WEBVTT - Ep. 69: A Private Versus Public Debate & Studying Land Use at UC Berkeley 0:00:00.400 --> 0:00:02.920 Hey, it's the Hunting Collective and I've been a Brian. 0:00:03.240 --> 0:00:06.560 Another week coming at you, another great episode. We've got 0:00:06.680 --> 0:00:10.119 a little round table discussion on private land and public 0:00:10.200 --> 0:00:13.760 land and the culture significance of those two things. And 0:00:13.800 --> 0:00:15.360 there's a little bit of a debate going on that 0:00:15.400 --> 0:00:20.319 we address with Steve Rinella, Mark Kenyan, Sam Longer, and myself, uh, 0:00:20.360 --> 0:00:22.799 talking about all lands and that they matter. And then 0:00:22.840 --> 0:00:26.479 we're gonna travel on into Berkeley, California, So you see 0:00:26.480 --> 0:00:30.280 Berkeley and talk to Professor Luke McCulley about his work 0:00:30.920 --> 0:00:34.400 as a range land ecologist and working. Uh they did 0:00:34.400 --> 0:00:37.320 a study on private lands and how we use them, 0:00:38.200 --> 0:00:40.279 how we lease them, how we own them, and why 0:00:40.320 --> 0:00:43.400 they're important. So hopefully you stick around for all of that. 0:00:43.560 --> 0:00:48.280 But before we get to that, it's summertime, man, and uh, 0:00:48.320 --> 0:00:51.320 that's the time you should be thinking about Yetti Yetie coolers, 0:00:51.479 --> 0:00:53.120 to be exactly, and it makes a lot of things. 0:00:53.120 --> 0:00:54.640 If you go to yeti dot com you'll find that 0:00:54.640 --> 0:00:56.800 they make lots and lots of things. And nobody has 0:00:56.800 --> 0:00:58.920 really given me the products to talk about in these 0:00:58.960 --> 0:01:00.480 little bits. But I'm gonna tell you right now that 0:01:00.480 --> 0:01:04.880 the hopper flip eighteen is my favorite thing this summer, 0:01:05.360 --> 0:01:08.399 and there's a lot of reasons. One, I can put 0:01:08.400 --> 0:01:10.920 a lot of beer in it. It's also durable. I 0:01:10.920 --> 0:01:12.880 can we can put it in the drift boat, we 0:01:12.920 --> 0:01:14.679 can put it in the back of the truck. Well, 0:01:14.720 --> 0:01:17.319 I can load it up and sling it over my shoulder, 0:01:17.560 --> 0:01:21.360 carried to the river's edge, and my little boys throwing 0:01:21.400 --> 0:01:23.800 his snoopy line in the water and I'm there drinking 0:01:23.800 --> 0:01:27.480 beer while he's doing it. It's just the best portable 0:01:27.480 --> 0:01:30.800 cooler on the market in my opinion. It also comes 0:01:30.800 --> 0:01:33.679 in hopper flip twelve and it's just the best thing 0:01:33.760 --> 0:01:38.880 for summer weekends drinking beer, hanging out. I recently got 0:01:38.920 --> 0:01:42.080 sent the charcoal version, which I think is pretty hot. 0:01:42.319 --> 0:01:46.240 But there's also the fog gray, Tahoe blue original Yetie 0:01:46.240 --> 0:01:48.640 hopper that's been around forever. So go to Yettie dot 0:01:48.640 --> 0:01:50.520 com check out the hopper, Filip eighteen and all their 0:01:50.520 --> 0:01:53.800 other products. Thank those folks for being a partner of 0:01:53.800 --> 0:01:57.520 the show and making cool products for the summertime, which 0:01:57.560 --> 0:02:01.960 is right now. So out further Ado, we're gonna get started. 0:02:02.600 --> 0:02:07.120 Let's go. I guess I grew up on an older 0:02:07.360 --> 0:02:10.480 road appared through the meadows. I always did what I 0:02:10.639 --> 0:02:14.280 told until I found out that my brand new closed 0:02:14.280 --> 0:02:17.399 a game second hand from the rich kids next door. 0:02:17.680 --> 0:02:20.200 And I grew up fast. I guess I grew what 0:02:20.360 --> 0:02:22.679 I mean. They have a thousand things inside of my 0:02:22.720 --> 0:02:25.320 head I wish I ain't seen, and now I just 0:02:25.520 --> 0:02:28.519 wanted through a real bad dream or being and like 0:02:28.720 --> 0:02:31.760 I'm coming a part of the seams. But thank you 0:02:32.000 --> 0:02:36.320 Jack Daniel. No, hey, everybody, welcome to the Hunting Collective. 0:02:36.520 --> 0:02:39.000 I'm Ben O'Brien, and this is you're gonna be listening 0:02:39.040 --> 0:02:42.320 to this one seven nine nineteen. We get a bit 0:02:42.360 --> 0:02:44.920 of a round table of sorts here today in the 0:02:44.960 --> 0:02:49.120 meat eater offices. We'll start to my right with the man. 0:02:49.800 --> 0:02:55.480 Uh they called Stephen Renel Steve, Yeah, right here, and 0:02:55.480 --> 0:02:59.680 then it's Mark Mark Mark Mark, My first time in 0:02:59.680 --> 0:03:02.240 the news studio to this. This is very nice. Do 0:03:02.280 --> 0:03:09.799 you feel that Steve takes over the questions? I'll talk 0:03:09.919 --> 0:03:14.360 later about it. Uh. Do you feel that the that 0:03:14.480 --> 0:03:17.239 the placement of the some of the artworking here is 0:03:17.280 --> 0:03:22.880 too close together? It's very I do. For example, right there, 0:03:23.000 --> 0:03:25.800 I see that I'd like a gap. I also noticed 0:03:25.840 --> 0:03:30.560 that there's zero white tail content. Of course you do. Yeah, 0:03:30.560 --> 0:03:35.200 but there's like, I mean, there's zero zebra content, but 0:03:35.320 --> 0:03:40.000 still there's not hunters. Aren't zebra hunters? Just giving our 0:03:40.040 --> 0:03:42.640 context of our conversation, I think that, Yeah, but there's 0:03:42.680 --> 0:03:46.800 no pictures of anyone doing anything. Yeah, there's turkeys, there's 0:03:46.840 --> 0:03:50.960 plane crabs, there's planes, pro planes, mountain. I like that 0:03:51.000 --> 0:03:54.760 there's blue crabs because I'm one horn going on in here, 0:03:55.080 --> 0:03:56.880 and there's just a little bit of a moose antler 0:03:56.920 --> 0:04:00.920 in that one. There's buffalo behind us. Oh yeah, well 0:04:01.000 --> 0:04:03.720 it's it's very stylized. It doesn't that. I mean, it's 0:04:03.720 --> 0:04:06.440 a big controversy here about Steve. You were the one 0:04:06.480 --> 0:04:10.080 that kind of envisioned the collage. I'm not really open 0:04:10.120 --> 0:04:16.080 to any feedback about it. I mean, I think the spacing, 0:04:16.240 --> 0:04:18.800 the spacing, I'm open to feedback about it. Do you 0:04:18.839 --> 0:04:20.760 do you agree though, that some of these spots could 0:04:20.800 --> 0:04:23.520 be added a little bit? Yeah? No, I think that 0:04:23.520 --> 0:04:24.840 there needs to be a bigger gap. I was just 0:04:24.839 --> 0:04:26.360 curious because you said he hadn't been in here. I 0:04:26.360 --> 0:04:28.039 thought if you walked in, you were like, hey man, 0:04:28.200 --> 0:04:31.960 things a little tight, Yes, between the pictures. It's still 0:04:31.960 --> 0:04:33.760 got some filling into. You're not open to the feedback 0:04:33.800 --> 0:04:36.560 about the elements of the clause. No, I don't care. No. 0:04:37.120 --> 0:04:39.400 I mean, like I took the bull by the horns, man, 0:04:39.640 --> 0:04:42.599 you did it well. I mean it's not done yet. 0:04:42.680 --> 0:04:45.160 There's plenty of space to go. No, I don't really, 0:04:45.160 --> 0:04:47.560 I don't really care what anybody thinks about it. If 0:04:47.560 --> 0:04:49.640 someone else had had a great vision and executed, that 0:04:49.640 --> 0:04:51.039 would have been different. But it just sat here and 0:04:51.040 --> 0:04:55.920 then I executed. Moving on. I like it. Sam Lunger's 0:04:55.920 --> 0:05:00.880 here too, howdy and uh Phil, Hey, morning afternoon. I 0:05:00.920 --> 0:05:06.360 think it's morning still. Why is Phill here? Phil? I've 0:05:06.360 --> 0:05:08.760 been asking that a question every week. This is Phil's 0:05:08.800 --> 0:05:12.040 third straight appearance on The Hunting Collective that I got 0:05:12.040 --> 0:05:15.160 my first email about Phil today. The gentleman rode In 0:05:15.200 --> 0:05:18.320 said he really likes Phil. Keep mind, it feels great. 0:05:18.839 --> 0:05:22.960 This is a data informed Yeah, we're listening this. This 0:05:23.040 --> 0:05:26.000 is it's a two way conversation. Yeah. On the show, Um, 0:05:26.080 --> 0:05:28.320 we're gonna talk about we have lots of perspectives here, 0:05:28.320 --> 0:05:32.559 which is always good. We're gonna talk about private land 0:05:33.480 --> 0:05:36.360 and public land on the show. We got I went 0:05:36.400 --> 0:05:38.479 all the way to Berkeley, California to talk to this 0:05:38.560 --> 0:05:42.360 dude named Luke McCauley who's a cooperative extension specialist at 0:05:42.440 --> 0:05:45.040 you see Berkeley, and he put out a study on 0:05:45.640 --> 0:05:49.039 public or private land uses in this country with a 0:05:49.080 --> 0:05:51.599 lot of really cool statistics. So we're gonna get into 0:05:51.640 --> 0:05:54.240 that later on. There's a lot He's got piles and 0:05:54.240 --> 0:05:57.120 piles of stats on how many acreage, how much acreage 0:05:57.120 --> 0:05:59.200 in this country is least for hunting, how much is 0:05:59.200 --> 0:06:02.560 privately owned for the purpose of hunting, for what that 0:06:02.640 --> 0:06:05.680 means in a lot of ways. That is good stuff, 0:06:05.920 --> 0:06:09.839 and we'll we'll preface that with a few things. But 0:06:10.360 --> 0:06:12.920 Luke McCauley coming up soon. But before we get to that, 0:06:13.800 --> 0:06:17.720 there's been a thing in the hunting world recently where 0:06:17.760 --> 0:06:20.640 we celebrate public lands. We all agree that public lands 0:06:20.640 --> 0:06:25.719 are fantastic. Steve. Yeah, And you look like a real 0:06:25.839 --> 0:06:29.279 tool with a private land owner T shirt, though, I 0:06:29.400 --> 0:06:31.599 though I have seen guys who wear one in jazz. 0:06:31.680 --> 0:06:33.600 But it looks like you're bragging. Looks like you're bragging. 0:06:34.279 --> 0:06:38.200 You are bragging, like there's doesn't just look like a 0:06:38.200 --> 0:06:41.240 T shirt company just released a shirt last week on 0:06:41.279 --> 0:06:43.760 this whole issue. And the the front looks just like 0:06:43.800 --> 0:06:46.479 the public land shirt public landowner shirt from b h A, 0:06:46.800 --> 0:06:51.040 but it says private land leacy. That's funny. Yah uh 0:06:51.920 --> 0:06:55.000 yeah that you're not bragging in no, but it's it's 0:06:55.040 --> 0:06:58.480 definitely speaking to the phenomena of the public land excitement 0:06:58.480 --> 0:06:59.880 and that shirt and stuff, and this is a ray 0:07:00.240 --> 0:07:02.040 to that because you get to hunt public land. You 0:07:02.080 --> 0:07:06.000 just go there and hunt. Yeah, that's exciting. I don't know, 0:07:06.120 --> 0:07:07.960 is it exciting to go somewhere and pay a guy 0:07:08.000 --> 0:07:10.800 to let hunt? I would rather not That guy sounds 0:07:10.800 --> 0:07:13.920 excited about it. Well, I've I've I've hunted. I've hunted 0:07:14.000 --> 0:07:16.120 least property and had a great time. Hut my friends 0:07:16.160 --> 0:07:18.040 private ranches and farms and have a great time. I 0:07:18.040 --> 0:07:19.800 have a great time. I don't feel all like proud 0:07:19.800 --> 0:07:22.640 and excited about it. You don't feel like you you 0:07:22.640 --> 0:07:25.240 don't feel like you'd wear that T shirt only land 0:07:25.240 --> 0:07:28.840 owner t shirt. Yeah, but I mean between my place 0:07:28.880 --> 0:07:33.160 in Alaska, I'm I owned two point six so does 0:07:33.200 --> 0:07:36.760 that count as a private land? My dad owns two 0:07:36.800 --> 0:07:39.360 point five and I was see, I always enjoyed hunting that, 0:07:39.440 --> 0:07:42.240 but it wasn't a lot of opportunity. Yes, you got 0:07:42.360 --> 0:07:46.239 point one acres. Sam's father. I killed my first deer 0:07:46.280 --> 0:07:48.880 on my family's three point two acre property. You really 0:07:49.160 --> 0:07:52.920 did it run over the fence? It did? So the 0:07:52.960 --> 0:07:56.160 statute of limitations on that though, huh. And my dad 0:07:56.240 --> 0:07:58.600 was really stressed out because I had a flashlight and 0:07:58.640 --> 0:08:01.600 we're walking down to try to find it that night. 0:08:01.640 --> 0:08:05.559 He's got put that flash down. Put that flashlight down, neighbor. 0:08:07.120 --> 0:08:10.720 It's not worried. I got to go night vision. So 0:08:11.320 --> 0:08:14.040 in this study, there's a bunch of good numbers, but 0:08:14.680 --> 0:08:18.640 the analysis of thirteen nationwide studies over about I think 0:08:18.880 --> 0:08:23.120 about eleven years. There's a lot of regional things, and 0:08:23.120 --> 0:08:25.880 we're all kind of live in and are from different regions, 0:08:25.920 --> 0:08:28.800 and I have our our perspective are colored by these regions, 0:08:28.800 --> 0:08:33.079 but tend to eleven percent the land area of the South, Midwest, 0:08:33.120 --> 0:08:37.640 and Northeast are owned primarily for hunting, and that's primarily 0:08:37.720 --> 0:08:42.319 then private land ownership and leasing, while less than one 0:08:42.320 --> 0:08:44.880 percent of the land of the West is owned for hunting. 0:08:46.840 --> 0:08:49.240 So there's a lot of a lot of differences. Mark, 0:08:49.280 --> 0:08:51.200 I want you to there's there's been a are you 0:08:51.200 --> 0:08:54.640 gonna tell people what um, like what it was that? God, 0:08:54.640 --> 0:08:58.400 it's even talking about this? Yeah, that's exactly what I'm sorry, Mark, 0:08:59.240 --> 0:09:02.079 can you tell what got us talking about this? Oh? 0:09:02.120 --> 0:09:04.200 You're doing it right now. Yeah, that's what I was doing. 0:09:04.440 --> 0:09:06.880 Interrupt You interrupted me while I was doing it. Yeah, 0:09:07.120 --> 0:09:10.440 you did like you had like a like a little approach. Yeah. Yeah, 0:09:10.559 --> 0:09:13.719 you're doing an approach coloring it. I was coloring the 0:09:13.720 --> 0:09:17.480 the topic. So you're talking about the Instagram post. Yes, okay, 0:09:17.800 --> 0:09:22.200 So there was an Instagram post from a guy in 0:09:22.240 --> 0:09:29.160 the hunting world, UM speaking to how much excitement and 0:09:29.360 --> 0:09:31.920 energy there is around the public land movement right, keep 0:09:31.960 --> 0:09:34.240 it public. There's a lot of energy their backgount, trunters 0:09:34.240 --> 0:09:38.360 and anglers just going full board, lots of membership, lots 0:09:38.400 --> 0:09:41.280 of interest. Everybody wants to wear these public landowner t 0:09:41.400 --> 0:09:45.160 shirts UM tagging their Instagram post keep a public, etcetera, etcetera. 0:09:45.679 --> 0:09:49.280 His point in his Instagram post was that, yeah, that's important, 0:09:49.440 --> 0:09:53.920 but let's not forget that the vast majority of the 0:09:54.000 --> 0:09:57.600 hunting happening east of the Mississippi is happening on private land, 0:09:57.800 --> 0:10:00.520 and the vast majority of the white tail hunt, which 0:10:00.600 --> 0:10:02.599 is somewhere around eight percent of all the hunters in 0:10:02.640 --> 0:10:06.280 the country, a very very important driver of conservation and 0:10:06.360 --> 0:10:08.840 the hunting based economy and all that. That's all happening 0:10:09.000 --> 0:10:12.160 the majority again on private land. So it was it 0:10:12.200 --> 0:10:17.640 was a pretty wine. It was whiny read very whiny, 0:10:18.000 --> 0:10:20.360 very well. I would personally say this, This guy's a 0:10:20.360 --> 0:10:24.800 friend of mine and I highly respect him. I would 0:10:24.840 --> 0:10:29.520 just say that, yeah, the way he framed it, I'd 0:10:29.559 --> 0:10:32.080 say that he could have framed it differently too. He 0:10:32.120 --> 0:10:34.040 had a good point, but I think that it came 0:10:34.080 --> 0:10:36.760 off whiny. Oh yeah, well he tagged us, Yeah, he 0:10:36.840 --> 0:10:41.080 tagged us. He's like, so that's how Like I can't 0:10:41.080 --> 0:10:43.200 remember who showed it to me. But what was funny 0:10:43.200 --> 0:10:46.120 about it was like someone showed it to us and 0:10:47.000 --> 0:10:48.480 I don't remember who. Who do you know who sent 0:10:48.520 --> 0:10:51.960 who showed it to us? And I was talking about 0:10:51.960 --> 0:10:53.679 I've told his story a couple of times, but it 0:10:53.840 --> 0:10:56.720 reminded me of a thing that was that was going 0:10:56.840 --> 0:11:03.800 on when the like a summer ago, maybe two summers ago, 0:11:04.800 --> 0:11:08.839 when the Black Lives Matter movement was really picking up, 0:11:09.320 --> 0:11:14.559 and I remember there's this cartoon, like a editorial cartoon, 0:11:14.600 --> 0:11:17.120 and I saw somewhere in the newspaper, and there was 0:11:17.200 --> 0:11:19.719 two guys standing there in front of their houses, and 0:11:19.840 --> 0:11:22.800 one of the houses is burning down, and its owners 0:11:22.840 --> 0:11:26.320 out front spraying a hose on the house that's burning down. 0:11:27.200 --> 0:11:30.120 But then the other the neighbor's house is not on fire, 0:11:30.559 --> 0:11:33.679 but the guys standing out there sprang a hose on 0:11:33.800 --> 0:11:35.719 his house that is not on fire. And the guy 0:11:35.800 --> 0:11:38.280 who's not whose house is not on fire, is saying 0:11:38.320 --> 0:11:40.439 to the guy whose house is on fire, Hey, all 0:11:40.480 --> 0:11:48.200 houses matter, so I U I said. When I saw this, 0:11:48.320 --> 0:11:50.600 I said to Ben so that I talked about how 0:11:50.600 --> 0:11:52.480 that reminded me of that, and Ben had a very 0:11:52.480 --> 0:11:59.280 good hashtag, which is all lands Matters matter. I think 0:11:59.320 --> 0:12:04.480 that's a good We quickly decided that it was not 0:12:04.559 --> 0:12:06.840 a good idea for fear to be seeming that we're 0:12:06.840 --> 0:12:09.120 making light of something that doesn't warrant being made light of. 0:12:09.480 --> 0:12:15.000 But yeah, it's like I think that no one's questioning 0:12:15.920 --> 0:12:18.280 right like right now. I mean, if the political cycle 0:12:18.280 --> 0:12:20.600 goal is certain directions, I can see this happenings, like 0:12:20.600 --> 0:12:24.480 the socialists takeover. But right now, no one's questioning the 0:12:24.600 --> 0:12:28.520 legitimacy of private land ownership in America. But they're questioning 0:12:28.520 --> 0:12:31.640 the legitimacy of federally managed public lands. They're like people 0:12:31.640 --> 0:12:35.960 like actively outright saying should we do this so that 0:12:36.120 --> 0:12:39.760 house is on fire. Yeah, that's directly where the public 0:12:39.840 --> 0:12:42.480 land movement is coming to, by the way, it's because 0:12:42.559 --> 0:12:46.320 it's because it is imperiled and people need needed at 0:12:46.320 --> 0:12:50.000 that At that moment when the keep it public hashtag 0:12:50.080 --> 0:12:54.679 started becoming big, it was very much um on on 0:12:54.720 --> 0:12:57.800 the line and people needed to get together and be like, hey, no, 0:12:57.920 --> 0:12:59.920 this is something we do want to preserve. This is 0:13:00.040 --> 0:13:02.320 awesome that anyone gets to go hunt here that you 0:13:02.360 --> 0:13:04.880 own title to that land as an American citizen. So 0:13:05.000 --> 0:13:08.040 his reaction from that so that that Instagram post felt 0:13:08.080 --> 0:13:11.199 like it really lacked a lot of historically. Let me 0:13:11.200 --> 0:13:15.280 give you a little bit from the Instagram post itself. Um, 0:13:15.440 --> 0:13:17.560 this person says, in my opinion, it's almost become a 0:13:17.600 --> 0:13:21.280 cult like mantra for a new, much needed but potentially 0:13:21.320 --> 0:13:24.520 misguided segment of hunters. I mean there's now more public 0:13:24.559 --> 0:13:28.600 land teachers out there than a van Halen tour and 0:13:28.679 --> 0:13:31.320 being a killer that I would have gone like, not 0:13:31.440 --> 0:13:37.760 van Halen. Yeah, that's a little context, man, It's a 0:13:37.760 --> 0:13:40.560 little bit if you wanted to go that era, you 0:13:40.559 --> 0:13:46.920 could have gone GNR. Yeah. But like yeah, as as 0:13:47.280 --> 0:13:53.760 you know what we're telling about, like Diamond Dave are Sammy, listen, 0:13:54.120 --> 0:13:56.160 look that I think the main thing here is like 0:13:56.200 --> 0:13:58.600 he's trying to color or there's a lot of people 0:13:58.600 --> 0:14:00.760 and I feel it it's legit, Mark, you tell me 0:14:00.800 --> 0:14:01.959 if I'm wrong. But I think there's a lot of 0:14:02.000 --> 0:14:03.839 people in the East, a lot of people in the 0:14:03.840 --> 0:14:05.480 white tail world, a lot of people in the South 0:14:05.640 --> 0:14:08.720 that are feeling a little bit left out of the party. 0:14:09.000 --> 0:14:11.480 That's that's what this is driving from A little bit. 0:14:12.920 --> 0:14:15.480 I don't get it, like left out of the party. Yeah, 0:14:15.559 --> 0:14:18.439 you're invited to the party, man to show up. Like 0:14:19.280 --> 0:14:22.320 if I smoke cigarettes and then people like then there's 0:14:22.360 --> 0:14:26.480 like cigar aficionado. I'm like, oh those guys that like, 0:14:27.280 --> 0:14:31.800 don't forget a lot of us like cigarettes. Who cares? 0:14:32.080 --> 0:14:34.800 Let me be Let me just if a guy or 0:14:35.240 --> 0:14:38.880 or a gal gets into hunting by listening to like 0:14:39.240 --> 0:14:41.360 someone who celebrates public land all the time, they get 0:14:41.400 --> 0:14:43.840 into hunting and their b h A and their TRCP 0:14:44.120 --> 0:14:46.160 and that this is the thing that they are introduced 0:14:46.200 --> 0:14:50.040 to hunting through that lens. This guy is saying, Hey, also, 0:14:50.840 --> 0:14:54.880 new guy, this is what I have to offer. I'm 0:14:54.880 --> 0:14:57.480 a white tail guy. If you have a lot, a 0:14:57.480 --> 0:15:00.720 lot of money, Is it not excuse me? Is it 0:15:00.800 --> 0:15:04.800 not well known that private land there's some pretty good 0:15:04.840 --> 0:15:07.760 hunting on private land, and is it not? Is it 0:15:07.840 --> 0:15:10.760 not well known that there is a thing called private 0:15:10.840 --> 0:15:12.920 land and you can buy it if you have the money, 0:15:12.960 --> 0:15:14.840 and it's nice if you can. And do you have 0:15:14.880 --> 0:15:18.040 to have that caveat in every discussion of public land, 0:15:18.040 --> 0:15:20.240 because I feel like that's what they're asking for. But 0:15:20.320 --> 0:15:23.040 that exists all the time. You hear any rhetoric coming 0:15:23.040 --> 0:15:25.200 out of b H A and TRC P, like you 0:15:25.280 --> 0:15:27.560 listen very long, they're all like Lantani says this all 0:15:27.560 --> 0:15:29.040 the time. He's like, hell, yeah, I'd like to have 0:15:29.080 --> 0:15:32.480 my own private ranch. Everybody would like that. Everybody hunt. 0:15:32.520 --> 0:15:35.240 Every hunter aspires to that, but many of us can't 0:15:35.240 --> 0:15:37.600 afford it because the prices have been going through the roof, 0:15:37.760 --> 0:15:40.000 and land has always been expensive. It's one of the 0:15:40.000 --> 0:15:44.680 only things that doesn't really depreciate. So I hunt private 0:15:44.760 --> 0:15:48.640 lands much of the public land. Everybody loves it. It's 0:15:48.640 --> 0:15:51.120 all about both. I'd like to keep this this going. 