00:00:08 Speaker 1: This is me eat podcast coming at you shirtless, severely bug bitten and in my case, underwear listening podcast. You can't predict anything presented by first light. Go farther, stay longer. So Carmen, Uh, what have you been doing? Are you still a biologist? That's a good question. Really, it's like up in the air. No, it's not up in there at all. That's never been up in the air. But as usual, I am just still patching things together. And um, let's see, since I was last year, since you were last in this studio, in this studio, I spent a winter um helping on a new project that is happening in Washington State. It's a big predator prey interaction project. So I'm already interested. Well. Um, so wolves have been returning to Washington on their own, walking in um, just like regular old animals, Just like regular old animals. Not ino, No, not in the back of trucks. Uh. They have four legs and they can travel real far. Can you tell peop where they're coming from? And my part of the state, in the Cascades, they're probably coming down from BC, whereas over in the northeast of the state they're probably trickling over from from Idaho, which are trickling over from the Yellowstone re interduction right and yeah, or and south from from Canada. Um Oh, so you think that some so, but if you think it's fair to say that if you took if you look at Washington State, do you think it's fair to say that some is definitely fair to say that some wolds are coming out of Canada and would becoming regardless of the Yellowstone work from the nineties. But is it fair to say that some are coming from the reintroduction work that happened in Yellowstone in the nineties, from them going into Idaho and then flowing over into Washington. Yeah. So anyway, this has raised questions about what might be happening to um our ungulate populations. There's a big mule deer heard in the Cascades in the Menhou Valley where I live. Um and so that's one of the steady areas. They're also looking at possible cougar wolf interactions, other interactions with other like what happens when a wolf and a cougar get together? Yeah, what happens when they're sharing the landscape? Um? And then over there's another study area over in the northeast area, and there they've got a lot more white tail and elk, and so they're looking at interactions with with um white tail and elk, and then also with cougars and wolves over there and another smaller carnivores too. But to do all this, these animals need collars on. So UM. Anyway back to what I did this winner, I helped put collars on cougars and then we did a deer capture effort so UM. So that was a lot of fun. And then over the summer. Right now, how how is she? How you put them on? There? This is a good time for that. On what how you got the collars on the wolves and the cougars. The wolves already a lot of them already had have callers on. The state does a continual monitoring, so the state's putting collars on. There was also some callers left over from a project I was on a while ago out of Washington State University UM looking at wolf predation UM, and so there were already some callers on from that project as well. So the wolves were that's kind of an ongoing thing. UM. The cougars UM. A woman out of University of Washington. A PhD student is heading that up and she's um working in both study areas, and there's houndsmen in both study areas. Actually Bart George is the one from the northeast with that guy. Well, I haven't um, well, no that's not true. Worked with him on the deer captures. But all right, I'll tell him you got you got a problem with him anyway, houndsmen that were incredible and their dogs that were really incredible to work with. Um. So they we'd just go out when there was um, you know, it was all snowy. So you're using this snow tracking snowmobiling around looking for for cougar tracks. And then and um, if you find cougar tracks that seem fresh, they load the dogs up. They had these cool little trailers stowmobile trailers to pull the dogs out there and set the dogs on them. And they would just work and and find those cats and tree them and then set up nets around the tree and and dart. They can really to catch it because they don't want it to get hurt falling out right, So you can set up these huge nets. Well net isn't quite the right word. It's like a big canvas thing and it's um, it's two of them, and so it's it's around the circumference of the tree. And then you stretch it out. It's probably a I don't know, ten or fifteen foot diameter. You've got a clear a lot of brush for you string this net, probably if there's brushing the way. Yeah, and then then you're pulling it out and tying it off the trees um and you're trying to guess, you know, where where it might fall and and block any dangerous things like rocks stuff like that. Yeah. So anyway, the idea is that the cougar falls into the net as it falls. But if it doesn't, if it gets hung up, then um, the w df W biologist who was heading up the capture would put on climbing hooks, climb up there and and lower the cat down. So but usually it seems like they fell out. That's easy from there. No, when you hit the cougar with the tranquilizes are dark, how long has it take before he dozes off? As long as it was a good hitt and it got a good dose and it got enough I don't know, maybe ten minutes, ten fifteen minutes, and this whole time the dogs are just going nuts and you got to restrain those dogs. He'll tear it at you to restrain them. Yeah yeah yeah. Is that done by like a rifle? Yeah, tranquilizes a gun, yeah yeah. Um and then the um So for capturing mule deer, that was actually really fun. And one of the techniques for catching deer is to set up on their winter range huge um nets, so hundreds of feet of nets, um, and you set them up in topography that might sort of funnel them towards your nets. And then um people hide in snow forts or whatever little fort they can make amongst these nets are kind of set up in in in rows and in various places, so his hiding. Meanwhile, I gotta understand the nets are laid flat. No, No, they're standing up there probably I don't know, ten feet tall and maybe strung together, so they might be a couple hundred feet. Why they're like if you had drift drift nets or something, so you might have um, sort of layers of them like a like a stadium going down a drawer or something. So you're hiding amongst the nets snow fort, maybe a white sheet over your head or whatever, and um, meanwhile there are helicopters or a helicopter driving around and they they pick up deer and sort of slowly gently pushed them towards the nets and the helicopters going and you're in your fort and you hear the helicopter and your heart starts beating really fast, and all of a sudden, there's deer just running right at you. They run into the nets and you had big giant box. They avoided that. They avoided that. It was winter so they didn't have their antlers. But um, we were just coloring doughs like you just wanted the dosh. Um. They leap into the net, they get stuck, You hop out of your fort and um spoon them basically. So you you run up and you start spooning them. Yeah, you straining up, big spoon, big spoon, um, and I mean you're latching yourself onto the back of the deer. Yeah. So they're they're probably kind of down on the ground, you know, tang in the net, and you come behind them. You don't approach from the front, right right, you don't want to get clovered. You come from behind and sort of just give them a big spoon hug thing, uh with your legs as well, and you want I learned the hard way. You want your your weight towards the back, um, because otherways they can get their back feet under them again and they can buck you. But um it actually I'm making it sound harder than it was. No, I don't. I don't think they No, I don't get that sense. I mean it's like it's a strong animal. It's a strong animal. How how hung up in the fence are they? They can get pretty hung up. So you so you spoon them, you've got them, You're you're grabbing their their legs so that they're not kicking once you've got it restrained people. Sometimes they did, sometimes they didn't. Yeah, yeah, just sort of depending on the deer and how worked up they were, I guess. So do you have your face just like really tucked into the side of like the neck so you're not yeah, or kind of in the shoulders so you're not getting headbutted. Yeah, and so you're just you're just yeah, it's like extremely cuddly with with this deer. How hook in one in one set where we were we were, um, they were pulling in small groups of maybe four four or five deer. Um. But we had a lot of people and so dar it hit the nets. Designated tacklers like myself, that was my job tackle the deer. Then other biologists come put a face cloth on or not like an I cover. They just chill right out. Then right, they chill right out. And if they aren't getting calm, and you know, they're monitoring their vitals that their vitals seem a little higher or whatever, they can be tranquilized to just help ease them through that where your goals are not tranquiliz them. Um, it's a pretty fast recovery if you don't, you know, because then they're just going to jump up and hop away. It's pretty fast recovery even with this particular drug. But um, it was pretty easy to just restrain them really quick, slap a collar on, take some measurements, and then they just go on their way. And what's their attitude when they jumped back up again? M hmm, bewildered. I don't know. It looked like a little like whoa yeah, yeah, yeah yeah, but then they quickly pull it together and get out of town. Ye exactly. Yeah. Have has anybody have any of that? Have you guys been checking on any interactions yet there's it too soon. Um. I'm not really a part of that project right now, so I'm not completely up to date. But you're just you were part of the collaring but not part of the monitoring. So um. Well yeah, basically so they as of the end of this summer, none of them had died from anything. My husband actually almost hit one in his giant work truck, but almost one, yeah, exactly. Um, but otherwise as of the end of the summer, they were doing Okay, I talked about this before. They did a big collaring study one time, um up near Juno, and they had a collard moose I believe it is a moose, not a caribou. A collared moose fell into a crevass. It was scavenged by a collard grizzly that fell into the crevasse and died too. And then those carcasses were scavenged by a collared wolverine. That's lots of collars, lots of stuff with collars commingling. Yeah, that's very cool. That's kind of stuff you'll be looking for the study. Yeah, but are there issues in coloring these deer in because you're you're picking them up and really like family groups. Right. Well there, Um, it's on their winter range, so they're pretty dense on the range anyway. But that was one of the reasons they were bringing in small groups. They pick off a couple from a group because we didn't want to get a bunch of callers in a group that's hanging out. I had this very I've changed the story slightly because I don't want to give away information to anybody, but who were having a very hard mule deer season in Idaho and we all, yeah, and pure curiosity. Everybody knows a bunch of biologists and uh. A friend of mine had called and the information that he got was, there are only four color deer left in your unit. I went out the next day and found three colored here in one group. I was like, huh, what are the odds of that? That's like a thing doing this poorly because I found all three in one spot at the exact same time. But Carmen can speak to this better than I can. But that's, you know, the survey strategy called mark and recapture. We'll be like, let's say you in Karmen craping where I'm wrong or add color to this after I exp playing my understanding of mark and recrapture. But let's say you have a lake and you're like, how many while I are in here anyway, okay, and you're going pull the scene through the thing and catch a hunter walleye and put a tag in each walleye, and then over the course of the weekend, you know, guys catch three hundred fish, including ninety walleye with a tag in them. You'd be like, I have a pretty good sense of how many wallye. Or in this lake where we're catching in a sample size of three hund we've got the collared ones. Or imagine you you tag a hundred walleye and then people fish for three years and pull hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of wally out of the lake and no one ever finds one of the tag in it. They're like, man, this shipload a wall in this lake. Sure. So if you know there's in the whole unit, right, there's four deer left with collars and you go find three, I'd be like, amy deer in this unit, yes, which was based on is the case? How's that? Was that a good job? Oh? Yeah, that's a good description of that. The only thing I was going to say is that it might not have been a Mark re capture that. I mean, there's a lot of just thinking along the lines of migration corridor. Um, how these deer moving. Not all the deer moved from one spot through one area to the next spot. So I was like, it seems odd to me that of the colored deer left are in this very small little hillside that I picked out. I want to clear, I didn't mean that. I don't want you think I'm a dumbass. I didn't mean that as Mark catcher. I just meant like as a way to say, like if I knew there was four right, yeah, no, yeah, I get what you're saying. I don't think you're dumb. I totally follow that made total sense. I think this is just a different situation. In my mind, it was probably a different question. Who knows what the question was that they were putting callers out there for. But so, no, they weren't doing a bad job. I don't know. So because I'm like trying to follow your career now, um, as a as a budding is not the right word, as an up and coming field biologist. You're right, now, not like you're not what are you doing right this second? I mean, I know you're right right the second, but where are you? What are you doing right now? Right now? So? Well, are you going to be working on another project? Yeah? I have another one coming up right now. I'm working as a baker making coffees for people. And when's your next project? Come up? In January? Won't be and that's gonna be another dear, dear thing. I've been doing a lot of deer things lately. So over the summer I was doing for the same Predator Prey Project UM coordinating the capture season for fawns, putting college on fawnds over the northeast part of the state as a part of this to see how what UM fawon survival rate is over there as a part of this bigger picture predator Prey project. So did that and then um, yeah, nothing was was starting up and in the area that I live right after that, So I've been just working at bakery, which is great place to be for the fall, and and then next doing another deer capture project totally different. This is with UM Department of Transportation because the stretch of highway that goes through the Mahow Valley apparently has one of the highest rates of road kill deer in the state. So going to be callering deer there and trying to figure out if there are certain habitat variables along stretches of highways where or of that highway where more deer are getting hit. So they're trying to understand if there's like some Yeah, it's a habitat study basically trying to see if we can link clues about the habitat to hire collision rates on the road. So it'll be a state level project. It's just in the Madhouse. So if you but I'm saying it's conducted by the state. No, this is Washington State University and Department of Transportation. So like, what's gonna happen to you in the long Like what's gonna what will happen in the long run? As a biologist in the long run, I'm but you gotta move. Well, that's the thing that I'm making it hard on myself because I love where I live, um and I've worked there for so long and on so many different projects that um, I've gotten pretty um attached to that landscape and just passionate about it, and that's the landscape in the wildlife that I want to be working with and and trying to improve. Um. My husband has a really good job there too, so that's a factor. I have family there, and so I'm I'm making If I wanted to just move around, which I did quite a bit when I was younger, Um, it would be a lot easier to to find a permanent job. But there's you know, it's a it's a tiny place. There's no no stoplights in this valley. It's it's small, so there's not there's not a lot of permanent jobs. Yeah, So I'm just biding my time until something does come up and just patching things together. So I'm kind of unusual. And then I'm almost thirty five and I'm I'm still patching things together doing field work. But on the other hand, that's really what I love to do, is is being out in the field and doing field work. And then what happened, because it's the other thing I wanted to check back with you in because I'm interested in your in your beginning to hunt. Mm hmm, Yeah, So what happened there this year? Yanni said that you said that you had what how did she say? What'd you say? Long? Argueous, challenging. Maybe it was it was a great hunting season, I mean for home real quick though, this is your what's hunting season? What? What? Isn't a word? But you get what I'm saying. I don't know. Yeah, yeah, yeah, um tenth maybe I think so almost maybe I yeah. So I started hunting, Um, I started getting really intrigued and interested. Um. And when I was doing my undergrad at humblest State University in wildlife. Um, I didn't grow up in a hunting family. UM, did some fishing with my grandpa. Whatever. You then you're going to be a biologist? Yeah, yeah, I've always known. Yeah, I was in school for wildlife biology and I always wanted to do that. Um, So I was already, um, you know, grew up camping and backpacking in the out of doors and grew up in a rural area and so, UM, I knew I loved being outside and all that, and I was doing wildlife work and I, um, yeah, I don't know, it's just something about it got me and I wanted to start hunting, and so I just did it. And I took my hunter safety and where safety on Bambridge Island, Washington in the Sportsman clubhouse. Um did that and I went. My first hunting trip was with a family friend in northern California and the Trinity alps Um and he had been backup I'm getting not lost, but close to it. So you're going to school down in northern California, in big dope smoking country down to home. So you're like, hey, man, I'd like to get into it. I'd like to get involved in this hunting. Yeah. So you wind up out on Bainbridge Island. Sorry, yeah, that is confusing safety. Yeah, that was the closest place. No, I'm I'm from Washington over in that area. That was. Yeah, So I was just it was a convenient time location to take it. You're living on on Bainbridge Island, but it was near to where my parents live. I was, I don't know, home on a break or something like that. So you're taking a ferry to go do hunter safety. There's a bridge ocase you're coming from the peninsula side. Yeah. Yeah, we just had a guest down from Bainbridge. Yeah. The writer John Mullam heard him. Just check them out. Um, okay, so I get it now. Yeah, so I was picture, you're taking a ferry from somewhere to go to hunter Safe, you're coming from You're coming from the Olympic Price actin anyway. So I got that and and yeah, I lined up this trip with UM in California. Back down in California with a family friend who had been packing. His family had been packing into this particular spot for I don't know, like fifty years or something. UM, and I was the first woman and I think the only one since to ever go to that to that him on the trip. Yeah, Um, so it was. And that's not by design. I'm guessing that's just by the fact the only ten percent of the hunters in America are women. Yeah, basically, No, it wasn't like no girls allowed, inevitable sign no no on the clubhouse door. No, Hey, there are a lot of signs on a lot of clubhouse doors. That's true. I was at a thing this year. I was at a thing this year where like no girls allowed for real hunting hunting thing. I'm leave it there. Sometimes you know signs that aren't there, but you can tell they're there, And there's sometimes just signs that are there. Now, not that I condone it's easier for me to understand that the signs not there, but it's understood. But it strikes me as really strange when the sign is there. That's pretty ballsy in this day and age. Do you think in a situation where women come and knocking that want please let me read the sign? That's weird. So what happens on this trip? First and last, first and last girl to ever come with these guys. Yeah, yeah, it was the first time they ever got skunked? Man? Really, did they draw a connection? No? But it has always haunted me, you know, because you're here. You know, back in the old days, no women allowed on the ships and stuff like that, So I've always worried that maybe, you know, somebody might have How many people were on this trip. It was just my dad and um this family friends. So there are only three of us and we got packed in on mules, dropped off, dropped off and no black tails. So it was certainly near the coast, and um, it was awesome. I learned a ton and it was Um, it was a great trip. Did you see some critters? We saw some critters. Apparently it was it wasn't the curse of having a female there. It was a really dry year. Things were different, and there had also been an article in a hunting magazine about this spot that previously that it always a lot of good spots, right, and so there were a lot. A lot of people showed up, whereas normally they had the place themselves. So we saw some some deer and I had a blast and I was definitely hooked. Um didn't even get a crack. No shots there were shots fired. I didn't. I didn't have any shots fired, but there was a miss early on in the trip. The family friend that that we were with, my dad wasn't hunting. He was just along for fun, and yeah, my dad doesn't doesn't hunt, so your old man. It was like, hey, that sounds fun. I'll come along, but I'm not hunting. But you're hunting. And the family friend he takes a poke, yeah exactly, and You're like, I got to do more of this. Yeah. And so then I just started going alone um or with anybody I could drag along with me in Washington after that, because I was a Washington resident. So I went um around the plain area in the North Cascades and just dragged my ass up ridiculously. Steve mountains in horrible um vine maple with little to no guidance, little to no guidance. I mean, I'm I'm comfortable in the woods. That wasn't it. But as far it was like someone's like, hey, man, go here, sit on this right, a little perch and observe and you'll see, you know, around nine am watching right that kind of intel no no intel um. But it was a blast, and you know I learned, Okay, crawling through vine maple isn't. There were deer there, I saw them, But crawling through vine maple up these cliffs isn't. Can you describe fine maple? No vine maple is It's kind of like um slide alder, that same sort of idea, where it's just really dense branches that you're having to contour it through, and if you're going uphill, it's coming downhill and you're trying to get oh yeah, like the way all there's branches downhill and girls parallel to the ground. Yeah yeah, exactly. That's a real plant that's hard to fall in love with. Yeah, exactly, So same thing not on this the cocktail of ruby with the trin and these are not there's some nasty country in there, and then you have poison oak. Maybe I don't get so I'm very lucky like that. Yeah special, yes, okay, so so I won't get the timeline. I'm trying to establish the chronology of a of a hunter. Not just that, but we're gonna get into the chronology of a female hunter, the creation of a female hunter. You're comfortable with that, which might not even be a thing I'm gonna ask, but Year one, are you cool on all this right now? Tracking no questions whatsoever. I'm just listening, okay, just want to make sure. If something comes up, jump in. I'll try for sure. Ten years ago, you do the trip now. I don't expect you to have like a like a You haven't kept the hunting journal, have you? No? I haven't, man, I for years kept hunting, extremely detailed hunting journals. It's fascinating to go look at those now I quit. I wish I hadn't quit. Whether what happened, who I was with, where I was. Oh, man, it takes like a lot of energy to do it, but my god, I was I was not too long ago, reviewing hunting journals from a long time ago. And if I had done that, my whole life because a lot of times I'm like, I'm like, man, I don't know. I know this one spile was pretty sweet. I can't remember where it was and I lost my map, But there's honest to goodness places where we went and saw bears spring bear hunting that I