00:00:02 Speaker 1: Welcome everyone to the Meter podcast. This is the second installment or episode we're doing from the Texas Panhandle. Um, we're on the Yano Esticado or state planes and we're actually this place called Ransom Canyon. Now these steak plays is the weird things. It's just dead ass flat chunk of land that comprises like the western half of the Texas Panhandle. And I was reading earlier, I make it so curious about this place because it's just flat. I want to read what real quick when Coronado, you know, the Conquisador, Well, Coronado came through here and wrote about this. He was the first European, first white guy passed through. He says, uh, I reached some planes so vast that I did not find their limit anywhere I went, although I traveled over them for more than three leagues, with no more landmarks than if we had been swallowed up by the sea. There was not a stone, nor a bit of rising ground, nor a tree nor a shrub there anything to go by. That's like, this place is flat. This makes my first wife look chesty. Yeah, that was a good one. This place is flat. But earlier I was reading it's that I don't know you guys might know this. It's pitched across this whole plane. It gains about two thousand feet of elevation ten ft per mile. It's pitched the southwest. No, the northwest corner is higher than the southeast corner. This whole plateau got cocked on its side a little bit. So the whole time you think it's everything's flat, you're on a you're at a cock eyed angle. You're on like something that Ronnie bab built. Speaking of which we're joined speed Works, joined um by ron bain Um, very long term friend of mine. Uh well, well, uh, sorry about that. We're trying to we're getting close onto the holiday seasons. We're trying to make rum and egg nog and a bunch of crane meat. A bunch of crane meat just fell out of the freezer. Also by Janice who tell us who works on the Mediator TV show crew. And Mike Panasi Hernasi there you Italian born and raised in Maine. He's now a Texan PhD candidate studies coyotes, studying coyotes. Right, Yeah, he's killed killed one. So he killed one. Can I tell why he killed it? Yeah, that's fine. He killed one just he was trying to tranquilize and he odeed it. It was in very poor conditions, so it was already made. And can I tell the thing he just revealed to us? Probably come on, tell us a little bit. It's out the thing. I mean, we've talked about a few things, nothing to do with your wife anything. What you were telling us about memory glands. I don't think people would be interested. I think if you don't want to tell, and I'll tell unless you don't want me to tell. Well, I just gave my opinion that I think it's some dependon told something you did, so I read about it all right, son, he did something that's the most interesting thing that you will here all week, but he won't share it what mikel was born and raised in Maine. I was born in Connecticut, moved to moved a couple of places, but raised in Maine when I moved to Maine when I was really young. Formative years in Maine. So pretty much you grew up Hunt Devision in Maine. Yeah, so, Mike, Uh, then you then you where'd you go? Graduated? Where'd you go to regular college? Graduated high school through May in Maine, went to Yukon. So I was there for four years, did some odd jobs and ends, did some field jobs here and there. Uh, went back to Connecticut to you know, earned cash. And then in the middle of each of them, what's your study in regular college? Uh, ecology and evolutionary biology at Yukon. Yeah, I took the biology track instead of the wildlife track. Yeah, and then came out to do a master's degree, did some field jobs, worked worked in the fields for five years. Um, then started my master's at Texas Tech. Finished it, decided to stay on it. That was on kind of genetics as well, but more of a lab based study looking at how well DNA sampled not invasively. Yeah, okay, So, um, there's kind of been a transition. You know, generally, when you do a genetic study, you kill the animal and take a tissue sample and then you analyze that. Well, you know, you can't kill an animal if it's an endangered species or uh, and really you know, people are less interested in killing animals if you don't have to. So there's been a transition to UM sampling not invasively, so hair samples where that you catch the animal, take you know, pull some hair int of it and let it go. You can also get DNA from their scat or their ship. Basically, So what happens is there, it's like you tissue from the abdominal it is so when the right right, it's it's it's the cells from the hope you know, from the from the animal that as the as the food passes through it, uh, it collects intestinal epithelial cells, is what they are. And it collects on the outside of this of the fecal sample. And so you pick up that fecal sample and you swab the outside and you get a mix of bacterial samples or bacterial bacterial DNA and then DNA from the animal, and so you will specialize. Well, yeah, you get that too. So what if you cannibalize the other kyle, would you be able to figure out what DNA was from the cow that got cannibalized or the cow that was taking the ship. That actually would be more challenging. But fortunately katies don't generally cannibalize each other. Now, um, you know, I found a coyote ship one time where he had shoot out an entire fond soof you actually, I've seen that a lot teeth and hoofs for some well obviously for teeth. I mean, they don't get digestics. Well, now now you're trying to do the one ups and ship game. Oh, that's fine. And I found a bear one time that shot out of bear cloth. One up that see, so he's pruning his teeth, cleaning his teeth, and he saw it. That's not that's found robbing nest. Shot of Robbing's nest. So, Mike, and then you did that work and now you're doing work on kyote genetics as well, but completely different questions. So now landscape genetics, So looking at the relating this among coyotes um across a large geographic area. You know, everybody thinks every you know, coyotes are very adaptable. They can live in you know, almost any habitat, you know, from city to a desert to motley this to you know, swamp land almost and so is there any differentiation among these? Are just any coyote can they just as easily move from one habitat to another? And so my question is, you know, are they are they genetically differentiated based upon well, not only habitat, that's the main question, but is there anything else? You know, temperature, or and you know, most people would think all kyote is being such a generalist species. No, but there's been some recent work out of California that actually suggests that there is. And so I'm trying to kind of second that to see if it's just kind of an anomaly or if it can be verified. Again, like you were saying to me that if a Kyle leaves you know, also my calls the kyotes, which is proper, but I find that anyone who has killed them, well I killed, it's still killing one. Um. That's like, if a Kyle leaves the mountains, is he likely to just go settle into some mountains somewhere. Well, that's the that's the hypothesis based on the workout of California because the natal habitat biased dispersal hypothesis pretty original, right, Yeah, natal have that bias. So if you're you know, fuck you Rod, all right, we can started talking about the strip clubs, run away up, talk you We're not We're here. We're actually here to talk about coles. Were talking about cranes and I'm gonna tie this. I thought I was getting a little long into two. No, listen, I'm gonna do some wonderful. You don't believe how good of a host I am because lot taw I do this transition. Um, check it out, wait for it. That's great about those coyotes. And it just so happens that Mike that I met Mike through our other guests here today at our nett say hello, how do you at Ore? That's a biologist, you know Roosevelt Conservation Partnership. I met Mike through Ed, who met Mike, Mike's professor, and I here to hunt cranes. We're here to hunt cranes and um, and I want to talk about cranes. And I know, like my friend Ed, this is getting are you back? Are you waking up? I'm trying to get through the sofa. I'll try to do this in the most efficient way possible. Through my friendship with Ed, I was invited out to a crane hunt, a Sandhill