0:15:51.560 --> 0:15:55.240 This guy is saying that that the over uh emphasis 0:15:55.240 --> 0:15:58.880 on public land is hoping that we do not lose 0:15:58.920 --> 0:16:04.600 focus on what really impacts conservation. So I think what 0:16:04.920 --> 0:16:08.640 this is coming from this is like it's like when 0:16:08.720 --> 0:16:12.920 you have it's it's a cultural thing, and it's when 0:16:12.920 --> 0:16:15.800 a band gets really cool. There's sometimes a reaction to 0:16:16.000 --> 0:16:17.960 that band getting so cool and now you don't want 0:16:18.000 --> 0:16:20.480 to like it anymore. As I feel about Van Halen. Man, 0:16:20.480 --> 0:16:23.280 I feel like a lot of people, a lot of 0:16:23.280 --> 0:16:25.240 people are getting like into Van Halen and I'm kind 0:16:25.240 --> 0:16:27.360 of like, dude, man, it was cool when like you know, 0:16:28.040 --> 0:16:31.280 like a year ago, right, It's like it's like the 0:16:31.320 --> 0:16:33.640 bandwagon thing, like everyone like the Golden State Warriors got 0:16:33.720 --> 0:16:41.320 really great at basketball, and then everybody bring it back in, 0:16:41.720 --> 0:16:44.400 bring it back in. Mark is there is there a 0:16:44.440 --> 0:16:48.480 Warrior clan and this state, this sporting event you speak of, 0:16:49.520 --> 0:16:51.840 the team doesn't matter. I think I don't feel no 0:16:51.840 --> 0:16:53.640 no going on with the analogy, but I do think 0:16:53.680 --> 0:16:56.960 that there's sometimes people will become irritated with like the 0:16:57.040 --> 0:17:00.200 social energy around a thing because like everyone's seen SEMs 0:17:00.240 --> 0:17:02.000 to want to be a Golden State Warrior fan, in 0:17:02.040 --> 0:17:04.520 this case the social media. If you were to look 0:17:04.560 --> 0:17:07.439 at how much like excitement and energy and in in 0:17:07.680 --> 0:17:11.119 social plays there around public land stuff right now, it 0:17:11.160 --> 0:17:14.440 probably seems disproportionate to the amount of people that actually 0:17:14.520 --> 0:17:17.640 hunt public land or how much money gets spent on 0:17:17.800 --> 0:17:20.280 el consin Mulier hunts versus white to hunts out east. 0:17:20.280 --> 0:17:22.920 So there's some small loud not even loud, but there's 0:17:22.920 --> 0:17:25.439 some small minority of people that are just kind of like, 0:17:25.560 --> 0:17:28.280 this is annoying. There's my argument, takes your lease money 0:17:28.840 --> 0:17:31.600 and and buy gas and drive west and hunt public 0:17:31.680 --> 0:17:33.879 lands every year. And I'm not saying and I'm not 0:17:34.160 --> 0:17:36.280 but what why why is it annoying? Like I don't 0:17:36.320 --> 0:17:39.120 understand me? Well, so like you've got to like some 0:17:39.160 --> 0:17:41.840 people now find it like you're trying to be cool 0:17:42.200 --> 0:17:44.040 by talking about how much you on public land, or 0:17:44.080 --> 0:17:46.639 like public land hunters are somehow like, okay, let me 0:17:46.640 --> 0:17:49.639 take a step back. I do think that there is 0:17:49.680 --> 0:17:53.160 a little bit of a feeling like the Midwestern East 0:17:53.200 --> 0:17:57.560 Coast typical white tail hunter that public land Western guys 0:17:57.560 --> 0:18:01.240 our latest a little bit like we're better because we 0:18:01.320 --> 0:18:03.800 hike in fourteen miles and we hunt public land and 0:18:03.800 --> 0:18:06.239 we wear this shirt and everyone you know, it's it's 0:18:06.280 --> 0:18:08.000 a really cool thing to be a part of right now. 0:18:08.240 --> 0:18:12.280 So are there are people that uh wakeboard, Are they 0:18:12.359 --> 0:18:15.560 annoyed about how surfers like surfing? It could be, I 0:18:15.560 --> 0:18:18.080 don't know. And and the thing is the public land 0:18:18.119 --> 0:18:21.600 guys out west who here this kind of stuff think 0:18:21.720 --> 0:18:26.560 they're elitist because they have kind of resources or connections 0:18:26.600 --> 0:18:28.720 to be able to hunt private land. A lot of 0:18:28.720 --> 0:18:31.040 people would like to be able to do that, but 0:18:31.080 --> 0:18:33.840 they're they're finding a way to celebrate what was what 0:18:34.040 --> 0:18:37.000 used to be looked down upon as really second class. 0:18:37.200 --> 0:18:39.560 And I don't know. And no means am I defending 0:18:39.600 --> 0:18:42.000 this viewpoint. I'm just trying to explain what I think. 0:18:42.040 --> 0:18:43.800 There is a little bit of a feeling like why 0:18:43.840 --> 0:18:46.040 would someone make this new T shirt that says private 0:18:46.080 --> 0:18:49.040 land leaser on it, except for it's in spite of 0:18:49.320 --> 0:18:51.360 all these people think they're so cool wearing public land 0:18:51.359 --> 0:18:54.040 owner shirts. Well, guess what, you can be cool. No, 0:18:54.080 --> 0:18:56.640 that's not why. It's like like the guy that came 0:18:56.680 --> 0:18:59.040 to one of our live events with a private landowner 0:18:59.080 --> 0:19:03.000 T shirt, he just thought it was funny, right, He's like, nah, Yes, 0:19:03.280 --> 0:19:06.000 it's that kind of thing. But the thing is, well, 0:19:06.040 --> 0:19:08.719 go ahead, I'm just gonna say it's it's it's funny. 0:19:08.760 --> 0:19:11.200 But then it's also kind of making like a counterculture statement, 0:19:11.720 --> 0:19:14.240 like flipping the bird to everyone who thinks this is 0:19:14.280 --> 0:19:17.239 so cool. Here's what I'm gonna say. I have I 0:19:17.280 --> 0:19:23.080 struggle greatly with the elitist thing that makes absolutely absolutely 0:19:23.160 --> 0:19:25.760 no sense at all, Like you're talking about the most 0:19:25.800 --> 0:19:28.600 it's absurd. It's absurd. It's the most democratic thing that 0:19:28.640 --> 0:19:30.720 there ever was. And the person that says it's elitist 0:19:30.720 --> 0:19:32.280 could get in their car and drive and go do 0:19:32.359 --> 0:19:35.280 it tomorrow. Go on opening day, on opening day, go 0:19:35.359 --> 0:19:37.480 to Michigan. You know it well, you know all the spots. 0:19:37.720 --> 0:19:41.880 Go to Michigan and do a sort of economic portrait 0:19:42.560 --> 0:19:44.840 of the people who are hunting private land and the 0:19:44.840 --> 0:19:47.080 people who are running public land and find out what 0:19:47.119 --> 0:19:50.560 their annual salaries are and education levels. Okay, and then 0:19:50.600 --> 0:19:52.320 go tell me how elite is the guys are who 0:19:52.359 --> 0:19:54.600 are down at the state game. Give me a break 0:19:54.680 --> 0:19:56.600 and then and then go do that in Montana too, 0:19:56.600 --> 0:19:59.320 and it's gonna be a similar breakdown. Come on, I think. 0:19:59.640 --> 0:20:03.199 And again, I'm not saying this, I'm saying that I 0:20:04.359 --> 0:20:06.200 picked up vibes some people. I don't feel this way. 0:20:06.240 --> 0:20:09.640 But what I do think is that people public land 0:20:09.680 --> 0:20:12.359 hung is more difficult. Like there's a some cache that 0:20:12.400 --> 0:20:15.080 public land hunters are getting now right, So it's like 0:20:15.119 --> 0:20:17.560 a cool thing. It's it's a badge. It's a badge 0:20:17.600 --> 0:20:19.120 of honor to put on you, to say I killed 0:20:19.160 --> 0:20:21.920 this buck in public. It's it's I feel that it's. Yeah, 0:20:22.000 --> 0:20:25.720 And there are a thousand variables. There are a thousand variables, 0:20:25.760 --> 0:20:32.240 but uh, I would yes, I count it if I 0:20:32.240 --> 0:20:35.439 look at all the things, all the components, and and 0:20:35.520 --> 0:20:38.239 something like that happens. Like someone gets like a like, 0:20:38.280 --> 0:20:40.040 I like big meal of your bucks a lot. If 0:20:40.040 --> 0:20:42.440 someone gets a big meal to your buck and it's 0:20:42.480 --> 0:20:45.960 on an eight acre ranch, I don't have a how 0:20:45.960 --> 0:20:50.240 did that dude pull that off? If a guy gets, uh, 0:20:50.560 --> 0:20:52.440 you know, a big meal of your buck on over 0:20:52.480 --> 0:20:55.560 the counter tag and he's hunting BLM land down in 0:20:55.600 --> 0:20:59.399 Colorado and he does it again next year, I'm like, 0:20:59.440 --> 0:21:02.320 what does that guy have that I don't have? Guys 0:21:02.320 --> 0:21:04.199 a good hunter and that's why that's why when you 0:21:04.359 --> 0:21:09.120 describe a thing you killed, you you modify it with where, yeah, 0:21:09.240 --> 0:21:11.760 this is my public land buck. You know, you don't 0:21:11.800 --> 0:21:13.760 say this my private land buck, because it just what 0:21:13.800 --> 0:21:15.320 Steve is saying. If they had an eye on the 0:21:15.400 --> 0:21:17.760 back of its head, I'd talk about that too. But 0:21:18.040 --> 0:21:19.800 so I'm just saying I think that the people that 0:21:19.840 --> 0:21:22.280 do hunt thousand acre leases or that have their own 0:21:22.280 --> 0:21:27.080 private land, there's like some kind of maybe it's insecurity, 0:21:27.280 --> 0:21:29.920 maybe it's I don't know what it is, but there's 0:21:29.920 --> 0:21:32.480 some pushback there. Yeah, and you're just kind of hearing 0:21:32.480 --> 0:21:34.159 it rumbling around a little bit. And the shirt in 0:21:34.200 --> 0:21:37.480 this post, I think is just a sign of that 0:21:37.520 --> 0:21:40.080 in some way. I get it. But we used to 0:21:40.119 --> 0:21:42.440 hang out on national forest land when we were kids. 0:21:42.920 --> 0:21:45.520 We grew up right at the southern terminus of what's 0:21:45.560 --> 0:21:50.880 now the Hiawatha Manistee National Forest change names anyhow, signs 0:21:50.880 --> 0:21:53.440 just say mansty Still. But that's where we grew up, 0:21:53.520 --> 0:21:54.879 and we did a lot of hunting on it, and 0:21:54.920 --> 0:21:57.640 we did a lot of hunting on Harold zeldn Russ 0:21:57.640 --> 0:22:00.520 and Alan's are lots farms. I was are you aware 0:22:00.760 --> 0:22:04.719 of how and who Alan's air Lot and Harold Zelnus 0:22:04.720 --> 0:22:06.560 came to have their farm, and I was very aware 0:22:06.600 --> 0:22:08.760 of how they managed that farm and how it was 0:22:08.840 --> 0:22:11.080 financed and who owned it and all that kind of stuff. 0:22:11.200 --> 0:22:15.600 The National Forest people treated it like ship. It's where 0:22:15.600 --> 0:22:18.199 you went to shoot signs. It's where you went to 0:22:18.200 --> 0:22:21.439 take and run over signs. It's where you went to 0:22:21.480 --> 0:22:24.240 go bahan. It's where you went to do Kegger's and 0:22:24.280 --> 0:22:27.239 not clean up and burned tires, and you treated it 0:22:27.280 --> 0:22:29.880 as though it was just this thing that everyone took 0:22:29.920 --> 0:22:32.080 for granted, and no one knows where it came from, 0:22:32.240 --> 0:22:35.000 who the men and women who work to maintain it, 0:22:35.320 --> 0:22:37.919 how it came to be the fact that there's been 0:22:37.960 --> 0:22:45.240 an increasing awareness of the of the history, mechanics and 0:22:45.359 --> 0:22:50.880 funding of these places, and and gaining and establishing and 0:22:51.119 --> 0:22:55.639 uh promoting a deepened heightened respect for these places and 0:22:55.680 --> 0:22:58.520 taking some pride in these places. I don't think that 0:22:58.520 --> 0:23:01.760 that's a comment on the work that Alan Zerlot and 0:23:01.800 --> 0:23:04.119 Harold zeldn Russ did on their farm. It's not the 0:23:04.160 --> 0:23:11.920 same thing. Those places had a guardian. It's just different. Well, 0:23:12.080 --> 0:23:17.439 there's and and a win for public lands is a 0:23:17.440 --> 0:23:20.440 win for this person who made this post and everyone else. 0:23:20.680 --> 0:23:23.199 I mean, it's it's to say that it's only a 0:23:23.200 --> 0:23:25.280 certain type of people that can use this, or it's 0:23:25.320 --> 0:23:29.320 only accessible. It's the term access and many of almost 0:23:29.359 --> 0:23:32.080 all of these cases means anyone in the east, the South, 0:23:32.320 --> 0:23:34.119 if they can get to it, they can access it. 0:23:34.200 --> 0:23:36.760 So win for public lands is a win for this 0:23:36.800 --> 0:23:40.879 person who's hating on public lands. And I think, yeah, 0:23:40.960 --> 0:23:43.119 And I've had conversations with a couple of people that 0:23:43.160 --> 0:23:46.760 have articulated this, and I agree with you, Stephen and 0:23:46.920 --> 0:23:52.400 in your count bad about it. That's not publican but yeah, 0:23:52.560 --> 0:23:58.120 it's not. It's not um But yeah, I agree, it's 0:23:58.200 --> 0:24:02.400 it's all these lands matter. But there are these different, 0:24:02.440 --> 0:24:05.919 weird little social cliques and norms, and I think that 0:24:06.000 --> 0:24:10.199 this is more like that ephemeral type of issue, And 0:24:11.960 --> 0:24:15.280 there's something be said about how that impacts why someone 0:24:15.280 --> 0:24:18.600 would spend some time and energy posting a post like that. Yeah, 0:24:18.640 --> 0:24:22.640 I mean, I think there's there's all kinds of missions, 0:24:22.640 --> 0:24:24.919 there's all kinds of organizations, there's all kind of in 0:24:25.040 --> 0:24:28.399 Every person that gets connected to their mission wants people 0:24:28.400 --> 0:24:30.080 to come and be a part of that. If they 0:24:30.119 --> 0:24:34.240 see some energy stealing thing out there, they want to 0:24:34.280 --> 0:24:36.480 go and and either challenge. There's one way to approach, 0:24:36.560 --> 0:24:38.680 which is like this person didn't other people have his 0:24:38.800 --> 0:24:40.879 challenge it and say it's not his valid as you 0:24:40.880 --> 0:24:43.840 think it might be. Or there's other things to embrace 0:24:43.840 --> 0:24:45.479 it and say and try to be part of it 0:24:45.480 --> 0:24:48.960 and understand it, and that's probably the better way to go. 0:24:49.200 --> 0:24:52.160 I would think, you know, oh, I was gonna say, 0:24:52.160 --> 0:24:54.200 following up on what you were saying, Steve, that people 0:24:54.240 --> 0:24:57.400 treated like ship And that was my exact same experience 0:24:57.560 --> 0:24:59.560 growing up hunting a lot of public land. That it 0:24:59.640 --> 0:25:02.080 was just like, oh, this is the land that nobody wanted. 0:25:02.200 --> 0:25:04.560 Nobody he lays claim to and you can do whatever 0:25:04.600 --> 0:25:06.720 the hell you want. No one didn't treat it like 0:25:06.760 --> 0:25:09.359 it was there exactly. And so I think that's why 0:25:09.400 --> 0:25:12.720 this this public landowner movement has been so important and 0:25:12.760 --> 0:25:16.800 so impactful because it's reinforcing. I mean, I was there 0:25:16.840 --> 0:25:19.000 when they came up with the idea for that T shirt, 0:25:19.119 --> 0:25:22.040 and I immediately I was like, that's that's awesome. That's it. 0:25:22.080 --> 0:25:25.080 People are gonna love this that you know that you 0:25:25.160 --> 0:25:28.920 do you do own this as an American citizen legally speaking, 0:25:28.920 --> 0:25:31.359 people talk about it being federally owned or stayed owned. 0:25:31.400 --> 0:25:33.320 But you know, if you if you go back into 0:25:33.480 --> 0:25:36.240 kind of the legal under underpinnings, it's property of the people. 0:25:36.960 --> 0:25:40.639 And I think that pride is very healthy and I 0:25:40.680 --> 0:25:45.080 think it will improve help help those those lands UM 0:25:45.280 --> 0:25:48.119 become better places to hunt in places to fish if 0:25:48.160 --> 0:25:51.080 people give a ship and and pick up trash instead 0:25:51.119 --> 0:25:53.560 of leaving it, or encourage others not to just go 0:25:53.680 --> 0:25:57.480 planking and blowing up washing machines and and pro pain 0:25:57.560 --> 0:26:00.679 tanks out there, and and then you know, can be 0:26:00.720 --> 0:26:05.640 a more useful part of the overall conservation UM portfolio 0:26:05.720 --> 0:26:08.119 of an area, which includes private lands as well. But 0:26:08.200 --> 0:26:10.959 I think we can improve upon all sorts of wildlife 0:26:11.000 --> 0:26:13.879 populations and opportunities for more people if if people have 0:26:13.960 --> 0:26:17.920 that sense of pride surrounding public land. I was gonna say, 0:26:17.920 --> 0:26:19.880 I do think though there's something to be said about 0:26:20.280 --> 0:26:23.680 UM acknowledging the importance of work being done on private 0:26:23.760 --> 0:26:25.760 land too, and the fact that that does have big 0:26:25.760 --> 0:26:29.240 picture impacts on wildlife in the environment. And I think 0:26:29.600 --> 0:26:32.280 that that if you have private land that you own 0:26:32.400 --> 0:26:35.320 or steward like, you should be empowered and realize that 0:26:35.400 --> 0:26:37.040 the power that you have there and the impact you 0:26:37.080 --> 0:26:40.640 can have that whether it's twenty acres or two acres um. 0:26:41.560 --> 0:26:44.280 That stuff trickles over that stuff all like, like you've 0:26:44.280 --> 0:26:47.160 talked about the study that you spoke about with this gentleman, 0:26:47.680 --> 0:26:51.080 some of the very highest quality wildlife habitat out there, 0:26:51.119 --> 0:26:53.320 some of the best opportunities we have to preserve green 0:26:53.400 --> 0:26:56.960 space and places for animals to rome does exist on 0:26:57.040 --> 0:27:00.159 private lands. So of course in the country back set up, 0:27:00.160 --> 0:27:03.280 because we spend far more on private lands conservation than 0:27:03.320 --> 0:27:05.560 we do on public and private lands, and far more 0:27:06.080 --> 0:27:09.280 we've spend far more on wildlife habitat improvements on private 0:27:09.359 --> 0:27:11.280 lands as a nation than we do on public lands. 0:27:11.480 --> 0:27:15.120 If you're the components of the farm bill, that's a piece. 0:27:15.200 --> 0:27:17.000 So I think that I don't see that this. I 0:27:17.040 --> 0:27:18.800 mean it's great, and I think that you know, and 0:27:18.880 --> 0:27:21.400 when I have friends Matt cooked dug during, I could 0:27:21.480 --> 0:27:24.200 name on and on the own properties the primary purpose 0:27:24.280 --> 0:27:27.879 of that property being to produce good wildlife habitat. And 0:27:27.920 --> 0:27:31.520 I don't feel, um, I never get a sense from 0:27:31.560 --> 0:27:34.720 them people actively doing it. I don't get a sense 0:27:34.720 --> 0:27:37.600 from them that they feel like they're the unsung hero. 0:27:38.160 --> 0:27:42.120 Yeah right, I just feel like they do they're they're 0:27:42.480 --> 0:27:44.840 doing something and the people around them know they're doing 0:27:44.840 --> 0:27:46.560 it and doing it great. And I'll point out funnything 0:27:46.560 --> 0:27:49.240 about these two is these two people are also very 0:27:49.240 --> 0:27:51.560 concerned about the well being of public lands in this country. 0:27:51.960 --> 0:27:53.800 So they're putting their money where their mouth is on 0:27:53.920 --> 0:27:57.760 private lands. And they're also miraculously, somehow able to be 0:27:57.800 --> 0:28:00.200 concerned about both these things at once. And that's a thing, 0:28:00.280 --> 0:28:02.320 is that that's that's what this is about, right like, 0:28:02.640 --> 0:28:04.440 And the reason why I want to have this conversation, 0:28:04.480 --> 0:28:06.360 the reason why I went and spoke to Luke McCauley, 0:28:06.400 --> 0:28:09.120 is exactly that, like we know it's there. It's a 0:28:09.119 --> 0:28:12.840 fact that hunting is a great like property owned at 0:28:12.920 --> 0:28:17.640 least for hunting, provides a greater economic incentive to have 0:28:17.960 --> 0:28:22.240 large tracts of unfragmented land that's good for wildlife, that 0:28:22.280 --> 0:28:25.240 has good that that harbors good habitat for wildlife. We 0:28:25.359 --> 0:28:28.760 know that that's leasing and owning property does that in 0:28:28.840 --> 0:28:32.600 many ways, right So we can discuss that is just 0:28:32.640 --> 0:28:35.160 the same way we can discuss some of the benefits 0:28:35.200 --> 0:28:39.120 of having large tracts of public land. But what we 0:28:39.440 --> 0:28:42.240 sure as ship can't do is start putting them up 0:28:42.240 --> 0:28:44.800 against each other like they need to people one versus 0:28:44.840 --> 0:28:47.520 the other. We can't piece of puzzle, Yeah, pieces of 0:28:47.520 --> 0:28:49.520 a puzzle? Can I? Can I bring up two quick 0:28:49.520 --> 0:28:56.280 points please? As I've become more familiar with UM nonprofit 0:28:56.320 --> 0:29:01.040 conservation groups, I've been surprised to learn learned that there 0:29:01.160 --> 0:29:06.760 is a competitive atmosphere among nonprofits. People know who people 0:29:06.800 --> 0:29:10.360 who run nonprofits UM in the conservation space know that 0:29:10.440 --> 0:29:15.000 most people out there don't join ten groups. They join 0:29:15.120 --> 0:29:19.360 and donate to one or two, and they compete. Grant 0:29:19.400 --> 0:29:24.520 funding is finite. They compete for UH what they might 0:29:24.680 --> 0:29:28.040 view as customers. And so I feel that there's a 0:29:28.080 --> 0:29:30.560 little bit of that at play where people that are 0:29:30.600 --> 0:29:34.040 going over holy with their finances and time and volunteer 0:29:34.080 --> 0:29:38.800 work with a very dedicated UH public land agenda that 0:29:39.000 --> 0:29:42.600 other players in the conservation space would be challenged by 0:29:42.600 --> 0:29:46.040 that because it might automatically seem to exclude their interests. 