Speaker 1: Hey, everybody, welcome episode number five of the Honey Collective.
Speaker 1: I'm been O'Brien. I'm joined today by a unique individual
Speaker 1: to say in the least, and that's Shane Mahoney. Shane
Speaker 1: is the president CEO of of an organization called Conservation Visions.
Speaker 1: You may have heard him speaking in the public venue
Speaker 1: about conservation, about his efforts, all the things he's done
Speaker 1: in his life. Shane is a native of Newfoundland, but
Speaker 1: he's also a scientist. He's a wildlife manager. He's a
Speaker 1: policy innovator, he's a strategist. He's a filmmaker. He's a writer,
Speaker 1: he's a narrator. He's pretty much the most interesting man
Speaker 1: in conservation, both by his awesome beard and hat and
Speaker 1: the way he speaks, the way he rates, and how
Speaker 1: he comes across as a hunter. I wanted to catch
Speaker 1: up with Shane about a lot of things, but mostly
Speaker 1: about his knowledge of history and how he sees the
Speaker 1: hunting world right now, and I believe it was one
Speaker 1: of the more interesting and passionate conversations I've had in
Speaker 1: some times. So I'm happy to share that with you,
Speaker 1: and without further ado, Mr Shane Mahoney enjoyed Shane. How's
Speaker 1: it going. It's going really well. Um. I'm excited to
Speaker 1: have this exchange his ideas and conversation with you, so
Speaker 1: it'll be another chance to talk about something we both
Speaker 1: feel really passionate about, which is the conservation of wildlife
Speaker 1: and our outdoor traditions. So very happy to be here
Speaker 1: with you. Absolutely well, thanks for thanks for jumping on
Speaker 1: with me. I think before we get into it, we
Speaker 1: should address your you told me you have a shiner. Currently.
Speaker 1: There was a little bit of an incident the other day. Yes, well,
Speaker 1: I was doing some tree limbing on the weekend, taking
Speaker 1: advantage of the fact that here in Newfoundland this winter
Speaker 1: we don't have nearly as much snow as usual, and
Speaker 1: I was up on a high ladder and this particularly
Speaker 1: large branch of some mature maple trees I have on
Speaker 1: my property decided to jump and smacked me in the
Speaker 1: face and knocked me just instantly off the ladder, onto
Speaker 1: the onto the ground with roaring chains on my hand.
Speaker 1: But fortunately the worst of things did not happen, and
Speaker 1: I just ended up with a fairly significant cut. And
Speaker 1: now I'm sporting a lovely looking a bizarre I which
Speaker 1: wouldn't normally be a complication, except that I'm doing some
Speaker 1: filming in the next couple of days, so we're trying
Speaker 1: to figure out if if that can work, and if not,
Speaker 1: we'll just have to postpone and wait for my my
Speaker 1: eye to go back to its normal color. Yeah, I'm
Speaker 1: working on a cold myself, if anybody can hear that.
Speaker 1: So we're both we're both fifty, but we'll make this
Speaker 1: happen nonetheless. So I wanted to just talk to you
Speaker 1: about you know, I've probably got many hours of conversation,
Speaker 1: like we've had a little bit in the past, about
Speaker 1: conservation and your philosophies and the things that you care
Speaker 1: about and are working on currently. But I realized I
Speaker 1: don't really know much about your upbringing or um, you know,
Speaker 1: really your hunting history. So I wanted to just kind
Speaker 1: of start by, um getting a little bit of your background,
Speaker 1: you know, growing up and your first introduction to hunting
Speaker 1: and conservation and and really the the beginnings of of
Speaker 1: of your passions. Well, I think the most important and
Speaker 1: influential element in my thinking and in my life was
Speaker 1: that I was raised, born and raised obviously in the
Speaker 1: Audit of Newfoundland and lived in my early childhood period
Speaker 1: and into my adolescence in very rural circumstances, in an
Speaker 1: incredible society, and in an incredible place where the physical attributes,
Speaker 1: the sea and the land itself, very rugged place sort
Speaker 1: of imparts a sense of identity and a sense of
Speaker 1: awareness of the physical and biological world that is impossible
Speaker 1: to miss. And I grew up in a culture where
Speaker 1: there weren't any policemen. There weren't any hospitals, there weren't
Speaker 1: any lawyers, there weren't any insurance companies. There weren't any
Speaker 1: of those kinds of things, fire departments, or things of
Speaker 1: that nature. They were really communities that relied absolutely fundamentally
Speaker 1: upon themselves in one another. We are the oldest non
Speaker 1: native culture in North America. All the people don't realize that,
Speaker 1: but the firm cultural identity of a single place, no
Speaker 1: other place, but no full ang goes back so far
Speaker 1: as to have that, and we have, over a period
Speaker 1: of five hundred years approximately, um we developed a very
Speaker 1: close association with the natural world. The fishing of fish,
Speaker 1: the whaling of whales, the ceiling of seals, um the
Speaker 1: hunting of wild creatures, the growing of our own food,
Speaker 1: and domestic lives, doctor so on. This became just the
Speaker 1: natural order. It was the natural rhythm of things. And
Speaker 1: at the same time that world gave all of us
Speaker 1: as children, completely unfettered lives. Everyone in the community above
Speaker 1: a certain age who was male was known as uncle
Speaker 1: so and so. And I don't mean that it's some
Speaker 1: kind of folk Taylor's way. That is absolutely true. Everybody
Speaker 1: who was of a certain ages of women was ant.
Speaker 1: We went in and out of one another's homes. We
Speaker 1: we slept over in lots of cases, as though we
Speaker 1: were parts of families. Children that got into trouble were
Speaker 1: chastised by anyone in the community, but they were also
Speaker 1: looked after by everyone in the community. So I also
Speaker 1: came to appreciate over time the kind of values and
Speaker 1: the kind of cultural identity that comes with people who
Speaker 1: live close to the natural world. And of course this
Speaker 1: has been maintained and as exemplified in a sort of
Speaker 1: very crystalline way with the the new play that has
Speaker 1: made such a hit on Broadway and elsewhere now around
Speaker 1: the world called Come from Away, which talks about how
Speaker 1: Newfoundlanders welcomed sevent of all the Transatlantic travelers, most of
Speaker 1: whom were Americans who were coming back to North America
Speaker 1: on that fateful day of nine eleven. And so I
Speaker 1: came to a very early appreciation of this relationship between
Speaker 1: human cultures and traditions, the harvesting of wild creatures, and
Speaker 1: are absolute total dependence on the natural world as a concrete,
Speaker 1: inseparable kind of idea. Um. And of course all of
Speaker 1: this takes place organically, and a child and a human
Speaker 1: being as they mature, but there's absolutely no question that
Speaker 1: this is the genesis of it. More importantly even than that,
Speaker 1: perhaps is the fact that because of this childhood, animals
Speaker 1: and nature became we're not only incredibly accessible to me
Speaker 1: and to all of my friends, siblings and so on,
Speaker 1: but it was it was entirely possible for us to
Speaker 1: enjoy it every day without fear. I mean we we
Speaker 1: we We lived in a society where everyone knew one another,
Speaker 1: and where no one was concerned if children disappeared for
Speaker 1: long hours or played at the end of wars, or
Speaker 1: when trouting by themselves, as I so often did, even
Speaker 1: as a very small boy of five and six years
Speaker 1: of age and even earlier. And also, of course, there
Speaker 1: were the domestic animals the horses and the sheep and
Speaker 1: the hens and so on that that people kept, and
Speaker 1: so you always had these kinds of companions around you.
Speaker 1: And then if your inclination was stronger than some, which
Speaker 1: there's always variation, then of course that environment set it free.
Speaker 1: And I came. My life with animals began as a
Speaker 1: very very small boy. And while hunting has had an
Speaker 1: impact on me, animals have shaped me. And so I
Speaker 1: don't see hunting as the ultimate driving force in my
Speaker 1: association with animals. I see animals as the driving force
Speaker 1: of my engagement with wildlife and with animals, and I
Speaker 1: see hunting as something that is a part of that
Speaker 1: um and which makes it entirely possible for me to
Speaker 1: say that I hunt and I love animals deeply, without
Speaker 1: absolutely any sense of contradiction or any sense of fear
Speaker 1: that I would not be able to defend that in
Speaker 1: any circumstance or any debate anywhere in the world. And
Speaker 1: it extended to wild creatures as well as domestic creatures.
Speaker 1: I love the ponies, I love the chickens, I love
Speaker 1: the sheep. I I and I've never lost fascination with animals,
Speaker 1: whether they are domesticated animals or whether they are wild creatures.
Speaker 1: And I guess the ultimate, the ultimate expression of that
Speaker 1: journey then is that I really and this offends some people,
Speaker 1: of course, but I really don't see very much difference
Speaker 1: between so called us and then. And this opens up
Speaker 1: a lot of philosophical discussions, of course, and sometimes makes
Speaker 1: hunters feel some hunters not at all, but some hunters
Speaker 1: feel a bit uneasy. But for me, as a hunter,
Speaker 1: you have to accept that truth can still be able
Speaker 1: to do it absolutely absolutely well. I mean, there's a
Speaker 1: lot there um to unpack, but especially but but what
Speaker 1: strikes me is just in your upbringing. Um, there's a
Speaker 1: lot of aspects that we're missing in the modern world.
Speaker 1: We're missing in the urban world and even the suburban world.
