a note of it. This would actually be the last time that anyone would see Bill to Zinsky alive. Oh. Besides that bear.

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Ask your doctor about Evglis and visit Epglus. Lily.com or call 1-800 LilyRX or 1-800 545-979. Okay. So a few miles down the road, Bill sees something large and brown in the expansive Hayden Valley. It's too small to be a bison but too large to be a black bear. He slams on his brakes and he quickly swerves into the nearby Otter Creek picnic area pullout. Bill's breasts were rapid. His hands are shaking a little...

What type of creek? Otter? Otter. Is that what I heard? Yes. in the valley where I saw the otter? Yes. It's just there right there. Oh, he got you.

All right. Really quick, before we get too into this, I did just mention the last person to ever see Bill alive. It just happened. So a lot of this is conjecture at this point, and I do want to mention my sources. I use both this book taken by Baron Yellowstone,

which was written by Kathleen Snow. And I know that author really, consulted a lot of the official park reports and whatnot for these stories. And then also Scott McMillan's Mark of the Grizzly. Those are my two main sources. This is also a story I talked to quite a bit with my supervisors in Yellowstone and got a little bit of insight info that way too. So his hands are shaking.

He grabs his tripod and his camera and he's thinking, you know, one morning in Yellowstone he already found his grizzly bear. Maybe his luck is starting to turn and this is going to be his big break. the bears roughly 500 yards away and Bill would have to make a careful approach. The rules dictate the guests are not to approach bears closer than 100 yards. But he's ready to break a few rules

in order to get the photos that he needed. This is October. There's hardly anyone in the park. It's a cold morning. It's not likely anyone's going to see him. So he decides just to go for it. Kind of like you guys with the Osprey Nest. All right.

So another rule that he's considering breaking was using this elk bugle to try and maybe get a better shot of this bear. So he ties on a black scarf. The elk bugle is tied to that scarf around his neck, and then he carefully gets out of his car where he puts on his brimmed camouflage hat, insulated camouflage sweatshirt.

He slips his gloves on, he grabs his camera, a 200-millimeter lens, which isn't that close, and he attaches it to the tripod, and then creeps out into the sagebrush. The wind's blowing toward him, and he, again, feels like this is a lucky break, because this bear is probably not going to pick up his scent as he approaches it. As he gets closer, he takes off his right glove and stuffs it into the pocket of his sweatshirt.

Now, that's because he wanted to take photos with his right hand and he wanted to make sure he didn't have anything in the way. He knew he might not have long to get the photo he wanted, so he wanted to be as quick as possible. But then he sees something that probably made his heart sink. This bear is wearing a radio collar. And in his opinion, this is someone who, again, likes to take pictures. pictures of very wild looking animals, a radio collar is going to ruin that.

It doesn't necessarily ruin it, though. It just makes it a lot trickier because what you would have to do is get the bear in a position where its head and its neck fur would obscure that radio collar. And you can do that. Like, I've taken plenty of pictures of bears with radio collars where it doesn't look like they're wearing them, especially grizzly bears in the fall because they're really fluffy this time of year. So it doesn't necessarily make him want to give up.

He creeps closer and closer, and then when he's in within 50 feet, he pulls out his elk bugle and blows, hoping for the chance to get the photo that he needed. A bear looking at him with eye contact where the radio caller isn't visible. Bear 59 does indeed raise her head, but she charges, and Bill takes the last photo that his camera would ever take. Oh, man. So around noon that day, snow starts to fall,

and another ranger notices Bill's car. This time it's in the Otter Creek picnic area, and it's parked haphazardly as though he had been in a rush. So the ranger peers into the car, he doesn't see anyone, but he also can't see any tracks leading from the vehicle. He looks back into the car, and he can see a card with Bill Tizinski's contact info on it.

So he notes down the information and he drives off. He's thinking, like, this guy's probably on a hike, or maybe his car broke down, and he had to travel to go get someone to fix it or get parts. So he just leaves. That night, Bill's girlfriend and his daughter start to get a little concerned when he doesn't show up. But they know Clyde Park is remote. Maybe he didn't have the ability to get out and get word to them in time.

He almost always communicated when he's going to be late, but they're also like aware of how wild this dude is, and they know we're probably just going to see him tomorrow. Next morning, though, Sunday, October 5th, the car is still there, and the rangers are starting to get pretty concerned. They check the immediate area, they find no tracks, and they start calling these numbers that they saw in his card, but no one picks up. The car stays unmoved all day, and as the evening falls, they start talking about bears, specifically Bear 59, who no one had seen in Canyon for a few days. And all these pieces are starting to come together into like a real nightmare scenario for these rangers.

