Speaker 1: Hey, everybody, Welcome to the Hunting Collective. I've been O'Brien
Speaker 1: and today for episode number twenty one, I'm joined by
Speaker 1: Jason Matt Singer and Sam sohol. You guys should know
Speaker 1: Sam Soho by now. He's the bus driving, badass nomad
Speaker 1: that's been on the podcast a few times, one of
Speaker 1: my closer buds, somebody who I love just having to
Speaker 1: ride along there as many pot as that possibly can
Speaker 1: get him. He's a great dude. He's joined by his
Speaker 1: good friend and somebody who's worked with a lot of
Speaker 1: Jason Matt Singer. Jason Matt Singer is a Fontana born filmmaker,
Speaker 1: conservationist just to have a great face in the hunting world.
Speaker 1: He's a sit gambassador, works with Eddie, does a lot
Speaker 1: of things in our space and most notably points them
Speaker 1: all towards conservation. And that's why I think many other
Speaker 1: reasons Jason court boys to hear. So we caught up
Speaker 1: for a midnight beer drinking, pizza eating podcast in Boson,
Speaker 1: Montana night before Total Archery Challenge. It's a great conversation
Speaker 1: about wild sheep, about how to conserve them, about how
Speaker 1: to better message for the wild sheep Hunter, A lot,
Speaker 1: a lot of good stuff to dig into, so hopefully
Speaker 1: you do an episode number one enjoy, And we're on. Gentlemen,
Speaker 1: introduce yourselves. Uh, Sam Souhol photographer, bus Guy, bus Guy,
Speaker 1: Jason Matt Singer, host of Endo High Country and Project Delk,
Speaker 1: Project Neil Deer, And we're about to launch the Circle
Speaker 1: of Life. Yes, that sounds good. Now I always like
Speaker 1: to start this will be fun. I'd like to start
Speaker 1: in the podcast by describing where we are now. This
Speaker 1: will challenge, says, will challenge your descriptive abilities. But Jason,
Speaker 1: give us a description of our current surroundings. Well, I
Speaker 1: think it proves how dedicated we are to getting it done. Um,
Speaker 1: you know, right now we are. We got a couple
Speaker 1: of white robes hanging on the wall. We got a
Speaker 1: pretty big audience, and we found a quiet spot amongst
Speaker 1: you know, amongst the chaos. Yeah, it's chaotic out there.
Speaker 1: Total our three challenges about to kick off. We're in
Speaker 1: Big Sky, Montana. It was a beautiful night, beautiful sunset.
Speaker 1: We had a photo shoot tonight. Yea, and uh, I'm
Speaker 1: just happy to be here. This is one of my
Speaker 1: favorite weekends all year. Of course, it's right in my
Speaker 1: backyard and all the people that I love to surround
Speaker 1: myself with or right here for a few days, especially Greg,
Speaker 1: who's in the bed. Uh, we're just gonna refer to
Speaker 1: him as only Greg. We wilyn describe wherees from what
Speaker 1: he's doing. Greg's arrival has been highly anticipated by a
Speaker 1: lot of people, so I mean so happy to happen.
Speaker 1: He's a bit of a big deal. He's resting a
Speaker 1: corps light on the stomach as he lounges on a
Speaker 1: hotel bed. He's got I think he's scouting. He's looking
Speaker 1: at maps, looking at maps his rout out for Morrow,
Speaker 1: because he doesn't Greg does not go by the course
Speaker 1: whatever target. The mountain has always been Greg's treadmill. The
Speaker 1: first time I met Greg, that was the shirt he's
Speaker 1: getting offgoing joke ever since it's a nice shirt. That's
Speaker 1: a nice shirt. Well, yeah, this is the lovely what's
Speaker 1: this called the Huntley? The Huntley Hotel. Shout out to
Speaker 1: those folks for making a hotel. Yeah, you're right, that
Speaker 1: was okay. Several chairs and the table, yep, it's just
Speaker 1: good and electrical outlets which are also helpful that we're
Speaker 1: supposed to do this in the bush, but we couldn't
Speaker 1: find a spot to park it where I could plug in. Well, listen,
Speaker 1: when you got a bus, that's bus problems. That's right,
Speaker 1: we're living out of a bus. Sometimes you gotta make
Speaker 1: You should have bought a shorter one. Are you gonna
Speaker 1: sleep in that bus tonight? I might? Yeah, I might
Speaker 1: not really want to share a room with anybody. Yeah
Speaker 1: that's true. Yeah, yeah, Well I don't blame you. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'll go assess the situation. The feeling is definitely mutual. Trust. No,
Speaker 1: the smell, I know, snoring and the smell. We're gonna
Speaker 1: get deep in the conservation talk. But a pizza will
Speaker 1: be delivered at some point during the podcast. So maybe
Speaker 1: we'll have the pizza. Every person come in and make
Speaker 1: a guess, ask him some questions, hopefull see how they
Speaker 1: feel some coupins. Based on our promotion of the pizza place?
Speaker 1: What was Greg? What was the pizza Place? What I
Speaker 1: am excited about is I've never had a pizza with
Speaker 1: way goo beef on it? Is that what we're getting? Yeah?
Speaker 1: They got a little what's it called pizza works? Now works?
Speaker 1: Is w E r X? I hope W r k
Speaker 1: s screw the valves right, all right? Well, pizza works
Speaker 1: Big Sky, Montana. Thanks for broad and we paid for it,
Speaker 1: but thank you for bringing it. What was the official
Speaker 1: name of that pizza A kind the Guido, the Guido
Speaker 1: and no offense to any Guido's out there. I suspect
Speaker 1: it will be a hell of a pizza. Meatballs, meatballs, Yeah,
Speaker 1: and interesting a lot. They got a lot of wide
Speaker 1: goo beef in Montana. Yeah, probably, so everywhere is everywhere?
Speaker 1: You know, cows getting massaged every national forest. Well, happy
Speaker 1: cows are good cows. You know that's true. That's true.
Speaker 1: One more point before we begin the real reason we're here.
Speaker 1: Sam did say that every time we've podcast together, we've
Speaker 1: been drinking and now we have to burp out the
Speaker 1: left side of our mouths to prevent away from the
Speaker 1: microphoy from the microphone. So, so if if any of
Speaker 1: you hear like a little bit of clicking or like
Speaker 1: Mike noise rubbing, it's just trying to shift the mic
Speaker 1: far enough away so you don't Because I was like
Speaker 1: a to our conversation and like the fifth time that happened,
Speaker 1: like what, yeah, what was that? That's happening? In there.
Speaker 1: If you go back and listen to the Lani recap,
Speaker 1: there's a lot of a lot of that. I think
Speaker 1: we addressed it there as well. I feel like it's
Speaker 1: not only appropriate to address address that going into it,
Speaker 1: that there is uh there will be beer burbs and
Speaker 1: it's Corona shout out to hopefully Coronabal sponsor this podcast
Speaker 1: at some point. I don't know why they wouldn't. I
Speaker 1: don't know why either. I'd go, I'd do beach interviews.
Speaker 1: I would wear a bikini. I don't really care. So, um,
Speaker 1: she hunting is awesome. Um that's my sage. We don't
Speaker 1: even have any real segue other than say, um, Jason,
Speaker 1: you got a great opportunity to draw it once in
Speaker 1: a lifetime tag here recently twice, once in a lifetime
Speaker 1: opportunity twice. Yeah, this is the second time. Yeah, I'm
Speaker 1: talking about tell us about that. Well, yeah, I mean
Speaker 1: I drew a big horn cheap tag in two thousand
Speaker 1: six here in Montana, and uh, fortunately here in Montana,
Speaker 1: it's not once in a lifetime. You know, we've created
Speaker 1: enough opportunity for us to get back out there, so
Speaker 1: every seven years you can reapply. I had I think
Speaker 1: four so points. Not the best at math, but it
Speaker 1: was somewhere right in there and drew again in one
Speaker 1: of the premier units in all of North America. So yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean it's it's just one of those tags that's um,
Speaker 1: you know, there's no words for it. It's it's as
Speaker 1: good as when in the lottery, you know, there's like
Speaker 1: when it comes to auction tags. The most expensive tag
Speaker 1: ever sold was for the chance to hunt big horns
Speaker 1: in Montana, and that was in I believe two thousand
Speaker 1: thirteen at the Wild Sheep Foundation. I went for four
Speaker 1: hundred and eighty thousand dollars. Yeah. I honestly get chills
Speaker 1: just driving down Cannon here along the Galton and I
Speaker 1: just saw a sign that said sheep crossing. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: then I was like, I love that sign. I was
Speaker 1: like a little kid. I was like, I told my
Speaker 1: wife Hannah, look look a sheep crossing. She's like, whatever,
Speaker 1: what's that mean? I'm like, he such, it's even to
Speaker 1: me even to be in country where, especially in the
Speaker 1: little forty eight, where you can run into a big horn,
Speaker 1: especially this magnificent country. Yeah, for sure there Yeah, and
Speaker 1: a lot of times, a lot of times around here.
Speaker 1: They end up seeing them driving up. They'll be hanging
Speaker 1: out right next to the road. Yeah, I've seen that.
Speaker 1: Not in Montana, with Colorado, I've seen that, Yeah for sure. Ye. No,
Speaker 1: they're They're just such a you know, iconic animal for
Speaker 1: North America, and I you know, I wish more people
Speaker 1: had the opportunity to actually uh be around big horn
Speaker 1: sheep because they are come in. Yeah, pizza arrived. Pizza
Speaker 1: guys here, pizza guys here going. We knew you were coming.
Speaker 1: That's fantastic. Appreciate that. Yeah, sex man, that was quick
Speaker 1: delivery too. That was pizza work and sell yourself short. Still,
Speaker 1: oh man, that looks good. If the end of this
Speaker 1: podcast gets a little sleepy, you'll know we're about to
Speaker 1: eat bread. If you take turns like pushing the microwa in,
Speaker 1: it's like, damn, all right, this is getting good. It's
Speaker 1: good real early like this. It's gonna need more beer though,
Speaker 1: saying I thing, maybe how many we got there? We
Speaker 1: got a couple left at least. Um when that when
Speaker 1: you draw a sheep tag like that, I mean, what's
Speaker 1: your I mean, what's your knowledge of the area? How
Speaker 1: much have you thought about that? I mean, is it's
Speaker 1: a dream tag, But is it enough of reality going
Speaker 1: into that that you've already scouted and thought and understood
Speaker 1: what it is. I mean only because I had had
Speaker 1: it before, you know, the first time I drew it,
Speaker 1: I can relate to that because I didn't have a clue.
Speaker 1: I mean, you're going into no man's land. You know.
Speaker 1: I've always heard about the area. I've you know, I've
Speaker 1: hunted around it for deer and elk, but I've never
Speaker 1: dug into it for sheep. So you know, you got it.
Speaker 1: It takes a whole other brain when it comes to
Speaker 1: approaching a sheep hunt versus an elk hunt versus a
Speaker 1: deer hunt, even if you're hunting them in the same
Speaker 1: to rain. So yeah, it was all foreign to me. Um.
Speaker 1: I remember I started. The first thing I did was
Speaker 1: Duncan Gil Chris video on how to Field Judge Sheep
Speaker 1: was one of the first things I got. At the time.
Speaker 1: Duncan was still alive and I ordered it from him. Um,
Speaker 1: great DVD. That taught me a ton about you know,
Speaker 1: because the first time I went out there, every sheep
Speaker 1: looked giant like those rams. I mean, they're just so impressive. Looking.
