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Speaker 1: this is the meat Eater podcast. We're broadcasting how's say broadcasting,
Speaker 1: it's it's it's not quite the right word. We're recording
Speaker 1: for almost immediate broadcast in the Governor's mansion in Cheyenne, Wyoming. Um.
Speaker 1: This town is uh the place where Tom Horn drew
Speaker 1: his last breath. You gets some with Tom Horn. Tom
Speaker 1: I wrote about Tom Horn one time, and Tom Horn
Speaker 1: was this guy who got kind of caught up in
Speaker 1: the wrong century. He was a livestock detective in the
Speaker 1: late eighteen hundreds and he developed methodology that wasn't as
Speaker 1: acceptable in the early nineteen hundreds and got himself into
Speaker 1: a whole bunch of trouble. Was the last man legally
Speaker 1: hung in Wyoming? Um, interesting, ultimately tragic tale. But don't
Speaker 1: steal cattle is the Morald of the story there, right,
Speaker 1: And if someone does take your cow, be calm, be
Speaker 1: calm and getting it back. Um. We're joined. We have
Speaker 1: very special guests. We have the Governor of Wyoming, Governor
Speaker 1: Matt Mead, and we're joined as well by NiFi Colin
Speaker 1: Dave Wilms, who are natural resource policy advisors. Rourke Denver's here.
Speaker 1: People have watched the Meteor television show, will know Rourke,
Speaker 1: author of Damn Few, Making of the Modern Seal Warrior,
Speaker 1: author of a you just put the finishing touches on
Speaker 1: another book just this week. Really, can you tell us
Speaker 1: what it's called. It's a little bit of a fight yet,
Speaker 1: but I think it's gonna be called worth dying for.
Speaker 1: When's it coming out? Hopefully spring of sixteen. So worth
Speaker 1: dying for a Navy seals called to a nation. I
Speaker 1: think everyone in this room is gonna enjoy it. Hopefully
Speaker 1: that's tight. That's enticing, and joined also by by Janice
Speaker 1: van Janni Van's Wall, who tell us, um, and we're
Speaker 1: gonna talk today. I'm sure last level come up, but
Speaker 1: particularly I want we're gonna talk about a handful of
Speaker 1: wildlife issues. And what's cool about being able to do
Speaker 1: this in Wyoming is the Governor Wyoming, who's sitting here
Speaker 1: to my right, has what I would consider to be
Speaker 1: the good luck of governing in the state where you
Speaker 1: get to think about and deal with wildlife. Yeah, I'm
Speaker 1: on a daily basis. Well, thanks for being here, Steven Rooral.
Speaker 1: Quite a privilege to have you here as well. It's
Speaker 1: a it's a good day for the Governor's mansion and
Speaker 1: Woming me to have you both here. I appreciate you
Speaker 1: making the travels. Uh So this morning just highlighted a
Speaker 1: little earlier what you said there. I started to my
Speaker 1: wife and I have a ranch about ninety miles from here.
Speaker 1: It's on the Colorado Wyoming border, and uh I got
Speaker 1: I love to get up early in the morning. This
Speaker 1: morning we were able to see moose, we're able to
Speaker 1: see deer and UH. But the ranch is one of
Speaker 1: the holdest ranches in Wyoming. H. We've had it for
Speaker 1: about fifteen years. But the guy that UH started the
Speaker 1: ranches in Cape Boswell and k Boswell. There's a couple
Speaker 1: of books on one it's called Frontier law Man and
Speaker 1: he was a legendary lawman in the territory of Wyoming.
Speaker 1: And in the barn that we still have reportedly there
Speaker 1: is there was two horse thieves hung from that barn.
Speaker 1: So yeah, cattle rustling and stealing horses was not a
Speaker 1: good deal back in the day. So I'm glad to
Speaker 1: have you both here and UH eager to talk about
Speaker 1: wildlife issue, So thank you. Yeah. First starting, you grew
Speaker 1: up um in Wyoming in a in a ranching family
Speaker 1: in the in the Grand Teton area, right. Yeah, My
Speaker 1: great grandparents homesteaded UH in Titon County in Jackson commonly
Speaker 1: called Jackson Hole and homestead of there. So my great grandparents,
Speaker 1: grandparents parents, UH, and now my brother and my sister
Speaker 1: and I were all in the ranching business. Although I
Speaker 1: have this temporary jobs in politics, but we'll get back
Speaker 1: to ranch and I still work that same land. Now
Speaker 1: my brother runs the family ranch there, and uh, it's uh,
Speaker 1: you know, we're gonna talk about wh life, but it's
Speaker 1: a cattle ranch. And uh, my brother and his wife
Speaker 1: still raised cattle ras did my great grandparents and so
Speaker 1: on and so forth. And I recall, you know, growing
Speaker 1: up granddad, when we were eating beef at dinner or something,
Speaker 1: he would talk about what luxury it is. And he said,
Speaker 1: you know, when we were growing up, we never get
Speaker 1: to eat beef, even though they were cattle ranchers, because
Speaker 1: that was for people who could afford beef for sale.
Speaker 1: And he said, we lived on elk. Now you know,
Speaker 1: now if people look at it like that, they were
Speaker 1: this is the higher dollar item um. You do some
Speaker 1: hunting still, even though you have obviously a lot of
Speaker 1: demands on your time. You recently were involved in the
Speaker 1: in the one Shot Challenge. I think you were. Weren't
Speaker 1: you the first guy to talking about one shot challenge.
Speaker 1: We'll have a I have a friend, we'll we'll talk
Speaker 1: about it at some other point. That just tried to
Speaker 1: grab me another a sneel Seal sniper buddy of mine
Speaker 1: to come up and compete in that competition. And are
Speaker 1: still talking about for next year. So I think of
Speaker 1: the Colorado UH need help? I saw was the only team?
Speaker 1: Can you do governor? Do you mind breaking down with
Speaker 1: the One Shot challenges? No, I I don't. I guess
Speaker 1: started work. We would love to have you on a team.
Speaker 1: Let me just say I think it was three years ago.
Speaker 1: Uh for for the first time the One Shot, which
Speaker 1: is limited to eight teams, three person on the team. Uh,
Speaker 1: for the first time, I had a wounded Warriors team.
Speaker 1: And yeah, incredible because these guys showed up and one
Speaker 1: of the guys had a open sites iron sights and
Speaker 1: with the day before the hunt, you go to the
Speaker 1: range and you have these little competitions and I knew
Speaker 1: we were in trouble because I couldn't even see what
Speaker 1: he was looking at with my scope, my fancy scope,
Speaker 1: and he's hitting this thing. And it couldn't have been
Speaker 1: a better story. They won the whole thing, and so
Speaker 1: and every year since then, we hadn't wanted water team.
Speaker 1: But yeah, so the One Shot is um it's the
Speaker 1: seventy fifth year. This year's the anniversary the One Shot.
Speaker 1: There's been some remarkable people that have participated in has
Speaker 1: co hosted by Colorado and Wyoming, and there's a friendly
Speaker 1: competition between the two states on who does better fishing
Speaker 1: game agencies. Well it's it's done by Wyoming and the
Speaker 1: Shoshoni tribe. But the it's always been the partnership between
Speaker 1: Colorado and Wyoming. Other words, of Wyoming governor of the
Speaker 1: Colorado governor. Each get to have their own team, and
Speaker 1: so it creates some fun competition. And uh, it's a
Speaker 1: timed event. It's not a trophy hunt. In other words, Uh,
Speaker 1: you see how first you got a hit, and you
Speaker 1: truly only get one shot. Now if you wund your
Speaker 1: animal doesn't go down, you record to take a second shot,
Speaker 1: then you're out of the competition. That's counts. That's a mess.
Speaker 1: That's a mess. So it's how quickly, uh, your three
Speaker 1: teammates can get an antelope with one shot? No rest allowed? Um,
Speaker 1: unless God put it there. If you're lucky enough to
Speaker 1: be on a brush or a rock where your shot is,
Speaker 1: then you can use that, can't use this link, can't
Speaker 1: use the rest. And for a lot of hunters, you
Speaker 1: know they're very good hunters are used to using artificial
Speaker 1: arrests and it creates a little more dynamic when it's
Speaker 1: one shot, no rest timed event. So we had a
Speaker 1: good year this year. Uh, two out of our three
Speaker 1: teammates hit. Um. I was my third teammate was a
Speaker 1: Colorado guy, Todd Helton, and he came up and he
Speaker 1: was very into it and he hit his anilo but
Speaker 1: it didn't go down run away, so I had to
Speaker 1: take a second shot. So there was a Colorado guy
Speaker 1: that spoiled it for you. You know, ye honest identifies
Speaker 1: very strong in Colorado. He kind of came of age
Speaker 1: in Colorado. Roart. Now I don't work, people know where
Speaker 1: you live or I'm spending time and spends time in Colorado. Um.
Speaker 1: So who was the winner though? The winner? Uh, well,
Speaker 1: I gotta because before I announced the winner here, I
Speaker 1: want to tell you that. So Governor here Looper has
Speaker 1: been great about this and so his first year in
Speaker 1: the event, which was my first year, he was so
Speaker 1: impressive event. He put together a traveling trophy which is
Speaker 1: from Colorado silver and Wammy gold and uh, a very
Speaker 1: nice gesture. He's a great sport on the whole deal.
Speaker 1: But since the first year he made this, so five
Speaker 1: years ago, Uh, it's never left Wimmen's borders um so.