0:29:46.360 --> 0:29:47.840 And then I'm just not like cold do that smokes 0:29:47.840 --> 0:29:49.400 too much weed? You know, I don't smoke weed at 0:29:49.440 --> 0:29:50.880 all when I say this, because I'm not going to 0:29:50.960 --> 0:29:53.440 get into great details about it. But there are a 0:29:53.440 --> 0:29:58.320 lot of very powerful political figures and business figures who 0:29:58.320 --> 0:30:02.520 are deeply intimid aided by the public land movement, and 0:30:02.680 --> 0:30:06.200 they find ways to go and attack people who are 0:30:06.320 --> 0:30:09.239 vocal about public lands. Ben and I have been like 0:30:09.360 --> 0:30:13.480 hit and punished for being vocal about public lands because 0:30:13.480 --> 0:30:17.920 you're upsetting a political status quo. And so I'm particularly 0:30:17.920 --> 0:30:19.920 sensitive about this kind of thing because I often look 0:30:19.960 --> 0:30:23.800 and I wonder, are they talking about this or they 0:30:23.840 --> 0:30:29.560 talking about something else? Right? Right? And that's that's me 0:30:29.600 --> 0:30:35.360 having a hit th HCS. I'll add the bong bubble 0:30:35.440 --> 0:30:38.320 in later. Now, listen, Phil, what do you think about 0:30:38.360 --> 0:30:41.760 all this? Then? Uh? Well, I mean for me, what 0:30:41.920 --> 0:30:45.200 ice coming from? Just like hunting one on one, I 0:30:45.240 --> 0:30:46.800 think a lot of people also just take a sense 0:30:46.840 --> 0:30:50.840 of a massive sense of pride and something that they 0:30:50.920 --> 0:30:54.000 grew up doing and at least like, for example, I 0:30:54.040 --> 0:30:55.800 grew up in Portland and I don't give a shit 0:30:55.880 --> 0:30:58.240 about basketball, but when the Blazers were doing well, there's 0:30:58.240 --> 0:30:59.480 like a little part of me that was kind of like, 0:30:59.640 --> 0:31:02.920 who go team? And I like, if you grew up. 0:31:04.320 --> 0:31:06.600 I was like that with the Seahawks when they were 0:31:06.720 --> 0:31:09.920 very briefly and then now I don't care anymore. Hunting 0:31:09.920 --> 0:31:13.320 mostly private lands or like that's what you know, you're dead, 0:31:13.400 --> 0:31:16.040 your grandpa took you too. And then all of a sudden, 0:31:16.040 --> 0:31:18.640 public lands get more clout kind of in the hunting 0:31:18.760 --> 0:31:22.320 the hunting community, there's a little you get kind of defensive, right, 0:31:22.360 --> 0:31:25.040 trying to defend like something that you grew up with 0:31:24.840 --> 0:31:28.160 with or are proud of. Um, yeah, that's a great point, man, 0:31:28.440 --> 0:31:31.000 And I think, wait a minute, you should be proud 0:31:31.040 --> 0:31:35.600 of my farm. Yeah well yeah, but but but but 0:31:35.760 --> 0:31:37.960 they but they hear, they hear people like Steve and 0:31:38.000 --> 0:31:40.960 myself and Ben's say that like you know, it bumps 0:31:41.000 --> 0:31:43.480 up the purity score or whatever when it's when it's 0:31:43.480 --> 0:31:46.680 a big buck taken on on public land, and they 0:31:46.760 --> 0:31:48.560 they're like, well, hell, I put in a lot of 0:31:48.600 --> 0:31:51.160 work to get to grow a big buck on my land. 0:31:51.240 --> 0:31:54.040 That's still valuable. It's still just as cool. And I 0:31:54.400 --> 0:31:56.720 would I would have to agree with them. It's still 0:31:56.760 --> 0:31:58.560 really cool. It's still cool to kill a big buck 0:31:58.600 --> 0:32:00.800 unless it's behind the hund be like, hey, can I 0:32:00.840 --> 0:32:03.720 can I hunt your place? Yeah, let me come see 0:32:03.720 --> 0:32:06.840 how cool it is. Prove it? Yeah, I prove it. Yeah, 0:32:07.080 --> 0:32:09.320 there'sh But I hear what you're saying, man, that point 0:32:09.520 --> 0:32:12.360 points very well. On the show Phil comes in, we 0:32:12.400 --> 0:32:14.800 should probably just end on Phil like a Phil comment 0:32:14.960 --> 0:32:18.040 at the end of every opening segment, just to really 0:32:18.080 --> 0:32:20.800 get people to transition into here's the guy who's never 0:32:20.840 --> 0:32:22.560 hunting and he just pulled out a gym. Could you 0:32:22.600 --> 0:32:29.040 play a doctor on radio? What's that? Don't Dr Doctor 0:32:30.680 --> 0:32:34.640 thought that? Dr Phil? Um, We're gonna we'll end on 0:32:34.760 --> 0:32:39.600 Dr Phil his his perspective. But I have one more question, 0:32:39.640 --> 0:32:43.640 please do What's what's up that dog collar laying there? Um? 0:32:43.760 --> 0:32:46.680 My dog likes to shake his head because he gets 0:32:46.680 --> 0:32:49.680 those ear infections, and I figured that'd probably sound pretty 0:32:49.680 --> 0:32:51.880 bad on the audio if he started rattling that thing around, 0:32:51.920 --> 0:33:01.680 So I take it off. Oh where's this going? Did 0:33:01.680 --> 0:33:07.200 I come in? And did we take our lunch break? Seriously? Here? 0:33:09.160 --> 0:33:12.440 All right, guys, we're all good here. We figured it out, 0:33:13.080 --> 0:33:16.000 did yeah? Oh yeah? What what? What? What we designed? Well? 0:33:16.120 --> 0:33:20.200 We all lands matter, That's what we decided matter. Speaking 0:33:20.240 --> 0:33:22.800 of that, we're gonna go transport back in time a 0:33:22.840 --> 0:33:25.760 couple of weeks. We're gonna go to Berkeley, California. Talked 0:33:25.760 --> 0:33:29.760 to Luke McCauley at in his office in the grand 0:33:29.760 --> 0:33:33.440 old Campus of Berkeley. Do you see Berkeley. We're gonna 0:33:33.480 --> 0:33:37.280 learn more about private lands, least lands and their impacts 0:33:37.400 --> 0:33:40.800 on this country and continue this discussion over there. So enjoy. 0:33:40.920 --> 0:33:47.760 Thank you, Ben. Thanks Ben. I guess I grew up. Hey, Looke, 0:33:47.800 --> 0:33:49.560 how's it going, man going? Well? How are you doing? 0:33:50.000 --> 0:33:52.640 I mean, I'm doing really good. I mean, you see Berkeley. 0:33:53.040 --> 0:33:57.280 I feel oddly comfortable. I don't feel strange. People told 0:33:57.280 --> 0:33:59.360 me that I would have to like watch out when 0:33:59.360 --> 0:34:01.840 I was here, right, it seems fine to me. A 0:34:01.840 --> 0:34:06.360 lot of nice people around, yeah, a lot of interesting people. Um, 0:34:06.400 --> 0:34:08.440 A lot of interesting people, A lot of nice people. Yeah. 0:34:08.520 --> 0:34:12.120 And we're sitting in your office UM at hill Guard 0:34:12.120 --> 0:34:15.040 Hall at the College. When I came in, it's like 0:34:15.080 --> 0:34:19.520 this giant metal door, this really beautiful architecture. It screams 0:34:19.600 --> 0:34:21.960 history and the place has a lot of that. You're 0:34:22.040 --> 0:34:24.360 you're saying, it does it does. This building was built 0:34:24.400 --> 0:34:26.960 around the nineteen twenties, a series of buildings right here 0:34:26.960 --> 0:34:30.240 as part of the originally the Agricultural College for University 0:34:30.239 --> 0:34:33.719 of California, Berkeley UM. Berkeley is one of the land 0:34:33.719 --> 0:34:37.160 grants for California, and California is a little bit different 0:34:37.160 --> 0:34:39.480 in a lot of ways, including how their university systems 0:34:39.480 --> 0:34:43.440 set up. Most states have a single land grant college, 0:34:43.440 --> 0:34:47.040 which really delivers a lot of the applied research out 0:34:47.080 --> 0:34:51.600 to farmers and ranchers and their agricultural colleges here in Berkeley. 0:34:51.600 --> 0:34:54.080 It started here at Berkeley, and it's extended out to 0:34:54.239 --> 0:34:57.520 University of California, Davis, where the majority of that agricultural 0:34:57.520 --> 0:35:00.560 research occurs today. And there's also quite a bit that's 0:35:00.560 --> 0:35:04.160 happening down at you see Riverside. But UM Berkeley maintains 0:35:04.239 --> 0:35:07.880 some of this agricultural research that's designed to bring the 0:35:07.960 --> 0:35:11.720 best conservation practices, the best production practices out to farmers 0:35:11.760 --> 0:35:14.960 and ranchers to improve outcomes for the people living out 0:35:15.000 --> 0:35:17.600 there as well as the natural resources that we all 0:35:17.640 --> 0:35:20.880 rely upon. Yeah, no, it's it's it's it's when you 0:35:20.920 --> 0:35:24.839 walk into the door, there's like glass cases with soil samples. Yeah. 0:35:25.480 --> 0:35:27.640 So Hill Guard was the is considered the father of 0:35:27.680 --> 0:35:31.120 modern soil science, so he has streets named after him 0:35:31.160 --> 0:35:33.680 here in Berkeley. Created some of the first textbooks describing 0:35:34.320 --> 0:35:37.960 um soils. So that's some of the main components of 0:35:38.000 --> 0:35:41.080 how we grow crops and how things how plants grow 0:35:41.120 --> 0:35:44.560 and animals grow and all the things we're interested in. So, um, 0:35:44.640 --> 0:35:47.359 he was an instrumental figure here at Berkeley, and there's 0:35:47.360 --> 0:35:50.239 been a number of those people here. It's really it's 0:35:50.239 --> 0:35:54.080 really quite humbling to be here among people, the Nobel 0:35:54.200 --> 0:35:57.239 laureates who have come out of this university and to 0:35:57.320 --> 0:35:59.440 look out and think that, you know, you might be 0:35:59.440 --> 0:36:02.040 passing by somebody like that on the streets, whether it's 0:36:02.040 --> 0:36:08.200 a nuclear physicist or a um or somebody's instrumental in agriculture. Yeah, 0:36:08.200 --> 0:36:11.600 it's a beautiful place and pactful place. Um, I'm happy 0:36:11.600 --> 0:36:15.840 to be here. When you were explaining the cooperative extension 0:36:15.920 --> 0:36:18.360 and some of your work, there's a big history to 0:36:18.440 --> 0:36:22.600 that a long long time that's been happening. Um, give 0:36:22.600 --> 0:36:25.439 people a little bit more color into that, just to understand. Yeah, 0:36:25.480 --> 0:36:27.640 so all of our land grant colleges. I had mentioned 0:36:27.680 --> 0:36:30.960 how Berkeley's part of the land grant system. They were 0:36:31.400 --> 0:36:34.160 back in the nineteen tens and twenties. Somewhere around then 0:36:34.239 --> 0:36:38.920 there was agricultural researcher found that he had developed some 0:36:38.960 --> 0:36:41.600 new varieties of corn or different crops, and he found 0:36:41.600 --> 0:36:44.880 that farmers weren't adopting him. He and they were reluctant 0:36:44.880 --> 0:36:47.440 to try new things, and so he found there was 0:36:47.480 --> 0:36:50.480 a real need to bring research that he was performing 0:36:50.520 --> 0:36:52.879 out to the farmers and ranches so that they could 0:36:52.920 --> 0:36:55.279 actually try him out. It was a it was a 0:36:55.320 --> 0:37:01.240 problem of adopting new technologies. So he began this effort 0:37:01.239 --> 0:37:03.440 where he would have demonstrations on the research site to 0:37:03.560 --> 0:37:06.759 bring farmers out to sea Um. If you've ever heard 0:37:06.760 --> 0:37:10.319 of four h um, that's part of cooperative extension. It's 0:37:10.400 --> 0:37:13.440 the effort to bring kids that One of the ideas 0:37:13.480 --> 0:37:16.000 behind that was that they could give some of these 0:37:16.080 --> 0:37:18.720 new crop varieties to kids to plant in the little 0:37:18.719 --> 0:37:21.920 home garden. And when the parents saw the kids crops 0:37:22.000 --> 0:37:24.839 growing better than the crops in the fields, they start 0:37:24.880 --> 0:37:27.080 thinking about adopting some of these new technologies too. So 0:37:27.120 --> 0:37:30.120 it was a way to get new information out and 0:37:30.200 --> 0:37:34.440 to promote adoption of new and the best practices. And 0:37:34.480 --> 0:37:37.080 so you were telling me that you're probably one of 0:37:37.080 --> 0:37:40.439 the only folks around here, especially in this building, thinking 0:37:40.480 --> 0:37:43.880 about hunting specifically. Probably I'm a little bit of a 0:37:43.920 --> 0:37:47.160 novelty over here at Berkeley UM. Other people do work 0:37:47.200 --> 0:37:49.960 on hunting. It's oftentimes in the context of UM. I 0:37:50.000 --> 0:37:53.320 have some some great colleagues who work in Africa working 0:37:53.320 --> 0:37:57.560 on bush meat hunting and very different context of where 0:37:57.560 --> 0:38:03.480 people are hunting monkeys, hunting endangered species um for their livelihoods, 0:38:03.520 --> 0:38:06.879 to survive, for protein and so and those our whole 0:38:06.920 --> 0:38:09.640 different set of challenges that fortunately we don't. We have 0:38:09.680 --> 0:38:11.920 a much more developed and regulated system here in the 0:38:12.080 --> 0:38:15.279 in the United States. That's uh, that functions really well. 0:38:16.120 --> 0:38:18.879 And is we're really we're really blessed to have that 0:38:19.239 --> 0:38:22.319 sort of system here, that's true. And and for you know, 0:38:22.400 --> 0:38:24.439 somebody like you sit in a place like this to 0:38:24.440 --> 0:38:28.000 to focus on this subject that was subject we're gonna 0:38:28.000 --> 0:38:32.440 cover here over the next um hour. So I think 0:38:32.560 --> 0:38:35.560 is was enlightening to me and the guys that Congressional 0:38:35.560 --> 0:38:38.600 Sports Is Foundation. Andy Treyharn sent me an email like, Hey, 0:38:38.600 --> 0:38:41.480 here's a guy that you should look at. Because as 0:38:41.560 --> 0:38:44.480 much as we in the hunting space talk about and 0:38:44.520 --> 0:38:48.280 advocate for public lands and do so um as we should, 0:38:49.000 --> 0:38:52.000 there's this this there's a little bit of data here 0:38:52.680 --> 0:38:56.239 that opens up the door to a whole big conversation 0:38:56.680 --> 0:39:00.239 on private lands and what they mean and range land 0:39:00.120 --> 0:39:04.600 and the real impact that they have on not only 0:39:05.320 --> 0:39:09.560 our ecosystems, but our economy and different things like that. 0:39:09.680 --> 0:39:12.719 So that's what brought me here because I think I 0:39:12.760 --> 0:39:15.799 think it's an important topic. I think it we can 0:39:15.880 --> 0:39:19.280 make that, make it as popular as our public land movement. 0:39:19.400 --> 0:39:21.239 Keep it public is something everybody likes to say. I 0:39:21.600 --> 0:39:25.080 think we need to also understand like what private lands 0:39:25.120 --> 0:39:27.640 do and what they mean. And you're the guy, yeah, 0:39:27.680 --> 0:39:29.960 and how private lands came about. You know, a lot 0:39:29.960 --> 0:39:32.560 of a lot of times we don't even think, um, 0:39:32.600 --> 0:39:36.200 what how did private lands become private? How did public 0:39:36.239 --> 0:39:39.399 lands become public? And it really comes back to the 0:39:39.560 --> 0:39:42.759 early settlers days when the country is being founded and 0:39:42.800 --> 0:39:46.880 there's this westward expansion really and and the reason I 0:39:46.920 --> 0:39:49.799 like to focus on private lands is that private lands 0:39:49.800 --> 0:39:52.200 are some of the most productive lands in the United States. 0:39:52.280 --> 0:39:54.440 I think about sixty or seventy percent if you include 0:39:54.440 --> 0:39:57.720 Alaska six lands or private lands. If you exclude Alaska, 0:39:57.760 --> 0:40:00.439 it's up to because Alaska has just said a huge 0:40:00.520 --> 0:40:04.760 land mass, but um, you have this vaster the US 0:40:04.840 --> 0:40:07.480 is private. And why is that? Was because there was 0:40:07.920 --> 0:40:10.560 as people the Homestead Act was moving people, and people 0:40:10.560 --> 0:40:15.560 were going out to farm land and to make it productive. 0:40:16.200 --> 0:40:18.239 They really focused on the areas where they could grow, 0:40:18.680 --> 0:40:22.360 grow crops and make a living. Um, that hundred and 0:40:22.360 --> 0:40:27.160 sixty acres estimate for Homestead Act land that you could 0:40:27.200 --> 0:40:30.880 acquire by moving westward worked pretty well until you hit 0:40:30.920 --> 0:40:35.560 about the hundredth meridian and your rainfall started drop below 0:40:35.680 --> 0:40:38.880 thirty inches a year, you didn't have enough to grow crops. 0:40:39.480 --> 0:40:41.520 You hit some of the deserts to Nevada and Utahn, 0:40:41.600 --> 0:40:44.279 it's really clear hundred sixty acres you're not gonna be 0:40:44.320 --> 0:40:46.880 able to make living off of for a family. So 0:40:47.880 --> 0:40:51.280 what ended up happening is some of these early explorers 0:40:51.320 --> 0:40:54.440 noted that we need to rethink this Homestead Act and 0:40:54.760 --> 0:40:56.840 in the West, because you're going to need at least 0:40:56.840 --> 0:40:59.680 two thousand, three thousand, five thousand acres to be able 0:40:59.719 --> 0:41:04.480 to apport a family unit out here. And so that 0:41:04.840 --> 0:41:07.200 I don't think those those numbers did end up happening 0:41:07.200 --> 0:41:10.040 in the Homestead Act. What ended up happening was that, UM, 0:41:10.280 --> 0:41:13.680 these lands were sort of left unsettled because people couldn't 0:41:13.680 --> 0:41:17.239 make living on a small parcel of land, and so 0:41:17.320 --> 0:41:20.520 you have these these areas and mountains and deserts essentially 0:41:20.600 --> 0:41:23.600 that were left unsettled and became part of our public 0:41:23.640 --> 0:41:27.960 federal public lands. So they're beautiful, they're a huge and 0:41:28.040 --> 0:41:31.840 wonderful natural resource thing to to behold and wonder and 0:41:31.880 --> 0:41:35.880 walk through and see. But they're also some of the 0:41:36.000 --> 0:41:39.400 least productive lands. But they don't have good flat soils, 0:41:39.440 --> 0:41:44.359 they don't have sometimes good water resources um and as 0:41:44.360 --> 0:41:47.160 it was, and also those same productivity issues that make 0:41:47.239 --> 0:41:49.799 them difficult and challenging for humans to live on and 0:41:49.880 --> 0:41:52.640 settle and to make living on. In some ways, they're 0:41:52.920 --> 0:41:56.080 difficult for animals. They don't have the same densities of 0:41:56.440 --> 0:41:59.840 deer that you would have on the bottom lands soil 0:42:00.000 --> 0:42:05.120 in the south. So because of that, it's really these 0:42:05.120 --> 0:42:07.839 public lands are really great, but they're not really representative 0:42:07.880 --> 0:42:09.799 of all the different resources that we have in our 0:42:09.800 --> 0:42:15.880 country and so um So that's why I think private 0:42:15.960 --> 0:42:18.279 lands are really important part of our conversation. They're they're 0:42:18.280 --> 0:42:21.200 the most productive lands. They host a whole range of 0:42:21.239 --> 0:42:24.600 biodiversity that's not represented in our public lands. Um. There 0:42:24.600 --> 0:42:27.000 are species that aren't found in public lands that are 0:42:27.040 --> 0:42:28.920 they're only found in some of our private lands in 0:42:28.960 --> 0:42:31.320 the in the eastern side of the country or even 0:42:31.400 --> 0:42:35.759 in the in California for example. So, um, and in 0:42:35.800 --> 0:42:38.360 California here where we are, the Central Valley, which is 0:42:38.400 --> 0:42:42.840 the the bread basket of the country, is almost entirely 0:42:42.880 --> 0:42:45.440 agricultural land now and some of those bottom land areas 0:42:45.440 --> 0:42:48.279 where there were huge valley oaks back in the day, 0:42:48.320 --> 0:42:50.800 some of those laws that that habit has been lost, 0:42:50.840 --> 0:42:53.920 and so we've lost some of those those aspects to 0:42:53.960 --> 0:42:58.200 support game species, the other species, birds and other things 0:42:58.280 --> 0:43:00.480 like that. Yeah, and you mentioned a lot in your 0:43:00.480 --> 0:43:05.680 work of biodiversity, um, explain kind of how you're like, 0:43:05.719 --> 0:43:08.160 how you would measure and say, there's two things I 0:43:08.200 --> 0:43:11.520 think that what was production? What does productive really mean? 0:43:11.960 --> 0:43:15.319 You know? And and what is how does private land? 0:43:15.320 --> 0:43:17.160 And then maybe publicly And it's hard to talk about 0:43:17.200 --> 0:43:19.640 these things as monoliths. I mean, there's so there's some 0:43:19.880 --> 0:43:23.000 very very and I've seen them very very biodiverse public lands, 0:43:23.040 --> 0:43:26.680 and there's some very very uh, non diverse private lands. 0:43:26.719 --> 0:43:29.040 It's just it's hard to talk about them in those ways. 0:43:29.080 --> 0:43:32.680 But when you reference them as productive, what do you 0:43:32.719 --> 0:43:35.360 what do you mean? What's that product for private land? Wherever? 0:43:35.440 --> 0:43:38.080 Any land? What's what's productive in your mind? Because there Yeah, 0:43:38.080 --> 0:43:40.799 that's a good question again, because it's like I said, 0:43:40.800 --> 0:43:43.359 it's hard to talk about these things like that in 0:43:43.400 --> 0:43:46.840 those ways. But product production means a lot of different 0:43:46.880 --> 0:43:51.320 things to different people. Obviously, Yeah, um, I generally probably 0:43:51.360 --> 0:43:55.439 would think of it in terms of UM. I would 0:43:55.440 --> 0:43:57.880 think of it probably in terms of how humans use 0:43:57.920 --> 0:44:01.520 the land, and so often times I would think of 0:44:01.520 --> 0:44:05.560 it in terms of soil quality, UM and the ability 0:44:05.600 --> 0:44:10.759 to produce biomass and so. Uh that generally a thought 0:44:10.760 --> 0:44:16.920 of as yields for crops, um grass grown for livestock, 0:44:17.560 --> 0:44:22.080 um water for people to drink, or for animals to drink, 0:44:23.120 --> 0:44:28.839 groundwater resources, so all those types of aspects that UM, 0:44:29.040 --> 0:44:32.440 I think humans in particular will look at, but also animals. 0:44:32.560 --> 0:44:34.839 You know, water is key a key resource for for 0:44:34.880 --> 0:44:39.000 animals and for life, and so having good water resources 0:44:39.000 --> 0:44:42.439 in an area is really important for productivity, and that's 0:44:42.440 --> 0:44:46.080 why there's been efforts to put out guzzlers and water 0:44:46.160 --> 0:44:50.120 resources in our public lands to increase that productivity. Yeah, 0:44:50.120 --> 0:44:52.319 it's a good point, especially for sheep. Guzzlers are a 0:44:52.360 --> 0:44:56.760 huge thing for desert big horn sheep and beyond. UM. 0:44:56.880 --> 0:44:59.719 So let's get to the actual research you've done and 0:44:59.800 --> 0:45:04.160 the paper that you guys have published UM, and I 0:45:04.160 --> 0:45:05.879 think there's a lot of numbers in here. I don't 0:45:05.880 --> 0:45:07.520 want to get to I don't want to just rattle 0:45:07.560 --> 0:45:09.399 off a bunch of numbers, but there are some really 0:45:09.440 --> 0:45:14.399 impactful kind of bottom line statements in and what's here? UM, 0:45:14.440 --> 0:45:17.680 So kind of take us through what this paper is called. 0:45:17.680 --> 0:45:20.320 I'll make sure everybody has access to it. That's listening 0:45:20.360 --> 0:45:22.000 what this paper is called, and kind of how you 0:45:22.120 --> 0:45:25.880 came to want to write this, and how you wrote 0:45:25.880 --> 0:45:29.440 the abstract, and yeah, it's a long ask questions. Well 0:45:30.120 --> 0:45:32.440 it wasn't It was quite an interesting story. When I 0:45:32.440 --> 0:45:35.759 started my dissertation, my doctoral research, I did not think 0:45:35.760 --> 0:45:39.000 I would end up doing a big nationwide study pulling 0:45:39.000 --> 0:45:42.680 together three big giant data sets from different national surveys. 