00:00:08 Speaker 1: This is the me Eater podcast coming at you shirtless, severely, bug bitten, and in my case, underwear listening podcast. You can't predict anything, all right, everyone, We have a like a boatload boatload of guests. I don't know if you could. You don't count as a guest, Johnnie. So there's Yanni and then three, uh, Matt Moyson, who I've known for twenty years. I think it's more than that. I think it's more than that. No, yeah, yeah, it's more two years. Fitzgerald, Jamie Fitzgerald, who I've known for Like, if I've known Matt for twenty I hadn't known you for twenty five early college. Jimmy Dorn and I don't know really at all. Bare what's the pizza with the what's the pizza with the hot red peppers on it? I don't know the pizza with the hot red peppers on it? You don't have a name for that. We have one called the Carols and that that's pepperoni and hot peppers on it. Yeah, Jimmy and dor and I just brokered a boat deal. Broke a boat deal. Excited about our boat deal. I'm pretty excited about it. I think the terms are completely reasonable. I think we need to put some terms around it. All right, Well, if you break it, you bought it. Now. First thing I want to get into is we have a guy like he's like the resident philosopher that never met him, a dude named Luke Ryan who always writes in with vexing questions. I want to pull you guys on a question Luke Ryan had. Luke Ryan says, um, what one I want to do first? Here's the first one. If you had to guess, imagine that you're standing on a patch of public ground, okay, and you're looking at a deer who's awesome on public ground, but between you and the deer is private ground. This happened to me on Saturday. I had this whole scenario go through my head because we're working a fence and we're looking at elk and I'm like, they're on private. And then we realized, we're like, let's get a little closer to make sure. And then we realized, no, they're not on private, they're on public. But there's a corner, you know, like there was coming basically out between the two of us, and we had to go around that corner. But I kept thinking, well, what if we get close enough and all of a sudden I'm pinned. But I'm I still haven't made it around the corner bullet trespass, I'm gonna have to shoot across. Yeah, so, but that didn't happen. But I had these exact thoughts. Yeah, I don't understand who who? I don't even know how did I also find out you gotta elk without you having known you gotta? It's been a busy weekend, So who are you out with? My buddy Brady and I had a cow tag that was good through the end of the year, so we're not shout a co out. Didn't even like tell me about it? I figured I would today. Well, you know, I found out about but not in the way I normally like to find out about stuff. All Right, So here you are, you're yanness. Okay, just look at your honest you're jest and you're on public looking at a dear elk. What have you? On public? But your bullet needs to cross private. Your bullet will have to trespass to get there. Is that legal or not legal? Matt? It's perfectly legal. And here's why I don't I'm saying in a declarative way because it sounds more convincing. No, did I thought you'd somehow, because you don't own airspace when you own the land, and that is what your bullet is traveling through. No, no bootprint, is no bootprint to be found on that land. Well, let me, let me, let me address that. Why is it? Why is it illegal to corner hop because you have to theoretically place a foot on the really corner hopping. I know what you I mean, what you understand? Corner This is another landscape or land issue, ownership issue. Imagine you got okay, imagine you got two pieces of well, two squares out. You got two squares and the corners butt up so the corners are touching. Now, imagine that those two squares where the corners are touching our public property, and then the other two squares that would make up the big square. Am I saying this right? Yeah? Keep going, okay, okay. Checkerboard situation. Literally, imagine a checkerboard and you're only allowed to walk on the black spots. The white spots are private, The black spots on the checkerboard are public. You would think that you would be able to walk up to the very tippy corner of a black piece, reach your foot out and over and land your foot on the corner of the next black piece and step over to it and have not trespassed if you're going by what Matt Moyson is telling you, and that's illegal. That kind of corner illegal. It's illegal because you're passing through. I don't know how you're passing, right, your body is passing through. So I don't know that the answer is an airspace issue if you were hunting, but it probably helps because let's say you were hunting deer with a bowling ball. You could see a guy saying, hey man, you just rolled your ball across my property. You can't do that. And what's senior azing, too, is if you flew an airplane, Well, at what point is it? Because what at what altitude does it become private? I don't know. I can't go hover a drone eighteen inches off your picnic table while you're eating dinner, are you sure? No? But yeah, alright, So we need to get this one because I haven't called that f F a f A, but I do have some insight. It seems to me that those boundaries go they go up, all right, I'm gonna this is a poor analogy, probably, but I'm gonna use it. In the NFL, in order to determine a touchdown, the football has to break the plane and that plane goes up. That's how they use to demarcate an end zone for football. So to me, it seems I am a sports fan. Are you a Seahawks fan? Jimmy dorn Is, Holy ship? Is that kind of Seahawks fan? I got with? I just don't even I can't agett to understand it. But anyways, sports fan? So yeah, yeah, So I think that boundary go your arm can just pass over the end zone. When your body never touches the end zone, you win. All you gotta do is have that ball over that plane which goes up to you know, the heavens. What if it just passes through and passes back out, it doesn't matter. You cross that plane. That's a turn they crossed, the plane made and your checkerboard is in three D. So it's like all those I didn't know the football county. So you're saying, I get what you're saying, But what about the bullet? Yeah, I think if that bullet passes the plane using that same analogy, then it's that bullet is on private land for however long it takes to travel across. But do private laws apply to bullets? I would think so, because the bullet can from some from an operator, right from somebody making the decision to shoot across that private land. Jimmy dor um, Well, it depends, like everything else in life. I don't know. I've spend I suppose looking at from both sides of the question. If you know, if I'm the private landowner, am I gonna be want somebody throwing at six round across my property? Probably not, But we're not asking you what you want, we're asking well, I kind of try to answer it. Or if if I was the guy and I was in that situation, I would put myself on the other guy's shoes and go, that might piss me off? Or you know, how big is it? You know what's the ramifications of my decision making? I don't know. I would say it's probably not kosher, and I try to figure out a way to just get around the private Is that the answer? Jimmy's answer is predicated on how big For permission or forgiveness, it's a lot easier to ask for permission in my experiences. Oh, speaking of that real quick, can we can you talk about the the guy you harvest wheat for and what happened with that buck on the bloody of mine? There was not not the guys that I work with. That story all wrong. That's great. Yeah, he caught somebody. Uh yeah, sure we can tell a story. I tell I won't name names. So it wasn't the guy you h assist with his agricultural operation. Just another a buddy, another guy that lives in town. And uh yeah, they're you know, there was a few deer on his place that he had seen and then lo and behold there was a pickup truck that didn't belong there, which is how anybody thinks you can get away anything past the farmer in their area. It's just stupid. And I mean the fact that someone would think that he would not yeah, that it would go unnoticed. And then you know they had seen this buck and it was an absolute monster of a deer. I'll show you a photo on a bit and uh, you know, all of a sudden he hears bang and he's like wait a minute, and he's like, oh, because he thought possibly they were gonna be hunting coyotes, bouch and he thought and then where he heard it coming from. He's like, no, I'm gonna run over there and see if they just shot that deer that I was saving, because he was actually saving it first kid. And of course he went over there and they were down the bottom. The coolie quickly feel dressing it, and he went down and you know, read him the riot Act and uh, you know, and then they threw themselves on the sword. You mean He's like, oh, I didn't you know, he started this story which he didn't think he was trespassing, but you know, he knew full well he was trespassed. And then it devolved into the that's the biggest year I ever saw in my life. I also hate telling stories like this too, because you know, it's like that told three stories down the line, how all the facts gonna change. But anyways, uh so he tried out the idea that he wasn't trespassing, and but he had to jump a fence, so it's kind of hard to say. I didn't know that that fence wasn't there for a reason. So then it became it was just so big. He's like kitting yeah, and then yeah, and the deer was so big. I don't know what happened, you