00:00:02 Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wire to Hunt podcast, your home for deer hunting news, stories and strategies, and now your host, Mark Kenyon. Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast. I'm your host, Mark Kenyan in this episode number one and today on the show, we're joined by Janis Patelis, producer of the Mediator TV show, and we're discussing the implications of social media on the future of hunting. All right, welcome to the Wire to Hunt podcast, brought to you by Sick of Gear, and today we are tackling an important topic, especially for this time of year. And I know what some of you might be thinking. You know, it's hunting season. You want a podcast packed with hunting advice right now, And I get that, but stick with me on this one because I think in the long run, I think the topics will discuss today are just as important, if not more so, than how to get an arrow or bullet into a big old buck. But what happens when you do get that arrow or that bullet into a big buck. Well, for many of us, it probably means we're gonna be posting a picture or video or something about this animal or this experience on social media. You know, whether that's Facebook or Instagram or Snapchat or some other crazy new thing. I don't know about you, but I love getting to see all the big buck pictures and the updates from across the country this time of the year. But at the same time, social media is this weird double edged sword which in many ways is now leading to a growing spike in anti hunting media attention and just a lot of kind of crazy stuff. You know, take for example, the whole media storm created recently surrounding the Bomar bear spearing video and the whole under armor deal, or any of the recent African hunting photos that have caused various frenzies here in the States. You know, whether we like it or not, what we post online and how we present ourselves to the outside world, it's becoming a major factor in the future of hunting in America, in North America, and really across the entire world. So well, that said, today we're joined by Janice ptel Us to discuss this kind of messy topic of social media, anti hunters, the importance of non hunters and how they perceive hunting, and a lot more along those lines. In addition to being the producer of Steven Ronella's Meat Either TV show. Janice is just a just a very informed and thoughtful person when it comes to topics such as these. So I think the end result here is that we had just a really interesting and thought provoking conversation that I think if you guys can take a little time to day to to dig into this one and do little thinking, I think you'll find it really valuable. I hope you will. So with that said, before we dive into this whole discussion, we do need to thank our partners at Sick of Gear for their longtime support of this podcast. And today's sick of story comes from another Sick employee, Alex Tannembaum. And Alex came to hunting late in life, and in this story, he recalls one of his very first bow hunts for white tails from a tree stand and a pretty profound lesson that he learned from this experience. Because it's getting light, you know, I I see some movement like, oh man, like that's a that's a deer, Like there are dear here, Like this is crazy, and you know the trail underneath of me, I thought for sure it was like a cattle trailer was just so heavily used like there, and they're walking straight on it like they're gonna come like right under my stand, and and uh, you know, it's a buck and I'm like, okay, now it's two bucks. Oh no, it's three bucks. Like they're just hanging out together and and uh, I have no idea what to do. I'm I'm I'm going like, you know, my heart's just raising a million miles an hour. I'm like I don't even have an arrow knock, you know, Like so I'm like pull an arrow out and and uh, you know, and and it's a mechanical and so like the blades like pop out, and I'm like, you know, so like putting the blades back in and and uh get the thing knocked. And I'm all shaky, you know, try to like stand up in the stand, and I'm like just you know, the whole stand is shaking underneath me because my legs just like you know, I can't can't you know, you just can't can't get can't get calm, can't get normal, and uh and and these things they're just common and comming and coming and I'm like, oh man, like they're well inside of twenty Like I don't know, I've never shot from a tree stand before. I'm like wait, like like trying to think about like, Okay, where's their heart? What's the angle I should shoot at? Like you know, like is a as they're like as as they're coming straight at me? Like is that okay? Like can it doesn't seem like a good idea and uh you know, like a frontal from above Like no, I'm feeling like physics says that's a bad idea. And uh so they're underneath me, and like I mean I'm looking straight down into like the basket you know, like on each of them, like this is the coolest thing in the world. And I'm not even thinking about drawing my bow at this point, Like I'm just shaking that these things are here and they're totally gonna like you know know I'm here. And and so then I'm like thinking all of like the things that I've heard and seen, you know, on hunting TV and like the very limited amount that I've you know seen, you know, like oh, you shouldn't look at them, like they'll feel you looking at them. And so I'm like looking up like at this guy like trying to like look at him with my peripheral vision like somehow like I know that there's like no a scientific basis for that, but you know, just just all the all the superstitious, stitious, all the superstitious stuff, you know that that just it's flooding through my brain as I'm trying to figure out what to do with these deer. And you know, and the trail like never allows them to really like get broadside, like they're like dead under me. Like they're walking away like dead away, you know. And and and like I said, coming full front on and there's none of that felt right to me. Um. And and so you know, I just kind of let them walk and let them walk and let them walk, and they're just having such a like they just seem like they're having such a relaxed morning. And uh, about thirty five yards out they did they kind of, you know, made a turn. Um it might have been because I made some noise. It's hard to say. And uh so I drew and we are going to pause right there. And next week returned to Alex's story to hear how this encounter ended and what else learned from this whole experience. And it's a little bit surprising what ends up happening here. So that said, this was a Sit Coast story. And if you'd like to learn more about sick Gear and their technical hunting apparel, you can visit sika gear dot com. And now let's get back to the show and get Janice patel Us on the phone. All right with us. Now on the line is Janice patel Us. Welcome the show, Yannice. Thanks for having me Mark. Yeah, we uh, we already had an interesting conversation about the Latvian Janice is in various names off air here second ago, so Dan Dan shared for everyone who's just tuning in now, Dan already talked about the fact he might be mad at Janice, so keep that in mind everyone, but hopefully that's not gonna be an issue. Yes, we we are excited to have you here. And um, you know I have I've been listening to you on the Meat Eater podcast for a couple of years now, I think, and have always been really interested in your perspective and what you had to share and your experiences and different things on those lines. So your guy I wanted to talk to on this podcast for some time now, I guess though, Before we dive into some of the different sticky topics that we're going to talk about here. Can you just tell us a little bit about yourself what you're doing today in the hunting world. Uh. And and maybe I got there, Yeah you bet. Um, try to keep it. Uh it's a sinct um. I produced the Meat Eater television program, which is hosted by Stephen Ronnella. So. I worked for a production company called zero point zero Production. They're actually based out of New York, but we have a satellite office now in Bozeman. So that's where I get to live, which is a pretty sweet deal. Um. So that's what eats up most of my you know, so called working time. Uh. I also do a little thing called hunt to Eat on the side with my brother. It's just a like a lifestyle brand kind of a project. We just we basically make hunting T shirts, uh for those people that aren't happy with the hunting T shirts they can find in the major retailers. Um. That's at least how I like to sell it. Um. And I guess how I got here. Uh. I moved to out West Colorado at the ripe page of eighteen skipped after high school education and I just got jobs working in restaurants and whatnot, and quickly got involved in guid in Elk Cohns and Gutten uh fly fishing for trout in Colorado, and uh that kind of fast forwarded a dozen years. Uh and I ended up in Alaska actually for a job with my wife's and uh from there just through some random, very random, small world type stuff, UM met uh met Steve Ronella, and uh ended up getting hired on is what we call a w p A, which is a Wilderness production assistant, UM, which is a position that's kind of unique to meet here. I mean, I mean, I'm sure other production companies have that position, but I think we we're kind of the ones that coined uh w p A. So anyways, you basically start out as just a gear mule, and that was almost exactly four years ago, four years ago maybe a month that I basically hauled up a you know, seventy five pound pack up a mountain a few times. And uh, four years later, you know, I've produced the television program. Um. So does that gonna give you a good enough background? How old are you? Thirty eight years old? Okay, yeah, married for oh boy, approximately thirteen years and uh, father of through awesome girls. Um, one just turned five and the youngest is about to turn three here in December. Here's the question I have. You and me we grab barbecue one day this summer in Bozeman, and you told me that you traveled. I'm gonna get the number wrong. It was like an astronomically high number. I don't it was like a hundred fifty days or something crazy. So my question is a what is that number? And then how do you pull that off with the wife and kids? Because me and Dan both need some advice on that front. Yeah, well, I think first foremost, like with the wives, that you have to, you know, set the expectations before you get involved in something like that. And um, it worked out really well for me. We actually talked a lot about this last week. We're on a moose hunt, and um, if anybody's been mouse hunt knows you kind of sit around a lot and wait for the moose to show if you don't really go chasing. Rounds. Were a lot of time to talk, and my dad was there and Steve was there, and we talked a lot about these relationships and uh, I was, I was. We were trying to I guess prophesies you know, or wondering if we prophesied when we met our counterparts, um, or are you know, not our counterparts, but are you know other halves, if you could ever like you know, guesses at how good or bad it might be. You know, because I got married at like twenty four years of age, there's like no way I could have possibly been like, oh, yeah, it's gonna be great in fifteen years. You know. There's just like no way that I knew that. Like I'm just I just wasn't smart enough, you know, and didn't have that kind of foresight. And so I definitely I feel like I got really lucky. But anyways, I got really lucky in the fact that, like my wife spent a lot of time in the field and was away from me in the summers, and then I would leave in the fall, and so it just kind of was always a part of our life, um, the fact that we had large sunks of time away. And it's a volved over the years. Um. But now that I'm gone roughly a hundred days a year, you know, shooting meat