crane hunt, and I until a couple of years ago, I didn't know you could even hunt cranes, like most people in America don't know you can hunt cranes. I put a thing up on Twitter I was going crane hunting. All I got was people saying, like, I didn't think you could do that. What do you do with them? Can you eat them? Is it legal? One guy said, I know that Oklahoma sells crane hunting licenses, but I didn't know you could actually hunt them, which is like a we trick that they must play on you in some states. And so we had to plan and do a crane on and um, we're down here now, and most people who see sand hill cranes see like a couple of Saint hill cranes. I remember the first time I ever saw sandhill crane was in Michigan Upper Peninsula and it was out in the field and we stopped and asked permission from a lady to see if we can walk back in her field to look at the cranes. Um, they're just not around, but here they're down here in massive numbers, five thousand ten. You might see in one or two. Yeah, yeah, I mean like yeah, in a group. And they're so good that the the lingo the joke is like people called rear buying the sky. So we're talking about a very unusual no yeah, so good eating it. Only eight states have a crane season. I used to live in Montana and you had to uh put into application and draw a tag to hunt a crane. It's crazy. Yeah, just like drawn the elk tech could apply for a crane tech. We get three day, three day for like two and well, let's see the middle of November to first week of February. I think it's the second Saturday of February, so it can go to the eighth generous season. Very generous and invited me down hunt craze and then he was kind of like, I want you to come out craze, but you also got to kind of understand it's not totally my deal. Like I'm this ed speaking, I'm sort of the guests of these dudes. What are these dudes being Mike who do all the work and Mike pounds. I'm hesitant even say what town Rid because you're on the gold here and I think you're gonna get swamped. We are. We've started, I mean this area. I've noticed a huge difference in the last couple of years. Yeah, I've been here for a little while because I did my masters and I'm doing finishing my PhD. And the first four years or so, very little competition. And when I say competition, I'm talking about from other you know, just recreational hunters and and other outfitters. Three years ago or so, we started getting you know, bumping up against outfitters other outfitters. But no, no, no, no, I mean other meanings different, like you know, not just one, but several different um. And it's gotten progressively worse. So last year, after Thanksgiving, which for some reason it seems like people focus on geese or something before that, for whatever reason, mid late December till the rest of the season, the outfitters are just on the cranes. And so I'm not willing to pay money for one, uh, you know, just out one out of principle, and two I can't afford it. Um. But they're just they're just always out there, especially where uh in this in the meadow area. Yeah, I mean that's fine, I'll say it out there. Yeah yeah, But I just want to really quick, like checks out really quick explain. Cran crana is similar to goose hut in the field. I mean, you're out there, you're going to the feeld, you putting up decoys. The birds roost on water at night, but instead of floating on the water, they stay in the water shellow. They're wrong here. They have these shallow leg's called applies gets daylight out. All of a sudden, the sky starts filling up with birds. You're out in the field on food. They're trying to hit crop land. You have decoys out, you pit blind, laying down, hiding whatever you do in layout blinds and they come in information if everything goes right in your bamy maham about three a day. And there way better than geese to eat table fair. It's a way better bird. And in your time here you've killed hundreds of them personally, I have, I mean I haven't. I had a lot. And how big is your stable of landowners you're allowed to hold on? I put a lot of work into it. I mean he has a speel, but I don't want you to talk about it because people are gonna steal your tilt that it's you know, it's it's something that works at a very high success rate. You know, he's pulling. This is a door, classic banging on the door. He's pulling. I'm very rarely sorry. He don't bring that door. Yeah, it's it's too time consuming, it's not it's not efficient enough. Yeah, he's got a speel. He gives over the phone. He was. Now I'm not on Facebook at all. He was run over success over it. I would say it's over ninety percent, but just to be conservative, and I'll say, but you know, it helps that they don't like the crane. Yeah, I would have thought that people to like the cranes or well, let's say the landowners the farmers to farmers don't well, and I'm generalizing, and I hate to generalize. Okay, so a good chunk of them don't care for the cranes. Another good chunk really like, you know, they they're still they consider themselves still a part of the land and hunting is very acceptable. So that certainly helps. So even if they love the cranes, they're okay to crane hunting because there's a you know, there's a sustainable population. We had a conversation we were out getting the permission. I was with you when you scored a permission and this was actually like started out started out the phone call, and that was I wanted to be to send a dairy queen. Right. Normally they don't want to do that, but that was cool that I got to meet him. You know, usually I don't want to waste your time. Yeah, personally, drives us around twelve miles and clearly he was busy too. They were fixing a combine and he took the time twelve miles to show us his fields and explain his property boundaries. Then at some point says, well, what said this for me? I said to him, what do you need to be in it for you? And he was so uncommitted to the idea of getting money that he did that was cool, talked himself out of it. He said, well, you know what, God lets me be a farmer and I should share this lamb with people. We're just touching, and he said like basically said you have my home is yours. If you screw me, I will screw you, you know, and he left. You know the way we would screw him. All you want to know is when we're gonna be at that. When are you in my fields? That's it. If you ever go in my fields without telling me you're in my fields. And he's got a cell phone, all I gotta do is text him and be like hey, and I did. We went out there the next morning. I texted him when we were setting up. I said, you know we're setting up. You know. The last thing he said to us was when we left, you said, can I text you? He said, don't expect me to text back? Yea, but he did. You know what's funny. You know what's funny, he responded, and I was like, well, you know, I don't know if I should respond or not. And I remember him saying, we'll have a text friend. Yeah. Well, and I didn't want him to think, well, I'll respond, so now he's gotta because I don't like the text so I didn't. You know, sometimes I feel like I don't want to respond, but I feel like you got a boyfriend kind of nobody likes a texting conversation. So he responded. I told him how we did that morning. I said, we killed this man, and he responded, so it was day two, we killed eight. That a good day, I said, actually, But I texted him right before we started to pack up, which is right before I got back to you guys, and I find out that you guys actually killed one more. So I killed him. I told him we killed seven. He texted back, well, it's better than six, which is cool, I mean, you know, and I was like, well, should I respond, you know, and I didn't. I didn't respond because you know, he said to me, don't expect a response, So I was like, you know, I'm not gonna respond. You know, he's home right now checking. I tend to overthink things, which you guys probably know from the decoy set ups, right, and we don't know what to do, don't I don't think that, um Field. I don't think you could really overthink it, because that just means you're getting I think like when you're overthinking waterfowl hoodie, you're probably thinking about if there's ten things in your head, nine of them don't matter, one of them does, but you don't know which one. So