know, And he's like, all right, we'll get the heck out of here. But then he had called the sheriff and Fishing Game and they came and they took everything and wrote to a bunch of tickets, and fishing Game ended up with a big, really big deer. I guess on what I've seen in the area in a while. I don't want to tell too many details of this because I don't it's best not no, no, not your thing. A whole different story. My brother, I don't know if he knows of him, or knows knows him, or knows of him. But there's a feller who poached the buck. And the buck got confiscated by the State Fishing Game Agency, and the State Fishing Game Agency, as they often do, have it mounted and they hang it in a game office, right and you know, like a lot of times you go into game office that I've seen a lower place, and they'll have all these animals up like like exemplary specimens, and with them is like the story of how they were confiscated or whatever. Hit by a car, hm, you know, poacher, as they caught, and this buck carries the name of the tells the story of the poaching case. My brother says that this guy is still so proud of that buck that he takes friends down to fishing game. Takes friends down the fishing game to show them the buck. He was okay with the fine. Wow, it's like a matter of fact, I got a nice buck. If you'd like to take a ride down to the fishing game. He's not. You can't touch it. Yeah, they confiscated it, confiscated everything, and then wrote him a whole bunch of tickets. And then one of the fellas that was involved wasn't supposed to be uh access in firearms, and that apparently he got in a bunch of trouble. So I love that story. Yanni, were you did you meet this guy? You know what I'm talking about. I'll tell you then you're telling you met him. I was talking to a warden who is watching one of those phony um one of those phony Alaska shows, Alaska hunting shows, and he's watching an episode and there's a scene in there where they're gonna go out and shoot some caribou, and the dad is making a big deal about how he's gonna let his daughter do the shooting, and it's just the warden watching. It just didn't like he says. He just didn't strike me like the kind of guy who, in this moment of cameras rolling and everything, is not gonna just want the glory. And it seems strange to him. He said, I'm sitting there watching and I'm thinking that guy's gotta be a felon and can't be on camera with that damn gun. Oh, and Colson turns up exactly right. Right, Uh So, how did you vote? No? Or you don't know or it depends or something like that. Shooting bullets private property? No, I wouldn't do it. You're like, you're not answering the question though you realize what exactly do I think it not legal? You're yeah, I'm gonna say that it's illegal. Okay, fair enough already know the answer. So I don't know because I was on the email chain too. Legal. It's legal, legal, no, kid, Yeah, don't get excited. I don't know. I don't think. I don't think it's your airspace thing. What is it? It just says it's not illegal, it's not unlawful. No, I put this to an investigator and Idaho. Every state is different, so he says, I can only speak to here. He says, it's not unlawful to shoot from public to public over private. Well, here's the doozy same thought. The resident philosopher Luke Grin writes in to say this. You're in a state where you're not allowed to bait deer or put out mineral attractans. What's wrong? Fits? I think I know where you're going with this. But oh please, no, I just shooting across state line where you can do that. No, no, no, no, no, we're done. We're shooting bait. So yeah, this is a good one though. I like that. So you're in a state where it is unlawful debate or use any kind of mineral attracting to hunt big game. But has anyone who's wandered around out in the woods nose. Ranchers who are running cattle have to put out supplements for livestock. So here you have where a rancher has out a salt lick or a supplement lick for his cattle, but it's illegal to put it out for critters. And you realize that elk are in fact using this legally placed supplement. Are you allowed to shoot deer? Oh, it doesn't matter. Are you allowed to hunt over that legally placed supplement which was not intended as an attractive To add a little flavor to this, I'll point this out. In states where you're not allowed to bait for bears, there's often a lot of questions around what if I shoot an elk and I got the elk? Or keep talking about let's say shoot a deer and up the deer, and then the next day I wake up when there's a bear eating the deer and I shoot it. Have I baited bears or not? We can get to that. But that's his color to this broader thing, the mineral lick thing. Matt me first, you know, if you if you feel like you're being unfairly picked out. No, No, it's a challenge. Um, I don't know, so I number one, I'm not sure actually the answer, But I would say that that is illegal, And I would say I feel like when I've read regulations that talk about the legality of using bait, using an attractant, they talk about having it be illegal to hunt over bait like they I don't think they talk about placing the attractive. I think they talk about it in terms of it being illegal to hunt over a placed bait or mineral attracting whatever, But I don't know. I don't know. That's great, that's great, But I want to add this coloru into the color Okay, and the bear thing. If you're in a non bait state, but there's a dead animal land there, you could shoot the bear. Now, if you shot a deer and dragged that gut pile ten ft over to get out in the little opening where you could spy on it from afar, that's baiting. So do you think if you as long as you don't touch that mineral lick, as long as you did not manipulate it, an I know the answer. I know the answer for the person I put it to an idol. Okay, I would, I would, just but bear in mind the stuff we're talking about about, Like that you um, yeah, that you shot the deer and the next day come by there's a burying the deer. You didn't do anything to manipulate, Like you shot the deer legally, gout of the deer, left the guts where they were. Bear happens to turn up on it, right, I'm real hesitant about this one. I would I would be inclined to say that's probably not legal. It's an artificial attractment. It doesn't matter who put it there, That's my guess. Fitzgerald, Yeah, I think I guess the same. I don't know, but it seems that if there's going to be enforceable regulations, then AND AND agencies are not gonna want to get into the matter of intention. Yeah, so I think that they would try to make it as cut and dry as possible. And if plus, I think they would probably be relying on hunters, you know, understanding that that salt lick that was there for a cattle is going to attract game. So it's the hunter's responsibility to, you know, resist that urge. But again, do I guess you know what happen to me one time? I do, well, a different time, not that you know what happened me one time that you don't know what happened. I don't. I know, you don't. I was, oh, funnally, Yeah, I was in Idaho and I was talking with two other guys and I didn't have a tag, but they did. And one day it was raining real bad and they didn't want to go out in the rain. So I went out on a little walk about to see what I could see. And I get about two miles from our camp and lo and behold, I coming down this trail like a seldom used trail. But I look and standing in a place and just just not expecting to see it where it felt extremely out of place. It's just a bull standing there looking at me, and like the first thing to start in my mind is like kind of you in your head, like how something's gonna happen. I just didn't like, it's just just rare to be walking out trail also as a bull, just like watching you right in a very heavily hunted area. So I hauled ask back. I got one of the guys inspired him to and then we go back and it's gone. But then I started thinking so much about what was that thing doing there? And I walked over and it was lick salt like SALTI for yeah, I actually had it in my head. It was like like it's a not a heavily used trail. I kind of had in my head that it might have been placed possibly it just it wasn't like kind of like where you'd you know, usually you're gonna put salt licks for animals, kind of like an area where live stocks actually gonna hang around, you know, shade trees out in like grazing areas. It just makes some sense. Just was not like and I think it usually placed two in places where they're trying to congregate the animals, like by a gate, you'll put a block so that you know, when you come around a week later, you can then push the cattle through the gate by a gate or by water or something that just yeah, this just didn't look like if I was ranching cattle, which I don't do, but if I was, and I was like, I'm gonna go, you know, helped the herd out with a lick, as I wouldn't go, like dump it where this thing was dumped. It could have been a bad rancher. Yeah, he could have been not good at running cattle. So anyway, I could have very easily had I been holding the tag, I would have shot the bull and I would have walked over and he'd been laying out salt, dead on salt. Look, you didn't see this. You can't see it when you first encountered the bull. No, I I didn't see it till I walked. It was burning at me so much that just something was so unusual about his position that I went over there and sure enough that's what was going. Uh So I could have like I would have. Who knows. We haven't got to the end. Yes, we don't know if I'd have been an accidental poach