cannot remember where it was that we saw him, but I know that was like, yeah, there's a slide up some creek and I just you know, you remember exactly everything, but just like would never be able to walk there again because we checked out a lot of trainages and it's become blurry and time. So now that you need that level of detail. But what happened to nine what happened nine years ago? So the year after the first one, is that what you mean? Um, that's when I went to playing and crawled around and fine, fine, maple saw some deer through the brain nothing happened, Yeah, because they were does Yeah yeah, so didn't see any bucks and you're hunting by yourself. Um that those times I was with some other family friends that I drug along some um, some guys that were younger than me, and they'd never hunted either, And you weren't married at this point. So you weren't hunting with your husband at all. So then, um, I did that, I think for a couple of years, and then let's see what happened doing all those couple of years. Never gotten, never got anything. Were you seeing bucks? Uh? Nope, it just does. But see that's what I'm saying. Why are you still okay at that point? Okay, go ahead and finish what you're saying. I wasn't hunting effectively at that point. I didn't know what I was doing. I knew that I wanted to challenge myself and be having a really hard time, so I was doing that. But because I was crawling through vine maple going up these really steep areas, you know, there's no way to be quiet. You couldn't. I wasn't. I didn't have good visibility. I was just bumbling around. I didn't really know if I walk long enough and hard enough eventually the exactly if I'm soaking wet? Yeah? Yeah? And why but what kept you wanting to keep doing it? Because people like instant gratification? Yeah, Um, I don't know. I was just determined and I I just love being out there. Um were you meantime saying to people a trailheads like, hey, do you see any deer on or you like running into all? Yeah, I was reading books. I was talking to anybody I could, friends that hunted that sort of thing. And when you read books, and the books said find um like a good place where you can really observe the surrounding country. That didn't make sense because you're in thick stuff. Exactly creative, but it didn't match up like what you were seeing, right. But so then I was learning about still hunting, and so I was trying to do that too. Um. But I mean, and this is in Washington. It's a week. You've got a week and a lot of times I did work during the week. So even though it was a couple of seasons, it was like days a couple, you know, going on general firearm right, exactly, general firearm right, not ten years, you got two days a year. No, this was just in the beginning. This is we're just we're only in years nine, eight seven or thereabouts right now, something like that. I don't remember exactly. But yeah, and you're seeing other animals, yeah, yeah, seeing those seeing you know, bears and whatever else is out there. Lions Nope, no, no, not in those years. Nope, not a very opy spot out there. Okay, what's wrong? Sure? Then what happened? Okay? So then, um, I decided to move to the Mahou Valley in the Cascades. Very different scene. It's open there, there's tons of meal deer comparatively, and so I, um, I bought my first truck and it was stick which I had never driven. So I I drove out there and learned stick on the way and pulled into a spot that I had breathed was a Toyota Tacoma. Nice rig. Yeah, and he's got that same rig. I'm thinking, is that a great or down grade? Joannie smaller? Okay, So there you are driving a stick shift Toyo Tacoma yea for the first time. And I pulled into this spot where I'm decided I was going to hunt. Um And how did you decide this? I looked at maps and then I breathe play scouted it and yeah, I just sort of it was a lot of just pulling out of the hat sort of. And still no one has said to you, hey, go do this, no mm hmm. I mean I I learned some from from this family friend on that first trip about you know sitting that. So his technique where we went was to you'd hike to these spots that he knew, you know, they'd consent, consistently gotten deer, and it'd be like a brushy, a little drawer or something, and we'd wait and then if that didn't work out, we'd go somewhere else. But meanwhile, how is it that they're not Meanwhile, why how is it there aren't guys saying like, come hunt with us. Steve is perplexed the universe hadn't offered you all some sort of guidance. Yeah. I also kind of had a thing where I really wanted to do it alone. Okay, yeah, because I could imagine, I could imagine that in a in a small mountain town where men tend to like outnumber women by a lot, Okay, that there'd be a lot of guys would be like, um, hey, let's go hunting. You know, I mean that as a euphemism. I mean there's be like like, oh, you you're like struggling to get into hunting. Come with us. You were rejecting those proposals. I wasn't getting those proposals, know, I mean I just so in the case of menhow I didn't. I mean, I've literally pulled right into the camping spot with all my all my stuff, and where you're getting funny looks like here's this lone woman out hunting, which is just you like, I'm sorry, just like it's not something not that it doesn't happen. It happens, but it's not something you typically see. You see a lot of groups of guys driving around on a truck Chester fried Chicken. That's the thing I see oftentimes. I don't oftentimes see I don't know. I'm yet to see uh, just a loane female hunter or even like a group of That's what I'm saying. I'm saying I haven't seen it, but I know that happens. I know the women right met and hung out with women who do do that. But I'm never out, No, it's rare and have I'm never like out. And I've seen some orange vest across the valley and I'm thinking about how upsetting that is to me, but how it shouldn't be upstaying to me because we're all in this brotherhood together. And then I decided to glass them up through my spot and scope and be like, oh, it's a woman that never happens. Damn sure what it is? The guy? I uh, I think that I'm out in the woods alone a lot for work, and so you don't feel and look out of place. I don't know what I look like, but I do comments. I get a lot of well you do get comments. Yeah, I have people saying telling me to be careful, you know, if you run into somebody or people make comments. Yeah, and I how do you reply to those comments? Well, nicely, but it doesn't. It is irksome. It is. I find it irksome. Um, the assumption that I need to be cautioned or checked in with because I'm out there alone. I wish it was different. I wish that nobody thought I had a second thought about it, which I mean, obviously that's wishful thinking because people are going to have a second thoughts. They don't see it very often. But it's kind of this this self perpetuating cycle of that's a good way important. Yeah, people saying, you know, be careful out there, and so then two women and so then women being fearful to be out there. Yeah, and I understand that because it's like you want to be you want to think like why, uh, why do you have to act like it's unusual, and some old guy is gonna be like, because it is right. I'm sorry that you want me to act like it's normal. But that's not normal. So like we can all pretend, or I can tell you that I hope you're careful right well, or you could say, you know, right, exactly exactly. It's kind of it's kind of you can make the metaphor um sort of similar. I often when I pick up a pocket knife, I am told, don't hurt yourself. You yes, how about when you rassling deer? Not so much. But but the part is when I pick up a kitchen knife, nobody ever says that, you know, And so it's, uh, it's it's this unconscious you know, it comes from a good place. I don't want you to get hurt, but I also I don't need somebody to tell me when I pick up a pocket knife to be careful. I know, it's sure. Yeah. Now, like everyone at this table besides you, comes from a place of incredible privilege in this society, being like you know, white men have like a track record of being in charge of stuff around hereabouts, right, So these sorts of things when I hear about it, like I felt like I have this knee your thing to want to defend the people Like oh, he means, well yeah, but how do you deal? Like when you deal with something like that, you recognize you're like, come on, dude, really like I need to be careful. Maybe you'll be careful because you look like you've already have a heart attack or whatever. You're thinking, like do you are you? Do you get mad at the guy or you just sort of get this like perturbed at how culture is. I get perturbed about how culture is. It depends also on how blatant something is. I mean, I think women probably in general are fairly used to or maybe don't even notice comments like that. But um, maybe because I work in wildlife biology and specifically oftentimes with carnivores and and also hunting, I'm often in an environment that's traditionally male dominated. Um and so um, I am around comments like that more maybe, And I'm also aware of them because i'm sort of constantly, um fighting those stereotypes and those assumptions that people might be making about me. Right, It's easy to walk into like walk into a room with another biologist, and if he's male, people assume that he's a biologist and say, you know, something signs you to him, maybe, but don't assume that I'm a biologist. Have you been pairing any vegetables lately? Essentially, it is culture, because I said, I got my own little story interject here. I used to faith feel that same when I'd be like in a grocery store, when I will stay at home dad doing the grocery shopping, and I'd have my eight months old with me, you know, and people would be like, oh, do you know where your mother and your wife is. You're out here alone in the world with this child. You know. I'm like, come on, you know, yeah, I'm just yeah, I got out of control. Man. It's fine. I'm gonna cook dinner tonight too. But yeah, you know, yeah, and that's yeah. I don't want to make it sound like, oh, this is just I think it is just a it's a culture thing. The difference is the difference is and this is like something that we're talking about a lot in our culture right now. There's a difference between stereotyping that has teeth in stereotyping that doesn't have teeth in some directions that's toothed damaging in some directions, it's just like weird and annoying, right, and in some directions, like with women, has got a whole nasty history too that goes along with it. But I mean, being stereotyped into either gender role is isn't irksome? So yeah? But um so now do you have you ever had you ever been out during these early years of going out hunting? Did you ever have guys that were just outright scamming on you? No? But I didn't. I mean I wasn't interacting with a lot of people either. I was trying to get away from people. And you never had guys make you uncomfortable out in the woods, No, in trailhead or whatever. It was a cute little lady like you. Yeah, but you're rolling that into the annoying Yeah, like that's the annoying not threatening type. Yeah. Um, so let's continue out with the chronology. Okay, I'm gonna return to this and return to aspects of this, not that aspect, but other aspects of of the female hunter experience. Um yeah, sol quick question, do you have a lot of pink stuff on all your stuff? I have zero pink stuff? Yeah, so um m hm um I think in your seven, I did eight, and what happened, well, but we missed. My first big solo trip was when I first letter that. Let's back up, because this was where I learned. I learned a lot um And yeah, yeah, So I pulled into the Manhoue Valley. I'm moving here, learning stick um, starting a new life here. Um. But what was it for work? It was because my sister had just moved there. She was about to have a baby. UM. I knew I loved the area, and I knew UM I liked working in um high mountain areas with carnivores, and it's a really rich environment there with um, you know, links and wolverines and bears and everything else. So so just you're like making a kind of move to a greener pastures, but not some overwhelming, like specific thing. You're chasing it, right, Yeah, And I wanted I'd been traveling around doing different field projects all over the country, and I was starting which I loved, but I was starting to want a community and a