The next day, the 6th of October, the car is still there, and a search is starting to be organized. In the meantime, the ranger is still calling his home, and around 3.30 p.m. on Monday, someone finally answers. It sounds like a child, and the ranger asks if William Tizinski was there, and they say that he's at work. So this ranger then calls his work, and they get a receptionist, and the ranger says, hey, does Bill Tzinski work there? And the receptionist says, like, yeah, he's here. He's at work right now. And this ranger's like, oh, great, you know? Yeah. You can just imagine all this relief.

and the person's the rangers like oh i need to talk to him right away and then the person the receptionist leaves and comes back and she's like my bad he's actually not here he didn't show up for work today and then his girlfriend actually is a car mechanic yeah i feel like she should know it's not like more than like five car mechanics in stocket montana a town of like a hundred people his girlfriend works at the same shop and she gets on the phone and she's like hey we're really worried about him.

We've called Clyde Park. We've told the sheriff's there that he's missing. We like haven't heard anything from him. And this ranger is like, well, his car is in Yellowstone. And the girlfriend's like, what the fuck? You know, like, why is he in Yellowstone? Oh, yeah, because he wasn't even supposed to be there. He was supposed to be in Clyde Park.

Yeah, Clyde Park, which is by Bozeman. So she hangs up the phone probably kind of in shock, wondering what's going on with her boyfriend. So the Rangers, they decide. to organize a search. And the next day on the seventh, they head out. And in the meantime, they're checking Bear 59's position, and they are getting a lot of points all around Otter Creek.

At the time, like, they would do this with a VHF signal and a plane, and all of the, like, beeps that they're getting are all in this one tight little group around Otter Creek, which isn't a good sign. So they include two two-person dogs, teams on this search, seven people on horseback, four people on foot, and then a helicopter or a fixed wing aircraft. A few of these rangers are using a VHF antenna to try and get real-time positions for this bear as

they're going. So they're listening for the bear, and then they're kind of heading in that direction just in case the bear did actually attack him. And they're doing their best to get these positions, and they're not really hearing it, they're carefully patrolling around this area, and they're really having a hard time getting a signal. They go back to Bill's vehicle and suddenly they get a signal. And they follow it through the woods.

And I've done this before. Like when you're following that signal, it's really hard not just to get locked in on that. And the front ranger was doing that. And as they were walking and it was getting stronger and stronger, the back ranger suddenly sees these ravens fly up. And that ranger's like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. And they stop.

And 25 yards away is the bear. And the bear's eating something. You would have like bumped into it. They think they might have ran into it had these ravens not flown up. That would be funny. Just balk into it. Probably wouldn't have been funny, but it would have been interesting. This Ranger, they tell each other to stop.

They both get pretty freaked out. The signal's just hammering. The bear's right there. They realize they're too close. So they go back to their patrol vehicle. They grab binoculars and a rifle with the telemarking. the telescopic sight, two rifles actually. And then they go back to get close enough to the bear

where they can see it clearly through the binoculars. And when they look through the binoculars, they see that the bear is eating something. And what it's eating is a human leg with the tennis shoes still on the foot. Jeez. So they watch in horror as they see this bear turn the kill over and they see both legs flip out,

blue jeans and tennis shoes still visible. And then the bear drags these remains across the ground and starts feeding. It then looks up at the men and it woofs. Jeff, can you kind of make a bear woof for me? I can't hear you, but I'm sure you're making it. It looks like you're doing a good job. Yeah.

Yeah, it's like a whu-hoo sound. And it actually kind of does a little bluff charge at them and then goes back to eating these human remains. And as they're watching it, they can hear bones crunching and they can hear the sound of the bear, like eating and tearing meat from these remains, which they said they would never forget that. sound. That's awful. They call the rest of the search party to say, hey, search is off. We found the

body. And they actually get orders from the lead ranger to kill the bear. So they line up their rifles and pretty much simultaneously take their shots. They knock the bear backwards, immediately killing her. At first, I didn't think it was real. I woke up to this blinding light and I was transported to another place. Pluto TV. Then I heard a voice. Come with me. you want to live. There were thousands of movies and shows and they were all free. The truth is our series. It's just so beautiful.

On Pluto TV, free streaming of Terminator 2, Fringe Arrow, the 100 and the X-Files may cause excitement, loss of sleep and sudden belief in extraterrestrials. No credit cards or alien encounters necessary. Pluto TV, stream now, pay never. All right, so the Rangers call everyone, they tell them the searches off. They kill the bear. And then as they approach the body and this dead bear, they start surveying the scene. And they say it's unlike anything.

that any of them had ever seen before. I'd hope so. His lower torso, yeah, you would hope so. Bill Tizinski's lower torso was mostly untouched. His two legs still in his jeans with his tennis shoes still on. Then just above his belt, which still had the big Bill belt buckle attached to it, and actually, Jeff, kind of like you mentioned earlier, helped them know that they were actually looking at Bill Tizinski.