Speaker 1: You know, until I watched Duncan's videos, I didn't really
Speaker 1: get a grasp of how to break them down, like
Speaker 1: you know, an elk or deer or something. I had
Speaker 1: been around a lot, so there was definitely that UM
Speaker 1: kind of side of it is just you know, what
Speaker 1: was a young ram, what was an older ram? What
Speaker 1: are growth rings? What are not growth rings? Just all
Speaker 1: of that, but then you know the area itself. UM
Speaker 1: at that time, you know, there wasn't on X maps.
Speaker 1: Unfortunately the Fishing Game does send out map or did
Speaker 1: at the time send out maps to the tag holders
Speaker 1: and kind of gave you an area on our idea
Speaker 1: where to start, and UM, from there, it was just
Speaker 1: about digging in and just putting boots on the dirt,
Speaker 1: you know, and um started finding rams and one leads
Speaker 1: you to the other, which leads you to somewhere else,
Speaker 1: and you know, next thing you know, you've got a
Speaker 1: few few areas. Uh, do you feel pretty competent in
Speaker 1: what kind of ram you looking for? You know, any
Speaker 1: animal I hunt, it's just the one that gets me going.
Speaker 1: You know, it's not it's no there's no picture in
Speaker 1: my head of what that animal is. It's just you
Speaker 1: know how it is when you're out there hunting and
Speaker 1: you're trying to convince yourself that's the one, that's not
Speaker 1: the one, you know. So for me, when I when
Speaker 1: all of a sudden, I see an animal and my
Speaker 1: heart starts beating and like I like not even thinking
Speaker 1: straight trying to figure out the next move or whatever.
Speaker 1: That's what I hunt. Can you like that's that's a
Speaker 1: good thing to delve into a little bit, and we
Speaker 1: should all try to explain because I don't know that
Speaker 1: you can when you see an animal in your heart
Speaker 1: starts being like, that's the animal we're gonna kill. A
Speaker 1: lot of times you can see be like, that's the
Speaker 1: biggest help I think I'll ever see, when this piece
Speaker 1: of property or wherever money, or the biggest sheep I
Speaker 1: think I'll ever see. Of course, you never know, but
Speaker 1: something like I said, sometimes you just look at an
Speaker 1: animal quickly through the bodies will be like, that's the one.
Speaker 1: Let's go, shooter, go totally, and I think you know
Speaker 1: it's a combination of the animal in the scenario. You know,
Speaker 1: sometimes it's just everything aligns and and you know, you
Speaker 1: just the bow goes off and you really don't even
Speaker 1: or the rifle or whatever, and you just and you
Speaker 1: look at each other like what just happened? Um? I
Speaker 1: think a lot of times that's with the scenario too.
Speaker 1: I mean, if you're in this epic location and you've
Speaker 1: may be pre scouted it and you've never been there,
Speaker 1: and then you end up in this spot next thing,
Speaker 1: you know, this animal just presents this beautiful, you know, opportunity.
Speaker 1: It just hits you, you know, and it may be
Speaker 1: way smaller than you picture it in your mind and
Speaker 1: maybe way bigger, and you just get lucky. I mean,
Speaker 1: I don't know, I don't know what it is. I
Speaker 1: think it's a combination of the animal, the point of
Speaker 1: the season in which you're at the location. You know,
Speaker 1: it's just all these factors that just sort of just
Speaker 1: hit you, you know. Yeah. I always wonder that how
Speaker 1: much social media, how much our expectation of what other
Speaker 1: people are gonna how other people might judge what we do. Well,
Speaker 1: I'll tell you with the sheep hunt that becomes real
Speaker 1: in a hurry, you know, elk antelope, anything else, it's
Speaker 1: not that, but when you get that tag you start
Speaker 1: to or any special tag that you know, a lot
Speaker 1: of people like to get. You start to feel like
Speaker 1: to some degree, you're hunting for everyone else too, you
Speaker 1: know when we touch on this in the film tomorrow
Speaker 1: like or Saturday, sorry, um, like you feel like you're
Speaker 1: kind of the ambassador for your friends because they live
Speaker 1: vicarious lee through you. And so you want to hunt
Speaker 1: as hard as anybody else would, and you want to
Speaker 1: get as good as sheep as anybody else would. And
Speaker 1: you want to you know, work for it like anybody else.
Speaker 1: You want to earn it like anybody else, you know,
Speaker 1: so you do really you know that comes into effect
Speaker 1: for Elk, for me, for dear. You know, I feel
Speaker 1: like it's not hard for me to hunt for me,
Speaker 1: you know, And I think that comes with I've got
Speaker 1: great partners in this industry, you know there there, It's
Speaker 1: not the days of fifteen years ago where you gotta
Speaker 1: show x amount of minutes of a sponsor or anything. Like.
Speaker 1: My sponsors are great partners. They build great products, and
Speaker 1: they they just let me do me. It doesn't matter.
Speaker 1: You know. My first two episodes this year, Sam and
Speaker 1: I worked our tails off this fall, and I got
Speaker 1: the opportunity at a bigger bowl than I've ever got
Speaker 1: my life, and I missed it, and I made a
Speaker 1: two part episode out of it where we went home
Speaker 1: with nothing, and and I'd love to be able to
Speaker 1: tell that, you know, and not have to feel any
Speaker 1: pressure of I've got to get X amount of animals
Speaker 1: or I've got to kill this animal or I've I
Speaker 1: told myself over ten years ago when I first started
Speaker 1: doing this, I will never kill an animal to make
Speaker 1: an episode. If I'm not feeling it like what we're
Speaker 1: talking about, it's just not going to happen, you know. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we've talked a lot about Uh. Steve Ornella is one
Speaker 1: of his brothers. I guess Matt talked to came up
Speaker 1: with this idea maybe not original to him, but of
Speaker 1: a purity score for hunting. And he's like, I just
Speaker 1: have a purity score. I could sit down in front
Speaker 1: of the animal, like what's the feeling? Like, what do
Speaker 1: I feel? How pure is this? Am? I thinking I
Speaker 1: got him? But man, I'm not sure that was the
Speaker 1: right I'm not sure what it was day two ship.
Speaker 1: Maybe it should have been day five, or maybe it
Speaker 1: should have been day seven. And for me now hunting,
Speaker 1: I like to just when it happened, sit down and
Speaker 1: like feel it feel right. And my second guess in
Speaker 1: it am I thinking, Man, I don't think I don't
Speaker 1: think people think this is big enough for I'm not
Speaker 1: sure I worked hard enough for this. I got lucky ship.
Speaker 1: I don't feel right about it, and just judge that
Speaker 1: and each time try to get to higher score, like
Speaker 1: just get to the next level. Um, And like you said,
Speaker 1: when you're in this industry, I'm sure you and say
Speaker 1: I'm saying, way you get all these invites and I'm like,
Speaker 1: come on, this hunt, it's a it's a dream hunt,
Speaker 1: Like what kind of hunt is it? It might be
Speaker 1: a dream hunt for you. I might think it sucks,
Speaker 1: or I might kill a giant L can feel like
Speaker 1: I was cheap. I've done that a few times. You
Speaker 1: kill like a bull that as a kid, I would
Speaker 1: have never thought that I would even got close to
Speaker 1: and you shoot it and you're like, well, yeah, okay,
Speaker 1: like that was awesome, but it didn't you like didn't
Speaker 1: earn it enough for something? Yeah, Or we were talking
Speaker 1: about we were making jokes coming in here, like I
Speaker 1: love those d I Y I guided hunts, like the
Speaker 1: guy's like shooting and then from there it's d I
Speaker 1: Y Yeah that all plays into it. But at some level,
Speaker 1: you know, I'm sure she hunt is is just the
Speaker 1: next level you amp up all these feelings and all
Speaker 1: the things that go into it. It is. It's just
Speaker 1: everything is. Because I mean I waited until there was
Speaker 1: nine days left in the season. We've been there almost
Speaker 1: thirty days filming hunting. The camera crew was there more
Speaker 1: than me because I'd go back and see my boys
Speaker 1: and then come back and they would continue to get
Speaker 1: content and stuff. But like it was, you know, when
Speaker 1: you have a tag like that, it's just you've never
Speaker 1: hunted along like you never wanted to be over. The
Speaker 1: situation is never good enough, you know, you hold it
Speaker 1: on such a pedestal. Well, I think the cool thing
Speaker 1: that you did last you're with that sheep hunt is.
Speaker 1: So we went up and scouted for a few days
Speaker 1: in augustin right towards the end of August, and I
Speaker 1: mean personally, I couldn't believe just sitting on one glassing
Speaker 1: now and we were looking at five, you know, five
Speaker 1: or six different sheep that were boone and crocket animals.
Speaker 1: I mean, just big sheep. I mean, the country is
Speaker 1: beautiful and you got all these big sheep run around.
Speaker 1: But from day one, your whole goal with that hunt
Speaker 1: was to soak up every second of it and make
Speaker 1: it like let it last as long as it needed
Speaker 1: to last, and like just embrace like the whole hunt
Speaker 1: instead of like, Okay, I'm gonna go in there and
Speaker 1: like I'm gonna whatever it takes. I'm gonna, you know,
Speaker 1: knock going down as early as or whatever. And that
Speaker 1: was never it. It was always just like I'm just
Speaker 1: gonna go, like this might be the last tag I
Speaker 1: ever drawn Montana for sheep, and I'm just gonna go
Speaker 1: let that just be in that moment for as long
Speaker 1: as possible. And that was cool. Do you feel doubly
Speaker 1: like I always as somebody in the industry who some
Speaker 1: almost my job to go do stuff like that and
Speaker 1: not cheap punt's course, but just hunting in general. I
Speaker 1: feel like some it's not a guilt, but it's just
Speaker 1: like a responsibility to enjoy this thing and to put
Speaker 1: all myself into it because there's a whole lot of
Speaker 1: people that would give anything to be doing So you
Speaker 1: got that, and then you also have what we're talking
Speaker 1: about earlier is the pressure of I'm representing everybody with
Speaker 1: this tag that would desire to do this or puts
Speaker 1: time and energy and money to do it, and so
Speaker 1: you have that the double responsibility of those two things
Speaker 1: that want. Yeah, it's it's really all the pressures you
Speaker 1: feel of hunting, no matter what it is, or just
Speaker 1: magnified on a sheep hunt. And I do appreciate you
Speaker 1: know you're saying that, Sam, it was. You know, I
Speaker 1: saw a lot of bigger rams than the one I got,
Speaker 1: And I'm not saying like by any means I'm upset
Speaker 1: with the one I got, But it always was about
Speaker 1: soaking it up. You know, I wanted to really get
Speaker 1: to no sheep. I wanted to really live in that
Speaker 1: country for as long as I could. I wanted to
Speaker 1: really understand the animal well. And because you did that,
Speaker 1: you were able to experience things last fall that people
Speaker 1: like even sheep hunters, will probably never experience in their
Speaker 1: entire life, Like that whole scenario when you guys were
Speaker 1: on the boat filming those sheep, like the one the
Speaker 1: sheep had a you know, another sheep like basically buried
Speaker 1: in the hole, like guarding it, and uh, you know,
Speaker 1: and then like ten minutes of unbelievable sheet footage. I
Speaker 1: mean I just got to see like little snippets of it,
Speaker 1: and it was it's just crazy. Take a quick break,
Speaker 1: Greg broke the seal in the pizza. What are we feeling.