eater, um, and it might be a little bit more. I haven't actually done account um in a couple of years. It might be a little bit more now because we travel a little bit for the podcast and UM shot show of stuff like that eats up some time too, but it's just always been a part of our lives and the way I guess we look at it is that that affords us the ability to have, um, just a very interesting life at home when I am at home, and it affords us, um, the ability for my wife to stay at home with the kids and raise our kids, which is um, you know, huge in our book that they get to spend that much time with their mother. UM. And when I am home, you know, they're like, dude, what what just happened on the latest adventure? You know? And I'm at home telling them about moose haunts and you know, wolverine sightings and grizzly bear sightings and you know, sleeping out in the you know, on the dirt for nine straight days and you know, flying around in super cubs and uh, it just makes for an engaging conversation. So, UM, I don't know if that's better or worse than every day of the week, you know. And you know, nothing against guys that are bankers, but like, I just got a feeling that the guy from the bank doesn't like talk, you know, quite so he's not quite as excited when he comes home to talk to his kids about banking as someone that comes home and tell him tell him about big adventures. You know, I think you're right. Um, does that answer your question? It does. It's funny. Um. Two people, I know you run around with a lot. Steve and then Randy Newburgh gave me some of the best advice on this topic. One time I was talking to Steve and he just told me, pick your battles like and and more so than pick your battles, don't battle like give your wife they win on everything, because you want to win all the hunting conversations. So he just said, I don't complain about the sheets. I don't complain about when we're going to dinner, I don't come playing about the birthday party. I don't complain about the fact that she doesn't want me staying out late for X thing or Y thing or whatever. You know. He just said, you know, if you want to be traveling and doing all these things, just let her have the other stuff. Um and then and I thought that was a great advice. And then number two. You've probably heard Randy say this. He talks about um, peace over justice. Peace is more important than justice when it comes to some things. So those two things I keep in mind a lot, and it's it's worked okay for me so far. So oh man, I try to and it's very easy to preach that and you know, much harder to practice it, true, you know, as with anything. But yeah, I definitely you know, have heard those same piece of advice thrown around a couple of times, and they go a long way. You know. He just really had to decide what's important, you know, and go from there. Have you guys seen the movie The Flight of the Navigator? No I haven't, You haven't, All right, Well, anyway, long story short, this guy gets in a spaceship and he goes around the planet whatever it's basically a time travel device, comes back to Earth and he knocks on his door and it it's his dad, but the dad doesn't recognize him. Like so for me, if I was on a hundred fifty days, I would knock on my door when I came back and there would be a new husband at the door. So so you know, that's one battle you can't win. Amen, Believe me, that has crossed my mind. It's like when you're gone long enough and you come home, I'm not so worried about another husband being there, but like you walk in the door and you having your kids, be like, dude, you don't even look the same. You know, you're look who are you? They're always changing, you know, and uh, you kind of wonder if that's every You know, it's definitely on your mind. There's no escaping it. So, UM. One other thing I want to I want to come kind of curious, but I feel a lot of people are probably curious about, UM, is what do you do as a producer for a show like that? Um? Because you know, I think people see Steve or someone totally run around the mountains and then there's some cameraman. But what does Jani's Ptelius to do during one of these great, big crazy trips? Yeah, well it starts a long time before the trip. Um. The beginning is probably when you know, Steve and I are just on a phone or chatting up somewhere, you know, waiting at the airport somewhere, and we're talking about you know, like right now we're looking at spring hunts and activities and adventures and just talk about what we want to do and where the show wants to go, and you know, what topics we want to cover in the show, and just decide on what adventures you know, where we're gonna go, what we're gonna do. Um. And then once we kind of get that little you know, more finalized, I'll start you know, researching, um, the trip itself and just finding out if it's if it's doable, if it's really going to be right for the show. UM, if we're gonna have you know, guests on the show, or you know, somebody might be kind of hosting us there on location, UM, you know, get ahold of them, and just kind of get as much research, you know, no differently than you would do it, you know, get research in a place to go hunt, you know, but just trying to get all the ground where it kind of figured out what it's gonna take to be there and whether we're camping or if it's gonna be a night in a hotel here there. And UM, I'm lucky enough now to have a team underneath me that UM, once we do pick a location, they'll, um, I'll just you know ask them to get flights for the crew. UM and that and the crew to you know, so I do most of the hiring now of the cinematographers that work for us, and our willness production assistance. Um, because usually on a shoot, you know, most I don't know about most I shouldn't say, because I really don't know. On our shoot, if there's just Steve um by himself on a shoot, it'll be Steve a camera person, UM, a mainshooter camera person, and then we'll have a long lens you know kind of specialists will also work on production stills and other specialty cameras for doing time lapses and stuff like that. And then sometimes even yet we'll have an assistant and then myself UM and UM. So yeah, it's a big crew. We can have a footprint of four or five with just a solo show, and so when it bumps to a guest, we're almost always at six. And uh, sometimes we're limited because of you know, we just want to take less airplanes into a location. If we had to fly into a you know, backcountry spot in Alaska, and so we'll drop a guy and just everybody will kind of you know, split up that guy's responsibilities and then just you know, carry a little bit more on their shoulders, so to speak, um, both in weight, you know, and in just job responsibility. But yeah, so once everybody's hired and we figure out who's going where and what, you know, all the logistics you know, get figured out. Um. And I tried to do as much pre production research as I can and just trying to figure out, you know, not only just about the hunt. Hopefully we have like a good idea of what the hunt's gonna be, just because someone gave us a good tip about a haunt or you know, just a cool location and go check out or what that might be. But just getting Steve some interesting information about the location or the people, the culture, and you know, any of its relative to hunting, you know, in those three topics, I'll try to kind of pick that out and write something up for Steve. At the same time, I'll write up what we call a treatment for our cinematographers that a lot of these guys aren't necessarily hunters, and they haven't spent you know, they've spent a lot of time in the field. We definitely hire people that are backcountry savvy, but they may not may not have been hunters, and so I write up a treatment that if you've never been on a moose hunt, this is kind of what to expect. You know that there'll be a scene where we're you know, getting off planes and flying in here, and there'll be another scene of you know, calling moose, and another scene where you know this and this happens, and then oh, the moose is a thousand pounds, so it's gonna take five hours to you know, butcher and pack the moves probably, so be prepared for this and just kind of rite out scenes, not really right out the show, but just to really give the cinema photographer is kind of an idea of what to expect. Um. A lot of times I'll get photographs just off Google images of areas that I can share with them and say, hey, this is what it looks like when we shoot this show. This is kind of what we would like the show to look like, whether it's you know, I'll use words like give me a lot of big landscapes and big wides, you know, really show that the massiveness of the you know country we're in, um where if it's a tighter place, you know, like say a swamp where you're just chasing rabbits around, you know, those shots aren't even available, so it might everything might just happen much more intimately. You know, you need just need a lot more shots of you know, the macro flora, fauna, um, just you know, small stuff that is going on in the location. UM. So again that's all pre production, and once we get there, UM on location, obviously it's logistics of getting everybody where they need to be, UM doing you know, getting food bought whatever for a camp and trip whatever that might be, and then we go into the production cell for the hunt. At that point, UM, I get a lot of questions asked to me, but most of the time I'm just kind of sitting back and maybe taking notes on what's happening. And that way, those notes I can use to basically write up UM notes that can then give to my editor, who will then again not being a hunter, needs to know like, all right, you guys shot all this stuff of this you know, sitting around making this weird moaning sound waiting on a moose. I don't really get it, you know, what was going on here, And so I have to write these notes to kind of say, all right, look at it this way, this is what we're doing here, This is why we did it. This is why it's interesting. Um So during the shooting, that's kind of my main focus is to just to really be thinking about the notes and if I feel like we need something out of Steve just to kind of drive the story along a little bit or to to you know, I just need him to expand on an idea. UM A lot of times I'll just have a quick conversation with Steve and say, hey, man, you know this I think is interesting. We should talk a little bit more about this when you know, when it comes to you. And then um, with Steve, a lot of times it's not like, hey, let's check in right now about what's going on with moose hunting. We'll just have like a kind of a grander vision or a grander idea and I'll say, man, that was interesting about how you know, the biologist talked about how the moose, uh, you know, interact with the amount of pressure of hunters in this burn area wherever. It might be about something that we read in that pre research, you know, stuff that I was doing, and then a day later, maybe Steve will look at the camera and give me something really interesting about you know that topic. Um So I try to kind of urge him along a little bit. I guess to uh, if I think it's interesting, usually it's gonna be interesting to the viewers. Um, and uh are you are you the guy that makes Steve interesting? Then? Are you know? Um, you know, there's probably maybe you know, one percent, you know, Yanni in every you know show of like a little drop of you know, actually a bit of information that might come out of his mouth, something that we've talked about, you know, through the course of making the show. But no, it's it's it's definitely Steve. He's Uh, it's pretty amazing, you know when it when it comes to that, And um, a lot of people don't know about how much you know, background he has in the in the writing world and just what a talented writer he is, and how much that you know, really um