WEBVTT - Ep. 095: Inconvenient Critters 0:00:08.960 --> 0:00:13.320 This is me Eater podcast coming at you shirtless, severely, 0:00:13.480 --> 0:00:16.080 bug bitten, and in my case, underwear. Listening to Hunt 0:00:16.239 --> 0:00:21.160 Don't Meet e podcast, you can't predict anything presented by 0:00:21.440 --> 0:00:32.080 first light, Go farther, stay longer ed Arnett, I didn't 0:00:32.080 --> 0:00:35.040 know until I don't think I knew till now. He 0:00:35.159 --> 0:00:38.080 used to be a bat like a bat biologist. I did, 0:00:39.159 --> 0:00:41.200 But I just can't picture because I figured. I always 0:00:41.240 --> 0:00:46.280 figure you um that your biology interests are dovetailed with 0:00:46.320 --> 0:00:49.040 your hunting interests, but bats that's not really the case. 0:00:49.159 --> 0:00:52.720 They certainly were. I grew up always wanting to be 0:00:52.720 --> 0:00:55.240 a biologist and wanting to study big game like most 0:00:55.280 --> 0:00:58.840 biologist A lot of biologists do, and uh I F 0:00:59.040 --> 0:01:01.680 I did my master's on big orange cheap so I 0:01:01.760 --> 0:01:04.959 fulfilled that for a long time. And UH when I 0:01:04.959 --> 0:01:07.360 went to work at in the Pacific Northwest, I started 0:01:07.360 --> 0:01:10.000 working a lot more on nine game issues. And when 0:01:10.000 --> 0:01:13.360 I worked to work for Timber Company Warehouser, I really 0:01:13.400 --> 0:01:17.240 started engaging in bat research. My PhD was on UH 0:01:17.400 --> 0:01:20.160 bats and forest management did a lot of work on 0:01:20.200 --> 0:01:22.240 wind energy and bats. And before I came to t 0:01:22.360 --> 0:01:24.920 RCP and got to meet you, guys. I was running 0:01:25.480 --> 0:01:28.600 conservation programs for Bat Conservation International and led a bunch 0:01:28.640 --> 0:01:31.880 of research on wind energy and back kills across the country. 0:01:32.080 --> 0:01:35.160 So you mean like bats running into um windmills or 0:01:35.160 --> 0:01:37.639 not wind mills, but they're being hit by the turning blades. 0:01:37.720 --> 0:01:40.559 They don't run into them. Bats have a very unique 0:01:40.600 --> 0:01:43.720 echolocation system and they helps them sea in the dark. 0:01:44.480 --> 0:01:46.319 And if there's too many of them that run into things, 0:01:46.319 --> 0:01:49.040 there would be what I'd call losers and Darwin's causino. 0:01:49.360 --> 0:01:53.000 They're not supposed to run into things, so they're getting 0:01:53.080 --> 0:01:56.920 hit by the turbans. So what was what was wire 0:01:56.960 --> 0:01:59.400 Houser's interest in bats? So you know, like if you 0:01:59.480 --> 0:02:03.760 if for you listeners, if you got a ream of 0:02:03.880 --> 0:02:06.160 printer paper laying around, there's a very good chance if 0:02:06.200 --> 0:02:08.079 you go look at that printer paper, it will say 0:02:08.120 --> 0:02:13.079 wire Houser on it was their interest in UH in bats. 0:02:13.160 --> 0:02:18.040 So back in when I UH finished up my graduate 0:02:18.080 --> 0:02:20.400 program on my big run Cheap study, I went to 0:02:20.440 --> 0:02:22.520 the Northwest and I was working for the Forest Service, 0:02:23.200 --> 0:02:25.720 then went to work with Warehouser. The reason I mentioned 0:02:25.720 --> 0:02:28.440 the Forest Service job as I started that literally a 0:02:28.480 --> 0:02:31.520 month after they listed the Northern spot at owl and 0:02:31.600 --> 0:02:36.720 a couple of years later, um I uh I basically 0:02:37.240 --> 0:02:42.560 um applied for this job and got it, and um 0:02:42.600 --> 0:02:45.920 you know, at that time, spotted owl's were driving a 0:02:45.919 --> 0:02:50.000 lot of the issues for this forest product. Yeah, okay, 0:02:50.040 --> 0:02:52.000 good ahead, I got a comment. But it's an endangered 0:02:52.040 --> 0:02:56.240 species issue. And so my job we were hired on 0:02:56.360 --> 0:02:59.200 basically to look at all of the managed forest and 0:02:59.200 --> 0:03:02.519 all the different kind is wildlife that use managed forests, 0:03:02.520 --> 0:03:06.560 and how in fact managed forest provide habitat or don't, 0:03:06.960 --> 0:03:09.279 and what we could do in a in a intensively 0:03:09.320 --> 0:03:12.600 managed forest context to manage all these species that could 0:03:12.639 --> 0:03:15.560 be listed in the future. Back at that time they 0:03:15.600 --> 0:03:18.960 were called Category two species, which all that really meant 0:03:19.040 --> 0:03:21.480 was there was a designation that they could be listed 0:03:21.480 --> 0:03:24.880 in the future. So Warehouser hired a bunch of people, 0:03:25.320 --> 0:03:28.920 myself included, to look at things beyond just spotted owl 0:03:28.919 --> 0:03:33.960 another endangered species issues because in their mind, all the 0:03:34.000 --> 0:03:37.920 trouble that spotted owl, all the controversy and trouble and 0:03:38.280 --> 0:03:41.720 just bad for business stuff that the spotted owl brought 0:03:41.760 --> 0:03:46.160 onto the logging industry, they were thinking of themselves, what's 0:03:46.240 --> 0:03:48.040 the next thing that's going to come up, and how 0:03:48.080 --> 0:03:50.160 can we get out ahead of that. That's exactly right, 0:03:50.200 --> 0:03:53.040 which is like being a responsible player, right, Yeah, exactly. 0:03:53.600 --> 0:03:56.200 They were thinking ahead of the game, whatever their regardless 0:03:56.240 --> 0:03:58.640 of their motivation. Of the motive. Yeah, obviously there were 0:03:58.680 --> 0:04:02.960 business ties to that, community relationships and those kind of 0:04:03.000 --> 0:04:04.840 being good neighbors and that kind of stuff, but the 0:04:04.880 --> 0:04:07.440 reality was it was all about you know, the future, 0:04:07.480 --> 0:04:11.560 licensed to operate and at that time and there still 0:04:11.600 --> 0:04:14.200 are today a number of species that are potentially going 0:04:14.240 --> 0:04:16.200 to be listed. So I did most of my work. 0:04:16.240 --> 0:04:19.039 I shifted from most of the work on four legged 0:04:19.120 --> 0:04:22.440 ungulets and you know, other four legged critters to nothing 0:04:22.480 --> 0:04:26.919 but songbirds, amphibians in stream amphibians in particular those that 0:04:27.040 --> 0:04:31.800 utilize small streams and forests, and bats. So that's how 0:04:31.839 --> 0:04:34.719 I got into it. And uh, one thing led to 0:04:34.720 --> 0:04:38.120 another and started working pretty intensively on bats and developed 0:04:38.120 --> 0:04:41.760 a PhD dissertation project on it, and the rest is history. 0:04:41.839 --> 0:04:44.640 So what was the what was the vulnerability of the bats? 0:04:44.640 --> 0:04:47.360 Like what was the harvest timber? Harvests? Like they were 0:04:47.400 --> 0:04:49.279 what do they needed? What were they using timber for? Next? 0:04:49.480 --> 0:04:52.960 What they need? Yeah, they need them for roosting. Um 0:04:53.120 --> 0:04:57.960 for both maternity roots where they have their young. Yeah, 0:04:58.000 --> 0:05:01.240 some old roots behind x full eating bark. So the 0:05:01.279 --> 0:05:04.040 crevices in bark. And you've seen this walking around the woods, 0:05:04.440 --> 0:05:08.240 dead trees, they'll go into woodpecker holes. Sometimes they'll uh 0:05:08.320 --> 0:05:10.640 just a just a slight crack and a live tree 0:05:10.760 --> 0:05:13.640 can create a place for bats. So they either roost 0:05:13.680 --> 0:05:16.840 during the night, you know, they do what's called night roosting. 0:05:16.839 --> 0:05:19.800 But they also have maternity colonies. And sometimes you'll be 0:05:19.839 --> 0:05:22.000 walking around next time you're out to Ponderosa Pine forest, 0:05:22.040 --> 0:05:24.080 you might see a big slab of bark peeling off 0:05:24.160 --> 0:05:26.400 of dead tree. There might be two or three hundred 0:05:26.440 --> 0:05:29.360 bats under that thing, just depending on how big their 0:05:30.440 --> 0:05:34.120 what species of bat is this so um, it could 0:05:34.160 --> 0:05:36.800 be any any of a number of species. There's what 0:05:36.839 --> 0:05:40.120 we call the crevice roosting species, and that could be 0:05:40.160 --> 0:05:43.120 anything from big brown to little brown bats. What's called 0:05:43.120 --> 0:05:45.400 the long eared myotis. That was the pictures you were 0:05:45.400 --> 0:05:48.280 looking at a little while ago in my house. That 0:05:48.400 --> 0:05:52.039 was a long eared myotis getting a drink of water. Uh. 0:05:52.120 --> 0:05:55.120 There's several of them that use uh use those crevices. 