Speaker 1: We're feeling good on that good. It's hard to eat
Speaker 1: with the microphone. We'll have to take turns of eating
Speaker 1: while someone else is talking. Yeah, apologies to the honest,
Speaker 1: but this looks really good. We're about to eat it anyway,
Speaker 1: go ahead. I'm sorry. Oh no, it was just um
Speaker 1: big because you know, you spend that much time out there,
Speaker 1: you you give yourself the amount of time, you give
Speaker 1: yourself the opportunity to have things happen to you for sure. Yeah,
Speaker 1: instead of rushing through it and just being able to
Speaker 1: appreciate the whole hunt. You know. It's Uh, it's funny
Speaker 1: because every time I've ever dedicated myself like full onto
Speaker 1: one of these big films for a conservation organization, I
Speaker 1: always feel like I get blessed with opportunity I wouldn't have.
Speaker 1: You know, it may sound weird, but like right after
Speaker 1: we decided to do Project Now, amazing things started happening.
Speaker 1: And I don't know if it's because I was focusing
Speaker 1: more on that animal. But I'm just like, I just
Speaker 1: felt like they were these gifts, you know, like, oh,
Speaker 1: you're gonna you know, you're doing something good here look
Speaker 1: at this, and like what Sam's talking about. I mean,
Speaker 1: you'll see it in the film. It's a nine different
Speaker 1: rams had one you, and she she wasn't ready to breed,
Speaker 1: so she went in this tiny little hole in the
Speaker 1: side of the mountain and she wouldn't come out, and
Speaker 1: this one big Ram wouldn't leave her alone, but he
Speaker 1: wouldn't let any of the other Rams get nearer as well,
Speaker 1: you know. And so it's this whole scene of him
Speaker 1: bashing heads with other Rams, running around the circle, trying
Speaker 1: to get in there with her, trying to get her out.
Speaker 1: Another Ram actually gets in there with her when he's
Speaker 1: chasing another Ram off, and he comes back and just
Speaker 1: starts pounding on him, and it's just in and sane
Speaker 1: saying and finally he like hooks his horn behind her
Speaker 1: horn and basically like drags her out, and she's got
Speaker 1: no choice. She just takes off up the mountain, and
Speaker 1: this whole like minnow trail of Rams trying to follow
Speaker 1: her up the mountain. It's just just telling me. You
Speaker 1: guys put like yakety sacks in the background, but now
Speaker 1: it was just yeah, it's stuff like that in Yeah,
Speaker 1: you just can't there's no way to describe, you know,
Speaker 1: getting to a place far away from everything and seeing
Speaker 1: something like that. Yeah, it was. It was one of
Speaker 1: the most memorable experiences I've had of you know, being
Speaker 1: out there. How far away from that were you couple
Speaker 1: of yards? That's and like Sam says, you know, like
Speaker 1: these rams, I mean we're passing up rams that would
Speaker 1: easily make the record book Boone and Crockett, Pope and
Speaker 1: young whatever. Like every day, you know, you're not You're
Speaker 1: not looking at just any ram. These are you know,
Speaker 1: the you know, new hunter harvested world record ram came
Speaker 1: just out of an area north of where I was
Speaker 1: hunting last year. So because what's the We talked a
Speaker 1: lot about the average amount of days that a sheep
Speaker 1: hunter Montana will hunt before they kill a sheep, and
Speaker 1: it's like, surprisingly less three days. Yeah, it's like because
Speaker 1: because they're like the population is growing and there's all
Speaker 1: these big rams, and guys can go out and hunt
Speaker 1: for a few days, scout a little bit, and then
Speaker 1: you find a few I mean you can get on
Speaker 1: a good knob and you can find a good sheep,
Speaker 1: and then you go in there and you can kill
Speaker 1: a boot and crockett sheep. I mean in a couple
Speaker 1: of days. First more, first day Sam and I went scouting.
Speaker 1: We saw, I know, one of the rams was. I
Speaker 1: know two of the rams we saw that day ended
Speaker 1: up being taken by other hunters than they were, you know,
Speaker 1: d plus rams. You know, you gotta feel, you know,
Speaker 1: the only sheep hunt that I've been a part of
Speaker 1: was in Northwest Territories is last year, and it felt
Speaker 1: it sucked. It was a wonderful hunt. I didn't have
Speaker 1: a tag obviously, but it felt like because you were
Speaker 1: limited in days, a lot of those hunters ended up
Speaker 1: going there and then coming back the next year, or
Speaker 1: going home for a month to coming back. You know,
Speaker 1: they're they're hunting ten days and not getting it done.
Speaker 1: It just felt like that arbitrary, what seemingly arbitrary amount
Speaker 1: of days that the alphator decides, well that's two days,
Speaker 1: or that's how much these this many days costs. It
Speaker 1: seemed like, man, that sucks. Man that sucks, because around
Speaker 1: day seven you're just like that fee link that you
Speaker 1: get when you see the one gets to be pretty artificial. Man. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you have to. But for you, you can go and
Speaker 1: see your kids, dedicate your time and do it the
Speaker 1: right way, which which is the fact you've we're dedicated
Speaker 1: to film and all that, I think is it. You know,
Speaker 1: it's quite the gifts for everybody that gets to watch
Speaker 1: that film. Oh man. I mean I feel like the
Speaker 1: lucky one though, and I'm just excited for everybody to
Speaker 1: see the film. You know, it turned out great. I've
Speaker 1: kind of got choked up, you know, every time I
Speaker 1: watched it here in the last since we've gotten a
Speaker 1: polished and I just can't wait for it to come out. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I know. I remember you were when you were doing it.
Speaker 1: You were like, well, we've been out here twenty seven days,
Speaker 1: probably have shot one one day, like six. But I'm
Speaker 1: an insane human. Now. There's there's just there's just levels
Speaker 1: to hunting. In my opinion, they're just like what you're
Speaker 1: willing to do, what your true dedication is to it,
Speaker 1: and how you display that's important, especially for you guys
Speaker 1: like yourself and saying saying you know that people are
Speaker 1: watching to see and they're looking for I think, especially
Speaker 1: on social media nowadays, people are looking for inspiration. Yeah,
Speaker 1: for sure. I mean there's so so much garbage out there,
Speaker 1: not you know, necessarily in any one area. It's just
Speaker 1: there's just a lot of noise in the world, negative
Speaker 1: for the most part. You know, you flip on the news,
Speaker 1: it's negative. You look at the newspaper, it's negative. You know,
Speaker 1: it's just it's so refreshing to see people out there
Speaker 1: living this life in beautiful places and doing what they love.
Speaker 1: And you know, I think it is inspirational for people.
Speaker 1: And and then you know, there's definitely different levels and
Speaker 1: whatever level that is that you know, gets the out there,
Speaker 1: I think that's great. You know, legal, ethical, there's there
Speaker 1: is all kinds of different levels. You know, if you
Speaker 1: want to uh on a water hole or if you
Speaker 1: want to hike to the top of you know, the
Speaker 1: biggest mountain around, you can do that here. And that's
Speaker 1: the beauty of it. So there's something for everybody. And
Speaker 1: and um, yeah, we live in a great place for
Speaker 1: it all, Montana, good Lord, and we are right in
Speaker 1: the middle of it right now. I'm what a wonderful place.
Speaker 1: It's hard for me not to laugh. And you're like,
Speaker 1: you know, right in my backyard. It's technically right in
Speaker 1: my backyard to where we're at. I just don't spend
Speaker 1: much time here. Yeah, let's let's you know, let's stop
Speaker 1: for a minute, just Sam, Like, when are you gonna
Speaker 1: settled down? Like Jason and I are a little bit
Speaker 1: just concerned. We haven't talked about this, but I'm just
Speaker 1: assuming I feel you're not the only people that are concerned.
Speaker 1: I've been I've been talking to your parents, trying to
Speaker 1: think of what somebody called me. What did Steve call
Speaker 1: me earlier? He's like, you have a home base or
Speaker 1: you just a hobo? Yeah it was hobo? Yeah, Um yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean at some point I think I gotta Um,
Speaker 1: I mean, I love all the travel and stuff and
Speaker 1: love what I've been able to do, but at some
Speaker 1: point and I have to slow down a little bit.
Speaker 1: I mean, well, you probably never stopped traveling, and I'll
Speaker 1: never have like a normal job, probably, but um, it's
Speaker 1: been fairly chaotic the last six years. Next next year
Speaker 1: you go short bus and then shorter bus actually get
Speaker 1: especially so we're gonna go from public land full size
Speaker 1: bus to like public land short bus to public land prius. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we figured that out. But you can do it like
Speaker 1: a little round year tough the side of the prius. Yeah,
Speaker 1: this is a state land only this is walking. It's
Speaker 1: cool though, what Sam has done, because he's taken off,
Speaker 1: you know, promoting what we all love, but just in
Speaker 1: such a unique way and something that you and was
Speaker 1: your brother and your buddies kind of talked about. You
Speaker 1: just wait for it, Yeah, because I mean I had
Speaker 1: even talked like the first time that Ben and I
Speaker 1: ever met, I was telling him about my I wanted
Speaker 1: to buy a school bus years ago. And yeah but
Speaker 1: um yeah the bus idea started a long time ago
Speaker 1: and I was the one dumb enough to buy one.
Speaker 1: So now it's I'm just I've been very happy to
Speaker 1: see how that project has progressed in like just the
Speaker 1: following that has and um, you know, I'm just a
Speaker 1: small voice in the fight to keep public lands public
Speaker 1: and it's been cool to see kind of people rally
Speaker 1: behind that and want to do more just because they've
Speaker 1: been like I've been helping try to help educate people
Speaker 1: about what's going on behind the bus like a reality show.
Speaker 1: Yeah you can line it up. Yeah, I'm not going
Speaker 1: to try to find the film crew to take care of.
Speaker 1: Like you said, just bringing awareness to it has elevated
Speaker 1: people's interests, you know, and that's what you set out
Speaker 1: to do. You know. I remember when you were talking
Speaker 1: about it, and it's just cool. It's been cool to
Speaker 1: follow along and see your journey and your dedication to
Speaker 1: driving that across the country to different places to these
Speaker 1: events like here, I mean, the bus has parked right
Speaker 1: out here, total archery Challenge. People can come by and
Speaker 1: check it out. You know, that's awesome. It's like the
Speaker 1: the like you just still your passion and your view
Speaker 1: of the world. Because we've talked about this before. It's
Speaker 1: like people ask like, how do you how do you
Speaker 1: get to where you were? Like, I don't know. I
Speaker 1: have no idea because I knew I would have just
Speaker 1: been like, got there quicker, right, I would have been
Speaker 1: there right off the bat. But like you, I'm super
Speaker 1: passionate about this thing. I have a mindset where I'm
Speaker 1: happier when I'm not tied down. Next thing, I know,
Speaker 1: I have a bush. But that's just this distillation of
Speaker 1: your passion as well as the way you view the
Speaker 1: world and what makes you happy and if you chase
Speaker 1: that thing and it turns into a public ends bust
Speaker 1: where it turns into a TV show and films about conservation,
Speaker 1: I think those things are all to be admired just
Speaker 1: for those reasons. Like you've allowed your your journey to leave,
Speaker 1: you know, to go that way because you want to
Speaker 1: chase what your dreams and you don't allow you know,
Speaker 1: I'll ship to get in front of that. Yeah. And
Speaker 1: I think I mean, like you were saying before, I
Speaker 1: think you once you become kind of hyper focused on
Speaker 1: one goal, I think you start to see the doors
Speaker 1: that are that open in front of you, and you like,
Speaker 1: it's not one decision or another that takes you to
Speaker 1: that path. It's just it's a million small decisions. And
Speaker 1: like but once you know, you're, like you said, you're
Speaker 1: really passionate about one thing, and then this opportunity kind
Speaker 1: of pops up and you kind of you just go
Speaker 1: that way a little bit, and then this opportunity pops
Speaker 1: up and just kind of people say that passion and
Speaker 1: you meet more people, you shake more hands. And who
Speaker 1: I was talking to about a five year plan, wo
Speaker 1: I started, Shawn to graves. Here's my five year plan.