Speaker 1: Your connection to the people around you, A deep sense
Speaker 1: of trust that that you had there and that that
Speaker 1: will allow you to probably explore more than maybe you
Speaker 1: would have if you didn't have a sense of trust
Speaker 1: in your community, uh, and things like that. So I
Speaker 1: think that you know your passion for animals in the
Speaker 1: in the connection you feel to them. I'm sure it
Speaker 1: was just driven closer by the environment that you you
Speaker 1: grew up. And I find that to be be something
Speaker 1: in the modern world that we we lack. And um,
Speaker 1: I think more folks could could take heed to the
Speaker 1: way you grew up and the changes that we've seen
Speaker 1: in the last few decades. Well, I think that is true,
Speaker 1: and of course it's a it's part of the great
Speaker 1: conundrum for conservation in in many ways, because we know
Speaker 1: that there is increasing urbanization occurring worldwide. I mean there
Speaker 1: is a there is a continuous and strengthening move to
Speaker 1: cities of course by people in cultures all around the world,
Speaker 1: and this is having a lot of effects in the
Speaker 1: sense that it is separating a lot of people from
Speaker 1: the natural world more and more. But at the same time,
Speaker 1: it is also freeing up considerable landscapes that at one
Speaker 1: time were occupied by people that are now being reclaimed
Speaker 1: by wildlife at many parts of the world, um, which
Speaker 1: a lot of people don't think about. But this is
Speaker 1: one of the outcomes of urbanization which is a benefit
Speaker 1: to conservation in the sense that it's more spaceful for
Speaker 1: wildlife to thrive and exist. Um. The flip side of it,
Speaker 1: of course, is this problem of association from the natural world,
Speaker 1: and we are going to have to find ways to
Speaker 1: bring people to a concern for animals and wildlife regardless
Speaker 1: of where they live. Fortunately, because our relationship with animals
Speaker 1: is such an evolutionary thing. I mean, it's so deeply
Speaker 1: bettered in us. But the one thing that city people,
Speaker 1: if we could call people city people versus rural people,
Speaker 1: do not differ on is their fascination with animals and
Speaker 1: with wildlife. Um. That's why the television shows like the
Speaker 1: BBC's Planet Earth, which to a large extent simply featured
Speaker 1: the biological diversity of the planet, attracts the largest television
Speaker 1: audience of all time. UM. So we're not helpless in
Speaker 1: this debate, as some of the rhetoric might suggest. And
Speaker 1: because children like technology just like we did as children,
Speaker 1: just like every human child has since we broke the
Speaker 1: first stone. Um, you know this is uh, this, this
Speaker 1: doesn't need that. We can define a significant conservation ethic
Speaker 1: within people in those circumstances, and we might be reminded,
Speaker 1: as hunters and anglers that it was the urban elites
Speaker 1: of the United States of America, the George Bird Grinnell's
Speaker 1: and the Theodore Roosevelt's it was the urban elites of
Speaker 1: your country which led the movement for conservation at the
Speaker 1: turn of the twentieth century. Absolutely there was a lot
Speaker 1: of Europeanism in those ideas that who would be a hunter? Right?
Speaker 1: I mean, um, that leads into a great uh, a
Speaker 1: subject that I wanted to cover up. Not I wasn't
Speaker 1: sure we'd get to it today because there's so much
Speaker 1: but just uh, the beginning of conservation in this country, um,
Speaker 1: and how you know, eighty years is a long time,
Speaker 1: um since we really got into the things like Pittman
Speaker 1: Robertson Acts and some of the more important legislation. UM.
Speaker 1: But I believe it was you know, the turn of
Speaker 1: the century when Pinochet define what conservation was and started
Speaker 1: to understand this idea that market hunting was going to
Speaker 1: two was ruined us to our wild life into America
Speaker 1: and we needed to have a different set of ideals.
Speaker 1: So talking, I know, you have a lot of knowledge
Speaker 1: about that, and you've been really involved and you know
Speaker 1: in the North American model of wildlife conservation and theorizing
Speaker 1: and talking a lot about how conservation came to be
Speaker 1: and then in the pursuing you know, preceding decades why
Speaker 1: it needed to to change when it did. So I
Speaker 1: would love you. I As an aside to that, I
Speaker 1: think there's a lot of hunters that do not know
Speaker 1: much about that history, and in our outbit removed from
Speaker 1: things like Pittman Robertson UM and and funds they pay
Speaker 1: into because they are generations, removed from the idea that
Speaker 1: it was necessary. So I think it's it's important to
Speaker 1: to cover those things well. It is important because in
Speaker 1: the broadest conceptual sense, UM, knowing our history is what
Speaker 1: prepares us for the present and the future. UM. And
Speaker 1: also knowing our history is what helps give our nations
Speaker 1: and our people a sense of identity. And one part
Speaker 1: of the history of the United States and of Canada
Speaker 1: meant certainly of some other countries, but really significantly in
Speaker 1: the United States was the rise of this idea of
Speaker 1: conservation and which was really kind of the forerunner of
Speaker 1: the sustainable use movement, etcetera. UM. You know, it's hard
Speaker 1: for people today to believe that a hundred and twenty
Speaker 1: and indeed a hundred fifty years ago, UM, the ravages
Speaker 1: being applied to wildlife and other natural resources such as forests,
Speaker 1: for example, but also river systems so on, were just
Speaker 1: extreme in in the United States. In particular and in
Speaker 1: parts of settled Canada, the depletion of wildlife was at
Speaker 1: such a state that, as I have said and reminded
Speaker 1: many policy makers, if we had had endangered Species acts,
Speaker 1: you know, at the turn of the twentie century in
Speaker 1: the United States Canada, most of the iconic species that
Speaker 1: most readily come to mind too people when you say
Speaker 1: the word wildlife, you know, such as black bear, or
Speaker 1: white tailed deer, mule deer, elk, you know, species Canada, geese,
Speaker 1: wood ducks, wild turkeys, and all these kind of iconic species.
Speaker 1: They would have all been on the endangered species list.
Speaker 1: There's absolutely no question of that. Depletions were so extreme
Speaker 1: and so geographically extensive and widespread that every one of
Speaker 1: them would have been elicted. And yet we live at
Speaker 1: a time whereas hunters like to point out, most of
Speaker 1: those iconic species, of course, are ones that are very
Speaker 1: safely distanced from anything like an endangered species listing, and
Speaker 1: they are in extraordinary abundance in many cases. So we
Speaker 1: have somebody there are being killed in our highways and
Speaker 1: turkeys in our driveways. It goes. So this is an example,
Speaker 1: first of all, all the extraordinary capacity of a country
Speaker 1: to move from wildlife crisis to wildlife triumph. And of
Speaker 1: course every country in the world is preoccupied with this
Speaker 1: issue today, and yet we have a demonstration of our capacity,
Speaker 1: as you know, beings to undertake such rescue missions and
Speaker 1: be successful. The second most important comment about that, of course,
Speaker 1: is that the people who responded to the crisis were
Speaker 1: people who, in many cases never needed to worry about
Speaker 1: their opportunities in life at all, because they were elites,
Speaker 1: they were from wealthy backgrounds, and so on and so forth,
Speaker 1: and yet they threw themselves into this fight as nationalists, essentially,
Speaker 1: as Americans, as people who believed, as Roosevelt articulated that
Speaker 1: if you did not care you could excuse me about
Speaker 1: the natural resources of your country, and if you did
Speaker 1: not want to play a part in their management and
Speaker 1: custodianship so that future generations could inherit them and share them,
Speaker 1: then you really had no right to call yourself an American.
Speaker 1: This ultimately got translated in the American social political environment
Speaker 1: to the White House because as a result of you know,
Speaker 1: an assassination, obviously um Teddy Roosevelt comes to power. He
Speaker 1: becomes the President of the United States of American he
Speaker 1: draws into the vortex of power are in the White House,
Speaker 1: these ideas and then brings them to the nation and
Speaker 1: to the governors, to the to the political infrastructure of
Speaker 1: the country, and then sets about, you know, doing the
Speaker 1: famous things that people know about him, you know, setting
Speaker 1: up national parks and wilderness areas, while life reserved and
Speaker 1: all of that. And while all of that was important,
Speaker 1: the most important thing that people like pin Show and
Speaker 1: Grinnelle and Roosevelt gave and which Roosevelt personified, was he
Speaker 1: gave to the American people this idea that conservation of
Speaker 1: wildlife and natural resource has mattered. And despite the fact
Speaker 1: that not everybody had been a fan of Teddy Roosevelt's
Speaker 1: when he was in the presidency, and despite the fact
Speaker 1: that you know, when he left the presidency obviously eventually, um,
Speaker 1: it's a very interesting that no American president since Democrat
Speaker 1: or Republican has really done it, has really done much
Speaker 1: to damage the basic kind of infrastructures that Teddy Roosevelt
Speaker 1: put in place. Despite the fact that he had so
Speaker 1: many critics at the time, that suggests to me that
Speaker 1: he embedded something in America. He embedded something in the
Speaker 1: American people, and that that makes political leaders think twice
Speaker 1: about changing too much the way that the resources of
Speaker 1: your country are managed. And this doesn't mean that every
Speaker 1: American citizen knows the history. It doesn't mean that every
Speaker 1: American citizen walks around preaching this. Of course they don't.
Speaker 1: But still there has to be a reason for why
Speaker 1: his programs and institutions have been so resilient over a century. Well.
Speaker 1: And I think the uniqueness of those ideas is really
Speaker 1: codified in the fact that today every American values wild life.