sort of set down't I guess, so I just chose that spot. Um. But anyway, this was day one and I pulled into this place where I wanted to camp and I spent the next um eight days hunting every day um by myself and yeah, I'd hyped back to my truck every day. UM. And it was incredible. I got to know this mountain really well and I was seeing I should have shot probably five bucks that trip. Um. I had opportunities. The stumbling block there was just UM, I was really worried about UM. I don't know. It was like I wasn't good yet at no, because it's a three point minimum and I, um, I wasn't good yet. A quickly figuring that out, which sounds weird three times, Yeah, exactly. So it had to be a Michigan six or a Western three point. Well it could be. It could only have one antler doesn't even missues as long as one antler has three points. So um. But I had some incredible moments with Bucks and it was a blast. So you'd see the book and you'd be like there'd be a pause or you just wanted to really extra careful. Sure there was no surprises when he got over there, right. I also had real shitty optics And is this still really thick country? Um? No, no more, it's more open. Yeah, the particular mountain I was on was a little thicker, but in general was more open. Yeah, more the what do you mean, what are the optics? I don't know, off brand binoculars. Yeah, but things that I know now, like okay, if I saw that animal again with my binoculars, now I would know exactly what it was, that it was legal. Um, in hindsight, you feel like there are some legal box Oh yeah, oh absolutely, I know, like I can picture the racket, yeah, exact claim. Um. And also just I don't know that those those It probably is something that people who have brought up hunting don't think about. But for me, the being out there was not what was hard. Figuring out just sort of smart ways to hunt was something I had learned in the years before that. But then those final moments between getting something in your sights and pulling the trigger was for me. Um, that was the stumbling block, just all the little decisions and I had a lot of you know, fears and anxieties about what could go wrong, and so that was a stumbling block. But if I hadn't been alone, maybe I probably would have gotten a deer because I might have had somebody to say, hey, go for it. Um. But I'm also glad that I did that trip by myself. I'm glad I didn't screw up shooting illegal block right yep, yeah, yeah, because you know, as a guide, we'd see that a lot. You know, people have a real easy time getting kind of up until that moment and then when it's just like you'd be like, yeah, peek over that hill and kill that deer or kill that bull, they kind of look at you like, uh, what what now? You know, what do you mean is like pick over that hill and kill that bull? And you're like, well, take about four steps and really slowly with your gun already up, you know, like no one you know, and there's like you're saying, there's like a thousand little things going through your head, and it's, uh, we're kind of coined a term for it, right, Like just those last few moments of like when you really go into like a kind of a kill mode, you know, and everything else just disappears and you're like, now it's going down. Some people lack that decisiveness. Yeah, I was just too caught up in my anxiety about was this going to be exactly right? Was it going to go exactly right? So we were one time. Uh, you know, there's a similar restriction with doll sheep where rather than accounting three points, there's like things that make a doll sheep legal or not legal, like that when viewed from the side, their horn describes the three sixty degree circle, or that both of the land lamb tips, that each lamb tip is completely broken off, or that it has seven annually seven growth rings. So if they're not obviously full curl, it gets really difficult. Then we were hunting with a guy at one time where we observed one, so that's a legal ram, and he stalked it and got up into range and we never heard, you know, the block, and he comes back, I don't think it's legal. Yeah, And then he had he left early, and then we went and refound it and shot at legal ram. It was like, is that yea doubt, But people that have that doubt are It's good to have that kind of doubt because the opposite right that can get you in just is like the trigger happy Yeah yeah, feller right, So I didn't. I didn't get a deer um anyway, started living in But you kept at it for eight days? Yeah, yeah, I kept at it. It was blast. I mean just being out there and actually seeing that many deer compared to the years before where I hadn't been. That was exciting enough. How many miles are you straying from your truck? I don't know. I wasn't. I wasn't keeping track, but I mean I'd be out all all day, hiking around, running into other hunters a little bit, not much. Yeah, that's a little good spot. Um. I've been there since and Nope, I've never seen I haven't spent that much time, but I have never seen that as many deer as I did that year. Um. Yeah. So I started living and working in the Mahaw Valley and um, just hunting every year, just you know, it's a short season. And I met my husband, he hunts, and so we started hunting hunting together. Um, which was which is it's great? I love Um I was let's see, it was the first winner that I moved there. And so I was, um, helping with the links trapping effort and also working at a bakery and making coffee. And he is alignment and his his crew was working in the area at that area of the valley where the bakery was, and yeah, came into the coffee shop. Yeah, and weally like, Um, was it quickly established that he liked to hunt and you'd like to hunt? Yeah, very quickly. Yeah. Um. Anyway, we started hunting together, which was a whole nother journey. Um, just for me, adjusting to hunting with somebody else really was a big part of it, um, like in a negative way. Um. Yeah, I liked hunting alone. I do like hunting alone. UM, but I also like hunting with other people. It was just meshing our our styles and um and yeah, getting used to consistently hunting with somebody else. And I think that you know, now we're married and we've been together for a long time, and you know, when we go on hunting trips, you might you're not always comfortable. You're tired, you're cold, you're hungry, and so when you're with somebody who you don't have to be on your best behavior with, um, you know, you can get squabbly and stuff. But we're it's getting more and more um, harmonious, and it's always been been great to hunt with him. It's um, it's pretty cool to do that with with somebody that I'm not close with. So um but anyway, back to the hunting journey. So we just started hunting together and finally got my my first buck and we were hunting together and it was it was it was perfect. It was a great spot in stock and um yeah, so that was a great experience. And then and so what happened with that? Like, how do you feel about that? Then? Did you feel like finally it felt like finally yep, yeah, and it felt really satisfying. And and it wasn't a huge buck or anything. I was really proud. Did you get up the way you wanted to get it? Like, were you still kind of doing it on your own? No, we were together, but we were working together, so well it felt it felt really good. We spotted the buck ways away and it was maybe an hour of stocking and then and I was out in front and peeked over this rock and the buck was bedded down maybe forty yards for me, So it was so it was it was perfect. Now did you, uh, what was your emotional response? Were there outward manifestations of emotion? Probably? I think that, um, I mean, you know, classic sort of things that you would see. Was it sadness or was it like real jumping up and down happy? It was? Um, I don't. I wasn't jumping up and down, but it was happy, it was relief. There might have been a tear or two. Is that what you're getting at, because I've yeah, I've had the good fortune to hunt with quite a few women over the years, and um, there's a And it's hard to understand. I don't know if it's that it's a freer if it's like a freer sort of expression, or if it's like some kind of innate thing or trained thing. But I find the emotional response, based on admittedly small sample size, I find that the emotional response is often different. Yeah, well, okay, what about this though laid on me? Could that be more that these are people who are experiencing their first steer kill later in life? I think? So that's what. Yeah, that's exactly right. Because the cases I'm thinking of our people being introduced to hunting as adults, whereas I'm hunting with a lot of guys who hunted their whole life and all the shock has worn off. The surprise is not the shock. But you know what I'm saying, All they're like, holy sh it, Yeah, I've seen plenty of man tears out there. Yeah, I have since then. Should I was on the verge this year with my mule there. God is telling me too. You know it's funny. Who was just telling me? They cried and they got something I've seen you told me. Damn your cry. Sorry, go ahead, that's what you think is going on. I think so. I mean for me, it wasn't um sadness. It was just there has been so much build up and then there was the adrenaline going and I cry easily, anyway, I don't, I was not correcting. There were a couple of tears. I think it was just kind of the release of all the all the build up to that moment. You know, I saw Yann he's uh Yan his dad Yeahan, his dad shed a tear when when he got his moves all right, because you got to what I was insane. But I'm just wondering. I'm like, you were there because when people any picture sign your hunting trip, I'm like, we took a hunting show on our right. I see everything. I got an eye in the sky when I review footage, and yeah, Yan, his dad was moved emotionally. Um so sure, I'm not gonna give up though, I'm not going to give up on the idea that I think it's more common. Well, I mean, let me be clear that I think it's a higher I'm not gonna give up on this idea that I think that that there's a higher likelihood. And then I could say, what what factors are at play? A higher likelihood that a female hunter will experience the emotions, not experienced them differently, but like, but the outward manifestations might be different, specifically, there might be tears. Mean, no, I think that a that there's a greater likelihood of of emotions beyond just hell yeah, yeah, yeah, Well okay, here's a little theory back to what we're talking about with gender stereotypes. It's more acceptable in women right in our society, less acceptable in our society. That's what That's what That's what I'm That's what I'm That's what I'm like getting at or wondering about. That's what I'm saying. I'm not saying that it's that it's that I see saying outward manifestations. Yeah, the feeling could be the same, and we only know about what happens when we're present. So whose principle is it just by observing something you change it Heidelberg Heidelberg principle. I don't know off the top of my head. He's talking about someone's uh, astronomy, not astrology, but astronomy. And there's this idea that by observing something, you change it. So it's not really that what that dude was tom about isn't really the same thing, is what I'm saying. What I'm saying is by observing in this interaction, you are changing it because you're a presence. So I don't think that I'm not postulating or I'm not saying that like, oh, woman experiences shooting a deer differently than man. It's just a guy might say. Of the ten things I'm feeling right now, I can tell you the one I'm not going to act on right because guys don't cry or guys don't act like they're conflicted. Yeah, I will act like I'm not conflicted and act like I'm not about to cry. I think the last time I had it, when I killed a big game animal. It was pure um like relief type of tears. It was like day five or six of the Haunt, and I've been just homping some serious hills and was worn out and just fatigued, probably hungry, lost like five pounds that week, and finally it's like standing over at dead elk and just like kind of like crying for no reason, and you're like it's just like the relief. You're like, finally, you know, I got it done. I've been just like pounding, pushing, pushing, pushing, pushing. You know. That was part of it for me that year too, because I had been hunting on the weekends really hard, and then during the week