00:00:00 Speaker 1: This is Dave three, technically day three of the road trip here, and we're still trying to track down a couple of our block management participants. Were starting to lose steam here because the hanging season, the hanging window. They just got this rain and then the rain let up, so everybody's out hand. And I think between the hang activity and the god awful robo calling activity that everybody is subjected to these days, um, we're fighting an uphill battle and regards to getting ahold of folks. So we're gonna have to go do some door knocking. If this phone call doesn't work out, welcome to Rizon Wireless. Your call cannot be completed as dials. Please hang up and we filed a number including the area code. All right, we are just west or just east to have her Montana dropping off. Thank you for the Montana block management program. And how long have you been in the block management program? I think since in the eighties, so that's a long time. Yeah. Yes, what what's the benefit of the program to you? Well? I like it because the hunters have to sign in, we know what's going on. And then, um, we've had a lot of great hunters out never had any problem with any hunters. And then of course there's a nice check. We all like that, and what do you do with your chair? Oh, my goodness, pay bills? But hey, feed the dogs, feed the cows. And is there anything you'd like to see change with the block management program? Oh? I can't think of anything. Let's make the check twice as much. I would describe this morning as moody. I'm sitting here, Actually we were sitting here snort tonight, are sitting here in the old Black Series camper, which I'm using for the summer, and we're staring out at Lake lwell Tiber Reservoir giant impoundment on the Mariahs. I'm probably twelve miles from where Lewis and Clark camped out out here and eventually got run off by the Blackfeet Indians. Anyway, we're getting a little bit of rain here, and this part of the country. It's great to get on the road before the road soak up any of that or else. Sometimes your trailers get so heavy they can't pull them anywhere because they've picked up all the clay off that road surface. What I'm a tempting to do here is take all of us, all you cow's We can review listeners on a road trip. Montana's block Management program is it's private land public access program. It's incredibly important here in Montana. Over seven million acres of access are opened up and it's a private agreement between a landowner and the state. They do get paid, there's an incentive there, but the public is who benefits many of these places, many of these properties, much of this seven million acres of upland, bird hunting, fishing, white tails, mule, deer, elk are open to the public in the simplest form you can imagine. You'd go up to the signing boxes, you fill out your paperwork, takes about five minute and basically like away, I go way, snort, and I go found rooster, sharp tales huns her first Hungarian partridge, oliver first. Really, we're may have been on Montana's block management. The point of our project is just an additional thank you to let these landowners know that it's not just an agreement between them and the state to let a bunch of faceless hunters come out and roam around on their property. But just like let these folks know that what they do is seriously, seriously appreciated. So the big thank you is we went out and bought a bunch of steel chainsaws, a bunch of visa check cards were two dollars and old snort and I and some friends along the way are dropping these off to block management landowners that we randomly selected across the seven hunting regions in Montana. And I'm gonna take all of us along with us, hopefully get some interviews, talk to these folks, cover these road miles. Think of it as a general appreciation tour. So the storms picking up here. Thanks for listening. Stick with us. Special edition Cal's Weekend Review on the road from Mediators World News headquarters in Bozeman, Montana. This is Cal's Weekend Review, presented by Steel. Steel products are available only at authorized dealers. For more, go to Steel Dealers dot com. Now here's your host, Ryan cal Callahan. Holy cats, a hunting season again? How did that happen? Yes, it's hotter than hades and fires have started popping up across the west. But in spite of the fire the heat, August is the antelope archery opener here in Montana. Soon seasons will be opening in your state in honor of this role of the Calendar. I've decided to put together a super special access episode of Cal's Weekend Review. That's right, this week, we've got private land, public access, what to Know before you go, and so much more. But first, I'm gonna tell you about my week. And you know, I'm recording to you live from Hawaii right now, if you believe it or not. That's all those crickets and lizards and frogs and whatnot chirping in the background. This episode is really based around some awesome interviews that I did in the state of Montana that I've already referenced here on the Weekend Review regarding Montana's block management program and the meat eater program that we threw together by raising a bunch of funds with your help through