Speaker 1: Having said that, the Colorado team that there was a
Speaker 1: Colorado team called Mile High Shooters and all three hit
Speaker 1: and so they won this year. So Colorado did well
Speaker 1: that way. Absolutely. I liked that it promotes um taking
Speaker 1: your time and making a shot. Yeah, you know it's
Speaker 1: it's and I tell you know, when people who haven't
Speaker 1: hunted before, they're like, you know, any advice, I'm like,
Speaker 1: One is you're gonna get on animal, there's no question about.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of animal. Two is, uh, you've got
Speaker 1: to be patient, take your time. Now there has been
Speaker 1: like last year I didn't follow my own advice. I
Speaker 1: was on an antelope like within five minutes and it
Speaker 1: was I'm embarrassed to say how close it was. It
Speaker 1: was one of those there's no way to miss. I
Speaker 1: shot and animal to naim flinch. And so this year
Speaker 1: I did. I was very patient. It took me about,
Speaker 1: you know a little over five hours to find the
Speaker 1: shot that I wanted. I had some other shots, but
Speaker 1: I just you know, you want to make sure so uh,
Speaker 1: and the guides are great, and you know they they
Speaker 1: let you take the time and be patient and make
Speaker 1: sure you make a good, clean shot. That puts the
Speaker 1: animal down. So we do need to move on eventually.
Speaker 1: But so, how's this deal never works? Someone Actually I
Speaker 1: had a professional speaking event that actually connected me to
Speaker 1: a gas oil firm. The CEO of the company keeps
Speaker 1: a hauling home in Jackson, and he called me about it.
Speaker 1: I'd never heard of the competition before, and he said,
Speaker 1: you gotta look this up. Go the website. I checked
Speaker 1: it out, and so he wants to I think, if
Speaker 1: I understand correctly, they at the sponsor and kind of
Speaker 1: bit into the process or applied to be a team
Speaker 1: in the competition. And he asked me, he said, you
Speaker 1: know anybody that shoot suit state? And I said, I
Speaker 1: I know a few people I could do that, and
Speaker 1: so we we thought we might put a try and
Speaker 1: put a team to us. We missed this year. I
Speaker 1: think you want to try and do it next year.
Speaker 1: Based on this podcast, maybe I've got another avenue into
Speaker 1: the competition. So the life's looking good for the for
Speaker 1: the one shot right now? Well or uh, we love
Speaker 1: having good shooters on the team. So one of the
Speaker 1: one of the things that really makes the hunt specialists.
Speaker 1: So I get to choose one teammate and then the Association.
Speaker 1: The One Shot Association chooses a local guide and a
Speaker 1: lot of these local guys or have been on you know,
Speaker 1: they've volunteered for thirty years, and so see if when
Speaker 1: they get their chance to hunt, you know, I feel pressure,
Speaker 1: but those guys, it's at one time, once in a
Speaker 1: lifetime deal for him, and everybody in that town knows.
Speaker 1: I mean, they go back, Hey, I see your uncle hit,
Speaker 1: your grandfather hit, what happened to you? And so it's
Speaker 1: a lot of pressure, but it adds, you know, to
Speaker 1: add so much to it to have those those local
Speaker 1: people who volunteered. You know, I talked to a guy
Speaker 1: to day or less this year on the hunt who's
Speaker 1: been volunteering for forty five years at that event, and
Speaker 1: so it's a very special event that way. And then
Speaker 1: when those guys get their chance, I mean, you know,
Speaker 1: everybody feels the sort of the pressure, but those guys
Speaker 1: it's a big big deal. You said, they've been doing
Speaker 1: it for seventy years, seventy five year. This is seventy
Speaker 1: fifth anniversary. So it's it's a great tradition. And there
Speaker 1: you see, you know, I participate in the Grand National
Speaker 1: Quil Hunt when I can that came out of the
Speaker 1: one shot. A lot of these competitions around the country
Speaker 1: or patterned after one shot animal punt. Okay, I want
Speaker 1: to jump in. I don't. I don't waste a bunch
Speaker 1: of time here. I want to jump into it. And uh,
Speaker 1: let's start off by talking about the es A. Now
Speaker 1: for hunters, fishermen, people like to spend time outdoors. Um,
Speaker 1: the kind of the quickest avenue for you to get
Speaker 1: into thinking about the s A Endangered Species Act will
Speaker 1: be to kind of think about some of these things
Speaker 1: that are in the news constantly for the last There's
Speaker 1: some of these species that are in the news constantly
Speaker 1: for the last decade, and in particularly will will kind
Speaker 1: of focus on three big charismatic critters. Um. When you're
Speaker 1: hearing about grizzly bears and what we're gonna do with
Speaker 1: grizzly bears and grizzy bear management, the gray wolf. Okay,
Speaker 1: all the news constantly coming out of the Northern Great Lakes,
Speaker 1: the Greater Yellowstone Area, Northern Rockies about gray wolves, how
Speaker 1: we're gonna manage if we're gonna manage gray wolves. And
Speaker 1: then most recently, all things that you've been hearing about
Speaker 1: or should have been hearing about the sage grouse. Um,
Speaker 1: what we're gonna do about sage grouse? How are we
Speaker 1: gonna how were we gonna go about preventing the collapse
Speaker 1: of this? These are all animals that are traditionally game animals.
Speaker 1: You think things that have been hunted for will be
Speaker 1: hunted for again. And I'm only a little bit of groundwork.
Speaker 1: I want the sa IS just so people can kind
Speaker 1: of get what we're talking about when we start talking
Speaker 1: about where the s A stands right now and some
Speaker 1: problems that that are occurring around it. So this goes back,
Speaker 1: you know, longer and I've been alive. Nixon, you know,
Speaker 1: signed the s A in what was meant to do
Speaker 1: is meant to save species that were being uh driven
Speaker 1: to extinction through through factors involving economic growth and development. Okay,
Speaker 1: so human caused things. And at the time in the
Speaker 1: seventies and and prior to that, we were having almost
Speaker 1: like an epidemic of New Yor extinctions. And it was
Speaker 1: when they came in with the e s A as
Speaker 1: that we're going to prevent these things at whatever cost necessary,
Speaker 1: and by that I mean like whatever economic cost to
Speaker 1: try to halt these things. It's administered by two agencies,
Speaker 1: so the US Fish and Wildlife Service and then NOAH
Speaker 1: or National Oceanic and atmosp Feric Administration. Kind of in
Speaker 1: your day to day existence, you definitely have a lot
Speaker 1: more to do with US Fish and Wildlife Service. Like
Speaker 1: if you're a waterfowl hunter, UM, you know waterfalls managed
Speaker 1: on federal and state level. That's US Fish and Wildlife
Speaker 1: Service that it plays a big part in waterfall management,
Speaker 1: other migratory things. Um. They say this is a debatable thing,
Speaker 1: but it's it's argued that percent of the animals that
Speaker 1: have been listed. The animals that have been listed have
Speaker 1: been saved from extinction. Now that doesn't mean that that
Speaker 1: the act necessarily save them from extinction, but of the
Speaker 1: things that have been listened still exists on earth all right.
Speaker 1: When the animal gets listing, it gets a lot of
Speaker 1: protections for it. It's habitat, and it can curtail and
Speaker 1: change human behaviors. UM. When something would get removed from
Speaker 1: the list, it's because a handful of criteria are met,
Speaker 1: where you have of the population has reached stability and growth.
Speaker 1: You've removed or put a control on the things that
Speaker 1: were threatening in the first place, and then you have
Speaker 1: the stability a habitat quality. We list things that aren't
Speaker 1: just in the US. So there's two thousand species that
Speaker 1: have ees a protection foreign and domestic. About sixty have
Speaker 1: been delisted. Okay, thirty of the species that have gotten
Speaker 1: protection have been delisted due to outright recovery, all right.
Speaker 1: Um ten have been delisted due to extinction, though the
Speaker 1: bulk of those were probably already extinct when they got listing,
Speaker 1: Like it was, we knew that there might be some left,
Speaker 1: Like there's this bird, for instance, um ivory build woodpecker.
Speaker 1: For a long time, it was like, maybe it's not extinct,
Speaker 1: maybe it exists somewhere. And now it's relatively certain that
Speaker 1: the birds gone, so you know, it could have been
Speaker 1: extinct the time of listing, and and you have things
Speaker 1: like that happened, and in a handful of things were
Speaker 1: delisted because researchers revealed that the thing didn't belong there
Speaker 1: in the first place either because they discovered a new population,
Speaker 1: so they thought that they had some very limited number
Speaker 1: of an animal or a bird, discovered that in fact,
Speaker 1: that it inhabits these areas. We didn't realize that inhabited,
Speaker 1: it's not at risk of genetic extinction, souls pulled off,
Speaker 1: or as happens, sometimes you get better data and you
Speaker 1: learn that you were wrong. Animals are very hard to count,
Speaker 1: even something as big as a grizzly bear. You cannot
Speaker 1: get people to agree on population estimates because it's hard
Speaker 1: to count animals. Um So, sometimes new data will come
Speaker 1: in in a thing will get de lists. Some examples
Speaker 1: of things that you find on the endangered Species lists
Speaker 1: bald eagle, whooping crane, the peregrine falcon, key, dear gray wolf,
Speaker 1: red wolf, blackfooted ferret, southern sea ott or some quick
Speaker 1: pros and cons of pro the Endangered Species Act. Someone's
Speaker 1: sitting here arguing the pros that Dered Species Act, they'd
Speaker 1: be like, hey, it works. Thirty the species that have
Speaker 1: gotten listing have recovered. If someone was here to argue
Speaker 1: the cons, they would say, only thirty. We've had two
Speaker 1: thousand listed, so you've recovered one over the thirty year
Speaker 1: history of the Endangered Species Act. You' you've got one
Speaker 1: percent recovery. So it's not entirely working. Um that that's
Speaker 1: sort of a general background I want to focus in.
Speaker 1: Are one of you guys here comfortable giving like a
Speaker 1: brief synopsis focused on Wyoming to just kind of bring
Speaker 1: listeners up to speed on what has happened with the
Speaker 1: roller coaster ride of gray wolf. Listing do you listing? Yeah, well,
Speaker 1: I can take a crack out of first Steve great
Speaker 1: summary of the Endangered Species Act. As you said, in
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy three, President Exton signed into to law and
Speaker 1: the intent to save those species that are threatened endangered.