you gotta do all ten right, because how could you ever know which one is the one that matters. Is it like that you have a yellow hoodie on the hoods pokeingon a little bit? Is it the wind? Yeah? Yeah? Whatever? Is it fresh dirt? Is it that you got X shot and you should be using Y shot? So first day we went out, it was a very good day that day. But I want I want to I want to I want to get that by one top I s el because it's really sets I think this kind of sets the scene here a little bit. We killed a crane this will kind of explained cranes we killed the crane's banded. First off, talk about how many Mike about how many crazy killed? How do you have bands out of So I've killed a lot of crans myself, but I also enjoyed taking people hunting, and I especially enjoyed taking people hunting who haven't hunter before. So you can imagine I take a lot of people hunting and it's not you know, I say, I. It's me and a couple of the guys that generally take people, although I'm the one pushing to take newbies because nobody else has the patients that I do. Um generally speaking, again, if we didn't have generalizations, we would never get anything. You just would be able to talk about anything, and everything would be like a constant qualification. That's wrong. So so, uh, you know, a couple of my friends have uh a killboard and they keep track of everything, everything they kill for the year. I don't like that, no, but you know it does. There are good points and bad points. But anyway to get to the point, what do you think about that? Hmm? It's like Boone and Crockett, you know, not really into the fact that like dudes are always scoring their stuff all the time, and always talking about numbers this, numbers that. But when you look back across records of all those numbers, those are valuable information. I'm gonna tell you why I do it. What happens when you get your Sandiel crane survey or your waterfowl survey from the Fish and Wilife Service. You want to guess, Yeah, but those are so broad, but you know they're general. Yeah, But I mean, I keep dragging numbers just so I know whether I'm within a My other day, I started making a list. That's right. I was with you. You told me how many species of fowl, of game birds general hunted killed, and I said, I'm gonna do that too. And I had just that day killed my first day in hill crazy forgot his first crane. I couldn't put it up dirty dirty, It felt dirty. It felt like we sat down and trying to make a list of every girlfriend you ever had or something. But it's not that. So I started making a list, and I felt dirtier and dirtier and dirtier the more I wrote. Now, not a conquered board, though I mean I respect the things I killed. It's more of a experience board, not a conquerboard. Kill board. You called it, Yeah, well they did that sounds real Pentagon. Well come on, we're not going to use a cliche kill Yeah, like you harvest. I'm not lying. I know, I know what killing is. It's killing it is. It is, Yeah, like why harvest to do? But the reason why I like it is because it's more of a ratio thing species to species, Like, oh man, we killed that many Widgeons this year compared to last year, versus Gadwall versus teal. And that's what that's why I like. It's a relative you know, it's a relative thing. I used to keep a hunt journal, so you did it too. I got Yeah, I kept the hut journal, and I got lazy and quit doing it. And when I look back, I can't believe I ever quit it. So why do you say it's you feel dirty calling it a killboard. A hunt journals different because here's the thing. A hunt journal is a day by day deal. It's not like you making this catalog this Noah's Ark collection, only the kills. Yeah, it's like that's like yeah, and has more heart. But but I don't want to get away from what was I even talking about we're how many change? Okay, always crazy? You see how many dead craze a pass through your hands in your time here text with all the all counting all the people that we take so basically over our decoys, okay, whether it was me, your friends, and we actually tallied this up last year, and so of course it's gonna be higher this year. It was one thousand plus, all legal. Of course, let me say that all legalus, Well, you know, probably a thousand plus. No, that's you and your uncud all that and over how many years? Well, first, hold on how many years I've been here? I've been in Lovick, So did having a lot of fun with my master's degree? Took some time, a lot of phone is the PhD. So since two thousands to get into your tardiness on your degrees here, Michael, since two thousand six, so a few years. But I didn't hunt for the first two. But anyway, and all the friends that I've taken in we take a lot of people. Thousand birds. I've seen now two banded birds, and so it's a big deal. And I actually I was the one who killed the other one. So I've got to the first one. The first one. Yeah, well all right, so real quick and if you could as quick because as as gnu as he banded a bird as quickly as possible, explain what that means that those is a bandoned bird, what it means to bandit? What a band it was? Like? What is a banded bird? Sure, so biologists for a variety of reasons banded waterfoil. Your your colleague and friend brand bands WATERFOLI banded thousands of ducks myself, but it did banned a few cranes. And the reasons to track their migratory patterns. You get information about not only movements, migration, but also how old the animals are, you know a lot of ifornation, survivorship, all those kinds of things. So when I was when I banded some cranes in Oregon, it was part of a net nest success study, and from my putting bands on those animals, we would you know, if they were killed in another part of the country, we'd know, you know, what their migratory pat Yeah. So, like the only way you're ever going to get any information is someone shoots or finds the bird he found it. What's that No one picks up road kill. So it's from Hume. You'd be surprised how many people do museum. She did ask what happened to it? And also I thought that was a naive question, But I didn't happen a naive question because we could have found it. Yeah, it could have been hit by winter and hit by a truck. But you get a lot of good demographic data once that band is returned in where it was from where it was banded to words it's uh, it's found or killed or whatever. Um, you get information about how old it is, all kinds of demographic information. So there's anything like real silled, well what do you guess? You guess, can't have a setting conversation. So there's anything like there's this thing that a bolgy too called market recapture. We'll say you want to do it lake going to a lake and net uh hundred bass out of the lake and you put a tag in each of those bass, and then a week later or and then then you on this tag. It says like if you catch this bass called blank number, and a week later ninety guys have called with bass, you put a tag and you'd be like, wow, man, there aren't many bass in that lake. And the ones that are all get caught. Or you're going to tag a hunter bass in a lake and ten years ago by and no one ever turns into tag, you'd be like, man, there's a lot of bass in that lake and the amount of people catching these there's not many people catching the bass, like you know, there's a hundred of them and whatever tournament. So with ducks, remember sometimes it's it's surprisingly high the number of these bands get returned, but the percentage, yeah, I can't. I'd have to call brand, but I was. I was kind of surprised, like how many, like how good people are about calling him? And there's some guys I don't want to day their names, but some of our friends and friends of mine who have a thing where they won't call in their bands and these are hides so they have strings. Why well, because they feel that it's like, um, did it, did it? Did? It's their little secret that it's like it's unreported, so therefore it's more there's than someone else's. And they have because their guides, so they have just their call landards or it's graped with bands that they brag about. The big American jewelry type band is like it looks like a wedding ring with a big, thick wedding ring with the biologists. These guys, well, I would almost like to get these guys names because they're huge numbskulls. When