Speaker 1: I was like, listen, man, I don't know. I don't
Speaker 1: have any five year plan ends because I feel like
Speaker 1: if i've i'm my five year plans out here and
Speaker 1: it's something awesome is going on, you know outside of
Speaker 1: my purview my five year plan, I might miss that
Speaker 1: ship I've already made goals too far down the road.
Speaker 1: I just like to have a passion and just like
Speaker 1: jump into it. Whatever happens happens, Because if you try
Speaker 1: to get yourself into a position where this is how
Speaker 1: I'm going to succeed or this is what I need
Speaker 1: to do, you're gonna miss some stuff along the way
Speaker 1: that doesn't fit into the plans you're made. And that
Speaker 1: doesn't mean that you shouldn't have like kind of an
Speaker 1: overarching goal, but like to have like a step by
Speaker 1: step something laid out like that's tough. Yeah you might, yeah,
Speaker 1: especially in your case. Yeah. Well it's kind of like
Speaker 1: an analogy would be, like, you know, I was talking
Speaker 1: to you about some of these photo shoots, and I'm like, man,
Speaker 1: I feel like these guys that are so worried about
Speaker 1: being at a time, at a certain place at a
Speaker 1: certain time miss a lot of the best stuff. And
Speaker 1: I think that's like, you know, relative to what we're
Speaker 1: talking about. If you're only thinking about one thing and
Speaker 1: one time, you're gonna miss a lot of the good stuff.
Speaker 1: It's like life is what happens when you're busy making
Speaker 1: other plans, you know. And so it's like Sam says,
Speaker 1: it's great to have, you know, a goal of Oh,
Speaker 1: I want to you know, make a great footprint for
Speaker 1: my kids, a foundation, send him to college. You know,
Speaker 1: you've got to have those goals. But to think like
Speaker 1: this is exactly how this needs to happen, or it's
Speaker 1: not going to happen at all. No. I mean my
Speaker 1: journey has evolved so many times throughout my short little
Speaker 1: time of doing this, Like but it just keeps getting
Speaker 1: better because we're passionate about what we do, and you
Speaker 1: meet other people who are passionate. I mean, that's what
Speaker 1: brought everybody in this room together as our passion. We're
Speaker 1: not sure what Greg Pizza and Greg. He's on the bed,
Speaker 1: but he's got his shoes on. Greg's noncommittal. He's on
Speaker 1: the bed but has a shoe. They're hanging off the
Speaker 1: hanging off the light of him. It's not like he's
Speaker 1: getting the pizza only good enough for one s like,
Speaker 1: don't worry, just get in there, don't don't be nervous.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah, because there's a lot of chewing to
Speaker 1: be had there. That's a lot of animal protein. Pizza extra. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's a lot of meat on there. What is that for?
Speaker 1: Shoot him? I think that's mouse backstrap. There's tomato basil.
Speaker 1: There's tomato basila on there, because I know every started
Speaker 1: with the basis. Well, here's what we do, boys. We
Speaker 1: take some bread, we throw it up in the air,
Speaker 1: we put in the oven, put some sauce on it,
Speaker 1: a little bit of cheese. After that's up to you.
Speaker 1: We look at it a whole different way than everybody else.
Speaker 1: Pizza Works. Thanks Pizza Works. If they're closing right now,
Speaker 1: I wish, I do wish. That's what we were doing
Speaker 1: is on a CB with truckers, like outside the hotel.
Speaker 1: Maybe I'll start a podcast where I just want to
Speaker 1: cebu with trucks recorded. That would be good. Random conversations
Speaker 1: with random truckers, just convincing truckers like pull over man,
Speaker 1: what's my handle? Let me think about that for just
Speaker 1: a second. Bus Yeah, bust, lord, bust, lord, al right,
Speaker 1: what were we talking about before? Oh, we were just
Speaker 1: talking about, you know, how your passion kind of ends
Speaker 1: up opening doors for you you didn't see in lading
Speaker 1: the in directions you really didn't see. And I, you know,
Speaker 1: I had to pinch myself moment. I was talking to
Speaker 1: Greg on the drive up from Bozeman, and I was like,
Speaker 1: you know, who'd have thought? You know, right in my backyard,
Speaker 1: I'm launching a film that's supported by arguably the biggest
Speaker 1: best companies for what we do right here with all
Speaker 1: my peers. I'm like, how did this happen? You know,
Speaker 1: like we're talking, I mean, fast forward ten years and
Speaker 1: here we are, you know, And and I'm like, you
Speaker 1: you know, I when I about, you know, several years ago,
Speaker 1: my mom passed away, and I just remember my dad saying,
Speaker 1: you know, live your life. If you don't have the
Speaker 1: money for it, who cares do it? If you don't
Speaker 1: have time, plan it and live it, because you'll regret it.
Speaker 1: And that's that's what I do, you know. And obviously
Speaker 1: I want to have a way to work things out
Speaker 1: if if things don't go right as plan, but I'm
Speaker 1: all about just committing and giving it everything you've got
Speaker 1: and it's just never really backfired. And there's nothing I
Speaker 1: generally disagree with people saying, like, be your best self.
Speaker 1: Fuck you, Like, listen, I'm gonna be a better self
Speaker 1: than I was yesterday. Like the only thing that's truly
Speaker 1: that you can truly compare yourself is to the person
Speaker 1: that you just were, like whether it's last year or
Speaker 1: ten years ago or ten years before that, Like that's
Speaker 1: really the only thing you can do, because if you
Speaker 1: start being like I gotta this, I could do this
Speaker 1: even as a hunter, Like there's you founded a long time.
Speaker 1: Everybody at this table is hunted since they were kiddos.
Speaker 1: You're never gonna know everything. You're never gonna be the
Speaker 1: best hunter or even the best version of your own
Speaker 1: the hunter that you will be, but you'll be if
Speaker 1: you're dedicated to it better than yesterday. And if you're
Speaker 1: better than yesterday, well hopefully when you're at the end,
Speaker 1: you'd be like, damn, that's pretty good. And it was
Speaker 1: pretty good because I didn't I didn't try to achieve
Speaker 1: something some shiny star. I just was trying to be
Speaker 1: better than yesterday. Always was never good enough, which can
Speaker 1: be torturous, but it also can be pretty damn good.
Speaker 1: You know, if you get to points where you're at
Speaker 1: you like, dude, I worked and worked and worked, and
Speaker 1: all of a sudden I looked around. I was like,
Speaker 1: wholely shit, this is cool. Like that moment is worth
Speaker 1: ten years of work. Yeah, yeah, I mean, you just
Speaker 1: it's worthful lifetime as far as I'm concerned. And what's
Speaker 1: funny is you keep hitting these moments where you're like, man,
Speaker 1: life is so good right now, you know, how's it
Speaker 1: going to get any better? And then six months from now,
Speaker 1: you're like, my life is so good right now, how
Speaker 1: is it going to get any better? And then flat,
Speaker 1: you know, fast forward six years, you're going, dude, how
Speaker 1: did this happen? My life? My life is so good?
Speaker 1: How's it going to get any better? You know? And
Speaker 1: it's like I think that's just you know, appreciating things too,
Speaker 1: and never taken things for granted. I mean, I've lived at,
Speaker 1: you know, virtually the Base Alone Mountain my entire life,
Speaker 1: and I stare at that mountain every second I get
Speaker 1: a chance, you know, And I think it's appreciating people
Speaker 1: and araortunities and places and sunsets and smells, and you know.
Speaker 1: I think that is what keeps people just passionate right
Speaker 1: to the end. You know, if you ever take it
Speaker 1: for granted, then I always ask that to people that
Speaker 1: live in places like Bozeman, like you ever just like like, yeah,
Speaker 1: there's mountains whatever. Fine. I've seen him every day for
Speaker 1: the last twenty years, because I can't imagine that ever
Speaker 1: happened to me. You wake up, your looks they always
Speaker 1: look different. Lighting changes, like in five minutes, a different
Speaker 1: mountain and the cloud. I mean, it's ever changing. I
Speaker 1: find myself being relieved by the fact that they're there,
Speaker 1: Like I wake up, they're still there. I'm not dreaming.
Speaker 1: I'm still in Montana or I'm still in Colorado, I'm
Speaker 1: still in wherever. Wherever you are, Well, there's there's this
Speaker 1: beautiful landscapes. Don't have to be mountains. It could be
Speaker 1: the ocean. Yeah, I mean the bad Lands is beautiful,
Speaker 1: you know, the prairies beautiful. It's yeah, it's just appreciation
Speaker 1: for when first every moment of life and the people
Speaker 1: around you. You know. Yeah, when I first moved to Montana,
Speaker 1: I lived with some buddies out in Belgrade in the
Speaker 1: room we rented a house, and uh, kind of on
Speaker 1: this new development area and the room that I had
Speaker 1: faced to the east, and I would never shut the
Speaker 1: curtains because every morning I'd wake up the sunrise coming
Speaker 1: up over the Bridger Mountains and like, I mean, that's
Speaker 1: just incredible, like to be able to just watch that
Speaker 1: come up. So I think, you know, it does happen
Speaker 1: where you live in one spot for a long time,
Speaker 1: you start to like you don't really notice him. But
Speaker 1: I think it's like we were talking about earlier, just
Speaker 1: gotta stop and just recognize like what you have, Like
Speaker 1: how cool that is. Well, it's funny because that stuff
Speaker 1: changes right when you allow it to. Because oh yeah, Greg,
Speaker 1: bring it over. Jason wants to bring it over. Dude,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna eat one of these wagon. Were you a
Speaker 1: gymnast at one point in your life? Close enough? Yeah,
Speaker 1: you get put an awkward You got to wear the tights.
Speaker 1: He was in it for the single. Let me get
Speaker 1: a ladies. One time I wore boxer shorts in my
Speaker 1: single when I was wrestling. Not a good idea. Look
Speaker 1: like I was wearing a diaper. You can't take your
Speaker 1: boxer because then you're just straight. Did you get laughed off?
Speaker 1: The mat Yeah, I feel like my brother was on
Speaker 1: the teen's and just after I was just like, holy ship,
Speaker 1: what are you doing? Man? I was like, yeah, they
Speaker 1: are bunching a little bit. I'll go lie to you anyway,
Speaker 1: back to Passion for Life. It's like going to switch subjects.
Speaker 1: These black good meat chunks on amazing. So who's gonna
Speaker 1: go first and have a piece of pizza? Like, who's
Speaker 1: gonna like think? Maybe Sam? You go, and then Jason
Speaker 1: I will describe you eating it. I'm really going to
Speaker 1: enjoy this. Um. He's going deep. He's pulling it out.
Speaker 1: He looks excited. That's not even that media of a piece.
Speaker 1: A little disappointed in you. That piece of side it is.
Speaker 1: Oh he's putting two pieces together, sandwich in it. Unbelievable.
