00:00:02 Speaker 1: 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. 00:00:22 Speaker 2: An anthropologist at the University of Michigan, published a study this week arguing that ice age humans may have eaten digesta, the partially decayed vegetable matter from the digestive tracts of bison. Digesta might sound like an off brand competitor to metamucil or something your grand folks drink, but this anthropologist says it may have offered a substantial source of calories and carbohydrates. In fact, Professor Raven Garvey claims that a one thousand pound bison would have provided enough digesta for twenty five adult foragers to meet the USDA's average recommendations for proteens and carbs for three days. I don't know what that says about the USDA's dietary recommendations, but I had no idea a bison's partially digested cud could be so nutritious. If correct, Garvey's observations could have important implications for how we understand the behavior of ice age humans. If these folks could harvest their vegetables and protein from a single bison, a prehistoric Walmart one stop shop, it's possible that hunter gatherer activities were less strictly stratified by gender than we previously believed. Maybe instead of wandering around looking for plants to forage, ice age women could have participated in the bison hunt and harvested those plants from the animal small intestine. I promise you this is the case. Basically, everything we've assumed about how the ice age people went about their day is slowly getting debunked, So let's not think that some sort of sexual stratagem was in place. Garvey had met that fresher plant matter was likely available for many hunter gatherer societies, but when plants were scarce, it's possible that digesta offered a way to gain key nutrients and free up time and energy for other activities, which, oddly enough, is exactly what we modern humans do right now. Think of all the drink mixes and meal substitutions that really don't taste great that we willingly inhale in order to free up our time. The price of convenience, have. 00:02:28 Speaker 3: An ult justlimp fast shake for lunch, and feel the difference. 00:02:31 Speaker 2: This week We've got amazing animals, legislation, and so much more. But first, I'm going to tell you about my week. And my week was super fun. I ran over to Missoula, Montana, go Hellgate Knights and join a bunch of motivated and talented people brought together by Pheasants Forever. These people represented a long list of agencies, councils, and nonprofits committed to open space, habitat improvement, and yes, even pheasants, but turkeys and miagratory birds too. I learned about building beaver dams in the absence of beavers in order to restore groundwater, create fire breaks and drought tolerance zones. I learned about rural coalitions that have been formed in order to take advantage of water and grazing restoration programs available from the FEDS in the state. I just felt good to see a bunch of folks doing good work, and also being as how the meetings didn't start until nine am, I squeezed in a few morning turkey hunts. Nothing like calling birds on private ground from the wrong side of the fence. Anyway, I stuck around Missoula for a couple of reasons. One Missoula Club Burger. Two the HHA Wild Night for Wildlife was Saturday night. If you're not familiar with this most excellent organization, Hellgate Hunters and Anglers. It's the type of local rotten gun club everyone should be a part of. Great membership. They show up to the capitol to testify on issues affecting hunters and anglers across the state, as well as fishing game meetings, and they even built a heck of an awesome archery range in town. On top of that, if you ever make it to a Wild Night for Wildlife, the food is really good. Whoever was pumping out the enchiladas, meatballs, impanadas, elk kso cheese dip sandwiches. I'm sure I'm forgetting some things, but it was fantastic. If you live in the greater Missoula area, do yourself a favor and look up Hellgate Hunters and Anglers. Next reason I stuck around town. A bunch of friends I grew up with flew into Missoula, and amongst the many highlights that occurred during the weekend of hanging out with this group on the banks of the Blackfoot, our buddy Dave got his first game animal ever. That damned turkey decided to cross the fence and then made another bad decision when he totally ignored the six foot six inch day of shaking on the ground next to the decoy thirty nine yards the old four to ten with number nine TSS shot. It was all over but the kicking, and I'll be darned if we didn't hear a single until after we completed a several mile loop and ended up right back at the truck. Great shooting, Dave. Congrats on your first bird. I'll let you know what he did with it. Onto the snort report. Ol Snorticus is three years old. She was able to ring in this benchmark age with roughly three hundred water retrieves from the icy cold Blackfoot. She's still asking for more. Happy birthday, little girl. Okay, housekeeping, Remember every Tuesday, the Element Crew and the Buck Truck is on the meat Eater YouTube channel, and by heading to the meat Eater website and signing up, you can win over three thousand dollars in gear as well as a personalized gear styling with meat Eater's own Giannis ptellus all right. Moving on to the wildlife desk, A new study published in the journal Scientific Reports has found that pheasant feathers could be used to determine the presence of heavy metals on the landscape. Birds tend to be more sensitive to talks than mammals, especially birds that are herbivorous and territorial, meaning they eat plants and stay more or less in the