0:05:55.160 --> 0:05:56.880 I'm guilty of having not paid a whole hell of 0:05:57.000 --> 0:05:59.840 attention to bats in my life. I didn't either take 0:06:00.200 --> 0:06:02.440 like I got that hunting fishing problem that you get, 0:06:02.440 --> 0:06:06.760 where like I I spent a lot of time observing, 0:06:06.839 --> 0:06:12.520 thinking about, reading about talking about game, either game species 0:06:12.920 --> 0:06:20.039 or like charismatic animals. Right, so animals that maybe animals 0:06:20.040 --> 0:06:23.839 that sort of have something to do with hunting and fishing, 0:06:23.839 --> 0:06:27.080 even if they're only a peripheral player. Right, Like I'm 0:06:27.080 --> 0:06:31.799 not gonna hunt humpback whales, but I'm interested in humpback 0:06:31.800 --> 0:06:36.880 whales because when I'm out fishing salmon and haliban and whatnot, 0:06:37.000 --> 0:06:40.680 I'm observing humpbacks and watching them fish, and so they 0:06:40.800 --> 0:06:44.039 sort of enter my consciousness. Right, But like, the bat 0:06:44.200 --> 0:06:47.720 has never had a real in hold with me, and 0:06:47.720 --> 0:06:49.280 and it does it for most people. I mean, most 0:06:49.360 --> 0:06:50.960 hunters probably wondering if they could hit him with a 0:06:51.000 --> 0:06:53.280 shotgun when they're running around in the evening, you know. 0:06:53.440 --> 0:06:58.640 But the reality is they're ridiculously important to ecosystems, and 0:06:58.839 --> 0:07:01.640 the insectivorous bad to eat insects at a rate that 0:07:02.360 --> 0:07:07.680 can all oftentimes render the uh U render That's maybe 0:07:07.720 --> 0:07:10.800 not the right word, but lessen the need for pesticides 0:07:11.120 --> 0:07:15.560 and in agricultural systems because they eat so many insects. 0:07:15.640 --> 0:07:18.120 There's some studies in Texas that demonstrate it's into the 0:07:18.200 --> 0:07:22.160 multi billions of dollars in terms of loss or the 0:07:22.160 --> 0:07:28.120 reduction of agricultural pests. Um they but they also important pollinators. 0:07:28.160 --> 0:07:31.640 They're important seed dispersers across the world. They eat just 0:07:31.720 --> 0:07:35.880 about everything, those that eat blood, those that eat fish. 0:07:35.960 --> 0:07:39.520 Some have specialized hooks for catching fish. All the bad 0:07:39.600 --> 0:07:42.520 pictures you've seen around my players there, they're all insectivorous bats, 0:07:42.560 --> 0:07:45.440 but they play a vital role. And you know, the 0:07:45.480 --> 0:07:48.560 interesting thing, we started calling things like this. You know 0:07:48.600 --> 0:07:51.520 you've heard LBJ the little brown jobs for dickey birds. 0:07:51.680 --> 0:07:53.960 Oh yeah, and then uh and then in the LBMs 0:07:54.120 --> 0:07:58.040 in mycology lb M little brown mushrooms, little brown mushrooms. 0:07:58.040 --> 0:08:00.480 Like if you're out mush mushroom hunting and you see 0:08:00.520 --> 0:08:03.360 a little brown mushroom, it's like, just keep walking. You'll 0:08:03.400 --> 0:08:06.640 never positively identify that thing. Or that's kind of like 0:08:06.680 --> 0:08:12.920 the just a term like we got your you know, morals, corals, bleats, LBMs, 0:08:13.360 --> 0:08:15.920 little brown mushroom. We started calling bats and other things 0:08:16.000 --> 0:08:20.800 like them. They are not so charismatic, microfuno. But they're critical. 0:08:20.920 --> 0:08:24.040 They're absolutely critical. And it started, Yeah, I start getting 0:08:24.040 --> 0:08:28.280 you to think about ecosystems and and you know, biological 0:08:28.320 --> 0:08:32.600 communities and systems. Everything's interconnected. Elder Leopold called the cogs 0:08:32.640 --> 0:08:35.800 and wheels, cogs on the wheels exactly right. You know, 0:08:35.880 --> 0:08:39.240 I was in Um, I was in the say shells. 