Speaker 1: Nobody saw this coming. Oh yeah, he's going two pieces
Speaker 1: that well. Friends, you can less time off the mike too.
Speaker 1: You're doubling up. You're doubling up. See. Sam has always
Speaker 1: been a thinker. That's what I don't get to wear. Sam.
Speaker 1: You don't get to like a semi homeless Instagram star
Speaker 1: by just not being an innovator. That's Sam. It was
Speaker 1: a halftime update. You're halfway through. What's so, how you
Speaker 1: feeling this is delicious? Yeah? Yeah, and that is true.
Speaker 1: You don't get to where I am without having lots
Speaker 1: of ideas. That's a good and good not bad. That's
Speaker 1: a good bad idea. That's probably a good time to
Speaker 1: talk about conservation, UM, particularly sheep hunting and hunters, because
Speaker 1: I want to talk to as many people as I
Speaker 1: can about this, especially yourself and eat some people like
Speaker 1: Grey Thornton, who who is the CEO, is the CEO
Speaker 1: and president and CEO's a good man. UM and we'll
Speaker 1: podcast with him later this week. Um. We got one
Speaker 1: guy eating pizza. We got one guy Jason second break
Speaker 1: to drink his beer. Sam says, about two thirds away
Speaker 1: people are riveted right now. Guaranteed they should be special. Uh,
Speaker 1: pizza works. I feel like I have myself. I am
Speaker 1: not conflicted on sheep hunting, sheep hunters and conservation, Like
Speaker 1: there's some nuanced things that I that I've had to
Speaker 1: think through over my time and and seeing kind of
Speaker 1: what conservation does for the animal, but also separated from
Speaker 1: the motivation, the general motivation of the regular sheep hunter,
Speaker 1: you know, and the fact that sheep hunting is expensive.
Speaker 1: It's it's for a small amount of people and can
Speaker 1: be labeled as elitist, if you'd like to think about
Speaker 1: it that way. So I imagine I say all that
Speaker 1: to say, Like, my question is if someone were to
Speaker 1: say to you, all sheep hunters are trophy hunters and
Speaker 1: the conservation is some kind of veiled attempt to you know,
Speaker 1: allow trophy hunting to continue, but just pay into conservation
Speaker 1: as a way to you know, shields your true intent.
Speaker 1: What would you tell him? You know, I'd tell them
Speaker 1: that they should thank everybody for the efforts that have
Speaker 1: been done because there's been nobody else out there doing
Speaker 1: a damn thing. I would tell them that all funding
Speaker 1: for sheep ah for wild sheep in North America is
Speaker 1: funded by the Wild Sheep Foundation. And you know, I
Speaker 1: didn't understand until recently talking to Gray, talking to Kevin Hurley,
Speaker 1: wild sheep cannot They're not a hearty enough animal to
Speaker 1: live on their own through the um the system that's
Speaker 1: put in place by state and federal agents agencies. Right now,
Speaker 1: there's not enough funding that comes in for the demand
Speaker 1: needed to keep and put wild cheap on the mountain.
Speaker 1: They're an expensive animal, you know, and I tell people
Speaker 1: all the time, like you would like to believe that,
Speaker 1: you know, it's all just God's creation. When you drive
Speaker 1: down the road and you see a deer off the side,
Speaker 1: or you see a bighorn sheep, uh, you know sign
Speaker 1: flashing on the side. But man, there's a lot of
Speaker 1: a lot of human you know, interaction to make sure
Speaker 1: those animals are there and and wild sheep are the
Speaker 1: pinnacle of that. Um. You know, I would say you're
Speaker 1: right in the fact that I do think a lot
Speaker 1: of people look at it as expensive and elitists. But dude,
Speaker 1: look at me. I mean, I'm not rich by any means,
Speaker 1: and I've had the opportunity to hunt those beautiful things
Speaker 1: twice in my life by putting in my what's a
Speaker 1: cost now in Montana like ten bucks application? I mean unfortunately,
Speaker 1: like my biggest expense was film permits, you know, for
Speaker 1: the whole entire thing. Um. So it's like to say,
Speaker 1: you've got you know, you've got to have you got
Speaker 1: to buy the sheep tag for hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Speaker 1: Will Thank goodness there are men out there with that
Speaker 1: kind of opportunity to do that. But no, you don't
Speaker 1: need to be that. I mean, and the Wild Sheep
Speaker 1: continues to be innovative in the way they like the
Speaker 1: less Than One Club. You know, you become a member
Speaker 1: of the less Than One Club. That's about your best
Speaker 1: opportunity to draw a sheep tag in your life and
Speaker 1: always make a joke fit. It's less a joke and
Speaker 1: more reality that you go to the Wild Cheap Convention,
Speaker 1: which is like awesome fun, it's so great of of
Speaker 1: that community of people. You just like go to the
Speaker 1: urinal taking a picture like Generald, why does sheep hunt? Like?
Speaker 1: You go around the corner like another sheep phuint you
Speaker 1: enter to win and you're like, really, this is if
Speaker 1: it was elitist, it wouldn't be this. Yeah, and the
Speaker 1: people you know are winning his hunts and that's what
Speaker 1: gets you there and and yeah, no, and beyond you know,
Speaker 1: the state draws and and all that. There is the
Speaker 1: Wild Cheap and there are those up aratunities. I mean,
Speaker 1: I'm a member. I'm a lifetime member of the Wild
Speaker 1: Cheap Foundation just for that. They draw a sheep on
Speaker 1: every year for a life member. You know, when you
Speaker 1: look at those odds, pretty good odds, then totally I mean.
Speaker 1: And then I'm a member of the Montana Wild Cheap Foundation.
Speaker 1: They draw a sheep hunt every year for a life member.
Speaker 1: Then I'm a member of the Chadwick Ram Society, which
Speaker 1: for every two and fifty dollars you donate to Chadwick
Speaker 1: Ram Society, your name's put in the hat to win
Speaker 1: a stone sheep hunt. So you know, say what you will.
Speaker 1: But I'm an active participant in as much of this
Speaker 1: I put in for Wyoming, I put in for other states.
Speaker 1: You know, I'm an active participant. There's a lot of
Speaker 1: upfront cost with some of this, but man, it pays
Speaker 1: dividends on into the future, you know. And and um,
Speaker 1: getting back to wild sheep, I mean, they're just so fragile. Um.
Speaker 1: Without the funding that amen through the you know, the
Speaker 1: Wild Cheap and these tag sales that are auctioned off
Speaker 1: every year, you know, our opportunities as Montana residents, you know,
Speaker 1: would just dwindle. We've got a hundred and twenty six
Speaker 1: I think tags right now that we can draw for
Speaker 1: and without the say half a million dollars every year
Speaker 1: that comes in from these sales, you know, it would
Speaker 1: go to whatever a hundred tags and then seventy five
Speaker 1: tags and then fifty and so I always try to
Speaker 1: have these conversations with as many people as I can
Speaker 1: and say, look, don't hate on that guy. Man. Without
Speaker 1: that guy, we wouldn't even have the chance to put
Speaker 1: in for these areas. And to your to your point,
Speaker 1: it's easy to say, you look at that one tag
Speaker 1: that went for half a million bucks, but well, no
Speaker 1: regular hunter can get that. But to your point, you
Speaker 1: live in Montana, you live in places where sheep or present,
Speaker 1: you have chances. You know, they're limited chances, as they
Speaker 1: should be because the animal is fragile. And you know
Speaker 1: these are biologists, wildfologist calling shots. Here's somebody you can
Speaker 1: kill this year. And so I think that's that's the
Speaker 1: point that needs to be made. Well, one thing I always,
Speaker 1: you know, also ran into this. I had another person
Speaker 1: right in specifically about sheep hunting that said, uh, it's
Speaker 1: an old white man's game. What he's talking about, It's
Speaker 1: an old white man's game. And it went back to
Speaker 1: the money thing. I was like, well, just rich guys
Speaker 1: can do it. Only rich guys can do it, that's all.
Speaker 1: It is, just rich gas Like one, you need those
Speaker 1: rich guys. But too. It's not that's not true. I
Speaker 1: mean I've only ever lived in Montana my whole life.
Speaker 1: I know of other opportunities and things, but to get
Speaker 1: to it, Montana has an has unlimited cheap areas. If
Speaker 1: you put in you will get the sheep tag. You
Speaker 1: can oceep hunting now on every single year once that
Speaker 1: quote has been met. Now, if you kill a ram,
Speaker 1: you're taken out for your seven years. But you can
Speaker 1: go hunt sheep with the tag in your pocket every
Speaker 1: single year in Montana if that's what you want to do.
Speaker 1: And once those one or two rams are killed in
Speaker 1: those units, they shut it down. But you know that
Speaker 1: is not a rich man's sport. I know so many people,
Speaker 1: not not so many, but you know a good grip
Speaker 1: of people out of Bozeman that do that unlimited thing
Speaker 1: every year, and they love it. They love the challenge.
Speaker 1: They love to just know they hold the sheep tag
Speaker 1: for ten years to go on one sheep hunt. They
Speaker 1: can hunt every year. They can look at rams, they
Speaker 1: can make stocks, they can you know, they can be
Speaker 1: sheep hunting. You know you live in uh like British Columbia,
Speaker 1: residents can hunt cheap every single year. Alaska residents have
Speaker 1: a lot of great opportunities to hunt sheeps. So I mean,
Speaker 1: it's how bad do you want it? You know, don't
Speaker 1: say that move to Alaska to Canada well and sorry,
Speaker 1: I mean it just takes. Yeah, sheep aren't everywhere in
Speaker 1: North America and that's the biggest challenge. I wish they were.
Speaker 1: I wish Wild Sheep Foundation wishes they were. You know,
Speaker 1: there's such an awesome animal. Once you have the chance
Speaker 1: to spend time with them, You're like, man, if more
Speaker 1: people had the time to spend with these things, they
Speaker 1: they'd love them. They they'd care about them more, you know,
Speaker 1: because they're for everybody. They're not just for the guy
Speaker 1: that draws the tech there. Everybody's to enjoy. You know,
Speaker 1: what is it about? You know, if you look at
Speaker 1: the you know, if you're just judging what's on their
Speaker 1: heads and the charismatic nature of the animal, you pick
Speaker 1: something else. Yeah, wild sheep are in the terrain they
Speaker 1: live in is magnificent. But the animal that they are,
Speaker 1: you can find something with the bigger set animals on
Speaker 1: top of its head, you certainly find something that's you
Speaker 1: know that in the rut is a little more interesting
Speaker 1: to hunt, Like, do you think if if wild sheep
Speaker 1: did some sort of a bugle or a roar like
Speaker 1: the button the head thing. When we got to see
Speaker 1: that when we were scouting in August. I mean, of all,
Speaker 1: it wasn't even close to the rut and they were
Speaker 1: still clashing heads Like that was pretty cool that. No
Speaker 1: I had no idea how far that noise carried. It
Speaker 1: just pops. Yeah, I mean we were looking at sheep
Speaker 1: that were over a mile away and it was like
Speaker 1: someone's sat next to you to clap their hands. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: so I mean when and that's that's just it. Like
Speaker 1: I spent so much time with them this fall. I
Speaker 1: gained a whole new respect for him. Like you say
Speaker 1: this until you have a chance to be around him
Speaker 1: and then there it's like watching uh college rugby team
Speaker 1: out on Main Street down at the bars every night.