I started duck hunting in Michigan the first time, I huna, would you know, back in Twin Lake, I heard guys say that if you call it in, you got to send it in. They thought that you had to give it up, and they thought it was such a neat token that they were afraid to call it in. Like, no, if you do that, they're gonna take it because they need But you've heard that years ago, Yes, years ago. I was about to say that whoever the FEDS official widelines ever, did a really good job at making it h you know, such a trophy to call it in and figure it out. But maybe you know, I'd never heard that that people actually think it keeping guys. So the only guys I know these guys are big snow goose guys. And so they like to just you know, you know, their eyes trying to find ways. And yeah, I don't want to get into you know, the reason. I was just gonna say this. This bird had a double band and the reason but we don't need induced the fact that this bird had a band. Oh yeah, yeah, well I thought we did. You said a thousand crates of past new Mike's hands or you see the thousand die. Yeah, we just got one. We just got the second one this week with the band on it. They had what I'd called a double band. So one band is the wedding ring band, the other band is a wedding band being the metal band, typical metal band. The other band is this big chunk of plastic on there with with big number so that someone would be able to read that with a pair of binoculars or a spotting scope would be able to pull that number off visually with all having to kill the thing to get the information from it. We call the eight hunter number. I mean, like the craze barret. I mean he's still warm from the sand. He calls the eight hunter number on the band from the field that we shot at, and we got the nicest girl in the whole world to take care of us. I think it was Tammy, super nice Gale, and she sounded hot and sarcastically because we were all arguing who shot this bird, because we we went round table around him, but you know the bird. I said, well, no, we put that one, and he goes, well, we know, I put that one in the grass. And then we got We're on the phone with Tammy and I was just being a smartass as usual, and I said, could we get four certificates for this? She goes, as a matter of fact, we will allow up to four certificates for a till a lot of guys getting fights over. Yeah, because like Mike said, it's a trophy. You know, they couldn't have done that ten years or twenty years ago. They probably like no one. I have like a medicine box. It's like a medicine bag, but I put it keep in the box. It's like just stuff I have, And I got a couple of waterfowl bands in there. It's just like, really, you think, like I said, they marketed it. Well, so we call up and she can't give us full information. But when you get a band and you call in a band, what they'll event you do is I'll tell you, uh where it was banded, which they told us immediately when it was banned, which they told us who based who banded it. This is when you you'll eventually get all this information like when was the bird banded? Um, where who made it? And how old was it when it was banded or at least certainly not a chick versus a Yeah, not the true age. But so this crane that we killed, the double bander, we called in and were immediately told that this crane was abandoned years ago in Fairbanks, Alaska as an adult. We did not learn that yet. The other one you had was what eleven and once I got the certificate back, it was banded as an adult. So it was several old years old, you know, yes, it was twelve plus. It banned in Nebraska Flat River. Most game birds like it like takes out like a like it takes out like a peasant. A three year old peasant is old. Yeah, it's old. When you get birds come out like most game birds. Every year of the birds that that that fledg So of the birds that successfully leave the nest, well first off about sets are destroyed. This is a very just like the Night of They don't help. They don't help at all, you know, like roughly like let's say it's variable, but nest are destroyed. Of the birds that reach something like six months of age or something. Firs that leave the nest, maybe like seventy will be dead within the year of those ones that have lived seventy will be dead next year. I mean this varies all through the thing, but you wind up realizing that when you go hunting pheasants, you're shooting a lot of birds that were born that year. You're shooting something that were born the year before. And then it almost becomes rare downline, like when you shoot a big turkey a big spur. If you shoot a turkey the big long itch, plush, sharp spur, he's three. You can shoot a hell lot of turkeys and not see that spur. Right, you know something that these things are just oldest dirt. Yes, I felt like ship. We found a whole that bird was. Do you know the oldest ones? You want to tell it? I found it too. I looked it up. I found it too, just just since we killed close one night. I guess so the oldest sandhill crane known on record, So that means at least probably no, I uh it was, I think it was. It was banded. Okay, that's what I saw. Thirty six years seven months. That's how old Custer was banded in Wyoming in ninety three and founded the message six years seven months. No wonder why it's so hard to hunt. So this was a young bird. I mean it was a young bird. You shot with the yoke. They don't like that's how how do they guys get before to start breeding? I'm a quick uh so some some birds will breed their second year. Some don't breed until seven years old. That's like, you know, talk about talk about a case selected species. Know a lot of people in eat wild game eat their eyes talking about how wild game eat tastes gaming and older animals get game, Like, remember the hell the word game means that that's the wholeder conversation. As an animal get it's older, it's muscles are more exercise, which would with cattle. Yeah yeah, But what the point I'm gonna make is people who just eat meat from stores and restaurants seldom are eating animals. They're never eating animals more than two years old unless they eat because then you know, you get Yeah. But they used to used to take seven years to run a dairy cow. They can run a dairy cole through wayfaster that they milk the guts out of dairy cot a couple of years. Now they're running through all her cycles that fast, get all every drop of milk. They would have gotten out of her in seven years. They get out of her animal in three years. You don't eat many old animals, chickens, those things are a few months old when you're eating six months for a meat chicken. And here you are we just tonight we're eating some bird this old. I killed a beardle seventeen years old. One time. I felt bad about that because I wasn't I mean, I was older than that at the time. I wasn't held out, you know, I felt bad. I don't know why. I just it just like it bothers me a little bit. But at the same time, it's like you're also going, okay, there must not be a huge amount of predation on them and a huge amount of hunter mortality because they wouldn't be all living that long, right, and one more point to make it, they're gonna be done talking about it. And you guys talk about stuff when when you look at why elk, like why elk gets so hard to kill on public land whatever? Because I used to saying like, oh yeah, you got a cow elk she's nine years old. She's spent nine years watching hunters try to kill him, you know, and they don't forget everything right, and so they have like this herd has this sort of institutional knowledge. You got a bunch of cows. Lead cows are old and they've just seen all this happen a bunch of times before, you know, and they know, like they know a fake cow call and they know to go their direction. And now here you are trying to fool some birds with excellent eyesight, and you've got some of these dudes flat around. They've been doing this, they've been playing this game twenty years. And you wonder, like why they keep flaring, why they keep flaring? Is it because of this? It's because of that. It's like you got you got a dozen birds flying across the sky. How many years of group experience or that dozen birds. It is very similar to catching a tarpon. Tarpin lived fifty years sometimes and have been just seen so many flies, so many