or not. Jimmy Doran, I'm gonna go with what fits said to you. I'd say it's hunter's responsibility to know. And yeah, no, no, yes. In Idaho, it says, and yeah, you already knows. You read the unit. Our friend, Eir Crawford says, as for the salt baiting question, our rule states the following. This is an idahole. No person shall take big game animals as outlined in this section with any bait, including grain, salt, and any form liquid or solid, or any other substance, not to include liquid scent, to constitute an attraction or enticement. He says, in Idaho and Idaho it would be illegal. Never mind that it is probably an ethical fairchase issue as well, So they gold duke grind. They would have to prove the intent, though, like you were saying, because if you've never been to an area, right, and you pop up there at first light and there's a herd and you knock one down, and you walk over there in the meadow and you realize that there's five salt lakes. How could it really be your fault? Right? Yeah, I'm taking out with a quarter if I get a ticket. Yeah, they'll call me for a witness and I'll be like, oh, Jimmy Dors talking all about the salt like alright, boat privileges. How he was gonna act like he didn't know what was there. He had someone else order the mental rock for him. Um, you honest to get back real quick? Can you finish talking about so? So you went out and got this, You got a cow. We guys hunt. You guys are hunting on public property. Of it's kind of a hodgepodge spot. But I found the spox. I was deer hunting there a couple of years ago. A cross the drainage and I know what you're talking about. Yeah, and one like morning, like across the drainage, it just sounds like a war zone, you know. I'm like, oh my god, I glass over there and there's orange everywhere and elk flopping everywhere, and I'm like, man should have been there, I guess this morning, you know, and all day long from where I'm sitting, I can hear him, and I can see dudes with sleds and horses and in and out and work in this trail. It's probably only like a mile and a half, you know from the truck, and uh, by like midday, they all either got their elk out, and I continue to glass for deer, and like at three pm, a glass back down that meadow and there's cow elk filtering back out in the meadow. Like, I don't know what's going on down there, but I'm gonna go get mine down there. And so I came out the next weekend and uh they were right in there, killed the cow. And so yeah, buddy of mine hiked in Saturday morning and uh, perfect morning, man, like just started snow in the night before and we had we've had zero snow in Montana and anything we had is melted, so we had probably two or three inches of fresh and uh we get up to where we should be able to see the elk and don't see him for about ten or fifteen minutes, just long enough from like what's playing be gonna be like, do we just go for the big power loop or we're gonna turn around and go home? And um, right there and there, we're just kind of being dumb hunters. Were out on a pretty exposed ridge at this point, and you know, hands up, our butts and our fingers and boots and uh, what's that's an expression? Yeah, we're not not not paying attention. And I glass over kind of just just out of my prifery where I wasn't really wasn't expecting to be, just kind of into the trees a little bit. And there's accountable, which was the oddest thing, right because it's middle of December and you're expecting to see like a minimum of a dozen cows together, right and if you see maybe just an animal or twould be like two bowls. But to just see a cow and a bowl together struck us as odd. But like they're actually in love. It's not just like most elk is just sex. Just September. So that's a life partner issue there. Ye, well I didn't help that out put him back on the market. Um, but yeah, we just snuck right in there. And even I think season has been closed for three weeks now in Montana. So I was expecting to have some chill elk and you know, they'd be out feeding late snowy morning, and then this cow was definitely like moving towards the timber, moving towards the timber, and we had to hustle a little bit to get within rifle range before she got back on to private. So not what was the dude your hunting was doing? Just came along? Oh he wasting? No, no, no, sorry, just not not shooting, just hunting. We're just enjoying the hunt. Yeah, it's perfect, man, We got her out in two trips. Um. I don't know what else say about it. It was, you know, easy, It's just I've just had my feelings hurt that I had to find out about it by reading a text chain between you and and Kevin Murphy the world's Greatest small game hunt. Yeah, well he was piling it on. Man. That dude has been all across North America shooting. Dude, if you get into a text message war with Kevin Murphy about who's been doing what, yeah, it's hard to come out on top. Um Fitzgerald. So you only get to be here because you only because you went on you finally after all the years I've known. You know, you could have been on because you're an avid angler. For an angler, I think that would get me get me passage onto the show. You could have been on because you're an angler, but you only recently, Like why you only are you went on your first hunting trip. Can you explain to me what? Why? Like why not before? But why all of a sudden? Now? Well, I actually did used to hunt when I was in probably like nineteen twenty, but it was like deer camp hunting off North Michigan. My cousin owned a place like forty acres up in Fife Lake. Oh dude, I know five Lake Will. I know that's where Matt drosslives and uh so I would go up there during the fall, you know, once one weekend of every fall and try to go get a deer. In fact, the first time I ever went hunting, I was walking out to my tree stand, had my rightfle on my shoulder, and I was probably it was like you know, four three in the morning, come walking around a bend and there is an eight point buck just standing right there and my guns on my shoulder. So I'm thinking like, man, this is this is it? Uh, it's easy. So I take the gun on my shoulder and as soon as we do, things gone. So I was like, well, I'm bound to see another one here soon. I see twenty years a lifetime pass. Uh. There's there's a writer. There's a gun writer, David petzel Um, who has a line where he says, uh, Now, he's an interesting figure because he's like a gun writing columnist. But he's also but he's kind of weirdly infatuated with like celebrity, who's famous? Do they deserve being famous? Stuff like that? And doesn't Isn't he the one that kind of plays like the grumpy gunwriter? Yeah? Like he um, he has a he has a what one would call it stick, which is probably Yiddish, right, think he has a stick of it being a he's a grumpy guy, like a grumpy old man, but he's aware of things that grumpy old man aren't aware of, Like he has big opinions about like Miley Cyrus. So like the normal like grumpy old man that I know. If I went and said, hey, man, what's your take on what Miley Cyrus has been up too lately? They would look at you like right, yeah, crazy right? So it's like this weird, grumpy old man thing where you're sort of like real hip to pop culture but hate it, but you got a lot to say about it anyhow. He says slings have saved more animals than Peter Slings like rifle sling rifles. Oh okay, you know, because you don't know if you remember your story you just told us a minute ago. I did. I forgot that he's an outdoor life for field. Yeah, very good writer, who is very funny. But it's just like he's a it's a complex sort of things he's got going on, like the intolerant grumpy old man slash pop culture critic, which is actually like something you can really develop. I was just gonna say, it sounds interesting. We might want to see what we can get him on to talk about it. Yeah, I would like that. Can you ask him if he just always carries his rifle like this out in both hands. Yeah, slings save animals if they save shoulder arms? Man, Like, what do you when you're climbing around? I think that what I think that the real lesson there? Well, you know you look at pictures of you know, this will help you look at like the Africa guys, the professional hunters, the phs in Africa, they don't use slings. There is carried over there. They don't carry their guns either. Well, no, the pH does. He'll have his gun over his shoulder, but he's also fifty yards from the truck hunting flat ground and there's a lot of danger stuff. They can stomp you. I mean, you know it's he spin back around and set it on the truck. But yeah, they don't use them for that reason. I think that you could be Yanni is not tell him to give everyone your thoughts about slings, Johnnie, if we're gonna get back to you for years. But I went through a phase of not carrying one for that reason. Readiness. Yeah did you really? Yeah? Yeah? And as I got it enough guys, I mean it only happened a handful of time. Is but that would even be prepping them, like, hey, we're about to come over our eyes. Good chance it's gonna be you know, something ahead of us here. Maybe you should be ready, and maybe I should just said take the gun off your shoulder and you know, carry it in a field ready position. I didn't, but yeah, we'd peek over and there's that bowl looking at you like there is and you know, as they get their sling off pieces out. So but you know, one of the things we've gotten so kind of like paranoid about safety and stuff that I usually don't even have a round chamber. So the least my problems is having the thing on my shoulder. You know, it's funny. I mean