Speaker 1: Like it's like I feel like it's watching like the
Speaker 1: men men of nature. Like they are always fighting, They're
Speaker 1: always like pushing on each other. They're always like kicking
Speaker 1: each other in the balls. They're always doing just messing
Speaker 1: with each other. And they're they're just like bodybuilders out there,
Speaker 1: you know. Yeah, yeah, I bring that all up, just
Speaker 1: because it's annoying to me that some of the things
Speaker 1: you hear being a kid from the East Coast, like
Speaker 1: that's how that's how it's portrayed. It's like sheep hunters,
Speaker 1: the western elitists. Yeah. Um, And for anybody listening, just
Speaker 1: just freaking listen, do your research and understand and also
Speaker 1: understand that there there's a deeper reason why people appreciate
Speaker 1: sheep the way they do. It's not just because they've
Speaker 1: got big curling horns coming out of their heads. Because again,
Speaker 1: there are many animals that are that are you know,
Speaker 1: if you're just looking at the look of an animal
Speaker 1: and feel of an animal, for many animals that are
Speaker 1: just as impressive. I would say I wanted caribou and
Speaker 1: elk and older and all of them are equally as
Speaker 1: impressive and you betually impressive terrain. So having never sheep
Speaker 1: on it, I would lean all guys like yourself to
Speaker 1: explain to people like, there is this innate feeling around
Speaker 1: these animals because one, they are so delicate, to their
Speaker 1: habitat is so delicate. Um, and there's such a you know,
Speaker 1: there's such a rarity that they do become this like
Speaker 1: hunting royalty that should be a little bit above you know,
Speaker 1: all the other things you might go chase. Yeah, I mean, yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't know what the answer to saying that it's
Speaker 1: just an old white man's game. I guess probably just
Speaker 1: more where they live, and just you know, you look
Speaker 1: at regions of populations and that's just where they live,
Speaker 1: you know. I think if they lived in more places,
Speaker 1: they'd be viewed differently. But unfortunately they're so fragile. They
Speaker 1: take such a specific habitat need to make it that
Speaker 1: there's just not tons of those areas in North America.
Speaker 1: And trust me, like Wild Sheep Kevin, all those guys
Speaker 1: worked really hard to try to find the best areas
Speaker 1: to move new populations in to open up new tag opportunities.
Speaker 1: Um it says it in the film, and don't quote me,
Speaker 1: but you know it's basically just under five thousand dollars
Speaker 1: of sheep. Yeah, I mean the translocation just in of itself,
Speaker 1: the things that they've done. I mean, I think the
Speaker 1: stories are well told when the elk populations in Kentucky,
Speaker 1: Pennsylvania place like that sheep less So I mean to
Speaker 1: some extent, but less, you know, really less storied than
Speaker 1: those places. Yeah. Um, and you've seen a lot like
Speaker 1: your films coming out. There's a film that I work
Speaker 1: with Ben Masters and Adam Fast and Charles post On
Speaker 1: about reintroducing uh, those same sheep to Texas in their
Speaker 1: native range. And you learn a lot from that, and
Speaker 1: you learn that we are the reason that they're not
Speaker 1: here anymore. And so why not you know, of all,
Speaker 1: you know, it's not just hunters. Hunters didn't kill all
Speaker 1: the sheep in Texas. Uh, He's like ranchers that put
Speaker 1: domestic sheep there and spread disease. Really, you know, then
Speaker 1: you gotta habitat fragmentation of different things. I've had to
Speaker 1: go on. So it's not just a hunter going in
Speaker 1: and killing them or not just marketing killing. There's a
Speaker 1: lot of things that that caused that to happen. So
Speaker 1: you've got to understand that. You know, as much as
Speaker 1: we're it fault, how many groups other than hunters have
Speaker 1: taken up the charge too to put these things back
Speaker 1: where they belong and to care for him. Well, that's
Speaker 1: just it. I mean, that's why I say, like two
Speaker 1: people that say it's selfish, I mean, I think you know,
Speaker 1: there may be is a little bit of selfish aspect
Speaker 1: to every bit of wildlife conservation. But you know, like
Speaker 1: we said in Project Out, we shouldn't apologize for it.
Speaker 1: Look at what it's done. Look what the numbers have done.
Speaker 1: Look there's no other system in place, there's no other
Speaker 1: better conservation method across the world. And it's not just
Speaker 1: hunters will get to enjoy him. Everybody who drove up
Speaker 1: and down the Gallant and Canyon today got to enjoy that.
Speaker 1: So you know, there is always a little bit of
Speaker 1: self serving ness with it, but it's not for big animals,
Speaker 1: it's not for you know, it's just for the greater
Speaker 1: good of the herds and making sure that that when
Speaker 1: my kids kids have a chance to drive up the
Speaker 1: Gallant And Canyon, hopefully they get to experience the same
Speaker 1: thing we did. And you know, it's it's habitat. You know,
Speaker 1: we live in a world where everything's at our fingertips
Speaker 1: and everything is manufactured and fake, and well, habitats not
Speaker 1: and it can't be manufactured. And when it's gone, it's gone.
Speaker 1: And uh, that's why it's awesome that sam And has
Speaker 1: taken you know, this awareness to make sure that you know,
Speaker 1: keep the public lands. We have public because we got
Speaker 1: a pretty damn good right hair, better than anybody else,
Speaker 1: and it'd be a shame to see all that go away. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, like you said, there's not like not worried
Speaker 1: about roads going away. Check the roads, right, But when
Speaker 1: wilderness goes away, sure we could likely get it back,
Speaker 1: but it won't be the same. You know, as soon
Speaker 1: as it's fract as soon as it's mind, as soon
Speaker 1: as it's that resource has changed forever. And how many
Speaker 1: how many of the things that we talked about, you know,
Speaker 1: Sam can can tell you this, especially from yeah, you know,
Speaker 1: your family's political background. It was like, how many times
Speaker 1: are we blind the fact that we are fixing a
Speaker 1: problem that we created? You know, we're even in the
Speaker 1: honey community, was like, we're celebrating this thing, but it's
Speaker 1: only because we've funked it up, not we, but three
Speaker 1: generations of humans again just unregulation and yeah, yeah, and
Speaker 1: it's not knowing how fragile the resource truly was absolutely yeah,
Speaker 1: And so I think that's like when you talk about
Speaker 1: fragile habitat, that's where it's like the reality is a
Speaker 1: forest fire burns to replace You're like, oh, I see
Speaker 1: oh crap, I see glaciers proceed. You got to Glacier
Speaker 1: National Park and watch that go down. You're like, whoa,
Speaker 1: I get this. Now, that's a tangible way to understand
Speaker 1: this the change totally. You know, well, the forest fire
Speaker 1: is different than a glacier as to like, not that
Speaker 1: you don't know that, but like, forest fires are painful
Speaker 1: to watch and to see this beautiful landscape get ripped apart.
Speaker 1: But then you're like, back, yeah, it's almost the it's
Speaker 1: almost the natural opposite of glacier because that glaciers likely
Speaker 1: and are in our time not coming back. Yeah, the
Speaker 1: fact that Glacier National Park won't have any glaciers at
Speaker 1: some point. Yeah, And they're and they're actively like saying
Speaker 1: that the folks, Okay, come on over, you got about
Speaker 1: three years, you know, give me some ice cubes up
Speaker 1: there or something like that. Right. Yeah, But all those
Speaker 1: things are just signified the way the landscapes change and
Speaker 1: the way that we should be as humans. We should
Speaker 1: be like, well, let's identify those changes and figure out
Speaker 1: how do we can do it, which is a good
Speaker 1: way that she hunters have have taken it up to,
Speaker 1: like we we desire to to chase and kill the
Speaker 1: most mature animal. In fact, we've just we've we now
Speaker 1: understand how to and you spend a lot of time
Speaker 1: studying this, as you were saying, we now understand how
Speaker 1: to figure that out, how to figure out by looking
Speaker 1: at an animal exactly how old it is, and then
Speaker 1: are our state wild Bob just have told us it's
Speaker 1: got to be that old. If not, that's that's that's
Speaker 1: a a lee goal is shooting a one year old,
Speaker 1: for sure. And so all those things I think are
Speaker 1: just a big part of why I've heard more negative
Speaker 1: about sheep hunting that I care to count. And it
Speaker 1: just irks me every time. It's like, if you just
Speaker 1: just stop and listen and look and read, you'll soon
Speaker 1: come to find that the easily marketable tag is not
Speaker 1: any part of the story. It's one tiny little part
Speaker 1: of it that can easily be flipped. But what can't
Speaker 1: be easily flipped is what Great Thornton and the Wild
Speaker 1: Sheep Foundation are doing and what you're helping promote. Yeah,
Speaker 1: for sure. Now it's a collaborative effort, for sure, and
Speaker 1: it's it's cool to see, I mean, yeah, sheep at
Speaker 1: one time where you know, as far as we could tell,
Speaker 1: we're in the millions in population, and then like way
Speaker 1: down in the you know, fifty thousand, just seventy thousand
Speaker 1: and somewhere in there. And and once we recognized how
Speaker 1: fragile they were and started putting this conservation foot forward
Speaker 1: and started relocating animals, and I mean we're threefold where
Speaker 1: we were only years ago on cheap population. So yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, unregulated hunting, disease spread from domestic livestock, A
Speaker 1: lot of things played that factor. But you know, I
Speaker 1: just don't think we understood how fragile everything was even
Speaker 1: thirty years ago. You know, you start to realize how
Speaker 1: everything of an impact it has when you do change
Speaker 1: even one thing. Yeah, yeah, and it is up to
Speaker 1: all of us to take care of it. And well,
Speaker 1: the romantic idea is just to let everything self regulate, right,
Speaker 1: you'd like, you'd you'd like to believe that nature can
Speaker 1: just take care of itself, but that would be excluding
Speaker 1: us from nature. And so you always have to realize
Speaker 1: that because we're part of it, and because we have
Speaker 1: screwed things up, like, we need to do a lot
Speaker 1: to help fix that problem. Even though fifty years from now,
Speaker 1: we might go, remember when we thought we fixed that problem,
Speaker 1: but we screwed this up. Now we gotta fix I mean,
Speaker 1: it's gonna happen. You look back at every generation. Every
Speaker 1: generation of humans looks back at the other generation like idiots, smoking,
Speaker 1: well pregnant dummies. Every generation looks back, and so if
Speaker 1: we're smart enough, we could identify the things we're doing
Speaker 1: right now that would a couple of years from now
Speaker 1: you look back and you're like, oh, definitely, prescription medicine
Speaker 1: and fast food. You guys are dumb. Why were you
Speaker 1: doing that, idiots? I think that's the cool part about conservation.
Speaker 1: Conservation organizations like Wild Cheap Is. I think all of
Speaker 1: them are now more forward thinking when they start to
Speaker 1: implement plans of you know, whether it be habit habitat
Speaker 1: restoration or you know, whatever it might be. I think
Speaker 1: they're starting to look a lot, you know, looking into
Speaker 1: the past of what we've done wrong, and then looking
Speaker 1: way further into future like what we need to do
Speaker 1: to get there. So yeah, sure, it's a good time
Speaker 1: to shift to another film that you guys did together
Speaker 1: this time, well how the other films together as well,
Speaker 1: But um it was called both sides of the fence.
Speaker 1: What was the official title other side of the fence,
Speaker 1: both of the fence, UM, Sam, tell me what that
Speaker 1: was about. So we did a collaboration UM a little
Speaker 1: bit surrounding the bus project, a little bit surrounding UM.