I was working every day, so I'd get up and hunt out behind the house before work, go to work, which was hiking all day, going to um wolf kill sites, and then I come home and hunt more, and so I was just kind of worn out by that. When you're going to wolf kill sites and then having a tough time hunt we ever like, man, these wolves, these wolves have this dialed no because they actually don't really have it died now that I think their success rate is, it's not what people might think it was. And a lot of so going to wolf kill sites, you're going to um places where there's clusters, they've got callers on taking GPS points every two hours. So you're going to places that I have clusters of points. Yeah, it's not like you know something died. You just know that something went on right, And so most of those places are betting sites or just whatever check right exactly. So that much time wolves have been hanging out. Oh it's awesome, and you're following around the same pack and so um yeah, you get to kind of know what what they're doing and what they're deal is. It's really they use the landscape and where their spots are and um and going to kill sites. It's just fun. It's really cool because you're you know, poking around trying to figure out exactly what happened, who's been there scavenging where they actually scavenging there's um yeah, it's fun. It takes a lot of tracking skills, which I enjoyed doing something yeah, which you're probably developed. But I want to make sure you put this thing. I want to make sure you put this thing to bread because I've like, I feel like you don't like what I'm saying or getting at When I asked about the crying. Oh no, no, um no, I'm problem with it. I just um, I just knew that was probably where you're going with it. How did you know that's what I was going with it, because it's um, I knew it was probably expected that a woman would be more emotional and no, no, no, not you. But if you you fit into a bigger, a bigger pattern. Come on, yea, what isatterny carbon into a bigger pattern to have before you asked the question or it got to your point that you sort of could have just pulled a group of people, and then it's sort of been like, what's possibly like a question that we'll get to you know, shit, really, yeah, here I am. I'm not going to sit here and defend myself. You don't need to know. It's not just like it wrong. This is like this. Here's what how I picture this. This is where I get to um, where I get to have a conversation with the person I respect, whose opinions I respect, and I get to ask them all the things that guys wonder about women about hunting. Now I was gonna ask this next, I'm gonna ask it now. The reason being, and this is something that you and I have discussed at length. The honest we keep being told, right, but we keep being told in the media and the outdoor media that there is such a thing as the female hunter and the female perspective is needed in hunting, and which I agree with wholeheartedly. But Janice is always saying, like, but is it really How do we know that it is that there is such a thing. Maybe it's just hunting. Yeah, and that's and there. And I want to like the second part because there in lies the issue. We're saying that it's no different. It should be no different, we should always treated as equals. But there's a lot of people who are very invested in this idea of enhancing, developing, bringing out the female perspective, which they tell us is no different. I'm just staying like, I have my own opinions about this. I'm saying like one might survey the cultural dialogue surrounding women in the outdoors and come to the conclusion that, like, let me make sure I'm getting this right. The female perspective is important, but it's not different. And there's there's tension between those two ideas, but they live side by side like friends. I would say to that a lot of things, not that I have a problem with anything that you've just said, but I have thought, yeah, and I don't I don't know. I'm just feeling like I need to defend the fact that that you felt like you were needing to defend yourself. No, I totally because I agree with you, because I've thought a lot about this obviously. Yeah, I knew you had because even ask that specific question, because and maybe I should have earlier, because I was just wondering, like, how do you spend time like sitting around in the woods when the hunting slow, thinking about this thing that we're now going to get Let's say what I damn sure haven't done, because I have never said all in the woods and being like as a man, I feel this right. Yeah, Well, what I've come to is if there is a special female perspective on hunting, I'm not really sure what that would be. I personally don't feel like I have a a special perspective on it. I feel like where we should be um what people mean when when they say that we should be equal. It doesn't have to do with the perspective, but in how women are represented and treated. I understand that's not the mysterious part to me. I would love to hear you talk about it. I completely understand that. Yeah, so I think it's it's I don't know that anybody's trying to say, um, that women have this different perspective and it's important. No, no, yeah, but that that, but that it's the same at the same time. I mean, I think you can bring different things to the table, but where it needs to be equal is how you're treated at the table, if that makes any sense, right, So I, um, you know, I don't want to be treated in any differently when I'm out there. It would be nice to see equal representation in hunting, you know, if if it would be great too go on TV and and see as many women killing it out there and being inspired by that and being inspired, maybe not even consciously, but just seeing women doing that helps you to realize you can do it too. Um. And and just by the fact that there aren't as many women out there doing it, and that when people are talking about hunting, it's all talking about men predominantly. Um. It just every time kind of reinforces them the stereotype in everybody's brain. Women included that this isn't an activity for us, This isn't something that I could excel at. Can you think of four ORMs of describe for me the ways that you see female hunters represented or how they represent themselves in in media, like like, what are the what are the things that you see? Do you have you have categories of representations? Well, I don't watch a whole lot of TV or I don't look like hunting magazines. No I do. I watch a lot of YouTube hunting videos and then mostly men. But I, um, there was one I saw lately of a woman just out there hunting by herself, high country mule deer, and she was just it was really exciting and cool for me to see, to see that because it was that it was that it happened to be a woman out hunting, but it wasn't the point of it exactly. Yeah, And so then you noticed it and it resonated with you. Yep, I noticed it. It resonated with me, and it um yeah, And she was just she was doing it alone and that was neat to see. If you're watching okay, let's let's say watching YouTube videos. If you're watching a YouTube video and you and you stumble across the video where the point of the video is to point out that here I am a woman out hunting. Does that resonate with you or do you not like to see it? Articulated No, I think it's it's great to articulate it because women are underrepresented. If you can, um, you know, bring attention to the few women that are doing it, I think that that's great. Yeah, it's the um it's just not seeing it as much and not being exposed to lots of women. It. It's not completely normalized, you know, and so that's why people have have a little double take when they see women in the wood. It's because it's not normalized. And it's it's back to that self perpetuating thing where it's not normalized for women to be out there. They're not you know, hearing stories about other you know, their mom or whatever going out there hunting. They're not seeing it on TV. They're walking into you know, hunting stores, and it's getting a lot better. But it used to be that the only camo for women was like bikinis and underwear, and so just seeing those little things daily, it just paints a bigger, maybe subconscious picture that this this isn't something that women do. Maybe they can't do it as well or whatever. But that to talk about camouflage underwear, Okay, there's there's I know what you're talking about, because it's like camouflage, is Fredericks of Hollywood still in business? I don't know's that type of First Light. You guys at First Light make camouflage men's underwear. We make camouflage women's underwear. To why because they are they are a camel line. I'm not gonna go find that. I just want to know because I don't know if I was dated when I it's very dated to point it out, but I just want to make sure I wasn't even so dated that it doesn't exist anymore. When it started out, you know, very small company. I want to interrupt my own and I want to go for it. Hold bear with me for a minute. This. I want to get back to this. But I just really need to This is a question I've had to. I need to pursue this for a moment. Sorry. So, I mean there are and we're at shot show. We'd be right across the way from Remember when we were in the corner it shot the booth right across from us with like the sexy camel Yeah, you know, like why do we have to be But okay, but when it started out for us, uh, you know, very small company and we have we would die Marino wool. You know the uh what's now a conifer not green black dry earth um and uh fusion right without really knowing what you're gonna make out of it. But you have to at least get to your m o Q, your minimum order quantity, just to get the stuff produced. So we got to this point where like, well, we gotta make everything in everything just to hit our m o Q. And that's how it started. But I was like, why the hell are we making camel boxers? The thing is they out sold the solid colors. Now who is buying them? Is it a dude buying them or is it? And I always said, you know, it's grandma buying like it likes camel needs new underwear exactly. But the thing is itself. So now it's it's there, dude, I had. So I had a pair of your camel boxers on. First off, I put him on, and my lovely wife pointed out that did not let that go on observed, uncommented on. She had to comment on her surprise, and we had a little laugh about it. Then in the middle of night, my two year old comes in our room because he is wet, and now that's not doesn't fly with him anymore, and he's gonna let someone know. So I hop out of bed in my camel boxers and I'm trying to be like because Jimmy and Roles, you're sleeping and mean be quiet, and he is screaming, what's that underwear? What's that underwear? It struck him like yeah, but we're trying there day a little kids, know would be afraid of snakes and spiders. He knew that he had not encountered underwear like that in his day, and it really just wrong me, Like, you know what, I don't know what is that underwear? So people really do want they want it, and it's everything, but it's boxers. So it's not like like I can see a guy dude hiking him too. I can see a guy a guy likes to hunt. It's Christmas time and he gets his wife some stuff that she actually wants, and he's like, yeah, I knows, for fun, I'm gonna get her some camouflage linger just to have a laugh, right, And so he would buy the camouflage later. But that's not who's buying technical Marino technical underwear. Yeah, I truly don't. I'm from the dude who buys his lady lingerie and camel. Oh just okay? Who has going to both ends of the spectrum and articulating here? I don't understand any of it. So yours puzzled and and everybody is too. But the thing is it's it's great for me because when I go on a trip, I'm like, yeah, we're the black Ones for five days. Now I can move on with new the camel like I go back to the Black One. Long trips like that, I find myself. Yeah, I'll change my said while in I'm like, if you balance the days, I should really go back to the dirty pair, because I got four on knows and six on these. Jump back to my dirty put it? What? Um? Can I see your underwhere? Real? Quickly? We'll call you running? I don't know. I think gray, solid gray, not a real tree blue? You have like a fish cut? Oh yeah, there's fish and deer on there? All right? Where were we? No? Okay? Um, I'm glad you stopped and we didn't