WEBVTT - Ep. 026 0:00:00.240 --> 0:00:02.480 Thank you for joining us. Ladies and gentlemen. This is 0:00:02.480 --> 0:00:06.840 the meat Eater Podcast. We're gonna talk now about something 0:00:06.840 --> 0:00:15.160 that is perhaps the least understood in my opinion, realm 0:00:15.280 --> 0:00:17.640 of of of hunting and fishing in America, which is 0:00:17.720 --> 0:00:22.200 hunting mountain lions. Um, something that I've never done successfully, 0:00:22.560 --> 0:00:24.760 no thanks to the guy I'm sitting here with, Floyd 0:00:24.760 --> 0:00:28.640 green Um. Before I get into that, I want to 0:00:28.680 --> 0:00:32.000 remind everyone if you like, like, if you want to 0:00:32.040 --> 0:00:36.960 watch watch the show meat Eater, not listen to the 0:00:36.960 --> 0:00:39.920 meat Eater podcast, go to meat Eater dot VHX dot 0:00:39.960 --> 0:00:42.800 tv and you can download it and stream it to 0:00:42.840 --> 0:00:45.680 your heart's content. They sell them on their and like 0:00:45.800 --> 0:00:49.440 these blocks of episodes, and if you go on there 0:00:49.560 --> 0:00:53.040 and use the offer code meat Eater Podcast, you get 0:00:53.080 --> 0:00:56.600 five bucks off any volume. And there's a lot. How 0:00:56.640 --> 0:00:59.840 many volumes did you say around there yet? Six six volumes? 0:01:00.200 --> 0:01:04.399 I think that's about off. I think they're around way 0:01:05.000 --> 0:01:09.959 huge discount. So me eater dot VHX dot tv, offer 0:01:10.040 --> 0:01:12.480 code me Eater podcast, And while you're at it, go 0:01:12.560 --> 0:01:17.360 on to Yanni uhhaspitelus is joining us here. Go onto 0:01:17.400 --> 0:01:23.440 Janice's thing website. Plug it, go buy some of yannice 0:01:23.520 --> 0:01:26.640 Is Hunt to Eat t shirts. What's one of those 0:01:26.640 --> 0:01:30.160 good T shirts cost? Y? We usually can get a 0:01:30.160 --> 0:01:32.679 ship for just a couple of dollars. And if Yanni's 0:01:32.680 --> 0:01:34.759 out of stock, like he always is, just keep checking 0:01:34.760 --> 0:01:36.360 back because he'll buy two or three more and get 0:01:36.440 --> 0:01:42.520 him in stock. Okay, I'm on the subject of hunt 0:01:42.520 --> 0:01:46.399 mountain lions I have. I'm gonna give my personal mountain 0:01:46.400 --> 0:01:54.640 lion resume. I've eaten three mountain lions, which is the 0:01:54.720 --> 0:01:57.880 same number of mountain lions that I've seen in the wild, 0:01:57.920 --> 0:01:59.840 though I haven't eaten any of the ones I've seen 0:01:59.840 --> 0:02:02.800 in the while, they all separate ones. There's this place 0:02:02.840 --> 0:02:06.160 outside of Missoula, Montana, called the Rock Creek Lodge, and 0:02:06.240 --> 0:02:10.080 every year they have something called the Testicle Festival, where 0:02:10.120 --> 0:02:16.880 they served There's this whole, big, very hedonistic festival around 0:02:17.080 --> 0:02:20.960 serving deep fried nuts from castrated steers. They cast rated 0:02:20.960 --> 0:02:22.760 steers in the spring with us in the fall. It 0:02:22.840 --> 0:02:27.200 must be freezing them. I don't never. It seems like 0:02:27.200 --> 0:02:29.480 you do it around the time, right, But one time 0:02:29.520 --> 0:02:32.120 I was in there in the spring and there was 0:02:32.160 --> 0:02:37.160 a pot of uh pulled pork on the counter and 0:02:37.200 --> 0:02:40.480 they weren't selling. It was free, and I made myself 0:02:40.480 --> 0:02:42.360 a sandwich and the guy told me that it was 0:02:42.440 --> 0:02:46.880 mountain lion, and um, he said, rock Creek lodge, balls 0:02:46.919 --> 0:02:51.320 in the fall, pussy in the spring. You know that 0:02:51.320 --> 0:02:53.160 that was one of the three mountain lions I've eating 0:02:53.160 --> 0:02:56.520 on another mountain lion I ate. My old girlfriend was 0:02:56.680 --> 0:02:59.280 in line in the hardware store and Wyoming and the 0:02:59.280 --> 0:03:02.280 guy in front of her was buying a mountain lion 0:03:02.400 --> 0:03:05.560 tag and she said, what do you do with the 0:03:05.600 --> 0:03:07.920 mountain lion? He said, I just wanted to hide. She said, 0:03:07.919 --> 0:03:10.320 we'll take all the meat, and sure enough, this dude 0:03:10.320 --> 0:03:12.400 called about a week later and gave us the whole 0:03:12.400 --> 0:03:16.680 mountain lion and we ate that thing every which way. 0:03:16.840 --> 0:03:20.239 It's not bad now, it's pretty good. The backstraps on 0:03:20.440 --> 0:03:22.840 there where it's at. Yeah, but it's all, you know, 0:03:22.919 --> 0:03:26.480 kind of a white meat that surprising resembles pork without 0:03:26.480 --> 0:03:29.960 the greasiness. You know, pretty good stuff. It'll test the 0:03:30.000 --> 0:03:35.480 strength of your jaw often. So so I'm joining this 0:03:35.520 --> 0:03:41.200 conversation buying a real, live, actual very serious um lion hunter. 0:03:41.920 --> 0:03:47.680 Floyd green Um. Floyd owns like some things that that 0:03:48.040 --> 0:03:50.080 you might be familiar with that that I like to 0:03:50.200 --> 0:03:55.640 use and you see often around um wilderness athlete outdoorsmans. 0:03:55.680 --> 0:03:57.560 But you've been a lion hunter longer than any of 0:03:57.560 --> 0:04:00.680 that stuff. He always started to talk lines the first 0:04:00.720 --> 0:04:03.320 time with some guys. And I was a teenage o 0:04:03.440 --> 0:04:05.960 late teens, and I didn't have my own hound star. 0:04:06.000 --> 0:04:09.200 I was around twenty. But you were you were born here. 0:04:08.840 --> 0:04:14.240 We're we're in Arizona right now, uh, in Skysdale and 0:04:14.320 --> 0:04:19.200 you were born here in Phoenix. And what was the 0:04:19.240 --> 0:04:22.000 lion hunting culture then? Like, how did you get into it? Well? 0:04:22.040 --> 0:04:25.840 I got into it actually up in show, Arizona, up 0:04:25.839 --> 0:04:29.200 there building homes and the guys were headed out one 0:04:29.240 --> 0:04:33.240 day and I just tagged along with them. And I've 0:04:33.240 --> 0:04:35.200 always been always had a lot of dogs and been 0:04:35.200 --> 0:04:37.200 around dogs my whole life. What was the reason you 0:04:37.279 --> 0:04:40.080 had them? I didn't have any lion hunting dogs that 0:04:40.440 --> 0:04:45.919 they were had one coonhound and one mutt. Uh. But 0:04:46.200 --> 0:04:48.599 after spending time with those guys and watching them work 0:04:48.640 --> 0:04:50.960 