Speaker 1: You know, Jason is going to go to the US
Speaker 1: the facilities and I'm gonna eat a piece of pizza water,
Speaker 1: I'll start talking. Give me about three minutes to eat
Speaker 1: this pizza. Sam. Yeah, So we did a collaboration to
Speaker 1: UM kind of talk about what I was up to
Speaker 1: with the bus project and public lands and the importance
Speaker 1: of public lands, and then combining that with the issue
Speaker 1: of UM kind of where kind of where we've gone
Speaker 1: in the hunting industry today that anytime somebody you know,
Speaker 1: takes an animal, everyone always asked the question what was
Speaker 1: that public or private? And this kind of in fighting
Speaker 1: that we have now like that some for some reason,
Speaker 1: you know, shooting in the same animal on private land
Speaker 1: doesn't mean as much as shooting an animal on public land.
Speaker 1: And so we wanted to dive into that a little
Speaker 1: bit and and kind of look at it from both well,
Speaker 1: I mean, both sides of the fence. The name of
Speaker 1: the film, But we wanted to look at it from
Speaker 1: both angles and show that we need public land and
Speaker 1: we need private land and both need to co exist
Speaker 1: together because without private land, you have no uh A
Speaker 1: lot of times you wouldn't have a sanctuary for herds
Speaker 1: of animals. UM. Late season, you wouldn't have sanctuary for animals.
Speaker 1: When you know gun season starter, you know when there's
Speaker 1: a lot of hunters and entering the woods during archery season, UM,
Speaker 1: you have a lot of animals shift onto places where
Speaker 1: they can stay safe, the herd can grow bigger. But
Speaker 1: you also need public land for people to be able
Speaker 1: to access um enjoy you know, the things that are
Speaker 1: like you know, people like Teddy Roosevelt and stuff that
Speaker 1: put in place, but also to access to those places
Speaker 1: and manage the herds UM. And you can do that
Speaker 1: without paying anything. It's just being a us or been,
Speaker 1: I mean, just coming here. You have access to all
Speaker 1: of that land. So we wanted to look at it
Speaker 1: from both angles and and show that both are important
Speaker 1: and we need both. And it's not like it doesn't
Speaker 1: matter if you hunt private land or public land. It
Speaker 1: doesn't matter if you hunt with a gun or a boat.
Speaker 1: It doesn't matter. You know, whatever you do, it's just
Speaker 1: what you do, and it all needs to co exist together.
Speaker 1: Do you imagine that just the because public land has
Speaker 1: become super trendy, Yeah, yeah, super trendy, Like part of
Speaker 1: that is good and part of that is bad. You know,
Speaker 1: we've we've we've seen you know, real, I mean all
Speaker 1: I'm heavily involved. H A. Obviously you are. Yeah, obviously
Speaker 1: you're involved with Wild Cheap and Army f and in
Speaker 1: BJ and a bunch of other organizations. Like everybody's sitting
Speaker 1: at this table as hey, we have a little street
Speaker 1: cred when it comes to this conversation. But there's plenty
Speaker 1: of people who are just trying to sell widgets by
Speaker 1: stamping public lands on them because people will buy it, which,
Speaker 1: like you said, it's not the worst thing in the world,
Speaker 1: certainly not something I would lobby against, but it is
Speaker 1: something that I would bring up. Is like, Hey, let's
Speaker 1: have this conversation in a honest way. This public land
Speaker 1: is cool because it's a great feeling, because it's nice
Speaker 1: back public lands, it's all of ours. It's great, it's
Speaker 1: American freedom. Or are willing to roll our seas up
Speaker 1: and go to work on it like what what public
Speaker 1: land means. So I appreciate that idea about let's understand
Speaker 1: the totality of especially even driving down the Gallatin River,
Speaker 1: you go from private land to national forest in the canyon,
Speaker 1: driving up the Big Sky, I mean, anywhere you go
Speaker 1: in Montana, that's what you encounter. And I think that's
Speaker 1: why it gave us a chance to We've dealt with
Speaker 1: it our whole lives. I mean, there is places you
Speaker 1: can go and different animals require different hunts, you know. Um,
Speaker 1: but we've dealt with checkerboarded properties, we've dealt with property lines,
Speaker 1: we've dealt with you know. And thank goodness for on
Speaker 1: X to be able to really allow us to know
Speaker 1: exactly where we're at so we don't end up on
Speaker 1: the wrong side of where we shouldn't be or whatever.
Speaker 1: But it, uh, yeah, I think it's it's just and
Speaker 1: when you grow up around the farmers and the ranchers
Speaker 1: and and you know you're part of them, and they're
Speaker 1: part of you in the community, and you see what
Speaker 1: good they do, and you know, you see what good
Speaker 1: people they are. You know, all private land is different.
Speaker 1: And we made that point in the film. It's not
Speaker 1: all gonna be like going and hunting like the White Mountain,
Speaker 1: Apache Indian Reservation or the play you know, like Ted
Speaker 1: Turner's ranch just down at the base of the Gallon
Speaker 1: Canyon that's got great hunting. I mean, I think the
Speaker 1: misconception is a lot of people think, oh, private land,
Speaker 1: it's uh, there's just big stuff. There's just animals everywhere.
Speaker 1: The opportunity is abundant. And when you live in a
Speaker 1: place like Montana, you have this grand scale of private
Speaker 1: land just like public land where I mean, I know
Speaker 1: private land that the fact that you can drive everywhere,
Speaker 1: and the fact that you can you know, and these
Speaker 1: people allow anybody to come and hunt. I mean, it
Speaker 1: is far worse off than just walking a little ways
Speaker 1: onto public I'll get into way more stuff there, you know.
Speaker 1: So just to say your own private doesn't mean there's
Speaker 1: just vast herds like the savannah out there when you
Speaker 1: walk out. Now, there are ranches that are, but there's
Speaker 1: this whole sliding scale in the middle. Some allow one hunters,
Speaker 1: some allow five hundreds, some allow the family. Some you know,
Speaker 1: I'm in and it's all different. And trust me, like
Speaker 1: hunting public land in Montana is the same I've got
Speaker 1: great public land spots, and I've got spots that used
Speaker 1: to be good that aren't. And it's just constantly shifting.
Speaker 1: And I think if you look at you know, the
Speaker 1: success of a hunt or the quality of a hunt
Speaker 1: by what side of the fence that animal is standing on.
Speaker 1: I just I don't want to say you're missing it,
Speaker 1: because everybody's out there for different reasons. But man, that's
Speaker 1: not why i'm there. I'm there to enjoy the experience.
Speaker 1: I'm there to learn about the animals, submerse myself in
Speaker 1: their world. Here the elk, bugles, smell the smells, get
Speaker 1: these close encounters, and man, I'll tell you it's never
Speaker 1: when you get close to an elk, my heartbeats just
Speaker 1: the damn same, no matter what side of the fence.
Speaker 1: That if you're somehow calmed at the moment, then elks
Speaker 1: in your face, there's something wrong with you. We got
Speaker 1: to talk you a serial, yeah, because that's a you
Speaker 1: know and like and like we It comes down to
Speaker 1: a numbers game too. I mean, our percentage is a
Speaker 1: population is so low now we're almost irrelevant in society,
Speaker 1: sadly enough. And when you look at I think the
Speaker 1: most recent number we could come up with was from
Speaker 1: two thousand thirteen a study that was done on the
Speaker 1: number of private land versus public and at that time
Speaker 1: I think the number was thirteen point four million hunters
Speaker 1: in the US, and of those thirteen points for only
Speaker 1: one point two million of them hunted exclusively on public land.
Speaker 1: So if we're going to break it down to you're
Speaker 1: only a real hunter if you hunt on public land exclusively,
Speaker 1: and we want to cast aside the other twelve point
Speaker 1: two millions hunt on public lands exclusive are elitist. There,
Speaker 1: you know, only one point two million of you. It's
Speaker 1: a little club. You won't let anybody else in your assholes.
Speaker 1: It's just a fact. Well it's just you know, like
Speaker 1: I was having a good friend a conversation with a
Speaker 1: good friend of mine the other day, David Brinker, we
Speaker 1: all know him, and he goes, how would you look
Speaker 1: at me? Am I a private land hunter a public
Speaker 1: land hunter? And I said, you do both? Think is exactly.
Speaker 1: I think that's gonna be so many people you ask,
Speaker 1: but it's become so trendy and so uncool to not say,
Speaker 1: d I Y did it myself. Public land fourteen miles
Speaker 1: in basically killed myself. I just don't get it, you know.
Speaker 1: I look at guys like my dad who have been
Speaker 1: doing it forever. Are we just not going to call
Speaker 1: him a hunter now because he can't hike into the
Speaker 1: back country and killing now that guy has forgot more
Speaker 1: about six cigars during this private life. My lungs are
Speaker 1: killing me. Man barely make it. It's a good It's
Speaker 1: an interesting topic because it comes back to a purity
Speaker 1: score we're talking about again, Like I've hunted on some
Speaker 1: private land where I felt like the scenario was such
Speaker 1: that I should have done more work to earn the
Speaker 1: thing that I got. So that's one thing that's one
Speaker 1: private land. That's a little bit more prevalent on private land,
Speaker 1: and there's on public land just because the nature of
Speaker 1: the thing. But if you have an ideal and you
Speaker 1: go out in the in the on the mountain or
Speaker 1: in the woods and say this is the thing that
Speaker 1: i'm looking for, here's my ten out of ten purity score,
Speaker 1: and I'm gonna go after it, you'd be foolish to
Speaker 1: be like, I'm only going to do public land. I'm
Speaker 1: only going to do You'd be foolish if the opportunity
Speaker 1: comes up to achieve the thing you're looking for. Who
Speaker 1: the hell cares? Who owns it? Who cares? I Like
Speaker 1: I said, it's easier to have reverence for public land
Speaker 1: because it is such a you know, majestic idea, and
Speaker 1: it's an American ideal and all the things like that.
Speaker 1: That's beautiful, But so is private land. So is homesteading.
Speaker 1: So it is setting out and and being lucky enough
Speaker 1: to find some land, and being lucky enough to then
Speaker 1: own that land and to grow that land and manage
Speaker 1: that land and have a wonderful heart animals on that land,
Speaker 1: and then being able as the landowners are select who
Speaker 1: gets to enjoy that privilege? That's just as beautiful. So
Speaker 1: well with you guys like Shane Mahoney has said before
Speaker 1: told us in Phoenix that you know, he's like, private
Speaker 1: land is the new frontier for conservation. And I think
Speaker 1: that's just about as simple and clean as he is
Speaker 1: so good at doing that, you could say it because
Speaker 1: you think about what if we were only given say
Speaker 1: we just like completely eliminate private land guys from the equation,
Speaker 1: and we're only given public lands to manage our wildlife on.
Speaker 1: I mean that would be a disaster to try to
Speaker 1: get everybody on the same page. It's not possible. So
Speaker 1: what you know it, I'll tell you though, you know
Speaker 1: you're right, there's this level there is nothing more warning, yes,
Speaker 1: then busting your ass for what you get. Now, that's
Speaker 1: not to be said. You can't do that on private
Speaker 1: that I think there's there's where the issue comes, like
Speaker 1: it's at the end of the day. That's how you
Speaker 1: feel what's happened there. Like I said, I've had some
Speaker 1: some private land hunts that were guided that I felt like, man,
Speaker 1: this okay, yep, I'm glad I get to solve this
Speaker 1: place and I'll get to eat this animal's flesh and
Speaker 1: it's all good. All that's good. Like my purity score
Speaker 1: is like a four. Yeah, you just didn't feel like
Speaker 1: you really earned it. Yeah, And I didn't get a
Speaker 1: sense of the place, really a sense of the animal
Speaker 1: like I thought I should have. That's the way I
Speaker 1: felt when I hunted Africa. Yeah, I was just there
Speaker 1: and there's animals running everywhere. You have no idea where
Speaker 1: they bed, where water is, where they feed, what they
Speaker 1: feed on, what times a day they like to move.