Speaker 1: I mean, we we disagree in a lot of ways
Speaker 1: about how that value looks and feels, what it means,
Speaker 1: but I think we all, unlike you know, Africa or
Speaker 1: other areas of the world, we all have a value
Speaker 1: determined value for those animals. And I think that's really,
Speaker 1: at the end of the day, the legacy of the
Speaker 1: early conservationists. I mean, I think it has to be
Speaker 1: that that there's no one in this country that would
Speaker 1: would stand for the wholesale slaughter of the animals like
Speaker 1: it was in market hunting times. No, I think that's
Speaker 1: that's absolutely true, and the sensibilities of the nation have
Speaker 1: changed in many ways, of course, but I think you're
Speaker 1: absolutely right about widlife. And and of course this is
Speaker 1: the great this is the great suit of armor that
Speaker 1: that conservation wears. Right. I mean, there's there is a citizen,
Speaker 1: citizen rebacking these values. It's not just a handful of
Speaker 1: professionals in the US Fish and Wirelife Service or geological
Speaker 1: survey of the National Park Service. It's not just a
Speaker 1: group of you know, of effective bureaucrats buried within you know,
Speaker 1: government offices in Washington. It's not just a Secretary of Interior.
Speaker 1: It's not just anything. It really the solid fabric of
Speaker 1: this movement lies in the this sort of generalized kind
Speaker 1: of awareness and sensibility that is now part of the
Speaker 1: American psyche. And you know, I think this is what
Speaker 1: all opportunity for conservation going forward springs from that reservoir
Speaker 1: of commitment and hope. Absolutely When then you go to seven,
Speaker 1: specifically when Franklin Roosevelt got a bunch of people together,
Speaker 1: two thousand conservations in fact, and they call it the
Speaker 1: North American Wildlife Conference, and and that was I think
Speaker 1: that is a huge point in the readings I've done
Speaker 1: in the history of of conservation, because they then began
Speaker 1: to put together a way to pay for all these
Speaker 1: ideas um, because obviously that you care about wildlife, you
Speaker 1: want to take care of them and leave places for
Speaker 1: them to roam, and for hunters to want to pursue them. Well,
Speaker 1: you have to have some sort of funding to do that.
Speaker 1: So talk about a little bit about you know, the
Speaker 1: user pays public benefits model, and a little bit about
Speaker 1: what was happening in the late nineteen thirties there around
Speaker 1: Franklin Roosevelt and then the passing of the Pittman Robertson Act,
Speaker 1: and then what that meant going forward, because I think
Speaker 1: that's often also a lost aspect of the conservation movement. Well,
Speaker 1: I think one of the first and most obvious UM
Speaker 1: residences and similarities in fact between you know, this time
Speaker 1: period of the mid mid in late nineteen thirties and
Speaker 1: the original cement period of the turn of the twentieth
Speaker 1: century and a little bit before, was that both were
Speaker 1: fueled by crisis um America obviously had you know, suffered
Speaker 1: the incredible effects of this sort of dust bowl era.
Speaker 1: The economic challenges were there, and interestingly enough, of course,
Speaker 1: a relative of Theodore Roosevelts is in the White House
Speaker 1: and does a great many things in the conservation realm,
Speaker 1: the conservation Corps, and yes, there was a variety of
Speaker 1: pieces of legislation established in that time period. Um. You know,
Speaker 1: the the North American Conference and Wildlife Management Institute were
Speaker 1: founded at that time. A number of very influential NGO
Speaker 1: groups came to rise at that time, the Wildlife Federation,
Speaker 1: just just the cooperative Wildlife Research Unit process. I mean,
Speaker 1: there were many, many, many, really substantial innovative changes that
Speaker 1: took place in that period of crisis in America at
Speaker 1: that time under Franklin Roosevelt's Roosevelt's leadership, the the ideas
Speaker 1: that there should be a user pay system to some extent,
Speaker 1: and that that kind of in in a sense, oversimplifies
Speaker 1: conservation in America. But the phrase is often used, and
Speaker 1: so it's helpful to discuss it in those terms. You know,
Speaker 1: this this need was identified much much, much earlier. George
Speaker 1: Burt Runnell was the first one that I am aware
Speaker 1: of who actually wrote in Forest Stream, which he was
Speaker 1: the editor of for many decades, UM, that it should
Speaker 1: be the hunting community of the United States of America
Speaker 1: who paid for all wildlife enforcement. Um. This was an
Speaker 1: idea that was thirty forty years ahead of its time,
Speaker 1: but nevertheless, the notion that there needed to be money,
Speaker 1: that the resource had to be managed and protected, that
Speaker 1: the money had to come from somewhere. This was already
Speaker 1: floating in the sort of conservation air. And when end
Speaker 1: we finally saw this solidify or codify, who was when
Speaker 1: you know, people decided, okay, let's pass legislation and find
Speaker 1: a way to raise significant amounts of money to help
Speaker 1: support the state agencies fundamentally in your country, which were
Speaker 1: of course constitutionally legally given the responsibility for the public
Speaker 1: trust of those resources, in other words, to manage and
Speaker 1: custody of those resources that you know that existed within
Speaker 1: their individual jurisdictions. And so the idea surface that you know,
Speaker 1: a way to do this was to put a federal
Speaker 1: excise tax, you know, on commodities that will be used
Speaker 1: by people who were involved in the outdoors, principally people
Speaker 1: who hunted um and so rifles and ammunition and things
Speaker 1: of this nature, and that we could place a tax
Speaker 1: there that would eventually be would be redistributed back to
Speaker 1: the states based on the formula of land areas and population, etcetera.
Speaker 1: Etcetera um, and that those moneys would then be given
Speaker 1: directly to the state agencies to manage the state wildlife resources.
Speaker 1: Of course, you know it. First of all, there were
Speaker 1: more than hunters involved in that process, because obviously anyone
Speaker 1: who practice shooting, for example, and the target practiced skate
Speaker 1: shooting and trap shooting its own, and so forth, anyone
Speaker 1: who actually purchased the firearms and ammunition were also contributing
Speaker 1: to that fund and therefore also contributing to the state
Speaker 1: agencies capacities to manage wildlife, whether they were hunters or not.
Speaker 1: So there was always a more diverse community helping to
Speaker 1: fund the state agency than just hunters. But over the
Speaker 1: intervening time period between nine seven and the present day,
Speaker 1: you know the Prisment Roberts and Act and the moneys
Speaker 1: that have come from it, I mean it literally had
Speaker 1: has raised billions above billions of dollars every placeable amounts
Speaker 1: of money that had been diverted to the management of
Speaker 1: wildlife in your country. And even to this day, of course,
Speaker 1: the dollars spent by hunters and also now because of
Speaker 1: subsequent legislation, the money spent by anglers people who fish
Speaker 1: are a major component, a majority proportion of the moneys
Speaker 1: that the state agencies have to operate with. So it's
Speaker 1: a it was a seminal piece of legislation, bord of
Speaker 1: ideas that had been launched thirty to forty years earlier,
Speaker 1: finally enacted and passed, and you know, has just made
Speaker 1: an absolutely unbelievable difference to the conservation and management of
Speaker 1: wildlife in your country. And you are the only country
Speaker 1: in the world that I'm aware of who has something
Speaker 1: of this specific nature. And it is not by any
Speaker 1: coincidence in my view, that the the States of America
Speaker 1: also has the most mature, the most complex, the most
Speaker 1: innovative conservation UH institutions and system in the world. Yeah, yeah, no,
Speaker 1: And I think you know, I think uh in my
Speaker 1: research and readings, it's about six of those state agency
Speaker 1: funds come from UM either license sales or or Pitt
Speaker 1: and Robertson funds UM or excise taxes. And that's that's
Speaker 1: that's huge. And over the over this eighty years of
Speaker 1: its existence, there's something like eighteen billion dollars or the
Speaker 1: funding that's that's been pushed in. That's just that number
Speaker 1: is amazing to me and it's amazing as a as
Speaker 1: a child that I wasn't taught that, or coming up
Speaker 1: as a hunter that that wasn't in just instilled in
Speaker 1: me that you're part of this history, this tapestry of
Speaker 1: a bunch of really smart people who cared about wildlife.
Speaker 1: They created this amazing thing that you're now paying into
Speaker 1: UM for this privilege. And I wonder if you have
Speaker 1: thoughts on why we don't as Americans celebrate that as
Speaker 1: much UM as I think we should. Well, I think
Speaker 1: part of the reason is just that, you know, you
Speaker 1: have to have UM. The idea of communicating history has
Speaker 1: to be someone's purpose, just like anything else in society. UM.
Speaker 1: The idea of communicating your political history, for example, in
Speaker 1: the United States of America, has been a has been
Speaker 1: undertaken by generations of amazing writers and historians and academics, etcetera.
Speaker 1: And so you know what happened joining, for example, the
Speaker 1: formative years of the founding of the United States, what
Speaker 1: happened during the time of the Revolutionary War, what happened
Speaker 1: at the time of the building of the consensus at
Speaker 1: strife around the constitutional frameworks? UM, what happened joining to
Speaker 1: America during the Civil war or what America's entry in
Speaker 1: the Two World Wars. You know, you know America has done.
Speaker 1: Your country has on an amazing job of capturing that
Speaker 1: history and bringing that history to the American people. Similarly, um,
Speaker 1: you know, the efforts of your armed forces over you know,
Speaker 1: a very long period of time, obviously has been widely
Speaker 1: celebrated and communicated and commemorated um by you know, American
Speaker 1: citizens who who who gave that knowledge and offered that
Speaker 1: knowledge to the rest of the public. And that's why
Speaker 1: there is such strong support in your country today for
Speaker 1: the men and women who serve in your own forces.