go all the way around the horn on cal Do you got fair of camels? Then? I know? On firmost basement, so freeze. I'm sorry? How did what came up that I that I needed to well, uh, the camel section in some of these big walking into a camel section. But do you really there were no female Yeah, I'm sorry. Karmon's point was there were no female hunting clothing hunting clothing. But would that actually bother you? Well? Yeah, what reasons? Why did that bother you? Well, first of all because of what it symbolized or because it was impractical, both both because it was just you know, going and be like, really, this is all there is is bikinis. There's nothing here for me. The store that had men's hunting apparel and then women's bikinis exactly, there might be a couple of items for women, but pretty you know, it was maybe a rack and then a rack of like camera underwear and stuff for women and be targeted towards the men shopping in the store. Right, Yeah, I actually might now that I think about it, I think I'm buying my wife as seat of these for this Christmas. Let me know, no, I mean the other call the bikini, not the kind you guys have. Ok let me practical set um yeah, just you know, just too it's free country yep um. Okay, So it bugged you because of what it symbolized in did you look at it and think this? Did you ever look at and go well, I guess it makes sense because because a lot of companies don't make left handed stuff, and that's a higher percent the high percentage of the American population is left handed than the female percentage of license hunters. I get that the frustrating. I feel burned when a company is not making a left handed product. That's tough, But I don't feel burned by what it all means, right well, because right yeah, because they've got nothing. Please, I'm not equating being left handed being ye yeah so um but yeah. But it's still frustrating because part of that is that's that feedback thing where when all signs are pointing towards women don't hunt and not encouraging women to hunt, there's not going to be women hunting, or not many women hunting, So there's not going to be many clothes sold for women, so there's not going to be many women hunting, and on and on. So do you think that a woman would actually not because I see this mentioned though, then that that's a barrier to entry. I have a hard time picture that there's in the history of this country has been a woman who is like, uh, man, I would love to go hunting, but I just can't because there's not specific female hunting close. There's no way that's happened. No, no no, no, yeah, but it's it's it's stacking all of these little signs up together. That's, hey, we don't want you here. Yes, I believe in that part. I believe in the the accumulation of these little girls allowed exactly accumulation of unwritten notices for women's entire lives. And it's not just women don't hunt. It's little cues their entire lives from when their baby's on too, be careful, don't take risks, um, don't be outside alone. It's kind of it's more than just don't hunt. It's it's a stack of cues that we're getting our whole lives. Are you getting it from your family you personally? Um? No, I mean my my um. My parents are very adventurous and always encouraged us to do whatever we wanted. My sister and I, Um, you haven't felt it like that disapproval from your father? No? No, no, no no, no no no no. My dad's a botanist, and so I grew up out in the woods with him all the time. Um My mom, they you know, took us backpacking and everything else. And my mom, um, my mom is an artist. Um her main medium is cow intestines and yeah, or pig. Um what is she doing with these intestines? So it's or fish skins or lots of different sort of um, organic media materials. And it's so it's not like creepy or creep vibe at all. Yeah, No, it's actually really beautiful. She does sculpture stuff and it's um. She takes the gut and and um slices it up so that it lays flat and dries it either around a form or dries it flat and then and that's her medium. Like you know, I don't know, paper would be or something. So she might stretch it around a frame of sticks that are made into a boat or um, make it into like a book, all sorts of things. What's the UK what's the word? You know? The Walter skin. Yeah, that was part of the inspiration for for those boats that she didn't think. Yeah slightly translucent, yeah exactly, Yeah, you can you can see light through it. So anyway I grew up, I'm just yeah, So she's not exactly a stereotypical to her on next time, she's great, yeah, I'll throw out a chunk of gut. So I grew up in a house where you open a yogurt container in the fridge and it might not be yogurt, might be a little scraps of meat scrap, It could be gut, it could be or whatever. I mean. She also she was actually, uh went to Humblet stay tuned. She worked in their vertebrate museum and skinning and stuffy animals and so so she wasn't gonna tell you. So she's not going to tell you that girls shouldn't be out cutting stuff up right exactly? Yea. All right, so you had a you had a I want to say, a typical but yeah, yeah, so it was. It was a science biology focused family, you know. Um yeah, No. The next thing I want to ask you about what when you see Okay, now, because around the subject of apparel and gear. All right, Um, when you go into a sporting goods store and they now have a full line of female apparel, but it's all got a bunch of pink stuff on it, are you thinking, thank God? Or are you like man? Do they overcorrect or is it some other kind of like I don't really know what to make of this. It doesn't need to be one of those choices. But you get what I'm saying. Yeah, yeah, the pink stuff, I mean to me, it's um is it actually technically good gear? Does it work? I think that um, it kind of gets back to that where women in the field and that special but we want to be equal. If um, I think that I'm a quite feminine person and I'm not gonna all of a sudden feel comfortable wearing UM. I mean, I'm not gonna wear like really man macho clothes just to fit in. I'm gonna wear what I feel comfortable with when I when I work with in the field, which is most days. I mean, I'm not dressing in any sort of macho way or anything. I'm wearing what I what I feel comfortable in. And so if women feel more comfortable and clothes that have a little bit of a feminine flair, um, I don't personally have any being cameled, but if that's what feels comfortable, I don't. Yeah, I don't need it doesn't make you nauseous to see it? No, I mean, if it it my to my I look ridiculous, But I don't. Whatever anybody wants to wear, if it works and it's comfortable and it's practical, yeah I don't. I think you can be feminine and be a badass in the field at the same time. Last year, Wisconsin and maybe some other states, Johnny, you might know the answer to this. Yeah. I think a few others I don't know who pass some legislation. Montana, did they pass some legislation? I know what happened in Wisconsin. It is one of the rare things where the all the politicians Wisconsin could all agree on this, and it was like a quick together and it's a quick, easy thing to decide that. Um, the reason women are out hunting is because they just don't like blaze orange. If you allow them to wear a blaze pink, they would flock to the woods. So once this problem was identified, they quickly got in and pulled together and and legalized blaze pink. Like, when you hear about a rule like that, what do you When I tell you? That, what do you? What jumps to your mind that that's really ignorant and ridiculous. That's not the problem. Yeah, he only has the problem No, absolutely not. I mean maybe you could make it into the problem sort of symbolically, like, um, we need to make the hunting the image of hunting. Um says no girls aloud and saying welcome. Yeah, but I don't know. Here's the problem I had with it. Half with it. I don't think of blaze orange as being like a man color. If you, to be legal, had to wear a face mask with a mustache painted on it, okay and one, And that was just how it always was. So anytime a woman wants to go out in the field, she has to have a mask with a mustache. And later states like, man, I just feel like the mustaches are a bit much for the female hunters. Let's pass a law saying you can wear a mask with no mustache. I'd be like, yeah, that's a that's a great idea. I agree with this new no mustache law because a mustache, when I see it, exceptions aside, screams man to me. But I don't think of blaze orange is being gender specific. Yeah. I don't either. I think that that was kind of a, um, not great idea they had. Yeah, I would really be surprised if that changed anything drastically Okay, there's no scientific data, polling data whatsoever to back that thing up. No women were like, oh, bro, I'm dying to hunt. Ain't doing it in blaze or no, Nope, not for me. I mean very quickly when and I mean I've seen this. And that's why this law was very irksome to me. I wrote a few letters on it. Um, what law the pink? Yes, you got you wrote letters about it. I didn't care that much. It's just an email these days, I got a lot of email addressed a long while. Um. But so we put together a women's line. We had a panel of fifty women from young to old. Uh, skinned wide, all across the spectrum of um of skill level or days in the woods, I guess. Uh. And that's how we developed our line. And then and we decided that we were gonna have any pink gun anything, right. And when we launched it industry facing at shot show and we're showing it two buyers for all these stores who are overwhelmingly male. Very often we would get, hey, this is really nice, but you know what you should do. Put a little pink on there. This is for you. And they'd be like, huh, a little insider info for you guys, helping you out, you boys, and idahol might not be aware. And this, yeah, the blaze pink laut it is the same thing. It's a bunch of dudes being like, all right, what they want. And that's what is irksome about the pink is that it that that is their idea of what women are going to want or what it makes them comfortable or something. I mean, if it is, that's great, but um, it feels a little bit frivolous to think that that's what's you know, that was the problem. I just don't like little things like that, tying down valuable time when any form of government is in sessions. Yeah, there's a few other things there. They want to go with some slam dunks now, and yeah, they definitely do. And you know, Wisconsin. I always love Wisconsin because they went from having a case law where you had to have your gun in a case to be in a no case state. Now you just put your gn the bad you don't gonna have a case. So the place has my you know, undying affection. So they know all the slam dunkers that they get through. I'm behind some of them. Yeahy are you typing down thoughts that you'd like to ask Karmen? I was reading up on how the blaze pink thing got started and just seeing where like the genesis of it was all right, Karmen, Now is there anything now that we've had uh, and we're the guys here might have more? I've asked a lot pretty much all of my ask a woman questions. Do you have questions that you've ever wished you could ask of a guy about these subjects? Mm hmm? And it could be like it, could you keep mind you're not gonna insult me. You could ask a question that that betrayed a you know, that might betray some level of ex aspiration with the way guys look at things whatever, Like I won't take offense, But is there ever do you have any like burning questions about why do you guys always have to blink? I think I would, I mean, I I think I know the answer, but I would ask men to think twice before they maybe even just sort of subconsciously are if they're in a situation with a woman outside um telling her to be careful or I don't know, to me be more encouraging of actually taking risks and putting herself out there and you don't like the protector stands. I mean no, not beyond what anybody would you know, watch their buddies back out there. Um yeah, well it's like the pocket knife thing. I don't need somebody to tell me to be careful with it. And I or, um, you know, I used to go I'm a runner, and I worked in the South for a while, and for whatever reason, this happened even more there. But I'd be running at night often and men would constantly stop and you know, asked me if I needed a ride, and wasn't I scared of bears exactly exactly, and I'd be like, no, I'm