lures, cruising those you know, flats, guy after guy after guy, and when you finally pull it off and make it all happen, it's a special thing. And it kind of felt like that this week. You know, we were. It took us four days to really kind of dial in our program and figure out how to get it. It took us four days before we were tricking cranes. We were killing cranes by sky blast pass you. Now, let's not I don't want to imply to that it was a learning experience because some things went wrong the first couple of days, and it was more of a logistics and it wasn't. It was it was a strategy, your strategy to people try to film hunt and you know what, it worked. We went back to the basics of how I usually hunt. I was trying to I was, you know, change, find the best cover and hide you on the way home or at the pond when you go out with just like another guy, you'll just grab a big tumble weed and haul down in the ball anywhere and just sit there like no, yeah, no, nothing. Just so we come out here. But we're like, well, no, it's gotta be eight people, big gass cameras, and the camera can't be down under a tumble of weeks, it's got to be and it's got a big lands and a lot of times you're looking at the sun and all the stuff. This isn't trying to criticize your crane hood to building. So we eventually got to We did fuler crane cameras because we're like learning how to hut cranes. We did ful of crate until the day because we're learning, like weather was an issue, but also just like how are we gonna do this like filmed thing. It was a learning curve with uh incorporating the camera crew factor and the number of people in the interaction between number of people and camera because I've taken out well, I guess seven was the most I've taken up. No, actually eight, so I've done eight people before once and we did not limit. But you probably had him scattered around. He didn't have. They were we have to have and actually was the last weekend of the season, and so they were educated. Well you know, we really how we really wanted up, what really wanted up helping is we got to do it dit roll. Yeah, like a dit roll between two fields where they wanted to be yea, they wanted to be there. We had to thick vegetation to hide it. But notice how you and I were just out in the middle of nowhere and we were hidden. No nothing flared, but you were hitting him, were like a great it was covered that we gathered and put it, went out into the middle and put it on us. And we could have done that and if we were thirty yards over, we wouldn't been in bear stripped kind. We would have been the same. Yes, I believe killed, don't care. I'll be crazy killed. It can't be the same. So you think you could have gone on in the winter wheat field, No, whe It's the only difference that deep green, no early season naive birds. Yes, but you don't have much time with that. That's the only difference. Really. Well, your guests on the show, so I don't want to take your task too bad? Well, that's fine, do it. I'll okay. Why were the birds spoken in the milo field so bad? The first day? Her second day to be honest? First day to yeah, yeah, of course I want you to be honest. Uh. It was hard for some of the new He used to stay down and stay covered when I so here's the problem, and it's a very don't mention any name. I'm not doing people. I mean, I know. So here's there's there's not saying it shooters or camera, but there is there's a general consensus that well, wait, I'm wearing camo, I blend in. That's bullshit. I don't think anybody thought that. Yes, people did, alright, everyone. I know you're enjoying the Meat Eater podcast, and you're especially enjoying it because it's free. And to keep it that way, we got to take a quick break to thank our sponsors. Football season is rolling down, it's slipping by, and your season long fantasy team might not be going anywhere. But every week you can get a new shot at glory by going to DraftKings dot com. Now DraftKings is the destination for one week fantasy football where you can relive the fantasy draft and play for huge prizes each and every week. 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Even if you're wearing the camo, they feel, you know, you could sit up a little bit and you can't. Like if you saw me and you were you yesterday, I didn't pay attention as much today because I wasn't in the field as long yesterday. You and I we were laying flat on our back head on the ground, and that's what you need to do. You're laying on the bosom of the bosom of the earth. Yes, nobody was doing that except for me, and and you know ed did it a little bit. He's he's down it a couple of times. But even he got so are you know, running through the decoys. Yeah, but he's a certain guy gets daylaid out, big old group cranes, crat, that's the good guy, basically running through the field like a lunatic. That was I don't want to say who times at work, you were just there. I was trying to cover all the bases, all the you know, okay, what happens if this happened. I was trying to dig a second another pit in case we had I don't I don't want to do pitts. And we abandoned pits and so, but we committed their pets and so if you're sha to get off the pot, we committed to pitts. So I'm gonna go all the way. And and yeah, that was my fault on that first group of cranees. I don't I'll admit it, but I'm confident. No, that's but the problem, and the problem was it was not the bare dirt or the tumbleweeds or anything. It was people not staying down. They were seeing our brand new cameo or even the old cameo. It does not look like the body. They're seeing this stuff day in day out. They have that extra rod cell or cone cell. I don't remember my basic biology. They can see, you know, exponentially more colors than we could even imagine to see. That was the problem. I promise you I will lay in them. I'll take you, honey me, and you will go tomorrow lay in the middle of the cotton fields with tumbleweeds. What do you do for clothes? I'll wear, I'll go naked, I'll wear white, whatever you want hide, and I will hide enough that they won't see through the tumbleweeds if they see anything. Totally reject what you're saying. I think it could be true. I think that they could see fabric definitely, And I think the fabric you might think like, oh, this fabric is And it might be that they're flying over and they're like, what the hell is that you? Like? You can see you through a window. But if I lay a window down in the big field and you're flying over, you'd be like, that's a siwmissing window out in the field. You saw the bibs I had on the last two days, those shadow grass. The pattern was absolutely perfect for what we were in. They were too damn bright. I needed to go roll around on the damn plia and get muddied up. But I was, and I kept it the idea I kept pulling. I did reject that idea, but I kept pulling the native vegetation. What are you doing it out there? And the ply on your back when you're I was wondering that myself. Stop No, But I mean that's a pattern that was perfect for the vegetation we were in. But it was still too it was way too, way too bright. I don't want to beat I gotta beat this up one part, I part. But where where we were there was a big mud pit hole player. It was nice to It was a ditch. It was a pond of some sorry okay, anyway, I don't know what all right, So there was water in there, okay. And beyond that was a bunch of white old hay bales, the plastic sheathing from hay bales all over the place. Why didn't that bother the cranes? Because he's there, it's been there, and because those that those pieces of garbage. But if the other day, the first field, and we had also just laid in white suits, but it was ron What did that first field look like? It didn't have all that ship laying around in there. I understand that there was an old propane tank. There was a bunch of the first time they look at that, So we're we're looking at that field for days now, at least days. He here's the decide. The white it's okay because they're accustomed to it. But no, because look at this. You gotta think about this. You already have anaiable. We know for a fast day. Did he's eleven years old, he was tagged in Fairbanks, Alaska. He's made Okay, whatever it is, it has managed to stay alive for eleven years, flying from Fairbanks, Alaska to Texas and