Speaker 1: But someone has to do it, someone has to take
Speaker 1: this on. And you know, while many people today talk
Speaker 1: about the North American model, I remember when that term
Speaker 1: was born, and that term did not exist until nineteen
Speaker 1: nineteen eight, did not exist in the English language. Yet
Speaker 1: a lot of people I talked to today, you know,
Speaker 1: kind of you know, speak about that term as though
Speaker 1: it's kind of always been with us. Well, no, it
Speaker 1: wasn't always with us at all. And the interesting thing
Speaker 1: is that it was a Canadian who came up with
Speaker 1: the term, of course, Dr Valerius Geist, and I was
Speaker 1: a student of his, of course, and remain a great
Speaker 1: and fast friend of this amazing man, and I undertook
Speaker 1: the idea of popularizing it and then, working with other colleagues,
Speaker 1: we did just that. So when somebody raises the term
Speaker 1: North American model, it is a primary example of what
Speaker 1: I am saying in response to your question. It took
Speaker 1: a group of people who were determined to communicate this
Speaker 1: history to make that emission without any real resources. We
Speaker 1: didn't have any plan. All I knew was that this
Speaker 1: concept had to go forward and led to efforts that
Speaker 1: eventually involved state agencies and provincial agencies and governments. And
Speaker 1: when I see the North American model as a term today,
Speaker 1: it makes me sort of marvel at the fact that
Speaker 1: we can bring a new concept to the broad public
Speaker 1: and have it embedded and have it talked about it
Speaker 1: and have it exercised. But what it amounted to was
Speaker 1: a need, a need to explain to people that there was,
Speaker 1: in fact a model in North America. So in a way,
Speaker 1: it too was born of crisis. Because one of the
Speaker 1: reasons why that term was developed it was because there
Speaker 1: was a growing trend in Canada and the United States
Speaker 1: at that time in the nineteen eighties, nineteen seventies, nineteen eighties,
Speaker 1: and which persists to this day of privatizing wildlife HM
Speaker 1: and the the arguments that developed between those who were
Speaker 1: in favor and those of us who opposed. The privatization
Speaker 1: of wildlife, which remains, as you know, a very hot topic,
Speaker 1: led to the question of well, what's at stake? And
Speaker 1: it was a result of that question being posed in
Speaker 1: people's minds that they're developed a response. And the response
Speaker 1: to what was at stake eventually became formulated in the
Speaker 1: concept of the North American model, which described the system
Speaker 1: of institutions, policies, and laws that arose out of the
Speaker 1: sustainable use of wildlife, which we've just talked about going
Speaker 1: back to the time at Roosevelt and Grenelle, etcetera. That
Speaker 1: that system was real, it wasn't a falsehood. And if
Speaker 1: we were to privatize wildlife, many many, many of those policies, laws,
Speaker 1: and institutions would be rendered either unimportant, useless, contradictory um
Speaker 1: and eventually we would undermine the successes of North American conservation.
Speaker 1: And that's where that term came from. So it too
Speaker 1: very much been was really born out of the need
Speaker 1: to defend something that's need, that's something really to really
Speaker 1: to look a look through here in this conversation. I
Speaker 1: mean that this I believe there are seven tenants of
Speaker 1: that model. Talk through that. I mean talk to how
Speaker 1: those were determined or or how you call those out
Speaker 1: and what that structure you look like, and why that
Speaker 1: was important. But I think the first thing to say
Speaker 1: at the outset with this, because you know, this is
Speaker 1: a conversation that you know often arises in as and
Speaker 1: as different viewpoints are brought to bear on it. You know,
Speaker 1: questions of roles will know why seven went out? Ten?
Speaker 1: Why not this one? Why not that one? And they
Speaker 1: the idea of putting together this framework was not too
Speaker 1: um was not to suggest that this was all their
Speaker 1: loss or two say this could not be rewritten or
Speaker 1: redefined or improved upon, or attitude. There was never any
Speaker 1: of that kind of authoritarian and kind of dictation going
Speaker 1: on when this ferment started in the late nineteen eighties
Speaker 1: and carried through through the nineties and now as a
Speaker 1: sort of common discussion of Parlors. No. But this was
Speaker 1: was an attempt to remind people in Canada and the
Speaker 1: United States that we did have this system first of all,
Speaker 1: that there really was a system. And that system included
Speaker 1: things like the Pittman Robertson Fund, and it included things
Speaker 1: like state agencies, and included things like government programs, and
Speaker 1: included things like international treaties for migratory birds. It included
Speaker 1: things like the strong science programs and so on and
Speaker 1: so forth. And it was they were like identified as
Speaker 1: major principles or ideas to remind everybody that they need
Speaker 1: not have happened when we started the conservation movement that
Speaker 1: the late nineteen hundreds, early part of the the late
Speaker 1: eighteen hundreds, early part of the twentieth century, we had
Speaker 1: very few game laws. We had no enforcement agencies. We
Speaker 1: did not have any university programs. We did not have
Speaker 1: any state or provincial agencies. We did not have any
Speaker 1: federal agencies responsible for these resources. We did not have
Speaker 1: the science programs at the universities. We did not have
Speaker 1: any of those things, and nothing said that we had to.
Speaker 1: But they emerged bit by bit, synergizing and actualizing one another,
Speaker 1: until we built up this system that relies on agencies
Speaker 1: and professionals and academ EMICs and and and participants, hunters
Speaker 1: and anglers and other people. And so the seven principles
Speaker 1: that are identified should be seen as guideposts, as very
Speaker 1: important and integral, and their principles in the sense that
Speaker 1: they they speak to philosophical things, you know, um, wildlife,
Speaker 1: the marketing of dead wildlife excuse me, would no longer
Speaker 1: be part of the North American system, and that obviously
Speaker 1: was an attempt to move against the market hunting issues.
Speaker 1: The principle that wildlife is an international resource, you know,
Speaker 1: the idea that wildlife moved across boundaries, both across state
Speaker 1: boundaries and between the United States and Canada, Mexico and
Speaker 1: the parts of the world, and that only by accepting
Speaker 1: that could we come up with the institutions that would
Speaker 1: be necessary for conserving the waterfowl being at best example,
Speaker 1: the idea that wildlife that hunting would be a right
Speaker 1: of every citizen, but of course they would need to
Speaker 1: be appropriately trained and you know, certified, and to do
Speaker 1: it under legal means and so on. So these were
Speaker 1: the kinds of principles that were identified and originally by
Speaker 1: hilarious guist Uh and promulgated afterwards by many others. But
Speaker 1: they were identified to remind again people in governments and
Speaker 1: in policy institutions that these principles really mattered. For example,
Speaker 1: the principle that science is the basis for management. This
Speaker 1: is a principle that we have abided by in North
Speaker 1: America for the last hundred years and eighty years since
Speaker 1: we started to gain real knowledge of of wildlife science.
Speaker 1: And as you know, there is a big debate today
Speaker 1: about whether we are starting to turn our back on
Speaker 1: science and manage wildlife from a totally emotional perspective. So,
Speaker 1: you know, it's a really important man that the audience
Speaker 1: understand that the principles are are not sort of meant
Speaker 1: to be like the like Moses delivering tablets, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean, like the there's a flexibility and an
Speaker 1: organic part of all of this that we have to accept,
Speaker 1: and that means we have to accept a lot of
Speaker 1: different viewpoints as being potentially legitimate, but of course they
Speaker 1: have to all pass the critical test, and the critical
Speaker 1: test is whether those viewpoints are in the best long
Speaker 1: term interest of wildlife, right, And I think that it's
Speaker 1: such I mean for everyone listening here. I knew a
Speaker 1: little bit about the beginning of that model and learned
Speaker 1: about it here recently and was shocked to know that
Speaker 1: it wasn't longer reaching than the eighties, but I think
Speaker 1: or you spend that in to you know, you start
Speaker 1: off at the turn of the center and you spin
Speaker 1: that into the current day. You look at the grizzly
Speaker 1: bear hunting band in British Columbia, and then the the
Speaker 1: constant really just debate around wolves and apex predators, mountain lions,
Speaker 1: and the emotionality that that that it's sucked into these
Speaker 1: debates where pragmatism is kind of not able to shine through.
Speaker 1: You are you concerned about about those ideas? And and
Speaker 1: because of the history of our wildlife conservation is so pragmatic,
Speaker 1: do you do you feel like the loss of that
Speaker 1: in some way is going to be one of the
Speaker 1: hardest battles that conservation has to fight. I think it's
Speaker 1: one of the battles that conservation has to fight. But again,
Speaker 1: I take a somewhat different view of all of this
Speaker 1: um confusion and mayhem, if you will, because at the
Speaker 1: same time that we can argue that, you know, science
Speaker 1: must be the basis where decision may king. I think
Speaker 1: we all really accept in any quiet moment of reflection,
Speaker 1: that emotionality and passion are not restricted to any particular
Speaker 1: group within society or the conservation debate. Hunters of passions
Speaker 1: not anters of passion and die. Hunters of passionate um.
Speaker 1: Those who have more of a preservation philosophy, who are
Speaker 1: primarily focused on say things like national parks and and
Speaker 1: you know, protected areas. They have great passion and great commitment,
Speaker 1: and they have a very legitimate argument to make about
Speaker 1: these these institutions and policies being a part of the
Speaker 1: conservation matrix. I don't think there's anybody today who would
Speaker 1: say that we do not need to consider protected areas
Speaker 1: or national parks or stay parts of things of that nature,
Speaker 1: even if they exclude hunting in some or many or cases.
Speaker 1: I think most people would agree, yes, they're very much needed.
Speaker 1: People might say, you know, well, I only think they
Speaker 1: should be in place if there's an animal that's in
Speaker 1: desperate need of a protected space. Other people would say no, no,
Speaker 1: I think they must be much more expensive than that.
Speaker 1: But I think most people would agree that we need
Speaker 1: a a if I could say, a more preservationist element
Speaker 1: in the mix. At the same time, hunters and anglers
Speaker 1: are very passionate about their traditions and often speak with
Speaker 1: great emotion and little science about their particular activities. Um.