0:45:43.280 --> 0:45:45.480 I was actually a little bit afraid of statistics and 0:45:45.520 --> 0:45:49.080 big data sets when I started my my doctoral work. Um, 0:45:49.200 --> 0:45:52.080 this paper is titled the Role of Wildlife Associated Recreation 0:45:52.120 --> 0:45:57.880 and Private land Use and Conservation. Providing the Missing Baseline. Bam, bam. 0:45:58.000 --> 0:46:00.760 That's like, that's that's not gonna get to people clicking 0:46:00.840 --> 0:46:04.120 on the old webside. We have to rewrite that headline 0:46:04.880 --> 0:46:08.040 providing the missing Baseline Yeah, that's that's that's a little 0:46:08.040 --> 0:46:12.120 a little bit of something sensationalize at something or public 0:46:12.239 --> 0:46:16.399 land sucks. It was, you know, I found uh private land. 0:46:16.400 --> 0:46:18.239 I would talk to people. I was interested in in 0:46:18.239 --> 0:46:21.480 interviewing ranchers and learning how ranchers might be using hunting, 0:46:21.520 --> 0:46:24.640 and hunting might being incentive for ranchers to maintain more 0:46:24.640 --> 0:46:28.239 wildlife habitat. It's an old concept that Aldo Leopold came 0:46:28.320 --> 0:46:31.120 up with and and suggested in the nineteen thirties. He said, 0:46:31.120 --> 0:46:32.800 you know, if farmers and ranchers are going to be 0:46:32.840 --> 0:46:36.640 able to earn something from having wildlife on their land, 0:46:36.640 --> 0:46:39.520 it's going to incentivize them to keep some habitat for 0:46:39.560 --> 0:46:41.880 these fonds in the in the back forty or in 0:46:41.920 --> 0:46:44.320 the certain parts of their areas, or leave the edges 0:46:44.320 --> 0:46:47.839 of their crops for quail or other different wildlife species. So, 0:46:48.680 --> 0:46:51.560 as I was talking to different ranchers and experts in 0:46:51.600 --> 0:46:53.640 this field, they said kept saying, well, private land, we 0:46:53.680 --> 0:46:55.840 really don't really know that much about how much private 0:46:55.920 --> 0:47:02.280 lands being used for hunting. Um. And so I began 0:47:02.320 --> 0:47:05.840 looking and started finding I've started learning about US Department 0:47:05.840 --> 0:47:08.120 of Agriculture had these big data sets that were available, 0:47:08.120 --> 0:47:11.960 and they they pulled every um, every farmer and rancher 0:47:12.000 --> 0:47:14.319 in the country every five years, every few years, there 0:47:14.400 --> 0:47:17.239 was different variety of different surveys, and I said, well, 0:47:17.280 --> 0:47:19.040 I should before I go and interview a bunch of 0:47:19.120 --> 0:47:22.360 ranchers asking them how much of their land is used 0:47:22.400 --> 0:47:25.280 for hunting, I should use data sort of been collected 0:47:25.280 --> 0:47:27.480 by our government. So I started looking into the Department 0:47:27.480 --> 0:47:31.920 of Agriculture Agricultural Resource Management survey, which they hold every year. 0:47:32.080 --> 0:47:35.359 There's some great folks over in Economic Research Service over 0:47:35.360 --> 0:47:37.920 at USDA who helped me out. I'll give a shout 0:47:37.920 --> 0:47:41.000 out to Bob Dubman who helped me out getting these 0:47:41.080 --> 0:47:43.000 data set up. And I had to go to a 0:47:43.000 --> 0:47:46.279 cold room up and Sacramento, which was totally cut off 0:47:46.280 --> 0:47:49.000 from the Internet because this is this economic data farmer 0:47:49.040 --> 0:47:50.880 and ranchers and they have to keep it very protected. 0:47:50.960 --> 0:47:56.520 So I made trips up to Sacramento and h and 0:47:57.200 --> 0:48:00.239 started learning how to use are and only statistic EGAL 0:48:00.280 --> 0:48:03.279 programs to figure out what are these numbers, how many 0:48:03.280 --> 0:48:06.879 farmers and ranchers are doing? Is how many acres are there? Well, 0:48:06.920 --> 0:48:09.040 I dug into that and I found well, there's certain 0:48:09.080 --> 0:48:13.520 limitations to that data set. And there's the another data set, 0:48:13.520 --> 0:48:17.640 the National Survey of UH Fishing, Hunting, and Wildlife Associated 0:48:17.680 --> 0:48:21.040 Recreation or wildlife watching. UM, And I said, well, I 0:48:21.040 --> 0:48:22.560 should take a look at that one. And it turns 0:48:22.600 --> 0:48:26.160 out there's a question there about private land that's used 0:48:26.160 --> 0:48:29.800 for hunting, both owned for hunting and least for hunting, 0:48:30.120 --> 0:48:33.399 and that people used for like day use fees, sort 0:48:33.400 --> 0:48:37.440 of like guided hunts. So I added that to my analysis. 0:48:37.480 --> 0:48:40.080 I pulled that in and figured out all three I 0:48:40.080 --> 0:48:43.920 pulled up, pulled pulled together three of those UH surveys 0:48:43.960 --> 0:48:47.960 over the course of like ten years. Because there's really 0:48:48.239 --> 0:48:50.120 the sample, the way the sampling works, you had to 0:48:50.200 --> 0:48:52.520 I had to aggregate these things to improve the standard 0:48:52.560 --> 0:48:57.040 deviations and statistical stuff. But all that exciting stuff, all 0:48:57.040 --> 0:48:59.960 that exciting fun stuff that your listeners, I'm sure really excited. 0:49:00.000 --> 0:49:03.600 It's just it, it's just me. So if he's just 0:49:03.719 --> 0:49:09.080 fast forward to the data, I love comparing like it's funny, 0:49:09.920 --> 0:49:12.680 I'm not gonna I'm jumping ahead. Um, I'm not going 0:49:12.760 --> 0:49:15.640 to jump ahead. In fact, when you're doing all that 0:49:15.760 --> 0:49:18.680 research and you're you're kind of jumping your lily padding 0:49:18.760 --> 0:49:21.600 to these like the spears of relevance to kind of 0:49:21.760 --> 0:49:24.279 to get are you changing your goals during that or 0:49:24.400 --> 0:49:26.040 you kind of you have a north star like I 0:49:26.120 --> 0:49:28.480 want to get to find out this thing. Or as 0:49:28.560 --> 0:49:30.799 you see the different available data sets, to you change 0:49:30.920 --> 0:49:34.080 or your goal? Well, I think there's a key overarching question. 0:49:34.360 --> 0:49:36.040 And I think that's one thing I learned from some 0:49:36.120 --> 0:49:39.400 of my mentors um in my research program, is that 0:49:39.880 --> 0:49:42.120 you do have a key guiding question and that that 0:49:42.239 --> 0:49:46.040 helps you helps to guide your your program um. And 0:49:46.160 --> 0:49:48.279 for me, it was like, what is what is the 0:49:48.400 --> 0:49:51.880 role of hunting and conservation? Is it actually helping with conservation, 0:49:52.520 --> 0:49:56.520 especially on the private land side. Um? So as you 0:49:57.320 --> 0:50:01.640 gather data and somebody articulated this really well, um, you 0:50:02.400 --> 0:50:05.320 you allow when you're writing science, I oftentimes didn't like 0:50:05.440 --> 0:50:07.840 to think of like science as a story because I 0:50:07.880 --> 0:50:10.040 felt like sciences is all about facts and data. We 0:50:10.120 --> 0:50:12.040 don't I don't I don't want to tell stories. I'm 0:50:12.040 --> 0:50:15.640 here to tell facts. But actually somebody actually changed my 0:50:15.719 --> 0:50:18.600 mind about them. They said, actually, you're telling a story, 0:50:18.719 --> 0:50:22.040 but your data are the characters. Your surveys are the characters, 0:50:22.080 --> 0:50:24.200 and you have to let them speak and let them 0:50:24.239 --> 0:50:26.680 be part of your story. So that's that's where I 0:50:26.760 --> 0:50:29.440 think how this process occurs. Right, I had one servant. 0:50:29.440 --> 0:50:32.160 I said, they're telling me something, but it's limited and 0:50:32.200 --> 0:50:35.560 I don't know about this other type of landscape, and 0:50:35.600 --> 0:50:38.120 so I'm missing some nuance to the story. And this 0:50:38.280 --> 0:50:40.000 character can only tell me so much. I need more 0:50:40.080 --> 0:50:42.600 characters to make the story. And that's where I went 0:50:42.640 --> 0:50:44.279 to the National Survey, and then I ended up going 0:50:44.320 --> 0:50:47.000 to the US Force Service had a big National woodland 0:50:47.040 --> 0:50:49.799 Owner Survey. Some of your some of your listeners might 0:50:49.840 --> 0:50:51.320 even have filled out some of these surveys they have 0:50:51.400 --> 0:50:55.960 passed UM. So Brett Butler Forced Service helped set me 0:50:56.080 --> 0:50:57.520 up with some of their data. So we pulled all 0:50:57.560 --> 0:51:01.600 these things together to understand, you know what describe the 0:51:02.080 --> 0:51:05.799 broader picture for private land use and the land use 0:51:05.920 --> 0:51:08.800 types that are um utilized. For this is if forest 0:51:08.960 --> 0:51:11.399 is a range land, turns out the majority's forest land. 0:51:11.560 --> 0:51:13.839 A lot of the South is really considered forest land, 0:51:13.840 --> 0:51:16.279 and that's the dominant area for for hunting in the 0:51:16.440 --> 0:51:20.880 in the country as well as the Upper Midwest area Wisconsin, Minnesota, 0:51:20.960 --> 0:51:24.560 Michigan huge areas of forests that are hunted, oftentimes for 0:51:24.640 --> 0:51:28.480 free sometimes under leases. Um. But a lot of really 0:51:28.520 --> 0:51:31.640 interesting nuances came out of out of analyzing these and 0:51:31.760 --> 0:51:34.759 so so just so everyone's tracking with us, we are 0:51:36.280 --> 0:51:38.120 talking about a study here that's pulling to get a 0:51:38.160 --> 0:51:42.080 lot of national data to determine you know, what you 0:51:42.160 --> 0:51:45.480 said before, kind of the hypothesis is is conservation? Is 0:51:45.560 --> 0:51:49.879 hunting a valuable way to produce conservation on public lands 0:51:49.960 --> 0:51:53.399 or on private lands? Beyond that, like, how are people 0:51:53.520 --> 0:51:56.359 using these lands? Um? You and you have some really 0:51:56.440 --> 0:52:00.319 interesting stuff about owned versus least and reading you said 0:52:00.320 --> 0:52:03.640 the regionalities and state by states. Um, I'm not sure 0:52:03.719 --> 0:52:05.719 how you crack the egg and walk through this. I'm 0:52:05.719 --> 0:52:09.120 sure you thought about this through. What's the first when 0:52:09.120 --> 0:52:11.080 you say, what here's the things we found? What's the 0:52:11.120 --> 0:52:13.040 first thing you would say to people? You know, what's 0:52:13.080 --> 0:52:17.160 the overarching abstract? Here? A big area of the United 0:52:17.200 --> 0:52:20.840 States is used for wildlife associated recreation, and of I 0:52:20.920 --> 0:52:23.360 think it's estimated at well. I think the paper shows 0:52:23.360 --> 0:52:27.120 about of the whole of the contiguous US has used 0:52:27.160 --> 0:52:31.640 for wildlife associated recreation. Of that hunting is a dominant contributor. 0:52:31.760 --> 0:52:34.239 And that's like in your study when you started looking 0:52:34.280 --> 0:52:37.680 at this, there's there's It's like wildlife watching is one 0:52:37.719 --> 0:52:41.520 of them. Hunting and fishing and fishing, Yeah, hunting is 0:52:41.680 --> 0:52:46.080 dominates the area, absolutely right. And you didn't go into 0:52:46.160 --> 0:52:48.200 that thinking, oh, yeah, hunting will be the thing that 0:52:48.400 --> 0:52:50.200 knocks it out of the park, did you. I mean, well, 0:52:50.239 --> 0:52:52.160 in some ways I do, and some ways I had 0:52:52.239 --> 0:52:55.560 some ideas to that because I've hunted on on lands 0:52:55.600 --> 0:52:57.520 and you go to big ranches, you need big areas 0:52:57.719 --> 0:53:01.200 deer crack traveling over hundreds of acres or traveling over thousands, 0:53:01.320 --> 0:53:04.400 sometimes tens of thousands of acres, miles and miles being crossed. 0:53:04.480 --> 0:53:07.480 So when I think of a hunting lease, I think 0:53:07.560 --> 0:53:11.279 of multiple hundreds, if not thousands of acres. Ideally, I 0:53:11.360 --> 0:53:14.160 think of a fishing lease. You really just need access 0:53:14.200 --> 0:53:16.520 to the stream, You just need an acre, And I 0:53:16.600 --> 0:53:19.239 think of wildlife watching. Some people can do that in 0:53:19.239 --> 0:53:22.320 their backyard from the road, you can. A lot of 0:53:22.320 --> 0:53:25.480 people do. And this survey did show that. Um but 0:53:25.960 --> 0:53:29.080 so it wasn't too surprising, but it was surprising to 0:53:29.160 --> 0:53:32.120 me to quantify for the first time the actual millions 0:53:32.160 --> 0:53:35.720 and millions of acres twenty million acres of land least 0:53:35.800 --> 0:53:38.520 for hunting in the United States. That's a huge that's 0:53:38.520 --> 0:53:43.680 a huge land. And when I think about hunting and conservation, 0:53:44.040 --> 0:53:45.959 you know, I often times people just say, well, hunting 0:53:46.080 --> 0:53:49.080 is conservation, and I wonder what is that? How do 0:53:49.520 --> 0:53:50.920 what do you mean by that? How do how do 0:53:51.000 --> 0:53:53.480 we actually say that? What does that mean? Because we 0:53:53.600 --> 0:53:57.280 buy hunting licenses because our money goes to the state agencies, 0:53:57.400 --> 0:54:00.600 is that is that conservation of the state agencies necessarily 0:54:00.640 --> 0:54:04.480 putting that back into conservation on the ground. Um? I 0:54:04.560 --> 0:54:07.840 think in a lot of cases yes, yes, um, but 0:54:07.960 --> 0:54:10.520 it's not necessarily a straight line. There might be other 0:54:10.600 --> 0:54:12.320 things with some of those funds go to that aren't 0:54:12.320 --> 0:54:15.120 necessarily conservation. Yeah, there's a lot of there's hunter recruitment, 0:54:15.160 --> 0:54:16.520 there's a lot of mean, if you look at how 0:54:16.680 --> 0:54:18.480 the dollars are a mass and what they're spent on, 0:54:18.520 --> 0:54:21.759 it's complex. It's a complicated state by state. You know, 0:54:21.840 --> 0:54:26.279 we always roll out this like of state revenues come from. 0:54:26.480 --> 0:54:29.120 It's it's but it's varies so much state by state 0:54:29.320 --> 0:54:31.520 that it's hard to nail down. And you're right, I 0:54:31.600 --> 0:54:34.200 say this all the time. Hunting is not conservation. Conservation 0:54:34.320 --> 0:54:36.960 is conservation. I think it's hunting. We've done a great 0:54:37.000 --> 0:54:39.000 job in this country of kind of intertwining the two 0:54:39.280 --> 0:54:43.160 in ways that we we really can't now separate. But 0:54:43.239 --> 0:54:45.120 you don't have a choice to pay the excise tax. 0:54:45.160 --> 0:54:47.160 In the Pitman Robertson, you do not have a choice 0:54:47.400 --> 0:54:49.759 to buy a tag. I mean, you're either buy a 0:54:49.840 --> 0:54:53.440 tag or you're a poacher. Um. And so, yes, they 0:54:53.480 --> 0:54:58.160 are intertwined. But conservation is to me still sits parallel 0:54:58.239 --> 0:55:02.040 and is a byproduct of of hunting, not not hunting 0:55:02.080 --> 0:55:04.320 in and of itself. Absolutely, And I was when I 0:55:04.360 --> 0:55:07.120 think about this topic, especially in this paper, I thought 0:55:07.160 --> 0:55:09.839 there's really two ways in which one which one can 0:55:09.920 --> 0:55:13.080 think of conservation. One is what I still see as 0:55:13.120 --> 0:55:17.840 one of the biggest things UM causing habitat causing losses 0:55:17.880 --> 0:55:20.480 of wildlife is habitat loss. It's still one of the 0:55:20.520 --> 0:55:23.320 main drivers. We talk a lot about climate change, and 0:55:23.320 --> 0:55:27.520 climate change does change. Habitat loss can contrive that. But 0:55:28.239 --> 0:55:32.280 really we're talking about paved, paved roads, We're talking about 0:55:32.440 --> 0:55:35.040 housing developments that are taking up thousands of acres now 0:55:35.120 --> 0:55:39.440 of more additional previously habitat, or we're talking about agriculture 0:55:39.440 --> 0:55:43.560 that's intensive agriculture that's moved into previously uncultivated areas. That 0:55:43.719 --> 0:55:47.040 is a known loss, and that is still the main 0:55:47.120 --> 0:55:51.279 way in which we are losing species and losing the 0:55:51.400 --> 0:55:55.440 quality of our natural resources. So I think land use 0:55:55.480 --> 0:55:57.880 and that's why it was this paper is published in 0:55:58.000 --> 0:56:01.360 Land Use Policy because I thought hunting is actually contributing 0:56:01.480 --> 0:56:05.760 to a reduction and conversion of land out of natural spaces. 0:56:06.520 --> 0:56:09.239 That would be a really great finding. We oftentimes think 0:56:09.280 --> 0:56:12.640 of I think of hunting, we think of conservation is 0:56:12.800 --> 0:56:14.560 okay practices on the ground, and we'll get to that 0:56:14.680 --> 0:56:16.520 next because we did get into that this paper. But 0:56:16.600 --> 0:56:18.759 I also thought, well, what's the indirect aspect of people 0:56:18.800 --> 0:56:22.200 are paying money to keep land and this Aldo Leopold method. 0:56:22.239 --> 0:56:24.800 They're paying money to a rancher and he's keeping his 0:56:25.000 --> 0:56:28.520 land as a ranch instead of selling off twenty acres 0:56:28.600 --> 0:56:31.240 here and thirty acres there for whether it's a vineyard 0:56:31.400 --> 0:56:34.640 or housing development or whatever. And he's keeping and hunting 0:56:34.680 --> 0:56:36.320 is helping him stay in business, so he keeps his 0:56:36.600 --> 0:56:40.279 unit contiguous. That's a win for conservation. So that the 0:56:40.480 --> 0:56:44.440 land use aspect, the lack of fragmentation aspect, So it's 0:56:44.480 --> 0:56:48.080 it's it's this happens we we apply this to a 0:56:48.200 --> 0:56:52.080 lot of the international hunting issues, you know, trophy trophy 0:56:52.200 --> 0:56:55.680 hunting based conservation. For lack of a really much better 0:56:55.760 --> 0:56:59.160 term than that, it's like hunting creates value, right in 0:56:59.320 --> 0:57:01.759 this case is what I'm from reading your paper when 0:57:01.800 --> 0:57:04.760 I'm what I'm getting from from it is hunting creates 0:57:04.880 --> 0:57:09.640 this value, and value really is what conservation is all about. 0:57:10.360 --> 0:57:12.279 If something has value, you want to conserve it, right, So, 0:57:12.840 --> 0:57:17.040 and then conservation leads to if this equation one one 0:57:17.080 --> 0:57:22.280 step further, the propagation of wildlife pushing it down those 0:57:22.320 --> 0:57:26.360 three levels. And so that's I think what when this 0:57:26.480 --> 0:57:29.080 was introduced to me, I was like, whoa perfect like 0:57:29.280 --> 0:57:31.720 this fits right into that this This is data that 0:57:31.840 --> 0:57:34.200 someone has done a lot of work to compile, kind 0:57:34.240 --> 0:57:40.240 of illustrating that equation in some way. Yeah, yeah, you know. Value. 0:57:40.240 --> 0:57:41.880 I think it's a really great way to think about 0:57:41.920 --> 0:57:44.440 this is the value of our natural resources, the value 0:57:44.480 --> 0:57:48.680 of of range land versus a vineyard. And economically, if 0:57:48.720 --> 0:57:50.560 you look at the dollars and cents, there's a lot 0:57:50.600 --> 0:57:52.920 of money we found there was billions of dollars being 0:57:52.960 --> 0:57:55.200 spent for I think it's two billion dollars a year 0:57:55.240 --> 0:57:59.400 going towards private land conservation or so private land recreation. 0:58:00.040 --> 0:58:02.160 And that's a that's a lot of money, and I 0:58:02.200 --> 0:58:05.680 mean two billion dollars a lot of money. But compared 0:58:05.720 --> 0:58:09.680 to the US economy, compared to agriculture, it's it's really 0:58:09.760 --> 0:58:13.400 quite small. And it is a contribution. And I think 0:58:13.680 --> 0:58:16.080 what I wanted to show was say, well, how much 0:58:16.080 --> 0:58:18.200 of a contribution. Where is it working at the edges 0:58:18.440 --> 0:58:21.040 where it's actually helping. And if you were to lose it, 0:58:21.160 --> 0:58:24.040 you would be losing potentially a subsidy of real value 0:58:24.080 --> 0:58:27.840 of economic value of billions of dollars of real value 0:58:27.880 --> 0:58:31.480 of dollar values for natural lands. Um. So if you 0:58:31.560 --> 0:58:34.360 were to ban hunting, you'd lose You lose this, you 0:58:34.520 --> 0:58:38.000 lose this incentive for ranchers stan ranching the money that 0:58:38.080 --> 0:58:41.919 they would say this is a value. There's a whole 0:58:41.920 --> 0:58:44.920 another aspect of value though too for ranchers that has 0:58:45.000 --> 0:58:48.880 been uncovered with some of my colleagues, researchers Dr Lynn 0:58:48.920 --> 0:58:52.000 Hunt Singer, my my colleague here, it's found that ranchers 0:58:52.040 --> 0:58:55.600 aren't ranching for money. Ranting is a horrible business to 0:58:55.640 --> 0:58:59.480 get into. Oftentimes you'll make. You'll make one percent return 0:58:59.560 --> 0:59:01.960 on your uh, on all your money, on all your 0:59:02.040 --> 0:59:04.760 land capital, you make one percent return. You do way 0:59:04.840 --> 0:59:06.600 better just to go stick it in the stock market, 0:59:06.840 --> 0:59:09.720 far better. Um, But people do because they enjoy it. 0:59:10.440 --> 0:59:12.560 Often times, he's ranches will lose one percent a year 0:59:12.720 --> 0:59:15.040 or they'll break even many years, but they do it 0:59:15.040 --> 0:59:17.360 because they like it, and there's a lifestyle aspect, and 0:59:17.400 --> 0:59:19.600 there's a value that they place on it that's the 0:59:19.680 --> 0:59:22.240 equivalent of what they what they could make in the 0:59:22.320 --> 0:59:25.640 stock market. That's funny. Yeah, at some level, this is 0:59:25.680 --> 0:59:29.760 probably over generalization, Like hunting can subsidize someone's you know, 0:59:29.840 --> 0:59:32.400 there's there's the ways that subsidies kind of support this, 0:59:32.640 --> 0:59:35.680 this ranching lifestyle, farming lifestyle. The government does it all 0:59:35.720 --> 0:59:37.880 the time, but hunting lease is kind of a way 0:59:37.960 --> 0:59:40.520 to do that as well. Yeah, it's a it's a 0:59:40.560 --> 0:59:43.280 way that they can help them if they're I've talked 0:59:43.280 --> 0:59:45.400 to ranchers who said, you know, at least I know 0:59:45.560 --> 0:59:49.120 my hunting income is solid. Every year, I'm gonna get 0:59:49.240 --> 0:59:51.320 ninety a year from my hunting lease. And this is 0:59:51.360 --> 0:59:54.080 a big ranch. So um, he's like, I know, I'm 0:59:54.120 --> 0:59:57.560 getting that the cattle the cattle might make ten thousand 0:59:57.640 --> 0:59:59.400 that year, they might make a hundred thousand that year, 0:59:59.400 --> 1:00:01.360 and there's it's highly variable in the cattle market. But 1:00:01.400 --> 1:00:04.520 at least he knew he got this sort of baseline 1:00:04.560 --> 1:00:07.480 from the hunting. The King Ranch in Texas has some 1:00:07.640 --> 1:00:11.840 really great um descriptions showing this the stability of their 1:00:11.880 --> 1:00:15.480 wildlife and hunting revenue compared to the livestock industry, which 1:00:15.480 --> 1:00:18.200 is really volatile. So yeah, if and in a lot 1:00:18.240 --> 1:00:20.160 of places in Texas it ends up about half and half, 1:00:20.280 --> 1:00:23.200 hunting ends up being about as much as the livestock. 