0:08:40.200 --> 0:08:42.280 You know where to say shells are like they sit 0:08:42.360 --> 0:08:45.559 off if you imagine if you went due east out 0:08:45.559 --> 0:08:49.360 of Somalia, wig at hell in the Indian Ocean. To 0:08:49.440 --> 0:08:51.679 say shells are so far removed that no one even 0:08:51.760 --> 0:08:54.880 knew they had never been colonized. No one knew about 0:08:54.920 --> 0:08:58.640 them until they came up with like intercontinental shipping. Like 0:08:58.720 --> 0:09:01.800 no indigenous people as wasn't like the Polynesian Islands, where 0:09:01.800 --> 0:09:04.880 indigenous people eventually found all the like Hawaii and everything. 0:09:05.320 --> 0:09:07.400 No one ever stepped foot on the stay shells until 0:09:07.440 --> 0:09:09.240 someone showed up in like in a full on ship. 0:09:09.880 --> 0:09:11.520 No one knew they were there, but we were there. 0:09:12.600 --> 0:09:15.720 The only native mammal on the say shells is the bat. Yeah, 0:09:15.920 --> 0:09:19.520 big huge freaking bats. Yeah that's what they were. Come 0:09:19.520 --> 0:09:21.360 out at night, look like a jet, like a bat 0:09:21.440 --> 0:09:23.640 the kind of bat that would like bite your neck, 0:09:23.640 --> 0:09:27.960 could kill you, but not like fruit in in some 0:09:27.960 --> 0:09:30.360 some countries are still consumption of bats. Yeah, that was 0:09:30.400 --> 0:09:31.839 one of the few times I ever paid attention to 0:09:31.920 --> 0:09:33.880 a bat. And my kids like to go on They 0:09:33.960 --> 0:09:36.160 like it to me to go on YouTube and pull 0:09:36.240 --> 0:09:41.440 up videos of Aboriginal Australians hunting baths boomerangs, which is like, 0:09:41.480 --> 0:09:44.040 if you've got kids, that's big ship to a kid. 0:09:45.040 --> 0:09:48.240 Hit the back of the boomerang is endlessly fascinating to children. 0:09:48.280 --> 0:09:50.680 That's a hell of a lot of skill to These 0:09:50.679 --> 0:09:53.559 guys are good man. They round them up and cook them. Um, 0:09:53.760 --> 0:09:56.160 So we have like I can't remember where we left 0:09:56.160 --> 0:09:59.719 off we're talking to we're talking about stage gross. Yes 0:09:59.760 --> 0:10:01.679 you want, I gotta I know where we're left off. 0:10:01.840 --> 0:10:06.920 Go ahead, I wrote it down. How long ago was 0:10:06.920 --> 0:10:09.200 it that we had a sage grouse conversation? A year 0:10:09.240 --> 0:10:12.840 ago and maybe a month? Okay, so we're doing a 0:10:12.920 --> 0:10:16.880 year ago checking on something. And here's why, here's why 0:10:16.920 --> 0:10:19.200 you should care. Here's why you should care about stage grouse. 0:10:20.400 --> 0:10:23.880 Besides the fact that it's just like a it passes 0:10:23.920 --> 0:10:26.160 the test that I put out earlier. The test I 0:10:26.160 --> 0:10:28.760 put out, We're like, I'm interested in things that have 0:10:28.880 --> 0:10:32.360 hunting efficient implications. So there's that with sage grouse. So 0:10:32.440 --> 0:10:35.280 you know, this is a game bird, the largest grouse 0:10:35.360 --> 0:10:39.600 species we have. Um, it's a very it's an iconic 0:10:39.760 --> 0:10:45.440 bird that is symbolizes is kind of of a symbol 0:10:45.480 --> 0:10:48.000 of a certain biome or a certain habitat type of 0:10:48.040 --> 0:10:52.079 the great sage brush sees um. And also it's really 0:10:52.120 --> 0:10:54.640 important to watch because earlier we're talking about the spotted out. 0:10:54.760 --> 0:10:59.000 If you're only remember the spotted owl debate, the spotted 0:10:59.000 --> 0:11:02.440 owl be kind of came to this sort of bird 0:11:02.679 --> 0:11:06.120 that was a proxy for a broader argument. And the 0:11:06.160 --> 0:11:12.000 broader argument was about, um, to what level do we 0:11:12.160 --> 0:11:18.400 inconvenience are commercial activities? To what degree are we willing 0:11:18.440 --> 0:11:23.599 to inconvenience are commercial activities out of deference to wildlife? 