Speaker 1: And I think that's really helpful because I think if
Speaker 1: we were all to speak simply dispassionately about animals, I
Speaker 1: don't think there would be any hope for them in
Speaker 1: this world. So I think the trick here is to
Speaker 1: realize that there are certain elements and questions that demand
Speaker 1: a combination of science and passionate commitment, and that we
Speaker 1: need to collectively all sides of this debate figure out
Speaker 1: that appropriate balance. Now, there are philosophical differences between people.
Speaker 1: You know, some people believe in animal rights, for example,
Speaker 1: as a somewhat more extreme view, and a lot of
Speaker 1: people do not. But as you move down and across
Speaker 1: the spectrum of conservation and ideas, you know, there's much
Speaker 1: more similarity between groups of people. Then there are differences,
Speaker 1: and we need to find that ground as well as
Speaker 1: a as a basis for discussion. I am, however, very
Speaker 1: concerned that science is being um um, the profile that
Speaker 1: science has in the management of wilife is being decreased.
Speaker 1: I think we are living in a world where information
Speaker 1: overload is the common practice. We're living in a world
Speaker 1: because of our new technologies that allow every opinion to
Speaker 1: be instantly received by hundreds of thousands, tens of thousands,
Speaker 1: millions of people UM. And that phenomenon is affecting a
Speaker 1: lot more than just the management of wildlife. It is
Speaker 1: undermining scholarship in many ways because everybody is an expert.
Speaker 1: It is undermining good science in many ways because anybody
Speaker 1: can get out there in quotation marks scientific opinion. Uh,
Speaker 1: you know, through mechanisms that are not controlled in any sense.
Speaker 1: You know, it's not like you have to publish in
Speaker 1: a peer review journal, because you can just get it
Speaker 1: out there through Facebook or YouTube or whatever you want
Speaker 1: to do, a Ted talk whatever. This is leading to
Speaker 1: a decent ableize circumstance of knowledge and I think this
Speaker 1: has very significant and dangerous implications for UM, for the
Speaker 1: management of wild And let me give you an example.
Speaker 1: So we have a great many people who are opposed
Speaker 1: to the idea of international trophy hunting, for example, because
Speaker 1: they identify it as an egotistical proposition. Somebody travels from
Speaker 1: one country to a place like Africa and they shoot
Speaker 1: an elephant to rely on things of this nature that
Speaker 1: they bring back the trophies and they put them in
Speaker 1: their living rooms or whatever. There's trophy rooms, and a
Speaker 1: lot of people have a negative view towards this, including
Speaker 1: by the way, many hunters, as you know. Um. But
Speaker 1: the so the emotionality is I don't like this, um.
Speaker 1: You know, the animals should not be taken for that reason.
Speaker 1: The primary motivation is not for food, etcetera, etcetera. And
Speaker 1: so I don't believe this should be done. But the
Speaker 1: reality is, unfortunately or fortunately, depending on how you view
Speaker 1: this issue. The reality, the scientific, empirical, knowledge based reality
Speaker 1: is that that activity contributes to the conservation of wildlife
Speaker 1: habitat and wildlife species in many regions. It isn't perfect,
Speaker 1: it isn't without corruption and loss and disfigurement. But there's
Speaker 1: no question that when you analyze and bring the facts
Speaker 1: together and interpret them, that those activities help, in some
Speaker 1: specific cases to significantly improve the chances for existence for
Speaker 1: lions and pray species and ecosystems. Indeed that would otherwise
Speaker 1: be lost to other activities if hunting was not occurring there,
Speaker 1: that would end up inevitably in the loss wildlife. So
Speaker 1: this is a this is a classic example. Let's before
Speaker 1: us right now. On the emotional side, many people find
Speaker 1: it difficult to understand. But when faced with the absolute
Speaker 1: facts that here is the alternative. Have these activities and
Speaker 1: protect that wildlife landscape, or lose those activities and lose
Speaker 1: the wildlife that exists there. And many people will say, ah,
Speaker 1: I didn't realize that. I still don't like it, perhaps,
Speaker 1: but I have to accept that it has merit for
Speaker 1: the conservation of wildlife. And I think this is the
Speaker 1: important thing. Then about emotionality. The important thing is to
Speaker 1: have a litmus test for emotionality. So I have a
Speaker 1: lot of people in the non hunting world who dialogue
Speaker 1: with me, and I have a lot of people in
Speaker 1: the hunting world who dialogue with me. And I have
Speaker 1: some people in the world to dialogue with me who
Speaker 1: say we cannot understand how you are a hunter, and
Speaker 1: I say, I understand why you find it difficult to understand.
Speaker 1: But for me, there is only one question. So whether
Speaker 1: I like a particular decision, you know, whether that's about
Speaker 1: protected areas or or hunting and angling, or any any
Speaker 1: issue that you can think about that impinges on conservation.
Speaker 1: My only only question, ultimately to myself is will this
Speaker 1: benefit wildless And if it does, I'm in favor of it,
Speaker 1: even if I don't like it and I'm against it,
Speaker 1: I'm against it obviously if it fails that test. Yes,
Speaker 1: And I think it's a great point you make about emotionality.
Speaker 1: And I just feel like because hunting and conservation, and
Speaker 1: especially in a different continent with a different set of
Speaker 1: value systems, I think that the complexity and nuance is
Speaker 1: lost in that emotionality. And that's what really what hunting
Speaker 1: is grounded upon, is that it is nuanced and that
Speaker 1: it is complex UM and it a lot of times
Speaker 1: it's oxymoronic, as you as you explained, there's a lot
Speaker 1: of ideas that killing animals to save them is a
Speaker 1: general one. Who get all the time that people say,
Speaker 1: well that makes no sense. Well, yeah, maybe on his
Speaker 1: face it makes no sense. But if you use, you know,
Speaker 1: your question of is it good for wild life as
Speaker 1: the guiding principle, I think that always gets us gets
Speaker 1: us to the right place. Do you do you feel like,
Speaker 1: specifically the British Columbia grizzly bear band is something that
Speaker 1: UM will be repeated and does that concern you or
Speaker 1: do you feel like that's a UM an outlier in
Speaker 1: some way? No, I wouldn't say that it's an outlier, um,
Speaker 1: but I also think that it's a It's a classic
Speaker 1: example of how of how our attachment to wildlife at
Speaker 1: an emotional level and a psychological level really tends to
Speaker 1: play out the issue of the hunting of carnivores generally
Speaker 1: mountain lions, grizzly bears, wolves, um is. You know, it's
Speaker 1: a phenomenon that's debated intensively, not only in North America,
Speaker 1: but it's intensively debated in UH in Europe as well
Speaker 1: at present time, where links and wolves and even bears,
Speaker 1: brown bears are expanding their range. I mean, we have
Speaker 1: we have wolves now living you know, the outskirts of Rome, um.
Speaker 1: And so it's generating an incredibly intense discussion and debate
Speaker 1: on social acceptance of the animals themselves by rural people
Speaker 1: and shepherds and people who have livestock, etcetera. Uh and
Speaker 1: of course by people who are opposed at a philosophical
Speaker 1: level to all kinds of hunting. So it certainly is
Speaker 1: not an isolated event. And of all the hunting that
Speaker 1: takes place in in Africa, of course, you know, it
Speaker 1: is the it is the hunting of lions which is
Speaker 1: one of the absolute most intensely discussed and debated, and
Speaker 1: of course the conservation programs that have developed in other countries,
Speaker 1: let's say for India, for example, which is very much
Speaker 1: a conservation program built in almost entirely on protected areas
Speaker 1: and preservationist ideals. It was the tiger, of course, that
Speaker 1: became sort of the emblematic and sort of was helpful
Speaker 1: or encouraging or incentivizing for that nation to to undertake
Speaker 1: the massive conservation efforts and very successful conservation efforts. I
Speaker 1: would point out that they have, so I certainly don't
Speaker 1: see these grizzly bear carnivore the issue, you know, as
Speaker 1: being isolated in a sense. And the debate within British
Speaker 1: Columbia has been ongoing for a very very long period
Speaker 1: of time um and that province has seesawed back and
Speaker 1: forth on the issue. It has mounted several scientific reviews
Speaker 1: of grizzly bear populations and sustainability over time. In fact,
Speaker 1: the Province of British Columbia has invested quite heavily, more
Speaker 1: heavily than most jurisdictions politically in trying to you know,
Speaker 1: sort of get at this question and decide whether there
Speaker 1: should be hunting for grizzly bears or not. UM. So
Speaker 1: I think that we can expect a great deal more
Speaker 1: of this. UM. If I were to look at this
Speaker 1: whole issue from the anti hunting point of view, I
Speaker 1: think that there's a tremendous amount of focus globally on
Speaker 1: African hunting and trophy hunting and so on in the
Speaker 1: African context at the present time, which we're all aware of. UM.
Speaker 1: It remains to be seen. What it's going to unfold
Speaker 1: on the continent is many, many great complexities obviously there UM.
Speaker 1: But I think it is fair to say that there
Speaker 1: will be increasing attention paid over time to the hunting
Speaker 1: of the charismatic big carnivores in North America, and that
Speaker 1: is going to lead to even further increased debates over wolves, reintroductions,
Speaker 1: management status of these species, interactions with the Endangered Species Act.