Speaker 1: You know, people don't disagree with that. I think, particularly
Speaker 1: you're in the West. We value of wildlife had adds
Speaker 1: for our quality of live But the gray wolf is
Speaker 1: a good example of what, in my mind is not
Speaker 1: working with the danger species that before I came into office,
Speaker 1: the state had struggled with this issue for many years,
Speaker 1: about a decade on what to do with the gray wolf,
Speaker 1: including the fact that remember that the gray wolf was
Speaker 1: reintroduced into Yellowstone. In other words, we went and grabbed
Speaker 1: a herd of gray wolves and put them in Yellowstone.
Speaker 1: So they're not worldwide, they're not this species that is
Speaker 1: on the verge of exchanging them, and they were available,
Speaker 1: we put them in Yellowstone and they are tremendous predators.
Speaker 1: And when you put them in Yellowstone which is National
Speaker 1: Park next to another National park, Grantito National Park, where
Speaker 1: you have all these game species that have you know,
Speaker 1: great levels of protection that they are naturally going to thrive,
Speaker 1: and they have. And so when I came into office,
Speaker 1: you know, we wanted them delisted. We wanted them to delisted,
Speaker 1: one because the population showed that they're more than stable. Two,
Speaker 1: when you have runaway population predators, that hurts other game species,
Speaker 1: for example, dear moose elk. It causes a conflict with livestock,
Speaker 1: sheep and cattle in particular, and so we wanted to
Speaker 1: gain a balance. We didn't want to wipe him out.
Speaker 1: We wanted to say, you know, how can we find
Speaker 1: an appropriate balance? And I worked directly one on one
Speaker 1: the Secretary Interior Salazar on that issue, along with the
Speaker 1: Director of the Fish and Wildlife Service, along with ranchers,
Speaker 1: conservation groups, environmental groups, and we came up with a
Speaker 1: plan that we felt very comfortable was going to provide
Speaker 1: the protection needed for the wolves, but bring in the
Speaker 1: balance and the ability for the State of Warming to
Speaker 1: manage that which belongs to the State of Warming, which
Speaker 1: is our wildlife um and secretary signed off on it.
Speaker 1: Fishing Wildlife signed off on it. I signed off on it,
Speaker 1: and it worked. In fact, in the time it was
Speaker 1: in place, we saw the wolf population remain very stable,
Speaker 1: even though we had a hunting season. And then a
Speaker 1: year and a half or two years after the fact,
Speaker 1: as always happens on these things, you know, we were
Speaker 1: soon and two years later Accord in Washington, d C said,
Speaker 1: no question, the wolves have recovered, but we don't like
Speaker 1: your plan, and so they threw out the plan. So
Speaker 1: now we're still in court on it. We'll see what
Speaker 1: happens at the appellate court level. But what this does
Speaker 1: is it leads to a lot of consternation and some
Speaker 1: pushback on what should be a good news story. Uh,
Speaker 1: the endangered species AC shouldn't be a bad news story.
Speaker 1: And you've heard, and I've heard, and we don't subscribe,
Speaker 1: subscribe to this, but this theory of shoot, shovel and
Speaker 1: shut up. And that's because in part, people get so
Speaker 1: frustrated with trying to figure out what do we need
Speaker 1: to do to actually recover a species? How do we
Speaker 1: reach the finish line? How do we get a species
Speaker 1: off the list after we have these eight conservation efforts
Speaker 1: and so um that's I think the gray wolf in particular,
Speaker 1: and I'm more familiar with Wyoming, although I know this
Speaker 1: isn't just a Wyoming story. It's certainly has been a
Speaker 1: story in Idaho and Montana, in Minnesota and other parts
Speaker 1: of the country. But when a species is more than
Speaker 1: fully recovered, you reached an agreement with all those people
Speaker 1: who sign off on these things, including the Secretary Interior,
Speaker 1: and you still can't get it delisted. That's a problem.
Speaker 1: And it's a problem not only for the frustration it causes,
Speaker 1: but it's a problem because if we're focusing time, effort,
Speaker 1: and money on species that clearly have recovered, what species
Speaker 1: are we forgetting about and we're not spending time on
Speaker 1: So it's not only bad in terms of what it causes, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, it's uncertainty in terms of our industry and businesses.
Speaker 1: It's bad for species we're focusing. You know, we've won
Speaker 1: the game with wolves. We should we should declare victory,
Speaker 1: and we should go try to find the species that
Speaker 1: actually do need help and focus on that one. But
Speaker 1: that's the question I've always heard about this. They had
Speaker 1: laid out at the time of the wolf reintroduction. It
Speaker 1: was laid out like what was an acceptable recovery? I mean,
Speaker 1: it was spelled out like numerically, Am I right? I
Speaker 1: mean we knew what recovery would look like, and that
Speaker 1: was pasted a long time ago. The same with grizzly bears.
Speaker 1: Might add that we've we've reached what would be recovery. Right,
Speaker 1: it's a moving goalpost. I think, what's that? What's that steak? Um?
Speaker 1: I'm talking to listeners more than your governor. What's that steak?
Speaker 1: I think with with something like the Endangered Species ACTU,
Speaker 1: I think that it winds up losing validity in the
Speaker 1: popular mind if it's seen as something that is a
Speaker 1: one way road and not a tool. I mean, this
Speaker 1: is a horrible parallel, but I mean, you know, if
Speaker 1: you have a problem and you go into the hospital
Speaker 1: and your problem gets better, you go back home. It
Speaker 1: would be like, well, no, you're gonna stay here now
Speaker 1: and live at this hospital because you had that problem
Speaker 1: at one time. And I think that that that's a
Speaker 1: problem we're running into with the gray wolf delisting. Is
Speaker 1: you have you've had a lot of people put a
Speaker 1: ton of time and energy into recovering this thing. And
Speaker 1: now I don't know. I think it's just I think
Speaker 1: it might be sort of an emotional thing where people
Speaker 1: have a hard time relinquishing the idea and turning it
Speaker 1: to state management and the thing that everyone should realize
Speaker 1: that game generally, like wild it is generally administer on
Speaker 1: the state level. So like here in Wyoming, for instance,
Speaker 1: if if if you have an Elk right and he's
Speaker 1: on Yelsa National Park, and he jumps a fence and
Speaker 1: comes on to National forest land and Wyloming and then
Speaker 1: he jumps another fence and he's on state land. He
Speaker 1: jumps a fence, he's on county land. Then he jumps
Speaker 1: a fence and he's in a subdivision. Okay, that Elk
Speaker 1: has throughout his journeys there been property like Chinao speaking,
Speaker 1: has been property the state of Wyoming. Various entities might
Speaker 1: control access to the thing, but the animals owned by
Speaker 1: the state, as ministered by the state. So when we
Speaker 1: talk about taking wolves or grizzly bearris and handing to
Speaker 1: the state, we're not it's not like this novel experiment.
Speaker 1: You know, you're putting it like you guys manage. We
Speaker 1: didn't manage all the wild life you have. You manage
Speaker 1: eleven big game species. I think, yeah, I think I
Speaker 1: kind of went out there to day my hills. Ten
Speaker 1: or eleven big games pieces are managed by the State
Speaker 1: of Wyoming. In the state of Wyoming. So when people
Speaker 1: here that you're gonna let a state draw up a
Speaker 1: management plan for species, I think that some people. I
Speaker 1: don't mean this as insults. I've lived in many urban areas.
Speaker 1: I think a lot of times people in urban areas
Speaker 1: they have concerns that they know about, you know, they
Speaker 1: have concerns that affect their daily lives, and they just
Speaker 1: don't have the time and energy and inclination to study
Speaker 1: up in this kind of stuff that doesn't impact them daily.
Speaker 1: When they hear that you're gonna give management over to
Speaker 1: a state, I think that they feel like somehow something
Speaker 1: strange is happening, right, rather than you're returning to a norm, right.
Speaker 1: You know. Yeah, that's a great point. I mean this,
Speaker 1: states do manage wildlife, and we have the expertise in it,
Speaker 1: we have the manpower, and we put their resources to it.
Speaker 1: And so you're exactly right. What is out of the
Speaker 1: norm now is to have species that are not managed
Speaker 1: by the state, for example wolves and greasily pars. And
Speaker 1: it's you know, part of the frustration is on the
Speaker 1: on the recovery plan for the wolves. It's the state
Speaker 1: putting in the money and the time to get it done.
Speaker 1: The Fish and Wildlife Service puts in money as well,
Speaker 1: but we get sued by groups who don't put money
Speaker 1: on the ground to conserve the species. They put money
Speaker 1: in the lawyer's pockets, UH and in the in the courtrooms.
Speaker 1: And so you know, just the millions that we have
Speaker 1: spent to make sure we have a very strong viomable
Speaker 1: wolf population that shows that it's more than recovered. Um.
Speaker 1: You know that is properly on the state's lab But
Speaker 1: we don't want just the burden of it. We want
Speaker 1: to be able to manage in wait, in coordination and
Speaker 1: in harmony with the rest of the wildlife that the
Speaker 1: state is required to and and UH wants to manage.
Speaker 1: From your perspective as someone who's dealing with the e
Speaker 1: s a NonStop and dealing with the wolf fishing, and
Speaker 1: I want to talk about the grizzly berry issue as well.
Speaker 1: But dealing with this, what are some things like, like,
Speaker 1: what do you feel are some things that could be
Speaker 1: done to make the process less? Like you hear the
Speaker 1: word ligigionous litigionous thrown around all the time, where it becomes, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, these issues become these like like a beach
Speaker 1: ball getting bounced back and forth in courts and there's
Speaker 1: no resolution. I mean, this has been how long this
Speaker 1: has been going on? Like we've like wolves have been
Speaker 1: genetically recovered in this area for a long time, a
Speaker 1: decade or more, and there's still no end in sight
Speaker 1: to this. I mean, how would you ever do you
Speaker 1: guys have ideas? Do you have thoughts about how someone
Speaker 1: would ever get it to be where there was just
Speaker 1: an actual end to the debate? What would that even
Speaker 1: look like? Well? There, I think there's a couple of things.