kind of forms who he is as a television host. Um, it goes a long way, you know. Yeah, you know, I think he's great as a host of the show. But I actually I am a fan of Steve most for his writing. I love his books and the articles he's done and everything. But um, but I got I got something I'm kind of curious about this related to what you've just shared. It's also kind of related to this larger overarching topic I was hoping we touch on, and that's kind of you know, the how hunting is perceived by the public and how social media and the greater hunting industry media, you know, all sort of forms those perceptions, and I'm kind of curious, you know, with with the media or TV show, at least from my perspective, I think it's one of the shows that does a better job of um, of showcasing what hunting is about and who we are as a community in a positive light. And I'm just kind of curious how much of that, you know, went in on the front end when you guys are creating these shows and episodes and thinking about the direction of the show, whether it be an individual episode or just the overarching theme of what you guys have created over this. So, however many seasons there have been, how much do you think about that? Is us anything about all? Um? I definitely think about it, and that's part of you know, I wasn't in at ground zero with Meat Eat or you know, I came in about um, you know, maybe a year and a half into it, so they kind of had that they had their vision I think fairly well ironed out and and and we're on a path. Um I hope that I've added, you know, to to that and you know, made the message stronger. Um only we we necessarily have like ever created something like reactionary to you know, kind of what you're talking about, But we've definitely not. We just want to make our own hunting show. We we didn't. Like. Steve is always stressing that I actually watched less Hunting TV because and and he'll tell you this about writing too. It's like he a lot of times tries not to read, um, stuff that's similar to what he writes, because that can influence the and like what you put out as a creative and I think the same thing kind of goes with what we do as a hunting TV show. And so we try to really just kind of make it original and make it our own, and that in turn has become what you see. So it hasn't been like because we're trying to make a certain message or whatever. It's just like, this is what hunting is to us, and we're gonna share it. And it just so happens that it's turned out to be you know what you see and kind of what people call this, like, you know, a better way to portray hunting. What kind of feedback have you guys gotten on that. I feel like I've heard you guys talk about getting a lot of positive feedback from either beginning hunters or non hunters. But I mean, is that right? Do you guys get a lot of people commenting about that or talking about that? Yeah, it's constant. I mean, you know, emails and you know, Facebook messages and you know, every social media avenue you can think of. We get every day positive feedback, very little negative, you know. I mean, you always have haters, but really it's very little negative, you know. And um, it's definitely good to hear, you know. And and some of the greatest feedback you know that I've seen that And why I really I'm just like just so happy and you know, proud to be a part of it is when we get you know, like a letter from a senator or you know, just someone like kind of high up and like conservation organization that writes us like a personal letter to thank you know, really more Steve, but us for doing what we do because they feel like it's making a difference and it's the right message. And uh, when you get those people you know that that taking that time to do that, you go, wow, that's cool, you know. I mean not to discount when we get new hunters going, Man, you guys change my life and I'm so into hunting now and I'm cooking on time before I because I love Osabuco now because you guys, I mean I get you know, just as high off of that too. Um well, there's definitely something special when we get just some like just that really heavy hitting feedback. You know, yeah, for sure. What do you think about the rest of the hunting media outside of what you guys are doing with media or do you I don't know, what are your thoughts on do you pay attention to the rest of the media world. Do you do you think it's is it showing is it showing us off in the right light? Do you think, oh man, that's tough one, that's a loaded one there mark the attention And really it just comes down to probably the biggest reason that I don't pay as much attension and maybe I should is because like I have my time that I spend at the office and and like a lot of times I feel like it's kind of hard to be Instagram and or Facebook and at the office because it just doesn't seem right in my head. And then when I go home, I try to really practice like just shutting it all down, putting it all the way and like it's kids time, it's family time, and that's where I need to be. And so if missing out on the rest of hunting media is you know, if that's the what I had to give, um, that's just how it's gonna be, you know. So um, you know, I mean we we all hear about the stuff it's in the news. Uh, you know, the cecils and the bear spearing as of late. Um, don't you know it's uh well, I don't know if that stuff it's the media when it grabs hold of it, obviously it's not. It's not great for us. Um. And it see, it does seem like sometimes when we're making a lot of headway with you know, good positive men that you get it's kind of a big blowback. But at the same time, I think that I'm hoping that with positive messages out there, that those just have like a stronger foundation to have longevity to where now, like the story I always tell everybody is I have an aunt who is a like full on Buddha chanting vegan, almost vegan, pretty much vegetarian, like just what I call like over the tai woo woo. Now. I love her. She's an awesome person. I love hanging out with her, but like definitely not something that you would when you met her, you'd be like this person probably not into hunting. But because of the way that I've talked about hunting and portrayed hunting to her over now that's been you know, twenty years now. She tells me the other day that she's at some like art she does art, and and she's had some uh a like a show what do they call those? At the gallery? Like a I guess it's just an art show, right. She's showing off some of her pieces a bunch of other artists there, and she overheard something. She overheard some strangers talking smack about honey. She felt the duty on her shoulders to walk over there, introduced herself, you know what, not all hunters are like what you're talking about and on behalf of hunting, Da da da dada, and kind of went on to defend hunting and this like different version of hunting that she knows of because of talking to me for you know, twenty years or whatever. So I'm hoping that that kind of stuff just like again that strong you don't just have longevity where these little nitpicky things that pop up in the media because you know, someone just made a mistake or someone you know didn't think you know, about what they were doing, about their action, and it kind of blew up that that stuff is gonna fade away. And even after that happens, my aunt is still gonna probably you know, go out there and speak on behalf of hunting. Although she'll never kill anything in her life, you know, she asked, actually asks the aunts to leave um her back porch as opposed to like, you know, killing him with some sort of sex side or whatever. Okay, so that like really paints to pick who she is. She's not killing anything, but yet she felt compelled to speak on behalf of hunting. I think that is a really really great example of the power of the disproportionate power of in person interactions when it comes to this type of stuff. You know, like your personal interaction with someone and your personal representation of hunting is going to be much more powerful than anything someone might see on TV. So I think that's an important thing for all of us to keep in mind. Probably, you know that one time that we interact with such and such non hunter or so and so woo w person. You know what we say, how we say, it might be their one in person interaction with somebody like us, a hunter, and that might form their entire perception of what this community is all about. You know. So that's an interesting Yeah, all these little blips that everybody gets through their phone or whatever, it just doesn't stay in your head that long, you know. Yeah, what what do you think about the whole under arm or issue? You know, you you kind of referred to the spearing deal. What's your take on all that? We haven't talked about this on the podcast yet, so I'm curious about your thoughts and dance too. Yeah, you're probably itching to talk about it, I'm sure, Um, you know, and I've gotten the chance now since it's been a while. I mean, heck, it's been a month at least, you know, I mean the video has been out for many months, but I guess the blow up is about a month ago or so. Um, you know, I got no problem with people's spearing animals at all. Actually, Uh, when I was a young hunting guy, we used to always we hunted wallows a lot, you know, and we kind of got this idea that we would one day, you know, basically lay down in a wallow, you know, with a spear and when that bowl came in there, you know, you're trying to spear a bowl. So it's not like I've never thought about doing it. And uh, it's like I give um what's his name that did it? Some Yeah, Josh, I give him mad props for what he did because it's like I know, and I did listen to a podcast where he was interviewed by the Greedy Bowman guys, and like, you know, that guy did an amazing amount of training and act as he's like a collegiate javelin thrower. Like it's like I would need two years of practice probably until I could think about going and using spear on animals. So like, yeah, it's amazing props for what he did. Um, I feel that maybe a little bit the way that it was portrayed on the video there was um the I think and not my personal opinions, but within the you know, kind of group I run with here in Bozeman and just you know, people that are involved with us and work. You know, we talked a lot about it when it happened, and um, I think the thing that got most people it was kind of the excessive celebration afterwards, at least like around here, that seemed like it was just like a little bit distasteful and maybe a little disrespectful. And again I'm not saying that that's what he meant by it, or that that's what he was doing, but that's how it came across on that video. And I think that that is like the biggest thing that we just have to when we are putting stuff out there in the media, that we have to watch out for. It's like, it doesn't matter if it's legal, if it's ethical, if you did everything right, you gotta think about how you're putting it out there. And I had a friend of mine saying, asked me, He's like when we were having the same conversation, he said, well, you like spend every day of your life thinking about how to make non hunters into hunters. And I'm like, no, no way, not at all. But I do spend time thinking about how to like portray hunting in a good light non hunters, you still be pro hunting and not anti hunting. And so I do feel like, you know, that's one of those instances where, um, you know, someone whoever somewhere along the lines after it left them and they made it, they maybe just didn't have that producer or that oversight or a dad or someone of a like a just someone to say, hey, you know, maybe you should just alter this a little bit, because I feel like a lot of other people could have done the same thing, go out and spear bear and told that story in a little bit different way, and it maybe would have been