Speaker 1: I think any of us who believe that that is
Speaker 1: not going to continue and be an intense debate are
Speaker 1: fooling ourselves. It is going to be very real. On
Speaker 1: the other hand, UM, you know, the idea that we
Speaker 1: can have unrestrained growth of large, dangerous carnivores in our
Speaker 1: midst greatly bears, for example, but also wolves which can
Speaker 1: be dangerous animals of course, and mountain lion, which we
Speaker 1: know can prey on people, etcetera. You know, whether you
Speaker 1: know society at large, it has a sort of an
Speaker 1: unlimited either indifference or willingness to accept these large carnivores
Speaker 1: in their midst You know, that remains to be seen,
Speaker 1: and I, you know, I highly doubt that you know,
Speaker 1: people are going to eventually want just you know, uncontrolled
Speaker 1: numbers of these of these big predators in their midst
Speaker 1: We we live in a time we're that realistically, you know,
Speaker 1: cannot play out. And of course what tends to happen
Speaker 1: in these debates is that the people who don't necessarily
Speaker 1: live with the dangerous wildlife are often the ones who
Speaker 1: most vociferously wanted protected at all costs. Having said all
Speaker 1: of that, there is a reason why these big carnivores
Speaker 1: capture our imagination, generate so much emotionality. Uh. This is
Speaker 1: not by accident, and this is not a product of
Speaker 1: modern media or any of those things. You know, we
Speaker 1: have always had this extraordinary relationship with the big carnivores.
Speaker 1: You know, we mythologize them, we feared them, we marveled
Speaker 1: at them. Um, you know, we have always had even
Speaker 1: as hunter gatherer people's there have always been cults and
Speaker 1: and amulets and things that have celebrated these big carnivores
Speaker 1: as a sense of power and prestige and so on
Speaker 1: and so forth. So we should not see the modern
Speaker 1: debate over these big carnivores as something new, or if
Speaker 1: you're on the anti hunting side, see hunter's interest in
Speaker 1: managing or hunting those animals as something new and bizarre.
Speaker 1: Nor from the hunting side, we see the emotionality to safeguard, protect,
Speaker 1: you know, those those animals as being something that is
Speaker 1: bizarre or new either. It kind of always has been
Speaker 1: with us. And it's for that reason that alone that
Speaker 1: I feel confident that we will continue to have major
Speaker 1: debates over what is best to do with with these
Speaker 1: big carnivores. And um, you know, society's values change over time.
Speaker 1: The values in America and the values in Canada, the
Speaker 1: two countries that we talked most about within the North
Speaker 1: American context, although they're not the only countries Mexico is
Speaker 1: there in those two countries, and I may say probably
Speaker 1: particularly in the United States. Um, there are really significant
Speaker 1: cultural shifts taking place as the society becomes more diverse,
Speaker 1: as new and different values emerge in the urbanized centers.
Speaker 1: As we've talked about earlier in the party cast, there's
Speaker 1: a lot of reason for us to expect that the
Speaker 1: idea that carnivore hunting will be criticized, you know, we
Speaker 1: we should expect that this is probably going to continue
Speaker 1: because of the social trends that we can see before us.
Speaker 1: And the real question is, then, um, how do we,
Speaker 1: from a hunting perspective, you know, mount the most socially
Speaker 1: effective arguments for having a sustainable harvesting, management based harvest
Speaker 1: of those of those carnivores. And some might say that
Speaker 1: we are already doing that. I would agree. Some might
Speaker 1: say we're probably not doing it as effectively as we
Speaker 1: would hope to, and I would agree with that also.
Speaker 1: So I think we we need to be prepared for
Speaker 1: a continuing long term debate over the harvesting of grizzly
Speaker 1: bears and it will never be settled then, in my view, absolutely.
Speaker 1: In other words, is it possible for me to envisage
Speaker 1: your time in British Columbia, for example, where some kind
Speaker 1: of limited harvesting of grizzly bears. Um. You know, is
Speaker 1: is permitted or could things change again? Yes, I believe
Speaker 1: they could, um and um. But even if they do,
Speaker 1: they won't change in that direction forever either. Well, and
Speaker 1: you make some great points there. One one of those
Speaker 1: is that this is just a continuing conversation like that,
Speaker 1: this is through generations. Obviously, you know the cultural societal
Speaker 1: changes will drive this conversation one way or the other way.
Speaker 1: But this is to me just a continuing conversation. And
Speaker 1: and if it was, if it was one question I
Speaker 1: think I feel like we all have to ask is
Speaker 1: and you've said this in the past, It's like, is
Speaker 1: what you're doing good for wildlife? Is it good for society?
Speaker 1: Good for for our society? That also is it good
Speaker 1: for wildlife? And if you can continue to answer that
Speaker 1: question yes every time, UM, I think we we will
Speaker 1: be okay in the sense of hunting. But one thing
Speaker 1: that has concerned me, and we've talked about this in
Speaker 1: the previous podcast A good bit is just the general
Speaker 1: sense that hunting in and of itself, the act of hunting,
Speaker 1: does not have the best public relations UM in in
Speaker 1: the grand scheme of of the world, whether that's you know,
Speaker 1: moreover the Africa trophy hunting issue, but but generally just
Speaker 1: the killing of an animal for sport, or or how
Speaker 1: you would explain modern sport hunting. Do you feel like,
Speaker 1: you know, in that ongoing conversation there is a way
Speaker 1: that you would would talk to hunters and say like, hey, here,
Speaker 1: here are a couple of things we can do better
Speaker 1: to drive this conversation in such a way that eliminates
Speaker 1: some the negative pr that we currently feel. Um, whether
Speaker 1: you think it's due to to really what hunters have
Speaker 1: put out there into the world, or that the world
Speaker 1: is changing in the face of hunting, long question, but well,
Speaker 1: I think there's a tremendous amount we can do. Frankly,
Speaker 1: and I I've always believed this, and I've always marveled
Speaker 1: at how slow we are to do them. I can't explain, um,
Speaker 1: you know, I don't find it hard to explain to
Speaker 1: the debate that's going on in society at all. I
Speaker 1: don't find it hard to understand the value systems, or
Speaker 1: the philosophies or the opinions of people who are opposed
Speaker 1: to hunting at all. I don't have any difficulty understanding that, Uh,
Speaker 1: just as I don't have any difficulty understanding why people
Speaker 1: feel so passionately about hunting and and how people can
Speaker 1: become real conservationists not only through hunting, but as part
Speaker 1: of their hunting world. I don't have any problem understanding
Speaker 1: any of that. And I don't think any group on
Speaker 1: either side of that divide, if we can call it that,
Speaker 1: are are more or less intelligent, or more or less fanatical,
Speaker 1: or more or less emotional, as I've said before, and
Speaker 1: I don't think any of that is a distinction. What
Speaker 1: I really find difficult to understanding is why the hunting
Speaker 1: public has been so slow to do some of the
Speaker 1: obvious things that we always should have been doing, and
Speaker 1: to cease doing some of the things that we obviously
Speaker 1: should never have been doing. So in the latter case,
Speaker 1: for example, some of the graphic imagery that we have
Speaker 1: been showing for now twenty five years, quarter of a century,
Speaker 1: it's a long time on our television shows, UM, often
Speaker 1: accompanied by you know, the glorification of the kill and
Speaker 1: of an animal in suffering or an animal which has suffered. UM.
Speaker 1: This has done incredible damage to the hunting world. Whether
Speaker 1: the hunters want to admit it, Whether the production companies
Speaker 1: want to admit it, whether the television stations want to
Speaker 1: commit it or admitted I don't really care. It has
Speaker 1: and it continues in today's world of almost inevitable viral exchange.
Speaker 1: It has opened up the possibility, through hard to track channels,
Speaker 1: an enormous flow of this kind of information to distant
Speaker 1: computers and cell phones all around the world that provide
Speaker 1: no context and which inevitably need the naive observer to
Speaker 1: fall on the side of opposition to hunting. Um. Things
Speaker 1: we also should never have done is we should never
Speaker 1: have tried to prove to the anti hunting world that
Speaker 1: the only thing we care about when we call ourselves
Speaker 1: conservation is the are the animals that we hunt. So
Speaker 1: I'd like to ask you, Ben, and ask your audience
Speaker 1: how many of the organizations that we have that are
Speaker 1: based on hunters and founded by hunters and talk about
Speaker 1: doing conservation, how many of them are really focused a
Speaker 1: non hunted species at all? Yeah, how many awards do
Speaker 1: you see being given out at those events for people
Speaker 1: working on non hunted species? What do we think conservation
Speaker 1: and ended with the game animals? Well, that's the exact
Speaker 1: message we give all the time, and our industries are
Speaker 1: giving it all the time. So when you ask about
Speaker 1: the things we shouldn't be doing, I think there's there's
Speaker 1: probably millions of little things that go on the social
Speaker 1: media circuit every day we shouldn't be doing. And then
Speaker 1: to get on and say that, you know, criticize people
Speaker 1: who are against hunting and say that they have no
Speaker 1: conservation ethic and so on? Did John You're not have
Speaker 1: a conservation ethic? Yeah? Who's going to stand up and
Speaker 1: say that that's ridiculous? So this is the other things
Speaker 1: that we do as a as hunters that are things
Speaker 1: that we we we we should not be doing, but
Speaker 1: we we do all the time. We shouldn't be slandering
Speaker 1: people with sort of racial nomenclatures like green eads, you know,
Speaker 1: and antis. Notice how they all end in those ease
Speaker 1: like Nazis and so on and so forth. What do
Speaker 1: you think that makes us look like? I mean, these
Speaker 1: are all things that I look at, and I've looked
Speaker 1: at for twenty five years, and I've I've I've spoken
Speaker 1: as much, I think as any human being before hunting
Speaker 1: audiences and talked about these issues to virtually no avail,
Speaker 1: and in my own personal estimation, I don't think I've
Speaker 1: moved the needle one bit. What do you what do
Speaker 1: you think? What do you think it's going to take
Speaker 1: to change that? Is it going to take some kind
Speaker 1: of you're going to take to change that? As a crisis,
Speaker 1: and I think we're getting damned close. In the last
Speaker 1: five years, we lost two million hunters in the United
Speaker 1: States of America. By our own surveys, we've lost two million.