Speaker 1: One is, I think it's easier to figure out where
Speaker 1: the goal post is and how to get to the
Speaker 1: end by how you start the process. You know, right now,
Speaker 1: at a list of species is a relatively easy thing.
Speaker 1: I mean, the joke is you can do it on
Speaker 1: the back of a n app Can you send it
Speaker 1: the Fishing Wildlife Service and you're on the list and
Speaker 1: they already have six hundred plus on the list the
Speaker 1: Fishing Wildlife Service. So here's some things would be better.
Speaker 1: One is you can only list one species at a time,
Speaker 1: in other words, not multiple listings. I want to have
Speaker 1: all these things on the list one species. Before you
Speaker 1: do that, it requires state notification. It requires in the
Speaker 1: data that the states have, because we do have data,
Speaker 1: we do have the expertise. In other words, don't just
Speaker 1: throw something out there. Go ahead and look at what
Speaker 1: the science shows. You look at one species, what the
Speaker 1: science shows, You give the state's notice time for us
Speaker 1: to input so that when it hits the Fishing Wildlife
Speaker 1: Services desk, they have a proper vetting process. In other words,
Speaker 1: it's a package. They can look at it. They can
Speaker 1: make quicker decisions, more full decisions, rather than, hey, we're
Speaker 1: gonna throw this out there, see if it sticks, go
Speaker 1: through years of sort of discovery on what the science
Speaker 1: is there, then get into the court system, so on
Speaker 1: and so forth. In other words, there has to be
Speaker 1: in my mind, a greater threshold before you even get
Speaker 1: on the list, so that we don't waste time, we
Speaker 1: don't waste money looking at species that shouldn't be on there.
Speaker 1: But interrupt you real quick. Sorry, isn't it true that
Speaker 1: there the Fish and Molife Service is constantly getting sued
Speaker 1: because you're not listening things though they are they are,
Speaker 1: and that's why it just if I can interject here,
Speaker 1: I think the UH as you know, as my initiative
Speaker 1: as chairman of the Western Government Association to see what
Speaker 1: improvements we can make to the Endangerous Species Act. And
Speaker 1: if you talk the Fish and Wildlife Service now, depending
Speaker 1: upon who you talk to, I think they recognize some
Speaker 1: of their rules and regulations would help offset that challenge
Speaker 1: that they face immediately by not listing UH. And also
Speaker 1: I believe there's an opportunity for some statutory changes. It
Speaker 1: would also help support what Fishing Wildlife Service is trying
Speaker 1: to do and trying to do it in a proper way. So,
Speaker 1: I know, interrupt you, but but continue on with the
Speaker 1: unless you're done about ideas and ways in which you
Speaker 1: would streamline the process. Are you saying that you could
Speaker 1: remedy the situation up front by I would imagine too
Speaker 1: by clarifying the goals of the listing. I think clarifying
Speaker 1: the goals will will certainly help and what we're trying
Speaker 1: to do with my Western Governor's initiative is around the West,
Speaker 1: get ideas and input from all all groups, sportsman's wildlife groups,
Speaker 1: environmental groups, UH to see what we think we could do.
Speaker 1: Because reaching that goal post, knowing how to get there,
Speaker 1: what is the recovery plan is important not just to
Speaker 1: reach the goal post, but if you say these five things,
Speaker 1: are these twenty things will help preserve a species, I
Speaker 1: want to know what it is because we want to
Speaker 1: do that. It's the right thing to do to preserve
Speaker 1: the species. If it's just this nebulous keep trying this
Speaker 1: shotgun approach and hope someday a court agrees with you,
Speaker 1: then if you do get a court degree with you
Speaker 1: don't even know if you've done the right things necessary
Speaker 1: for the species. So anything we could do beforehand to say,
Speaker 1: you know, here's how you go about this, and here's
Speaker 1: how you reach the goal line that not only is
Speaker 1: better for species and better for businesses and industries, but
Speaker 1: it also allows us to go to the next step
Speaker 1: to the next species and started getting these off the list.
Speaker 1: Because when you only have since nineteen seventy three, a
Speaker 1: little more than one percent who have ever gone on
Speaker 1: the list off the list, that's the flip side of that,
Speaker 1: only one percent or so has ever gotten off the list.
Speaker 1: We're just adding to the list. What are we doing
Speaker 1: the recovery species. Every time there's a listening it should
Speaker 1: be viewed as a failure. Every time there's a recovery
Speaker 1: and a species a sound that should be celebrated as
Speaker 1: a victory and we should move on to the next species.
Speaker 1: You know, it's fake. As I remember with the bald eagle,
Speaker 1: it was treated as a victory. It was it was
Speaker 1: a cellar. It's great as there was a great news story.
Speaker 1: It's yeah, it's just boggled my mind the way that
Speaker 1: the people now view and look at and the way
Speaker 1: that achievement was reached. That you just I guess that
Speaker 1: animals sparks different emotions than what's going on with the
Speaker 1: wolf thing, where it's so many people are there's just
Speaker 1: a tremendous reluctance to say, Okay, in this you know biome,
Speaker 1: Right in this biome, we've achieved recovery. No one is
Speaker 1: arguing that you've cheated across the whole thing. But I'll
Speaker 1: point out of elk, like we're not having a conversation
Speaker 1: right now about elk being in dangered species of Elk
Speaker 1: habitat at the time of European contact has no elk,
Speaker 1: has no elk on it right now? Okay, so we're
Speaker 1: able to discuss animals in terms of with with a
Speaker 1: level of specific I don't know even know regionality is
Speaker 1: a word, but with specific regionality, you know, elk are
Speaker 1: doing fantastic in many places. They're not doing fantastic in
Speaker 1: the southern portion of my home state of Michigan, which
Speaker 1: is absent of them. But people can in that way
Speaker 1: comprehend like, Okay, yeah, you're hunting elk here even though
Speaker 1: they're absent here. But I think in a way that
Speaker 1: they look at wolfish and the wolf fish and they
Speaker 1: have a hard time fathoming that, yes, we have certain
Speaker 1: pockets where we've achieved objective and that isn't commenting on
Speaker 1: where we're at in Arizona in New Mexico. You know,
Speaker 1: I think that's another problem. Not I'd be curious from
Speaker 1: you guys. Have you have you found that drawing those
Speaker 1: borders in terms of state and national is that cumbersome?
Speaker 1: You know? Because I know that when you guys manage
Speaker 1: game like how many game units is wyoming divided? Into
Speaker 1: many things on the species. I was recently hunting grizzly
Speaker 1: bears in British Columbia. British Columbia has that has British
Speaker 1: Columbia divided into sixty management units. Okay, so they're able
Speaker 1: to make very precise decisions well, basically one sixtieth of
Speaker 1: the province at a time make very precise decisions about
Speaker 1: management goals. Some of those places have hunting, some don't
Speaker 1: reflected by what's going on on what's going on on
Speaker 1: the ground in those specific locations. And I think that
Speaker 1: that's a huge hang up the people have had about
Speaker 1: and I want to touch on grizzly bears to a
Speaker 1: big hang up people had and grizzly bears is, Yes,
Speaker 1: in some areas, there's a lot of work that needs
Speaker 1: to be done. In some areas we've achieved goal. Why
Speaker 1: not say that it's achieved here and then, like you said,
Speaker 1: move on to some of the areas that haven't right.
Speaker 1: I think it's, you know, when the grizzly bears and
Speaker 1: wolves are a good example, it's, you know, if we
Speaker 1: did everything exactly right. And why I'm going with the
Speaker 1: guard the wolves and grizzly bears, but Montana and idahope
Speaker 1: were not, they would still be listed. It's so it's
Speaker 1: it's not just jurisdiction by by state or county, it's
Speaker 1: you know, the area, as you pointed out, and so
Speaker 1: in this area, Montana, Idaho, Wyoming, those three states have
Speaker 1: to do a good job for that Yellowstone ecosystem population
Speaker 1: on managing the wolves and so. But in that region,
Speaker 1: we know that the bears have more than fully recovered.
Speaker 1: And so does that mean we have to go and
Speaker 1: tell there's sufficient amount of bears and uh uh around
Speaker 1: Dever Denver metropolitan area. I don't think so. I mean
Speaker 1: you have to understand where there's uh the habitat for
Speaker 1: these populations, uh, and then make sure they're doing well
Speaker 1: in those in those areas where there's proper habitat form.
Speaker 1: So keep it in mind. Some of these scenes are
Speaker 1: talking about do you mind doing a similar break down
Speaker 1: you did with wolves on on the grizzly bear issue
Speaker 1: and where it stands and what it might mean for
Speaker 1: outdoors men and you know, people beyond Wyoming but certainly
Speaker 1: includes Ave of Wyoming. Yeah, well, I just you know,
Speaker 1: when we get when we had the wolves delisted, Um,
Speaker 1: you know, I view that as a great victory, not
Speaker 1: on any for us as a state, but frankly for
Speaker 1: the species of wolves. And as soon as it was done,
Speaker 1: we had developed through that process a good factual, rel
Speaker 1: working relationship with the Fish and Wildlife Service in the
Speaker 1: Secretary of Interior. And so as soon as that was completed,
Speaker 1: I to the sick Or letter and said, you know, now,
Speaker 1: grizzly bears need to be lead listed. And uh. In fact,
Speaker 1: I had gotten some letters about that time saying, hey,
Speaker 1: thanks for your efforts on the wolves, but frankly, grizzlies
Speaker 1: are a better, uh or a more serious problem in
Speaker 1: terms of conflict, in terms of not having the balance
Speaker 1: in the wildlife in the greater Yellowstone area. So we
Speaker 1: got on it right away. And here we are three
Speaker 1: four years later, and we see that the grizzly bears
Speaker 1: are not delisted. Um in two thousand ten, Uh, there
Speaker 1: was an attempt to delist the grizzly bears, and the court,
Speaker 1: as they do, say, well, it's pointed out to us
Speaker 1: that white bark pine populations going down that habitat, and
Speaker 1: that's one of the food sources for grizzly bears and
Speaker 1: therefore we're not going to approve the delisting because we're
Speaker 1: concerned that they're not going to have the food sources.