1:00:23.280 --> 1:00:26.680 So in that case, that's a big component to the 1:00:26.760 --> 1:00:29.480 economic picture for these ranchers, in addition to the fact 1:00:29.520 --> 1:00:31.200 that they did do it because they love it. Yeah, 1:00:31.400 --> 1:00:33.600 then you've got one thing I pulled out here. Private 1:00:33.640 --> 1:00:35.520 landers in the US are an approximate at one point 1:00:35.560 --> 1:00:38.360 five billion dollars in the annual income from hunting over 1:00:38.400 --> 1:00:41.600 two million acres. And there's a lot of these percentages 1:00:41.600 --> 1:00:44.000 and stuff I I like it, which is sixteen four 1:00:44.240 --> 1:00:47.280 six four percent of all private lands in the US. Yeah, 1:00:47.920 --> 1:00:50.680 that's just an interesting stack to me. Yeah, and interesting 1:00:50.720 --> 1:00:53.040 to see it presented in that way. Big areas and 1:00:54.000 --> 1:00:56.080 you know, we went further beyond sort of this sort 1:00:56.080 --> 1:00:58.800 of big that all this stuff we've talked about so 1:00:58.880 --> 1:01:00.520 far is this sort of big picture of like how 1:01:00.680 --> 1:01:04.320 land is used and how people value it, and we're 1:01:04.440 --> 1:01:06.840 what happens is really at the edges of land use. 1:01:07.040 --> 1:01:10.120 So if something's on the edge of shifting into a 1:01:10.240 --> 1:01:14.040 great orchard or almond orchard or some other sort of 1:01:14.080 --> 1:01:18.520 intensive agriculture, if if you reduce you're hunting revenue and 1:01:18.640 --> 1:01:20.760 take it out of the picture, it will just accelerate 1:01:20.840 --> 1:01:23.040 that transition. At these edges. It will make it that 1:01:23.120 --> 1:01:26.200 much less profitable, profitable, and so people will move into new, 1:01:26.560 --> 1:01:29.640 more profitable uses more quickly. That's sort of the larger 1:01:29.680 --> 1:01:32.120 economic theory of how this happens, and I think it 1:01:32.160 --> 1:01:36.000 plays out on our landscapes. The second thing we got 1:01:36.320 --> 1:01:38.400 some data on is why we looked into some of 1:01:38.440 --> 1:01:42.160 this U S Department of Agriculture datas. They gather information 1:01:42.320 --> 1:01:44.440 on what are people actually doing on the ground for 1:01:44.520 --> 1:01:47.840 conservation practices. Are they involved in some of these working 1:01:47.960 --> 1:01:51.520 lands programs which are um any of the people in 1:01:51.560 --> 1:01:53.760 your audience, you might be landowner, is probably familiar with 1:01:53.800 --> 1:01:57.000 the EQUIP program. Environmental Quality and Centers programs, the U 1:01:57.080 --> 1:01:59.760 s D a program that helps does cast share to 1:02:00.080 --> 1:02:03.480 to some conservation practices. We found people who were who 1:02:03.520 --> 1:02:07.280 had hunting leases there were more involved with these conservation programs. 1:02:07.720 --> 1:02:11.160 We found they were also more likely to hire private 1:02:11.920 --> 1:02:15.160 consultants to do conservation practices on their land. So we 1:02:15.240 --> 1:02:19.080 found additional correlations. We can't say for sure causation, but 1:02:19.120 --> 1:02:22.000 we did see people who had hunting leases, we're doing, 1:02:22.080 --> 1:02:24.720 we're participating more in these conservation programs, and they were 1:02:24.720 --> 1:02:29.520 participating in hiring private conservation folks. Those hunters were not arguing, 1:02:30.040 --> 1:02:31.960 I don't even look into the causation. We'll take it. 1:02:32.760 --> 1:02:34.920 I do. I do think there's a funny there's a 1:02:34.960 --> 1:02:37.360 funny point there. And we were talking earlier about the 1:02:37.440 --> 1:02:40.640 Quality Deer Management Association at q d m a UM 1:02:41.280 --> 1:02:44.760 and managing land for deer. Now you're you're doing, you're 1:02:44.800 --> 1:02:47.760 manipulating the land in certain ways. And if you talk 1:02:47.760 --> 1:02:49.520 about in the Midwest or the East or the south, 1:02:50.080 --> 1:02:52.480 all of the land is disturbed. I mean, there's very 1:02:52.520 --> 1:02:55.840 few pristine places that haven't already been disturbed in some way. 1:02:55.960 --> 1:02:58.400 So a lot of deer hundles will come in pay 1:02:58.440 --> 1:03:02.640 for a lease and then plant food plots, hinge cut 1:03:03.120 --> 1:03:07.880 you know, make cover, screening cover from different areas where 1:03:07.880 --> 1:03:11.000 there's roads and things like that to give the deer 1:03:11.040 --> 1:03:13.760 a better place to thrive. And the question that we 1:03:13.840 --> 1:03:17.520 always ask is is that is are those activities, by 1:03:17.600 --> 1:03:23.360 happenstance driving biodiversity. How much is that kind of like 1:03:23.520 --> 1:03:28.600 single species driven changes to the landscape really helping everything. 1:03:29.640 --> 1:03:31.200 I don't know if you have that answer, but it's 1:03:31.200 --> 1:03:33.640 just something that we've we've been looking at and talking 1:03:33.680 --> 1:03:37.240 about recently. Absolutely, I think it's something to think about. Absolutely. UM. 1:03:37.840 --> 1:03:40.240 I'd say, like if you talk to any any sort 1:03:40.280 --> 1:03:42.960 of academic, they'll say, well, it depends. That's the that's 1:03:43.000 --> 1:03:46.760 the big things that it depends. UM. Look, if you're look, 1:03:46.800 --> 1:03:49.760 if you're planting food plots for deer and having some 1:03:49.880 --> 1:03:52.560 cover and providing some of these habitat aspects, it's going 1:03:52.600 --> 1:03:54.400 to benefit some species and it might not be as 1:03:54.440 --> 1:03:57.840 beneficial for others. I think it's pretty safe to say 1:03:58.280 --> 1:04:00.960 it's probably better than a housing development, and that when 1:04:01.040 --> 1:04:03.720 I feel pretty sure about UM, it's probably better than 1:04:04.040 --> 1:04:08.680 an intensive agricultural operation. So UM to the extent that 1:04:09.200 --> 1:04:11.880 we make that comparison, I think, yeah, it's probably a win. 1:04:11.960 --> 1:04:16.760 It's probably win for conservation, even if it's single species management. Um. 1:04:17.560 --> 1:04:21.200 There are so many ways to measure biodiversity. We don't 1:04:21.200 --> 1:04:26.360 even oftentimes don't even think about invertebrate biodiversity. For example, 1:04:27.000 --> 1:04:29.240 it's hard to measure that. It's really hard to even 1:04:29.240 --> 1:04:31.720 get in there and measure the diversity of the thousands 1:04:31.760 --> 1:04:33.800 of species that you could find. And then you can 1:04:33.840 --> 1:04:35.840 go down down to bacteria and think about, well, what 1:04:35.920 --> 1:04:38.080 are the nematodes in the soil. What's about about the 1:04:38.120 --> 1:04:43.000 diversity at that level. So um, But I think that's 1:04:43.040 --> 1:04:45.880 where I think, you know, I think even hunters have 1:04:45.880 --> 1:04:47.880 a responsibility. Yeah, I think about that, Well, what are 1:04:47.960 --> 1:04:50.320 the what other species in your local area that might 1:04:50.840 --> 1:04:56.000 might really depend upon thick forests. Maybe there's some you know, uh, 1:04:56.600 --> 1:05:00.200 there's a some thick cedar forests in central Type because 1:05:00.240 --> 1:05:02.240 for example, they are important habitat for I think black 1:05:02.280 --> 1:05:06.200 cat vireos, are golden cheek warblers, these endangered species. You know, 1:05:06.240 --> 1:05:08.600 I think it's the responsibility of hunters and landowners when 1:05:08.600 --> 1:05:10.560 they get that landed dig in to call their local 1:05:11.640 --> 1:05:14.240 um in ourcs, their U S T a personnel call 1:05:14.280 --> 1:05:17.440 their local cooperative extension advisors find out, well, what what 1:05:17.600 --> 1:05:19.840 might not want to be thinking about beyond just deer. 1:05:19.960 --> 1:05:21.880 And there's so many, Like you say, there's so many reasons. 1:05:21.960 --> 1:05:24.360 We have a top secret project that media we're working 1:05:24.400 --> 1:05:26.920 on right now that that is running into this. You know, 1:05:27.200 --> 1:05:30.000 it's I can't I don't know how much I could say, 1:05:30.240 --> 1:05:33.280 but it's top secrets. But we're working on. We have 1:05:33.360 --> 1:05:35.560 a piece of land and we're trying to involve as 1:05:35.600 --> 1:05:38.240 many state and federal agencies as we can to come 1:05:38.280 --> 1:05:41.440 in and tell us what we can do better. And 1:05:41.560 --> 1:05:46.080 I think your point in the causation of I think 1:05:46.280 --> 1:05:49.080 hunters are just more inclined to think about conservation because 1:05:49.160 --> 1:05:52.040 the more you can serve the land and conserve the habitat, 1:05:52.120 --> 1:05:55.320 the more you have the game that you seek. It's 1:05:55.360 --> 1:05:57.360 just take it one step further. Is there more you 1:05:57.440 --> 1:06:00.360 can do not only to conserve that that have that 1:06:00.560 --> 1:06:04.560 for the game you seek, but for the other species 1:06:04.680 --> 1:06:07.120 as well? That will just help the entire ecosystem which 1:06:07.160 --> 1:06:10.320 you which you live and work and play. Absolutely. No. 1:06:10.480 --> 1:06:13.439 I you know Steve Keller. Have you heard of Steve Keller? 1:06:14.040 --> 1:06:16.360 He was a Yale professor. I think he's retired now. 1:06:16.520 --> 1:06:19.480 He he did a really interesting stud He did surveys 1:06:19.520 --> 1:06:22.840 of hunters around the world, and he wrote up this 1:06:23.400 --> 1:06:25.680 brief publication and it didn't get it got published into 1:06:25.760 --> 1:06:28.240 some some small journal. It wasn't really out. It's not 1:06:28.320 --> 1:06:30.720 really easy to find the internet. I should put it 1:06:30.760 --> 1:06:32.760 on my website. Maybe I'll do that after this I'd 1:06:32.800 --> 1:06:35.640 like to read it. He describes that he found through 1:06:35.680 --> 1:06:38.800 all of his efforts to of of serving hunters around 1:06:38.840 --> 1:06:41.120 the world, the US and Africa, all over the place, 1:06:41.360 --> 1:06:43.640 he found there was three types of hunters. He said. 1:06:43.680 --> 1:06:47.880 They were utilitarian hunters who just wanted meat, they wanted 1:06:47.920 --> 1:06:52.520 to bring home food. There were ecologistic hunters, who I 1:06:52.600 --> 1:06:55.800 think is the kind that we're trying to maybe advocate 1:06:55.880 --> 1:06:58.240 for or encourage people to think about. When we talked 1:06:58.240 --> 1:07:00.280 about this topic of well, what other species might you 1:07:00.280 --> 1:07:03.000 want to think about? And those folks, I think he 1:07:03.160 --> 1:07:06.320 was really articulate. He said, the's ecologistic hunters. They wanted 1:07:06.360 --> 1:07:10.360 to participate in the circle of life. They wanted to 1:07:10.400 --> 1:07:12.560 be part of it. And I think that was for me, 1:07:13.240 --> 1:07:16.160 helped me to describe for myself, like why I like 1:07:16.280 --> 1:07:19.560 to hunt it's not that I enjoy the kill. Um, 1:07:19.760 --> 1:07:22.000 I mean there there are aspects of that, Like I 1:07:22.080 --> 1:07:24.880 think this is part of being a predator in the 1:07:24.960 --> 1:07:28.919 predator prey system, like participating in nature in a way 1:07:29.040 --> 1:07:31.880 that you don't if you're just watching it from the outside. Yeah, 1:07:32.160 --> 1:07:33.960 I'm getting ready to go and talk to some animal 1:07:34.040 --> 1:07:36.120 rights folks, and I'm that's very much the point I 1:07:36.240 --> 1:07:43.040 make always I feel this intense like proximity to how 1:07:43.160 --> 1:07:45.280 this all works. I can't I'm not sitting on the 1:07:45.320 --> 1:07:48.880 sidelines and and you know, using my emotions or using 1:07:50.040 --> 1:07:51.840 some sort of circular logic to kind of get to 1:07:51.880 --> 1:07:54.000 the point where I feel good about what's happening. I'm 1:07:54.080 --> 1:07:57.960 inserting myself into it and trying to, over years and years, 1:07:58.000 --> 1:08:00.480 figure out what's the best way to interact with it. Yea, 1:08:01.040 --> 1:08:03.560 and it takes You're not gonna walk in with the answer. 1:08:03.640 --> 1:08:05.560 It probably won't walk out with it either, But yeah, 1:08:05.760 --> 1:08:08.120 it's better than sitting on the sidelines. Yeah, in a 1:08:08.200 --> 1:08:10.439 lot of ways. Well, when you think about our evolutionary history, 1:08:10.480 --> 1:08:13.720 I think pent of our history we were hunter gatherers, 1:08:13.800 --> 1:08:17.439 So I think there is some deeply embedded aspects of 1:08:17.520 --> 1:08:21.240 our of our genetics that are tied to hunting and 1:08:21.720 --> 1:08:24.479 tied to finding our own food, and we have We'll 1:08:24.479 --> 1:08:26.479 also have another guy I'm talking to who's a human 1:08:26.520 --> 1:08:29.519 evolutionary biologist, and it says, like kids throw rocks. You know, 1:08:29.560 --> 1:08:31.240 I have a three year old son. He throws rocks 1:08:31.280 --> 1:08:33.720 like you wouldn't believe. Like he sees he picks up 1:08:33.760 --> 1:08:35.960 a rock, he doesn't think, what is this. He picks 1:08:36.040 --> 1:08:37.720 up a rock and he immediately looks around to what 1:08:37.880 --> 1:08:41.400 he can throw it, and he's like, dude, that's that's 1:08:41.439 --> 1:08:44.800 because humans, when we first figured out how to throw things, 1:08:44.920 --> 1:08:47.160 then we first started to figure out that we could 1:08:47.200 --> 1:08:50.160 procure our own meat. And and there's some kind of 1:08:50.280 --> 1:08:53.479 biological ticker in there that when your son picks up 1:08:53.479 --> 1:08:55.960 a rock, he doesn't see something he might lick or 1:08:56.000 --> 1:08:58.439 put in his pocket. He sees something he needs to throw. 1:08:59.040 --> 1:09:01.800 So there's a connection in there for sure. Yeah. The 1:09:01.920 --> 1:09:04.400 third type of hunters is to close that top. That's 1:09:04.560 --> 1:09:07.639 that topic that Steve Kellet raised was the sportsman hunters, 1:09:07.720 --> 1:09:10.880 the trophy hunters that we think about today, which I 1:09:10.920 --> 1:09:13.800 think there was an interesting thing to think about um 1:09:13.960 --> 1:09:15.840 for the hunting community. And I'm sure You've probably had 1:09:15.920 --> 1:09:18.200 great um people on your podcast, but I find that 1:09:18.280 --> 1:09:20.160 to be a really interesting thing. You know, one thing 1:09:20.280 --> 1:09:23.560 people don't think about with the sport that trophy hunting community, 1:09:24.120 --> 1:09:27.200 is that it really came out of Theodore Roosevelt's efforts 1:09:27.280 --> 1:09:31.120 to reduce the amount of harvest of wildlife. The idea 1:09:31.200 --> 1:09:34.040 was he would just take a single specimen that was 1:09:34.520 --> 1:09:37.360 hopefully past his prime, just past his prime. It's bread, 1:09:37.479 --> 1:09:39.840 it's it's lived a full life, and you take the 1:09:39.920 --> 1:09:42.439 single trophy, you take one instead of it is in 1:09:42.479 --> 1:09:44.719 a time of market hunting when people were taking hundreds 1:09:44.760 --> 1:09:48.200 and hundreds of animals, and it was an idea to think, wow, 1:09:48.280 --> 1:09:51.280 we really actually can conserve the species by doing trophy 1:09:51.360 --> 1:09:53.479 hunting and encouraging people to just take a single animal. 1:09:54.200 --> 1:09:56.160 And I think today it's really taken on such a 1:09:56.240 --> 1:09:59.960 different tone. Yeah, And it's hard when you start to examine, 1:10:00.160 --> 1:10:03.919 as as Keller lays out there, like the motivations of hunters. 1:10:04.280 --> 1:10:06.080 And that's why I think where it gets all twisted up, 1:10:06.120 --> 1:10:08.840 it's like, what's what's our motivation? Well, I mean, there 1:10:09.000 --> 1:10:10.720 those are three really good types. I've met a lot 1:10:10.760 --> 1:10:15.919 of types. Those are three pretty there's three pretty universal 1:10:16.000 --> 1:10:20.240 types that kind of covers probably hunters I've ever met. 1:10:20.280 --> 1:10:23.439 There's some some outliers there, I'm sure that kind of 1:10:24.880 --> 1:10:28.440 like that. People people that don't like people that sometimes 1:10:28.520 --> 1:10:31.120 are when I hunt when I'm not a trophy hunter, 1:10:31.160 --> 1:10:34.200 when I hunt pheasants, Yeah, but when I'm when I'm 1:10:34.280 --> 1:10:36.640 hunting a mule deer, I'm a trophy hunter, all right. 1:10:36.760 --> 1:10:39.760 So there there are just it's it's such an intertwining 1:10:39.800 --> 1:10:43.920 and twisting and turning story. But when you start to 1:10:44.120 --> 1:10:46.160 and that's what I think in the modern sense we've 1:10:46.200 --> 1:10:48.519 done is trying to really look at what is the 1:10:48.560 --> 1:10:52.120 motivation of a hunter because there's so many people that 1:10:52.160 --> 1:10:56.160 aren't motivated to do it. There's of the country that 1:10:56.320 --> 1:10:58.639 that are not motivated to do it, and there's there's 1:10:58.920 --> 1:11:01.040 a chunk of those folks that are motivated to stop it. 1:11:01.400 --> 1:11:04.680 And so that's I think we get so locked in 1:11:04.760 --> 1:11:07.800 on the motivations that it's hard to see. I think 1:11:07.840 --> 1:11:11.240 that's what a lot of what what your paper because 1:11:11.280 --> 1:11:13.280 it's hard to see. You know, there's a lot of 1:11:13.320 --> 1:11:17.280 trophy hunters that have leases and what they're doing is 1:11:17.320 --> 1:11:21.120 benefiting the landscape. Now you have to separate I always 1:11:21.120 --> 1:11:23.240 are you. You need to separate those two things, you know, 1:11:24.400 --> 1:11:27.919 but it's also good to be aware of the benefits 1:11:28.040 --> 1:11:30.880 of of every part of every motivation and hunting, yeah, 1:11:31.120 --> 1:11:34.480 no matter what it is. And I think those ecologists 1:11:35.240 --> 1:11:38.639 motivated hunters are. I mean there's a lot of them, 1:11:38.760 --> 1:11:40.080 and they have a lot of them in the white 1:11:40.080 --> 1:11:43.920 tail space. And in fact, we had a gentleman from 1:11:43.960 --> 1:11:46.559 the q d m A write a little social post 1:11:46.600 --> 1:11:49.640 about Hey, look, you know I think it was I 1:11:49.680 --> 1:11:54.800 don't want to miss quote a hunters live not in 1:11:54.880 --> 1:11:59.960 the West. There's like there's hunters that live in West, 1:12:00.120 --> 1:12:03.719 but there's yeah, the bulk of that as public lands. 1:12:03.760 --> 1:12:06.599 I'll have to get the right numbers of our public 1:12:06.680 --> 1:12:10.360 lands are in the West, only of our hunters. Yeah, 1:12:10.560 --> 1:12:13.840 And like your research, your research backs up the power 1:12:14.040 --> 1:12:16.600 of the South and the East and the Midwest and 1:12:16.680 --> 1:12:19.680 that private land, Yeah, chunk of what we do and 1:12:19.760 --> 1:12:21.800 access in getting people the ability to get out there 1:12:21.800 --> 1:12:25.559 and to participate in this nature. I think that that's 1:12:25.560 --> 1:12:28.200 how I got into conservation, because I wanted to be outside. 1:12:28.200 --> 1:12:31.360 I wanted to participate in this cycle of life out 1:12:31.400 --> 1:12:34.360 on ranches. I fell in love with ranches, working it today. 1:12:35.240 --> 1:12:38.160 Um And I think the more that we can encourage, 1:12:39.280 --> 1:12:42.160 you know, ranchers, farmers and ranchers who might have a 1:12:42.200 --> 1:12:45.560 bad opinion of hunters to think about, well, maybe I 1:12:45.560 --> 1:12:48.160 should open my lands up for hunters. Maybe I should 1:12:48.160 --> 1:12:50.839 consider this as a something that can not only benefit 1:12:50.880 --> 1:12:54.439 me economically, but also benefit the natural resources on my 1:12:54.560 --> 1:12:58.800 land through their work. Oftentimes hunters will will volunteer their 1:12:58.840 --> 1:13:02.200 time and effort to do that work. Um. And so 1:13:02.280 --> 1:13:05.439 I think they're while we show there's the land areas 1:13:05.439 --> 1:13:08.760 and for us for wildlife Associate recreation, a bunch of 1:13:08.840 --> 1:13:11.120 that's hunting, that's still theres still a whole lot of 1:13:11.160 --> 1:13:13.320 other land that's not being used, so that's closed off. 1:13:14.400 --> 1:13:16.680 People might think that huntings or hunters are going to 1:13:16.720 --> 1:13:19.719 shoot your cow or shoot your horse. I've never actually 1:13:19.720 --> 1:13:22.439 met anybody who actually experienced that. Um, But it's a 1:13:22.680 --> 1:13:25.640 sort of a narrative that is an excuse to not 1:13:25.840 --> 1:13:28.040 let people on. But I think the more we can 1:13:28.080 --> 1:13:31.400 allow people in these urban areas to get into get 1:13:31.439 --> 1:13:35.080 out into that nature. Look, we're we're we have too 1:13:35.160 --> 1:13:38.360 much too much at stake to not work together. Right Like, 1:13:38.920 --> 1:13:42.400 if you don't think animals, you shouldn't hunt animals, um, 1:13:42.520 --> 1:13:44.800 but you still want to. I think animal rights folks 1:13:44.840 --> 1:13:48.000 they want to maintain wildlife. They want to maintain natural 1:13:48.080 --> 1:13:50.560 areas well. I guess what hunters do to. But we 1:13:50.640 --> 1:13:53.800 have a fundamental difference on whether you should harvest an 1:13:53.800 --> 1:13:56.479 animal or not. But in the end, our goal is 1:13:56.520 --> 1:13:59.840 to maintain natural areas. And if we're fighting each other, 1:14:00.520 --> 1:14:03.559 we're just really we're missing an opportunity to work together 1:14:03.600 --> 1:14:06.439 and find the common ground. And yeah, considered pland I 1:14:06.439 --> 1:14:08.439 always tell this folks, we start from the exact same 1:14:08.479 --> 1:14:10.760 place like you. It's almost if we were standing back 1:14:10.800 --> 1:14:13.960 to back and we turned around like, hey, well we're 1:14:14.000 --> 1:14:16.280 in the same spot. We both care about natural places 1:14:16.320 --> 1:14:19.400 and wildlife, and ECO says we all we care about this. 1:14:19.680 --> 1:14:21.920 And in our country, we're lucky enough that most people 1:14:22.720 --> 1:14:25.519 value these things. Like the bulk of the people this 1:14:25.600 --> 1:14:28.439 country would would say, there's hurt help. Do you value that? 1:14:28.520 --> 1:14:31.439 You want that to be there? Yes, of course I do, um, 1:14:31.520 --> 1:14:33.160 And we have a structure in place to keep it there. 