Just above that belt, it looked as though he had been cut in half. the upper half of his body had been mostly eaten but the rangers found an arm and a hand his skull an arm bone and other bone fragments in different burial piles around the area his shredded and bloodstained clothing was everywhere so we've talked about this a little bit with bears but when they do kill someone or any kind of large prey

they'll eat their fill and then they cash what they're not going to eat so often what that means is digging like a burial pile and pushing that the rest of the carcass under the ground. That's to stop the scent from getting out and drawing in other predators, and it also kind of helps preserve the meat a little bit longer too. So they do that quite a bit, and this bear had been doing that for days with his carcass. It had worked through most of his upper torso at this point. So after they saw this scene, which looked like a bomb had gone off,

they used search dogs to retrace his steps and try to put together a narrative of what might have happened. in the moment that he was attacked. So using their reports, as well as these books that I read, this is what I could piece together. First of all, he approached the bear to within 50 feet, which is way too close to approach a grizzly bear, even a habituated grizzly bear, that you're just way too close. Even though the rules 100 yards,

and there are people that get that close in their vehicles, if you approach a bear that close, that's out of the norm for them. That's not typical human behavior, and they likely are going to react to that. They're either going to run away or they're going to charge, and this bear decided to charge. So when Bill was within 50 feet, he set up his camera on the tripod, and then a common theory, which I reported earlier,

is that he either blew his elk bugle or he yelled or whistled to get this bear to look up at him because he really wanted a shot. With wildlife photography, the money shot is to get the eyes. Like you want the animal looking at you, and that's likely what he was trying to get. And he did get one last shot as the bear charged at him, which was just a blur and the camera like hitting the ground.

She knocked him to the ground. The shot wasn't good. It wasn't a good shot, unfortunately. He had no shots of like clear grizzly bears on his roll of film. I do want to look up his photos because I'm really curious to see them. If I find him, we'll post him to the Instagram. Yeah. It looks like she knocked Tzinski to the ground.

then he probably got up and ran about 10 feet up a little hill before she grabbed him again and then mauled him really violently at that spot. And the reason they think that is because the camera was about 10 feet away from where the biggest pool of blood was and that's where they think she really got him. And then she dragged him and his body over his camera, over the tripod, toward some trees in a small depression where she started eating him. And he very well could have still been alive at that point because there was quite a of blood in that spot as well. We know this because there was like fur and blood matted into the

tripod legs and the camera and his bugle was like soaked in blood too. There's a lot of blood on this scene. I talked to one of my old supervisors about this when I was working in Yellowstone and he mentioned that one theory is that these blue jeans actually stopped the bear from consuming the legs and she'd kind of save them for last and then I think when these rangers showed up she was starting to kind of work on them. Yeah, because their first site at the scene was the bear eating a leg with a sneaker still on it, right? Right.

So I think she was just starting to eat the legs. It would be a pretty good ad for brinklers. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, the park did get some pushback for killing this bear, especially because a similar attack had just happened in Glacier with another photographer. but the decision in the Glacier case was not to kill the bear. But I actually think Yellowstone did make the right decision for a couple reasons.

First of all, this attacking glacier involved a female with cubs. So it was more like classic cub defense behavior. It also involved a dog which aggravated that bear. And then the most important thing here is that this bear in Yellowstone, Bear 59, was feeding. And that is just behavior that usually leads to a bear being, killed. And the main reason for that is if you leave that bear out there and then someone else gets hurt by the same bear, they have a really good leg for a lawsuit. So it's often, and it's just, it can be a safety hazard. So they did kill this bear. The other, oh, yeah, the last thing, too,

is because the bear was still feeding, they knew they were killing the right bear. Whereas in Glacier, they would have just been like trying to find a bear with cubs. And it's, it's like possible they would have killed the wrong bear in that scenario. Sure. Okay. That's pretty, much the story. We're going to talk in conservation about just how much better things have gotten for bears in Yellowstone. But do you guys have any questions about the story before we move on? For the, what would Jeff and what Mike do thing? I would, I would have got a good picture of it right before it got me. That's a good answer. Without the collar in it. Speaking of the collar, so is there some kind of mechanism on the collar that accounts for like the size?

change that a bear will go through throughout the year? There are, especially with these grizzly collars. Like, the collars that me and Jeff put on black bears, they had a little explosive charge in them that I could trigger from my keyboard to make the collar fall off. Kill the bear. So our bears were only going to be, it doesn't kill them. Blow their head off.

Blow their head off. And then you can collect the collar. No, it, like, made it so we could control the amount of time the bear would wear the collar. And so if we thought, oh, this bear is getting a little older and bigger, we should probably drop this collar. We could drop it. With these grizzly collars, the new ones have that as well, but they also have this elastic part that you put on the collar, and that allows the bear to have some room as it grows. Right. It's not like a true elastic, but it works really well.

It's really slick the way it works. Yeah, that's nice. So they're built really well for these bears. Back then, they would just do capture, recapture. So the bear would be in the study for a few years, then they'd catch it again and take the collar off. Anymore, we can just drop those collars. So it works pretty well.

Yeah. About the bugle, the elk bugle, is that, that's not like a faux paw in the wildlife photography scene is to like use calls or anything like that? Or is that kind of like a cheat? It's kind of a cheat. Okay. It's illegal in the park.

You can't do it in Yellowstone. Oh, it is. Yeah. And then just for, even with birds, like calling birds sometimes is considered wrong because you're disrupting natural behavior. So it's like you can use bird calls to your best judgment. But like with elk and stuff, obviously like bow hunters can use them. But if you're just trying to get photos to me, it seems a little cheap. It seems like you're disrupting that animal's behavior just for your own gain.