Speaker 1: And what we've shown since that court decision is the
Speaker 1: white bark pine has been going down in terms of
Speaker 1: available white bark line grizzly bear population has been inversely
Speaker 1: going up. Grizzly bears, as you know, probably better than
Speaker 1: I firsthand. Uh, they are they are good eaters and
Speaker 1: they can eat just about anything. And the grizzly bear
Speaker 1: population has continued to go up. And so as those
Speaker 1: numbers have gone up despite the white bark pine not
Speaker 1: being as prevalent. Again, we're at this point where there's
Speaker 1: no question that should be delisted, and I made that clear.
Speaker 1: The secretary cells are and I think it was two
Speaker 1: thousand eleven, and we're hopeful now perhaps at the end
Speaker 1: of this year that we can actually make some good
Speaker 1: movement on that. If that happens, do you feel that
Speaker 1: it'll it'll turn into the same never ending cycle of
Speaker 1: like retributional lawsuit. Yeah, we're worried about it because that's
Speaker 1: that's the pattern we see. And you know, I understand,
Speaker 1: I mean people have uh, you know, people get emotional
Speaker 1: about specific species. UM. You know, you don't. You don't
Speaker 1: hear people worrying about carp u. You don't hear him
Speaker 1: worrying about rattlesnakes. But there's some species that they get
Speaker 1: very concerned about, and grizzly bears and wolves because they
Speaker 1: view it beyond just individual species and it's iconic of
Speaker 1: the West and iconic of um. You know, people put
Speaker 1: spiritual value on on some of those species. I appreciate
Speaker 1: that they have that perspective, but they also need to
Speaker 1: know for the benefit of those species, UM, the best
Speaker 1: way for their survival is one public support too to
Speaker 1: have the state manage them, and three have them in
Speaker 1: an equilibrium uh fashion uh cones co exists with the
Speaker 1: other species because I can tell you that if you know,
Speaker 1: grizzly bears and wolves wipe out the entire moose population
Speaker 1: or elk population. And I'm not saying that's happening, but
Speaker 1: if that happened, I think it's something this this is
Speaker 1: me talking for like just observation and time of many people.
Speaker 1: I think in some areas with moves, it's it's precarious
Speaker 1: almost it is, well, we we see that. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's my exaggerated point was if they wipe them all out,
Speaker 1: that's what That's what I'm saying. It's not happening. But
Speaker 1: there's no question. We see the moose population declining, we
Speaker 1: see the elk being struggling. We see also you know, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, the numbers of human conflict in the number
Speaker 1: of human desks by grizzly bears is going up. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's not a big number, but the rate is an
Speaker 1: exponential growth rate. And you talk to hunters and maybe
Speaker 1: you've seen this as well. The gunshot as a dinner bell,
Speaker 1: they hear a gunshot, and that's why people want to
Speaker 1: hunt with suppressors in part because when they hear the
Speaker 1: when the grizzly bears here, the gun shot go off,
Speaker 1: that means there's a gut pile there, that means there's
Speaker 1: food there. And so you see the tragedy of people
Speaker 1: getting killed more and more by grizzly bears. So I
Speaker 1: think there is in all this you have to have
Speaker 1: the balance, and in today's world you also have to
Speaker 1: up management. And as you pointed out rightfully that historically
Speaker 1: and rightfully is in the state's hands. You know, we've
Speaker 1: we've touched on a couple of things, of things that
Speaker 1: I would think of as being undecided. UM. I think
Speaker 1: a lot of people are dissatisfied with how things have gone.
Speaker 1: There's no end in sight. It's been kind of a
Speaker 1: like a systemic failure. I would say, with with that,
Speaker 1: my personal painion about wolf and grizzly management, just how
Speaker 1: it's gone the way those animals have been used, UM
Speaker 1: as sort of pawns in the game about what our
Speaker 1: relationship is with the natural world. But last week, I
Speaker 1: think it's a week ago, and I might have lost
Speaker 1: track of time. There was a case where, you know,
Speaker 1: we had the Greater sage grouse was being considered for
Speaker 1: Endangered Species Act protection. UM. A lot of people agreed
Speaker 1: that that would had they gotten that level of protection,
Speaker 1: and they're an animal love of of the sage flats.
Speaker 1: Had they gotten that protection, it would have had huge
Speaker 1: economic implications. It would had implications for absolutely for hunters
Speaker 1: and fishermen, land managers of all sort industry across the board.
Speaker 1: It would have had big implications for them because had
Speaker 1: they gotten es a listing, it would have really had UM.
Speaker 1: It would have changed business in quite a few states,
Speaker 1: six or seven states. UM and that way, the ESA
Speaker 1: had teeth because people knew what to be afraid of.
Speaker 1: But rather than going down the role of listing or
Speaker 1: just acting like this is an inevitable thing, a bunch
Speaker 1: of conservation groups, I know, governor your own office, the
Speaker 1: office of the governor's offices of several other states really
Speaker 1: pulled together and did a dramatic turnaround on that bird
Speaker 1: in habitat as well. Can you talk a little bit
Speaker 1: about how that battle kind of took shape and how
Speaker 1: reach what seems to be like resolution And I know
Speaker 1: now it might not be. You know, the lawsuits will
Speaker 1: get rolling, but would you mind talking a little bit
Speaker 1: about kind of where your stance on that has been
Speaker 1: and what kind of work you guys have done there. Yeah, well,
Speaker 1: the you're absolutely right. If the stage grouage would have
Speaker 1: been listed, it would have affected uh many states, uh
Speaker 1: in a substantial way, but the West and and and
Speaker 1: frankly the country. And there I say the country because
Speaker 1: you know, if the bird would have been listed in Wyoming,
Speaker 1: and Wyoming, as you probably know, exports more energy than
Speaker 1: any other state, UM oil, gas, coal, uranium. Uh, we're
Speaker 1: really big in that. We export more coal than any
Speaker 1: other state, and had the bird been listed, you look
Speaker 1: at historical range where the bird not necessarily is now,
Speaker 1: but where a hit has ever been. And we looked
Speaker 1: at that and it would have virtually shut down all
Speaker 1: the coal mining and the state and that coal mining
Speaker 1: is it. Well, that's great for Wyoming, but we supply
Speaker 1: cold over thirty states and they get the benefit of
Speaker 1: low cost energy from that coal. The same with the
Speaker 1: oil and the same with gas. With what we were
Speaker 1: able to work out, rather than having virtually eight of
Speaker 1: the coal shut down, now we've managed it so the
Speaker 1: coal is not shut down. The same with oil and gas.
Speaker 1: About uh sixty six percent of the oil and gas
Speaker 1: production when be shutdown. Now it's limited to five. So
Speaker 1: that's on the good industry news front. But on the
Speaker 1: wildlife front, my predecessor, govern To Friedenthal did have very
Speaker 1: good job putting together diverse groups. I mean, you have
Speaker 1: Audubon society out there with ranchers, with industry folks trying
Speaker 1: to figure out how to go about doing this, how
Speaker 1: to not shut the state down, but at the same time,
Speaker 1: make sure you preserve the habitat for sage grouse so
Speaker 1: that we can know that they're going to be viable.
Speaker 1: And so this work started before I came into office
Speaker 1: and continued with my great staff while I have been
Speaker 1: in office, in cooperation with Fish and Wildlife Service, the
Speaker 1: Secretaries Office, many conservation groups, as I said, ranchers, and
Speaker 1: we came to a point, as you pointed out, where
Speaker 1: the Fish and Wildlife Service says, because of the plans
Speaker 1: that we have in place, that is the states that
Speaker 1: the bird does not it's not warnted to be listed.
Speaker 1: And this is a great victory, but it is not Uh.
Speaker 1: There's certainly the teeth was in the Endanger Species Act.
Speaker 1: But what we did, the model that we have set
Speaker 1: up here is not because of the Endangered Species Act,
Speaker 1: is because we're trying to find answers. We're trying to
Speaker 1: preserve habitat, we're trying to preserve species, and we're trying
Speaker 1: to do it in a way that doesn't shut down
Speaker 1: their states. We're not a zoo. I mean, we have
Speaker 1: to put food on the table like any other state.
Speaker 1: And so it I in terms of that bird not
Speaker 1: being listed, I think it's not only a great victory
Speaker 1: for the bird, but hopefully to answer your earder question,
Speaker 1: it is a model on how to go forward where
Speaker 1: you can reach the finish line with multiple diverse interests
Speaker 1: coming together and saying we've got to find an answer. Uh,
Speaker 1: it's good for the species and that's good for business.
Speaker 1: So I'm hoping one that doesn't get thrown out by
Speaker 1: the courts, and then too that we can use it
Speaker 1: to how to address other species in a grand scale.
Speaker 1: The good news on the stage Gross is that by
Speaker 1: conserving that habitat, we know it's also going to help
Speaker 1: other species that rely upon the habitat the same happitat
Speaker 1: the Savee Cross two that that's that issue would up
Speaker 1: be one of the more complicated ones that I've followed,
Speaker 1: because when I was first came when I was first
Speaker 1: introduced to the to the stage Gross issue, it was
Speaker 1: through a friend of mine who's a biologist with the
Speaker 1: Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership, and he came for and was
Speaker 1: talking about how catastrophic he felt that listing was going
Speaker 1: to be, and so it was kind of it was
Speaker 1: kind of funny. I think a lot of people have
Speaker 1: a hard time sort of wrapping their heads around the
Speaker 1: idea that like, here's the here's a guy from a
Speaker 1: conservation organization, saying no, no, no, this isn't the best thing.