Speaker 1: We have a demographic wave moving through the hunting population
Speaker 1: in the United States and Canada that inevitably made were
Speaker 1: inevitably means we are going to lose millions more by
Speaker 1: the demographic wave. I'm obviously referring to just we're a
Speaker 1: very old age class. Yea, we call them age classes
Speaker 1: in the hunting world, we call them baby boomers. In
Speaker 1: this country, that generation, recruitment processes are not replacing them.
Speaker 1: So I think we're going to need a crisis, and
Speaker 1: we're also going to need to have some conservation leadership
Speaker 1: in the hunting community stand up and do certain things.
Speaker 1: So it's fine for me to say what we shouldn't
Speaker 1: be doing, but I think there there also needs to
Speaker 1: be ideas about what we should be doing. So. Here's
Speaker 1: an idea that I have offered up to a number
Speaker 1: of organizations in the hunting world. Take some significant percentage
Speaker 1: of all the money that comes in from the from
Speaker 1: the hunting world and devoted into some broader conservation effort.
Speaker 1: Why don't we give ten percent of the money that
Speaker 1: we raise two non hunted species efforts. Yeah, sea turtles
Speaker 1: or dolphins or other things that have captured butterflies, things
Speaker 1: that have captured the imagination of children around the world.
Speaker 1: Why don't we prove that we are really about conservation
Speaker 1: written large, and not just about conserving the animals that
Speaker 1: we shoot. Why don't we establish awards for people who
Speaker 1: do things in conservation, and whether they be a hunter
Speaker 1: or a non hunter, treat them equally, as is now
Speaker 1: starting to happen. Why don't we develop television shows that
Speaker 1: celebrate the animal. I mean, there's a million things that
Speaker 1: can be done. I mean, you know, and there's there's
Speaker 1: good efforts starting along these roads. Then, I mean, there
Speaker 1: are companies you know that that are out there are
Speaker 1: starting to do really good things in this world about
Speaker 1: conservation and the and the new films that are being
Speaker 1: produced by some of those companies are excellent, and we're
Speaker 1: we're seeing some movement in the television world. We're starting
Speaker 1: to see this, but we need to do it all
Speaker 1: much harder and much faster. As I've said to many
Speaker 1: people running our hunting conventions, the day that the non
Speaker 1: hunting world, the day that the non hunting world, and
Speaker 1: I would say even the anti hunting world can find
Speaker 1: something of real value when merits for them on that floor,
Speaker 1: then we will have begun to move forward in the
Speaker 1: way that Teddy Roosevelt imagined. Yeah. Yeah, do you think
Speaker 1: that man was a fanatic about songbirds? He love birds
Speaker 1: more than he loved hunting. Yeah, yeah, A naturalist, a naturalist. Yeah,
Speaker 1: do you feel like, uh going forward? You know, there
Speaker 1: is this mentality in hunting that I've seen, and I've
Speaker 1: seen it propagated by a lot of very famous folks,
Speaker 1: a lot of some of the figureheads of our industry
Speaker 1: from a celebrity standpoint, that said every hunter should should
Speaker 1: support every hunter, like this idea of tribalism, like we
Speaker 1: must if we don't all support each other, will fall
Speaker 1: at our core. Or if if if we don't support
Speaker 1: every type of hunting, re hunter or every pursuit, then
Speaker 1: we somehow fail. I personally don't agree with that. Do
Speaker 1: you feel like that's part of the reason why change
Speaker 1: hasn't been as a parent for the hunting world? Um,
Speaker 1: I know that some people feel that way, and I
Speaker 1: have some empathy for the position, because you know, if
Speaker 1: it's a hunting community, just like any other community, a
Speaker 1: political party, or a country, you know, it's just constantly
Speaker 1: consumed by infighting, and clearly that's that's not a good thing,
Speaker 1: and it destabilizes the best of messages and the best
Speaker 1: of intentions. So I have an empathy for that viewpoint.
Speaker 1: But like you, I feel there's a limit to this.
Speaker 1: I feel that we have to we have to realize
Speaker 1: that hunting has to be made relevant in a modern society.
Speaker 1: We cannot continue to treat it as though it is
Speaker 1: experience of the American and Canadian frontier. We have moved
Speaker 1: moved a long way from the days of Lewis and Clark.
Speaker 1: We've moved a long way from the days of Autubon.
Speaker 1: We've moved a long way from the days of Roosevelt.
Speaker 1: We moved a long way from the days of Leopold.
Speaker 1: We've moved fifty to sixty years beyond the days of
Speaker 1: Rachel Carson in Silent Spring, fifty to sixty years a generation.
Speaker 1: And we have to make this activity the oldest of
Speaker 1: human activities. We have to make this relevant to a
Speaker 1: modern society. We have to normalize hunting in a moderate society.
Speaker 1: And when you start to think about those as your goals,
Speaker 1: which they are mine, I wish to normalize it. I
Speaker 1: don't wish to exceptionalize it. I don't wish to make
Speaker 1: it exceptional. I want to make it relevant um. And
Speaker 1: you start to think about doing things very differently. You
Speaker 1: start to think about new organizations. You start to think
Speaker 1: about new magazines. You start to think about new television shows.
Speaker 1: You start to think about new marketing possibilities. You start
Speaker 1: to think about new coalitions. You start to think about
Speaker 1: things like food, wild food. You start to think about
Speaker 1: people whom love animals, and you want to be able
Speaker 1: to reach out to them and talk to them about
Speaker 1: your own love of animals. Um. You start to explain
Speaker 1: the fact that the rancher who is still believed to
Speaker 1: care very much for his animals as he does, or
Speaker 1: the small scale farmer who does care very much for
Speaker 1: their animals, they know those animals will die. In fact,
Speaker 1: they're raising them for death. Yet they have managed to
Speaker 1: maintain a position in society that's viewed as relevant and valuable,
Speaker 1: and they are believed to really care for their animals.
Speaker 1: Isn't that true? It is, so we need to ask
Speaker 1: ourselves the question, why do so many people believe that
Speaker 1: we don't care? Is it really the animal death issue?
Speaker 1: Because that's just the same for the rancher in the farmer.
Speaker 1: Maybe it's us, Maybe it is. Yeah, And I think
Speaker 1: there is introspection needed, and I appreciate yours personally, and
Speaker 1: then the forced, you know, forced introspection that we can
Speaker 1: all get from conversations like these. I think it is
Speaker 1: absolutely essential to challenge every idea, um and everything that
Speaker 1: that we believe is true. Because, as I'm sure you are,
Speaker 1: our upbringings are very different. But I'm sure as you
Speaker 1: have come to to be a part of this broad
Speaker 1: conservation movement, you've changed your ideals and adjusted with your
Speaker 1: expanded knowledge. And the more you've known, the more that
Speaker 1: you have theorized new things. And I think that is
Speaker 1: that's true for me as a hunter to a smaller
Speaker 1: scale than you, But I think that every hunter should
Speaker 1: listen to your words and just and start to examine
Speaker 1: the ways in which they act and the ways which
Speaker 1: their groups act, and how that can be be better
Speaker 1: constituted to get to the goals that that that you
Speaker 1: put forward. UM, yes, I totally agree with you, Ben,
Speaker 1: and I would say this too. And you know, despite
Speaker 1: the fact that in this podcast we have covered a
Speaker 1: lot of intense series and problematic areas and so on
Speaker 1: and so forth, the the the the resilient truth is
Speaker 1: that when the hunter man, woman, young, old, and when
Speaker 1: the hunting community of every that mixture operates at its
Speaker 1: best with a conservation ethic in mind, with the idea
Speaker 1: of what is best for wildlife in mind, it is
Speaker 1: a It is an unsurpassed force for the good of wildlife. UM.
Speaker 1: And the frustrations that some of us carry every day
Speaker 1: when we are embedded in these debates every day, is
Speaker 1: that we know that to be true. And what I
Speaker 1: am trying to do in my small world of influence
Speaker 1: and with the time and energy I have, is to
Speaker 1: unlock that part of the hunting world and to chip
Speaker 1: away at things that that limit that potential. And just said,
Speaker 1: it's free, as it was set free at the turn
Speaker 1: of the twentieth century and which history proves did an
Speaker 1: absolutely unbelievable thing. All the odds were against us yea
Speaker 1: as a nation's I mean not just as hunters were
Speaker 1: against our nations. Well you think about white tail white
Speaker 1: tail deer. I mean five hundred thousand of them in
Speaker 1: ninety seven. Today there's thirty million of them. That is unbelievable.
Speaker 1: Um And as we've often said, and that this greater conversation,
Speaker 1: there's not this isn't, you know, some big attempt just
Speaker 1: to be negative. It is just an attempt to talk
Speaker 1: through some of the tougher things and get to the
Speaker 1: point where we all know where we have to be.
Speaker 1: Is that that you're There's the reason that hunting has
Speaker 1: changed my life and conservation surely has changed yours is
Speaker 1: that it is it is transformative in many ways. So
Speaker 1: that's why it's important to me and to you. And
Speaker 1: while these conversations happen, so um I that's a good
Speaker 1: way to end it. But before we get out of here,
Speaker 1: I want you to tell everybody, um yeah, about the
Speaker 1: wild harvested issues. About something we've discussed in the past,
Speaker 1: and something I think it's very important going forward, and
Speaker 1: and something you've been working very hard on in recent past. Yes, well, uh,
Speaker 1: it's very a proposed because, of course, um, it came
Speaker 1: out of my thinking, much like the discussions we've had today.