1:14:33.240 --> 1:14:36.080 But then for animal rights folks, for hunters, you start 1:14:36.120 --> 1:14:38.720 to kind of walk away from each other and you 1:14:38.880 --> 1:14:41.320 forget that you started in the same spot. Because that's 1:14:41.360 --> 1:14:44.360 so I mean, it's so easy to sensationalize the animal 1:14:44.479 --> 1:14:47.759 rights folks beliefs. You know, I think, oh, animal personhood, 1:14:47.800 --> 1:14:50.720 that's silly. They think killing something and say you care 1:14:50.760 --> 1:14:53.160 about it, that's silly. And you get caught up in 1:14:53.280 --> 1:14:58.920 like those really you know, those videosyncrasies and and and 1:14:59.040 --> 1:15:00.479 the fact that we kill we want to kill them, 1:15:00.479 --> 1:15:03.840 they don't want to kill them, right, But that's I mean, 1:15:04.600 --> 1:15:06.720 that's what the conversation is. That's where that's where the 1:15:07.000 --> 1:15:08.800 heads come together, and like, how can we figure this 1:15:08.920 --> 1:15:11.439 out where we can co exist. We're both you know, 1:15:11.640 --> 1:15:13.560 there's a lot of hunting stories that have led to 1:15:14.200 --> 1:15:16.600 a lot of wildlife, a lot more wild life. And 1:15:16.640 --> 1:15:18.400 how how nice if we every time we heard those 1:15:18.400 --> 1:15:20.599 sort of those sort of descriptions that you just said, 1:15:20.880 --> 1:15:22.800 like if we had instead it, Well, actually we both 1:15:22.880 --> 1:15:24.680 want the same thing. We both really want to make 1:15:24.720 --> 1:15:27.639 sure these species survive in the future as a whole, 1:15:27.760 --> 1:15:31.600 that the population are viable and the ecosystems are maintained. 1:15:32.040 --> 1:15:35.479 Your hands off, I'm hands on. Can we just agree 1:15:35.520 --> 1:15:37.599 that that's what where we are? And well, I mean, 1:15:37.680 --> 1:15:40.559 let's raise the deficiency. Who who does better for wild 1:15:40.880 --> 1:15:43.320 or each has a role, Yeah, each has a Yeah better, 1:15:43.400 --> 1:15:48.960 that's way better. Uh So you one thing that interesting. 1:15:49.040 --> 1:15:52.080 I don't know that this shock people is interesting, It 1:15:52.200 --> 1:15:54.560 said the anally in your paper. The analysis revealed that 1:15:54.680 --> 1:15:57.080 ten point two to eleven point three of the land 1:15:57.200 --> 1:16:02.320 area the South, Midwest, and Northeast are primarily owned for hunting, 1:16:02.520 --> 1:16:04.080 while less than one percent of the land and the 1:16:04.160 --> 1:16:06.599 West was owned for hunting. In terms of leasse lands 1:16:06.680 --> 1:16:10.800 the South and Northeast of their respective land us for 1:16:10.880 --> 1:16:14.200 hunting leases, there's only four two percent of the land 1:16:14.280 --> 1:16:16.479 in the Midwest and West are at least for hunting. Yeah, 1:16:16.479 --> 1:16:18.040 it wasn't that interesting. I mean, there's a lot of 1:16:18.120 --> 1:16:20.240 numbers you through out there, but there's some some nuances, 1:16:20.360 --> 1:16:23.200 especially in the Midwest, where you had a lot of 1:16:23.280 --> 1:16:26.519 people owning land for hunting but very few people leasing 1:16:26.600 --> 1:16:29.320 land for hunting. And I started digging in, like what 1:16:29.520 --> 1:16:31.880 is happening in the Midwest. That's that's a bunch of 1:16:31.960 --> 1:16:34.880 hunters live in Wisconsin, and that's that's some of the 1:16:34.960 --> 1:16:37.280 highest density of hunters in our country in that area. 1:16:38.600 --> 1:16:41.160 And as I dug into some of those states, if 1:16:41.360 --> 1:16:44.360 I found some policies and This is where the paper 1:16:44.439 --> 1:16:46.760 sort of ends, is sort of like to think about 1:16:46.760 --> 1:16:49.599 in the future and has become a new research avenue 1:16:49.640 --> 1:16:54.559 for US. But Wisconsin and Minnesota and Michigan, I believe 1:16:54.600 --> 1:16:56.880 all three of those states. Maybe maybe it's just Michigan 1:16:56.920 --> 1:17:00.880 and Wisconsin have these forest land and Acts which give 1:17:01.000 --> 1:17:04.200 property tax breaks to landowners forced landowners if they open 1:17:04.280 --> 1:17:07.679 up their land for free public hunting, so it cannot 1:17:07.760 --> 1:17:10.960 be leased, so you have that tax break is sort 1:17:10.960 --> 1:17:13.439 of allowed opening up a lot of free, free land, 1:17:13.520 --> 1:17:16.240 but it's reducing I think. I mean, millions of acres 1:17:16.280 --> 1:17:19.200 are in some of these programs in Wisconsin and Michigan, 1:17:19.760 --> 1:17:22.040 so I think that really reduces the sort of area 1:17:22.160 --> 1:17:25.479 that's that's leased in these states. But it points to 1:17:25.520 --> 1:17:28.560 the power of policies and how policies can incentivize and 1:17:28.680 --> 1:17:32.479 change the dynamics for access for hunters. And what does 1:17:32.520 --> 1:17:36.160 that mean. Yeah, I mean when we talk about in Texas, 1:17:36.240 --> 1:17:39.960 you're from there and I live there, and we talk 1:17:40.000 --> 1:17:42.080 about like what it means to go hunting in that 1:17:42.240 --> 1:17:45.040 state leases, I think if you were to ask all hunters, 1:17:45.400 --> 1:17:47.640 could we eliminate leases and just give free access to 1:17:47.720 --> 1:17:49.880 every place where you'd like to go hunting big. Yeah, sure, 1:17:50.240 --> 1:17:52.679 I'll keep my money about spend it on something else. 1:17:53.240 --> 1:17:54.800 I think we would all agree on that. I mean, 1:17:54.880 --> 1:17:57.320 we will all agree that are all of our most 1:17:57.400 --> 1:17:59.720 hunters goal. My goal is to own land one day. 1:17:59.720 --> 1:18:01.840 If ever it's way far it, I'm gonna have to 1:18:01.880 --> 1:18:04.960 do a lot more podcasts. Tell your friends, folks, I 1:18:05.040 --> 1:18:09.800 wanna need more downloads. But that's I think, you know, 1:18:09.960 --> 1:18:13.519 that's the American gold, American dreams part of my goal. 1:18:14.080 --> 1:18:16.960 But there's these like things you know in the middle, 1:18:17.000 --> 1:18:19.160 and leasing is kind of like the next best thing. 1:18:19.880 --> 1:18:22.160 But we would all I think we would all agree. 1:18:22.800 --> 1:18:24.320 If we didn't have to do that, we wouldn't do it. 1:18:24.640 --> 1:18:26.280 But that's the reality of Texas in a lot of 1:18:26.320 --> 1:18:29.320 places where leasing happens. And to see a lot of 1:18:29.400 --> 1:18:33.560 your numbers looking at least land, you know, just just 1:18:33.640 --> 1:18:35.800 shows me how how many people are doing and how 1:18:36.040 --> 1:18:40.720 how as a hunting company that I work for, this 1:18:40.920 --> 1:18:43.320 pod podcast about honey, we don't talk about how to 1:18:43.439 --> 1:18:46.720 least land, How where did lease land, what to do 1:18:46.880 --> 1:18:49.479 with it, how to how to be a good lease e, 1:18:49.840 --> 1:18:51.680 how to how to find people to come and leash 1:18:51.680 --> 1:18:53.840 your land that will take good care of it. And 1:18:53.920 --> 1:18:55.960 we don't really talk about that subject all that much. 1:18:56.000 --> 1:18:58.080 And it's it's the numbers that you're buried out to 1:18:58.120 --> 1:19:00.960 be a pretty impactful thing. There's so many opportunities. I've 1:19:01.000 --> 1:19:04.120 met so many where this works well. Land owners who 1:19:04.160 --> 1:19:06.800 really love their they're hunting their hunters, they love having 1:19:06.880 --> 1:19:09.599 them out there. They provide a service to them. They 1:19:09.640 --> 1:19:11.479 know there's not going to be an illegal pot grow 1:19:11.600 --> 1:19:14.160 in the back back of the ranch. They know that 1:19:14.640 --> 1:19:16.880 there's gonna be guys crawling around the property and keeping 1:19:16.920 --> 1:19:19.679 an eye on it. Um A lot of times people 1:19:19.760 --> 1:19:22.200 do free work, take care of the property, fixed wells, 1:19:22.240 --> 1:19:24.439 report if the water, if the water troughs empty for 1:19:24.479 --> 1:19:27.720 the livestock, or they see livestock sick. It's nice to 1:19:27.800 --> 1:19:29.479 have this sort of eyes on the ground for us, 1:19:29.520 --> 1:19:32.840 some of his landowners. The other thing about leases I 1:19:32.920 --> 1:19:35.200 think we haven't touched on yet is that you know 1:19:35.600 --> 1:19:38.639 and and this is right. I actually questioned Steve Ronnella 1:19:39.160 --> 1:19:44.160 at the recent Congressional Sportsman's Foundation uh National Assembly of 1:19:44.200 --> 1:19:47.280 Sportsmen's Caucuses. He was he was speaking in New Hampshire, 1:19:47.320 --> 1:19:51.400 Breton Woods, New Hampshire, beautiful place and he he had mentioned, 1:19:51.400 --> 1:19:53.320 you know, the importance of access and the ability to 1:19:53.360 --> 1:19:56.680 get out. I coming from Texas, I grew up and 1:19:56.960 --> 1:20:00.600 hunted on private lands, friends lands and friends ranches, and 1:20:00.680 --> 1:20:02.559 it's a white tail system, so there's a lot higher 1:20:02.600 --> 1:20:06.160 density of deer. But coming out to California and becoming 1:20:06.200 --> 1:20:10.479 a public land hunter that it is exceedingly hard and 1:20:10.640 --> 1:20:14.160 sometimes to even see a single legal animal over the 1:20:14.240 --> 1:20:17.559 course of a week. Um it takes a whole another 1:20:17.760 --> 1:20:21.080 level of skill, which is good. It's it's if you 1:20:21.160 --> 1:20:24.400 want to become an excellent hunter, being able to harvest 1:20:24.760 --> 1:20:27.519 a solid trophy buck on public land, you have to 1:20:27.600 --> 1:20:29.439 be a really quite a good hunter, or very you 1:20:29.560 --> 1:20:33.240 might get really lucky too, that's right, But um it, 1:20:33.400 --> 1:20:35.280 I think it can be discouraging for a new hunter 1:20:36.040 --> 1:20:38.479 going out, um and to spend a week out and 1:20:38.520 --> 1:20:40.800 not even see a legal buck because they have gotten 1:20:40.960 --> 1:20:45.680 so attuned to the to the pressures that they just 1:20:46.120 --> 1:20:49.800 become totally nocturnal. At whenever the cunning season opens, they 1:20:49.840 --> 1:20:52.200 can hear. It is remarkable too. I mean, we have 1:20:52.520 --> 1:20:55.760 half of California's public land and even though there's very 1:20:55.920 --> 1:20:58.759 there's only what two percent of the state population as hunters. 1:20:59.240 --> 1:21:00.679 You go out into the men to see no national 1:21:00.760 --> 1:21:05.120 forests on opening day of archery season and every campground 1:21:05.200 --> 1:21:08.960 is full. There are vehicles driving those roads. There are 1:21:09.200 --> 1:21:11.760 lots of people here. Yeah, these dear no, they can 1:21:11.840 --> 1:21:14.519 smell the smell the exhaust in the forest and thinking 1:21:14.800 --> 1:21:16.960 something's going on today, I better high tail out of here. 1:21:17.040 --> 1:21:19.880 And that was that's uh So, some of these challenges 1:21:19.920 --> 1:21:21.920 in the public land and when you talked about were 1:21:21.920 --> 1:21:24.960 eliminate all leases and let free public access. You know, 1:21:25.000 --> 1:21:27.880 in some ways there's there's some beneficial aspects to having 1:21:28.000 --> 1:21:32.080 that limitation, to to be able to really limit the 1:21:32.120 --> 1:21:36.120 density of hunters out there. Um, I don't know. I 1:21:36.120 --> 1:21:37.600 don't know how to how to manage that in some 1:21:37.680 --> 1:21:39.679 of these systems because I am torn. It is great 1:21:39.720 --> 1:21:41.240 to have public access and be able to go out 1:21:41.280 --> 1:21:43.719 whenever you want, But then if you don't see a deer, 1:21:44.280 --> 1:21:47.000 you don't see a harvestable animal, that's that's tough. It's hard. 1:21:47.040 --> 1:21:50.000 I've been flipping about it in the past, say things like, well, 1:21:50.080 --> 1:21:52.280 you know, you gotta value the experience, you gotta value 1:21:52.360 --> 1:21:54.720 the time outside, and then at the end of the 1:21:54.760 --> 1:21:57.960 day you're like wait, wait, wait, wait wait, Um, If 1:21:57.960 --> 1:22:01.640 I'm playing chess, I'm trump beach the goal. I have 1:22:01.720 --> 1:22:03.759 a goal. If I'm hunting, I'm trying to kill an animal. 1:22:04.080 --> 1:22:06.800 Like it's it's it's just silly for someone so well, yeah, 1:22:06.960 --> 1:22:09.080 it's like being outside. No, I'm I'd like to have 1:22:09.840 --> 1:22:12.640 some nice fresh meat on the round. So yeah, I 1:22:12.680 --> 1:22:14.200 know that it's it's a point to be made that 1:22:14.240 --> 1:22:16.439 there's a balance, right, And that's what I think, I 1:22:16.560 --> 1:22:19.479 really think this conversation really is all about. Is in 1:22:19.640 --> 1:22:22.960 my mind, is that's what it's about. It's about understanding 1:22:23.560 --> 1:22:28.680 the whole picture, and not that I feel that we 1:22:28.800 --> 1:22:31.320 need to over emphasize one thing or the other. But 1:22:31.720 --> 1:22:33.439 I've always said, and I've said this on this podcast 1:22:33.479 --> 1:22:36.800 many times, public lands. It's like apple Pie and bald 1:22:36.840 --> 1:22:39.719 Eagles and Teddy Rose about it's easy to love public lands. 1:22:39.880 --> 1:22:42.320 I mean it's and it's also easy to promote them. 1:22:42.479 --> 1:22:45.280 I mean, what is it. It's free access, it's not 1:22:45.400 --> 1:22:47.639 for you to pay for it. But we all own them. 1:22:47.840 --> 1:22:49.679 We have these shirts public land owners. We all own 1:22:49.720 --> 1:22:53.200 this land. We have this. I've I've hunted primarily National 1:22:53.280 --> 1:22:56.760 Forest for the last for all the Turkey season, and 1:22:57.439 --> 1:22:58.960 my Dad's from the East Coast and he comes to 1:22:59.040 --> 1:23:00.880 hunt with me, and I don't know that he really understands. 1:23:01.040 --> 1:23:02.360 And I don't know that I do yet because I've 1:23:02.400 --> 1:23:04.760 only been living in Montana for six, six or eight months, 1:23:05.800 --> 1:23:08.120 not that I that I don't really understand that. So 1:23:08.240 --> 1:23:12.040 it's it's public is an easy sell. It's like, we 1:23:12.200 --> 1:23:14.439 all pay into this, we all get to use it. 1:23:14.920 --> 1:23:18.320 It's beautiful landscapes. It's open for for us to fish, 1:23:18.400 --> 1:23:20.240 to hunt, to recreate in the ways that we want, 1:23:20.280 --> 1:23:22.360 as long as we take care of it right. It's easy. 1:23:23.120 --> 1:23:25.400 It's hard, and it's harder to sell leases to people. 1:23:25.439 --> 1:23:28.040 It's harder to talk about private lands and talk about leases. 1:23:28.120 --> 1:23:30.920 It's just not as it's not as marketable. It just isn't. 1:23:31.240 --> 1:23:32.960 I don't know. I see this is this is my 1:23:33.080 --> 1:23:35.400 Texas up upbring coming up because I go out to 1:23:35.439 --> 1:23:37.360 public land and I see a full campground and I 1:23:37.439 --> 1:23:39.800 see cars all over the roads, and I'm like, oh man, 1:23:39.920 --> 1:23:42.120 this is not what I was looking for I want. 1:23:42.120 --> 1:23:44.240 I'm thirty miles down a dirt road in the middle 1:23:44.240 --> 1:23:48.920 of Mendisine National Forest and there's people everywhere and the 1:23:49.080 --> 1:23:51.360 nice I mean, there's a certain aspect of density of 1:23:51.439 --> 1:23:54.320 people that that can also I mean, it's easy to sell. 1:23:54.400 --> 1:23:56.720 But also I mean I've seen hunting videos were like, yeah, 1:23:56.760 --> 1:23:59.160 we're planning and going this one valley and for a 1:23:59.200 --> 1:24:01.840 sheep hunt, but there was twenty cars in the parking lot. 1:24:01.960 --> 1:24:04.040 We had to change plans. We're going somewhere else. And 1:24:04.160 --> 1:24:07.600 so there is I mean, that's another thing in this 1:24:07.680 --> 1:24:10.439 paper found is that the density of people using hunting 1:24:10.520 --> 1:24:13.120 lands that you can use these big, wide open spaces, 1:24:13.880 --> 1:24:16.280 and part of what we want is hunters is to 1:24:16.360 --> 1:24:17.800 kind of get away from it all and get away 1:24:17.840 --> 1:24:22.120 from the crowds, and so the I think there are 1:24:22.200 --> 1:24:24.160 public plans where you can find that, but as they 1:24:24.200 --> 1:24:26.840 get discovered, you can have it. Can we definitely love 1:24:26.920 --> 1:24:29.400 them to death? We we can love what we have loved. 1:24:29.400 --> 1:24:31.839 I mean I was talking to a buddy from Colorado 1:24:31.920 --> 1:24:34.280 and he's he's like, we are loving the outdoors to 1:24:34.360 --> 1:24:36.639 death in the state. You know, I said, it's coming 1:24:36.680 --> 1:24:38.920 for all the other states that have these resources. People 1:24:38.960 --> 1:24:40.800 want to use them and then they can be loved 1:24:40.800 --> 1:24:42.320 to death. So that that is a point. I think 1:24:43.160 --> 1:24:46.280 they're these competing principles. One of the principles in public 1:24:46.400 --> 1:24:49.560 lands is like, there's no elitism in public lands. You 1:24:49.600 --> 1:24:51.240 could be rich, you could be poor. You could have 1:24:51.320 --> 1:24:53.360 a dollar, you could have a million, but you can 1:24:53.479 --> 1:24:56.880 still go. If you have enough money for the tag 1:24:57.000 --> 1:25:00.200 and enough time, you could still go and use this source. 1:25:00.280 --> 1:25:03.720 We all it kind of levels the playing field, and 1:25:04.280 --> 1:25:07.080 that's beautiful. But what happens with private land and leasing. 1:25:07.960 --> 1:25:11.320 There's this this idea that that's what we came to 1:25:11.400 --> 1:25:14.679 this this new world to kind of to escape some way. 1:25:15.320 --> 1:25:17.120 But at the same time, like you said, I think 1:25:17.680 --> 1:25:19.640 both these things that play together, both these ideas that 1:25:19.680 --> 1:25:24.719 played together helped disperse the opportunity, helped disperse the number 1:25:24.760 --> 1:25:27.240 of hunters, and so that it all has to matter, 1:25:28.120 --> 1:25:31.160 um provide opportunities. Yeah, it all has to matter together. 1:25:31.200 --> 1:25:32.880 So I'm just trying to better understand that I would 1:25:32.920 --> 1:25:35.640 admit to not really when I read your paper, I'm like, 1:25:35.680 --> 1:25:38.679 there's a portion of this that I don't understand. There's 1:25:38.680 --> 1:25:41.599 a portion of this entire land news picture that I'm 1:25:41.640 --> 1:25:44.080 not picking up here and and reading your paper, I 1:25:44.160 --> 1:25:47.799 started to pick up some of it um in better detail, 1:25:47.840 --> 1:25:50.920 because I understand, Yeah, in the East, in the South, 1:25:51.040 --> 1:25:52.800 a lot of people in Eastland in Texas, A lot 1:25:52.800 --> 1:25:55.200 of people in Eastland, a lot of people just have 1:25:55.320 --> 1:25:57.320 to be really friendly to landowners to get a chance 1:25:57.360 --> 1:26:00.519 to go hunt and equality of game. I knew that, 1:26:00.680 --> 1:26:03.240 but this starts to paint a picture that's important. I think, Yeah. 1:26:03.439 --> 1:26:06.479 And I also think it's a you know, the elite 1:26:06.560 --> 1:26:09.560 ism thing. Maybe it's I you know, I when I 1:26:09.600 --> 1:26:11.479 go out and talk to ranchers, I rarely meet a 1:26:11.560 --> 1:26:16.000 rancher who's elite. I usually find somebody who's we're in 1:26:16.120 --> 1:26:20.000 jeans that are dirty, an old shirt, and they're working 1:26:20.040 --> 1:26:23.160 to land. They're working hard. And I mean, there certainly 1:26:23.200 --> 1:26:27.920 are elite landowners for sure, but by and large i've 1:26:29.120 --> 1:26:31.559 I didn't. One of my doctoral chapters was to interview 1:26:31.640 --> 1:26:34.519 ranchers and they're like, and I'd tell people hear at Berkeley. 1:26:34.520 --> 1:26:36.240 I was like, yeah, I'm gonna go interview ranchers around 1:26:36.240 --> 1:26:38.080 the state. And they're like, you're gonna tell me you're 1:26:38.080 --> 1:26:41.600 from Berkeley. I was like, yeah, yeah, I guess so 1:26:41.680 --> 1:26:44.240 I have to. I've got to introduce myself. And you know, 1:26:44.520 --> 1:26:47.559 like I was amazed how few people of these ranchers. 1:26:47.960 --> 1:26:50.040 I sometimes get a little bit of eyebrow raised but 1:26:50.880 --> 1:26:52.799 a lot of these people their kids came to Berkeley, 1:26:53.360 --> 1:26:56.000 or their grandparents went to Berkeley, but their parents so 1:26:56.160 --> 1:26:59.240 that they themselves did. So there's you know, a lot 1:26:59.280 --> 1:27:02.599 of these things are sceptions about like how different we are. 1:27:02.720 --> 1:27:05.400 And as soon as you meet somebody, shake their hand, 1:27:05.760 --> 1:27:08.240 you tell me you're just interested in knowing their perspective. 1:27:08.920 --> 1:27:11.160 They want us to share their story too. And I 1:27:11.240 --> 1:27:14.400 think I think that plays with private leases as well. 1:27:14.479 --> 1:27:16.960 I think if you look at it as this as 1:27:17.000 --> 1:27:19.320 this big no trespassing sign and this big scary thing, 1:27:20.120 --> 1:27:22.960 if you instead just call him up. I've had remarkable 1:27:23.040 --> 1:27:25.880 luck just calling up a landowner. And I called up 1:27:25.880 --> 1:27:28.320 a couple of landowners. I had some some staff flower 1:27:28.360 --> 1:27:30.400 growing up growing on it just north of Davis for 1:27:30.479 --> 1:27:33.080 dove hunting. Uh, and it it takes a lot of 1:27:33.120 --> 1:27:35.439 courage to call, to make a cold call to a landowner. 