with their dogs, and you know, the first time you 0:04:51.000 --> 0:04:53.039 see a lion climb a tree, or you walk up 0:04:53.080 --> 0:04:55.200 to a tree and one is in it, it's just 0:04:55.279 --> 0:04:58.440 the buggy that generally bites people that really enjoy that 0:04:58.640 --> 0:05:01.400 and amazing on them to be up close to like that. 0:05:02.400 --> 0:05:05.400 And it's a dog thing largely too. Absolutely, we can 0:05:05.440 --> 0:05:09.080 get into that. Absolutely, that's if it wasn't for watching 0:05:09.160 --> 0:05:13.000 the young dogs transform and all the planning that goes 0:05:13.080 --> 0:05:16.760 behind putting your packet dogs together, breeding the next group 0:05:16.760 --> 0:05:19.640 of puppies, you know, just seeing lions get killed. It's 0:05:19.680 --> 0:05:23.360 certainly not why people hunt lions. So how how many 0:05:23.440 --> 0:05:28.640 years ago was that you started hunting lions early eighties 0:05:29.440 --> 0:05:33.000 somewhere right around and got your own dogs and that 0:05:33.080 --> 0:05:34.400 was I had a lot, you know, I had my 0:05:34.440 --> 0:05:36.520 own dogs within a year at that time, but they 0:05:36.760 --> 0:05:39.000 wasn't a very successful group of dogs at that point 0:05:39.000 --> 0:05:41.680 in my life. Just had a lot more dogs and 0:05:41.760 --> 0:05:45.160 headline catching going on. What what one thing that Floyd 0:05:46.800 --> 0:05:49.720 does like that? There's correct me if I'm wrong in this, 0:05:50.000 --> 0:05:53.839 But basically you would divide lion hunting into two categories. 0:05:56.600 --> 0:06:01.279 Talking him in the snow, right, is that fair? It is? Uh, 0:06:01.320 --> 0:06:04.080 you know, or hunting them in what there is no snow? Well, 0:06:04.279 --> 0:06:09.120 hunting him in bare ground conditions is more challenging due 0:06:09.160 --> 0:06:11.200 to the fact that you you rely on the dogs 0:06:11.240 --> 0:06:13.359 a lot more so, it takes a lot higher level 0:06:13.440 --> 0:06:16.960 of hound. Uh. You know, you're in the snow, you're 0:06:16.960 --> 0:06:20.160 gonna drive the roads. Look for where alliance crossed in 0:06:20.200 --> 0:06:22.720 the snow. You can determine, generally, determined to some degree, 0:06:22.760 --> 0:06:25.200 how old that track is. Certainly can determine which way 0:06:25.240 --> 0:06:28.359 it's going with the hounds. When you're riding along on 0:06:28.400 --> 0:06:31.520 your muddle or some guys do it off of before wheeler. However, 0:06:31.520 --> 0:06:33.120 you may be doing it and your dogs are free 0:06:33.120 --> 0:06:36.080 casting out in front of you. There's literally dozens of 0:06:36.120 --> 0:06:39.960 animals that they have the opportunity that they smell every 0:06:40.000 --> 0:06:42.800 step of the way, they're smelling some different creature and 0:06:42.839 --> 0:06:45.120 you're relying on them to let you know that they've 0:06:45.160 --> 0:06:48.240 they've crossed the lion's path and you may go. You 0:06:48.360 --> 0:06:50.920 may go days before that happens in a lot of cases. 0:06:52.000 --> 0:06:55.200 My brother, my older half brother, was an elk guide 0:06:55.400 --> 0:06:57.599 in Colorado for many years and he did some lion 0:06:57.680 --> 0:06:59.720 He had a guy, one of his guides was a 0:06:59.760 --> 0:07:03.279 lion and hunter and they would just you know, have 0:07:03.440 --> 0:07:06.640 clients he wanted to come out and he would have 0:07:06.720 --> 0:07:09.760 a list of guys and he wouldn't call the client 0:07:09.880 --> 0:07:13.520 until he found the track, and guys would because he 0:07:13.560 --> 0:07:15.200 would have some guys like you gotta be ready to 0:07:15.200 --> 0:07:16.920 go at the drop the hat and he'd called and 0:07:16.920 --> 0:07:18.200 got and like get on a plane and come up 0:07:18.240 --> 0:07:22.080 from Dallas or whatever. And then they begin to hunt them. 0:07:22.120 --> 0:07:24.360 And then you go chase that line. And I don't 0:07:24.400 --> 0:07:27.640 you know, in some parts of the country there's just uh, 0:07:27.800 --> 0:07:30.920 nobody even thinks about lion hunting until the snowfalls. And 0:07:31.040 --> 0:07:32.880 part of that, you know, now with the wolves like 0:07:32.960 --> 0:07:34.960 they are right, you know, they can really determine whether 0:07:35.000 --> 0:07:37.680 there's wolves in the area or not. Also before they 0:07:37.680 --> 0:07:40.000 turn there, because the wolves to kill your dog. You know, 0:07:40.000 --> 0:07:42.800 the Canadian wolves are just a dangerous you know, they're 0:07:43.320 --> 0:07:46.080 they're always a threat to the guys with hounds up there. 0:07:46.080 --> 0:07:47.920 And I don't know much about hunting in in the 0:07:47.960 --> 0:07:52.000 northern part of our country, but what I see of it, it's, uh, 0:07:52.080 --> 0:07:54.160 you know, snow hunting can be very very challenging, and 0:07:54.280 --> 0:07:56.760 it can be really really tough physically. Some of the 0:07:56.800 --> 0:07:59.040 toughest hunts I've ever been on have been in the snow, 0:07:59.160 --> 0:08:01.920 just climbing around on snowy hillsides you know, go fifteen 0:08:01.960 --> 0:08:03.920 miles and two ft of snow and in and out 0:08:03.920 --> 0:08:06.240 of the Grand Canyon a couple of times, and you 0:08:06.280 --> 0:08:09.600 know you have It's just a tough, tough hunt on everybody. 0:08:09.640 --> 0:08:11.760 But what what what the snow gives you? Though? So 0:08:14.000 --> 0:08:16.360 when you when you go out and loot for a line, 0:08:16.480 --> 0:08:18.360 Let's let's just set this up first, so so people 0:08:18.360 --> 0:08:19.920 get tome about when you got a loot for line, 0:08:19.960 --> 0:08:23.280 how old does the track have to be? Like, what's 0:08:23.320 --> 0:08:27.200 the oldest track you can run? Most? You know, that's 0:08:27.520 --> 0:08:32.880 a highly controversial subject. I would say nobody's gonna catch. 