same place. Bird tissue can indicate the presence of heavy metals like lead, arsenic, nickel, and zinc. But these Polish researchers wondered if that same information could be collected from feathers, so they harvested tail feathers from sixty four one to two year old pheasants that were killed during hunting season in four forested areas of Poland. Sure Enough, when they analyzed the feathers for heavy metals, they found a strong relationship to soil contamination and urbanization. While they caution that the results are preliminary, this is the first analysis of pheasant feathers and monitoring environmental pollution. It could be a non invasive way for scientists to check the heavy metal pollution over the last few months. This could be a cool way to measure your cock after a hunt against a fellow hunter's bird. We know pheasants like to live on that edge habitat created by farming operations, and the ones that live beyond the site of the barns and cultivation are extra special. So you could determine the wildness of your bird, and thusly how far you ranged as a hunter by how few metals are found in your bird's feathers. Then show those numbers off against your fellow hunter's feathers, and then you'll get it. You know, then you know who's better. In another cool study sent in by listener Carl Kaufman, scientists report that northern elephant seals sleep twenty minutes at a time and average only two hours of shut eye per day. This means that elephant seals rival African elephants for the least amount of sleep measured among mammals, though I do not believe college students and maybe new parents congrats Kevin and Laura Farron are included in any of that data. Elephant seals live in the Pacific Ocean for most of the year, where they spend their days hunting for fish, squid, and other food. During these months long expeditions, they have to worry about keeping their two thousand pound bodies fed while also avoiding predators like sharks and killer whales. It's hard to get much quality shut eye when you're worried about free willy snacking on your hind quarters. So elephant seals dive way below the surface sixty to one hundred meters, where sharks and whales don't often go. Then they relax into a glide until they fall asleep, at which point they hold themselves upright. As they continue sleeping, they float slowly downwards, even farther out of reach of predators. They usually get about ten minutes of sleep, and they're below the surface for about twenty minutes. Scientists were able to track this sleep strategy by attaching caps and other sensors to thirteen young female elephant seals. They use these sensors to track the brain waves, heart rates, and three D motion of five at a lab and six hanging out along the coast of California. Once they determine the seal's distinct sleep dive motion, they could pick out naps in the dive records of three hundred and thirty four adult seals that have been outfitted with tracking tags from two thousand and four to twenty nineteen. Their detailed data also showed them that unlike many marine mammals, which sleep with half their brain at a time, elephant seals shut off both sides of their brains while they sleep. This makes them more vulnerable to predators, but it also gives them better rest. They have to dive down to over one hundred meters to get it, but it sounds worth the effort. I mean, just turning off both sides of our brains is worth the effort. I mean guaranteed you could sell that ability for a premium during the upcoming election cycle. In our final story at the Wildlife Desk, a bee researcher in Arizona recently released a book claiming that bees feel complex emotions similar to mammals. According to a review of the book in the newspaper The Guardian, Stephen Buckman claims that bees can demonstrate sophisticated emotions resembling optimism, frustration, playfulness, and fear. He also says bees can experience PTSD like symptoms, recognize different human faces, process long term memories while sleeping, and maybe even dream Buckman and his colleagues, which The Guardian is describes as quote fringe, are arguing for a more humane and ethical treatment of bees given this apparent sentience. This, by the way, also presents a pretty serious problem for vegans. Honey isn't the only food that relies on bees. Virtually all plants require some form of pollination, and many crop producers trucking and bees from somewhere else for that purpose. Thousands, probably millions of bees die every year during this process, which, if Buckman is right, makes them very very sad. Of course, we aren't yet able to sit a bee down on a couch and shrink its head. Researchers rely on experiments and tiny neurotransmitters and use that data to deduce emotional states. For example, one experiment hit a robotic spider inside a flower, which captured and then released bees when they got too close. Bees learned to look for that spider before landing on a flower, but some exhibited what scientists called PTSD like symptoms. They showed false alarm at safe flowers, scanning them briefly before moving on. Other experiments tracked dopamine and serotonin levels in bees and extrapolated emotions based on that. Whether you believe that honeybees get angry or bored or that's just beeswax, their history in North America is fascinating. Honey Bees are not native to this continent. They were imported by Europeans, and their migration across North America tracks pretty well with the white settlers. They were used for pollination and honey, but they also out competed native species of bees for resources. All bees pollinate plants, but humans have given honeybees an advantage because it's easy to transport