I never even considered it, Like, I never considered the sling as being a uh, having an impact on readiness. It would just never occurred to me. It's pretty fast. It's a good point. But yeah, if you walked around with it up against shoulder all time, crack off, there's a time and place, you know, Like I'll put on my backpack if it's dark. I don't really put on my backpack. Any chance of seeing it if my gun's on my backpack is because my tag is punched or it's pitch black. Right. I hate that feeling. But you've gotta be able to recognize like when you're sort of again to use my expression from earlier, but like kind of like Didley dialing and not paying attention not haut and then you're going down a trail and you just go, man, it's a good chance that something could be just standing here in any moment and get the rifle off your shoulder and just remember everybody taught they taught that. What do they call that? It is called like the cross field field carry, right, Yeah, uh, stone stone glacier. They got the pack thing. You ever see this? Yeah? I have it? Ever really stuck that. I just go like, no, no, no, no, that's not where there's but you know what you're talking about. What your quick draw if they have one where you look it to your pack. But there's this little tab so it rides behind your shoulder. It's it's vertical, You're right, is vertical behind your shoulders strapped to your pack like total hands free. There's this little tab. You can kind of like talk into your shoulder strap or whatever. And when you pop that tab, it's like you're pulling a parachute. You pop that tab and your rifles free. Really does it come down into like a like a field ready, No, it's like you pop it. Then you kind of reach over your shoulder and grab the barrel or whatever, grab the stock or barrel. Everyone just lifted out of the I mean, I would like to see that work, because yeah, I have a hard time imagining that's what is? Why is How's that better than a sling. It's not better sling. It's worse than a sling. Oh, I thought you would arguing this for having no total hands free. Well, it's better in the sense that, like even a sling requires some care, you know, every couple of minutes. And so this is like intermediate. It's either in your pack and for all intents and purposes, you have no gun. Right, this is like halfway between. Yes, okay, okay, I got it. It's like, man, this is a long ship hike. Yeah, and I'm always whatever need in my hands two take leaks and open gates and whatnot. And you just put the thing on there and then but if I have to, I'll pull that ripcord. Yeah, I've done it, and I keep my ripcord handy. I haven't. I've never had to do a quick release. But everybody's fits there. You never got a dear as a kid, never got DearS kid, No hunting up fife light you guys hunting bait. Uh some years and then some years now because your cousin you know a little piece of land like forty acres up there, you head hunter safety Yep. The other time that I went hunting, not that long ago, up on San Juan Island with Chef Andy. We were hunting those chef chefoot. We were hunting those uh those are Columbia black tail up there right. So you know you can only use a shotgun on San Juan. So I had a shotgun and I had I was probably fifty yards from a little buck and I had it lined up, pulled the sugar gun. Misfiredn't it's not used here, I swear to God, and nothing took off. So I need help, man, I'm here for help. We'll know if we're gonna get to your successful hunt. I know I want to get a deer. I want to get in fact, yeah, hearing about Matt's you know Elk hunt a couple of weeks ago. I want to get over in Montana maybe with your brother. You get inspired by that. I did get inspired by that. So did the firing pin. It's not hit. It must it must have, because yeah, because then we went somewhere else and you know, I react and shot it. We're fine. I don't know. You guys tried to hunt your on sand One I own. Yeah, this is about five years ago. Oh, I do remember this, so so you have Dilly daily. Yep, I have. Now, I don't want to say where it was. We're gonna say that you were just beyond the fact that it was in North Dakota. Beyond the fact that it was North Dakota. Um, don't get in any great special specifics, but talk about your impressions of turkey hunting. It was. It was so fun. I mean, it was the most interactive kind of you know, game experience I've ever had. I mean with fishing. I don't fly fish, so I know that's a lot more physical and interactive, and you're reading things differently. Oh, they'd sure like to think it is that unless you want to go down a real different path. Yeah, I've done it, but yeah, sure, yeah. I mean, so, you know, with the walking out in the woods, looking around, making those calls and then all of a sudden hearing that response is just one of the most exhilarating outdoor experiences I've ever had. And then you know, posting up, putting decoys there, and then calling him in and just what you know, the first day we were there only about four hours and Matt called in a big tom and just to kind of see that thing, you know, a hundred yards out coming in through the willow, and then all of a sudden he got closer, you know, big plume goes up. I mean it's just one of the most exciting things I've ever seen outside and that that was and Pooter got him. So then the next day we went out early in the morning and the same kind of setup, just walking around the woods. Got a call posted up. Yep, and it didn't take long either. You know what they call that, they call that spring thunder? Spring thunder? Yeah, what are they calling the fall? They don't go. I mean some dorks gonna write in about how they do go hobble in the fall, and they do, but not like they're do in the spring. Spring. They're fired up. Yeah, as they gobble in the spring, as will Primo says, they're out there saying this is my time of year in the spring. Yeah, yeah, it was. It was incredible. It was incredible. Yeah, I got a jake the next day. It was also the first time I've ever seen a turkey fly. That was interesting, really impressive. Were you where they could fly? I knew they could fly? What are they like? A gallanaceous bird? Right, And I knew they could fly, but they can't fly along, right, They don't fly a long distances. But just to see him fly like they were, they were much more agile than I than I would have expected. Yeah, I would never accuse him of loving to fly. Yeah, powerful flyers. I mean as far as just like the amount of energy and noise and just like uh yeah, when they take flight. It's not a subtle thing. Now, you know, you know what you like fl you know what you're like walking through the woods and and like a grouse will scare you to death, like a turkey is would would put you in your grave. I mean they it sounds like somebody shooting at you. You know when the one of those things takes off. You know, me and my boy were out Jimmy were out there on Sunday when I took a little look for some small game and he had his first getting the ship scared out and by a rough grouse. But it blew out of a tree about head high. But still the same fact. It's super surprising. So that so here it comes and you level off on him. Well, that jay got in close. He was in god probably, I mean it seemed like ten yards. He was right, he was right there, maybe even closer. I mean he was. He was super close and U coming right up to that decoy. And so this is the first time you've ever fired a shot because you've tried one, you screwed up because you're sling. Then you had your I would argue that you did something wrong with your shotgun. I would I would respectfully disagree, but I no way to tell. Can we fack out to the shotgun question real quick? I don't want it? Well, did you look at the primer? Was the primer dimpled? I was gonna ask that. Was there a strike mark on the primer? There was? All right, right, but not even You know, it's funny we're muzzlower hunting is here in in Maryland and I heard a guy off the swamp half a have we're just a cap? Have just either the pan or the cap? What time? It's like you know you're hearing right now, and then like boom, you know this thing's allowed right, it's like real like And also went off the swab here where the guy's cat went off in a dignite. It was like prime time. It was like this dude was shooting at a dude was definitely shooting. It was like he was just getting rid of the so um any feelings of remorse or anything, like, what was your emotion? Pure, pure exhilaration, just you know, Well, I was nervous because I was like, all right, I felt like the twenty year weight of history on my shoulders, right because I've had to, like, you know, two experiences. Do you just refer to it as your slump buster? Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure, Yeah I will now for sure. But yeah, it was, I know, it felt, it felt incredible. It was wild, like how active that bird was after it gets shot. Oh, just I mean they don't flailing. And then you know, it was with Matt and we ran over there and he basically jumps on the bird and pushing all the air out of it. I guess is that what he's saying. Yeah, and uh yeah, no, no feelings are remorse at all. It was it was. It was, yeah, one of the most exciting outdoor experience I ever had. You probably realize this. It might be counterintuitive to some folks, but that flailing is a is a way for you to see just how dead it is. Mhm. Because like, the more you know, for people who haven't a turkey when you shoot a turkey shooting and it generally like if you had with the shotgun and shooting in the head with a shotgun, and well when you chop the head off a chicken, off the chop about chicken. Yeah, So when you see that like really just explode, like fluttering and jumping around. I don't look at that and be like, oh, he's gonna get away. It's more like, oh man, he's dead or and dead. I would prefer it though, because they do sometimes just fold their wings up and just lay over. You don't always get a flop kind as they do just kind of just literally fold their wings and tip over. But because a couple of times I have seen it where it's like the flop and they keep getting a little farther away and they flop and all of a sudden they're flopping, but they're on their legs and you're like shooting in any flopping that is them going whatever they're doing, but they're going the other way. I take that as a very bad sign. Oh yeah, that's different than what I'm talking about. What I'm talking about is that because they have him, it's not a clean well he's got what okay, like but degree circle, what are the there's right a three sixty degree circle, and if he's picking that like fifteen degree band that's directly away from me, I'm like, that feels to me like, um, sure he could be doing a general flop or there could be more to this, and the fact that he's coincidentally chosen the opposite direction to do that in I get like real nervous, But I don't think they look that different for a second, you know what I mean. That's what I'm saying, Like general protocol is like pull the segger. As soon as he's like flopping or whatever's going on, I'm up on my feet and gaining some grounds. You'll never be glad that you didn't run over there. There's no like pro to not running over there. All I'm really trying to say is birds flop around a whole bunch as evans by. If you've ever dispatched chickens, It doesn't mean that he's like kind of still alive, that's all. Yeah, But no bad feelings, No, No, it did surprise me the day before when Peoter got that Tom how fast Matt was running towards that bird. Once Pewter shot like exactly like you said, you honest, like he was sprint into that bird. That surprised me. I wasn't expecting that, but I lost the turkey. Ones hit him, assumed that he was down and didn't get older fast enough. We were on a very steep slope and he pitched off that slope and just vanished. Really, you couldn't even begin to go look for him. What was down the slope like a thick some big mountainside. Oh oh jeez, and he like went down. I was like, oh, I got a turkey. The thing took two steps and it was a steep pitch, like I said, took two steps, pitched off that hill and it was just just gone. Now only one time I've seen one shot that covered ground faster than anything I've ever seen, Like my buddy Eddie shot too, and the second one was only winged or whatever. And that thing vanished. I mean it, I saw it running when we couldn't throw down on it, and I was just like, I was pretty impressed with its track abilities. I mean that thing was yeah, tootles, you never found him, never found it. Did not look and actually just you know, miss Aim because if you don't hit him in the head of the neck and he just body shoot to mean you just get that big puff of feathers. I mean, you might have a few pellets that we've their way in there, but a lot of times not lethal fits. Were you field questions about your wife? Uh? Yeah, Can I hear some first before I decided your wife? Your wife eats seafood. She does doesn't like red meat. Would she have eaten the turkey you shot? Probably not. The only time she's eaten meat in the last fift twenty years was in Montana when we were helping out at your brother's wedding making all that elk Ravioli and she accidentally ate one. Now she she's like, I guess maybe just we just worked too hard in that kitchen, and she's like, screw it, I'm gonna eat one. Yeah, she didn't. She liked it, but I don't think she would eat the turkey, but she likes to eat fish. M hmm. What what do you think is going on there? I understand it, yeah, I mean not not. Yeah, It's like, you know, I've known people like that in my whole life. She's known at a very young age that meat was not for her, Like she was a kid, you know who was complaining to her parents about anything that was meat at the table, and it was just a you know, it's just it's just a essential part of who she is. Meanwhile, you have a shirt on that's a meat chart over cow. I like meat. So you feel that the turkey wasn't gonna it probably wouldn't. No, I probably wouldn't do it. Maybe if I got a bigger animal, maybe maybe maybe. I mean she's eating milk. So so do you picture now that you will go on more outings, more hunting trips. I would like to. Yeah, I would definitely like to. Um, you know, part of the reason that I haven't done it regularly is that I feel like I've always kind of been a little out of my element doing it. You know, I didn't grow up hunting. I didn't have like a you know, a brother who took me hunting or anything like that, or even friends until I met you guys were and uh so you know, it wasn't something that I felt I had a lot of agency to do on my own. And uh, you know, it's like do you ever play poker or a black jack at a at a casino. Yes, no, because I feel too out of my owner exactly like you don't want to screw up everybody's else's you know, game, right, And I kind of feel I felt like that way for a long time about hunting. I don't want to go out there and mess up somebody else's situation. Yeah, that's a good analogy, man, because I'd like to play black jack, or used to not like, but we would play black jack at two dollar tables because you go there and everybody at the table sucks. But then when you go on your with serious players, right, you become like very self aware at black jack, Like how do you say, like all these guys suck, suck at what okay? Deciding if you hit or st and that they have like real set opinions about stuff out what you stay on. So like you could be playing black jack and I'm not like dr black Jack. But there are people who are suspicious enough for irrational enough to be that if you took a hit, that's illogical, that you have disturbed the cosmos and have robbed them of the card that would have been theirs, and it will be mad at you because if you knew what you were doing, you'd have known to never take that hit. Therefore you have offset this thing that was in motion between the stars and the universe. And so what you're saying is those are tables. Like it's not that the people suck, it's that the odds that somebody's gonna come play at that table who sucks and messes it up for everybody else is higher. Like you could you could have people. I mean, when I sit down, if I was gonna sit at one of those tables, and I have to go to Las Vegas every year for work one and I always really bad want to do it. You want to go play black time? Yeah, but like fits where I feel like I will take too long. I don't really understand when to do what that they'll have some irrational blow hard get like pissed about something I did, and and and because it doesn't really really mean that much to me, I just sometimes don't unless I see a table where no one's there, or I'm with a couple of buddies of mine, Like last year, me and Yanni threw down for a long time because we just had our own little scene. Yeah, we had the whole table, well, maybe five out of six spots We had like five or six guys that we all knew each other, and so we could go play and I didn't need to feel like I was like inserting myself into this this thing that was going on my unprofessional to get good. Eventually, Like you're watching the cards so much that you sort of in a way start to count cards, right, so you kind of know what's been coming out, and so you're sort of like, but no, it's like six decks. I mean, you can't. You can get in trouble for own cards. If you can go play at Binions or go playing some of the old school casinos and they'll play single deck blackjack, that would be different, and I would allow that that would be very higher minimum bet. Are you play poker house? Odds are bad if you're playing against another player. I just don't. Yeah, I like poker a lot. Do you win a lot of money at board? No? No, I don't. Haven't played in quite a while, but I played a little bit. It's fun. Why why do you like a professional football? But? Wow, that's a jump. I don't know. I've always they don't know you, they don't like you, they don't live they're not from here. I was born. I've been playing football since I was you know, a kid up. They're not from here, He's trying to explain. So he called me and asked me to go fishing on a night there was a Seahawks getting like, oh, I'm going to the football game, and he could not wrap his head around the morning. Yeah, senilities, I don't know. I just I've always love football. I get I'm emotionally invested. I mean in people that you don't know, you know, who are just I played team sports all the way through college. I mean, I just always been attracted to it, and I never to play at that level. But yeah, I know you're right and I'm wrong because everybody likes sports, Jimmy, I would feel remiss if I didn't stick up for you a little bit here because I don't even have Like I didn't grow up watching football and I never played it, but I like it now as an adult. I like watching football. I have a team that I hope wins. I hope wins a game. I can't explain it. What team is it? It's the Green Bay Packers. Really, yeah, that's cool. They're pretty good. Why but you're from I can't I can't leave Jimmy didn't have hung out to dry because I'm even everybody on the planet, I know, I know. So I've had another