0:08:33.640 --> 0:08:37.760 You're gonna catch very few lines that are over six 0:08:37.760 --> 0:08:41.120 to eight hours. Your six eight hours behind them. Okay, 0:08:41.160 --> 0:08:43.680 So step one of a lion hunt, just for listeners, 0:08:43.679 --> 0:08:45.600 like step one of the lion hunt, would be that 0:08:45.640 --> 0:08:49.480 you're going into likely lion country or a place a 0:08:49.480 --> 0:08:52.560 lion is likely to pass through, and you're trying to 0:08:52.600 --> 0:08:56.280 find either through the nose of your dog or from 0:08:56.360 --> 0:08:58.559 tracks in the snow or tracks on the ground. You're 0:08:58.559 --> 0:09:02.280 trying to find a place for a mountain line came 0:09:02.320 --> 0:09:05.600 through walk through within the last six eight hours. Ideally, 0:09:07.720 --> 0:09:09.360 I don't mean the harder on the snow thing too much. 0:09:09.360 --> 0:09:10.800 But it's just like it's just an interesting way to 0:09:10.800 --> 0:09:12.720 start thinking about some of the complexities and hunt lines. 0:09:12.760 --> 0:09:15.559 Because if there's snow on the ground, you know how 0:09:15.600 --> 0:09:19.480 big the lion was, right generally the speech or the gender, 0:09:19.920 --> 0:09:23.160 so you can tell that even right and the best 0:09:23.440 --> 0:09:27.200 you know what way it went. Absolutely we experienced that. 0:09:28.520 --> 0:09:30.680 It's you know, knowing you're going the right way is 0:09:31.520 --> 0:09:35.560 the battle. Yeah, because the dog, like like a famous 0:09:35.559 --> 0:09:37.679 thing people want to say about, like a good beagle 0:09:38.280 --> 0:09:40.160 is a bagle can zing back and forth on a 0:09:40.240 --> 0:09:42.480 rabbit track a couple of times and he can tell 0:09:42.600 --> 0:09:46.679 relative freshness just on a short stretch, and he'll know 0:09:47.240 --> 0:09:50.200 what way the rabbit went. But with the line that's 0:09:50.240 --> 0:09:53.160 not it takes them a little while longer to figure 0:09:53.200 --> 0:09:58.760 it out. Well, sometimes they the tendencies of the dog. Well, 0:09:58.920 --> 0:10:01.760 the rabbits are hot a hot scent track type track, 0:10:02.200 --> 0:10:04.559 whereas a lion I would consider a cold or you 0:10:04.600 --> 0:10:06.880 mean hot, like the rabbit just jumped out, this was there, 0:10:07.040 --> 0:10:09.840 So it's much more obvious to that that beagle which 0:10:09.880 --> 0:10:13.760 way that tracks going because it's dissipating and with a 0:10:13.800 --> 0:10:17.319 lion that track maybe laying there. You know, a lion 0:10:17.360 --> 0:10:19.880 when it walks, it's it's you know, it's off floating 0:10:19.960 --> 0:10:22.280 cells or spores, whatever you want to call them. That 0:10:22.280 --> 0:10:26.400 that that's what the dog is detecting. And for whatever reason, 0:10:26.440 --> 0:10:32.880 a lion leaves a scent longer than most animals. And it's, uh, 0:10:33.240 --> 0:10:36.160 it's it's different in the sense that like with coon dogs. 0:10:36.200 --> 0:10:37.600 You know, coon dogs are the same thing as the 0:10:37.640 --> 0:10:40.160 beagles do on rabbits, and they almost generally figure out 0:10:40.160 --> 0:10:41.960 which way that coon's going and go the right way. 0:10:43.440 --> 0:10:47.360 Lion hellms, there's I if I can't help them, then 0:10:47.400 --> 0:10:49.560 I let them make the decision. I don't ever try 0:10:49.600 --> 0:10:53.160 and outguess them. But I'm sure gone the wrong way 0:10:53.160 --> 0:10:55.080 a lot of times. How far? Why you go the 0:10:55.080 --> 0:10:59.320 wrong way until the dog has become exhausted or the 0:10:59.320 --> 0:11:02.959 track burns out there and I've gone in. Well, Chris, 0:11:03.440 --> 0:11:05.560 but the day we caught your line, this is a 0:11:05.600 --> 0:11:10.040 line that's caught Floyd Sogen to Chris Denham here, who 0:11:10.120 --> 0:11:16.760 hosts um Western Hunter TV show and is UH publisher publisher. 0:11:17.120 --> 0:11:20.600 It's a good polisher of Western Hunter, Elknor Magazines and 0:11:21.240 --> 0:11:26.800 Chris Unfairbedy line Hunting with Floyd that Yeah, we we 0:11:26.920 --> 0:11:31.560 took a large mail down in the Catalina Mountains and 0:11:31.920 --> 0:11:34.760 after the lion was shot, Chris had shock the line. 0:11:35.840 --> 0:11:39.079 One of our our better dogs turned around and trailed 0:11:39.120 --> 0:11:42.600 that track, the one that was now dead backwards till 0:11:42.640 --> 0:11:46.160 six o'clock that evening and probably went twelve miles from 0:11:46.160 --> 0:11:49.920 where we started in Bank trailing the line, you know, 0:11:50.040 --> 0:11:52.000 I mean, there was no question about what went on, 0:11:52.320 --> 0:11:55.520 you know, And we ended up catching up with her 0:11:56.640 --> 0:12:00.400 in Canada del Oral almost to the bottom. Shot him 0:12:00.440 --> 0:12:03.319 at it was April fifteenth, to remember his taxing. We 0:12:03.360 --> 0:12:06.400 shot him, it was it was it's a crazy, crazy story, 0:12:06.480 --> 0:12:09.240 but it shot him with an hour of daylight and 0:12:09.360 --> 0:12:11.760 we were we got to the bottom of Kennon to 0:12:11.840 --> 0:12:15.000 Laura and finally found that that dog at dark and 0:12:15.080 --> 0:12:17.559 came pretty much out in the dark. It was fourteen 0:12:17.640 --> 0:12:21.880 hours probably that dog was trailing back on that on 0:12:21.920 --> 0:12:25.040 that lion. Yeah, when we went out those a couple 0:12:25.040 --> 0:12:28.320 of times and looking even when the dogs start running something, 0:12:28.520 --> 0:12:30.240 we were still spending a lot of time trying to 0:12:30.280 --> 0:12:32.800 find a track to verify what it was that they 0:12:32.800 --> 0:12:35.680 were after. Right, you know, a lot of these dogs, 0:12:35.720 --> 0:12:38.600 all of my dogs now, line numbers have dropped in 0:12:38.640 --> 0:12:40.839 the last five years, and all of my dogs have 0:12:40.920 --> 0:12:43.520 gotten the trailing bobcats and they never used to do that. 0:12:44.440 --> 0:12:46.760 So now we have to determine is it a bobcat 0:12:46.840 --> 0:12:49.040 or is it a lion? You know, And and it's 0:12:49.080 --> 0:12:52.520 really hard to tell. Why did you dogs start running bobcats? Well, 0:12:52.559 --> 0:12:55.440 you just it's basically you would consider that a fault 0:12:55.480 --> 0:12:57.880 and a dog in a true bear ground lion him. 0:12:58.640 --> 0:13:01.319 But almost all of them will at one time or 0:13:01.320 --> 0:13:05.760 another trail bobcats and foxes because you don't come across 0:13:05.840 --> 0:13:08.280 enough line tracks to keep them. You know, they're gonna 0:13:08.320 --> 0:13:10.959 they're gonna trail something, you know, And and it's very 0:13:11.000 --> 0:13:13.199 hard to tell the difference between the two unless you've 0:13:13.200 --> 0:13:15.400 got the soil