And I personally don't like. You're like, if you're going to bugle one, you better. kill it. Yeah. You better eat that elk. All right. Any other questions? No, that's rough. That's rough for a family whose father and boyfriend was found in a place they didn't expect him to be not alive anymore. That's got to be incredibly difficult. Yeah. And from reading in these books, they talk a little bit about how hard it hit his family. And a lot of them were really angry, but most of them did understand, like, this is what he did because he loved it and that he was a person to push the limit. And his brother

was quoted as saying, like, I have no doubt that he got too close to that bear, you know. And I don't blame the bear because Bill just kind of always pushed the envelope a little bit. And I'd like to think that he didn't blame it either, you know, that he knew that he was, in her space and risking a lot just for a photo. But yeah, for sure. Like, I'm sure they're still struggling with his loss even 40 years later. The bear was probably like, this is my space and you're not one of my top eight. You think that joke would have played so well in like 2007, but I still love it.

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So first of all, I wanted to know your guys' favorite, Bill from pop culture. This can be a real-life bill that's somehow involved in pop culture or a character named Bill. Or William. Your whole question. Okay, yeah. Okay. Yeah.

I said, favorite pop culture, Bill or William. Sorry. I'll go first. All right. I took William Wallace from Braveheart. Yeah. Yeah. I feel like kids nowadays don't really get how movies used to be either.

We didn't really fact check anything. So that was like who William Wallace. was for a long time was like yeah just like the coolest yeah the coolest yeah the coolest bravest dude of all time and turns out most all of that was made up but it's still like one of my favorite movies and you can you can tell from that movie that the stuff about mill gipson's probably true but he really goes full psycho a few times in that movie and it's just great entertainment yeah it is that is a great movie i i rewatched it not long ago and i was just like, man, they don't make them like this anymore.

That's so good. I rate revenge movie. True. You're into that. You like revenge. Who would you, who's the person you most want to get revenge on in real life, Jeff? Is there anyone you can think of? Like a bully in high school or something?

Oh, I do have, yeah, maybe like. Park Ranger. Joe in high school who'd always hit me in the nuts. Ah, dude, come on, Joe. Look at Jeff. Now, Joe. Thriving. I'll help you out.

With that, his nuts are working. Kind of. Maybe that's what gave you that hernia problem. Yeah. You mean kind of? Yeah, how do you know? So my favorite, I recently rewatched Pirates of the Caribbean. And listen, Jack, I get, Jack is an iconic character.

But the first movie, which is the best movie, and one of my favorite movies ever, it doesn't work without Jack's insanity counterbalanced with Will Turner, being kind of like his normal foil. and I just, I don't know, I'm a big Orlando Bloom guy. Will Turner is essential to the plot of that first movie, and I just think he's great. Yeah, I love it. I love that movie so much. All right, I've got a pick and a runner up as well. My number one pick, it's got to be Bill Waterson, the creator of Calvin and Hobbs.

It has to be my favorite all-time bill. That, like, Calvin and Hobbs was such a critical piece of my adolescence, and I still love it to this day. So I'm going to say Bill Waterson and then my backup is Bill the Butcher from Gangs of New York. I think it often overlooked Scorsesey movie and like

a really hateable character, like a bad person, but such a good performance and such a good character. Who's the guy again? What's his name? Daniel Day? Yeah, Daniel Day Lewis. Yeah. I mean it's really the only in my estimation, the only reason to watch

that movie is to watch Daniel. Neil Day Lewis is Bill. I don't care for that movie. But it kind of goes all over the place. Yeah. Our next category. We forgot about Bill Clinton. We did forget about Bill Clinton.

Not a big Bill Clinton fan, actually. Not a fan at all. But, you know. Like Willie? He is a rascal, isn't he? Yeah. All right. So I wanted to ask you guys, what's the best photograph you think you've ever taken?

I don't want to go first. I'll go first. So I am not one to take photos. Rarely ever am I pulling out the old camera. I took a picture of a TV I was trying to sell once and posted it online. My TV sold pretty quick. Got me a bunch of money. So probably the most valuable picture I've ever taken.

But there's one that for anyone else. Were you like in the reflection of it like half naked or something? That reminds me. Like only a T-shirt on? My friend David, I'm staying at his place in Dallas right now. He took a picture of me half-naked and sent it into. cold stone to make an ice cream cake with like a picture on top you know how they can do that and uh i guess they just didn't catch the fact that i didn't have pants on and just they did it

yeah right on the cake we had it for my birthday um i did take a picture in a restaurant that for anyone else would be like a picture they would take any day and they wouldn't think twice about it but it's my brother and his daughter and their daughter's kind of like standing there with her hand on his shoulder and it's just like really cute small moment it was candid they didn't know i was taking it And I was like, hey, that was nice. So I sent it to him, and I have since retired from taking photographs. All right. How many did you take in Borneo again?