got tripped up by a white plastic under ground. No, don't, don't. Don't try to do that. Don't try to do the flipping a trivial bullshit with me. Okay, that's eleven years old. You tell me it can move from Fairbanks, Alaska to Texas, back and forth and do it eleven years and not get killed, not run into something or whatever. But that's something bitch. Can't get a basic sense, a basic spatial sense of what is where it is habitat? Sure? Can I think that if you had taken a propane tank out to the first field we hunted in. How big was that propan take standard? Yeah, okay, if you took that out into the milo field we first hunted and plopped it down there, I think the cranes would flare from that pro pan take because they've been feeding in this area and all of a sudden, that's not the way it is. Also, these milo fields are very uniform. It's like strip a vegetation dirt, strip vegetation dirt, and these things are a quarter section, a half section, big cater jack. It looks like someone dropped a couple of Yeah. Way on day two, it looks like someone dropped a couple of bombs out here in this field. The weird Where did the exposed dirt end up on my pit? It was on a berm immediately in front that was covered in my ouse side. I think the bird stupid, the burst up in the air. If you were hunting jack rabbits, the burn would be a great idea kind of what is on my phone next to this beer? Now I'd be like, oh, yeah, he'll never see my phone because my beers in the way. But when my fingers up here, the bear doesn't matter. But it's not a beer. It's it's dirt in the middle of a dirt field. It's just piled mounds of dirt in a uniform field. I see what you're thinking. If I took a sheet of yellow line, if I took a sheet of yellow line paper and then put a quarter on it, you'd be like, you see anything wrong with this yellow piece of papers. Damn core about it. It's that I don't I want to tell you. Let me, let me, let's make one more point, move one more I want to make a point. So here's what this is going to suggest strongly that you're wrong. There's no such thing as proved. I'm not even go to the coundar. I don't know what it is. I will not count it. Go he's on the defense. Please do when the outfitters go out, that can spend uh their entire working day doing this, so basically this is their life. What they'll do is they'll make three hundred of these stuffers that I have and spend more time than I do. What they'll do for a blind in the middle of a milo field, They'll take this ft long, four ft deep, four ft tall grasp build that morning with you know, because they break it down and put it in the truck. There's a trailer and put it up every morning, flip open lid like you'd see a duck blind that you make permanently, and the birds suck in because there's so many decoys they do that. It's a new You're welcome, Thank you, appreciate your go ahead and see. Okay, I thought so, I thought so. Next next to counter, then you said you would you would know? Please? What do you have to say for that that? What I'm saying is the little berm that was eighteen inches high covered in milo stocks that are also covering the rest of the field did not flare. It was people in their fabric. I promise you, okay, I have counter for you. If we were the same way, exactly the same way we were the first two days and we dropped out six D crane decoys, do you think those birds would have flared on us with both days? Day one? It was not us flare them Day one, it was somebody had hunted the field illegally did and I didn't know until the day that they were flaring on us. Then on fabric or berms or whatever it was they were flaring on us. If we had six hundred decoys out slaughtered them. That's a good question because there's there's competing variable. See there's there's always more than one. Let's talk, sure, hold on one of the quick thing. I just want to drop in because we're on this old bird and it's like Fairbanks, Alaska to Love Texas. Sounds like a talk about that. We didn't say where it was. We didn't on the field. It's right next to the Fisher game. You know. We didn't talk about this today. Yeah, we did a little quickie. You gave a little date on it. That's where it was a banded We got that right. Okay. I just said he went back and forth eleven times, very Banks, Alaska. Anyways, it sounds a far away, just so everyone knows. It's three thousand, seven hundred and sixty three miles. Yeah, he just a dumbass bird. You don't know what's the what Okay? I got text back from brand about bands and about percentages. Historically it was around and they have been reporting, but it's come up to around with the toll free number. And what I'm saying of the birds that they put a band down, they get them back, they get them back now it's up to seventy percent because there's a website on the band and there's a toll free number. It varies a lot by location. Alaska, it's still built fifty. Do you know whatice That bird was so damn old. There's no website on the band. That band like pre website. The metal was actually started to hear your way some of the words on it. That's right, you know what, Yeah, that's that's an old band style. You know. I saw that clip and thought it was odd, and I didn't think it's because it was so long. Metal shop. Some guy with the an villain of a coal f forging got two birds band in a year back, so he killed one of the damn So the decoys um in in field hunting, you know, people use typically rags, which it can be just like a piece of fabric for snows. It used to work for already got wise to it. Yeah, if you just put white stuff white rags out of the field. Now we had to do an these things silo. Then there was like silhouettes. We basically that's what we used to when I was a kid to hunt candidate us We try to you like cut out the silhouette of a goose and put it on a stick and put it out of the field socks, which would be like rag decoys. We tried to use it and use silo socks, which is a silhouette head with a sock body. Then people will have shells, which is basically like the top half of a bird. You just lay down, you'll have free standing whole geese with legs. But Mike is making what do you guys, what do you guys what from about silo socks? I never thought, I never I wondered why they call him. We didn't put two and two together, so like boom, what is that? Oh yeah, same thing. Anyways, So Mike makes his old crane decoys. This is a whole interesting thing about birds and and uh Rodney can poo poo. This is being just a bunch of horse pucky. But Mike skins his cranes and then explain the process. He reforms the cranes skin into a decoy. Now not everyone, of course, I mean they take you know all, when it's all said and told. Each decoy takes just under an hour to do um from dead bird to decoy, dead bird to decoy. Alright, tell the process how I do this. Okay, so uh, it's not like an assembly line process, you know. I start with I'll cut a whole bunch of so each uh, each decoy has a couple two by four blocks in it. Now, I'm not saying this is the best way to start with skin of the bird, Okay, like falls out of the sky dead. Well, that's what I'm saying, though, because I don't start there. I prep I do some prep work so that so I'll start, you know, ten decoys or something. I'll prepare ten steel steaks that are going to be the neck or at least form the neck, cut the blocks, um, you know, gather the uh you know size screws that I'm going to use, and you know, put it all like make a decoy making kid basically, then the season start. I deal. I do it before the season. Didn't this year because I had an unexpected issue with domestic beetles. But um so now let's start in the field. Shoot a bird. To start, I only use the biggest cranes. Um So, whether it's a greater or lesser, I mean the um you know, you can get a big lesser, but generally they're gonna be greaters. And so if it's in good shape, meaning you know it's not all beat up from your shot, I skin it um salted pretty well. Leave his own legs on, I do. I leave its own legs. How far do you skin the wing out? Uh? As far as you could, basically as far as you could until it's just where you can't go anymore. But you can still uh slip some loppers in there to to cut through that bone. And so there's actually there's always a little bit of meat tissue left there and then brain tissue because