or you find some way to find 0:13:15.400 --> 0:13:19.160 a track as foxes and bobcats wherever where lions are 0:13:19.200 --> 0:13:22.400 here in Arizona. Well that's that's always been something of 0:13:22.440 --> 0:13:24.640 a problem. But the good news is typically fox and 0:13:24.679 --> 0:13:30.160 bobcat tracks very similar to a coon or a rabbit 0:13:30.240 --> 0:13:34.240 that the track dissipates quickly, so typically is gonna run 0:13:34.240 --> 0:13:37.959 in the right direction right and typically if they don't 0:13:38.040 --> 0:13:40.480 go anywhere that's a good sign. That's probably not a 0:13:40.520 --> 0:13:43.600 line if you start moving it out as you're saying, 0:13:43.679 --> 0:13:45.680 it's not gonna like, he's not gonna They're not gonna 0:13:45.760 --> 0:13:48.880 run an eight hour old track very long, right, Well, 0:13:48.920 --> 0:13:50.920 they won't run an eight hour old Bobcat track or 0:13:50.960 --> 0:13:53.600 fox track. They won't. It's gonna be fresh to get 0:13:53.160 --> 0:13:57.360 in within probably thirty minutes or now that. Okay, what 0:13:57.600 --> 0:14:03.559 um between all the hunting you've done, like just hunting 0:14:03.600 --> 0:14:06.480 lines of people and all the stuff you've done with biologists, 0:14:07.640 --> 0:14:10.559 treating them for research purposes and tranquilizing the one, not 0:14:10.840 --> 0:14:15.240 how many lines have you run? Run? How many lions 0:14:15.280 --> 0:14:17.680 are you caught? Like like lion guys use the word 0:14:17.760 --> 0:14:20.600 caught for a lion, whether you kill the line or not, 0:14:21.720 --> 0:14:24.200 because the whole thing is catching it. Right after that, 0:14:24.240 --> 0:14:26.280 it's you know, shooting him kind of an anti climatic 0:14:26.360 --> 0:14:30.680 end to the chase. The uh. As far as lions 0:14:30.720 --> 0:14:33.040 have caught, it's between three and five hundred, you know, 0:14:33.080 --> 0:14:36.880 it's always hard to put a number on that. For me, 0:14:37.280 --> 0:14:39.320 a lot of them were caught with other hunters there 0:14:39.320 --> 0:14:41.720 in a different situation, you know, circumstances and things like that. 0:14:41.760 --> 0:14:43.840 Some of them were lions that were caught multiple times 0:14:43.840 --> 0:14:46.640 and turned loose. You know, it's always challenging to figure 0:14:46.640 --> 0:14:48.800 out how to keep score. But there's been times in 0:14:48.840 --> 0:14:50.880 my life where we've caused many as twenty five lions 0:14:50.920 --> 0:14:53.240 a year for you know, several years in a row, 0:14:53.240 --> 0:14:56.160 and there's other years you catch you know, my goal 0:14:56.200 --> 0:14:58.040 is always to catch ten a year, but there's been 0:14:58.040 --> 0:15:00.560 a few years we haven't got that done. Yeah, so 0:15:00.640 --> 0:15:02.440 maybe when you think about doing it for thirty years, 0:15:02.440 --> 0:15:06.000 that adds up pretty substantial number. As far as the 0:15:06.200 --> 0:15:12.560 lions that I've trailed, you'd be you know, thousands. How 0:15:12.560 --> 0:15:16.400 many dogs you take out to hunt a lion, I 0:15:16.520 --> 0:15:19.440 take as many as thirteen at one time. I would 0:15:19.520 --> 0:15:22.800 prefer to take a half a dozen. That's an optimum number, 0:15:22.840 --> 0:15:25.440 four to six. And I've caught a lot of lions 0:15:25.480 --> 0:15:28.640 with one dog, you know, you just it's uh. But 0:15:28.760 --> 0:15:31.640 typically for a good, good fun hunt, the number I 0:15:31.680 --> 0:15:34.080 would pick would be five or six. But a lot 0:15:34.080 --> 0:15:35.920 of times we'll take all thirteen of them just to 0:15:35.920 --> 0:15:39.520 help keep them in shape, oh, just exercise them, yea. 0:15:39.680 --> 0:15:42.080 So much about catching a lion has as much to 0:15:42.120 --> 0:15:45.360 do with the physical ability of the hound to persevere 0:15:45.440 --> 0:15:47.400 through a whole day of day of trailing and then 0:15:47.480 --> 0:15:49.680 jump the lion and actually put enough pressure on it 0:15:49.720 --> 0:15:51.640 to get it to climb a tree. So if they're 0:15:51.680 --> 0:15:53.800 not in good physical shape and their feet aren't tough 0:15:53.840 --> 0:15:55.400 and they can't go and they they got to be 0:15:55.440 --> 0:15:58.440 able to go ten twelve hours. So layout for me 0:15:58.520 --> 0:16:00.480 like how a lion hunt. Layout me like how a 0:16:00.480 --> 0:16:03.240 successful lion hunt goes. You get them the morning and 0:16:03.560 --> 0:16:06.640 like what I know each time is different, but it's like, 0:16:06.680 --> 0:16:10.680 how might a hunt go well? Chris is yours is 0:16:10.720 --> 0:16:13.080 a classic, the one we were just talking about. We 0:16:13.080 --> 0:16:16.480 got up in the morning and uh, saddle the mules 0:16:16.480 --> 0:16:18.440 and and wrote out rode up the very first. You 0:16:18.520 --> 0:16:20.680 prefer to hunt out on a mule, Yeah, that'd be 0:16:20.720 --> 0:16:24.320 my preference by far. So you're you're mounted dogs running 0:16:24.320 --> 0:16:26.520 all around, and I can stay with my dogs a 0:16:26.520 --> 0:16:28.920 lot better. Is as good as shape as you feel 0:16:28.960 --> 0:16:32.520 like you are. It's hard after a few days to 0:16:32.680 --> 0:16:36.040 physically stay with him on foot on regular basis. We 0:16:36.160 --> 0:16:38.560 cover ay enormous amount of ground. I felt I felt 0:16:39.280 --> 0:16:41.200 when I was out with you. I never hunted with 0:16:41.240 --> 0:16:43.440 a group of guys that was physically in the in 0:16:43.480 --> 0:16:46.480 the shape that you guys were when we went. Joe 0:16:46.520 --> 0:16:48.720 and I were both absolutely amazed every night when we 0:16:48.760 --> 0:16:51.760 came in and and all the guys running the cameras 0:16:51.760 --> 0:16:54.160 I mean and running them backwards up the hills and 0:16:53.960 --> 0:16:57.880 in super tough country. It was amazing. And normally guys 0:16:58.000 --> 0:17:01.320 just don't show up and that kind of physical cond issue. Uh. 0:17:01.320 --> 0:17:03.760 And we did go a long ways, you know. There 0:17:03.800 --> 0:17:05.679 was a couple of times we trailed lines that I 0:17:05.760 --> 0:17:08.760 was sure we had the one cot and uh, and 0:17:08.800 --> 0:17:12.000 we didn't. But that would have been even That's a typical, 0:17:12.160 --> 0:17:15.199 although Joe started that one early. For us, it was 0:17:16.400 --> 0:17:19.800 the distance wasn't unusual. You know, do their collars like 0:17:19.920 --> 0:17:22.600 the GPS. Their GPS is to keep a track of 0:17:22.680 --> 0:17:26.000 the distance they run. These dogs look like satellites. Man, 0:17:26.040 --> 0:17:29.200 they got like three collars on wires and stuff. Come. 0:17:29.240 --> 0:17:31.720 It was an average day that the dog puts on, 0:17:32.280 --> 0:17:36.960 well the dog's a minimum of the average days twenty miles, 0:17:36.960 --> 0:17:40.720 so you know, and I've seen thirty five mile days. 0:17:41.080 --> 0:17:43.720 You know, that's not not not a crazy deal either. 