you know, not blowing up the way it did, and it would have been a little more acceptable. Um. Yeah, that's my sense on it. Yeah, no, I think that you echo a lot of the things that are kind of floating around in my head. Um, what do you think about how under Armour reacted to it on the other on the flip side of the equation. Yeah, well, I mean there again, I don't know the numbers enough. I didn't really delve into under Armour numbers, but I heard a couple of things to the grapevine that like under Armours obviously multibillion dollar company. I think that like hunting is like twenty million bucks for them or something like that. Anyway, So it's like this Mike, you know, microcosm of their giant company. So the people that are like, oh my god, they're tapping in and just trying to you know, suck money out of hunting. And now they're distant things in themselves from hunting because of this thing. It's like the kind of but not really, you know, they've probably done as much good as they have, you know, if any bad at opera hunting, And so I don't really get that argument. Um, I feel that that reaction was pretty normal, um, you know, with the way that it blew up on you know, wherever you want to call it in the media. And uh, I feel that probably where the mistake was made is that, like I said, the right filter wasn't in place early on, because if I understand correctly, they actually posted the video long before anybody got mad about it. Is that is that how you understand it? That's correct? Yeah, And so again I just feel like somebody aren't under armor. Wasn't there to be like, oh man, you know what, this is cool? But yeah, for sure, I kind of feel the same way. You know, their business and hunting is a very very tiny part of that business, and they're gonna make a business decision. You know, I don't think you know, we're on your podcast, Dan talking about this earlier this month, you know, just after it happened, and my whole take on the thing is is probably exactly almost exactly what you just said, you honest. You know. Number one, when it comes to a business, I'm not expecting them to fight on behalf of hunters or you know, uphold our rights or something, because that's not who they are. Maybe if it was a purely hunting company and they were a percent dependent on us, you might expect that. But I will always expect a business to make business decisions. Even though I might not like that and maybe I won't think it's right, it's still probably the realistic expectation we should have. So in this case, like you said, you honest, it's a microscopic, tiny piece of their business. Of course they're gonna air with a larger part of their their customer base. Um. Then to the point of you know, the video itself, I think that's the bigger question, or the bigger takeaway I've I've gotten from all this is just what a reminder this, this is of the negative power or negative influence that one mistake. And like you said, maybe it's not a hun percent mistake, maybe it's just a little tweak of how they presented things. But whether you like it or not, I guess it's the how significant of an impact one piece of content like this can have if it's not if it's perceived negatively by a large population of people. And I mean we saw coming out of like the cecil stuff you know, that was legal stuff that happened over Heck, I can't even remember exactly what all was finally decided on, but stuff going on over there, changed laws related to airlines importing parts and hides and different things from animals over Africa that influenced tons and tons of people in this case because of one video that you know, whether they did a great job with it or not, this one video got picked up by the media, picked up by the general public. They perceived it pretty negatively, and now all of a sudden we're seeing spearing becoming illegal in different places. So my big takeaway is what happens. You know, this is like a what's the right way to say it's, um, I don't know, like a warning shot. You know, really serious stuff can come out of these types of quote unquote mistakes. So we need to be careful about what we put out there. We need to make sure that we try to have that filter and think about these things. Now, like you said, take an extra second and say, you know, how's this gonna go over? Um? Because the ramifications are really significant. As we're starting to see, there are many methods of take that are completely legal in the Lower forty in Alaska, in Canada that if you make a video of and really showed it exactly how it goes down, people are going to freak out about it. There's nothing wrong with it. It's legal, it's ethnically right. I'm not going to mention what those what those things are, but like there are methods of hunting they're completely legal. But to most people are gonna be like, ah, you know, if we hunted with bows and arrows the way that um Art Young and Saxon Pulp that get it right, wasn't the opposite? The opposite was it was Art Young? I think I mean those if you roll, if you read their stuff from back in the day, they rolled around packing like two hundred arrows into a hunt, and they would fire at all kinds of ranges and fire many many arrows at a single animal to bring it down. You go ahead and make a video of that going down right now, and see how and see how fast traditional archery or even archery is gonna last. So then what about this? And Dan, I want to I want to get your take too, but really quick, I'm curious from either one of you. So when we start talking like this, you know, when we start talking about like you just said, Younus, there's certain things that if we made videos of it, it would have huge blowback. When we start talking about this, you start getting some people saying, ah, stop your pandering, stop pandering now, and a hunter stopped being a big wuss. And you know, we have a right to do this. It's legal, we can do it. I don't need to apologize about it. Blah blah blah. What do you say to that? No, you, I mean, they're completely right. You don't have to know not I mean, nobody's like forcing them to do that. But if they haven't figured it out yet, you know, laws are made and uh, you know rights are taken away by voting, and people will vote. Are hunting so called rights right out from right around from underneath us? Yeah, we're definitely and it What what scares me is the knee jerk reaction type decisions that come out of the stuff. You know, like there's this huge outcry and then before even people get to think about it, you know, changes are made, you know, laws are changed or stuff happened so fast because of some crazy outcry that now maybe the media or social media or something allows it allows these things to spread so rapidly and then bam, this thing's done. Um that's what really scares me. And nobody's talking about spearing bears anymore. I mean, I don't know, I've been in the woods for two weeks, but just slipp flipping through Instagram today, there wasn't anybody you know, talking about spearing bears. It's like it's kind of like that conversation's gone right, It's it's in and out. What what do you? What's your tike on all this? Dan? You we we haven't got to have your opinion on this whole deal on weird Hunt. Yet it really sucks because I think there's a whole bunch of issues in this one instance that need to be that need to be talked about, and it's not you know, this isn't the podcast to actually talk about it, because it's an entire podcast by itself. But for me, you know, kind of a breakdown of it. Do I think that that hunt could have been edited a little bit different before it was released? Yeah? Probably? Um do I think that hunters, you know, like the people who are producing this, who are who are we making this for? Do we need to do we need to make sure that we're editing it and putting it out, you know two, you know, for that the person who may get offended by it. I mean, how how long until we're not showing kill shots on animals anymore on our hunting videos? You know what I mean? Just to just to say I don't want to offend these people so they get piste sign a petition and then my sponsors dropped me. You know, I understand that there's there's a lot to talk about in there. Um. I I'm kind of fired up when it comes when it comes to you know, under armour, they posted the video, shared it. We're congratulating Bomar several months before the Antis got ahold of it, they signed up. You know, they put down a petition that you know was upwards of seven maybe under I'm just gonna say under ten thousand dollars or ten thousand signatures before it was all said and done. And when all that went through, Um, that just shows me that a company who it was wanting money from us then got pressured by anti Hunters dropped these guys. That tells me right there, I'm not for me. I'm not gonna I'm not gonna buy under Armour again. I'm not gonna wear under Armour clothing again. Um, because they didn't stand behind who were they were trying to get money from. Although yes, it was a good business decision for them, I'm a Hunter. I don't need to support them right there. And you know, and then there's the whole issue about you know, like the Druries, the Lakoski's, the Eva Shokis to the world, the Cameron Handes of the world. You know, why are you still supporting this company when the when they just did not back the Hunter on this occasion. You know, now we're talking about business again because we know that the guys are getting paychecks front under Armour. These guys are going to be potentially loot if they stood up to under Armour and said, you know, we don't like what happened here. There's giant contracts in place that we don't even know about, dollar amounts that we don't even know about, where they could be not only losing, but under Armour could come back and say, all right, well you it was your your the reason that you're dropping this sponsorship, so now we can come back in and take some more, you know, than what we've actually given you. So that's stuff that we don't even know about that could potentially happen. So of course the druries put out a vague response, you know, other celebrities or entertainers put out um no response at all. And for me that I don't know why, but that kind of rubs me the wrong way because they're making their money off of us, right they they have they're getting their dollar amount, you know, their their money to try to talk to us into purchasing you know, under Armory gear. I'm not going to purchase it, so why are you repping it after all that has happened? You know, these these are just obviously random thoughts coming into my head all at one time, and no, no organizational you know, no organization, but you know, so it's just there's so many things wrong. And then we have the which to me is the most important thing is this has caused even a bigger divide amongst hunters right right, So this is all kind of past right now, right where we've we've forgotten about this. So how long until these anti hunters, you know, go to some hunter who does a really and I'm just going to use this as an example, uh, goes to the meat Eater television show and says, you know what, I don't like you. I don't like this, and they're gonna find a way to get you know. Ten Tho, However, many people to back these because there's way more crazy assholes out there than there are sane assholes. In my opinion. Uh So, I don't know, I'm just firing off random thoughts my brains, firing random random things. But I think that this is it's way bigger and there's so many topics within this this one instance that you need to break down and talk about. So the long story of the long story short, I feel that it's caused even a even a rift between hunters and when we need to kind of look past it and remember that we can't let the ani hunters win no matter what happens. We have to unite and and unite under one voice so that our privileges are rights are not