Speaker 1: This isn't the best thing. Like listing isn't the best
Speaker 1: thing for the es A listing isn't the best thing
Speaker 1: for land managers. It's gonna bring a lot of animosity.
Speaker 1: This guy continued to hunt sage grouse through the whole thing, right,
Speaker 1: you know, because he was like, it's not a hunting issue,
Speaker 1: like I think that hunting is. It has big economic factors.
Speaker 1: It incentivizes people on land issues, and you wind up
Speaker 1: where if you had to go and explain to someone
Speaker 1: completely outside of this world, you have a very difficult time. Gone. Um,
Speaker 1: it's in the better interest to the bird to not
Speaker 1: get listing, and it's in the better interests of the
Speaker 1: bird for sports and to maintain or renewed albeit very
Speaker 1: limited through the you know, legal means interest in pursuing
Speaker 1: this bird, right, and it's gonna keep this bird sort
Speaker 1: of woven into the culture of the West and have
Speaker 1: it not become a spot of owl right right. You know.
Speaker 1: I think it's that is such an important point you make,
Speaker 1: because it's it invests people in seeing these species are
Speaker 1: taken care of, and you know, people would be so prize.
Speaker 1: If you said, you know how many saves grouse are
Speaker 1: we talking about where they you know, what are we
Speaker 1: down to a thousand or five thousand? Well, in Wyoming alone,
Speaker 1: there's an excess of a hundred thousand of these birds
Speaker 1: and we do have a hunting season on them. And
Speaker 1: people say, how do you have a hunting season, Well,
Speaker 1: it's we look at the risks to saves grouse and
Speaker 1: a hunting season is not a risk to the saves
Speaker 1: grouse because there we have such a healthy, robust population.
Speaker 1: But I think it's one of the reasons I think, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, on a broader scale, is so important to
Speaker 1: recognize the value in hunting and the conservation that comes
Speaker 1: from hunting. Not only uh, for those who hunt, but
Speaker 1: it is the sportsman who put so much back into
Speaker 1: seeing species, whether it's fish or wildlife, maintain these healthy populations.
Speaker 1: It's why groups like the Audubon Society we're leading our
Speaker 1: charge and trying to get us to this point because
Speaker 1: they saw that in the broad picture, it would be
Speaker 1: better for the species not to be listed. What do
Speaker 1: you feel now now when people look at the area
Speaker 1: and it's a complex arrangement, are you guys are you
Speaker 1: comfortable trying trying to like sum up what there recover
Speaker 1: I know even call the recovery fan. But now we
Speaker 1: have a quarter million we're a kind of quarter million
Speaker 1: birds and and the stage brush areas of the west.
Speaker 1: But is there like how would you sum up like
Speaker 1: what the plan is? Well, I guess at the core
Speaker 1: of it in Wyoming is uh, we have core areas,
Speaker 1: in other words, where there's high concentration of the bird,
Speaker 1: and in those areas there is much greater restriction than
Speaker 1: outside those areas. That's one. And then to UH, if
Speaker 1: there's a disturbance to a core area where there's multiple
Speaker 1: lex for example, you have to offset that disturbance in
Speaker 1: some way somewhere else that will benefit the bird. So
Speaker 1: at the key to the plan is the safe grouse
Speaker 1: core areas where we recognize there's high concenteration and birds
Speaker 1: and that there we have to be extra careful in
Speaker 1: those areas with what we do with any type of development.
Speaker 1: But there's areas outside there that would have little or
Speaker 1: no effect. And those are the areas so hey, you
Speaker 1: want to put in a new housing development or have
Speaker 1: a chance for an well and gas development because it's
Speaker 1: outside of those areas would have much impact on their habitat.
Speaker 1: We can go ahead and do that as long as
Speaker 1: we're ext are careful in these areas where there's a
Speaker 1: concenteration of birds and this this core of strategy we
Speaker 1: know is working. Now, there's a lot of variables that
Speaker 1: go into population, as you know, but we will point
Speaker 1: out the sense two thousand and thirteen, the increase in
Speaker 1: the mail lax, which is how we count birds as
Speaker 1: best as we can, has gone up exponentially. Just in Wyoming,
Speaker 1: for example, the mails from uh increased greatly in two
Speaker 1: thousand fourteen and from two thousand fourteen to two fifteen
Speaker 1: over fift increase um. Now, buyers can change that, and
Speaker 1: bad weather can change that, but the core areas strategy
Speaker 1: is working. Yeah, that that's a interesting you bring up,
Speaker 1: like the fires and why there is anyone who pays
Speaker 1: attention to who follows upland birds and anyway, you know,
Speaker 1: it's just the implications of of drought. An ill timed
Speaker 1: hail storm can put you into serious trouble. So I
Speaker 1: imagine now there's a lot of people are sitting around.
Speaker 1: We'll probably during like the laying time for the Greater
Speaker 1: Sage grounds to be watching the weather very carefully, because
Speaker 1: you could like numerically diminished the bird without any thing
Speaker 1: happening to habitat. You could also be like, Okay, now
Speaker 1: we're back down to you know, for factors completely beyond
Speaker 1: our control, down to a dangerous spot. All right, laying
Speaker 1: of water conservation fund? Can we can we ask you
Speaker 1: about this as well? We got any fight here. He's
Speaker 1: an expert on at least that was any major did
Speaker 1: in college, or at least that's what he told me
Speaker 1: just right now. Because this is the most this is
Speaker 1: one of the most important things I think that effect
Speaker 1: people like to spend the time outdoors, that that they've
Speaker 1: never heard of. UM. I'm gonna do a similar run
Speaker 1: down here just to give people up speed that it was.
Speaker 1: It's been around since nine. What happens, you know, offshore drilling,
Speaker 1: offshore oil drilling, So it's occurring, UM on what would
Speaker 1: be land. You know, it's like land owned by the
Speaker 1: American populace. Okay, but it's not deded to any particular entity.
Speaker 1: It's just like government land. And when people go and
Speaker 1: extract oil off, they're they're essentially paying a fee to
Speaker 1: the American people. Um. For the ability to extract that oil.
Speaker 1: Some of that money is put towards grants and matching
Speaker 1: funds to federal and state agencies, and it's earmarked. It's
Speaker 1: intended purpose is for use in public access and land acquisition.
Speaker 1: I'm talking everything from parks, scenic overlooks, beaches, mountain ranges,
Speaker 1: you name it. UM Land and Water Conservation Fund money
Speaker 1: has secured over seven million acres of land. This is
Speaker 1: not tax para money, Okay, I mean it's money that
Speaker 1: goes into a federal budget, but it's not coming out
Speaker 1: of your taxes. It's been renewed one time. So the
Speaker 1: first time they put it in, it was good for
Speaker 1: twenty five years. At the end of that twenty five
Speaker 1: years and got renewed for another twenty five years. And
Speaker 1: it just so happens that if you're alive right now,
Speaker 1: you have to be alive, you know, during one of
Speaker 1: the years when it would need to be renewed, and
Speaker 1: it seems like a no brainer that it would get renewed,
Speaker 1: but it's stalled. Um. It's hard to say. There are
Speaker 1: people who don't There are people out there who don't
Speaker 1: like it because they just have a general antipathy toward
Speaker 1: I guess the antipathy or the government owning and managing
Speaker 1: land for for public use, like that's at play, but
Speaker 1: large it's just kind of held up in budgetary squabbling.
Speaker 1: It's a casualty. Nifies that fair to say that it's
Speaker 1: like it not being renewed right now has more to
Speaker 1: do with just budgetary issues in general than it has
Speaker 1: to do with the Land and Water Conservation Fund. You
Speaker 1: know what, It'd be tough for me to talk about
Speaker 1: what issues specifically, you know, they're talking out of the
Speaker 1: hills relation to it, but it would be fair to
Speaker 1: say that, you know, as a priority, there's huge bipartisan
Speaker 1: support for reauthorization of the Land and Water Conservation Fund,
Speaker 1: and I think what you're running into is people would
Speaker 1: like to make sure that the original intent of that
Speaker 1: act is honored. You know, originally the Land and Water
Speaker 1: Conservation Fund, you had about six of the money by
Speaker 1: rule going to the states to make decisions on that.
Speaker 1: And and in Wyoming that's done things like you know,
Speaker 1: and in every community if you're listening to this, you've
Speaker 1: got a community pool, you've got a ballpark, you have
Speaker 1: nature trails, you have work that's been done on your
Speaker 1: you know, you've got your riverwalk. You know, all those
Speaker 1: projects are projects that you know, in every state, in
Speaker 1: every community there LWCF projects, access like LA or you
Speaker 1: see a little sign like public launch and everything else
Speaker 1: around there is private that the money that landing get donated.
Speaker 1: And I think it's fair to say that folks right now,
Speaker 1: you know, at this opportunity when they're talking about re authorization,
Speaker 1: they want to have a robust discussion about whether or
Speaker 1: not there really the intent of the Act is still
Speaker 1: being being met and ensured that it is being met.
Speaker 1: And I know, um, you know, Governor Mead and the
Speaker 1: other governors have weighed in on this and and said
Speaker 1: that that's important, that it's important that there's integrity and
Speaker 1: funding that there. It's important that states have an opportunity
Speaker 1: to do what we believe that local communities and states
Speaker 1: do best. You know, typically people what you're talking about species,
Speaker 1: whether you're talking about land, the people who live closest
Speaker 1: to the issues on the ground typically are the people
Speaker 1: who can come up with the best solutions. They can
Speaker 1: identify how to spend money in an efficient way. You know,
Speaker 1: conservation is a huge priority in Wyoming. We you know,
Speaker 1: Tourism is our number three industry in this state. Number
Speaker 1: two industry, apologize, agricultures are number three industry. And when
Speaker 1: people come to Wyoming, they come here to you know,
Speaker 1: they come here because of the lands that they see.