Teddy Roosevelt Conservation Partnership. We use those funds to buy a bunch of chainsaws. And you know, I cover a lot of this stuff here, so I'm not going to bore you with it again. So let's get to it. What the heck is block management? Now you're going to hear some interviews with both Region seven and Region two access managers for Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks. So I'm Kendra McCloskey. I'm the Region two Hunting Access Manager in Western Montana. In essence, it's a program that the State of Montana works with private landowners to open up their private land to the public for hunting seasons. And it's definitely an annual partnership where UM, we work with landowners to define how they want to see their property managed, how that fits into their their ranch management goals, and we help them build a specific set of you know, map and rules that outlines how they want to see hunters managed on their property. And then on the flip side during hunting season, FWP steps in and helps them manage their prop pretty and that's you know, keeping sign in boxes stocked up, collecting permission coupons, helping hunters navigate where things are, how to get there, UM, and answering basic questions about the rules. Can you camp here? Yes or no? If you can camp here, what do you gotta do? UM. Do you get a lot of questions from hunters in regards to block management, Yes, like how many a ridiculous amount? Like a unsustainable amount? I would say, can you give me example of like how many phone calls you'll get during because there's an official start of the block management reservation season and then there's an official and as well, yes there is. Yeah, So like in that time period and any given year, how many calls will reach into get in regards to block management. So when all of our maps and rules come out to the public on August tent, that kind of starts the kickoff of all the questions real went in. So are access resource specialist Tyler Renfield. He fields between two and three thousand phone calls between the beginning of August to the end of December, and some of those are just general questions. Some of them are reservations that he manages. But it's I mean, his every single day is filled with with hunter phone calls. My name is Travis Machet. I'm the Region seven Access manager for Fish, Wildlife and Parks based out of Miles City. So we're in charge of all the private land access programs in the state in the region UM for hunting, fishing, and general recreation. So block management is the biggest access program I'm in the state. In this region UM we have three cooperators enrolled about two hundred and forty five block management areas. In block management is a private land Hunting Access program where private landowners enroll in agreements with a department to open their private property to allow free public hunting to the public hunters. So each block management agreement has its own set of rules. The landowner decides how they want to permission issued the rules if it's walking, if they're going to allow driving, so each agreement can be a little bit different, tailored to that specific landowner. The department negotiates those terms with each landowner. The hunter's role mainly is to follow the rules in my mind, because a lot of times we lose co operators because the hunters aren't following rules. And make sure you get a map in rules page for each individual B M A because they are different. Rules are on the back specific to that property, and just follow the rules and landowners will be happy. So now that we know what block management is, let's hear from some of the operators as to what you should know before you go. First. One is in regards to invasive grasses and weeds. The rest pretty darn self explanatory. When you get people coming over from west of Montana with leafy spurge or you know whatever, spotted knapweed and it's all over their vehicles. So when they're driving around on us, they're dropping that stuff and you can tell, you know that is coming from the vehicles because it's all along the ranch roads and county roads. So I mean that that's probably the main reason why we don't let people driving in on the on the ranch. If you had anything to tell hunters to do more of or do less of, what would you say? Don't grow hunt, stop in at the property, sign in and get out and walk because you're going to see more game when you get out of your vehicle and walk into that property. It's day on the roads. I mean, when it's dry out, don't be driving all over you know, pastures because it can create a fire. And and if a gate is open, you open the gate, you close the gate. I mean, just be respectful of the land. You know. The main thing too, if you're gonna shoot a deer or something, take the whole deer. Don't just be a trophy hunter. I hope you haven't seen any of you believe we've had some incidences, yeah, her breaking, yeah, but as a whole, everybody's really good. Really good hunting season is also shipping season, and so there's a lot of trucks on the road. We also have hay trucks on the road, and it's it's really not safe any time to just stop and cock off. So that's probably kind of the main thing that we've seen is