friend of our got into watching football and he's like, because I hate TV so bad, I find myself that I'm in front of a TV. It's the It's the most genuine seeming thing to me, the football, Like watching the game. It just feels like you're actually watching something genuine. Yeah, it was an early childhood like it's like honest and genuine. It's a contest. I mean it's but you're right. I mean, they don't know you, they don't you know. I can't even explain it, but I do recognize now as an adult that I enjoy it. Yeah, but for me, it's just always been there. Like corn Husker football on Saturday mornings is one of my earliest memories. I was probably for you know, so Cornhuskers like the hand lotion. No, you're funny, now, you just pissed off everybody in the brasket. There's a team Cornhuskers go big red really professional football tea no, no, no, college college football. Alright, it feels so bad, but not on about him. Um okay, now, Jimmy Dorran can you lay out you're Can you explain a little bit about your Oregon hunting? Sure, it was easy, it was great. What the trip the hunt itself? Yeah, just kind of how it goes down. Um, buddy's got a great big place. And how I met him, Russ, I met him at your restaurant. Yeah, I was tending bar and this is probably like the mid nineties. I was still tending bar before I owned the place. And he came in with another buddy of mine and we started talking about fly fishing, and then it was, hey, you want to go fishing. And we've been good friends ever since. And uh, bunch trips and I guess I want to say around two thousand or something, his dad bought a great, big, huge place kind of by fossil oregan cattle range. Uh, it big. The previous owner did grace cattle on there. Um, there's some light egg, there's some wheat, and there's some hay and stuff there. But it was just mostly recreational n they do. He has a he has an agreement with his neighbor that we can hunt on his property if we allow them to graze cattle on his So it's kind of a good you know, it's a good handshake deal. That's that's lasted quite a long time. And uh so we get to you know, just so that that that's the deal. That is the deal. Grazes. He grazes your buddy's land and your buddy gets hunt his land. That's correct. Yes, it's a great spot. I mean the John Dave River runs right through the middle, smacked out through the middle of it. So there's fantastic small mouth fishing and steelhead right now, and um every kind of bird you wanted to shoot more or less. Uh, and fantastic elk cunting. There's chucker. There's a couple of pothole ponds, so they're stucks. You can shoot for sure, not as many. I mean you walk down and pop couple in the morning. That's about the extent of or day. I he jumps, shoot him, Um a lot of times you can actually you can push him back and forth if there's actually between the whole Have you guys done that where you're going? We used to do that in stock ponds. Now and then instead of going in are trying to kick him off and take a shot, Just kick him off, throw two decoys out and hide and wait yeah, they come, I don't even leave. You'll see him circling way out and then like all those dudes are gone now, So I was, what's that? But they're not gone, they're hunger. Um just uh, pretty easy two yards uphill shot. One just came around the bend. It was skylit, perfect beautiful, perfect symmetrical four point buck and it took one look at me and that was the end of that. It was just it was really easy and dragged it downhill. It was like one of the most There wasn't a pack out. It was a hundred and fifty yard downhill, dragged to my truck and then strung it up. So do you feel that kind of the hunting donners making you pretty soft? I agree. I had occasion to go out on a high buck hunt in the Passade and at the beginning of the season, and I was a little unprepared and I was a little disappointed at my level of being a bit to be honest on some of it. We got there and I had kind of ms rett a forecast and you know, probably good idea to look not the valley floor, but actually where you're gonna start going in, and we rode horses in like sixteen miles way back in there, and I'd kind of not I'd read the brochure and whatnot, and the outfitter was just great people, but you know it was they kicked the wallton off the off the side of the mules and then we got in late and drop off drop hunt. Yeah. So you you hired an outfitter to pack you in, but then he just drops you off pretty much you're looking country and then you're like two seeing a week and uh, sixteen miles in Yeah, And I hadn't ridden a horse, and I mean I had ridden a horse fairly recently, but not that far. I just I was surprised where I hurt the next day? Yeah, your buttocks region, my knees. Where was the weird thing even? Yeah? And uh but we woke up and I was with my really good friend of mine, Henry, who just was amped about the whole deal, and it just man, I woke up cold and I thought I read cot not bring a cot. I read there was. Yeah. So the setting up the tent and they had had this big burn band and the whole hunt cana came off late because the area was closed and the outfit really had to put the screws to the Forest Service to get him to let him go back in there. They close fire season, they were the whole, the whole they had closed the whole wilderness area anyway, so you know, nothing was set up. We kind of got in. There was a burn band, so we weren't allowed to make a fire. And then you know it was it was really it was pretty cold. First day, a sleeping on the ground and dude, you sounded awful right now, Yeah, it wasn't. I wasn't super jack. I mean whatever just saw from this or no, no, no, I think it's accumulation of a lot of So so what wound up going on there? What happened were seeing big giant bucks run round. Didn't see you buck? Saw about fifteen dose total, saw one spike, but it's a three point minimum. How like if you had on a sliding scale of one to temp, how hard were you hunting? Uh? I would say about a nine. I mean he had to do, you know, you two thousand vertical to get to where he wanted to glass. You had to get up in the morning and do that in the dark. And then the second day it snowed nine inches, so throw that into the mix days jab six. You stuck it out for six hunt days. It was either that or walk sixteen miles out there, made you know. And I actually had all of that from funny thing too, I'll admit it. But like I had all my ship packed and I looked at it on the map in the whole area, part of a specificresh trail, and I knew where my truck was. And I got to thinking because my feet, my feet got wet on the second morning and they didn't dry out, and we kicked the whole no fire thing to that. We're like underground. I'm pretty sure. I'm like, they want to write me to take it, I'll go to court on this one. And uh, you know, we made a fire, got kind of comfortable, but you know, I didn't really get warm for about a week. Did you get some of wood stove? No, but went old stove. Yeah. Weren't allowed to bring in a stove. Oh, I see, because of the band. So I was just kind of all thrown together at the last second. And my buddy Henry's really super just nice guy, resilient. He really tolerated me being a ship head for a couple of days because I'm sure it wasn't too fun to be around, but it was up and down. I mean it was according to my iPhone, it was, you know, eighty stories a day and it's straight up looking around for you your ass off for six hours. And I got good at taking a nap when I was cold. But it was great. It was you know, it was a hard hunt. Um, ridiculously beautiful place. I'm going back, but spit. I'm sure it's that gonna be well, you know I'm eating hot. Yeah, well, I'll bring a cot. And I had also misread. I thought it was fifty pounds of gear per person. So I got like mountain house and my jet boil. And this other group of hunters came and they literally brought like RVs worth of ship. Like they had boxes and you know, eight days worth of prep food and coolers and pack alongs, and you know, I had my one little and he dropped those guys off on top of your camp. No, he dropped us first. And that's another reason why he just the wall tent went off here you go, because it was getting dark and they had another three and a half miles to go. So we were hunting in this one big basin and they were in the next so there's just only two groups and normally he has like six or seven groups. So it was beautiful and it was it was worth every penny and I'm gonna do it again. And uh, you know, I've apologized to my buddy a bunch of times for yeah kill No, we didn't kill you never saw anything but a spike. There are those guys, dude, the Washington high buck Hunt. Man, the more I talked to people about it and even you're stirring inspiring story there. Um No, it was just it's the same one that Carmen was talking about. Well, yeah, in that it's an early season high buck hunt. Dude, I'm gonna get weight. I'm gonna become like Joe high Buck. I think I'm gonna change my name to Joe high Buck. You're funny. I am so fired up about the high Buck Hunt. I'll show you where I went and Ei, there's no way that you don't love it. It is just absolutely beautiful, like ridiculously gorgeous, and there's tracks and I'll go with you. Dude. I'm glad you're still doing that because I'm starting to feel that, um like the Oregon private land hunt you go on. As fun as it sounds, it just seems like it's gonna make a spoiled brand out. I went to Montana as well, and that was legit. I mean there's some walking around at least, you know, it wasn't nearly as easy. So I mean, I'm fortunate enough to go to