you know, I uh, if you're gonna do a museum prep, you would skin out the entire skull, but that would make three times as long. So I just cut it as close to the skull as possible and as close to the wings as possible. Um, and I leave the head so that neck I inverted, you know, so it's like an inside out. It's called tube skinning or case skinning. All right, there you go. I didn't know that, So you salt that I used salt. Your borax would probably be more effective, but it's more expensive, and you know I do it on the cheap. You called I call him magas well. Zombies I was offended in the nicest possible way. No, I'm just kidding. So yeah, he he reformed the things so skin it salted, and then generally the next day if it works, if you wait longer than that, depending on the temperature a little bit, but the the next starts to harden and it's not as malleable, and so ideally it's the next day. Then I, you know, nailed two six inch two by four black box together, Staple that steel rod that I had cut, you know, maybe a probably a twenty four to twenty eight inch steel rod stable to the top of those two by fours, Shove it up the neck. Then I put some like pillow stuffing, synthetic stuffing or I've actually he's caught and that I've gathered in the field again when times were tough, this stuff on the side of the road, of course, So then you kinda and all that does you put it on the side of the two by fours, and so all it does makes the decoy wider, and then you kind of fold over the skin flaps and staple it to the edges of those two by fours. So because it doesn't matter what, you know, if there's two by four exposed at the bottom. Nothing sees the bottom, so he skinned over. Could I add one thing basically in case someone's not getting what he's doing, he's basically playing taxidermists. Yes, not cheapass text. Yeah, if you want a text out of mass scale. You paid for these birds. You know how people might come on. There's a couple of them that don't have foam coming out of their mouth like they're vomiting. There might be a crawling out there. But in your defense, this morning when the fog lifted, I'm like, spurts, there's some there's a birds in the field and like those are the stuffers he thought they were because it was so thick a ship, like, oh, that's where we put stuff up. Cranes land in the decoys and I can't laugh about that. Crane land and walking around. Cranes are all dead, they're just boring. Well, you guys, all right, let me go sit for a medic. You have a crane coming with a red cross on its wing, with any that is like anybody there's a megot you got magots coming out of your eye. But you guys, but I want to here's what I want to get to is uh, do I mean to finish up with the crane making or decoy making or well, I'm just worried about time because I want to get to I want to get to that basically. Yeah, but um, Robert Abernathew, a friend of mine who's a was a biologists, did a lot of work with turkeys. He he makes decoys similar process, but he just plucks a turkey that buys a shitty turkey decoy and then glues the real turkey's feathers under the turkey decoy. He made one of these and he was saying that I can't remember what did you ever be honest? Thirty one or he was saying somewhere it was like he said, I think it was thirty one. He said, thirty one turkeys, thirty one male turkeys have laid their eyes on this decoy. I have killed all thirty one of them within some inches of the decoy. And he said, and we showed that decoite a number thirty two and killed it. Now, what the You can't fathom what a bird looks like when it when it sees. Remember a guy was talking about these burden of jungle in the the iridescent color on that bird, and they're trying to figure out like what do these what do birds do when they see other birds? And he said it might be akin to what what that bird sees when he sees a member of his species through the jungle, which just just seems like green and there's flitters of movie. He said, it might be like what you see when you see a lightning bug. It's like, you don't know what that thing sees when it sees it, you know. And there's something about the coloration and the iridescence in those feathers, says Abernathy, that like when he sees a turkey decoy, he's like, oh, that resembles a turkey decoy, But there's something about when he sees those feathers. It's like, I'm not wondering what that is. I know that that's what that is. And it's some combination probably of shape, position, you're adescence. But we can't just assume that, like when we look at a camel pattern, be like, oh, blends right in. You just don't really know what they're seeing. Yeah, how they judge, like how a bird in the air says, oh that's my kind and how other times when the burn and the air just goes, I'm coming in no matter what, or you think like that and thinks for an antelope and he's coming. You know what I mean, you're shooting at him. He's still coming because he's like God, it's like he screwed up. He's got in his head he sees something. But I think that those decoys work. And I feel like today the birds that approached those stuffers, the maggots, zombies home stop like the looks of those decoys. Yeah, they work. They didn't like the I think they liked that it was that much that we committed. Also committed kind of flare from the decoys. I mean, some people do well with silos well, but I think the silos would get them close they can see them. But I don't even think they were seeing them today. The day before they were coming in and flaring around them. That's why we kind of sat outside of them because the way they were flaring over then they gave us really close past. Earlier, we had birds land in a spread that included mag It's in silos, silos, silos. It is typical actually to get birds landing in the decoys. That's pretty common, you know, not that we're letting them go to land. It's just sometimes they come from a direction we different and everyone from the east today and you do it all of a sudden just well it was once that went over. Yeah, then they washed them up, that's what. Oh and you're saying like an opening day, they like pile in. But at this point we're into they've been getting shot at for a couple of months, so they might be getting a little bit. And it also, you know, there is you don't know what trip they're on. Like we talked about this sort of institutional knowledge about these birds that are alive so long you don't know what happened to him an hour ago. Yeah, that's true, because do you call us a bird of eleven o'clock? He flayers for decoyst ten o'clock. You getting shot at by some dude, you know what? You just don't know. It's like you don't know what kind of trip they're on, what they've been doing, what they've been seeing. Why do you sometimes out freak out? Sometimes I would don't freak out. Was a guy that a guy just shoot at him? And how much does it matter what that lead bird does it to? Today? We had we're going to get the trucks and a bunch of geese. Yeah, we had. We had a bunch of geese. Came over a fraction a third of those geese, five or six on that edge you really wanted in. I split off started circling like they were like, oh, let's go laying with those other keys. And there was some geese going and you can see this little group of geese going through this like don't do we don't know anyway? It end they're like ship They went joy up with the group because their mom was up there. It was the edge birds that wanted to the lead birds didn't, and they won the argument. And they've proven that, dude, the older birds really lead. Absolutely. I'm not sure you'll see. I have a friend that shot the lead bird of a group of like a hundred, and he said it was tough as nails, suggesting it was it was an old, old bird. But I know I haven't read the literature with l I've seen where you'll have a calf you'll be like putting the moves out of group of elt in a caffle bust you and the castle jump and start, and no other elk cares because it's like a boy crime wolf. They're like, yeah, you know what he's doing, you know, And sometimes as if so much just picks up her ears. The whole herds like what you know, well, and if you happen to shoot the lead cow. I experienced this. She must have been the lead cow because they all just stood there. They didn't didn't know what to do. They found