Speaker 1: It came out of my thinking and my search for
Speaker 1: something that would make hunting really relevant in a modern society,
Speaker 1: and and instead of fighting social trends, to set it
Speaker 1: up in a way that is shows how it is
Speaker 1: actually working with important social trends. And this led me
Speaker 1: to the idea of the growing concern that people have
Speaker 1: for health, for the role that the arm it around
Speaker 1: and plays in maintaining or harming their health, and with
Speaker 1: the concern that people have especially with respect to the
Speaker 1: quality and source of their food. And in thinking about
Speaker 1: all of this, I began to wonder, well, how much
Speaker 1: wild food do we really as hunters and as anglers
Speaker 1: harvest in Canada and the United States, Given that you know,
Speaker 1: forty million of let's participate in those activities every year,
Speaker 1: and just knowing from myself and from friends and colleagues,
Speaker 1: just you know how much wild neat uh, some individuals
Speaker 1: consume and just how many people they share it with.
Speaker 1: So I launched this what's called the Wild Harvest initiative.
Speaker 1: It is a continent wide assessment of the harvest of
Speaker 1: wild fish and birds and mammals UM you know, on
Speaker 1: in Canada and the United States. UM. It is bringing
Speaker 1: together the list of all species obviously in the list
Speaker 1: of all harvests that are recorded by the management agencies.
Speaker 1: It is estimating obviously the total biomass or total weight
Speaker 1: pounds MS of of that harvest for all species UM,
Speaker 1: then determining through various sources the actual consumable weights of
Speaker 1: all of that harvest, working with economists to give it
Speaker 1: a fair market value. And we are obviously talking billions
Speaker 1: billions of pounds of wild food that is harvested, to
Speaker 1: give that a an actual economic value, real economic value
Speaker 1: in today's market if it was in the marketplace, and
Speaker 1: then to work with agricultural scientists and others to say, well, okay,
Speaker 1: we have this commodity. It is worth this amount. It
Speaker 1: is providing this amount of food to people. Now, what
Speaker 1: would happen if we ended hunting and angling? You know
Speaker 1: what would it cause society to actually replace all of
Speaker 1: this wild food? Along the way, we will be establishing
Speaker 1: a sharing index to indicate just how many people those
Speaker 1: individuals who do hunt and fish how many people they
Speaker 1: actually share that wild harvest with, so we get some
Speaker 1: idea of the the ripple effect or the generosity footprint
Speaker 1: of this activity in society. UM. And then we intend,
Speaker 1: of course, to to mobilize this knowledge in the context
Speaker 1: and coalition with people who harvest other things from the
Speaker 1: natural world, such as wild fruits and wild berries, wild
Speaker 1: mushrooms and so on and so forth. Medicinal plants two
Speaker 1: again pursue my goal of normalizing hunting and demonstrating to
Speaker 1: a modern public, not the world I grew up in
Speaker 1: because it has passed, but to a modern public why
Speaker 1: this activity remains relevant and why people should consider engaging
Speaker 1: in it or coming to understand that the people who
Speaker 1: do engage in it are doing something that is very
Speaker 1: honorable and worthwhile. UM. I see the trends of where
Speaker 1: hunters and anglers are coming from you know what, demographic,
Speaker 1: what locations, and it is very clear that it is
Speaker 1: possible to reach people, bending back on the earlier part
Speaker 1: of our conversation, who live in you know, urban areas
Speaker 1: and so on and so forth, because they are very
Speaker 1: much concerned with this issue of food and the quality
Speaker 1: of food. UM. This is an attempt on my part
Speaker 1: to bring hunting before the modern public in a way
Speaker 1: that they're already sensitive to, which, as I said, is
Speaker 1: the quality of their of their food. And I'll also
Speaker 1: be emphasizing the other aspects health benefits of this activity
Speaker 1: in terms of emotional uh sensitivities you know, at the
Speaker 1: time spent in the outdoors and in nature, the physical
Speaker 1: activity benefits of the activities so appealing to the broader
Speaker 1: issues of human health, for which there is a growing
Speaker 1: body of scientific evidence. Of course, um and just trying,
Speaker 1: as I said, to make people understand that while this
Speaker 1: activity may not be for everybody. While and everybody will
Speaker 1: be a rancher, not everybody will be a farmer. For
Speaker 1: a group of people in society, this is a way
Speaker 1: for them to take responsibility for the meat they consume,
Speaker 1: and most people in society do consume meat. Um and
Speaker 1: at the same time demonstrating that this is the largest
Speaker 1: environmentally friendly food procurement system in existence. We do not
Speaker 1: destroy habitat, we defend it. We do not despoil the
Speaker 1: environment we protected, and at the same time we share.
Speaker 1: We have this virtually insane drive to share this wild
Speaker 1: food with friends, family, colleagues and even strangers. As I've
Speaker 1: said in many lectures over many years, none of us
Speaker 1: will go to the grocery store and buy a beefloast
Speaker 1: or a chicken and bring it to our neighbors and
Speaker 1: give it to them. As soon as we harvest the deer,
Speaker 1: harvest and elk, harvest wild mushrooms, harvest wild berries, harvest wildfish,
Speaker 1: the very first thing we want to do is to
Speaker 1: share this. We want to give it to somebody, We
Speaker 1: want to have them for dinner. And when we do
Speaker 1: share it with them, they're absolutely delighted to sieve it
Speaker 1: and they immediately want to share it. They'll say, oh,
Speaker 1: thank you. You know, my son is coming to dinner
Speaker 1: tomorrow night, I'm going to cook that for him, or uh,
Speaker 1: you know, my my father and mother would love to
Speaker 1: have that, so I'm going to share this meal with them.
Speaker 1: There is something innately human about the drive to share
Speaker 1: wild harvested food, and we are about to launch a
Speaker 1: major communication effort with the help of now partners, which
Speaker 1: include you know, industry groups such like blophold at Sitka
Speaker 1: and YETTI groups such as that, as well as with
Speaker 1: state agencies in the data and Florida and Texas, a
Speaker 1: wide variety of NGOs, while Sheep Foundation, Dallas, Sportsman's Alliance,
Speaker 1: s c I, Houston, I mean a lot of Elk Foundation,
Speaker 1: a lot of NGOs, too many to mention. We're about
Speaker 1: too soon start to launch the information from this. We
Speaker 1: have built the database. We have an amazing and the
Speaker 1: most knowledgeable database now formed database on all of this,
Speaker 1: and I'm really looking forward to it being a way
Speaker 1: to have comfortable conversations about hunting with people from very,
Speaker 1: very diverse backgrounds. As a medical doctor from the San
Speaker 1: Francisco Bay Area said to me at the end of
Speaker 1: the lecture a couple of weeks ago, she said, Um,
Speaker 1: you know, there are many people in the San Francisco
Speaker 1: Bay Area who are opposed to hunting, But she said,
Speaker 1: there are a lot more people in the San Francisco
Speaker 1: Bay Area who are fanatical about new culinary experiences, and
Speaker 1: one of the things they really are intrigued with and
Speaker 1: interested in are these wild harvested foods. So you know,
Speaker 1: it's a it's just my attempt to to seek in
Speaker 1: the middle of all of this debate and a quiet
Speaker 1: space that I know will matter to people. I'm not
Speaker 1: trying to make them hunters. I'm not trying to make
Speaker 1: them anglers, although I be delighted if they would be
Speaker 1: open to that, just trying to make them understand that
Speaker 1: this is relevant and the reason is relevant. It's because
Speaker 1: it's about healthy time in nature and the harvest the
Speaker 1: food of the highest quality that we take responsibility for
Speaker 1: ourselves absolutely well as a hunter. I appreciate you, know,
Speaker 1: not only your words, which are well spoken, but your
Speaker 1: actions in that regard. I think that's um, the ability
Speaker 1: you have to to articulate these ideas but then also
Speaker 1: help them stand up with this data and these these
Speaker 1: efforts I think is is um can be revolutionary. And
Speaker 1: I appreciate you sharing those and and sharing the rest
Speaker 1: of your story. And I thank you Shane for your time.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much, Pat, it's been a real pleasure.
Speaker 1: Care of yourself. Thank you. Okay, by life, that was
Speaker 1: a good one. Episode number five in the books. I
Speaker 1: want to thank, of course Mr Shane Mahoney for all
Speaker 1: that he does and who he is, and for his
Speaker 1: efforts with the Wild Harvest Initiative and Conservation Visions. If
Speaker 1: you want to learn a little bit more about that,
Speaker 1: you can go to Conservation Visions dot com. Click on
Speaker 1: Wild Harvest Initiative you can learn more about his efforts there.
Speaker 1: I think those could possibly be industry changing numbers that
Speaker 1: comes out of his study of where our wild meats
Speaker 1: go and why they're important. Thanks again to all of
Speaker 1: you for listening to episode number five. You can go
Speaker 1: to the Hunting Collective dot com to check out the
Speaker 1: other four episodes, including John Dudley, Ryan Callahan, Steve Ronnella,
Speaker 1: Aubrey Marcus. There's videos there, there are articles there. There's
Speaker 1: a bunch of stuff at the Hunting Collective dot com.
Speaker 1: We're also on iTunes and Stitcher. If you'd like this podcast,
Speaker 1: roll over to iTunes, give to review, subscribe, subscribe, tell
Speaker 1: all your friends to do the same. For now, that's
Speaker 1: all we have. We're gonna be joined next week by
Speaker 1: the one and only Remy Warrant, my good friend and
Speaker 1: someone you all want to hear from. So thanks again. Bye,