taken away from us. You it. You bring up a lot of interesting things, which you're right, we could dive into a whole bunch of those. But what you just said there, right, We've talked about this before, but I'm curious about your taking honest this whole topic of uniting his hunters versus you know, calling things out like this maybe isn't right or maybe we need to tweak this. I feel like when that conversation starts happening, Like I know you and Randy had a big conversation about the long distance shooting thing, and how you said, well, okay, there's some questions about some of this stuff. When you start having those questions, there's a certain segment of the hunting community will say, you know, if you're raising these questions, if you're saying this stuff, you're dividing the hunting community and you're helping the anti hunters or whatever whatever. What do you think about that? Yes, Yeah, I don't sense the like the device and is quite as much. And again it might not might be just because I'm not like looking at it in the media and seeing it there as much. Because I feel like I really haven't run into too many people that feel to you outside of this issue that you know that you know than I do, or that we've been discussing here. Um, but I mean, I don't know. It's like there's bad apples in every category and every group of people in life. I mean, for if you want to go there and you can look look at it, Like with the Muslim thing, it's like, in my opinion, all Muslims are not bad. Are there some bad apples right out there right now that are really making them look bad? Especially in American eyes? Yes, it's like really really bad. Does that make all Muslims bad? And not in my book? So that the same thing with like the Hunting thing, And I feel like with the Hunting thing, if you keep and this is just like an isolated incident, you know, and uh, with with the Bomart thing, I don't feel like he's a dude that's like purposely shooting, like Steve says, shooting holes in the bottom of the boat to try to sink our collective boat. But if you have a person is consistently doing that that it's just using rhetoric that is not helping us move forward in a positive direction. And it might even again, it might because he's got he's got the right you know, he's saying okay things, but it's just the rhetoric. It's just the wrong way to say it. It's and it's gonna shoot holes in our boat and bring our boat down. Well, I do feel like we have to, you know, kick that person out of the boat and say, you know, figure out a different way to talk about what you're talking about. I mean, I think the best thing about all of this is it's just that we should just be cool with talking about it because if anything, all it does is makes all of us more knowledgeable about all these topics. And then hopefully we can have that same conversation with some non hunter and again, you know, build this like just like stronger positive foundation that you know, at least up keeps what we have. Maybe it will never you know, grow bigger, but at least we can keep it rolling a little bit longer. I feel like that's always what I end up on this too. Like we start having this conversation and you know, like it always comes down to that, at a minimum, let's just allow the conversation and try to stay civil and like talk about these things and we don't necessarily to agree on it. But I think it's a net positive if we at least talk about this stuff. It shouldn't not in my opinion, it shouldn't be taboo to talk about some of the stuff, to talk about differences in opinion, or to talk about why maybe X is not what I think is the best way to talk about this or whatever it might be. I think it's okay to verbalize that talk about it, but I think maybe the the key is how we go about doing that. You know, if we're condemning and attacking that kind of stuff publicly, that's probably the stuff that is not constructive. It just shuts people down and gets people defensive. Um, So maybe that I think. I feel like that's like my big takeaway from this conversation. They feel like occasionally pops up throughout the years, as we have these different episodes, we kind of jump onto this. Every once in a while, something happens where these types of things get in my mind, and and I think this is something we're probably helping the country in general, whether it's hunting or not. Just being civil conversations about differences in opinion would probably be a good thing, um for sure. But it's just to add to that to your like the taboo of just talking about it. It shouldn't be taboo if you have a change of mind, if you if we all have a conversation, and at the end of it, I go, you know what, I'm kind of leaning a little bit more towards you know, dance thoughts now, Like I just kind of rethought it and like I like what he said and that changed my mind. Don't get mad at me for that. I'm just like learning and rethinking. It's like, it's okay, nobody should get mad about that. That's funny mentioned that I was just having this conversation. I was on an elk hunt last week and we were sitting there talking about it, you know, all the stuff in politics. Not to get into our specific political situation now, but you always hear this thing of like flip flapping, like such and such said this ten years ago, but this year they said something totally different. They're a flip flopper, they're horrible, and I got you know, you get to thinking you're like, you know, evolving views, like being open to learning and adjusting your perspective. How is that a bad thing? You know? Over time? Of course, there's some examples where it's like obviously switching because of who you're talking to, and I know there's cases of that, But in some situations, like I don't think it's such a bad idea for people to be open to evolution and viewing things differently and being open to other perspectives. You know, no, not at all, because I'm always hoping that if you're like non hunter, anti hunter, that maybe you'll be open to hunting after talking to having a conversation with me. You know, yeah, I think And I think one thing that you know, back to the under armer thing though, is the power that the anti hunters have, right so, and I also think that a majority of the hunters kind of forget about that kind of thing. They forget, you know, they all they're focused on is what is right in front of their face. So with you know, a majority of the deer hunting seasons opening here pretty soon, if not already opening, they're they're thinking about themselves and what they need to do to be successful in the woods when there is actually a bigger picture out there all year round. Right, So we have to realize that if the anti hunters want to band together and you know, do all these things, they could probably do it. But so you know, when it comes to you know, preserving our our rights, preserving our heritage, you know, um conservation efforts as well, I just feel that, you know, we have we have people the hunting community just kind of forgets about the important things when it's not right in front of them, when it needs to be in front of them all the time. Yeah, nothing's really like stung slately, like just like bid is hard enough to really be thinking that way. I think to your point, it's something we always need to be vigilant of. And then also, at least from my perspective, I'm not really concerned about anti hunters. You know, like there's that five percent or ten percent or whatever it is that just downright is not going to ever be okay with what we do or anything along these lines. But it's that other or nine or whatever it is of non hunters that are kind of in the middle. They're on the fence. I think that is those are the hearts we need to win, or at least, you know, and right now, for the most part, they are generally you know, okay with hunting in certain contexts. You know, I think we we talked about the stats a lot. You know, I can't evenmember what the exact numbers, but a large majority is okay with hunting in general. But when you start talking about, you know, hunting for food, yeah, everyone's up for that. But when you say hunting for trophies, trophy hunting, then it's down our support of that. So there's all these weird little nuances that the general public, you know, how the influences their thoughts. But you know, I'm getting on tangent. Long story short, I don't worry so much about anti hunters. It's it's how is the rest of the general public perceiving what we're doing? And like people hate thinking about that, Like I know what you're saying. Damn when you talk about you know, how far do we have to go? You know? Can we not show kill shots anymore? Can we not show blood anymore? Can we not you know, do we have to completely pander and pretend that this is something that it's not. I get that, like frustration and I don't know how far stuff is gonna go, and like, I don't like that either. But at the same time, I'm also just a realist and Okay, when X happens, why is the result? So when something gets out there that the non hunting public is not okay with, it is negatively, it is making a real negative change to what we can do our rights or our privileges or whatever it might be. So, whether I like it or not, I'm still going to try to make some kind of change to reduce the chances of that negative out come. Whether I think it's right or not, it's just, hey, this is the reality of it, and we need to do something. Um. So it's either we change the reaction, we change how people react, or we do something on our end to make sure the reaction doesn't happen. I don't know what the right answer to that is, but for me, it's it's how can I reduce the risk of this negative reaction as much as possible, um while still being able to do what I love. And that's the trick I think for all of us today, I think, and I think that's kind of good. It's kind of where I wanted to steer things next is just how this isn't like just a media thing either. This is like an individual person thing, you know. I mean, it's not just the actions of some famous hunting celebrity that could you know, have a negative reaction. It could be Joe Schmo hunter. Um. A big difference, you know is years ago, if I had a hunting picture, or if I had a hunting video or hunting store or whatever, the only people that ever would see that would be my friends and family, like the people who get me, the people who have a context, the bull that are in my own little tribe. But now with the Internet and everything, I might post that on Facebook or post on YouTube or whatever, and you know, I made that for fellow hunters or I you know, I'm wanting to show this to my hunting buddies. But now, through crazy ways of the Internet, all of a sudden ends up in the anti hunter's hands or someone else who then you know, uses it for some horrible negative thing. And we just don't have that control like we used to. So I think the onus is on the individual now to have that filter. Like you were talking about Janice Um to at least at least think about this stuff, right, Yeah, totally. Man. I used that example of the like the little like when was the last time you had like your little flip photo album? You know, it's like everybody used to have one of those that had like twenty or thirty pictures in their truck. You meet somebody on a job and then you can like be like, oh, you're a hunter too, Oh at lunch, you know, let's you know, share photos. You know you you know you'd share, you know, trade them, and you know you flipped through the little book. But now it doesn't work, and so it was only really shared. You know, you had that filter already in place. It's only shared with other hunters. Now, yeah, you put it on wherever and it just it just blasts out to the world. Right, Okay, So social media good or bad for hunting? What do you think on us? Oh, he's bad for the world, it's bad for humankind. What do you say, Dan, I'm gonna