0:17:44.000 --> 0:17:46.080 But what gets tough is that's not hard for a 0:17:46.080 --> 0:17:49.160 good condition. HOWND to do on any given day, it's 0:17:49.160 --> 0:17:51.840 hard for that dog to do day after day after day. 0:17:52.560 --> 0:17:54.879 And that's where you see professional lion hunters, guys that 0:17:54.920 --> 0:17:57.640 are guiding full time, or some of our government lion hunters. 0:17:57.880 --> 0:18:00.600 That gets to be the difference between them and sport 0:18:00.680 --> 0:18:04.520 hunters is the condition of their dogs. Quality of the dogs, obviously, 0:18:04.560 --> 0:18:07.600 but the condition is huge where they can pursue a line. 0:18:07.600 --> 0:18:09.760 They may trail a lion for three days before they 0:18:09.800 --> 0:18:13.200 overtake it and actually jump it. And I'm not saying 0:18:13.200 --> 0:18:15.720 they're stopping the track and picking it up each day, 0:18:15.760 --> 0:18:18.040 but every day you learn more about that animal and 0:18:18.080 --> 0:18:20.440 you're you're getting closer to it, You're getting into a 0:18:21.040 --> 0:18:24.240 tighter area where it may be. Well in that third day, 0:18:24.240 --> 0:18:26.119 if you've been running like you're saying, three days in 0:18:26.119 --> 0:18:29.119 a row, you might pick up where that lion was 0:18:29.160 --> 0:18:32.760 the night before. Absolutely as he's daunting an area. Well, 0:18:32.800 --> 0:18:35.080 you won't pick up the exact spot, but you know 0:18:35.119 --> 0:18:37.720 the lions travel into the south. We've trailed him four 0:18:37.760 --> 0:18:40.560 miles in that direction, down this drainage. We'll try and 0:18:40.680 --> 0:18:43.360 loop ahead of him and pick him up again. And 0:18:43.480 --> 0:18:45.879 typically with good broke dogs, when you when you cross 0:18:45.920 --> 0:18:48.119 this track there, you know, they'll let you know and 0:18:48.280 --> 0:18:50.879 verify the direction and go again. Sooner or later, that 0:18:50.960 --> 0:18:53.760 lion is gonna kill something, or he's gonna lay up somewhere, 0:18:54.040 --> 0:18:56.600 and that's when you'll overtake him once he gets a 0:18:56.600 --> 0:18:59.520 belly full, or he was that because he's stopping to 0:18:59.520 --> 0:19:02.879 eat because he's just hungry, because he's full and doesn't 0:19:02.920 --> 0:19:07.680 run is good, No, well, it's because he stopped trappling. Okay, 0:19:07.760 --> 0:19:09.840 you know, he just finally because you know then he's 0:19:09.880 --> 0:19:12.439 camped out on the carcass and he's there. And so 0:19:12.480 --> 0:19:14.200 I think this is an important point because I think 0:19:14.200 --> 0:19:17.000 I was like under the wrong impression too, because I 0:19:17.080 --> 0:19:20.040 always everybody or in my head, it's like you start 0:19:20.080 --> 0:19:21.960 out and it's like as soon as you're on the track, 0:19:22.640 --> 0:19:25.920 you're like, dogs are chasing this lion. But it's not 0:19:26.040 --> 0:19:28.360 that way. This lion is just out and about doing 0:19:28.400 --> 0:19:31.040 this thing for maybe three or four days, and eventually 0:19:31.560 --> 0:19:36.560 your hounds is catch up to it. For those dogs 0:19:36.680 --> 0:19:39.440 never got close, and it seems so exciting because those 0:19:39.480 --> 0:19:42.159 hounds are so excited and they're balling and carrying on 0:19:42.280 --> 0:19:44.800 that you feel like you're the lions up and running 0:19:44.840 --> 0:19:46.920 from it. But that cat might not even know about 0:19:46.920 --> 0:19:50.480 you and your dogs. That's a more more often than 0:19:50.520 --> 0:19:53.040 not when you're trailing a line. There was only one 0:19:53.080 --> 0:19:55.200 instance that I thought maybe we had a line jumped, 0:19:55.200 --> 0:19:58.600 and that was that large tom in the galeras that 0:19:59.040 --> 0:20:01.000 and I believe he out ran So I think that 0:20:01.080 --> 0:20:05.800 lion left the country. Um, But almost every other line 0:20:05.840 --> 0:20:08.040 we those lions probably never knew we were even in 0:20:08.040 --> 0:20:11.560 the vicinity. I think I think my line was a classic. 0:20:11.600 --> 0:20:14.080 As we were writing, it was the third day, and 0:20:14.119 --> 0:20:16.560 we had done the same loop the first two days, 0:20:17.200 --> 0:20:20.199 you know, probably a fifteen eighteen mile loop, you know, 0:20:20.320 --> 0:20:23.600 just country, yeah, just and working the same you know, 0:20:23.640 --> 0:20:26.840 the same trails and just kind of working out old tracks. 0:20:27.440 --> 0:20:29.359 And the third day we left camp and we weren't 0:20:29.400 --> 0:20:31.520 what a mile from camp, and all of a sudden 0:20:31.520 --> 0:20:34.080 the dogs struck, I mean and you know, and and 0:20:34.359 --> 0:20:37.800 struck hard. And we've been through that exact canyon the 0:20:37.800 --> 0:20:40.560 two days previous. We knew that lion track wasn't there 0:20:40.600 --> 0:20:43.359 two days before, so we knew, you know, this is fresh, 0:20:43.600 --> 0:20:46.280 so knew the line had walked. You were sleeping in 0:20:46.320 --> 0:20:48.320 the lion passed through a mile from where you were sleeping. 