box hives across the country. Other bee species, which live in the ground or plant stems, may be native to North America but aren't given nearly as much attention. In fact, you may have seen these bees and not even realized you were looking at a bee. Take a little time to learn what kind of native bees are in your area and do what you can to protect them by planting some pollinator plants. And if you're interested in and reading more about emotional bees, Buckman's book is called What a Bee Knows, exploring the thoughts, memories, and personalities of bees. 00:12:09 Speaker 3: Ladies and gentlemen, please thread these bees. 00:12:21 Speaker 2: Moving on to the animal attack desk. Public health officials in Monroe County, New York confirmed last week that a swift brown fox did not jump over the Lazy Dog, but it did bite six people in one day, and it had rabies, surprise, surprise. One woman was bit as she was walking down her driveway. Quote, I felt this horrible pain in my left leg and I thought somebody was sawing it off. Another resident, an eight year old named Arbury, told the reporters that the fox bit him in the leg as he was playing in his backyard. Arbury's dad used his hands to pry the fox's jaw off Arbury's leg and threw it away, but it got up and went after the boy again. Arbury's dad threw a brick at the fox and it fell down unconscious. Wildlife officials killed the fox in the backyard later that day. There is no effective rabies treatment once the infection has taken hold, According to the Mayo Clinic, while people have survived a Raby's infection without treatment, it usually ends in death. The good news is that if you receive treatment before the virus establishes itself in your body, you'll probably be okay. If you haven't already had the rabies vaccine. Doctors will start with a fast acting shot to prevent the virus from infecting you. That will be followed by a series of rabies vaccinations to help your body learn to identify and fight the virus. If you think you've been bitten by a rabbit animal, see a doctor as quickly as possible. If you know someone who has been bitten, avoid eye contact, fast movements, and get your hands on a silver bullet. In our second animal attack story of the week, a black bear in Canada shrugged off a beating and an entire can of bear spray before stealing and killing a pet dog. Two hikers in Jasper National Park were hiking with their two dogs off leash near a trailhead. One of their dogs saw the bear and ran after it, but it didn't take long for that bear to realize it was much larger and hungrier than the canine. It turned around and charged the dog, but ended up grabbing the other pooch, which was also barking. One of the hikers deployed an entire can of bear spray at close range and hit the bear on the head with the empty can, but it wasn't enough. The bear ran away with the dog in its mouth, and wildlife officials later learned the bear had stashed it for future meals. That kind of aggressive behavior is enough for a death sentence in Canada. Biologists found and killed the bear the next day because quote this non typical behavior indicates a highly habituated bear and increased the likelihood of further negative interactions. In case you're wondering, and I know you are, park visitors are required to keep their dogs under control and on a leash at all times, so you know. Moving on to the fishing desk, and eglut in Tennessee became a minor celebrity last week when concerned citizens made officials aware that it had become caught in fishing line. The nest, located on the Dale Hollow Lake Marina on the Tennessee Kentucky border, was being monitored by a public livestream camera. Viewers noticed that the two eglits in the nest appeared to be stuck, and biologists who investigated later confirmed that both were tangled in fishing line and a hook. They were able to free both eglets, but one of them required additional medical attention. Veterinarians performed surgery on the damaged tissue and joints on the eglit's legs, but the joints became infected with septic arthritis. It is unclear right now whether the eglet will recover. The American Eagle Foundation explained in a Facebook post that it may be able to return to the wild, but it cannot return to the nest. This is just a quick reminder that your fishing line doesn't disappear. Sometimes leaving the line in the water is unavoidable, but do what you can to bring all of it home. Some sweet baby symbol of American freedom might thank you. Moving on to the legislative desk, the Natural Resources Committee in the US House of Representatives passed a bill last week that would permanently remove gray wolves from the endangered Species list. The bill, optimistically dubbed the Trust the Science Act, was introduced by Colorado Representative Lauren Boubert and co sponsored by twenty four additional Republicans. Boubaert, whose name I hope I'm saying right, If not, it's Bobert, argues that the wolf population in the lower forty eight is well above initial goals and that states have proven that they can manage their populations. 00:16:42 Speaker 3: Let's do as my bill says, and trust the bipartisan science and pass this bill so we can finally dalist the recovered gray wolf and focus scarce taxpayer funding on endangered species that actually need help being recovered. 