0:11:23.960 --> 0:11:27.280 Is that fair? Ed? That's very fair. So it became 0:11:27.320 --> 0:11:30.400 like it became this symbol of a national debate about 0:11:31.040 --> 0:11:33.559 if we had to turn we can make money doing something, 0:11:33.679 --> 0:11:38.640 but that we're gonna we're gonna we're gonna perhaps lose 0:11:38.920 --> 0:11:43.440 species of wildlife in order to make that money. Is 0:11:43.480 --> 0:11:46.080 it worthwhile or not? Like do we push ahead or 0:11:46.080 --> 0:11:49.280 do we pull back? And it was sad for the 0:11:49.280 --> 0:11:51.360 bird because here's this bird has no idea any of 0:11:51.400 --> 0:11:53.680 this is going on. But the bird becomes like a 0:11:53.760 --> 0:11:59.439 maligned creature. Yeah, the bird becomes like the punchline to 0:11:59.520 --> 0:12:03.760 a joke or a threat. Sure, there was a lot 0:12:03.800 --> 0:12:05.680 of that going around in the nineties. Yeah, and it 0:12:05.720 --> 0:12:08.880 want to be like the bird's reputation kind of suffered 0:12:09.200 --> 0:12:11.080 and in a way, like if you think about these 0:12:11.120 --> 0:12:13.559 sort of debates, we're sort of in a current thing 0:12:13.640 --> 0:12:18.560 now with you know, we're security now like gray wolves, okay, 0:12:18.960 --> 0:12:21.439 where the gray wolve sort of stands in as a 0:12:21.559 --> 0:12:25.840 symbol of this bigger argument about do are we gonna 0:12:25.880 --> 0:12:29.280 allow an animal beyond the landscape that is so inconvenient 0:12:29.320 --> 0:12:33.040 to some people live Like it's an inconvenient to livestock 0:12:33.040 --> 0:12:35.559 producers and a lot of hunters perceived it as being 0:12:35.640 --> 0:12:38.439 very inconvenient to them, And so what is our tolerance 0:12:38.520 --> 0:12:41.520 level going to be of this species? And it suffers 0:12:41.520 --> 0:12:44.000 in a similar way that the spotted owl suffering. It's 0:12:44.000 --> 0:12:46.760 always sad to see this happen where the wolf, like 0:12:46.800 --> 0:12:52.079 this animal that cannot that would be incapable of comprehending 0:12:52.080 --> 0:12:55.360 the debate that he's in. Like wolves exist without the 0:12:55.440 --> 0:12:59.080 knowledge that this conversation is taking place. They don't know. 0:12:59.640 --> 0:13:02.120 They have know, like if they don't know anything else 0:13:02.200 --> 0:13:04.760 of the world, to be on their own experience. Like 0:13:04.800 --> 0:13:07.720 if you ask a wolf in Wyoming, he doesn't know 0:13:07.760 --> 0:13:10.199 that there's a bunch in Alaska, but they're missing from 0:13:10.200 --> 0:13:12.120 other areas. It's just like way outside. He just like 0:13:12.200 --> 0:13:15.080 understands his little realm. But meanwhile we're talking about them. 0:13:15.160 --> 0:13:17.800 Is this big and become this big single and it 0:13:17.920 --> 0:13:20.800 becomes something that winds up being like the animal itself 0:13:20.840 --> 0:13:23.840 becomes controversial when all he's doing is putting us in 0:13:23.840 --> 0:13:27.800 a situation where we need to discuss our tolerances, but 0:13:27.840 --> 0:13:30.839 he becomes sort of a victim of it. That's all 0:13:30.880 --> 0:13:32.680 like a preface to say that right now, if you 0:13:32.679 --> 0:13:35.559 want to understand wildlife politics and kind of where we're 0:13:35.600 --> 0:13:38.000 headed and the kind of conversations that we're going to 0:13:38.080 --> 0:13:43.360 continue to have, the current version, the current spotted out 0:13:43.360 --> 0:13:45.760 like today's spotted out real quickly, wad what happened to? 0:13:45.840 --> 0:13:48.360 How's the spotted all doing now? Is he good? No? 0:13:48.600 --> 0:13:52.680 They're not off the list? Um and just to add 0:13:52.679 --> 0:13:54.520 one quick thing to that. You know, they became the 0:13:54.559 --> 0:13:59.520 poster child, and in my view, um really kind of 0:14:00.040 --> 0:14:02.240 zembled the metaphor if you can't see the forest because 0:14:02.240 --> 0:14:05.320 of the trees in Freddy and everybody focused on spotted owls, 0:14:05.360 --> 0:14:09.320 but it was really about that ecosystem and about accelerated 0:14:09.360 --> 0:14:12.360 harvest of old growth forest and how important old growth 0:14:12.400 --> 0:14:15.800 forests were. We learned a lot about, you know, at 0:14:15.800 --> 0:14:18.559 that