1:27:36.040 --> 1:27:38.479 And I called two people and both of them granted 1:27:38.560 --> 1:27:41.000 me access, and they were so they were grateful that 1:27:41.040 --> 1:27:43.080 I even called them. They're like, wow, thank you so 1:27:43.200 --> 1:27:46.360 much for calling. That's really nice of you. Um, it's 1:27:46.439 --> 1:27:49.960 it's and they actually felt I think pleased to be 1:27:50.000 --> 1:27:52.640 able to be generous to to you know, at the 1:27:52.680 --> 1:27:55.160 time a graduate student, somebody kind of lower income, and 1:27:55.560 --> 1:27:57.160 I just wanted to get out in the nature. So 1:27:58.120 --> 1:28:00.160 they have something at stake. They love these lands too. 1:28:00.240 --> 1:28:02.320 They have some mistake to encourage people to get out 1:28:02.360 --> 1:28:04.720 there and to enjoy and love these lands in the 1:28:04.800 --> 1:28:08.720 same way they do. So, so I I don't. I 1:28:08.800 --> 1:28:10.599 don't like that sort of I mean, I grew up 1:28:10.600 --> 1:28:12.719 in a place where, yeah, knew ranches that were super friendly, 1:28:12.760 --> 1:28:15.320 so they're from these people I knew, and so I don't. 1:28:16.240 --> 1:28:19.120 I don't necessarily see that elitism thing is driving the 1:28:19.240 --> 1:28:23.200 private land lease arrangement. I see it more as as 1:28:23.240 --> 1:28:26.200 an opportunity for controlled and also for the ability to 1:28:26.720 --> 1:28:29.280 to go to a place and sort of making your own. Um. 1:28:29.479 --> 1:28:32.120 Somebody described like the best hunting leases they've set up. 1:28:32.800 --> 1:28:34.439 It was it was a guide. It was an operator 1:28:34.479 --> 1:28:37.080 who set up leases hunting leases around the state, and 1:28:37.080 --> 1:28:38.960 he said, you know, the best time is if you 1:28:39.000 --> 1:28:41.880 can get guys in there. They start treating the property 1:28:41.920 --> 1:28:43.599 as if it's their own, and once somebody is there 1:28:43.680 --> 1:28:46.160 for three or five years, their kids start going, they 1:28:46.240 --> 1:28:49.320 grow up there, their kids take over the lease. You know, 1:28:49.680 --> 1:28:51.479 it really is part of the landscape is part of 1:28:51.520 --> 1:28:53.800 their they're being. So I think that's the thing that 1:28:54.960 --> 1:28:57.720 that that's a real opportunity. And in the places where 1:28:57.720 --> 1:29:01.280 there aren't leases for whatever perceptions, whether it's oh you're 1:29:01.560 --> 1:29:04.080 you're a leader, Oh hunters are just gonna come and 1:29:04.120 --> 1:29:06.479 shoot my cows or pop hole or shoot holes in 1:29:06.520 --> 1:29:08.840 my trough, you know, to the extent we can get 1:29:08.880 --> 1:29:12.040 past those sort of caricatures, I think there's some real 1:29:12.080 --> 1:29:15.439 opportunities to expand are yeah, yeah, and it's it's it's 1:29:15.479 --> 1:29:18.160 a real important part of the conversation. I think, Um, 1:29:19.520 --> 1:29:22.880 there is like I said, there're there, they're these ideas 1:29:23.000 --> 1:29:26.240 that well, I would just say that it's leases and 1:29:26.439 --> 1:29:30.200 things of that nature aren't something that we dig too 1:29:30.280 --> 1:29:34.280 deep into. We just don't we dig deep into. Every 1:29:34.320 --> 1:29:37.519 time there's a we need access to a certain you know, 1:29:38.080 --> 1:29:41.320 say the Crazy the Crazy Mountain Range there in Montana, 1:29:41.400 --> 1:29:43.439 we will fight for that. There's a lot of examples 1:29:43.479 --> 1:29:47.640 of things that we fought for, um, the Sabinoso Wilderness 1:29:47.680 --> 1:29:50.960 and and things that we're fighting for to have a 1:29:51.000 --> 1:29:53.600 direct action. Right we if we do this, if we 1:29:53.640 --> 1:29:55.599 get a walk in area here, if we get an 1:29:55.640 --> 1:29:58.040 easement here, we're gonna open up all this access to people. 1:29:58.160 --> 1:30:00.240 And so when you talk about, like pushing back on 1:30:00.320 --> 1:30:04.240 Steve's comment on access, this access thing is is such 1:30:04.280 --> 1:30:06.720 a it's it's not a chicken. It's like, it's not 1:30:06.720 --> 1:30:07.960 a chicken in the egg. But like, if I can 1:30:07.960 --> 1:30:10.519 get an easement right here on this square chunk of land, 1:30:11.800 --> 1:30:15.240 then that's then I've provided access and anybody that wants 1:30:15.280 --> 1:30:17.280 to go through there can go through there, So that 1:30:17.479 --> 1:30:19.760 there really is a good feeling that that you're making 1:30:19.800 --> 1:30:22.960 a difference there. It's harder to say, well, I mean, 1:30:23.120 --> 1:30:25.280 we really talked a lot about leases and more people started. 1:30:25.880 --> 1:30:30.439 It's just not it's easy of equation. It's relationships, right, 1:30:30.479 --> 1:30:33.760 It's like building relationships, and there's thousands and tens of 1:30:33.800 --> 1:30:36.960 thousands of ways those can work out, and they can change, 1:30:37.080 --> 1:30:39.240 and they're not permanent. The nice thing about public lands 1:30:39.240 --> 1:30:42.200 and a conservation easement, you've got a permanent access, which 1:30:42.240 --> 1:30:45.720 is really nice. Um, so what are we missing here? 1:30:45.720 --> 1:30:47.280 There's so much I feel like we've got to be 1:30:47.320 --> 1:30:49.320 missing some stuff in your Yeah, well, I think one 1:30:49.360 --> 1:30:51.120 thing that's kind of interesting is we're digging in now. 1:30:51.680 --> 1:30:53.840 After this we started thinking about what are states doing 1:30:53.960 --> 1:30:58.040 to seeing the impact of these policies and that Midwest 1:30:58.120 --> 1:31:01.720 area on affecting lease rate and things like that. We 1:31:01.760 --> 1:31:04.360 started digging into how all the different states and we're 1:31:04.360 --> 1:31:06.519 gonna present we're gonna pronoun a proposal to present this 1:31:06.720 --> 1:31:11.600 at the en NASK Summit for the National Assembly of 1:31:11.640 --> 1:31:16.599 Sportsmen's Caucuses with Congressional Sportsman's Foundation. Um, we're gonna propose 1:31:16.680 --> 1:31:20.680 that we've dug into six different policy areas for all 1:31:20.760 --> 1:31:23.000 fifty states. We've got three great undergraduates who have been 1:31:23.040 --> 1:31:24.880 working on three four undergraduates have been working on this 1:31:24.960 --> 1:31:28.160 over the course of the last year and its painstaking worth. 1:31:28.200 --> 1:31:30.920 They go to every single state and they dig into, well, 1:31:31.000 --> 1:31:33.280 what are the cost share programs that are around. There's 1:31:33.320 --> 1:31:35.240 a big you know, federal government has a big cost 1:31:35.280 --> 1:31:38.320 share programs for conservation through the NRCS. Well, there a 1:31:38.360 --> 1:31:40.160 lot of states we found we started digg into this, 1:31:40.200 --> 1:31:42.280 a lot of states have their own cost share programs. 1:31:43.160 --> 1:31:45.760 What are the property tax systems? Obviously we saw the 1:31:45.800 --> 1:31:50.639 impacts of Wisconsin and um in Michigan's property tax laws 1:31:50.680 --> 1:31:54.040 on and the effects that are likely affecting their leasing rates. Well, 1:31:54.120 --> 1:31:56.840 what how what are other states doing? For property tax exemptions. 1:31:57.280 --> 1:32:00.240 Does does Some states you only get your property TAXI 1:32:00.240 --> 1:32:03.360 exemption if it's an agriculture. You don't get it if 1:32:03.400 --> 1:32:07.439 it's in wildlife conservation. Some states do, like in California, 1:32:07.479 --> 1:32:09.720 put in wildlife conservation, you put in recreation, it'll can 1:32:09.760 --> 1:32:12.519 still count for your agricultural tax exemption. But some states don't. 1:32:12.800 --> 1:32:14.680 These are some things that there's a lot, yeah, we 1:32:14.760 --> 1:32:16.840 could think about and our super secret media to project 1:32:16.920 --> 1:32:19.400 where there's a lot of things where well, if you'll 1:32:19.479 --> 1:32:21.320 if you'll do this to the land, if you'll plant this, 1:32:21.479 --> 1:32:23.560 if you'll rotate these crops, if you'll do this, this 1:32:23.720 --> 1:32:28.160 will pay you. But now so I'm so now I'm 1:32:28.720 --> 1:32:31.160 I'm just leasing a property or or I bought a 1:32:31.280 --> 1:32:34.479 small piece of fragmented acre. It's just because I know 1:32:34.560 --> 1:32:36.040 there's some deer on there and that's gonna be my 1:32:36.160 --> 1:32:38.280 family might build a little capital there. And I've got 1:32:38.400 --> 1:32:42.120 forty acres of my own. Finally, well, the government will 1:32:42.160 --> 1:32:43.519 come in and say, if you do this, this, this, 1:32:43.680 --> 1:32:47.800 and this, we'll give you a monthly will basically rent 1:32:47.880 --> 1:32:49.640 this from you to give you a month payment. That 1:32:49.720 --> 1:32:52.760 might help to subside like subsidize you're buying it a 1:32:52.840 --> 1:32:56.240 property or or leasing the property out whatever. But then 1:32:56.280 --> 1:32:58.280 you also have a bunch of work to do. Yeah, 1:32:58.360 --> 1:33:00.360 And if you just want to recreate and you just 1:33:00.439 --> 1:33:02.320 want to hang some tree stands and kill some to hear, 1:33:03.280 --> 1:33:07.080 now you have this obligation to you know, keep up 1:33:07.320 --> 1:33:09.720 the work that you've you've promised the government that you'll do. 1:33:10.000 --> 1:33:13.320 So it's a it's a weird there's a weird dichotomy there. 1:33:13.520 --> 1:33:15.360 How do you how do you balance those things? Yeah, 1:33:15.360 --> 1:33:17.439 they're trade offs, yeah, for different for how much you 1:33:17.439 --> 1:33:19.360 want to get involved with these things. And some people 1:33:19.439 --> 1:33:21.080 might might want to do these things even without the 1:33:21.080 --> 1:33:24.559 government support. One rancher told me this joke once. He said, 1:33:25.320 --> 1:33:27.040 I just gotta repeat it because it is so funny, 1:33:27.920 --> 1:33:29.840 and I'm probably gonna get in trouble for saying it. Um, 1:33:30.080 --> 1:33:33.000 I have to have you censored out. Later. Um, I 1:33:33.040 --> 1:33:35.120 could beat I'll beat it out. And he said, he said, 1:33:36.160 --> 1:33:39.360 he said, we don't work, We don't do any government programs, 1:33:39.600 --> 1:33:41.800 and this is just a big land under in California. 1:33:41.840 --> 1:33:43.880 He said, we don't do any of those because get 1:33:43.960 --> 1:33:45.840 in bed with the government, you get a lot more 1:33:45.880 --> 1:33:50.679 than a good night's sleep. That is a strong opinion 1:33:50.760 --> 1:33:55.000 and some aspects of of the private land under community. 1:33:55.120 --> 1:33:57.240 But so I just to illustrate there's just such a 1:33:57.280 --> 1:33:59.519 diversity of ways in which people look at this. But 1:34:00.000 --> 1:34:01.960 I also think some of those landowners still might do 1:34:02.240 --> 1:34:04.160 a lot of these same practices anyways, they just don't 1:34:04.160 --> 1:34:07.040 want the government involved. Yeah, that's yeah, that's true. Like 1:34:07.080 --> 1:34:08.880 I said, once you get him involved, there's there's been 1:34:09.040 --> 1:34:12.360 they'll they'll give you the benefits, right, there's financial benefits there, 1:34:12.439 --> 1:34:16.160 but it it is you're now working with a complicated entity. 1:34:17.400 --> 1:34:19.360 So you have a there's a big, a big data 1:34:19.479 --> 1:34:23.400 thing here. It's a bunch of numbers. It's down in 1:34:23.439 --> 1:34:25.840 the middle of the paper table too. This is land 1:34:25.880 --> 1:34:30.519 areaan property, characters is for wildife associated recreation and and 1:34:32.120 --> 1:34:36.240 total acre total acres and millions for these two things 1:34:36.400 --> 1:34:40.320 by region. If you go to hunting, there's two d 1:34:40.439 --> 1:34:44.720 and twenty million, as we've discussed, lease acres and a 1:34:44.840 --> 1:34:51.320 hundred and thirty five million own acres. It's pretty interesting obviously, 1:34:51.640 --> 1:34:53.880 So explain those two numbers. Because when I look at this, 1:34:53.920 --> 1:34:57.280 I was like, so this survey look asked landowners are 1:34:57.360 --> 1:35:02.800 asked hunters, do you own or least land primarily for hunting, um, 1:35:02.920 --> 1:35:05.760 And so they could answer yes to either those UM. 1:35:05.960 --> 1:35:09.960 So they answered so they owned land primarily for the 1:35:10.000 --> 1:35:12.160 purpose of hunting, which was a whole lot. Hundred thirty 1:35:12.200 --> 1:35:16.840 five million acres was for people owned land primarily for hunting. Now, 1:35:16.880 --> 1:35:19.439 the interesting difference is there's a lot more. There's quite 1:35:19.479 --> 1:35:22.479 a bit more for leasing million acres for leasing land 1:35:22.520 --> 1:35:27.160 for hunting. But um. The difference that's interesting is this 1:35:27.680 --> 1:35:29.960 mean size of the property. If you scoot over to 1:35:30.479 --> 1:35:33.679 the fourth or fifth column on there, the average size 1:35:33.720 --> 1:35:38.040 of the least property is acres. So two thousand, four 1:35:38.080 --> 1:35:40.720 hundred acres you get on average if you're leasing land, 1:35:41.120 --> 1:35:43.639 because if you're owning land is down at the average 1:35:43.680 --> 1:35:47.280 is three six acres. I mean that that makes sense. 1:35:47.400 --> 1:35:49.880 Lands expensive, it makes sense, makes no But you can 1:35:49.960 --> 1:35:54.920 lease a lot of land for acre uh, and you can. 1:35:55.280 --> 1:35:56.840 You can make your money go a lot farther and 1:35:56.880 --> 1:35:59.599 get a lot bigger acreage. After looking at this, I've 1:35:59.600 --> 1:36:02.680 always to own land to yeah, But after looking at this, 1:36:02.920 --> 1:36:06.640 I also want access to thousands of acres from my hunting. UM. 1:36:06.840 --> 1:36:08.360 It would be nice if I was in the high 1:36:08.360 --> 1:36:10.760 density area with white tail and turkeys were all over 1:36:10.800 --> 1:36:13.560 the place. Yeah, a few acres probably do it. But 1:36:13.840 --> 1:36:16.320 in the West for sure. Yeah, the numbers say least 1:36:16.760 --> 1:36:18.840 at least get get to spend your money in two 1:36:18.840 --> 1:36:21.120 thousand acres lea well, and you wonder, you know, just 1:36:21.240 --> 1:36:24.599 that I'm thinking of my future, Like, if I'm gonna 1:36:25.920 --> 1:36:28.679 spend the money for twenty years to least the same properties, 1:36:29.200 --> 1:36:32.040 I'd say it's two twenty years to least two thousand acres. 1:36:32.040 --> 1:36:33.600 I don't gotta pay the property tax, I don't go 1:36:33.720 --> 1:36:36.439 through the upkeep. I still have access to that property. 1:36:36.520 --> 1:36:38.320 I'm gonna take a really good care of it, probably 1:36:38.360 --> 1:36:40.599 have great relationships to the landowners. Or I could buy 1:36:40.760 --> 1:36:43.240 a couple of hundred acres and struggle with all the 1:36:43.320 --> 1:36:45.680 things we've talked about, which is keeping up with a 1:36:45.720 --> 1:36:49.040 boid adversity, making sure um the land is taken care 1:36:49.120 --> 1:36:52.599 of and it's it's part of a healthier ecosystem overall. 1:36:52.680 --> 1:36:54.800 So I mean, yeah, if I'm just if I'm just 1:36:54.880 --> 1:36:57.439 thinking about my hunting, yeah, I mean, I'm least you 1:36:57.479 --> 1:36:59.080 can if you can lock in a good least and 1:36:59.160 --> 1:37:00.800 you can find somebody in that's that's where the work 1:37:00.840 --> 1:37:02.400 comes in. If I got enough money for a land 1:37:02.439 --> 1:37:07.519 manager on my O'Brien ranch that we're gonna buy. Um. 1:37:07.800 --> 1:37:10.599 But the other thing that's interesting here just you broke 1:37:10.680 --> 1:37:13.679 this also down into the four regions obviously Northeast, Midwest, 1:37:13.720 --> 1:37:17.760 South and West. UM. So take people through both the 1:37:17.880 --> 1:37:20.680 lease and owned percentages just by region, because I think 1:37:20.760 --> 1:37:25.759 that's interesting. Yeah. The leasing, So about the land least 1:37:25.800 --> 1:37:29.000 in the countries in the South, Um, you think about 1:37:29.240 --> 1:37:32.920 Texas has a huge leasing industry, UM, as well as 1:37:32.960 --> 1:37:36.080 I think of the states like Alabama, Mississippi, Georgia. So 1:37:36.160 --> 1:37:38.640 it's just a culture of it. Um. Somebody once I 1:37:38.680 --> 1:37:42.160 think I make reference in the paper. One suggestion for 1:37:42.280 --> 1:37:45.360 why this is is that, oh gosh, it was a 1:37:45.960 --> 1:37:49.559 sociology paper. They said the South was predominantly settled by 1:37:49.760 --> 1:37:53.559 people of from upland areas in Scotland and I think Ireland, 1:37:54.120 --> 1:37:58.040 and they tended to be more uh. I think they 1:37:58.120 --> 1:38:02.920 used the word territorial. Now we're getting real deep. So 1:38:04.320 --> 1:38:08.960 they were they were expecting to have payment for access 1:38:09.000 --> 1:38:10.720 on their land. And this is this is going way 1:38:10.760 --> 1:38:13.599 back to like you know, eighteen hundreds of time frame, 1:38:14.240 --> 1:38:17.680 whereas people in North came from areas in England where 1:38:17.720 --> 1:38:21.240 there was more of an open land culture, and so 1:38:21.479 --> 1:38:23.920 that this might have been I think I suggested this 1:38:24.080 --> 1:38:26.120 might be some of the reason why you see this 1:38:26.280 --> 1:38:29.120 very different rates of leasing in the South versus other 1:38:29.400 --> 1:38:31.560 um parts of the kinds pretty crazy. I mean the 1:38:32.080 --> 1:38:35.840 Midwest is five or the Midwest of six, Northeast five, 1:38:36.560 --> 1:38:40.800 West eight forty two for the South. Yeah, it's very Yeah, 1:38:40.840 --> 1:38:44.200 that's it's interesting. That's not a number that that that's 1:38:44.200 --> 1:38:46.800 a number that the bears explaining and if that's the way, 1:38:47.640 --> 1:38:49.840 and I think it's I think Texas is a big state, 1:38:50.080 --> 1:38:51.960 UM and that probably is a big part of that. 1:38:52.160 --> 1:38:55.519 And I think that same culture follows in place like Alabama. 1:38:55.600 --> 1:38:59.759 Damn you, Texas. You're always skewing the numbers owned total. 1:39:00.040 --> 1:39:02.040 There's there's some interesting things in the own total that 1:39:02.439 --> 1:39:05.320 the Northeast there's only three point seven percent, in the 1:39:05.439 --> 1:39:08.400 West only one nine, and then in the Midwest and 1:39:08.439 --> 1:39:11.839 the South fifteen and sixteen cent or practically so interesting 1:39:11.960 --> 1:39:13.879 that if you were combined the South and the Midwest, 1:39:13.960 --> 1:39:19.280 that's that's roughly, you know of of a thirty percent number. 1:39:19.800 --> 1:39:22.839 A huge portion of that was I was really surprised 1:39:22.840 --> 1:39:24.680 by that sort of dichotomy in the Midwest that you 1:39:24.760 --> 1:39:27.720 have this really large number of people owning land the 1:39:27.840 --> 1:39:29.919 large a lot of the owned lands in the Midwest, 1:39:30.360 --> 1:39:32.360 but very little the least lands in the Midwest. And 1:39:32.439 --> 1:39:34.720 that came down to those sort of I think those 1:39:34.800 --> 1:39:38.960 policies up in those states. Um, but then you think 1:39:39.280 --> 1:39:42.519 those policies are pretty neat. But then if it's encouraging 1:39:42.600 --> 1:39:48.040 people to own land, might this also be encouraging fragmentation 1:39:48.120 --> 1:39:51.120 of those two thousand acre properties into three acre properties. 1:39:51.120 --> 1:39:53.240 Because if if you if you only need, if you 1:39:53.240 --> 1:39:55.080 can only af forward or only need three hundred acres 1:39:55.120 --> 1:39:57.679 for your hunting end of splitting up land into smaller 1:39:57.680 --> 1:40:00.280 and smaller chunks, that might be all right, but in 1:40:00.560 --> 1:40:03.400 the end you're probably gonna have more human impact the 1:40:03.520 --> 1:40:08.880 more fragments you take sixty acres and breaking up a 1:40:08.960 --> 1:40:11.880 bunch of forty acre parcels you I mean, you have 1:40:12.120 --> 1:40:14.000 you go from it's obvious and you go from one 1:40:14.040 --> 1:40:16.879 contiguous management to a bunch of different types of management 1:40:16.920 --> 1:40:19.400 that we all as hunch as we all know you 1:40:19.600 --> 1:40:23.080 like if you buy back forty is it's about your neighbors, man. 1:40:23.560 --> 1:40:25.160 You gotta have good neighbors. If they're over there on 1:40:25.240 --> 1:40:27.439 opening day just shooting every year that walks, you're not 1:40:27.479 --> 1:40:30.479 gonna have the best experience on your forty and the 1:40:30.520 --> 1:40:32.439 impact of fencing. You know, there's been some really interesting 1:40:32.520 --> 1:40:36.519 things that my colleagues, justin Dr Justin Bushchairs is working 1:40:36.560 --> 1:40:38.760 on up at the Hopland Research Station up north. They 1:40:38.840 --> 1:40:41.639 here and they're looking at fences. They have GPS colors 1:40:41.680 --> 1:40:43.960 on deer and there's they're noticing that some deer, even 1:40:44.000 --> 1:40:46.120 though it's just a barb wire fence, a standard you know, 1:40:46.439 --> 1:40:50.000 three or four five strand bar wire fans, these these 1:40:50.080 --> 1:40:53.320 deer will just walk and it will affect their home range. 1:40:53.320 --> 1:40:55.040 When you look at their home range and where they're going, 1:40:55.600 --> 1:40:57.680 there is a solid border where they just don't really 1:40:57.720 --> 1:40:59.840 want to cross this fence. It's not that much energy 1:40:59.880 --> 1:41:01.880 to get over it, but maybe it's on the edge 1:41:02.400 --> 1:41:04.479 and they don't go. So it does create these even 1:41:04.800 --> 1:41:07.479 standard bob wire fences that deer have generally no problem 1:41:07.520 --> 1:41:10.400 getting over, do impact some of their movement and you 1:41:10.439 --> 1:41:14.080 start looking at large migrations. Cross number ten fences versus 1:41:14.120 --> 1:41:16.760 one is a big deal. Yeah, to travel back to 1:41:16.880 --> 1:41:19.080 Texas for a moment, there's a lot of high fences there. 1:41:19.200 --> 1:41:21.080 Oh yeah, well that's a whole another thing. It's like 1:41:21.160 --> 1:41:23.360 what does that do to wild Yeah, that's just that. 1:41:23.720 --> 1:41:25.360 That's I don't want to get into that. I just 1:41:25.520 --> 1:41:28.519 want to get into that. But this is all you know, 1:41:28.560 --> 1:41:30.000 well I did look into that, but this is kind 1:41:30.000 --> 1:41:31.519 of interesting to look at. Yeah, because I was thinking, 1:41:31.560 --> 1:41:32.600 I was like, well, what does this mean for it? 1:41:32.680 --> 1:41:34.400 Is there gonna be inbreeding because of this, Like if 1:41:34.439 --> 1:41:37.400 you have these fragmented populations, like I called some of 1:41:37.400 --> 1:41:39.879 those folks the biologies out there in Texas Parks and Wildlife, 1:41:40.720 --> 1:41:42.000 and they said, you know, there's no such thing as 1:41:42.000 --> 1:41:44.760 a deer proof fence. And if you have just one 1:41:44.840 --> 1:41:48.040 deer get through every year or every couple of years 1:41:48.120 --> 1:41:51.519 or something some very small rate which they expected, they 1:41:51.600 --> 1:41:54.160 did not expect to have genetic impacts to these animals. 