would Mark, would you be in business if there was no such thing as social media? Probably not. Nope, neither would I. And that's where it's like I almost feel like the power is somewhere else right now. So it's like hunting is existing because there's somebody else out there who doesn't care enough about it too, like let it not exist? Does that make sense? Is that? Does that make sense at all? You're saying like hunting is okay right now because people just the people that wouldn't be okay, but it just don't care enough to do something about it, right or or or they might not be organized enough to quite attack it yet. Right. I just feel like this is they're like a battle cry. Right. I don't know why, but it's like right now, this whole under armor thing God forgot about in a couple of weeks. No one's talking about it anymore. It's it's water under the bridge, when in my opinion, I feel that is an attack on us. They just they just organized and said, Okay, we don't want you to support this group of people anymore. So they organized and they they won a small battle. Right, So, what what have we done? What have we done? Well? I don't I don't think. I don't think we've done too much anything. No. I think it's not like it's not a new thing though, you know. I mean this was one instance related to like hunting a visual like a a personality or something. But I mean probably every month or every week somewhere across the country there's some kind of anti hunting initiative, whether it be trying to ban the use of dogs for mountain hunting in California, or trying to ban the use of baiting for bears in Maine, or trying to that National Deer Alliance article. You know, they were coming out with Staten Island not allowing I think it was Staten Island or was it Long Island not not allowing hunting so they captured the deer and sterilized them instead. Blows my mind. Yeah, there there there's a lot of these things going on, and I I think, you know, this has been going on for a long time, right and we haven't lost our problege to hunt. But but I think what we see is like there's this small minority right hand, anti hunters are a very small minority, but they're loud and they're passionate about something. And then you've got the hunting community that's a small minority and we're passionate. But the difference is this we as hunters, we're passionate about our own activity, Like we're passionate about what we do, so we put most of our time and energy and passion into doing that thing. Then you've got the anti hunters. They're not passionate about doing something they love. They're just passionate about stopping us from doing our things. So their whole passion, their time, that energy goes into the action of stopping what we're doing. UM. So I think that's why we see like they're taking actionable steps, maybe more often than the hunting community does sometimes at defending that. Um. But to your point in I mean, we do need to be ever vigilant. We do need to be you know, getting involved when we can, and as individuals, I'll keep preaching it. We also need to our own individual part two to portray a positive representation of all this stuff and then get involved with organizations that are supporting hunters and give our time and energy and money to do all those different things. Um. Because I don't think this is gonna stop right. I mean, we had the Beaumar thing recently, we had cecil line last summer, we had you know, the Melissa Bachman with a deadline, and we had such and such person with another African animal and there's always it seems like it's just becoming a trend and I don't know what's next. But I don't know. I don't know where this all goes. But we need to probably do a better job preemptively preparing for it. I would think, how do you do that? That's the question. I don't know. Do you guys have any bradies? But actually, before we move on to those next thoughts, we need to take a quick break to thank camel fire dot com for sponsoring today's podcast episode. And camel fire dot com is a daily deal website for hunters that offers midtime huge discounts on great hunting gear, including very often some great deals on sick of gear, which my friends and I have taken advantage of in the past, which is pretty nice. But interestingly enough, in my previous job before going full time with ware and Hunt, I actually got to know the founder of camel Fire just as he was starting this business, as they were actually using some of the online marketing tools that my company had created. So that said, I recently reconnected with camel Fire founder Kendle Card to hear just a bit about what was like launching a company like this From scratch. Man, it was like everything was against us to get Camel Fire off the ground. And even at one point we threw in the towel and you know, are my wife encouraged me to kind of rekindle the website, you know, as it was almost done, and like, okay, fine, we're gonna give it one more chay and and it was so I mean, you know, we we launched it, and uh, it was you know, it was like, man, I can't believe it took us that long just to get to this point. And it was still wasn't perfect. I mean, that's that's one thing that I kind of learned about about business, and it's just like you wait for something to be perfect, it's never gonna happen ever, Right, So it was it was kind of a kind of a you know, it was a whirlwind of struggle and conflict and overcoming on a ton of things and then finally just having enough grid to put it together and launch it. And so Campbellfire was a you know, it was a pretty pretty humble beginning right in March basement. And uh and from there we've you know, we've obviously grown. It's been almost eight years. Wow, what did that feel like that moment after all that adversity, when you finally you know, turn it on and sent it out into the world. What was that moment like for you? Well, the two things it was. It was you know, thrilling and scary all at one time. It's like, I'm psyched we finally got this thing up. And then it's like, okay, people can start buying stuff now. I can definitely relate to that kind of shock of your thing actually launching and try and wrap your head around that. And yes, you can start buying stuff now. And if you'd like to check out some of the great deals that camel Fire has going on, you can visit camel fire dot com and check back daily as their deals are changing out frequently. And with that said, let's get back to the show. I don't know, I'm cue passed. I don't know. Yeah, does any of this makes sense to you? No? I mean it all makes sense, you know. I think, like I've said before, the conversation is as important as anything, um, you know, and just you know, I mean, Dan brings up a good point. It's like what have we done? You know, And it kind of took me a while to you know, think about that. But I do feel that, you know, Rocky Mount Volk Foundation, you know, they've got there haunting his conservation message that they're trying to push. You know, it's it is what it is. It's good, like all those facts are great and whatever. Do I feel like it's maybe sometimes it's just like we're patting ourselves on the back because when they put it out on their Instagram, who sees that besides hunters, right, very true, it's like great, good job Mark, good job man. You know. It's almost like we need a message, not it's like we need to form a voice, and it's it's all right, like what you said. You know, the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation is doing all these great things, but they're not telling that to the people who don't like us. The hunting community needs a PR agency that talks to the rest of the world. That's that's what we really need. We need. We need some PR help and interesting. I don't know if you saw this, Yannis, given your connections back to Colorado, but I know Colorado has actually been I'm not sure if it's their fishing gaming agency or who's funding this, but they've done like an advertising campaign promoting the positive benefits of hunting and hunting dollars and conservation and stuff to help the whole recreational public. Have you seen anything about that? Yeah, you mean like the like have you hugged hunter lately? Yes? Yes, that's pretty cool idea, the very very man and like I think that came out right and now I was leaving Colorado and um, yeah, you'd see just posters pinned up where there's like the mountain biker with his bike in one hands in the midstream like hugging the fly fisherman, you know, and uh, you know had the message right there. It's like that's awesome. You know that message needs to be spread throughout the nation for every state. Yeah. There, there's just feel like the rural areas it happens a lot more. Um. You know, we have a good friend Kevin Murphy down there in Kentucky. We've done a couple of episodes of him now and he's just the hunting list, fishing list fool you've ever met. Man. The guy just gets after it. And at the same time he's just so involved with his community and such a positive force in his community that anybody that's relate, you know, remotely, you know, affected by what he does is probably maybe not pro hunting, but like like on the plus side of hunting, you know, they're not anti. They're like, even if they're not hunters, they're probably not going to vote against it or or or speak badly. I love it because of what this guy does, you know, in his community, and um, how much he's involved and he's you know, taking kids out hunting and just being involved in just like voting access, you know, putting a new voting access. And he's there and so while he's there, he's talking about how like, yeah, man, I'm doing this for everybody. I'm you know personally, I'm gonna use it to maybe shoot a couple of ducks as I float down this river, or catch a couple of brim or whatever it might be. But you know, he has a just by being in himself and what he does in his small little community in Kentucky, Like, he has a huge positive impact. And I think it happens a lot. In those kind of places where it's not happening, it's much harder to have that impact. And that voice heard is like in metro Chicago. You know, it's very hard. Um, but and I don't know how to beat that because it's like I'm not really like making you know, monthly trips there to give away venison to people and speak on behalf of hunting, you know. Um yeah, I don't. Like it's in the city where I see like a lot of those problems because it's just like they have no contact with you know, what we're talking about, and it's just all out of context. And when it's out of context, it's just hard to make sense of it. Oh yeah, I mean people and these urban centers are so disconnected from anything. I mean, firearms is a great example too. I mean they have no contact again exactly, you said, they have no context for a positive use or reason for having firearms. So of course they have these what I think are misconceptions in many cases, but they have these beliefs or perceptions. And the same thing with hunting when you have no contact with it, when you have no context for it, it's pretty understandable why maybe these people when they see something pop up on social media or whatever, they jump to this like, oh my gosh, it's horrible. Um, and that's a big thing, Like we're gonna be continuing to deal with as more and more people move to these places, more and more people spend more time in the computers and less time outside. More and more people's only you know, the idea of what a wild animal is is what they see in the Discovery Channel or what they see in a Disney movie. Um, I think there's like, yeah, there's very real challenges ahead of us down the road, and I think what you said, you honest maybe is one of the best things we can do, which is just simply like everything, but one of us just needs to know that we are We could be that one interaction, We could be that one person. And if we all think