not scared of bears. And in my head, I'm thinking, but when people slow down and stop like this, this is what yeah, yeah, I'm getting kind of yeah. So um, I think it's it's not even conscious for a lot of people, but this sort of just protective. It's not even that it's worry that's palpable from men. I'd rather just be assumed that I got this. I'll ask for help if I need it. We kind of covered this early, but I just want to help a check on something. Do you feel that when a guy does that thing the little lady, you know, I don't know, it's dangerous are here. Do you feel that it's a that it's coming from an honest place normally, or do you feel that it is a way of that it is a way of like asserting a sort of dominance. Is a little bit strong award, but it's a way of like letting you know how he feels about what he's seeing. Or do you think it's like he's honestly concerned about my well being? I think that it's usually from that place of honestly being concerned, but it's it's it um is coming from that's it's coming from a naive place um, and it comes off as sort of patronizing. So yeah, yeah, yeah. Every conversation I have on the trail with an anybody ends with have fun, be safe. Yeah kind of be safe. That's like see you later. Yeah yeah, but I say it to everybody day. We're a tricker treating we trick or treated the fire barn. As I walked off, I was like, thanks a lot of guys, be safe, man. Now, I don't think those guys like that guy really patronized us. It's just it's like a sign off. You're telling me all these kids can't be sweat like when I when I like my body is taken off, I give him the finger. It's just like I'm just saying, you know, be safe. You're saying, what's up? See you? And that's kind of I mean, I totally give what you're saying, and I say, you know, I tell people to drive safe, be safe whatever, all the all the time. So it's not that's why these things are. It's hard to describe and hard to talk about because I couldn't probably point to every single instance and be like he was being really I mean, sometimes it's blatant. You can tell that they're talking down to you or patronizing it. But I couldn't um tell you the motivation between behind every one of these events. But as when it's your whole life and it's it's a pattern, um and it's just they're they're just slight things that um you might even be questioning like what what did you mean by that? But it's it's um hard, it's it's hard to maybe put your finger on what the motivation was because there are so many people who are just you know, be safe out there or whatever, And it's totally coming from a good place. But it's the it's the pattern of it. It's a it's stacking up over living and growing up and around old men and hunting camps. You're like, very real and happening all the time. There's a word. It's not new. Um, it's kind of coming into its own now where you'll see it like all the time. Uh. Like the word man splaining you're familiar with, does that bug you? Man's plaining for people who don't man's plaining is there's this idea that men explain things to women differently than they explain things to men, where they explain things as though they were talking to a dumb child, yeah, or just as assuming even that just that it needs to be explained, little lady, let me tell you the r the dose and that. Yeah, I'm I've just learned that word this summer. Um. And funnily enough, a woman was describing it to me and then a man splained man splaining to me right there. Um, But it is a good word to describe something had a man's plain man splaining Yeah, yeah, no, yeah, that's bother some. For example, this just a couple of weeks ago, my mom and I were out hiking and ran into somebody coming down the trail and he stops and we're chatting, and I interrupted him to because there's a peregrine falcon and I was pointing. I said, oh, look, peregrine falcon whatever, and he says, Nope, that's actually a h Harris hawk um and starts describing to me that I've misidentified it. And he starts telling me about this hawk and he was totally wrong. It was a falcon and I but you know, I didn't want to get into it, so I just let him man splain it to me. But both my mom and I, she's a great birder, just internally rolling no. And he started to get into well, they used to be called uh, and he started to say swamp hawks, which is not correct. It's marsh hawks. And I sort of corrected him there, but he didn't didn't even catch on that maybe I knew something about what I was talking about, and he continued to So you guys were having a little know how showdown. Yeah, I mean, I basically just let him go on about it, let him be a guy. Yeah, but my mom and I definitely afterwards were just like, yeah, so the you and your mouth, you and your mom, it was enough union mouth. Then later oh yeah, we talked about it later. It was so blatant and he was so wrong. We were there there. That's what I'm talking example, I'm talking about a woman in the wood. Yeah, yep, yeah, that's the experience. Can't be Yeah, yeah, So I think we don't know if we covered it or not. We kind of you kind of said I like when you said, like, you know, we bring it, might bring different things to the table. We're gonna be treated equal at the table. So you've had like a lot of honey experiences now with guys and as a female if you much with other females. Nope, no, But like, so do you do you feel like is there a different experience to be had there? I? Um, I mean I certainly cannot speak for all women, and I um, if there is, I haven't identified it, or I don't feel like I in particular bring something special as a woman. I think, yeah, none of it has to be special, but just not blessing that you're not blessing the woods with your presence special or like changing hunting in in any way with some fresh female perspectives that the deer you shoot feel better about having been shot by a woman. No, I don't think they give a gentle hand. Sure glad it was lady that blew ahold through my side Jesus hot and cold. That was like my big takeaway when I sat around chatting with the gals from the office, Brittany and Nicole and Annie. I don't know who else is there that time, but it's sort of like we went through like their year of hunting that fall and were kind of having the same conversation. In the end, I was like, yeah, it kind of sounds like you just had all a bunch of like beginner like hunting stories this year, you know. Um so yeah, cool, thank you. Yeah. I mean maybe there will be some women out there that do bring a special feminine perspective, and I'm look forward to hearing what that is. But I don't feel like, yeah, I just don't. You're not hostile to it. No, I'm not hostile to it. Okay, I forgot one thing I forgot that asked we started out so you know, have go in great detail. This year was a shitty hunting yeard or no, No, it was great something, Yeah, I did. Yeah. So this year I shot a buck all by myself, UM alone on the mountain for the first time, which was that felt really good working. Uh No, he was packing for our trip to Idaho because we went, so we did. So this year's story was we did um the high hunt. So in Washington there's in September there's a week long high hunt UM and that was really it was a really fun year. It was hard because we were having a UM huge wild fire. It ended up burning two d seventy thousand acres, mostly in the Satan Wilderness, which is our big wilderness area to UM to hunt for the high hunt. That's where we've hunted before. Can you explain high hunt? So that's it's in certain only in certain wilderness areas. Wilderness areas tend to be the highest nasty portions of the fort. Yeah, there might even be an elevation requirement of like you guys talk about Colorado, it has to be above in the rags called the high huntin I think they call yeah, yeah, and right, But have you ever heard like, like what's that Colorado hunt where they you cannot hunt below ten there's like an early season mule deer wilderness tag and it's for ten thou feet and but I think I could be wrong, but I feel like these do they say that, It just say wilderness are is what happened to be real high I I don't remember. I don't know. I think, well, in our area, yes, we're fine in all of our all of our wilderness areas where you can hunt, but I don't know about other areas in the state if there's an elevation thing. Um. But anyway, so we kind of had to be on our toes. So we ended up um hiking into areas that we've never been in hunting and UM, we had a blast. It was it was awesome, but neither of us had the stars a line to get a buck. Yeah, yep, we saw bucks. Let's see we went. We actually ended up backpacking into three different spots. Um. In the first spot, I think we saw four And why couldn't you get one because you're seen them way off? The first we saw a little um there was a little group the night before opening and they were way off. Went up to where they were for the opening day of the high hunt and UM ended up jumping one buck and and didn't see any other that day, and then I saw another one that trip uh just for a second and it disappeared into into the trees. Nope, we didn't see any other hunters. That's That's one of the really great things about the High Hunt is there's a lot of people coming in hunt in the Okanagan in Okanagan County. Um, because it's great. There's a big you only heard there, but you have to work to get away from people. Um. But the High Hunt kind of does that for so. UM, then you guys are gonna go hunt Idaho. And he's like, I'll pack you hunt. Yeah, so well, so that so we did the High Hunt. We hunt it really hard, had a great time, didn't get any deer, so then we both could still hunt during general because if you get something there the high Hunt, you can't hunt during general General. We backpacked in pretty much did another high hunt um, and my husband got a deer and um, so that was really fun. And then we we came back from from that particular trip and had a couple of days before we left for our Idaho trip and so um, I wanted to just hunt to the bitter end, so he had to pack and I just went off hunting by myself. Just behind our house there's a bunch of state land and UM found a little buck and uh and I I stared at it and I had so now I was in that position again of here's the last couple moments where you're my mind was racing and having all these doubts, and I just uh finally told myself that I'm I'm gonna have these doubts every single time. I just need to pull my socks up. And and I knew that I had it, you know, part of my brain. I just needed to shut those doubts down and and I did it and I got it. So so that felt good. I felt like a hurdle I finally cleared. So do you're all by yourself? Yea may having doing getting through those those final moments by my by myself with yeah, without somebody you know saying you're good, go for it. So yeah, so we got so I got that deer. And then next day we left for Idaho and UM and that was an incredible trip, really worked really hard. Um I only had an elk tag and my um husband had an elk and a deer, and my brother in law did as well, and they both got nice mule deer, and um, we never caught up with the elk, but we we learned a lot about the area and I had a blast though. So that was a really cool trip too. Yeah, oh yeah, And he presented it to me like it was some kind of disaster. Oh no, not a disaster at all. I mean we worked really hard, you know, maybe that's the part he caught us arduous. Yeah, we were hiking in you know, I think our first camp was thirteen miles and in and we stay there and hunted hard. And it's I mean it's rugged country and uh in the Cascades. So but yeah, what time do you hit that hit Idaho? Uh? Last week of October? Yeah, yeah, And it was for me coming from Washington going there. The number of deer that we were seeing it was insane and some big wide open, some big wide open. Yeah, and just it was so cool to be seeing that many bucks every day. And it felt like compared to our bucks that I'll tell you what, if I was playing are all out of whack. I haven't heard enough where I know. If I was playing the Hunting Trip, I would be headed to screw Colorado. Just unbelievable. Amounts of bucks everywhere. You look like you trust Carmon because she's a woman. He was talking about Colorado. They're forecast to know about the gentler sets that they do not. Okay, I'm not saying this is this is everywhere. Any comparison in comparison. So yeah, in comparison. Can't trust these women. Everybody