there's these guys studying these vervet monkeys and how they have like a little bit of language like that. They have a call for predator in the air, they have a call for predator in the tree, they have a call for predator on the ground. They recorded a monkey vocalizing a threat, and it started playing the recording of the monkey vocalizing the threat to his troop all the time. Eventually it got to be where if this monkey vocalized the threat, the monkeys didn't care because they burned him out with the recording. He lost his credibility. Yeah, he like people like, you know, eagle up there, dumbass it every day. Oh then the eagles moved in. Yeah, that's that's what good eagle was like, why did you get the head of the stuff I want to talk about? Can we keep going so I don't want to, I don't want no, I don't want to be too long. Could I ask a question? Please? So back in what was it, Mike? Maybe two thousand eight? I started hunting with you. It was about two thousand and eight when I joined faculty at Texas Tech and we got to know each other and started hunting. I've never handed cranes a day in my life, and we went out and I thought this was the coolest thing I've ever experienced, and I really have been coming back every year. I'm just curious of Ronnie, and I just want to share what you thought of the experience. I just I think it's one of the funnest things I've ever done. I think it was fun. But I'm such I'm so addicted in my dogs. I would rather be working. I would rather be working with my dogs. It's not I know ed. Ed was lucky to bring his dogs and got some retreats, which is every hunter likes that do that. But if I've got like so many hours a year I can spend in the field, I'd rather spend it with my dogs. But I do a fair amount of crane or not a fair amount of goose hunting. Tiny bit of duck hunting. I really enjoy that. I really enjoy it. But it's not like what you're saying. I came down here and I thought it was like it was just I'm a social hunter. Steve knows me for a hum of years if I wouldn't hunt if it wasn't for friends and a dog. So he said, you gotta go hunt through I'm gonna McDonald's. I'm not gonna go hunt for my food. But I love hunting. I love being with my dogs and my friends, and so it was a great trip for that. But it wasn't like the end on Bill. I I've been just as excited with Canada's coming in or a duck coming through the trees. Just excited. Yeah, I mean it was neat because it was a bird I never shot before. That was the neat part. We learned a lot, oh yeah, about all kinds of stuff now the whole time, I knew this is gonna be kind of the cap on um my hunting season. In a couple of days, I have to go get a vast sect. To me, what ye and my wife's having a baby in a couple of weeks. Because you didn't get a a sect of me. I didn't get what I was gonna get it, and uh now I'm going down Now, I'm definitely going down there. So I'm done a hunt for the fall. And during this whole fall, I was doing what I consider my spect my personal special to be or what I like to do is I like to hunt in the big game in the mountains. I like the backpack hunt. Um, And that could get miserable and it could start to feel like just a tremendous amount of work. It's like a ton of work before you kill something that it's really a lot of work. It's just like misery. And the whole time I was like, man, we go on that crane hunt, gonna be gravy, you know, But it's not. Man. Field hunt is hard, like three thirty wake up. You're on the field hours before daylight, haul and gears. It's just like I'd saying, It's like, it's not like field hunters are just like some lazy dude. When it gets daylight, you gotta be dialed in, truck parked half mile away, decoys out, everybody hid. It's like an early Riser. They got that same kind of drive and desired you do to climb a mountain. Oh there, they're out there. Remember we're talking about the guy who wanted to get out of like what I mean, pick up a two in the morning, like too, I just going there now. Not No, it's hard, it's like hard work. And I was out there and I was thinking, people that get good at this, you know, are hard workers like you gotta they're not hiking up a hill and just how much time we are and other times yeah, oh yeah, but I mean field, it's it's like a serious thing. It's a it's a it's a serious discipline. I think you gotta stay on it. You have his many things float into your head to hunt cranes. You have as many bits of information coursing through your head as you do up in the mountains. Maybe more. Yeah, I mean there's more little things, more little factors are are swirling through your head to hunt field up for crane. I think than than at least right. It might be right, but you're probably right. And the fact that because he's gauging over like thousands or let's just say, hundreds of kills, you're gauging your own hunter after maybe too bear kills or three elk kills so he's got all that other days and it said, like what does that like? It was this thing like exactly, so you're right. I think you're absolutely right. There's even more stuff going on in that in his head trying to get these things set up like wherever because no one shot a thousand elk and then there's these days and just make every mistake possible. I'm joking. No, he was guide. That wasn't asking is how many elk kills he was in like present for, and he thoughts upwards of a hundred, which is astronomical seeming to me. I think he's live. It's just a lot. That's a lot of experience with an animal dollars. He han't seen hundred house. You know, it's funny. Just a comment on that last statement made you sit there and take it your brand new hat, just like him throw it out like calling your liar. All right, we gotta wrap up the final thoughts, and I'm not gonna have a final thought that I had. Really glad you guys came down and got to experience it. I do want to have a final thought. I had a phenomenal time. I learned so much. Final thoughts, Mike Cool you know, I just wanted to finish that thought. You know, even cranes will make mistakes, and it's not like you know, the individuals will. But I've had days when you shoot a limit and it was easy. They just wanted to be in that field so bad. You're packing up decoys and they're still flocking in with you and you're like, wait, makes season is so I mean, crane Honey is so easy. Like this day it was like they were they're landing like almost on you when you're standing up. But what causes that? I don't know. Those days are three or four, but it doesn't make sense. That's why I want to say people who like the Bowl because the weather is the same, the temperatures the same, the lanes to save the ball ways the same way to say they put them to say configuration. It's like, how can you not get to strike every time or at least eight every time? It's like sometimes you can get ted. Why can't you get ted all the time? Because nothing changes, at least with Honey every day is something new, something No, nothing changed. It's like I think if you took some real elite athletes and had them bowl, they'd get ten every time. I think I'm from Chicago. We both You're right, that kind of stuff keeps you out there. And one last thing, tell these guys how many pounds of crane sausage you may just try to use the thighs from the thime me and I'm not talking to jump stick, but it's just the thought. Because the breast you don't do. You don't corrupt him. You just eat. You know, I'll do it in a bunch of different ways. But you're right, I don't, like, I would never grow really big gumbo out of the breast of I hesitating. I don't even make jerky. A lot of guys do, and it's good, but I don't. I wouldn't even make jerkey out of this just too good. Yeah, it's like, you know, throwing in a croc bot and a lot of people out there do that. But I mean, you could throw anything in a crock pot for eight hours. Yeah, So answer your question. I made last year, and granted these weren't only birds that I killed, but my friends don't say the thigh so I take theirs. I mean, I had fifty pounds of thy mead crane timid and then plus whatever pork I added to a container like that, I want to wrap it up with that. Ladies, gentleman, that's what I'm talking about. Fifty pounds of crane sausage. Old Beater Podcast, Thanks for tuning it.

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