time, there wasn't an immense amount of research, particularly 0:14:18.600 --> 0:14:20.880 in managed forest, and I think we learned a lot about, 0:14:21.560 --> 0:14:25.680 you know, how you can manage structural features and habitat 0:14:25.800 --> 0:14:30.000 features for the animal without necessarily having older forests, but 0:14:30.120 --> 0:14:34.200 you have older forest conditions. And but what I think 0:14:34.240 --> 0:14:36.960 a lot of people realized in with the spotted owl 0:14:36.960 --> 0:14:39.680 as the poster child, that this is about an ecosystem 0:14:39.680 --> 0:14:42.880 that's vital to so many different creatures and you can 0:14:42.920 --> 0:14:45.800 manage you can you can preserve old growth forest, but 0:14:45.840 --> 0:14:49.640 you can also learn and also manage for habitat in 0:14:50.080 --> 0:14:52.440 managed forests as well. Yeah, and in the same way 0:14:52.440 --> 0:14:56.240 that that spotted owl became a poster child or symbolic 0:14:56.320 --> 0:15:00.160 of old growth forest, we're gonna talk about now like 0:15:00.360 --> 0:15:02.800 with sage grouse. The sage grouse is sort of standing 0:15:02.840 --> 0:15:07.080 in as this as the poster child of sagebrush. Yep, 0:15:07.400 --> 0:15:10.000 and like a better one. I think that would ring 0:15:10.080 --> 0:15:12.640 with more people. Perhaps would be if the if, the 0:15:12.720 --> 0:15:17.680 if the American prong horn or antelope. We're in as 0:15:17.800 --> 0:15:21.160 rough of a spot as the as the sage grouse is. 0:15:21.240 --> 0:15:23.760 I think people might be seeing this different, more well 0:15:23.800 --> 0:15:27.160 known creature and kind more like there's just like kind 0:15:27.200 --> 0:15:30.520 of like a cooler it's just bigger, it's more recognizable. 0:15:31.480 --> 0:15:33.840 You know, you should picture people that animal. They're gonna know. 0:15:34.440 --> 0:15:36.680 To start a conversation about stage grouse, you almost gotta 0:15:36.720 --> 0:15:38.800 be like, okay, here's what one looks like, because a 0:15:38.760 --> 0:15:42.400 lot of people don't really know, right. But to wrap 0:15:42.480 --> 0:15:45.680 up the point I was making earlier and leading into this, 0:15:45.680 --> 0:15:50.640 this conversation that we're having about in like economically inconvenient 0:15:50.720 --> 0:15:55.640 animals and what and how much do we curtail activities 0:15:55.640 --> 0:15:59.240 in order to ensure that we don't drive species to extinction, 0:15:59.640 --> 0:16:02.200 and we about extinction, it's we're talking about making things 0:16:02.200 --> 0:16:07.840 gone forever. This conversation will always be going on. It's 0:16:07.880 --> 0:16:12.240 just the players will change. That's right on the wildlife 0:16:12.240 --> 0:16:15.600 and the human front. Yeah, the wildlife. And it's good 0:16:15.640 --> 0:16:18.120 because you know what at a time, if we hadn't 0:16:18.160 --> 0:16:22.480 figured out electricity, um, and we were driving and when 0:16:22.520 --> 0:16:26.120 we were driving uh, some whales to extinction and driving 0:16:26.160 --> 0:16:28.360 some whales to near extinction in order to make fuel 0:16:28.400 --> 0:16:32.520 oil for city lamps, we would have been having this 0:16:32.600 --> 0:16:36.240 conversation in the eighteen hundreds instead of what we did. 0:16:37.040 --> 0:16:42.720 But the whale was saved by electricity or probably no, yeah, 0:16:42.760 --> 0:16:44.600 by the other thing. No, not electricity, yeah, but but 0:16:44.840 --> 0:16:49.640 fossil fuels. So, which is at the heart of this discussion, 0:16:49.680 --> 0:16:51.880 which we exchanged what you have to bring even more 0:16:51.920 --> 0:16:53.680 full circuit wines about this. So we're gonna talk about 0:16:53.680 --> 0:16:55.760 stage grouss. But remember we're talking about stage guss. We're 0:16:55.760 --> 0:16:59.040 talking about a current version of something that will always 0:16:59.040 --> 0:17:02.760 be happening in our society, in our country, which is 0:17:02.760 --> 0:17:08.040 a country that places a tremendous value on wildlife and 0:17:08.119 --> 0:17:14.760 also we play a