Like one? One. One in Borneo, a water monitor. Oh, that's so great. All right, I can go next. I think, honestly, I think my favorite photo that I've ever personally taken is of Jeff. And it was on the Bear Project that he helped me with, and it's him holding two cubs. and they like perfectly outline his face and like he looks the happiest that a human being has ever looked and both of these cubs just look like incredibly cute and it was kind of like my dream photo that i always wanted with cubs so i'm glad i at least got it with jeff and then my runner up my runner up is i took a really great photo of an ermine which is a weasel jumping through the air with a mouse in its mouth and i it was like the fastest little critter and i was lind and i was lest little critter and i was

laying on the ground trying to take that photo and just took hundreds of photos trying to get it. And I finally got it. And that's maybe the most proud I've ever been of a wildlife photo. You told us about it when it happened. Listeners will remember. It's a good story. Good picture. I have one from like before I even had like a phone with a really good camera, but it had a camera.

And it's in Glacier. It's one of my earlier posts on my Instagram. but there's like a baby mountain goat walking by like a little puddle on the trail. And it's my first time that I ever really like framed a picture like with like a mountain in the backdrop and then this goat with its reflection in the pool. And I think I maybe have taken better ones and have better like cameras now. But I think this was the first time I was like really proud of myself for figuring out how to take a good picture. Yeah, you started Instagram a little later, so going back to the start of your feed isn't...

Yeah, I had one that I like deleted and then I started another way. Okay. Oh yeah, I see it. I like it. Yeah, good reflection. Good composure. Nice job, Jeff. Yeah.

I want you guys to recommend something you liked from the last couple weeks. And there's a reason I want to do this because there's something that I've been watching that I really like. So go ahead and bring up yours first. Charlie XX's new album, Brat, it's incredible. It's the best album of the year so far. Kind of resets the, it's like, I don't know, she makes pop music like I imagine pop music will sound 10 years from now. It's just, it's so cool, so good. It would be probably number one on the charts, especially over in England.

If Taylor Swift would stop reissuing versions of her albums all over the place and taking over the number one spot from everyone else. She does it whenever someone's like about to have a big week to. She's a legend. Listen, dude. She's got relationship problems right now. Just lay off of her. Oh, man. She's going through it.

Yeah, we got to let her have a win for once, I guess. Jeff, do you want to do yours? I'm just going to recommend sharks. All right. Okay. Dude love sharks. Not for eating, but, you know, learning about maybe drawing sharks if you want to draw a shark. I got this shark pillow that I really like.

It's a nice pillow. And, you know, there's a movie, Jaws. Go check that one out. Great movie. That exact answer, like verbatim, is what I would have given at seven years old had you asked me this question. All right. But I support it. I do, too.

I just watched the, like, I rewatch the Fishman arc in One Piece, and there's some sharks. Not my favorite arc, but, you know, he's got a cool, you've got a cool, no, there's a fishman island. Yeah. You're still a ways away from that. You just got through giant. I have been watching, just so you guys know. I know. I'm so proud of you.

Skype, yeah. All right. The other thing that I've been watching and that I keep telling Mike to watch, but he refuses to, and it's driving me crazy. is the 2003 Star Wars Clone Wars series. It's the animated one that was done by Gendie Tartavkowski or whatever his name is. He's the guy that created Dexter's Lab and Primal. Primal is one of my all-time favorite animated series. And so is this Clone Wars series.

It's so good. Jeff, we watched it together once, me, you and Brent. It's like the cartoon one. And I think it's like top of... It's high up there. No, it's not the CG one. Like, it's not the Clone Wars series that was like eight seasons. This is the, like, the animated one that was done by the guy that did primal.

There's only like three episodes, right? Yeah, it's like two and a half hours total. And it's amazing. It's honestly like some of the best Star Wars content out there. So I'm really excited for that. Well, have you seen the newest show? I'm going to. I haven't seen Acolyte.

I don't think I've got to watch it. Yeah. I just don't think you should say it's one of the best until you see that. Yeah. You have to watch every piece of Star Wars content. I watch most of it. I mean, let's be honest. All right.

Our next category is one of my favorites. We're Mike and Jeff paying attention. So, for this week... Which part? Which part? Which part were you... The entire thing. I got some really cool rocks in your...

Yellowstone. I got some fossilized... How many can you put in your mouth? Quite a few. What do they taste like? I got fossilized shark teeth. I got pleasiosaur teeth. I got some really cool geodes, a few other things.

I'm going to have a pile, and whoever wins gets to pick one from this pile of rocks. Oh, sweet. Oh, nice. All right. So first question. Who wants to go first? I'll go first. Okay.

Jeff, what's the name of the campground where I got this? video of the moose and the bear. Soda butt. Soda Butte. Soda Butteam Campground. One point, Jeff. It doesn't even have to get the number of the campsite? Crazy.

No. We start with these ones. What number? 26. Good job. All right. Should I give him another point? Michael Jordan's number.

Yeah, two points. Yeah. He loses a point for saying Michael Jordan's number. Okay. Back to one then. Mike, what animal was Bill originally headed out to photograph? Oh, in Bozeman. I don't know, like a horse?