0:20:49.680 --> 0:20:52.160 So then what happened on that hunt? Oh he got 0:20:52.160 --> 0:20:55.840 it got pretty crazy after that. But uh uh we 0:20:55.840 --> 0:20:58.280 were right in the bottom of a canyon in uh 0:20:59.320 --> 0:21:01.640 the dogs trying that they were going back and forth 0:21:01.680 --> 0:21:03.760 and we find to find a scratch and figure it out. 0:21:03.840 --> 0:21:06.600 Then the scratch was saying the lion was going up 0:21:06.600 --> 0:21:08.399 the canyon back up, and explain what you mean by that. 0:21:08.760 --> 0:21:11.000 With the lions will scratch, you can explain a little more, 0:21:11.040 --> 0:21:13.040 but it was with a scratches. But where they where 0:21:13.080 --> 0:21:15.560 they they're marking their territory as at Tom's and they 0:21:15.640 --> 0:21:18.639 use their front feet and they pull it. They pulled 0:21:18.680 --> 0:21:22.160 it the soil up over top of where they've urinated 0:21:22.760 --> 0:21:26.360 and and they create a it's just a pile of 0:21:26.359 --> 0:21:28.560 of leaf litter or whatever. It's in the bottom of 0:21:28.600 --> 0:21:31.240 that little canyon and you can see it from a 0:21:31.240 --> 0:21:33.560 good distance. It shows you, like what maybe six ten 0:21:33.560 --> 0:21:36.880 inches long. They can likely little places like you can anticipate, 0:21:37.480 --> 0:21:38.800 like when we were out, we kept looking at it 0:21:38.800 --> 0:21:40.520 after id be like that's the place where he would 0:21:40.520 --> 0:21:42.440 do that. Yeah, you know, like we're too too. You're 0:21:42.440 --> 0:21:45.000 in the canyon and a tributary comes in it was 0:21:45.040 --> 0:21:49.800 like a leafy area or something, you know. Yeah, and 0:21:49.840 --> 0:21:52.040 so we knew this, We figured the lines. We know 0:21:52.160 --> 0:21:54.120 that from the direction of the scratch, he's probably going 0:21:54.200 --> 0:21:56.879 up the canyon. But the dogs keep trying to they 0:21:56.960 --> 0:21:58.600 go up, and then they turn around. They want to 0:21:58.600 --> 0:22:00.320 come back, they want to keep wanting to come back. 0:22:00.960 --> 0:22:04.520 And finally one dog went tried went up and around 0:22:04.600 --> 0:22:06.760 us to get around us because we're trying to pull 0:22:06.800 --> 0:22:09.320 the dogs and push him the other direction. And then 0:22:09.320 --> 0:22:11.080 all of a sudden he struck. And we figured out 0:22:11.119 --> 0:22:14.480 afterwards that we probably literally jumped that lion out of 0:22:14.480 --> 0:22:17.800 that canyon and and he went he's scratched, and then 0:22:17.880 --> 0:22:21.440 went right up and over the top, and uh some 0:22:21.600 --> 0:22:24.639 as we got up over the top, and uh, do 0:22:24.640 --> 0:22:27.080 you want me tell the whole story? Yeah, okay, it's 0:22:27.119 --> 0:22:30.800 it's a pretty good story. This is explaining how Yeah, 0:22:31.000 --> 0:22:34.080 so keeping mind the miles, keeping mind miles through so 0:22:34.160 --> 0:22:36.879 people get a perspective of like the scale. Okay, this 0:22:36.920 --> 0:22:39.240 one actually happened pretty you know, pretty quick, in a 0:22:39.280 --> 0:22:41.520 short amount of time. But so that we know the 0:22:41.560 --> 0:22:43.480 line went up and over top this ridge maybe a 0:22:43.480 --> 0:22:47.199 three foot elevation half mile over the top, and we 0:22:47.240 --> 0:22:49.200 got up to the top and and we can hear 0:22:49.240 --> 0:22:51.360 the dogs barking down to the bottom just but it's 0:22:51.440 --> 0:22:55.480 kind of crazy barking. And uh, Floyd split off to 0:22:55.520 --> 0:22:57.359 get a bit a little bit of a different angle, 0:22:57.400 --> 0:23:01.280 and I stayed with the mules, and and Floyd calls me. 0:23:01.760 --> 0:23:03.320 You can hear the dogs barking down there. And Floyd 0:23:03.359 --> 0:23:05.840 calls me in the radio and says, Chris, this lion 0:23:05.960 --> 0:23:08.119 is coming right to you. Get off, you know. So 0:23:08.160 --> 0:23:10.200 I jump off my mule, and I get my pistol out, 0:23:10.480 --> 0:23:13.000 and I'm standing there like, you know, with my pistol 0:23:13.000 --> 0:23:14.400 out in front of me, just waiting for a line 0:23:14.440 --> 0:23:18.440 to come up. Anyways, another dog came up there and 0:23:18.440 --> 0:23:20.439 and all of a sudden, that lion took off and 0:23:20.440 --> 0:23:24.399 went back down and back into the other hounds. And 0:23:25.000 --> 0:23:27.359 you can see this happen. No Floyd can see this happening. 0:23:27.400 --> 0:23:29.480 I can't see this. So he bails down to where 0:23:29.480 --> 0:23:33.159 the where the dogs are, and uh, and I'm just 0:23:33.240 --> 0:23:34.840 kind of standing up on top of the mules, just 0:23:34.920 --> 0:23:37.120 trying to just waiting for, you know, for Floyd tell 0:23:37.160 --> 0:23:39.359 me what he is going on. And all of a sudden, 0:23:39.400 --> 0:23:41.280 I just hear this voice down on the bottom of 0:23:41.280 --> 0:23:44.639 the canyon, and it would be we go from R 0:23:44.760 --> 0:23:47.119 rated X rated if I actually told you everything. He 0:23:47.160 --> 0:23:49.920 was yelling at me, But it was like, Chris, get 0:23:49.960 --> 0:23:52.280 your ass down here. I can just hear him just 0:23:52.440 --> 0:23:54.600 yelling at me. And I got a radio in my 0:23:54.640 --> 0:23:59.000 hand in the in the perfect Chris, Just for everybody listening, 0:23:59.000 --> 0:24:02.480 that this line very unusual. It is gone by about 0:24:03.240 --> 0:24:05.320 fifty trees that it could have gone in, from oak 0:24:05.359 --> 0:24:08.520 trees to juniper trees. And it's fighting the dogs on 0:24:08.560 --> 0:24:11.399 the ground, which is really unusual for Mountain one. And 0:24:11.480 --> 0:24:13.840 it's fighting him like a jaguar or a bear would fight, 0:24:14.400 --> 0:24:16.720 and it's winning. I mean, it's mucking him out. And 0:24:17.240 --> 0:24:20.880 oh it was. I mean it we stapled and stitched 0:24:20.880 --> 0:24:25.440 dogs for hours after this, this whole prog. But Floyd's 0:24:25.440 --> 0:24:28.359 getting to see this, I was. I was panting Chris 0:24:28.359 --> 0:24:30.920 to hurry down there. Yeah. So he's seeing all He's 0:24:30.960 --> 0:24:32.680 seeing all this, and I'm just timeing to like trying 0:24:32.720 --> 0:24:35.439 to piece it all together in my head. So I 0:24:35.520 --> 0:24:38.120 go bailing off the ridge, you know, down to where 0:24:38.119 --> 0:24:40.960 all the screaming is coming from, and uh, I've got 0:24:40.960 --> 0:24:43.080 shaps on there's too long for me. I was stumbling 0:24:43.119 --> 0:24:45.760 and falling and and and get there and there's a 0:24:45.760 --> 0:24:47.720 big oak tree in the very bottom below me, and 0:24:47.720 --> 0:24:50.680 there's a bluff I'm standing on top of, and and 0:24:50.920 --> 0:24:53.399 right underneath the oak tree, I can see just a 0:24:53.480 --> 0:24:56.680 muck of dogs and Floyd screaming and the lions screaming 0:24:56.720 --> 0:25:00.359 and and on the ground on the ground. I mean, 0:25:00.359 --> 0:25:04.600 they're they're perfect, yeah, perfectly under a huge bit perfect tree. 0:25:05.240 --> 0:25:07.440 So I really I kind of jump off that little 0:25:07.440 --> 0:25:09.520 bluff through the tree and I land on the ground 0:25:10.119 --> 0:25:12.920 and uh, and I get there and there's a washout 0:25:13.000 --> 0:25:15.919 underneath the tree, and that washouts filled up with oak leaves. 