tremendous value on economic prosperity. You know, Um, 0:17:14.800 --> 0:17:17.440 if I may, before I tell you where we left 0:17:17.480 --> 0:17:20.639 off and start into that. You also made a point 0:17:20.640 --> 0:17:23.199 in the last podcast that really hammers home on this 0:17:23.359 --> 0:17:26.240 because you were talking about you'd think if you went 0:17:26.280 --> 0:17:28.359 to the Philippines or some other place you could just 0:17:28.440 --> 0:17:32.119 catch the hell out of fish, and not always the case. 0:17:32.920 --> 0:17:36.879 And there's that linkage between, uh, that social and economic 0:17:36.920 --> 0:17:40.760 component with conservation that's vital. I mean, we want wildlife 0:17:40.760 --> 0:17:44.159 in this country. We have um a variety of laws 0:17:44.200 --> 0:17:48.119 and principles that we work from to keep wildlife. We have, 0:17:48.480 --> 0:17:51.640 you know, the legacy at Theodore Roosevelt and and all 0:17:51.680 --> 0:17:54.439 of the people that he worked with and we're colleagues with, 0:17:54.520 --> 0:18:01.280 and thereafter that, you know, define that social um desire 0:18:01.359 --> 0:18:04.919 to have wildlife in our landscapes, and then we've been 0:18:04.920 --> 0:18:07.479 trying to figure out that economic balance ever since. But 0:18:07.800 --> 0:18:11.040 make no mistake, if we had five million people in 0:18:11.040 --> 0:18:13.520 the US and hardly any resources, we wouldn't have very 0:18:13.520 --> 0:18:15.760 many wildlife either. That's the funny thing I find like 0:18:15.800 --> 0:18:18.000 this is uh, you know, like guys that like to 0:18:18.000 --> 0:18:21.800 get all ready for like societal collapse, like prepper type 0:18:21.800 --> 0:18:25.359 of guys there are real fired up about having the 0:18:25.440 --> 0:18:27.960 right kind of hunting guns. Like you see him online 0:18:28.000 --> 0:18:32.119 debating like what's the perfect gun for post apocalyptic hunting scenarios. 0:18:32.720 --> 0:18:37.240 It'd be like, dude, post apocalyptic scenarios or like societal 0:18:37.359 --> 0:18:43.080 collapses in failed states generally mean there is no wildlife. 0:18:43.600 --> 0:18:46.680 You don't have a failure, you don't have like robust 0:18:46.720 --> 0:18:50.800 wildlife within a failed state. That's right, the first thing 0:18:50.840 --> 0:18:52.800 that goes And that was your point. What was I 0:18:52.840 --> 0:18:54.960 thought about that? Well, that was the whole point of 0:18:55.119 --> 0:18:58.360 I thought. You know, the discussion about the Philippines where 0:18:58.400 --> 0:19:01.080 you're talking about going fishing and hard to confine the 0:19:01.160 --> 0:19:04.920 fish because they poperished scenario I was reading on. I 0:19:05.000 --> 0:19:09.440 just turned into the frontier days again are coming through 0:19:09.440 --> 0:19:11.600 the road. You know this one guy, this one prep 0:19:11.640 --> 0:19:13.640 rouse reading no one time he was talking about he's 0:19:13.680 --> 0:19:15.720 like laying it out for his buddies and he's like, hey, 0:19:15.760 --> 0:19:18.680 here's the thing though, man, in a real post apocalyptic, 0:19:19.320 --> 0:19:22.840 you know, societal collapse scenario, you need a gun that's 0:19:22.840 --> 0:19:25.639 real good for rats and dogs. Because he was like 0:19:25.800 --> 0:19:27.960 he's planning on he's gonna be eating these rats, but 0:19:28.000 --> 0:19:30.040 he thinks that the dogs are gonna be out trying 0:19:30.040 --> 0:19:32.159 to kill you, that the dogs are gonna pack up. 0:19:32.200 --> 0:19:34.920 Like this is the level of detail, like like like 0:19:34.920 --> 0:19:38.000 like prepper guys get into He's got it all sorted out. 0:19:39.119 --> 0:19:41.439 But all right, so a year ago, where was the 0:19:41.680 --> 0:19:43.320 Can you just lay out for me what's going on 0:19:43.400 --> 0:19:46.159 with stage grouse? Okay, what's going on in general? What 0:19:46.280 --> 0:19:48.560 was going on a year ago? And then we're gonna 0:19:48.560 --> 0:19:51.360 focus on what happened since a year ago. Okay, So 0:19:51.880 --> 0:19:54.280 when you and Ronnie were out hunting