Roy. Bison. Shoot, grizzly bear. Jeff, do you want to steal? Yeah, elk. Elk. Correct. 2.0, Jeff. Jeff, what city in Montana has galleries with Bill's photos?

Great Falls? Great Falls. 3.0, Jeff. All right. What? Mike, what was Bill's other job outside of photography? Kiss that plesiosaurus tooth. goodbye.

I don't know, car mechanic. Correct. On the board, baby. Jeff. Bill had a disability that didn't really slow him down, though. What was it? Diabetes. Incorrect.

Mike, you want to steal? Blind and one eye. Correct. He masturbated, but not that much. Mike, you got a chance to tie it up here. Edge. Just enough to get rid of one eye. Right.

My dad used to say, Like if I was like scratching my grain or something, he'd be like, You're going to go blind down there. Yeah. Down there. Down there. Not down there. I'm sorry.

You just don't have eyesight out of your dick. All right, Mike, what turn out of something was different about me. And I don't need the full name for this. I'm just, I'm an account partial. What turnout did they find Bill's car in? Oh, Hayden. You should turn out. No, you should get this because we joked about it quite.

a bit. Really? Can I steal? Yeah. Otter Creek. Otter Creek. Dang. Hey, Jeff, you got a chance to do an insurmountable lead here until we get to the bonus question.

Right. What place in Montana was Bill originally supposed to go to photograph elk? Um, I don't know. It was like by Bozeman, but I don't know the name. Mike, can you steal this? Every time you said that, I thought of Clive Barker. Uh, it's Clyde Park. Clyde Park, correct.

Three to four. Who's Clyde Barker? He did like Hellraiser, some other stuff. Mike, you can tie it up here. Is he related to Bob Barker? Probably. He's not related to Bob Barker. What kind of car did Bill drive, Mike?

Truck. It wasn't a truck. Really? What? Yeah. What kind of car was it, then, Jeff? Dad had this car at one point. Osmobile?

Nope. A Chevy. Heavy Impala. All right. And then the bonus question, lightning round, whoever wins this, Gryffindor rules wins it all. Yes. You're like Dumbledore.

Whoever says it first wins. What's the number of the bear? 59. Ooh. Mike wins. Because it's only 10 away from 69. I'll break the, I'll break the pleasiasaur tooth in half and we can share. I'm actually, I got one for both of you guys.

So you just get to pick first. But, yeah. You both get it. Everyone gets a tooth. I knew the number. I just froze. We all get teeth. It froze.

You get a tooth and you get a tooth. All right. I think Michael Jordan's number still. 26. Next category. We're going to get to our listener questions now. I'm going to do a couple patron ones. Everyone, I'm trying to get caught up.

I swear I am, all three of us. I shouldn't say I. I do a lot of them because a lot of them are animal questions, but all three of us will get in there and answer questions. We're trying to get caught up, and we will get there. Yeah, I've been really bad at responding to people in general. We've been gone out of life. It's hard.

You know, I've been open about it. Sometimes I have depression and just like putting on clothes is hard. I'm not going to respond to people, you know. You don't want to respond to them naked? Yeah. That's awkward. Yeah. I get it.

We all get it. We've all been there. We all get depressed sometimes. I was depressed not long ago. All right. On to our next question. Hey, it's men's health month, you know? It is.

We got to be old. Mike, you depressed at all? Yeah, I rarely have clothes on these days. It's also Pride Month. Hey, congrats to all of our LGBTQ listeners. The gays. You know? The gays.

I'm actually doing a little bit of a thing about that in my subscription episode coming. Oh, cool. Yeah, in all seriousness, though. Like, we think it's cool to be celebrating some big victories for that community. Hell yeah. And if you don't think that's cool and it makes you mad, maybe just, like, think about why that makes you mad because it's kind of crazy to get mad that people are celebrating being accepted.

So, anyway. All right, let's get into some questions here. This one's from Kim. Kim really wanted to know a little bit more about spraying bear spray in the wind. And Kim is so concerned about this That they've been having like some nightmares and stuff So I do just want to get into this for Kim's sake Wow

Yeah, got to get that about like spraying themselves with bear spray Yeah, I think so just bear spray in general She's like wakes up in like a deep sweat like I didn't get sprayed This opens the door for a lot of bad questions though People are going to be like I keep having nightmares about what should I do in Yellowstone When I go there in the summer West

I have nightmares Can you plan my trip for me? Please. Yeah. No, but really, if you have a strong wind blowing right at you, it can really affect the way that your spray works. It can blow it back at you. The thing that I always just say, though, is you should still try and use it

because being mauled by a bear is much worse than getting bear sprayed blown back up at your face. It does really decrease the distance at which it works. And a wind behind you really increases that distance. So you do want to keep that in mind. and if the wind was really coming at me hard, I probably wouldn't spray the bear until it's within like 15 feet. And typically I'd start at like 30. So we've talked about this before,

but the point with bear spray is that you're putting it in between you and the bear and the bear has to cross through it to get to you. So it's just putting it out there, getting it in between you and the bear at some point is the most important part. If you're that unlucky and the wind's coming at you that hard, the bear still might make contact with you, but it's still going to hit that spray, and it's still probably going to stop it from really mauling you.