0:25:16.320 --> 0:25:18.399 And also I can see as Floyd with a big 0:25:18.440 --> 0:25:21.399 stick in his hand in the bottom of this washed 0:25:21.400 --> 0:25:25.640 out oak leaf like pool, and uh, they're the lion. 0:25:25.720 --> 0:25:27.639 Floyd's got this big, huge stick in his hand and 0:25:27.720 --> 0:25:29.479 one end as the lions hanging on to one end, 0:25:29.480 --> 0:25:31.960 and there's dogs just jumping in. This lion's just got 0:25:32.000 --> 0:25:35.960 paws going everywhere, claws going everywhere, and with a stick 0:25:35.960 --> 0:25:39.680 in his mouth, you know's yelling at me, shooting, shooting. 0:25:40.720 --> 0:25:42.440 So I go sliding into the hole and I grab. 0:25:42.600 --> 0:25:44.320 I have my pistol in my hand, and I'm I'm 0:25:44.400 --> 0:25:47.040 literally from me your foot, like three ft from the lion, 0:25:47.640 --> 0:25:49.919 and dogs are jumping in there, and I'm trying to 0:25:49.920 --> 0:25:53.240 grab dogs to to get a clear shot. And Floyd, meanwhile, 0:25:53.280 --> 0:25:55.280 I was covering his face because he knows the bullet's 0:25:55.320 --> 0:25:57.680 gonna create some kind of splash. We're also close. He's 0:25:57.800 --> 0:26:00.640 you know, meanwhile, the stick's broken off between his hands 0:26:00.640 --> 0:26:02.679 and now he's down to two hands, hanging onto the 0:26:02.680 --> 0:26:05.080 stick like a fishing rod with a big you know, 0:26:05.200 --> 0:26:08.240 the sailfish on the end. And I shoot the lion 0:26:08.320 --> 0:26:11.480 through the shoulder and from you know, from three feet, 0:26:11.480 --> 0:26:14.280 there's no way I missed. And Floyd picks the cover, 0:26:14.400 --> 0:26:16.080 uncovers his eyes and he looks at the lion. He 0:26:16.119 --> 0:26:17.760 looks at me and the lions still doing the same 0:26:17.800 --> 0:26:19.879 thing he was doing before I shot him. So he 0:26:19.960 --> 0:26:23.160 yells at me shoot him again. So I shoot him again, 0:26:23.200 --> 0:26:25.080 and then then then then finally the lights go out 0:26:25.119 --> 0:26:28.040 and on the lion he's just dead, and you know, 0:26:28.119 --> 0:26:30.159 the dogs are piling in there, and I mean, it 0:26:30.240 --> 0:26:33.760 was just utter, complete chaos. But what had happened is 0:26:33.800 --> 0:26:38.240 they with those oak leaves in that pool. Nobody could 0:26:38.240 --> 0:26:40.360 get any traction to get out of there. And I'll 0:26:40.359 --> 0:26:43.120 tell you, you you tell what happened to your pistol. Well, 0:26:43.160 --> 0:26:47.320 I was I mean, Chris, Chris, Chris, one to shoot 0:26:47.359 --> 0:26:49.439 the lion. I didn't one shouldn't use my tag. But 0:26:49.720 --> 0:26:51.400 when I looked down in there, it was just all 0:26:51.440 --> 0:26:54.160 the dogs were they were getting killed. I mean they were. 0:26:54.200 --> 0:26:56.280 This lion was grabbing one. It wasn't that there hadn't 0:26:56.280 --> 0:26:58.960 been a group of those dogs there that he would 0:26:58.960 --> 0:27:03.040 have surely killed numerous dogs. And and he was big. 0:27:03.040 --> 0:27:04.880 It was one of the few hundred and sixty pound 0:27:04.920 --> 0:27:07.000 of lions that I caught in my life with. And 0:27:07.520 --> 0:27:09.919 I mean it was a big, big male that just 0:27:09.960 --> 0:27:11.840 didn't have any fear of us or the hounds or 0:27:11.880 --> 0:27:14.600 anything else. Anyhow, when I slid down in there, I 0:27:14.600 --> 0:27:16.280 had my pistol in my hand and just you know, 0:27:16.320 --> 0:27:19.159 you're slide and I jammed it into the dirt and 0:27:19.200 --> 0:27:20.919 I just didn't want to, you know, I didn't know 0:27:20.920 --> 0:27:23.520 if it was full of dirt or not. And I 0:27:23.560 --> 0:27:26.800 had that stick with me. Typically when lions are wounded, 0:27:27.040 --> 0:27:29.280 they'll bite down on a stick like that. I never 0:27:29.320 --> 0:27:31.440 really had to deal with one that had not wasn't 0:27:31.440 --> 0:27:34.440 wounded before, but it did the same thing, and Chris 0:27:34.480 --> 0:27:36.240 got there about the same time that bit down on 0:27:36.280 --> 0:27:38.720 the stick. But that's what I was using to beat 0:27:38.760 --> 0:27:40.680 the dogs, and it back trying to get them separated, 0:27:41.720 --> 0:27:43.719 and that's how the stick got in its mouth. So 0:27:43.840 --> 0:27:48.119 you lose a lot of dogs two lions, no, uh 0:27:48.240 --> 0:27:51.159 if you typically lose them to the bluffs, you know, 0:27:51.240 --> 0:27:55.479 and fallen off of things more than lions. Uh. This 0:27:55.560 --> 0:27:58.160 last year we had a dog or lion another lions 0:27:58.200 --> 0:28:02.399 similar to Chris's that that you know, busted the skull 0:28:02.440 --> 0:28:05.720 on one dog's head and had another one in his skull, 0:28:05.880 --> 0:28:08.159 you know, his the hound's head in its mouth, and 0:28:08.240 --> 0:28:10.720 I shot it, but you know it would have killed 0:28:10.760 --> 0:28:14.240 some dogs. But we you know, definitely lost maybe four 0:28:14.320 --> 0:28:18.479 or five over thirty years directly to a lion like that. 0:28:19.840 --> 0:28:21.639 I think, I think this is you that I asked 0:28:21.640 --> 0:28:26.000 this one time. I was asking you if if you 0:28:26.040 --> 0:28:28.800 ever have any problem, like when you bringing in dogs 0:28:29.640 --> 0:28:34.400 have been tore up by lions, if the vets ever 0:28:34.480 --> 0:28:36.280 frown on you, And I think you told me you 0:28:36.280 --> 0:28:38.960 went and found a vet who likes to hunt lions well, 0:28:39.000 --> 0:28:41.480 there's we we have a he's retired now, but we 0:28:41.520 --> 0:28:43.120 have a local beat here in the town that that 0:28:43.440 --> 0:28:45.920 and there's a couple of them that that are that 0:28:46.000 --> 0:28:50.680 are lion hunters, and there they understand about it. And 0:28:50.720 --> 0:28:53.520 even the you know, the clinic we use now, I would, 0:28:53.640 --> 0:28:57.440 you know, there's certainly not what I would consider hunting 0:28:57.440 --> 0:29:01.080 oriented or anything like that, and are always there for us. 0:29:01.160 --> 0:29:03.480 But there are a lot of people that frown on it, 0:29:03.600 --> 0:29:05.120 you know. I remember one time I went into an 0:29:05.120 --> 0:29:08.240 emergency clinic with one of my hounds and it would 0:29:08.280 --> 0:29:10.920 it had had a gastric torsion where its stomach had turned. 