Speaker 1: You're just I'm completely lost and was it an awesome
Speaker 1: experience with my dad? Was it like triple the lifetime? Hell?
Speaker 1: Yeaut was? But was like the sense that I got
Speaker 1: from killing my kudu the same as you know, Sam
Speaker 1: and I bust and are asked to get a shot
Speaker 1: into nilk. It's not that same, you know, you just
Speaker 1: you don't feel like you earned it because you didn't
Speaker 1: understand why you're there. You're put there because well, it's
Speaker 1: like hunting to Walmart. They're like, well down, They're like,
Speaker 1: well fuck that. I'd like to just walk around and
Speaker 1: find one. They're like, well no, we go drive over
Speaker 1: to the giraffe paddock. There's no fences, but the funder's
Speaker 1: there right over there. They tend to like tall trees
Speaker 1: and there's only seven of them. But that's that's how
Speaker 1: I felt. In Africa. I felt the same way. I
Speaker 1: just felt like I was hunting some kind of damn
Speaker 1: like marketing ploy. Yeah, not all is a damn continent,
Speaker 1: right right. We don't talk about I always say, like,
Speaker 1: we don't talk about North America like that, like a
Speaker 1: North America hun that's not a bit. Yeah I was was.
Speaker 1: It just didn't give me that, Yeah, I was the
Speaker 1: same way, and not that you know, there's places in
Speaker 1: the previous strip where you feel like you're in it
Speaker 1: man um. But where I was was like, okay, I
Speaker 1: see like and you may even doing New Zealand at all.
Speaker 1: I have not. That's bucket list though, Sam, and I
Speaker 1: know a spot, yes we do, and I can check
Speaker 1: that thing off like the same one I've been down
Speaker 1: there in In Africa and New Zealand especially, it seemed
Speaker 1: to me like they have harvested like the worst ideals
Speaker 1: of our hunting culture and just sold it back to us.
Speaker 1: They're just like, hey, you wanna you're in Africa, you
Speaker 1: want to come kill a list of creatures that you
Speaker 1: have no idea about and will learn nothing about really
Speaker 1: unless you really push us. Come on, well, so each one,
Speaker 1: each one of them has a cost fact and you
Speaker 1: can kill as many as you want conservation. I don't
Speaker 1: know what you're talking about, but that New Zealand same way, like, hey,
Speaker 1: come kill a stick, that's what you're here to kill.
Speaker 1: And I think less Africa more New Zealand in that sense.
Speaker 1: New Zealand has this like breath of public places and
Speaker 1: even private ranches where you can have great experiences that
Speaker 1: what's sold to you is not quite what's there. In Africa,
Speaker 1: they just they're the entire thing is to value the
Speaker 1: animals through the dollars. So they are selling, selling, selling,
Speaker 1: up up selling, selling again to get that value, which
Speaker 1: is important to them. So both those places, like you're
Speaker 1: kind of they kind of oversell what's there, and you can't.
Speaker 1: You gotta kind of erase that and get down to
Speaker 1: the freaking actual you know, what was actually happening to
Speaker 1: for me, get the purity score high enough to enjoy
Speaker 1: the damn Yeah, for sure. Yeah, it's a business to them.
Speaker 1: They got a certain amount of time to run people through,
Speaker 1: and they've figured out how to do it. You know,
Speaker 1: you don't get to spend twenty eight days on the
Speaker 1: mountain Nanimal trying to figure them out, you know, yeahs
Speaker 1: or twenty one days and not shoot something. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: which was my elk season, our elk season. I should say, yeah.
Speaker 1: I don't think people realize how long twenty one days
Speaker 1: hunting is. That's long. It's long. That's it's long. That yeah,
Speaker 1: But you just keep thinking, you know, it's like golf,
Speaker 1: like I just didn't I wouldn't putting good today, but
Speaker 1: tomorrow if I get the putting down best, Yeah, I
Speaker 1: want to get the girl out of his green tack
Speaker 1: at this time. Eventually it's all going to come together.
Speaker 1: Just one day. That's what keeps you wake up before
Speaker 1: in the morning you're like, well, day, it's like a
Speaker 1: lion hunting I had, you know, one year. I remember
Speaker 1: I was in it, like twenty three days straight checking
Speaker 1: canyons and no tracks, and I'm like, I can't stop.
Speaker 1: I mean, if I miss one day, that's going to
Speaker 1: be the day he crosses and I'm gonna miss it.
Speaker 1: And it just kept going and going and going, and
Speaker 1: finally we ended up finding a cat. But man, you're
Speaker 1: just getting this groove of like, I'm so committed and
Speaker 1: you know, we've put all this in and we do
Speaker 1: have more time, and there just might be that chance. Yeah,
Speaker 1: the rut, you know, might be winded down, but you
Speaker 1: find that one bowl and it's just those little things
Speaker 1: that just keep you wanting to chase it right to
Speaker 1: the end. But the difference between you know, not good
Speaker 1: and bad, but that's just just the difference between that
Speaker 1: ultimate like you have that persistent nature throughout your entire
Speaker 1: hunting life You're eventually going to stumble into some greatness,
Speaker 1: you know, at least what's perceived greatness, you know, some
Speaker 1: giant animals somewhere because you were there and nobody else was,
Speaker 1: you know. That's yeah. I've always said, like, I'm not
Speaker 1: like successful because I'm the greatest hunter and make all
Speaker 1: the best moves. I just just time in the field.
Speaker 1: Eventually things come together, you know, and being lucky enough
Speaker 1: to have that time in the field. Yeah, that's something
Speaker 1: not a lot of people get. Yeah, yeah, for sure.
Speaker 1: I don't take it for granted me either. Well as pizza,
Speaker 1: there's well cold, but it's still it still looks so good.
Speaker 1: I don't starting to look like sheep meat balls the
Speaker 1: same we got Ronella likes to called concluders. Sam. Do
Speaker 1: you have any uh conclusions from this conversation. I feel
Speaker 1: like we covered I mean, we we went real deep
Speaker 1: just on life, and we covered a lot of stuff
Speaker 1: about conservation. I think kind of take away from this
Speaker 1: whole thing is just well, I mean, on the life side,
Speaker 1: like just find what you're passionate about and go after
Speaker 1: it and just keep allowing those opportunities to happen. And
Speaker 1: on the conservation side, of things. I think what we're
Speaker 1: trying to do a good job of is just raise
Speaker 1: awareness about the possibilities for people to be involved in
Speaker 1: this type of thing. And now the next step is
Speaker 1: for everybody listening to go out there and do a
Speaker 1: little res which on their own and just become part
Speaker 1: of the solution to helping, you know, make herds better
Speaker 1: and make hunting better, and um help the community as
Speaker 1: a whole, hunting community as a whole come together. I
Speaker 1: think that's the next step for them, Like we can't
Speaker 1: do what we can you know, talk, we can be
Speaker 1: you know, be its death. Like people need to be involved,
Speaker 1: but it comes down to the every person individually, you know,
Speaker 1: going out there and doing what they need to do
Speaker 1: to Yeah, save these types of things for future generations.
Speaker 1: Give what you can. You may not have all the
Speaker 1: money or all the time, but give the money in
Speaker 1: the time that you can, whether it's tiny little bits
Speaker 1: here and there, every every amount counts. Yeah, I mean
Speaker 1: it kind of goes down to the analogy. Like, you know,
Speaker 1: when I was a little kid, if I were to
Speaker 1: like want to take a rock or stick or something,
Speaker 1: my mom would say, what if everybody in the world
Speaker 1: took a stick. Would there be any sticks left? You know,
Speaker 1: And it's just it's kind of the same thing. What
Speaker 1: if everybody in the world just did a little bit
Speaker 1: make a huge difference, you know. That's that's it. And
Speaker 1: I just feel lucky to be here, appreciate the opportunity
Speaker 1: to talk to you guys, and it's been a pleasure
Speaker 1: and really looking forward to the rest of the weekend. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: we're we're This is Thursday. We're into were damn hear
Speaker 1: in a Friday morning? Now we have we have crossed it.
Speaker 1: We've crossed into Friday morning. So tomorrow evening we'll be
Speaker 1: debut in your Circle of Life film Saturday, Saturday. Oh yeah,
Speaker 1: it is tomorrow. We alright here, what's that's up? Now?
Speaker 1: You got it? You gotta get the last piece of pizza. Yeah, um,
Speaker 1: we'll be the debuting that here big sky. Um. And
Speaker 1: so by the time people hear this that I've already happened.
Speaker 1: But um, it's gonna be a good event and happy
Speaker 1: to and there agains just another opportunity to bring people together,
Speaker 1: celebrated thing that we do that's pretty unique to this
Speaker 1: place and time, you know, this time because it's the
Speaker 1: conservation is still fairly new to our humanity, and so
Speaker 1: is this model of conservation that we have. It's barely
Speaker 1: unique to this world that we live in. So um,
Speaker 1: thank you boys for being a part of that. Pretty
Speaker 1: damn cool. Yeah, I feel lucky. Greg any concluders from you.
Speaker 1: Greg is full now as shoes are on the bed.
Speaker 1: He is checked out all right. Thanks to Pizza Works,
Speaker 1: We're going deep bye. Thank you. That's it. That's all
Speaker 1: Episode number twenty one in the books. Thanks to Jason
Speaker 1: Matt Singer, Thanks Sam Soul. Thank you to a boy
Speaker 1: in the background, Greg pranging out eat pizza late night
Speaker 1: here in Big Sky. It was a fun conversation. That's
Speaker 1: what I live for. It gets we pumped up, smart
Speaker 1: people drinking beer, having a good conversation, and thankfully we
Speaker 1: get to record it. So episode number twenty one. Hoped
Speaker 1: you like Episode number twenty two. We're gonna be here
Speaker 1: in Big Sky again even wise Olympic gold medal skier
Speaker 1: and the half pipe and then yeat honest tell us
Speaker 1: from the media crew with Sam Sho joins us once
Speaker 1: again for episode number twenty two. But before we go
Speaker 1: this time, I just want to say one thing. And
Speaker 1: the last episode with Charles post episode or twenty, we
Speaker 1: mentioned um at the very end briefly that I would
Speaker 1: be moving to Montana. Now, some folks thought I might
Speaker 1: be kidding or something notes a month that it might
Speaker 1: be hopeful, but it turns out it's true, moving to Bozeman,
Speaker 1: Montana in the coming months. Um. It's a big step
Speaker 1: for me and my family. We're moving from Texas to Montana.
Speaker 1: We're excited about that big step and there's other big
Speaker 1: announcements to come soon what will be the future of
Speaker 1: the Hunting Collective and really my career as well, some
Speaker 1: exciting things. Uh. Hopefully everyone will stick with us as
Speaker 1: we make those changes that are the only helpful to
Speaker 1: the podcast, to the platform and the message. Hopefully it'll
Speaker 1: be exciting to you as it is to me, So
Speaker 1: we'll keep talking about it. Next time on the huntcluc
Speaker 1: to see and love in all stand and