So I would still spray it. Like, it's powerful spray. It will still, like, like, it might get you a little bit, but it'll still keep you from a bear. Yeah. So still spray it. That's the main thing. All right.

And if this one's from gauge. If you keep having nightmares, that we've done all we can for you. Maybe, like, I have them too. Maybe you got to just, like, go spray some in the air above you and let it hit you. And, like, it'll suck, but it's like, You'll learn that you don't need to have nightmares about it. Yeah, yeah. We don't actually condone that, but if you need to do it, go do it.

All right, this one's from Gage. Gage says, I have a question for you guys. If you could talk to any of the people who have passed away from any of your animal attack stories, who would it be and what would you guys say? I think for me it would either be Brigida Friedenhagen, because she was killed in the backcountry in Yellowstone, and he'd want to know what happened. Or I would tell Ray Kitchen that he saved Kelly McConnell's life and that he was a hero, which is very sweet.

Just curious what you guys would think. Keep up the good work. I had a hard time thinking of a better one than the Ray Kitchen one. Yeah. Because that would be really nice just to tell him, hey, you saved people's lives. I'd probably want to talk to that little dingo baby and like, be like, hey. Talk to the baby. Did your mom kill you?

No, I'm just kidding. I know that the dingo got it, but yeah, talking to a baby would kind of feel a wasted wish. Hey, just so you know, you've ruined your mom's life by dying. Do you guys have a good answer for that? I was thinking about any of the shark victims in the river during the attacks that inspired Jaws, especially the guy who was like a tailor or something, the hero of the town, the big shot. What was his name? Lester was the kid.

That was the small boy. Shoot. I don't know what I would talk to them about, but I'd be like, hey, listen, your story goes on to inspire maybe the best movie ever made. So thanks for your sacrifice. That's terrible. I don't know. That's bad. I don't want to say that.

You're just going to thank him for the movie's Jaws? That's awful. But I would want to talk to them and just be like, you're, you tried, man. you did your best, you sound like an awesome guy. Yeah. Lester Stillwell. That was the kid. Yeah.

I don't know. Maybe like the tiger, San Francisco Zoo, killed that guy. It's like, hey, you saved your friends. Because he got killed trying to like help his brother, I think, right? Or his friend. So like tell that kid, like, hey, good job saving your friends. Yeah, I like those answers. All right.

This one's from Christian. Christian says, hey, guys, in a recent episode, you mentioned alligators. can take some injury while hunting prey. And in the past, you've mentioned, big cats really can't take much injury or else they can't hunt. What animals do you think can take the most injury and be the least affected by it? Love the podcast. Thank you.

Like worms? Oh, that's, I was thinking geckos can just have their tail ripped off and grow it back. But worms is even better. Cut a worm and half and it just turns into two worms. You get two of them. Awesome. It's hard to be that. Yeah, that's a good answer.

Ants, I feel like a lot of times you squish them and they just pop right back up like nothing happened. Yeah. Yeah, you probably didn't squish them if you did that. I mean, sometimes, though, if you, like, lightly squish one and then it, like, walking circles for, like, a minute or two, and then it just kind of pops itself back into it normally. Yeah. No, I think you're on. You guys don't know what I'm talking about?

No, I do. I know what you're talking about. Squish ants for fun? I don't squish them anymore. Right. You have. No, I know what you're saying. And when you think about it, that's like a skyscraper falling on that ant.

And then it still wanders away. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. And as a little kid, that's like what I did for fun. It's just, yeah. Saw how much I could, like, squish an ant. I got one more thing kids do all have smartphones now.

That's all that's it for our patron questions. Jeff, do you have any listener questions you want to do? Sure. Yes. I mean, yes. All right. Glenifer asks,

can Mike please explain his positive rating for Matrix 4? Super confused. I'm confused on that too. Did I? It's a trash movie. It's a hard one to defend. And I'm not you like that movie all the way. But I do think it was very deliberately a middle finger to the studio.

Because it was just, just one of the Wachowski's this time. She intentionally sabotaged basically the entire process. And I respected on that level, if indeed that is how it happened. But I saw it once and I was like, hey, okay, I can kind of respect that. But maybe it's just a bad movie and it wasn't intentional at all. I'll say when you saw it, you were like pretty stoked on it. And I was like, oh, sick, a good new Matrix movie.

And then I saw it and I was like, this is bad. This is a bad movie. I'll have to watch it again. We'll revisit this question later. Yeah. Yeah, you're pretty positive about it. Yeah, I remember being positive. I feel like this is actually the most negative I've ever heard you be on it.

Agreed. Moose Heart Beads asked, who do you think is the hottest TV slash movie villain? I mean, Sandra Bullock and Dusk Till Dawn. You mean Salma Hayek? Salma. Or Salma Hayek, yeah. Yeah.

Or when De Nierius goes bad in Game of Thrones. James Gandalfini as Tony Soprano is pretty hot. Daddy. In a weird way. I honestly think he kind of is. What? Really? I don't know.