Speaker 1: They come here because of our outdoor recreational opportunities. And
Speaker 1: I think, like most of the West, we recognize that, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, conservation is a huge priority to us. And
Speaker 1: I think it's you know appropriate that there's a robust
Speaker 1: discussion on making sure that it's being done the right way.
Speaker 1: And I think that that's reflected in people's thoughts on
Speaker 1: Land and Water Conservation Fund, both on the amount of
Speaker 1: huge the amount of bipartisan support for its re authorization,
Speaker 1: but also on the fact that some members up on
Speaker 1: the hill want to take a good look at it
Speaker 1: and want to make sure that it's getting you know,
Speaker 1: spent in the right way, that that the dollars are
Speaker 1: going to where they should go, and that ultimately states
Speaker 1: get to innovate with some of that money, get to
Speaker 1: look at conservation he's been themselves, and get to have
Speaker 1: us say in how that money spent. All right, everyone,
Speaker 1: I know you're enjoying the meat eater podcast, and you're
Speaker 1: especially enjoying it because it's free. And to keep it
Speaker 1: that way, we've got to take a quick break to
Speaker 1: thank our sponsors. What what will happen if it doesn't
Speaker 1: get renewed. I think you have a short term in
Speaker 1: the long term, so right now the money from that
Speaker 1: there's a trust and the money's there, and uh, I think,
Speaker 1: you know, I'm not that's in the long term. Um,
Speaker 1: in the long term, the very very long term, it
Speaker 1: could go away. In the short term, you know, people
Speaker 1: are going to continue working with it on you know,
Speaker 1: the way that it is. It's interesting when you bring
Speaker 1: that up. The Endangered Species Act hasn't been reauthorized in many,
Speaker 1: many years. But you know, you can see that the
Speaker 1: Endangered Species Act, it's it's still there. It just but
Speaker 1: it wasn't but it wasn't set to be finite, right
Speaker 1: or was it. I'm not sure as far as finite.
Speaker 1: You mean the land Wanted Conservation Fund and years and
Speaker 1: they got renewed for twenty five years. So you know,
Speaker 1: Dave's gonna have to jump in here with me on
Speaker 1: this one. But in general, these you know, these acts,
Speaker 1: they do have a time frame mount them. They have
Speaker 1: a you know, Uh, I don't know if sunsets the
Speaker 1: right where because the act doesn't go away, but they
Speaker 1: you know, they have a situation where there's an anticipated
Speaker 1: date where you're going to come back and take a
Speaker 1: look at it. If changes are not made, it continues
Speaker 1: status quo. Um. But but when that date hits, it's
Speaker 1: an opportunity to take a look at those acts and
Speaker 1: to see you know, that was the way that they
Speaker 1: were designed, is that there would be changes to them
Speaker 1: that that you know, as we grow, as it's just
Speaker 1: you know, as a nation, you know, we update those
Speaker 1: things for the future. So do you think it's gonna
Speaker 1: get Do you think it'll I know it's hard to
Speaker 1: predict this, but will that funding come back and will
Speaker 1: continue to be able to make improvements with public access
Speaker 1: and and do these kind of things. I think conservation
Speaker 1: is too important to everybody in the nation that for
Speaker 1: for people not to to work on that issue. And
Speaker 1: I don't think any of us, you know, sitting around
Speaker 1: this table know exactly what it's gonna look like. Um,
Speaker 1: But I think that it I think I anticipated being there. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I hope that people take the time to notify their
Speaker 1: representatives and them know how they feel about it, because,
Speaker 1: like you're saying, it is just a by parton issue
Speaker 1: that it seems to have overwhelming support. You know, it's
Speaker 1: important for sportsman. I just wish they would get it,
Speaker 1: you know. I hope they get a squared away. I
Speaker 1: trust they'll get squared away. UM, run out little bit
Speaker 1: of time. But I got a couple of things Governor got.
Speaker 1: There's two main things. One you gotta make it that
Speaker 1: um that wilderness lands aren't closing nonresident hunters. This should
Speaker 1: be the main thing you work on. My crayons broke.
Speaker 1: There are thing it would be helpful, to be honest,
Speaker 1: is if there's a state law that everybody had to
Speaker 1: buy a hunt eat T shirt. Ya. Do you have
Speaker 1: any uh You've been quiet through this whole thing. You
Speaker 1: got any observations or questions? J honest? Not in particular,
Speaker 1: UM honest. And I lived the wolf issue UM NonStop
Speaker 1: through questions that come in from viewers of the show
Speaker 1: and listeners and people who are trying to make sense
Speaker 1: of something that seems like a pretty complex issue. And
Speaker 1: it is very difficult. I've found it very difficult to explain.
Speaker 1: My kid the other day asked where planets come from.
Speaker 1: It would be easier to explain that than the wolf
Speaker 1: fish you but you don't, so you don't have uh,
Speaker 1: you don't have concluding thoughts hounds. Oh, I didn't know
Speaker 1: we started on concluding thoughts. Well, yeah, I mean, you know,
Speaker 1: we have limited time with the governor and we've used
Speaker 1: it up. So if you have lay some concluding thought.
Speaker 1: Everybody gets a chance to concluding thoughts. It's it's a
Speaker 1: tradition here. Do someone else have them right at the
Speaker 1: tip of their telling. We'd like to start concluding thought.
Speaker 1: This is a man who hasn't spoken word. Yeah, do
Speaker 1: you have any thoughts? I'm pretty proud of of not
Speaker 1: having anything to say. That means that governor did a
Speaker 1: great job. Man talking right now. I used to be
Speaker 1: the you were you were one of the lead lawyers
Speaker 1: or the lead lawyer for Wyoming Fishing Game. I represented
Speaker 1: the woman gaming fish for a number of years. It's
Speaker 1: interesting stories. There were some fun stories there. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: you got any concluding thoughts? Uh? But you can be
Speaker 1: you can take the form of a question. No. I
Speaker 1: mean you know when I when I hear the conversation
Speaker 1: and it does uh, it reminds me of of things
Speaker 1: we wrestle with in the military. And and then the
Speaker 1: thing that I love about this conversation is that you know,
Speaker 1: the state's autonomy throughout the country I think is such
Speaker 1: a critical part of who we are as a country.
Speaker 1: And and that the folks, as we were saying, the
Speaker 1: boots on the ground know what's going on in their terrain.
Speaker 1: I mean that the the number of times my teammates
Speaker 1: and I were in some austere, inexplicable cultural region in
Speaker 1: the world that that no one really had good perspective
Speaker 1: on other than the folks living there, and then us
Speaker 1: that we're standing there and trying to communicate that back
Speaker 1: to a leadership and say, hey, this decision we know
Speaker 1: needs to be made, and then get pushed back or
Speaker 1: some type of an argument for somebody that's sitting in
Speaker 1: you know, an air conditioned office trying to trying to
Speaker 1: tell you how to do your job would make you
Speaker 1: an absolute crazy person trying to trying to affect change
Speaker 1: that you know what it takes. So when I hear
Speaker 1: any issue that's coming from the folks that are, in
Speaker 1: my mind, the trigger pullers, the people that that live
Speaker 1: it every day, it's uh, it's unbelievably frustrating to see
Speaker 1: that those voices aren't the the absolute you know, flag bears,
Speaker 1: because those are the folks that understand that those ones
Speaker 1: that are there. So it's been a treat to listen
Speaker 1: to the governor talk about, uh this within this state,
Speaker 1: and I would I would imagine all the Western state
Speaker 1: governors know the exact same that they know what they need,
Speaker 1: they know what needs to happen in their own backyard,
Speaker 1: and I think the support needs to be there for it. So, uh,
Speaker 1: those are my thoughts. You know, I understand the frustration
Speaker 1: if I concluding thoughts. You know, I think, um, I
Speaker 1: think all of us agreeing. I think this is the
Speaker 1: exciting part when you start talking about these issues. I
Speaker 1: believe that there's wide consensus for the importance of conservation
Speaker 1: wildlife and opportunities to go out and joy it. And
Speaker 1: I think, you know, talking about these issues too often,
Speaker 1: I think we let divisiveness rule the day, and uh,
Speaker 1: I think we're we have a unique opportunity in America
Speaker 1: right now and certainly here in my own and we
Speaker 1: recognize that opportunity to kind of bring everybody back to
Speaker 1: the center and say, hey, let's let's look take a
Speaker 1: look at these things that are important to all of us,
Speaker 1: and let's make sure that they work and that we
Speaker 1: project into the future the values that are important to us,
Speaker 1: that we you know, make sure that our you know,
Speaker 1: kids have places to recreate, we have healthy wildlife populations,
Speaker 1: and then we have an opportunity to enjoy these things.
Speaker 1: And I think that for me has been the exciting,
Speaker 1: you know part and the and the part that where
Speaker 1: it's been a privileged to work with the governors because
Speaker 1: I know that that's uh, that's consensus around you know,
Speaker 1: the people that I get an opportunity to work with
Speaker 1: is recognizing that importance. And it's just just it's a
Speaker 1: really sharp group and it's a privilege to work on
Speaker 1: those issues and to work with him on those issues. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's one of thing I see that I get this.
Speaker 1: This will stay in it as my concluding thought, it's
Speaker 1: two part one one um watching some of these issues,
Speaker 1: it is nice to see that there are some people
Speaker 1: out there who are striving for compromise and going for
Speaker 1: a consensus. I think that the divisiveness around some of
Speaker 1: these wildlife issues comes down to UM and I'm in
Speaker 1: many ways guilty this myself. Um, and I try to
Speaker 1: crack it all the time. It comes down to where
Speaker 1: you're putting together your worldview based on very limited conversations
Speaker 1: that you're having with a very limited group of people,
Speaker 1: and you're you, you end up existing in these little
Speaker 1: echo chambers. And if people would take the time and
Speaker 1: so and I'm speaking to myself as much as any
Speaker 1: when it's not preaching, but take the time to go
Speaker 1: and really educate yourself yourselves about issues like you we're
Speaker 1: gonna take the gravel thing. Really educate yourself about the
Speaker 1: history of that species, where that species exists, now, where
Speaker 1: things stand. Get out of map, try to study the map,
Speaker 1: think of population dynamics, look at numbers, look at trends,
Speaker 1: and dig a little deeper than what you know your
Speaker 1: buddy at the bar might have told you. Um, it's
Speaker 1: so hard to do, but it's so rewarding, you know,
Speaker 1: when you take the time to do it, Um, Governor,
Speaker 1: you get that you get to conclude with your concluding thoughts.