and we hooked 0:19:54.320 --> 0:19:57.920 up and talked about stage grouse, it was days literally 0:19:58.040 --> 0:20:02.639 days after the um decision was made as a not 0:20:02.760 --> 0:20:05.920 warranted decision by the Fish and Wildlife Service to list 0:20:06.119 --> 0:20:09.280 and provide protections under the Endangered Species Act for sage grouse, 0:20:09.920 --> 0:20:14.800 meaning they they looked at the stage grouse issue and 0:20:14.800 --> 0:20:17.320 tried to figure out, like, do we need to make 0:20:17.840 --> 0:20:22.159 give them a Danger Species Act protection? Correct all the 0:20:22.240 --> 0:20:24.840 numbers and said, you know what, we thought we might 0:20:24.960 --> 0:20:27.800 need to, but we don't. Well they didn't run. They 0:20:27.880 --> 0:20:30.000 ran a lot of numbers, but there was a lot 0:20:30.040 --> 0:20:32.000 that went into that that we'll get into on what 0:20:32.040 --> 0:20:35.200 it took to get to that decision. But not everything 0:20:35.320 --> 0:20:37.359 was in place, and that's why it's so important for 0:20:37.400 --> 0:20:40.720 our talk today about what still isn't yet in place 0:20:40.800 --> 0:20:44.040 per se and what's being considered. But what led up 0:20:44.080 --> 0:20:47.240 to that where decades of research, a lot of concern 0:20:47.320 --> 0:20:50.919 back at the nineties from biologists not not not you know, 0:20:51.480 --> 0:20:54.719 uh ngo, I got it's killing me. I gotta interrupt. 0:20:54.760 --> 0:20:58.479 You go ahead. Can you back up a hundred fifty years? 0:20:58.760 --> 0:21:02.840 Oh man? Not not detail level, but tell how like 0:21:03.119 --> 0:21:05.000 I know it's impossible staying and like this kind of 0:21:05.040 --> 0:21:09.280 question drives biologist nuts. How many of these birds were there? 0:21:09.520 --> 0:21:14.480 Where were they living? And how much has their habitat 0:21:14.520 --> 0:21:17.359 been reduced? And how much has their numbers been reduced? 0:21:17.400 --> 0:21:19.199 So people kind of understanding, well, how this even came 0:21:19.240 --> 0:21:22.880 to be? Yep, Um, they are an obligate of sage brush, 0:21:23.000 --> 0:21:27.880 which means they cannot live without sage brush in their lives. 0:21:27.960 --> 0:21:31.040 So you didn't have them in the east or the south, 0:21:31.200 --> 0:21:33.080 or in Illinois or you know, in the mid heart 0:21:33.080 --> 0:21:36.639 of the Midwest, you know. So so went the stage 0:21:36.680 --> 0:21:40.440 grounse as sage brush did. So they were everywhere where 0:21:40.520 --> 0:21:42.760 there was sage brush. And at that time there were 0:21:42.760 --> 0:21:47.400 fourteen states I believe at least three provinces um that 0:21:47.480 --> 0:21:51.800 had extensive sage brush habitat. There was an estimate, and 0:21:51.840 --> 0:21:53.480 I remember we talked about this because you asked me 0:21:53.480 --> 0:21:57.040 if I knew where the sixty million bisons figure came from. 0:21:57.160 --> 0:22:00.880 It was gues estimated. I'll say, at best sixteen million 0:22:01.119 --> 0:22:03.439 stage grouse at the turn of the century, you know, 0:22:04.000 --> 0:22:06.760 you know, before the turn of the century, before Europeans, 0:22:06.880 --> 0:22:10.760 who knows if in the sagebrush like portions of the 0:22:10.800 --> 0:22:14.240 sage brush sees were like the hundredth meridian in west, 0:22:14.880 --> 0:22:17.040 in the Great Plains and in the Great Basin. Yep, 0:22:17.400 --> 0:22:21.399 that's right, and they no longer exists in three states, 0:22:21.440 --> 0:22:24.200 and now we have them in eleven states. It's estimated 0:22:24.240 --> 0:22:28.080 that about fifty of the habitat has been lost, and 0:22:28.119 --> 0:22:30.280 that was one of the metrics that led the service 0:22:30.359 --> 0:22:33.840 to consider the species for listening. They've lost half their habitat. 0:22:33.880 --> 0:22:37.960 It's been fragmented, it's been degradated. Um, there's all kinds 0:22:38.000 --> 0:22:40.879 of threats to the remaining habitat, and the numbers have 0:22:40.920 --> 0:22:43.560 been going down for a long time now, as you 0:22:43.600 --> 0:22:49.000