00:17:00 Speaker 2: The legislation would give the Secretary of the Interior sixty days to reissue a twenty twenty rule that delisted wolves in the lower forty eight That rule was overturned by a judge in twenty twenty two, which restored protections for wolves in forty four states. Representative Bobat's legislation would restore the twenty twenty rule and clarify that once this rule is reissued, it will not be subject to judicial review. In other words, if this bill passes the House and the Senate and is signed by the President, the rule could not be challenged in court by conservation or animal rights groups. Democratic Rep. DeBie Dingle tried to pass an amendment removing that language, but the committee voted against it. Here's Committee Chairman Bruce Westermann responding to Representative Dingle's amendment. 00:17:44 Speaker 4: I appreciate the General Lady's sincerity and wanting to work to fix some of these issues. I do oppose this amendment because I believe it puts back in place what the bills trying to do, and that is to remove the Higgins from actually stopping the asciance and the management. 00:18:04 Speaker 2: Westerman points out that Wolf delisting occurred during both the Obama and Trump administrations, and so he believes this should be a bi partisan issue right now that looks more like wishful thinking than anything else. Zero Democrats signed up to co sponsor this bill, and zero Democrats voted for it in the twenty one to sixteen party line committee vote. The Republicans controlled the House by a very slim margin and the Democrats control the Senate. Maybe it goes without saying, but the lack of Democratic support spells trouble for this legislation moving forward. Staying in Washington, d C. Republican Representative Andy Biggs has introduced four bills that are not small. In fact, they would significantly reduce the ability of federal agencies to purchase land to conserve for public use. HR two two zero seven, HR two one five eight, and HR two one sixty nine would defund the twenty twenty four land acquisitions funds of the US Forest Service. US Fish and Wildlife Service and National Park Service. HR two one five three would severely limit the Bureau of Land Management from acquiring public land without a funding cap of twenty eight million, which is less than half of the proposed budget. Biggs introduced these bills alongside hundreds of other proposals. He says, we'll cut the federal budget end quote, eliminate wasteful spending programs. He obviously doesn't have a clue what these programs do. They are anything but wasteful on this issue. Most of Bigg's colleagues in the Republican Party would disagree with him. Three quarters of Congress, including many Republicans, voted for the Great American Outdoors Act, which permanently funded these programs with the Land and Water Conservation Fund. President Trump signed this funding into law, and even though Biggs voted against the Great American Outdoors Act, I don't recall him accusing President Trump of wasteful spending. Get in touch with your US representative about these bills removing funding from LWCF. Keep in mind LWCF was a monument bipartisan act that's barely had time to breathe. These bills are short sighted, perhaps even small minded representative bigs. You can find more info at the meat eater dot com forward slash cow. I have good news out of Michigan. The Michigan Department of Natural Resources announced last week that it had denied a request from the National Guard to expand Camp Grayling's footprint by more than one hundred and sixty thousand acres. We covered this story in detail back in episode one seventy. Camp Grayling is located in northern Michigan and is surrounded by state land used by Michiganders for hunting and fishing. The National Guard wanted to expand the camp's footprint into those areas, which could have significantly impacted public access. Thousands of hunters and anglers weighed in and their voices were heard. Quote. We appreciate the many comments we received on this proposal and the commitment people have to public lands, said Acting dn R Director Shannon Lot. Public concerns and feedback from tribal government's cup with our own review of the proposal, led us to decide against a twenty year lease on such a significant portion of state managed land. The National Guard will still be allowed to apply for limited land use permits to conduct exercises on up to fifty two thousand acres of eligible land, but the DNR says these permits will only be for low impact training and public access will not be affected. Moving on to the mail bag, and this one's from Meat Eater's own Corin Schneider. Canadian photographer Ken Pritty photographed a thirty foot tall fallus shaped iceberg off the Newfoundland Coast. Ken hales from Dildo, Newfoundland, located one hundred kilometers outside of Saint John. I know what you're thinking, and you're correct. Dildo has a long history, as it was named by Captain James Cook back in seventeen sixty, but was inhabited possibly as early as sixteen hundred. Also, you may be thinking that a seashore town named Dildo is fitting because the word dildo comes from the name of a fallus shaped wooden then or pivots against in a rowboat. Look how smart you are. Anyway, Ken is getting some hard earned press from taking the picture of an iceberg that looks like a frozen male member. It has been dubbed Chili Willie and it's floating somewhere out in the Bay of Conception. Thank you. Krin Schneider and thank you to everyone for listening. Remember to write into ask c A L. That's ask Cal at the Meat Eater dot com and let me know what's going on in your neck of the woods. Also, remember to go to www. Dot steel Dealers dot com to find a local, knowledgeable steel dealer near you. They're going to get you set up with what you need and not try to send you home with what you don't. I got my chainsaw charging right now because i know i'll need it as I'm cruising around the Turkey Woods this weekend. Thanks again, and I'll talk to you next week.