Speaker 1: That's the powerful moment. Okay, well I'll do my best.
Speaker 1: Well let me I I do want to say starting out,
Speaker 1: what how grateful I am that you all are here
Speaker 1: and are covering this issue. And Roork is great to
Speaker 1: have you here. Thank you for your service. What what
Speaker 1: a honor to have you here with us. Really appreciate that. UM.
Speaker 1: I think it's been well said. But you know, UM,
Speaker 1: we can get in those echo echo chambers. But I
Speaker 1: do think there is a common perspective that most of
Speaker 1: us have, and we think about the next generation. And
Speaker 1: I started this conversation thinking about talking about my great
Speaker 1: grandparents and my great and father used to say in
Speaker 1: Wyoming and where you find one bladed grass leap too,
Speaker 1: And he was a ranch guy. But it's a theme
Speaker 1: that goes beyond ranching, and it goes to each of
Speaker 1: us have an obligation to leave the place a little
Speaker 1: better than we found him. And we think about that
Speaker 1: and not only in terms of just our legacy as citizens,
Speaker 1: but we think about it in terms of our our
Speaker 1: work as parents. You know, I want this place is
Speaker 1: to be special for my kids and grandkids and so
Speaker 1: on and so forth, and all of you do as well,
Speaker 1: and so conservation is something that is critical. And as
Speaker 1: a state, with the first national Park, in the first
Speaker 1: National monument um, you know, we take that very seriously.
Speaker 1: In Wyoming, and as Rourke said, we think we have
Speaker 1: expertise on him. And not only do we just claim
Speaker 1: that it's not a boast. Look at the state of
Speaker 1: Wyoming and look and see what we have done and
Speaker 1: see our history a d twenty five years, and we
Speaker 1: put an emphasis on that, uh and seeking that balance
Speaker 1: and seeking the right way to go, because in the end,
Speaker 1: when we leave these jobs that we have, we want
Speaker 1: to be able to say, you know, hopefully we have
Speaker 1: done our part to leave that next play to grasp.
Speaker 1: Hopefully we've done that part so that, you know, fifty
Speaker 1: years and now my kids will be teaching their kids
Speaker 1: or maybe their grandkids that first hunt and the ethics
Speaker 1: that goes with that, in the appreciation for the outdoors,
Speaker 1: the appreciation for the West and all that it brings,
Speaker 1: not just to those of us who are fortunate to
Speaker 1: live here, but how proud we are to show it
Speaker 1: off to the rest of the nation and the rest
Speaker 1: of the world. And it's a special trust that we
Speaker 1: have and we're obligated to preserve it. And UH, nobody
Speaker 1: has a greater invested interest and seeing that it's done
Speaker 1: right than those of us who live here, and certainly
Speaker 1: me as governor. Want to make sure that I do
Speaker 1: my part in that. So thank you both for being here.
Speaker 1: Great issue. And I thought I was gonna be able
Speaker 1: to talk about my alligator hunt. I thought I was
Speaker 1: gonna be able to talk about getting sprayed with a
Speaker 1: skunk here a couple of weeks ago, living and ranch
Speaker 1: my whole life Nember sprayed by a skunk. I got
Speaker 1: just I was like ground zero pingo, and my wife
Speaker 1: wouldn't let me in the house right out here here, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: right out right outside our window. I was just where
Speaker 1: was security? That's a damn good question. So I went
Speaker 1: out the sliding glass door, and you know, we have
Speaker 1: these little rabbits and I like seeing the little rabbits
Speaker 1: and her little bush movement. Oh there's gonna be a
Speaker 1: little rabbit down there. Direct hit. So I come in
Speaker 1: the house. My wife's like, get out of here. And
Speaker 1: what am I to do? I'm I'm I'm homeless. Now
Speaker 1: what do I I got hose by my own pepper spray?
Speaker 1: You know, I really a lot of like is not
Speaker 1: automatic aim on those. It's just well it was on
Speaker 1: my belt. It was on my belt. I threw. I
Speaker 1: was going through some thick brush. This the the switch
Speaker 1: depressed the button. It's like, I'm just trying. I mean,
Speaker 1: I know, I know consensus is on pepper spray, and
Speaker 1: I know this is gonna drive a live people does
Speaker 1: but I have now if you factored the number of
Speaker 1: days that you actually spend with pepper spray, I have
Speaker 1: been witnessed the three pepper spray accidents. I'm just really
Speaker 1: it's like I've been charged by one grizzly and I've
Speaker 1: seen three pepper spray accidents. Um, that's an accidental discharge,
Speaker 1: isn't that? That's a d I'm telling you that I'm
Speaker 1: doing some real soul searching about my my relationship with
Speaker 1: pepper spray. I decided a long time ago about my
Speaker 1: relationship with skunks. But um, and you feel free to
Speaker 1: share about your alligator hunt. I'm not here to cut
Speaker 1: you off. You're here to cut me off. Well, I
Speaker 1: said that in Jess. But I did have all the
Speaker 1: hunting I've done, and you know the hunting I do
Speaker 1: with my daughter and my son, and it's all in
Speaker 1: the West. But I did have occasion to go to
Speaker 1: Florida once and hunt alligators with a buddy of mine
Speaker 1: who was raised in Wyoming, and then he moved to
Speaker 1: Florida and in his words and short order, became a
Speaker 1: real expert in alligator hunting and in boat building. And
Speaker 1: so he built he built this boat that you know,
Speaker 1: we're going across the water and it's you go out
Speaker 1: at night, as you know, and you got the bottom
Speaker 1: of the boat's moving and I I have a fear
Speaker 1: of snakes, and so as we're going and we get
Speaker 1: further and then there's bushes on this side. I'm trying
Speaker 1: to decide, you know, recompense, say, worst case scenario, do
Speaker 1: I get in the water or do I get on
Speaker 1: land with the snakes. I never never got that. And
Speaker 1: then you get out the spotlight, you know, and that's
Speaker 1: how you see him. You see there's red eyes and
Speaker 1: you have a crossbow to get him. And uh uh
Speaker 1: the guy was with he got he went back the
Speaker 1: next trip and got a huge alligator. But for me
Speaker 1: from the west where you get natural and then all
Speaker 1: of a sudden, you have spiders and you have snakes
Speaker 1: and you have glowing red eyes. Uh, it made it.
Speaker 1: It made uh, you know, a skunk look like just
Speaker 1: a smelly nuisance, not something that's so that's a long
Speaker 1: way of saying you're not wearing alligator skin boots right now. No.
Speaker 1: That was the other thing is, you know I talked
Speaker 1: to my wife about hey, can I go and then uh,
Speaker 1: I came back and I didn't get an alligator, And
Speaker 1: she was like, I thought you were gonna I was
Speaker 1: gonna get a purse. I was, what's what's the deal?
Speaker 1: I sent you out there for three days that came
Speaker 1: back empty candid, So I'll go back one day, um
Speaker 1: or you just did some hunting. You want to quickly share?
Speaker 1: They were really gonna end this podcast. No, No, So
Speaker 1: I've got a couple more shots. But a friend invited
Speaker 1: me that he played football out at at Syracuse was
Speaker 1: where I played lacrosse. He's been hunting a canyon outside
Speaker 1: of Steamboat up in the Zirkel Wilderness area for fifteen years.
Speaker 1: They've just more than I would have said, Well, no,
Speaker 1: you're right. So you're right, you're right. Nonetheless, this guy's
Speaker 1: had tremendous, tremendous success. You know, they've they've seen it
Speaker 1: and and rarely seen other people. And when we showed
Speaker 1: up for the hunt, there, you know, nine vehicles at
Speaker 1: this trailhead that we even give us access to this region.
Speaker 1: So I think he was automatically dejected when we got
Speaker 1: there that we're gonna see more folks. We didn't see
Speaker 1: any other people, but we also didn't see a whole
Speaker 1: lot of elk. We got one cow close and it
Speaker 1: was my first archery hunt, so I was I was
Speaker 1: very excited, and uh, I'm I'm definitely taken by it.
Speaker 1: I'll be I'll be hunting with a bow for life again.
Speaker 1: But I'll also go with other means. But I've got
Speaker 1: a couple more chances before the season. Did you you
Speaker 1: got a little little excitement? You know, it's fine. I've
Speaker 1: had several people take take me on hunts. They're like,
Speaker 1: you're not gonna be able to control you know, your emotions.
Speaker 1: I said, I feel like I got a decent shot.
Speaker 1: You know, unlesson elk shows up with a with an RPG,
Speaker 1: it wouldn't be the first time I saw that either.
Speaker 1: So we'll see what happens here. You know, you joke
Speaker 1: about telling people you're hunting spot um my brother hit
Speaker 1: one of his pack lambas is missing out of rigs, Idaho,
Speaker 1: and he was trying to get me to online. Uh,
Speaker 1: somehow let's slip that my favorite elk hunting spot was
Speaker 1: right where his lamas missing, thinking that the huge influx
Speaker 1: of people that one of those guys would turn his lama. Um,
Speaker 1: but it's still missing. So if you're all by ricks
Speaker 1: Idaho and you see a lama run around, its name
Speaker 1: is Maggie. Um. Put some uh, put some marbles in
Speaker 1: a coffee can and shake it and Maggie will come
Speaker 1: running up grab it. It's my brothers. He's offering a reward. Um.
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening in again, govern Mead, thank you so
Speaker 1: much for coming on. Very generous your time. Um, that's it.
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