just being mindful of that and being mindful that wherever you've been, if there's been any weeds or anything, you may be packing those along with you. So just to be cautious of those things. And fire, that's probably our biggest fear. It's fire pretty simple, right, Stay off muddy roads, don't park in tall grass when it's dry, Be respectful of the fact that these ranchers are working, keep the county roads clear. Do your glassing from as far off the shoulder as you can get. Now, what the state is actually able to pay these landowners to participate in the program is historically not very competitive with what others are willing to pay. So let's listen to why a landowner would participate and what opportunities they could be sharing on their property. For the most part, it's it's just to give the local community and in Montana's opportunity to uh come hunt and be able to share that with their families and promote hunting, and what's the big opportunity on the ranch or the thing you'd be happy, yest with folks taken off the place. Elk, we got a lot of them. There's a lot of elk there in the beer pause. You know, we get a lot of deer and antelope on our property. Kind of controls the management of it. UM keeps the antelope. You know, we get a lot of antelope. They do a lot of damage, you know, kind of helps the control helps hunters, you know, where a lot of people are closed to hunting. When we first started block management UM, it was to help the youth hunters as kind of how we got into the program. Well, honestly, for our deal, we wanted to do an easement and that's part of the requirement of the eastment is the block management. And I'm not gonna lie. We were nervous about doing it. We're thinking, man, that is a lot of people, armed, people that we don't know coming on our property, and we're just really glad we did it has been it's been a good experience. It's been good for them and good for us. We've had a lot of locals that have said they have a tough time getting access anymore. You know, when they were kids, they could kind of hunt wherever, and it's just getting harder and harder, and so um, it's just felt like a good thing. What are the species that folks are coming out to your property to hunt? Ours is mostly mule deer. We've got a few white tail, got a few antelope, uh, some turkeys, and um, we've got some grouse. But generally there's easier places to track them down then out there, because you got a hike quite a ways to find them on our place. But um, those are probably kind of the main ones that folks are after. This two thousand plus mile trip was incredible. A lot of Montana had gotten over four inches of rain in less than a week. The grass was tall, the creeks were running, the stock ponds were near full, if not over full, which if you were out here last year, is a very different scene from what you probably saw. There was drought followed by an onslaught of grasshoppers, which had forced many ranchers to unload up to fifty of their herd, sometimes more. They did so at a time when market rates were not good. One rancher told me that there wasn't a blade of grass left on her place, and the grasshoppers were forced to eat the trees. So not only were the farm fields and past years we've ventured through well watered, they were when compared to previous seasons, understocked. You never know what you're gonna get in the farming and ranching game, just like hunting season. Every season, rains change. Here in Montana, just like in your state, we're seeing the turning over of ranches and farms, sometimes to new generations, sometimes two new ranchers, sometimes to recreational interests, and worst of all, to development. Can't grow a big old mule deer buck in a condo canyon. With this turnover, old discussions start popping up as to how to handle public access to public wildlife that spends its time on private ground. Again, the Montana Private Bland Public Access program Block Management has around seven million acres currently enrolled. Seven million acres is a lot. If you were to line up seven million acres and end in one big long rectangle, it would take you roughly one hundred and thirty six thousand hours to walk just one side of that rectangle. So that's just a third of the amount of time you could spend right one to yeah, something like that on Montana's block management. And guess what, here's the best part, best for last, just for you. Almost every single state has a program just like this, a total of roughly twenty nine million acres, a number we can expand on and a number we can detract from. I hope everybody has an amazing start of their hunting season. I hope you keep some of these little anecdotes in mind, and most of all, I hope you remember to say thank you for the access. It means a lot to us. Be friendly, be respectful, pick up your trash, and above all, be safe. Thanks again. I'll talk to you next week. And if you do get stuck at home, swing by your local, friendly neighborhood steel dealer. Look at you, set up with what you need and they won't try to send you home with what you don't. Thanks again, I'll talk to you next week, and don't forget to write into a s k C a L. That's an asked cal at the meat eater dot com. The