1:41:54.240 --> 1:41:58.840 So that was interesting to me. I think, um, certainly 1:41:58.920 --> 1:42:01.080 it does seem artificial all to have, you know, this 1:42:01.200 --> 1:42:03.519 sort of completely broken off system. And it said that 1:42:03.560 --> 1:42:06.439 to me, I'd be like, yeah, but that's I mean, yeah, 1:42:06.520 --> 1:42:09.479 but you're still changing the whole city. Maybe one or 1:42:09.520 --> 1:42:12.639 two get through, but maybe they don't. I mean, you're 1:42:12.680 --> 1:42:17.240 you're certainly leaving that open to happenstance. Yeah. Yeah, man. 1:42:17.439 --> 1:42:19.680 The other thing here, as you were saying, this may 1:42:19.760 --> 1:42:22.000 not be as impactful as I thought it was when 1:42:22.040 --> 1:42:24.960 first reading it. But fishing, I mean there's thirty four 1:42:25.040 --> 1:42:30.120 million lease and owned total acres U thirty five million 1:42:30.200 --> 1:42:33.560 for hunting and then for for wildlife watching, which is 1:42:33.680 --> 1:42:38.560 the third one umt million, And so hunting is a 1:42:38.720 --> 1:42:42.200 giant chunk of the data you could pop. Yeah, in 1:42:42.360 --> 1:42:44.519 terms of the area, it's it's it's dominant. I mean 1:42:44.560 --> 1:42:47.600 compared to wildlife and fishing. Wildlife watching and fishing. Like 1:42:47.760 --> 1:42:49.320 we said, just for fishing, you just need to get 1:42:49.320 --> 1:42:51.800 access to the stream. Yeah, so it's not Yeah, yeah, 1:42:52.120 --> 1:42:53.960 you buy a cabin on a stream access and you 1:42:54.240 --> 1:42:57.479 got it. When I first read that up, like yeah, hunting, fishing, no, 1:42:59.720 --> 1:43:02.880 you can be down or not. My excited um and 1:43:02.960 --> 1:43:05.040 then the while I like watching too. You can do 1:43:05.120 --> 1:43:06.439 it on a pretty small A lot of people like 1:43:06.479 --> 1:43:08.840 to bird watch. You know, you're gonna see your deer 1:43:08.880 --> 1:43:11.120 and your you get get five ten anchars. You probably 1:43:11.120 --> 1:43:12.680 you deer coming through your property if they're deer in 1:43:12.720 --> 1:43:15.160 the area. Yeah, Well, I mean I think all this 1:43:15.360 --> 1:43:17.400 you know. What strikes me about this is time you spent, 1:43:17.880 --> 1:43:21.760 you know, in cold rooms looking at ridiculous amounts of data. 1:43:22.280 --> 1:43:24.040 I think some people can can look at this. We've 1:43:24.080 --> 1:43:27.800 done some other um things where we just looked at 1:43:27.800 --> 1:43:30.600 studies where people have questioned, well, what sample side like, 1:43:31.479 --> 1:43:34.679 there's that there surely is that those are critical parts 1:43:34.720 --> 1:43:36.439 of this. But the other part of this is what 1:43:36.560 --> 1:43:39.680 you what you've learned and doing the work to put 1:43:39.760 --> 1:43:43.000 this together. You know, you've you've been closer and closer 1:43:43.040 --> 1:43:46.720 proximity to this data than maybe anyone, and you've been 1:43:46.760 --> 1:43:49.759 able to just have this is like the empirical knowledge 1:43:49.960 --> 1:43:53.519 of of spending that time, whether you want to break 1:43:53.560 --> 1:43:58.400 down exactly the sample sizes and how accurate here or there. 1:43:59.160 --> 1:44:02.160 I feel there's value. There's just really intrinsic value and 1:44:02.240 --> 1:44:05.320 the fact that you spent the time to really analyze 1:44:05.360 --> 1:44:08.200 these things and and go deep. So I appreciate that 1:44:08.280 --> 1:44:09.800 and I think it's I think it's valuable for that 1:44:09.880 --> 1:44:11.920 reason in and of itself. Well, we report all our 1:44:11.960 --> 1:44:14.320 standard errors so you can see you can see the uncertainty, 1:44:14.479 --> 1:44:16.599 and there are there is uncertainty essocially with all these numbers, 1:44:16.600 --> 1:44:19.800 and they're all reported so um. But the you know, 1:44:20.120 --> 1:44:23.120 one thing before we wrap up of what I see 1:44:23.200 --> 1:44:25.280 is some opportunities. You know. I think we look at 1:44:25.320 --> 1:44:26.880 these data and we see some of the big numbers, 1:44:27.720 --> 1:44:29.760 and I think in the West it is interesting. The 1:44:29.880 --> 1:44:33.400 West is clearly a lot of public land. California, which 1:44:33.439 --> 1:44:35.880 people might not think of as really a big public 1:44:36.000 --> 1:44:40.120 land state is half public land. Um. I think there's 1:44:40.400 --> 1:44:42.920 there is this sort of that dichotomy that we were 1:44:42.920 --> 1:44:46.080 talking about. There's a sort of culture whereas like the 1:44:46.160 --> 1:44:47.920 hunters go out in the public land and the private 1:44:48.000 --> 1:44:51.679 land is not. I even see it among our there's 1:44:51.720 --> 1:44:57.040 a culture that suggests that private landers should not charge 1:44:57.479 --> 1:45:00.920 money for access because we're in a public lands. Hunting 1:45:01.080 --> 1:45:05.519 is a public resource. Game is a public resource, and 1:45:05.680 --> 1:45:10.320 I I again I find myself feeling like it limits 1:45:10.400 --> 1:45:12.840 us if we if we come to our landowners, so 1:45:12.960 --> 1:45:16.680 you shouldn't be charging money. A lander's gonna say, well, 1:45:16.680 --> 1:45:19.719 I'm not gonna let anybody on, and so that's a loose, 1:45:19.800 --> 1:45:23.880 that's a lose, that's a lot of lack of access entirely. Um. 1:45:24.680 --> 1:45:26.840 Even if this lander says I'm only going to sell 1:45:27.920 --> 1:45:30.880 dollar trophy, elk huts that's all I'm gonna do. And yeah, 1:45:31.760 --> 1:45:33.200 that to a lot of us that that is out 1:45:33.240 --> 1:45:35.400 of that is out of my reach. Um as a 1:45:35.920 --> 1:45:38.639 as a faculty at you see Berkeley, that's that's totally 1:45:38.680 --> 1:45:42.519 out of reach. But I don't know if it's that nice. 1:45:43.720 --> 1:45:46.760 But at the same time, at twenty acre hunt, at 1:45:47.520 --> 1:45:50.880 dollar hunt is a hunt for somebody? Is that better 1:45:50.960 --> 1:45:54.400 than a zero hunt? That than hunt for nobody? And 1:45:54.680 --> 1:45:57.559 a landowner who's probably gonna just do everything he can 1:45:57.680 --> 1:46:00.559 to get rid of those elk because he has no benefits. 1:46:00.640 --> 1:46:03.800 They're grazing his pastors there on his irrigated pastor. He 1:46:03.880 --> 1:46:07.880 has no benefit for them. He's angry at the wildlife agencies, 1:46:08.120 --> 1:46:10.960 he's angry at hunters. He hates the whole system and 1:46:11.240 --> 1:46:14.680 and everybody's mad probably hates the government, hates regulations. That's 1:46:14.800 --> 1:46:19.439 generally versus versus is a zero or is it? Is 1:46:19.479 --> 1:46:22.160 it an acceptable thing to have ian? And isn't that 1:46:22.240 --> 1:46:25.840 person paine for a hunt? Aren't they a hunter too? 1:46:26.600 --> 1:46:28.479 I mean they are. There are certainly people who have 1:46:29.439 --> 1:46:33.000 a lot of financial resources, but maybe they're also somebody 1:46:33.000 --> 1:46:34.960 who just saved up for ten years. And he said, 1:46:34.960 --> 1:46:36.840 I'm gonna do this. There's a lot of that, and 1:46:36.960 --> 1:46:39.639 and you're right, and I think I came, I came 1:46:39.720 --> 1:46:42.920 to this place. I came to Berkeley's especially to challenge 1:46:42.960 --> 1:46:45.679 my own perspectives on things. And I think that's that's 1:46:45.840 --> 1:46:47.760 what you just said. There is a very important thing 1:46:47.880 --> 1:46:52.560 too for all hunters, especially those of us who celebrate 1:46:53.320 --> 1:46:56.280 access in public lands. So much is to understand, like 1:46:56.400 --> 1:47:01.200 what's the proper cultural like stificates of each thing, what's 1:47:01.240 --> 1:47:05.000 the proper mix in our our our culture just shared ideas. 1:47:05.280 --> 1:47:07.960 How do we make sure that we were holding up 1:47:08.040 --> 1:47:12.559 the things that are important but understanding the there are 1:47:12.600 --> 1:47:15.479 other things that also contribute, and how do we balance 1:47:15.560 --> 1:47:17.280 those things in a way that makes sense. How do 1:47:17.360 --> 1:47:20.240 we not over emphasize public lands and how we talk 1:47:20.320 --> 1:47:22.240 and how we communicate to each other in our community, 1:47:22.280 --> 1:47:25.800 how do we emphasize each type of land use, each 1:47:25.920 --> 1:47:29.160 type of land ownership, and and how do we just 1:47:29.280 --> 1:47:31.360 make sure that we understand all those things together? And 1:47:31.400 --> 1:47:34.639 the big ridiculous tapestry that this is. Like I said earlier, 1:47:34.680 --> 1:47:36.640 you can't talk about these things in a monolith. There 1:47:36.720 --> 1:47:40.240 isn't public lands and private lands. There are just it's impossible, 1:47:40.720 --> 1:47:43.439 But I came here to kind of like I want 1:47:43.479 --> 1:47:46.800 to highlight that. I want to make sure everybody understands that, well, 1:47:47.040 --> 1:47:50.519 I public lands. There is American to me, is is 1:47:50.560 --> 1:47:53.400 apple pie. I don't really like apple pie, but people 1:47:53.439 --> 1:47:58.280 seem to like it. That's fine. But but there's also 1:47:58.360 --> 1:48:01.120 I also understand the need for balance and the need 1:48:01.200 --> 1:48:03.760 to examine every type of land use and every type 1:48:03.760 --> 1:48:06.439 of land. Yeah, and so hopefully folks can do that 1:48:06.720 --> 1:48:10.880 and increase opportunities and build relationships and increase these coalitions 1:48:10.920 --> 1:48:13.000 where we have common ground. And I think ranchers are 1:48:13.920 --> 1:48:18.320 solidly in the side of maintaining these landscapes, which is 1:48:18.400 --> 1:48:20.880 the saying solidly where hunters are too. And I think 1:48:21.880 --> 1:48:24.200 these sort of wedge issues that drive us apart, when 1:48:24.240 --> 1:48:26.800 we really at the at the core, we can get 1:48:27.000 --> 1:48:29.000 get past those sort of things that are dividing us. 1:48:29.880 --> 1:48:32.320 We can probably make a lot more progress. And I 1:48:32.400 --> 1:48:35.160 will tell you that I've had I have I often 1:48:35.360 --> 1:48:37.439 say things I like and don't like on this podcast. 1:48:37.800 --> 1:48:39.479 I don't really like apple pie. I just want to 1:48:39.520 --> 1:48:41.800 put that out there for everybody. So if you think 1:48:41.880 --> 1:48:47.120 that's weird, deal with more of a cheesecake family that brownies, brownies, cheesecakes. 1:48:49.320 --> 1:48:51.800 I'm not really not really there depending on the type 1:48:51.840 --> 1:48:54.200 of filling right, it could be. But also I don't 1:48:54.200 --> 1:48:58.040 like peas, and and I had I've had a lot 1:48:58.120 --> 1:49:00.479 of people who are like pea farmers be like, well, 1:49:00.520 --> 1:49:04.320 come and hunt my pea farm. There's deer walking around everywhere. Um, 1:49:05.040 --> 1:49:07.200 so maybe I'll do that. I'm trying to trying to 1:49:07.280 --> 1:49:09.760 balance my perspective to get a little nuance into it. 1:49:10.200 --> 1:49:12.600 But anyway, apple pie, if you put ice cream on it, 1:49:12.680 --> 1:49:17.240 it's fine, Like it's just fine, but it's just okay. 1:49:17.320 --> 1:49:21.479 It's not great. And bald eagles also, they're okay, not great. 1:49:21.560 --> 1:49:24.240 They're okay, they're not great. Have you been around them? 1:49:24.280 --> 1:49:26.720 They're like go to you know, go to Prince of 1:49:26.800 --> 1:49:29.439 Wales and Alaska and they're like buzzards flying around. You're 1:49:29.479 --> 1:49:32.840 not real great. Um. I don't know why. I don't 1:49:32.880 --> 1:49:34.400 know why I did that. What a horrible place to 1:49:34.439 --> 1:49:37.559 be go watch a bunch of buzzard like eagles flying 1:49:37.600 --> 1:49:40.719 over your head. Yeah, the wild turkeys better than the eagle, 1:49:40.800 --> 1:49:42.840 I feel, because I just want to put that all 1:49:42.880 --> 1:49:45.080 out there. But I don't know where I was going 1:49:45.160 --> 1:49:47.080 with any of that other than to say that I 1:49:47.160 --> 1:49:51.120 think hopefully people can listen to this and really think 1:49:51.120 --> 1:49:54.640 about you know, as we as as hunters, we have 1:49:54.800 --> 1:49:58.080 different opportunities, right, different opportunities to go interest and use 1:49:58.120 --> 1:50:01.280 different types of land, to have different types of ownership. 1:50:01.360 --> 1:50:03.880 Some we all own together, some we don't, Some we 1:50:03.960 --> 1:50:06.400 have to pay to get access to. Some no one 1:50:06.479 --> 1:50:08.519 couldn't get access to because someone bought it for their 1:50:08.560 --> 1:50:11.439 own for their own reasons. So I just understand all 1:50:11.479 --> 1:50:14.160 those things, and I'll make sure everybody has access to 1:50:14.240 --> 1:50:16.560 this paper because, um, there's a lot of numbers and 1:50:16.560 --> 1:50:19.040 a lot of words, but there's a lot of really 1:50:19.520 --> 1:50:23.200 um impactful stuff. It's good information. It shows the impact 1:50:23.240 --> 1:50:25.760 of the hunting community from an angle that generally has 1:50:26.080 --> 1:50:27.960 been thought of as a black box where people didn't 1:50:28.000 --> 1:50:30.519 know how much fun are we talking about nationwide? Um, 1:50:31.320 --> 1:50:33.439 And we've got some We've put together the best data 1:50:33.479 --> 1:50:35.160 sets we can to get the best numbers we can 1:50:35.240 --> 1:50:38.240 on that and uh, and I look forward to doing 1:50:38.280 --> 1:50:40.560 an update with what we're doing. We're carrying on with 1:50:40.640 --> 1:50:43.320 this work and seeing how policies now are impacting this stuff. 1:50:43.320 --> 1:50:46.559 So I'm looking forward. So when's that policy working. It's ongoing. 1:50:46.600 --> 1:50:48.080 You see this map on my screen right here. I 1:50:48.160 --> 1:50:52.639 got several I started the giant screen. I love big screens. 1:50:52.680 --> 1:50:55.400 You know. Once I met a lawyer who said he 1:50:55.439 --> 1:50:56.960 had a really great pen, and he said, you know, 1:50:57.840 --> 1:50:59.479 I'm a lawyer, so I have a really nice This 1:50:59.600 --> 1:51:02.080 is the tool of my trades. It depends. So I 1:51:02.160 --> 1:51:03.840 feel like, you know, I work on the computer all 1:51:03.880 --> 1:51:06.840 day and this is this is a tool of my trade. Um, 1:51:07.400 --> 1:51:09.920 let's see where is the might if I get to 1:51:09.920 --> 1:51:12.400 screen that big and make me look smarter? Yeah, there 1:51:12.439 --> 1:51:14.720 you go. That's another good reason. So we're we're looking 1:51:14.720 --> 1:51:16.920 at all these different programs and seeing how we're gonna 1:51:16.920 --> 1:51:20.000 be presenting this um in Bozeman, and we're going to 1:51:20.080 --> 1:51:21.960 do it work. This is a draft working paper for 1:51:22.040 --> 1:51:26.120 Bozeman Perk, the conference they're holding in July I think 1:51:27.560 --> 1:51:30.000 nine or so, and we'll be talking about how these 1:51:30.040 --> 1:51:34.160 different policies interact. So covering everything from public access programs, 1:51:34.200 --> 1:51:37.000 is a lot of mentorship and hunting programs that we're covering. 1:51:37.400 --> 1:51:40.519 We're gonna see like we're about at this point where 1:51:40.600 --> 1:51:42.200 the cusp of being able to pull all these big 1:51:42.280 --> 1:51:44.599 data sets together and seeing what is what is interacting 1:51:44.640 --> 1:51:47.960 between these different programs. Are our states with good public 1:51:48.000 --> 1:51:52.160 access programs for private land also doing cast share programs, 1:51:52.200 --> 1:51:56.880 so they also doing property tax exemptions for conservation. Um. Yeah, 1:51:56.960 --> 1:52:00.280 like what are the unintended consequences? Y? And and how 1:52:00.320 --> 1:52:03.280 do they interact and what um. One of my undergraduates 1:52:03.520 --> 1:52:05.240 mentioned she had studied and I was like, well, what's 1:52:05.280 --> 1:52:07.120 the what do you think is happening here? Says, well, 1:52:07.160 --> 1:52:08.880 it seems like it sort of reminds me of this 1:52:09.000 --> 1:52:13.560 class I've read this stuff about she called it. I 1:52:13.640 --> 1:52:16.720 want to look up federalism. There is different types of federalism, 1:52:17.439 --> 1:52:23.160 compensatory federalism and versus cooperative federalism and iterative federalism. And 1:52:23.200 --> 1:52:25.880 the idea was that states and sometimes in our system, 1:52:25.960 --> 1:52:28.639 they can really take the role, take on a lead 1:52:28.680 --> 1:52:30.320 on something when that they see a gap from the 1:52:30.360 --> 1:52:33.280 federal government happening, and so then the federal government might 1:52:33.320 --> 1:52:35.679 take lead from some of the states they're doing something innovative. 1:52:35.760 --> 1:52:38.880 So we found some really interesting programs like Indiana's got 1:52:38.960 --> 1:52:43.680 this program called Apple which it combines public access, habitat 1:52:44.360 --> 1:52:47.000 and cast share. I think it combines all these things together. 1:52:47.680 --> 1:52:50.439 It seems really innovative. I mean, we're going to highlight 1:52:50.439 --> 1:52:51.880 a few of these in this talk, in this paper. 1:52:51.920 --> 1:52:54.200 They'll come out for perk this working paper, and then 1:52:54.720 --> 1:52:58.080 we're hoping to present over at the with Congressional Sportsman's 1:52:58.080 --> 1:53:01.240 Foundation coming up in November. So look forward to giving 1:53:01.280 --> 1:53:03.320 an update. And you're coming to both and I'll come 1:53:03.400 --> 1:53:05.400 and uh, I'll come and cheer you on if you'll 1:53:05.439 --> 1:53:06.920 get a coffee might Yeah, I am I allowed to 1:53:07.000 --> 1:53:10.800 cheer if why you're please do that's that's the best. Yeah, 1:53:10.920 --> 1:53:16.200 I'll be like your hype man. Yeah. Federalism, yeah, bring 1:53:16.280 --> 1:53:19.680 it all right, Look well I appreciate it. I'm off 1:53:19.760 --> 1:53:22.639 now to go find a vegan and an animal rights 1:53:22.920 --> 1:53:25.440 I look forward to hearing that. That's gonna be those podcasts. 1:53:25.840 --> 1:53:28.000 It's gonna be fun. Um. But all like I said, 1:53:28.080 --> 1:53:30.840 this is as much to me like to to find 1:53:30.880 --> 1:53:33.560 ways to challenge my ideas on on land. This is 1:53:33.600 --> 1:53:35.760 it in the same way as I'll hope those folks 1:53:35.800 --> 1:53:38.400 can challenge me on some of my thinks that things 1:53:38.439 --> 1:53:40.800 of killing and eating. I look forward to hearing about it. Yeah, 1:53:40.840 --> 1:53:42.800 all right, thanks, thank you, thank you, take care. Thanks. 1:53:45.360 --> 1:53:50.679 I guess I grew up. That's it. That's all another 1:53:50.720 --> 1:53:53.280 episode of the Hunting Collectives in the Books. Thank you 1:53:53.400 --> 1:53:55.880 to Luke McCallie. Thank you to our little round table 1:53:55.960 --> 1:53:59.280 there in the beginning, including Steven Ronella, Mark Kenyan, Sam 1:53:59.360 --> 1:54:02.840 Longer and and Fill the Engineer Um. Great conversation. I 1:54:02.880 --> 1:54:04.599 don't want to get into a bunch of sales pitches 1:54:04.640 --> 1:54:05.840 at the end of the show here this week, and 1:54:05.880 --> 1:54:09.120 we're not going to have any listener feedback. I just 1:54:09.200 --> 1:54:12.600 want to address this issue because we I know this 1:54:12.800 --> 1:54:15.559 this podcast isn't going to solve some of the angst 1:54:15.640 --> 1:54:19.080 out there about public lands and the public land movement 1:54:19.200 --> 1:54:21.720 and the identity of the Western hunter and some of 1:54:21.760 --> 1:54:25.479 the Midwest and the East feeling a little angst and 1:54:25.600 --> 1:54:29.200 anger towards some of the focus uh in our community 1:54:29.240 --> 1:54:31.679 and our culture on these things. But what I will 1:54:31.720 --> 1:54:33.520 say is that you know, it would be it would 1:54:33.520 --> 1:54:36.560 it definitely be our ruination if we allow this the 1:54:36.720 --> 1:54:41.320 kind of sever the bonds that that both public lands 1:54:41.360 --> 1:54:45.280 and private lands bring to our community. So for those 1:54:45.280 --> 1:54:47.080 of you that that are in listen to this, and 1:54:47.200 --> 1:54:49.360 you're in North Carolina, or you're in Maryland, or you're 1:54:49.400 --> 1:54:51.839 in Florida, or you're in Georgia, or you're in South Carolina, 1:54:52.400 --> 1:54:54.760 or you're in Iowa. You're one of these states where 1:54:54.840 --> 1:54:57.360 you feel like maybe a little bit left out of 1:54:57.400 --> 1:55:00.560 the conversation. Maybe the conversation has changed since you came 1:55:00.560 --> 1:55:03.920 into hunting. UM. Maybe the energy is in places where 1:55:03.960 --> 1:55:08.400 you don't reside. UM one right in and let us 1:55:08.480 --> 1:55:11.040 know that, and we'll have these conversations. We'll have both 1:55:11.080 --> 1:55:13.880 the difficult conversations where we agree and disagree, and we 1:55:13.920 --> 1:55:16.800 will have conversation about how we get better. And that's 1:55:16.840 --> 1:55:19.520 why I went and talk to Luke McCauley and wanted 1:55:19.520 --> 1:55:21.839 to learn more about what leasing in private land ownership 1:55:21.880 --> 1:55:28.480 really means to economically, socially, conservation wise for our country. 1:55:28.840 --> 1:55:32.320 And UH was pleasantly surprised to find a very educated 1:55:33.000 --> 1:55:36.160 professor that was sitting in a very unlikely place talking 1:55:36.200 --> 1:55:38.680 about something that means a lot to me. So as 1:55:38.720 --> 1:55:40.680 a way to kind of bring this all together, I 1:55:40.720 --> 1:55:45.160 would just say, certainly, while public lands are trendy, we 1:55:45.240 --> 1:55:49.160 gotta watch out in our in our world UM four 1:55:49.280 --> 1:55:52.080 trends and where they're headed and make sure they're always 1:55:52.120 --> 1:55:55.280 on the right course. As we do with anything else, 1:55:55.680 --> 1:55:58.080 So thank you for listening, or take you out with 1:55:58.160 --> 1:56:00.960 old number seven and we'll see next week on the 1:56:01.040 --> 1:56:05.920 Hunting Club. Dennisee who whiskey got me drinking in Heaven? 1:56:06.080 --> 1:56:09.640 And I know I can't stay here too long because 1:56:09.720 --> 1:56:15.440 I can't go a week without doing run oh without 1:56:16.000 --> 1:56:25.960 and run drinking out and run wrong drinking in Heaven