knows that can't. I'll be careful out there. There's a lot of big bucks out there. It could hurt you. What are you doing with that pocket knife? I shouldn't have that. Who gave that to you? Um? So it's all the grays. You guys are eating all kinds of deer meat. Yeah, a lot of dear meat. You guys eat muliar. Then you guys are eating mule deer, right. Mostly guys like the flavor. I mean it is so that first buck that I got was a buck. I mean, as I was walking up to it, I could smell that that goaty smell that was that was a strong one. But it wasn't. Oh yeah, the whole thing tasted goaty. Did Yeah, I did, what do you call it? Goadie like kind of a barnyardy sort of Yeah, And that year it was ruddy from a Yeah that year, Yeah, yep. You could smell it as it was cooking, as I was cooking. Yeah, yep. And that that year's still tasted fine, right, I mean it tasted strong. I mean we ate it. It was really but yeah, so just walking up to it, you were like, holy moly. Yeah. And that year, um, hiking for work, there were least two times when I smelled a buck before I saw it. Really, yeah, this is real barnyard goaty kind of smell. But the Idaho ones I heard bucks are great and Idaho all the bucks we got this year are delicious. But they were not they you know, they didn't you couldn't smell them when you were up at them. They weren't already smelling. Yeah. Yeah, what was the date of the one you shot in Washington? You felt, was like right, it out pretty good? Um, it was it was mid October. That was a strange year. That year is what a lot of people in the valley referred to as the slaughter of because for whatever reason, bucks started migrating down into the valley earlier. Maybe because it was a really dry summer, I don't know, but um, they started migrating down really early, and um it seemed like they started getting ready earlier and they were just it was a slaughter. So people were killing show up everywhere, right, Yeah. Yeah, this pass hunting season people have done I think pretty poorly, it seems like. So it's just one of those things. But yeah, well congrats on your first solo deer. Thanks. Yeah. Yeah, it's about as small as a deer as could be legal in Washington. No, no, not this one. No, that was yeah, this one, that one, So what's the new one? So that's a just tiny, delicious buck. Yeah, alright, good. I thought you're saying you got a whole bunch of eating a head of you know, that's all behind you know, ye yes, polish it off. Now you're moving on to the good one. Yea. And then have you guys eaten any of the meat off the box that were killed in Idaho? Yep? They're great? Yep yeah yeah, Kale, I'm just ask if you had any final thoughts. I'm just wondering, Uh, where are you taking me hunting next? Now? Your place is burned out. I'm so sorry. I'll tell I'll answer that, and I have some thoughts and questions but I'm gonna not do them ungradulation and uh, lots of milestones to come huh. And obviously, uh, when did you guys start going out of state for hunts? Uh? My husband has gone elk hunting for his whole life out of state. Um, this was my first time. Nice. Yeah, but adding some more days to the year, Yeah, that's a big thing. Yeah. Does he does he kill elkin Washington too? Yeah? And then real quick, I'm going to ask you this before, Um, would you do you have interest or not in bear hunting? I don't not an invitation, I don't personally you're a baker. Oh then the bear fat Yeah, yeah, I've done that with a road kill. No, it wasn't a road kill, was a bear call. I've done sweet good. But I just, um, I think we may be talking about this last look at it and see a game animal. I've just yeah, I've done so much bear work, and you know, cub counts and you're dealing with their cubs, and I just just special. There's a lot of people I know that are lifelong cold blooded hunters. You just don't want to hunt bears. Man. They're like a lot of guys I know they got a bear too, and my brother put it, uh, one of my brothers put it. He quit bear hunting when he got a bear and walked up to it as his first sort of feeling because you know, the hide is beautiful, right, so you can't ditch the hide, but it's expensive to get him tanned. And you used to be like sweet, you know, get the bear, get the eat the bear, have a bear rug or bear hide for whatever. He said. He walked out to one and his first feeling was oh man, and he's like, then I just knew I was done. I just knew well the minute I calculated, like I gotta spend money to get the two thing tan because it'd be wasteful to that. And he just took that as his thing. That wrapping her up on bear hunt. Yeah that makes sense because and you guys chime in obviously. But you're seasoned hunter now, right, like ten years doing things a hard way. That was a girl, and you've got some successes, right, I mean, do you feel like, um, now you're kind of working up to something else. Um? Yeah, well, elk I'm really looking forward to getting my first elk um. We always putting for all kinds of tags. I'm I really want to go moose hunting. I'd love to go sheep hunting. There's tons of things I'd love to do. Um, but I'm also just I just want to get um good at high country mule deer hunting, because that's what is Yeah, it's what you know. We've Yeah, I love We've spend the summer scouting and hiking around in the high country and um, yeah that that part has just really got me in the getter and I'm want to do that. So yeah, I want to get good at that me too. Can you explain it last time? You explain that sort of graph, the sliding curve that you have for when the animal goes from yeah, food, and then I forget what too. Yeah. So there's there's your your and it's I imagine its being different for everybody. Got your x axis, which is a order of animals, and it might, for example, start with mosquitoes, something you want to kill, and it might end with like your mom, something you really don't want to kill. And then there's two lines and one is kind of your I think of it as like, uh empathy, and that that line climbs to a point where you're you cannot set that aside, and you just could not kill something. And then there's the want to kill, want to want to want to hunt, wanna you know, engage in some sort of predator prey relationship want to eat it line, And so where those Internet sect is where things get fuzzy. Oftentimes that's maybe a bears for people, it seems like, and then above that as things you just couldn't bring yourself to to kill, and that that line for me, um gets blurry or it gets the empathy line climbs when I've worked a lot and and know a lot about and a species. Yeah, I was thinking on the flight over here at a very agitated gal that I was right next to um for reasons unknown, and I had stewardess or flight attendant, and I was working her tail off and uh, but she like whacked me with the cart and I was trying to avoid the gal to my right because she definitely needed some space. But so I got whacked with the cart really hard, and I kind of looked up at this gal and she looked at me like, get the hell out of the way. I just wanted to ask her, when did you lose your empathy? Yeah? Probably doesn't take long in service business sometimes, but that's not necessarily just being around the critter that you're dealing with, right right, Well, I mean I don't know, under understanding and maybe um it gets harder to objectify them. Yeah, like if you started squid, you make it burned out and eat squid or find I'm not appetizing, but it wouldn't be like, oh I studied squids so much that I now feel real bad eating a squid, Right, I'm not sure that would happen with a squid for me. So yeah, I think it's like it has a different kind Yeah, well yeah, so for like, um beavers, I worked on a beaver project, a really cool project and how for a couple of years that um it's still it's still happening. It's a beaver relocation project, and a beaver, I feel like, is one of those animals that people um underappreciate, But through this project, I just um have kind of a in love with them, just learning and sort of taking time to recognize what they do. Because this project, um, so our job was to there be landowners that might call that live down on on the river, on the ditch system or whatever, and they have problem beavers, and so usually those are just easily removed. Well in the Medhow, just like a lot of the West beavers were you know, trapped out and UM yeah right yeah, and in a lot of places they've had a hard time re establishing UM themselves. And so in the Medhow there's all these high country creeks and stuff that used to have beavers in them, creating a vastly different landscape. So we had these little creeks that would then have UM just sprawling wetland beaver establishments, UM just sort of punctuating these streams with all this fabulous habitat that is, you know, waterfowl habitat, fish habitat, fawning habitat UM. And then not to mention that those beaver establishments hold water back and so the snow melt off doesn't just rush off the mountain, and so everybody downstream benefits by a slower release of the melt off every year, and maybe that stream doesn't dry up UM. And there's also evidence that that's holding the water in ponds. UM keeps the creek at a lower temperature for for fish because that water is sinking down into the ground. And when when it comes up later, it's it's still really cold. Um. So the aim of this project is to take those problem beavers and then um by live trapping them and then we would um actually hold them in a fish hatchery facility until we could get like a family group, um and then release them up in the high country in areas that could benefit from basically restoration of the creeks. Um. And so we'd release them and hopefully they would they would stick um anyway. But the point is is that beavers, I feel like, are often really underappreciated, but um, they are actually now I know, just nuggets of gold. Um. And so that's something that I personally maybe didn't think about much before. But UM, my empathy line has has gone way up for these these critters because what they do is just so it's instant gratifications, the most important it's the most important animal to American history. America was built on that, right. Yeah, America's first homegrown millionaire made his fortunes. Yeah, yeah, trading and beber hunh. Yeah, but they're also really important for our landscapes. But yeah, Pooter, Andrew, Andrew Pooter, do you have any final Um, it's been interesting has been a pleasure to listen to your stories. It's feeling good about everything. Yeah, I didn't contribute much, but I don't care. That's good to listen. I want to make sure you have that you feel welcome to good presence. Yeah, thanks, Yeah, I'm John already had my closing thought. Cal I think I'm there too, don't. There's some good stuff though, Carmen, Um, can I make a b h A plug? That's great? So I, um, um, you're just gonna make the rest of us look bad. Well, I'm working on growing a little community of h members in the Mahaw Valley because it is such a important maybe you know, probably the most important mule you're hunting place in the state. UM. And it is such a unique landscape with those wilderness and everything else. UM. So trying to get a b h a UM community sort of established there. Um. And it's also BHA means back Country Home, which is a nonprofit conservation group that uh you tell them right, keeping public land public and um and managed appropriately. And so we have an issue with a mining company in the valley UM wanting to put in a Canadian mining company wanting to put in a big copper mine. On our our four service land UM and so our Washington chapter is UM supporting a mineral withdrawal, which is legislation that would protect uh forty million acres of our headwaters from not only this copper mind but any future mining claims and UM. Anyway, so our our chapter is supporting this mineral withdrawal. UM. But I just want to encourage anybody who is from Washington, especially if they come maybe from the west side of the state, to hunt out in the men how to UM check out our Washington chapter and get involved. And we're gonna have some volunteer stuff coming up this spring and UM people who hunt out there can can work on the landscape a little bit with us too. And a headwaters issue is everybody's issue, because everybody's downstream. Yeah, good plug, ladies and gentlemen. Carmen van Bianchi, that's right right, Thank you for joining us, Carmen, thank you,