this place in Oregon. It's just lousy with deer. I mean there's yeah, it's hard to not go. It's yeah, I'm gonna go as long as they keep letting me go. Yeah, there's a lot of public land hunters out there who hunt public lands. They don't have any better option. There's a ton of public rare dude who goes to the heart, Like who could go to like a gravy spot but chooses to go to a ship spot. I agree, that's a rare MANH Yeah, I'm lucky to get to go there. They're the nicest people and uh, you know, fortunately get to shoot stuff most of the time, or at least see stuff, you know. So, um, Montana was really good to me again this year. So I had tags in Oregon and I bought tags in Montana, Washington. Tag in Washington. That's soup and uh, just because, to be honest, the freezer is full, and I didn't really feel that that was okay tag to burns. It's forty bucks, but you don't burn Montana or again, when you're talking six bills or whatever, you're gonna have something to show for it. Yeah, I'm gonna put a little bit more effort into that for sure. So Montana was fantastic this year. That was a good hunt with a good shot, and yeah, I'm gonna tear it at high Back hunt a new one. Man. We're gonna sit down. I've been living here a couple of years now and haven't gone. You're more than welcome to come along. I'm always run around doing on the junk. It's the fifteenths right in the kills one for you there, it's the fifteenth September to It's like the time when there's the most stuff to do, right as well, what's the elevation for that out here? Went in at seventy seven and I got as high as I want to say, tickling nine thousand. But don't quote me, quote me. I know I'll be wrong there because you said he rolled in for sixteen miles and you climbed to vert two thousand vertical from your ten you've been up on the top of Everest by that. We did passes. We went over three different passes to get to where we were hunting, which no, no, not fiving got your journalism live? How many people listening to this? How many emails you get if I lie? Yeah? What what the charge you eight hundred bucks? Eight hundred bucks you gotta for the two of you? You gotta tent out of the deal? Yeah, pretty much. I think it would have been a little bit more custy. Like I said, it was closed and he wasn't allowed in there, and we got like the eleventh hour call to go. I should also segue with the whole story started with I thought it was done. I thought we weren't going. I thought it had been canceled. I just assumed my deposit or whatever we go for the next year. But I get like, and it was on the heels of a Seahawks game where I might have had a couple of beers. They not to read the brochure. I get the phone call, Hey, we're going, like we're going like in a couple of hours, and I'm like, he ain't go nowhere. What are you even talking about it's canceled. Nope, it's open. It's good. And they had to you know, throw everything together when normally they would have had several weeks to prepare and uh so we showed up and he was still putting bridles on meals and stuff. So it wasn't it wasn't all the way dialed and we left it. We started in at one o'clock when we definitely should have been starting in it about eight thirty in the morning at the latest. So, I mean, it's just the whole thing was like, you know, we got there and of course the last two miles you know, started raining like God was angry. I mean, it was just like it was a cold, wet from jump and you just you know, I love it. You love it. Yeah, that makes one of us like I'm not, you know, love it all. In hindsight. Yeah, generally, I think we've had this conversation. Were the ones that you remember are the ones that you know potentially sucked the worst, but you wax, you know, nostalgic or reminisced about how awesome it was. H the harder I worked for definitely, the better I feel. If I'm successful. Yeah, when you're an old man getting there. So in a couple of years on your deathbed, dying, right, you're not gonna be like, oh man, that one time man, that was a short pack out on Buddy's place, cold beer and the cup holder. No, you're gonna be like thinking back to that, that mountain, that rainy, snowy, no camp fire mountain. I'll do it better next year. I'll definitely be better prepared. And you know, I owe my buddy one because he definitely was very tolerant. So I want to go on the trip with you. You are invited. I'll show you on a map you look over, yeah, al right, and then finally, uh, Matt Moyson, you had a harrowing trip. No you don't think it's harrowing though, No, not really, not really. It would be the shortest story, for sure. I hunted. It was hard. I did that for a while and nothing happened. But I'll recap it. I mean I couldn't go where you wanted to go because so much snow. Yeah, we couldn't even approach it. Yeah, we weren't within Now, don't say, don't say the spots don't even give like mountain ranges. Okay, it was the mountains. It was the mountains of North Dakota, Dakota, Okay, you're right. So we had planned to hunt. Can I say the state North Dakota, okay Um where we had planned to hunt, was inaccessible because of snow the high mountains of That's what I'm saying, mountains of North Dakota. And so we ended up having to pick another mountain range. But that wasn't that didn't seem real detrimental at the time, because of hunted that mountain range before, and and and plenty of animals, plenty of you know, uh that that doesn't seem like a limiting factor, you know, but uh, we just I just couldn't quite make it work. Animals. We saw animals the first two days of the trip, and in fact milk yep, yep, hunt milk um, but just never never put it together. How far off the ones you were seeing, um like three yards. A guy, one of one of the one of the guys in our party missed a shot at like two seventy five. I actually missed a shot on that trip. I missed a head shot on a on a which is a terrible shot to have to take and it was it was you know, it's one of those where I thought, this is either gonna go totally not my way or it's going to go my way, and but it but it's a crap me too. Uh if you hunted? Um, yeah, I mean so it was. It was a you know, low percentage shot at something that and and it's one of those things like I don't know how often you guys do this, but I'm always like replaying stuff in my head. You ever, just like replay what happened and think about what you should have done. I have any energy, your time and to go forward, for all I know, I m spend analyze in the past. I spent a full day thinking about how I should have done that different, Like what I could have done different that would have let me had a shot at the body of that elk and not ahead was elk in behind a blowdown timber and had me dead to rights. It's like, well, it's either it's either. I mean, I was standing because if I bent down, she her head wasn't even visible, you know, so it was I mean, anyway, it's the bummer of a shot and I didn't make it. So that's even bigger bummer. But that was it, you know, that was the first I guess that was the first day. And then after that we just weren't We just weren't into animals. You could see where animals had passed through in a you know, migrating from from high to low, but but we didn't see any of the move like being pushed down by the snow. I think so. So the first there was a lot of snow and and the first um, the two days before we got there, and the first day we were there there was quite a bit of snowfall and and and you could you could see animals moving. We would be uh like before light. The first day we drove past a string of cow el because it was probably you know, they were they were nose to butt for probably most of a mile, yeah, traveling you know, like they like to travel kind of at the darkhay yep. So driving in, we saw uh you know on private yeah, yeah, all low down in the on the farm on the yeah, um, a ton of elk. And actually even from up in the mountains you could you could glass way down and just pick out hundreds of them in the flats. But they're so far I mean there's thousands of feet below you or I'm guessing you know whatever they are. Yeah, um so anyway, we just you know, no one in the party ended up getting an ELK. So, and how many miles are you guys walking every day? I'm not very good at counting. Um, I don't know, you'd probably have five or six mile days. I guess, I'm I'm I don't know, I don't know. It's hard for me to guess. I mean with a guy who had grown up in a city, and he would always talk about blocks, really just put it into He would be like, even with Cariboo, would you like anyone looking at a Cariboo would have no idea what the city block. But he would talk about it's probably like you'd be like, there's a sault bowl probably three blocks away. Wow. In the distances he walked, he would give you in blocks, it's bad about seven two blocks? Yeah. No, I'm bad at judging that, but you know, it was it's challenging country. I mean, it's it's a it's either up or down. You know, if if it feels like so a year walking in snow, Yeah, there was six or eight inches of snow that adds to it, for sure, it does. You know, I've gotten better at that later in life, though better it was, I've gotten better at being uncomfortable. I was not good at that as a young person. I had a real problem with it. And now I feel like I can just kind of chill out. It's like, yeah, I know this, this sucks, but yeah, being okay with trudging. Yeah, I was not good at it. I really wasn't. I mean, you know me for twenty two years, but I never knew years. I never thought if he has a cupcake, yeh, I did no. But I mean I think it's like I was fine with this hunt and actually I wasn't even super bummed out to not get one. I mean I just felt like, uh, that's what an ELK tag is, man. You you you know, dude, if you went up and just plug every time, I yeah, you go look at success rates. If you go look at non guided, nonresident ELK success rates, they hover like around ten percent. Well, I'm in the nineties, I can tell you that this year. Yeah, no, it's and I know I'm I was okay with it. I mean it was you know, any time you're successful when you're hunting it's it's it's it's real. It's still a thrill for me anyway to to be a successful hunter. But I think that not having success is it's like weirdly also poignant and and it didn't it didn't, it didn't bumm me out. I don't know. It's a weird. It's a weird thing. Man, you really arrived at Like it's like, yeah, that is one thing. That's next. Time'm getting nextime, I'm getting two mule deer tags. I'm killing something. Next, I'm putting in for muled your doorteg. Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah. You used to bumm me out. I mean myself personally when I was a kid. If I didn't get something, that was a failure. Now just being there, So it depends a lot on what's going on in the old freezer. Yes, that's a good point, right. If I'm sitting on if I'm sitting on a cult freezer is packed full, I get real no not non salant, but I get real interest and seeing my buddies. Fine, success, then it's fun. That's fun for me then. But if I'm kind of like really weighing out, just like uh, you wanted to have the I want to have the jam pack freezer full of me that I get a little bit fussy, become less interested in my bodies good times, you know, in a weird way, I think, being like, so you know I don't hunt that much. I mean, I you know, I really don't with with career and and family and kids. Like I'll do sort of probably one good hunt like that every year, and maybe I get to do some in state stuff and you know, goof off. But um, I feel like in a certain way hunting less. It's not made me care less, but enjoy it for its like experience more, you know what I mean. Like, and I'm not so outcome driven as when I hunted more like when when I was younger, I would actually I would hunt more. I'd be more miserable or at least wallow in it, and I would care more whether I was successful or not. And that's interesting me. Yeah, I know I don't understand it either, but it's true. So now older, more seasoned, more responsibilities, you're willing to go out there and enjoy the sucky aspects and not fixate on the success thing that you used to be pushed by. I guess so, so it used to be like, I hate being uncomfortable. I really wanted to get something. Maybe I really wanted to get something so you could get home. I don't know the only way to get out of here, to get out of here and safe face to be able to get it. If I don't feel this, Dang man, I'm gonna have to be out here forever. Yeah, no, I don't know. It's it's funny. Yeah, that's good. I like that. Jimmy Dork. Ask about one last last thing that you were upset when the when Chris Cornell from Sound Garden died. Can you talk about that? Sure? Oh man, why that upset you? I just I don't know. I met him when I was, you know, young, We're about the same age, and I think we discussed it pretty well. Like, I just can never wrap my brain around what, in my opinion, is it temporary problem with obviously permanent solution When somebody does that not to me, Yeah, you're like, man, just call somebody something like Jesus, that's what spoke to you about that. Well that you know, there's two different ways, you know, I get pissed. I'm like, oh, what you know? Too many persons? You know, too many private jets and you're tired of those five star hotels, Like, what's going on here? Most people, you know, large percentage of humanity, would you feel pretty good about the situation he was in? And but you know, I've never understood like, I mean, I really liked him and I obviously loved music a lot, and you're just like, dude, why would you just not just call somebody? I don't know, it couldn't have been that big of a deal. It couldn't have been that big of a deal that you're done, and you just can't wait till tomorrow and about tomorrow is gonna maybe be better or something. I don't know, man, try to stay optimistic. But yeah, that was definitely a Yeah. That one sucked. Really bumm me out. There's so many good musicians, there are lots of just kill themselves. Man, I don't get it. The guy I used, you know, the mark links from Solin Garden or not something to know, Sparkle horse m. We talked about myself with a shotgun in the chest. Oh jeez, that can't be good. Elliott Smith stabbed itself to death with it. Yep, this conversation is taking a dark turn. I did we talked about David Wallace, right and and uh, you know, trying to read his books again, kan your prompt. I even bought the books. A supposedly fun thing I'll never do again. I did. I've got I know him there. But it's just like trying to get a drink out of a fire hose. Man. It's like you do you have you read brief interviews the hideous man? No, I'm still working on the thought. That was the last one he said, and supposedly fun thing I'll never do again. Yeah, I kept infinite jest next in my room so that way I looked smart. Yeah, he used as a prop. I saw Tom Petty the week before he died here. Yeah, yeah, total weird circumstance. I mean, I would I like Tom Petty, but I would not about a ticket to that, you know what I mean. It's just not really what I'm saying because me and me and the mid not there but three years ago. No, I'm not saying anything by it. It's just like anyway, tickets fell into our lap and and and we went, and we were invited by like a work colleague, like, oh man, I love to go. I'd love to see Petty you know, it's it's an icon. It was a great American, one of the one of the greats. And that's the story of Tom Petty is a story about everything that's great but here so so I just I just bring it up because of Jimmy's story about Chris Cornell, which which is like horrible. I view Tom Petty as the opposite. There's a glorious story that dude wraps up a tour and and you know, figurative Mike drop and just goes out and like, how do how do you do better than that? What's the quote you used to say, like some guy said, if I had to do it all over again, I do it like Petty did it. Oh, yeah, it was an interview. It was an interview with uh it was an interview with another musician. You said, if I could do it all over you gonna do it like Tom Petty. Yeah, that's what I thought about when Tom Great America. I mean, the story of Petty's career and success is so like to be like kids from Gainesville, Florida, like a garage band, become like a bar band, cover band, go out to l A to make it big. None of you's ever been Western Mississippi. You find some scrap of paper in a phone booth with like some record producers names on it. Start it's just a bizarre story. No, it's iconic, that's the thing. It's like. And even when he died, I was like, this, in a way is the coolest thing in the world. I mean, it's it's terribly he died, but it's like, you're gonna die anyway. Why not rap, you know, I mean, just why not put a bow on it? Speaking of suicide, American Girl, she could hear the cars roll by on all four or forty one, like the waves crashing on the beach, and for one desperate moment, it's about a girl that kills herself jumping out of a window. American Girl is wow, yeah, it's about a suicide. Oh god, yeah in the court. Oh god, it's so painful, something that's so close but still so far out of reach. American Girl. Um, honestly, it's a doll line now, so I think that's it. Oh No, I wanted to want to say. A guy wrote in. I had said something like having a hammer hanging over your head, and a guy rode in to say, oh, it's not that you meant this sort of democles. Did you write in that? Nope? How do you know what I'm talking about? How do you know what I'm talking about? Because it's not a hammer over your head, that's that's not a thing. Imagine. No, I was being like, I wasn't referring to that, the sort of democles, because you guys are alluding to it when you talk about famous people rich, famous people killing themselves. So a king has like a guy in his court who's just a professional flatterer. Okay, And he says to the king, my god, for just I would what I would love just to be you? For to be you? You have it made right, you're rich, you're the king, Like, why can't I be you? And he goes, oh please, I'll show you exactly what it's like to be me and seats him at the banquet table with the beautiful women around him, the food, the wine, the drink, and then he takes a sword and hangs it from a single horsehair high above his head. Is that right? I guess I don't know this, he says, Okay, do you want to stay in my seat now? Yeah? A sort of democles and the hammer of Steve Vernella. Have you, by the way, you do have a kayak paddle over your head, so I think it's symbolic carbon fiber werner. Carbon friber werner paddle could fall and bust me in that, that's right. I think won't even give you a headache like a feather. I don't know if you know, if Fitzgerald butt up at the fish shack, the next time you go to take the boat out to get to take the canoe to get the skiff, you'll notice that I now have a carbon fiber canoe paddle up there. Holy ship, Yeah, I think I saw something here about this. Yeah, good stuff. You keep thinking you forgot the paddle, then you realize that you're paddling. It's great, it's amazing, all right. Thanks for joining us, guys, Thanks man, Thank you,