There's something about him. There's a magnetism to him. Sure. Oh, man. I'm not going to yuck on someone else's yum. I'm going to echo your Selma Hayek one. She's about as hot as anyone's ever been. What's his name's?

Stinger in the wire. Oh yeah, Idraselba? Yeah, Stringer Bell. Yeah, he's a good looking dude. I can't think of one. I can't think of one. I'm sure. I'm sure there's a million that's just beyond the grasp of my brain.

What about in one piece? Who's the hottest? Yeah, isn't there like some like half moose in one piece or something that you think is hot? Yeah. Jafar? No. Jafar? No.

If we're going to allow Gandalfini, you got to, like, let me have Jafar. I push back on Gandalfini too. Right. He's hot. I don't know how to explain it. Mesothelialoma. Mesopelagic mermaids.

Wes's opinion on bear-shaped honey bottles. Love them. Sometimes I have a hard time throwing them way because I love them so much. It's a good idea. It's a great idea. All right, last one. Meg Elizabeth wants to know what are Jeff and Mike's ideal type of lady? I might know some people. A spicy question.

Yeah, one that is so independent that she forgets I exist sometimes, I think, would be mine. It's a great answer. Jeff? So your personality that just there's no interaction. Yeah. That AI girl from Blade Runner. I'd say just like cute girls Nice

Yeah You're on to something there Cute women Can I answer Mine is my girlfriend Jesse What about her Score big points Dark hair

She's interesting She's like fun She's funny to be around And she gives me She's fine with me Living my life She doesn't need me To like

Do her thing all the time which is great. All right. Well, that's nice. She just got roasted in our comments yesterday. Yeah, but you know, everyone gets roasted

in our comments from time to time. What the heck? I got a whole news hell. Someone was tired of guests, but whatever, her guest episode was really fun. Okay, we're going to move on really quickly to conservation.

I brought this up a few times in the past, but we really don't see many more relocations or translocations with grizzly bears. And that's kind of something we can celebrate. because we're at a point where those bears, instead of just being moved, can be removed from the population,

which I know sounds terrible, but it's making grizzly bears as a species much more accepted. When you get rid of those problem animals, people tend to have a better view of the animal as a whole, and that's really great for their population, for the species as a whole, and translocations aren't really necessary anymore, because we used to have so few bears that we couldn't afford to lose any of

them that we would just move them around and they still cause problems. And now there's a lot of bears in the greater Yellowstone ecosystem. There's over a thousand bears in that ecosystem. There's over a thousand in the northern continental divide. And those bears are spreading. Those populations are getting bigger. So we don't really have to use those management tools anymore. And that's actually in a weird way, a success story.

How are they going to do the new bear population they want in the Cascades in Washington? They're taking some bears probably either from Montana or Canada and they're flying them out there. I believe they're going to do it via helicopter was what I last heard, but they might just drive them out there in traps too, and they'll release them and hope that they mate and hope that they spread. So it'll be a number of male bears and a number of female bears. And the hope is just that they stay there. That's like far enough from any other bear populations that it's likely they'll stay in the

same area. But this is kind of unprecedented. It's not something that's been done with Grizzlies, really. So it'll be interesting to see it unfold. Yeah, I think it's cool. Me too. I wish it's helping with it. Yeah, I think ideally they do it with pandas there. Yeah, that would be cool too. They would be very well. Because that would just be awesome, but we'd have pandas for about life. You'd probably have to do it in like Hawaii, huh? Yeah, somewhere with bamboo. Yep. All right. And then very quickly, I mostly, me and Jeff, this is a, a 10-claw animal for both of us. This is like my gold medal winner, 10-clot animal.

Mike, where are you at on grizzly bears? Nine. Nine. All right. Nine. All right. I'll accept it. I like it. I want you to get to a 10 at some point. I don't think they ever will. All right, we'll see. Are they your favorite right now, West?

Yeah, they are. Yeah. Especially after this moose thing that happened. So, yeah. Thanks, everyone for listening. This has been a fun episode to research and share. No problem, dude. I'll listen anytime. Thanks, man.

You know, we should just keep this going then. We've mentioned this before. We're starting to produce more episodes, free episodes. So look forward to that. The format of those episodes might be different from what you guys are used to, but they're all going to be really fun. Jeff just did a fun Borneo one. We've got more interviews coming up.

We've got more movie reviews. and then of course like more attack stories too that's our bread and butter it's what we're going to stick to but we're just finding ways to give you guys a lot more fun content um yeah and our patron and subscriber episodes are going to keep on coming to so we'll have two of those and we love our subscriber community they're the ones that have gotten us this far so if you're interested in joining that community head over to our apple gris club or our patreon and also uh we should have some new merch pretty soon so keep an eye out for that and I'm excited excited about it it's looking cool and a potential new trip in the works too that would be going to india indiana

so keep your eyes peeled for that it would be with naturalist journeys who i guide with but jeff and mike would be along on that trip and it'd be pretty amazing so we're trying to indiana food's pretty spicy right yeah it is like curry and stuff i mean fried fried pickles okay uh we'll see you guys later love you see you love it