about that more and make sure that anyone that interacts with us, hopefully anyone that interacts with us enough, we'll have a positive you know, vibe or feeling or perspective on what we do as hunters. You know, if there can be what there's twelve million deer hunters out there or something, if we could all be like Kevin Murphy, that probably could make a pretty big impact. But I worry you affect ten people and all of a sudden jumps to a hundred million, and then you're talking about you know, a third of our population. That's mega. I guess first final final thoughts on this whole deal with the media with non hunting perspectives. I mean, I don't know, is there any other action item that you think we should be thinking about, or any final thoughts on this whole deal that you know we should keep in mind, because I think this is something that we should all probably try to keep in the back of our minds throughout hunting season, especially during hunting season, when you know, the opportunity to share what we're doing, or talk about what we're doing, or demonstrate. You know, this is the time that stuff is getting out there. So what would you want people to be thinking about. Yeah, it's funny, man, because we're gonna talk a little bit about, you know, growing up hunting white tails in the Midwest, and we can do that another time. But I still remember, like when we used to kill deer in Wisconsin and then drive back to Kalamazoo, Michigan. We had to go right through Chicago. A lot of times we drive right through downtown and we'd have three or four or five years strapped to the hood and then we had one of those like little trailer hitch not to the hood. I'm sorry, but to the roof of like a it was like a Chevy Blazer, and we had one of those like hitch kind of rack deals that we ran for a while, and you know, we got all kinds of looks. But it's like nobody ever was like going to scratch our you know, car pop our tires for it. But it's like these days, I just don't know if you could do that. You know. It's kind of like back then, even when we were you know, when I was a kid, and I guess I might be a little bit older than you, but like there was a time when there's just so many more hunters, you know, not not when everybody was a hunter, but everybody knew a hunter, you know. And and that's changed a lot to where if you you know, drove through Chicago now with that deer on your you know, the top of your truck, it's just like you're gonna be looked at as being disrespectful. But I mean to your point about what we can do now, man, I think that the easiest way, what good I don't know if it's the easiest. It actually takes some effort. But like venison diplomacy, as Steve says, it. It's like I do it here all the time in the office because we have a lot of people that work here that are are maybe not even associated with meat eater or just like very remotely. But when we come back from a trip, like we just came back with a moose, you know, we've got hundreds of pounds of meat. You know. Uh, none of these people were there to not none of them. Some of them were there to help me butcher on Sunday, but like for the most part is meeting three other four other guys. You know, we butchered for six hours. But I make sure that we had like a lot like one pound packages the burger and like one pound packages the roasts and you know, stuff you can cut up for steaks, and so that everybody here in the office is gonna get like their three or four packages. And like everybody is so stoked on that, and they're like there's just no possible way that they're at home eating that thing or walking home with those chunks and meat having like negative feelings about hunting at that point, you know. Um, And just to backtrack a little bit, we're always a friend of mine, Um says. It's a lot we're hunting. The hunting community has to answer to the lowest common denominator a lot of times. And I'm not saying that any of these people that got busted or that got blown up in the media are like the lowest common denominator, but that, you know, there's just like those bad apples that like, that's who gets portrayed as who hunters are when we all know who we are, you know, but that's who gets chosen by everybody else to represent who we are. And so um, I don't know how to like exactly counter that except that just you know, speak well, you know, on behalf of all of us when you are out there talking to down hunters, and don't be defensive, because I don't being defensive doesn't get us anywhere. We should use the same advice that we use for you know, getting to do stuff and making peace with our spouses as we do with people that are not on hunters, you know, And just like you know, you don't have to be exactly right. You don't have to like win the argument. You just want them to walk away going you know what hunt is probably okay, you know, but yeah, I don't know. I think the venice and diplomacy thing is huge, you know. Um and just uh, I think knowing like knowing our animals, uh, knowing the biology of our animals. UM. I was in a camp not long ago that we just happen to be staying at this church camp and there's other folks staying there at the same time as we were. We were there turkey hunting turkey on the adjacent property. We just happened to be staying there, and like these people were like, you know, they're like, okay, they weren't like voicing their negative thoughts on hunting, but you can tell there was a little bit of tension when like we were there and we're like, yeah, we're here hunting. You know. It wasn't like they would started asking us like all these like you know, interesting questions about what we're gonna be doing and what we're doing. It's like, oh, that's cool. But they had kids there, So like the next day we're coming at eleven am with a dead turkey over our shoulder and the kids come running over and we're looking at the turkey checking it out, and there's like nothing more interesting like than a dead wild turkey when you've never encountered something like that. It's just like the colors are unbelievable. There's like all these different interesting parts and if you, as a hunter can speak to all that off and be like, yeah, this is why this bird is so cool and this is why I love it, and yes, I go and kill it, but this is you know, and just explain yourself. All of a sudden, like it was like the kids were there, and then ten minutes later, like the parents were there, and then like the grandparents are there, and all of a sudden, everybody's like, well man, you think you might cook up some of that later, you know, And it's like I feel like it made a difference, you know, like all the kids got to take home some feathers, and uh, you know, I just feel like knowing our animals as as more than just you know, the big box, you know with the big antlers that goes along, that goes along, so that I think are in our context. Because again it's like between you and I I know that you know that your hunt is way more than just your trail. Camp pis of you know, whatever you've named him, Mr Houdini or whatever. I know that, but like someone else that looks at that from the outside. With out that context, they just see like, well man, all he's into is these pictures, and I think all he's talking about are those antlers, right right, So, um, yeah, I think just giving him the whole story, you know, it goes a long way for sure. I think that's you know, my one big takeaway or big kind of I don't know, final thought on all this is just to that point. It's look at every one of those interactions with someone as an opportunity to provide that positive context, to provide that positive example. And if you can do that so many times, that can make a big difference. And um, all those things you mentioned, sharing venison, knowing about what you're what you're pursuing, and being able to communicate that that stuff all helps so much. So I'm definitely you know, I'm always trying to keep this stuff in mind when it comes to in person interactions or social media posts and all that kind of stuff. And I definitely think that hopefully if we all everyone listening and all of us can do that this season and you know, in the future, that that might make a little bit of difference, a little bit of positive difference. So yeah, both of us are doing it right, and maybe aren't. You know, maybe most of us just aren't actually putting our voice out there. You know. It's it's just like, don't let the bad apple be your voice, or don't let the lowest common denominator be your voice. Yeah for sure. So speaking of of sharing experiences of my last question for you, that's the last thing I'm curious about. How's the how have the trips been going so far this season? How's the hunting season? Looking for the meteor crew? No, they didn't, great man. We had a super fun archery deer hunt in Nevada to kick the season off. Um, let me see what do we do next. I was actually out for a Prince of Wales Island black Tell deer hunt because I had moniscus surgery, which I gotta say, Man, if anybody out there is like thinking about doing it and you've got like some pain or some discomfort and they're kind of saying, yeah, go ahead and do it, and then we're about the art of ritis later, I highly recommended because I literally wasn't even off my leg for a day and and a week later I went on a moose hunt for ten days pack moose Hike Ground toast six hiked up and down mountains and it's like, I'm just so happy I got that done. Uh, yeah, it's amazing. It was amazing what you know, what the medical technology does these days. But yeah, we just did a moose hunt in the Alaska Range. Um. My dad was on the show and uh he was lucky enough to uh call in a nice bowl on the second day. Um, it almost happened too fast. I mean we've all been around enough to know that you take an easy one when it comes. But sometimes for production purposes, it's just like you just need a little more struggle before you get the the resolve, you know, and reached the prize. Like day two in the morning, you're like, oh, what do we get what we needed to, you know, to make a show out of this? So um but no, that was great. Um, and we had, you know, just great experiences. You know. Alaska has always has never lets you down. Man. It's uh just such a cool, beautiful place. And so it's yet man has been there a lot, but it's still just so much less than down here in the lower forty. Everybody's gotta go check it out. Um, let me see what's coming up. We got We're going to hunt some grouse and Wyoming next week, and we're we've got a muileor hunt in Colorado, which I'm real excited about. Um, and then Elkin, Montana, and uh, that kind of that kind of about rounds us out, So let's go go go definitely between here in December sounds like some fun trips, though, I gotta tell you, I'm very jealous of how much time you guys get spend Alaska. Every time I see you guys or anyone up there, I just keep saying, I gotta get there, I gotta get there. And I finally decided, like this past month, like I'm just gonna stop saying someday and I'm just gonna go. So next summer I'm trying to put together I'm gonna try to get to do an Alaska hunting trip. Um. I don't know exactly how to pull it off. Nobody that I know has the time or the ability to go do it yet. So I'm working on figuring that out. But it just seems like something that you have to experience, and I'm I'm ready to get out there. So well, I guess well I have you be honest, I'm gonna be selfish here. Given your experience up there, what would you recommend for the first d I y Alaskan trip, um Man, it's tough on um. You know the moose thing. I've been on a couple of moose hunts right now, and it's it's a great haunt. It's interesting that animals are way cool, but it's it's definitely like a very it's a pretty sedentary I mean, I know there's hunters a dude chase their moose and and kill him that way, but most people recommend sitting calling is it's a pretty sedentary hunt. Even if you flow the river, you know you're you're gonna end up probably shooting moose right on the bank or close to it. Um. And So I don't know if that is on your bucket list, you can do it. But like to me, Um, I've been on a few cariboo boo haunts. This is the first. I got to kill cariboo last week, which is my first one, which is way cool. But to go and see, like go to a place where there is the big numbers of caribou, where you actually get to see like just the massive migrations. Um, it's a special thing, because you don't really get that down here in the lower forty eight and it's in like no matter how many times you see it on Discovery Channel, when you see it, you know firsthand, and you get to watch a couple of hundred or maybe a thousand animals you know, go by you in one day, it's just magical. You know. That was actually we're seeing I were talking about and I was saying, you know what this that would be one thing that you could go and see and even if you didn't pull the trigger or fire and arrow, just to see that massive animals moving across the landscape. A lot of those animals they have never ever seen a human in their lives, you know, go in front of you. Um, it's pretty special. And to me, I feel like the carib just kind of really a symbol of that the North Country you know, like you really you don't you know, you got moves down here. We've got grizzly bears down here in the lower forty eight, um, black bears, We have deer like you. We don't have caribou. You know. That's like it's definitely a North Country animal. UM. And I think that like if you get to the right place. You are almost guaranteed to like to get into them to probably fill your tag um. There's usually lots of opportunities and most I think, you know, get a lot of references and making sure you've got the right out there that's gonna work hard to get you or the right transporter. If you're gonna go do d I Y that they're gonna work hard to get you into the right place. If they don't get you in the right place on the first drop, you know, they'll maybe movie of mid hunt to get you out ahead of them, you know. The movement of the of the caribou. I mean, a lot of the pilots we've talked to you, they're just like they keep telling guys. It's like, you know what, just tell yourself, don't shoot on the first day. Watch the animals. Look at what caribou. Figure out what cariboo look like. Because to all of us that you know, especially once they grew up in the Midwest, just like looking at white tails all the time, it doesn't matter if you look at a yearling caribou, you're like, oh my god, look at all those antlers. I'm shooting. That's what you see. One that's four or five years old. Um, And they're just saying how often it happens where guys kill like the second day they're there because they can't shoot the day they land, so the next day, you know, they shoot like the first kind of big one they see. And then also they gotta get flown out because their meats going out, and you're back at them. You're back on the tarmac and you're like, whoa hold on? That was my whole Alaska trip. Like I just went up there and it's over in like seventy two hours. And so with a caribou hunt, you on my just had to force yourself just to go up there and take it slow, you know, look and just watch them enjoy it um and try to you know, not pull the trigger maybe until the third or even fourth day if you can manage. Um. But anyways, yeah, that would that would be my I think first pick. If I had to just go back in time and say, all right, I'm just gonna go do one Alaskan animal, I probably do cariboo, and more just for the overall total experience than just like just because it's a cool you know animal itself. But you just you to go get a cariboo, You're just you're gonna get flown into some unbelievable country, you know, And they do have hunts that you can do when you don't fly. You know, you could go a TV or even hike in. I know, if you draw some of the permits on the Key nappendance, those places you can just hike in when you gotta draw that permit. But um, I don't know. I think I would just wait an extra year and save the money to get flown in to just you know, get away from you know what pressure there might be off the road system in Alaska. Man, that's good advice. I'm getting getting excited just talking about it. Cariboo. Cariboo is definitely one of those species that is very high on my list of just a dream animal to get to know and to see out there. And it sounds like you said, like it's a reasonable like you can go into that type of hunt doing it yourself with a reasonable expectation being able to pull it off. And you know, like I feel like with a moose hunt, when you're deep in there and with your a friend or you know, that seems pretty intimidating when you get that huge of an animal that deep in the back country and figuring all that out. But the cariboo seems like if you're get in the right place, it seems like it's a relatively opportunity rich type experience and it's not quite as daunting as as dealing with that ginormous moose carcass on the ground. You can kind of kind of approach a little bit easier. So, man, maybe one year from now we'll be talking about my caribou hunt, I hope so, and hopefully a lot of fly fishing too, So I'm excited about it. So, yes, we gotta let you go. We've been talking area off here. But before we do, what where should people go online to see what you've got going on with meat Eater and your hunt to Eat shirts? Where can we get those? Meat Eater is the meat Eater? Um? If you don't have a Sportsman channel. We aired eight on Thursdays, and right now we're in a fresh season and so this Thursday, we've got a Montana Bear episode coming up. It would be the twenty second, which would probably be this podcast by air later than that, I guess. But um, anyways, Thursday nights at eight, UM, maybe it's eight thirty Eastern. But if you don't have Sportsman Channel, you can go to um meat Eater dot vh X dot tv and immediately is the episode airs. You can buy all episodes for and uh, you know, some people look at it as like a lot of money, but I figured for twenty two minutes of good TV that three bucks as well worth it. You don't you have it forever, So that's a way to get around, you know, you don't want to you know, have uh, you know, pay for the whole cable package and then Hunt to eat if you want to go out our T shirts And my brother and I got going it's a hunt to eat dot com and that's UM t O not the numeral two. So h U N T t O e A T dot com. And uh, I think we've got roughly twenty states are so represented, and we have some state specific shirts um that you know, if you want to you know, rep your home boundaries you can. And then we've got another half dozen shirts that are non states specific that uh, you know, cover a variety of animals and just you know, some different designs, some stuff that uh, like I said, you can't find it that at the the big retailers. So, um yeah, that's uh, that's everything awesome. Well, I'm loving my Montana hunting shirt. It's been on been on a good number of trips to the mountains already, so I definitely can it can endorse what you guys are doing. Good stuff, and you've got kind of like a Kickstarter type deal going to write for getting people news. Actually gonna run um again, I don't know what when you're playing on air in this but through the end of September, we're running basically like our own version of Kickstarter. We're calling it hunt Starter. And because we get just a lot of requests for people wanting, you know, in Oklahoma shut in a Tennessee shirt, and um, it's just hard. It just takes a lot of capital, you know to basically come out, you know and make another thirty s thirty designs, so we cover every state in the nation. Um, so we decided to do this hunt Starter campaign. We're basically we saw most of our shirts were twenty five bucks, but for the hunts our campaign, you can go online and uh to our website and basically pre order your state shirt for fifteen bucks and if we reach a hundred pre orders for let's just say Oklahoma, then at the end of the month, we're gonna basically make an Oklahoma shirt and everybody gets a shirt for fifteen bucks versus the normal. If if the anybody that orders to say a state that doesn't make it to a hundred orders by that time, um, we're basically just gonna send them a new we're working on, like a new Hunt to Eat logo T shirt. It's gonna be way cool and you're kind of gonna get that as a Constellation Pride. So either way, you end up getting a Hunt to Eat T shirt for fifteen bucks instead of and hopefully we've got a couple of states that are getting there. We're hoping that, you know, with a with a little extra push here at the end of the month, we'll get a couple of states to actually make it to a hundred and we'll do uh, we'll do a few new state designs. So yeah, that's the Hunt to Eat hunt Starter campaign. Sweet. Well, we'll have this episode out before the end of September, so people have time to to get on that. Very cool, awesome, be honest, well, man, I appreciate taking time to do this and chat definitely through some of these. You know, sometimes not so much fun topics to talk about, especially during hunting season. I'd rather talk about animals and adventures and everything, but one of those things is probably good to to have on the mind and chat through. So thanks for sharing your thoughts and perspectives on all of us. Yeah, man, no problem. Um, I hope I didn't raffle too many feathers. And if I know, you guys just need to suck it up and you know, think about it a little bit. But yeah, I do appreciate you having me on, and uh it's I'm always honored when I get to be uh good to be a guest on a podcast. Um, I get us talk a little bit more than normally do on on our podcast. But I'll leave you with one little thing because I know you've been talking about possibly making a move out west. Last night, I got woken up in the middle of the night. I couldn't really tell what it was it was keeping me awake, but finally I just like got out of bed. I was like, all right, I must have to go p or something, you know. So I got out of bed and walked towards the window that was cracked open, and all of a sudden, I here. I'm like, you gotta be kidding me, you know. So there's a bowl outside raising ruckets. I go out onto my deck to go take a leak onto the moonlight ensure enough, there's two bowls in about twenty cows, like I don't know, probably three hundred yards four hundred yards off my off my deck, just you know, going balls to the wall. And I was like, yep, it's all about right here. I gotta say I hate you just a little bit right now. You're honest that you come and stay anytime, careful what you offer because I might be out there before you know it. Well, thank you, honest and good luft the rest of the season. Yeah, man, we'll we'll talk to him are And there you go. Another episode in the books. And I hope you enjoyed this one. And then I gave you a little food for thought as we enter the two thousand six hunting season. That said, before we wrap this one up, we need to thank our partners who helped make this podcast possible. Big thank you too. Sick of gear, Redneck Blinds Hunter, a maps, Yetie Cooler's Ozonics Carbon Express Mavien Optics, and the White Tail Institute of North America. Thank you so much for supporting those companies who support us. It really does make all the difference in the world. And I actually just got an email from one of these companies saying that they got emails from some of you guys saying how much you appreciate that, how much you appreciate them helping make the White Hurt podcast possible. And man, that is the coolest thing. I can't tell you how much I appreciate that. Thank you so much. Now, with all that said, speaking of thanks, thank you all for tuning in today. Best of luck in the woods, and until next time, stay white eared to hunt.