0:29:11.600 --> 0:29:13.280 It was a great dog, and I was really worried 0:29:13.280 --> 0:29:18.760 about losing it. And this pudgy little veterinarian told me 0:29:18.800 --> 0:29:22.000 that the dog she did obviously didn't believe in hunting. 0:29:22.720 --> 0:29:24.000 And she told me she was going to turn me 0:29:24.040 --> 0:29:26.680 into the Humane Society of the Sheriff's Department from mistreatment 0:29:26.720 --> 0:29:29.320 of animals. And because my dog was was in such 0:29:29.440 --> 0:29:33.640 poor shape physically, and she was probably fifty pounds overweight, 0:29:33.840 --> 0:29:36.000 and I pointed out to her that you didn't see 0:29:36.000 --> 0:29:39.560 any fat people winning the Olympics either, and uh, and 0:29:39.600 --> 0:29:43.480 of course that didn't help our relationship. Uh they did 0:29:43.480 --> 0:29:45.720 save the dog. But yeah, once in a while you 0:29:45.800 --> 0:29:48.560 get into those clinics and run into that. There's a 0:29:48.560 --> 0:29:50.640 lot of people that disapprove a lion, you know, hunting 0:29:50.680 --> 0:29:54.320 with hounds, and they think that it's unfair to hunt lions. 0:29:55.080 --> 0:29:57.200 It's like one of the lion hunts. One of the 0:29:57.360 --> 0:30:06.040 things that when anti hunting groups anti hunting money, Humane 0:30:06.040 --> 0:30:10.200 Society love the money comes from other organizations. When they 0:30:10.240 --> 0:30:13.920 look at what they can go after, that's one of 0:30:13.920 --> 0:30:17.080 the things they go after. Like you'll like, I remember 0:30:17.080 --> 0:30:19.520 reading this thing where it was a series of polls 0:30:19.560 --> 0:30:24.200 on acceptance of hunting. I remember reading one in Arizona 0:30:24.800 --> 0:30:29.760 or if you just ask people, do you support you know, 0:30:30.760 --> 0:30:35.000 a person's right to hunt? Okay? And it was surprising 0:30:35.040 --> 0:30:37.200 to me. I can't remember exactly, but it was somewhere 0:30:37.360 --> 0:30:39.760 on lines of like you know, like seventy four sevent 0:30:40.680 --> 0:30:44.760 of people supported it. But anytime you ask them a 0:30:44.800 --> 0:30:50.680 specific thing, the acceptance rate would go down. So people 0:30:50.760 --> 0:30:53.360 like the idea, but you say, like, okay, how about 0:30:53.880 --> 0:30:59.080 you know, hunting like bow hunting much less Okay, any 0:30:59.200 --> 0:31:01.560 no matter what secific inquiry you put to them. It 0:31:01.600 --> 0:31:03.840 was always like less people approved of the specific and 0:31:04.080 --> 0:31:07.760 to the concept. And when you want to go after something, 0:31:08.320 --> 0:31:11.840 you you can make the case pretty easy. And you've 0:31:11.840 --> 0:31:14.680 done it effectively in several states. Now you can make 0:31:14.720 --> 0:31:18.640 the case pretty easily that it's real bad to hunt 0:31:19.640 --> 0:31:24.920 lions with dogs. Absolutely, we've lost it in Washington, California, Oregon. 0:31:26.720 --> 0:31:30.120 I don't understand why, Like I guess I kind of 0:31:30.160 --> 0:31:32.800 get what they're thinking, but I think that they're thinking 0:31:32.840 --> 0:31:35.360 that the dogs they're doing all the work, or I 0:31:35.400 --> 0:31:37.800 don't like, what is the Have you ever gotten a 0:31:37.880 --> 0:31:40.239 sense and you're well, it's you know, I always kind 0:31:40.240 --> 0:31:44.560 of it's it's always tough for me to approach those people. Whatever. 0:31:44.600 --> 0:31:46.920 People have a strong opinion about something that they have 0:31:47.120 --> 0:31:51.560 no knowledge about. You got it almost assume that you're 0:31:51.600 --> 0:31:56.120 dealing with an idiot. Yeah, So at that point the 0:31:56.160 --> 0:31:59.760 discussion for me becomes hard to engage. And I'll sit 0:31:59.800 --> 0:32:01.400 down with some people and talk to him about it. 0:32:01.440 --> 0:32:04.080 But the one thing I always tell people is, you 0:32:04.080 --> 0:32:06.520 know in my life that you know, I learned to 0:32:06.560 --> 0:32:10.520 fly helicopter in thirty days. You can run multiple businesses. 0:32:10.680 --> 0:32:14.320 Everything is relatively easy compared to getting up in the 0:32:14.360 --> 0:32:17.600 morning and saying I'm gonna go catch the outline today. 0:32:17.760 --> 0:32:21.800 So it's really insulting when somebody says it's not sportsmanlike 0:32:22.040 --> 0:32:25.880 or it's it's unfair because they have no it just 0:32:25.960 --> 0:32:28.360 haven't got a clue. You know, when you look at 0:32:28.400 --> 0:32:30.800 that and you think about that being put to a 0:32:30.920 --> 0:32:35.080 ballot or an initiative. I can make the case your 0:32:35.200 --> 0:32:37.960 lions are very probably the most noble creature in the woods, 0:32:38.040 --> 0:32:41.840 probably certainly one of the most beautiful, and when people 0:32:42.000 --> 0:32:44.600 look at that, they say, how could you go kill 0:32:44.640 --> 0:32:49.240 that animal? You know, in in wildlife management, all animals 0:32:49.320 --> 0:32:51.000 have to be managed. There's not you don't get to 0:32:51.040 --> 0:32:53.080 pick and choose which ones you do or don't manage. 0:32:53.720 --> 0:32:55.880 So I I get really, you know, I I understand 0:32:55.920 --> 0:32:57.840 how they make the case. I can probably do a 0:32:57.840 --> 0:33:00.520 lot better job than they do. But it's mostly they 0:33:00.520 --> 0:33:03.640 don't understand how sporting it is. That's you know, it 0:33:03.720 --> 0:33:06.360 used to be the sport of kings chasing the hounds. 0:33:06.480 --> 0:33:09.160 It was chasing boxes in England. Yeah, a thing that 0:33:09.400 --> 0:33:13.600 I find works for people. It's like it's helpful when 0:33:13.600 --> 0:33:15.920 you're like sort of conceptualizing what kind of hunting is 0:33:17.600 --> 0:33:21.400 acceptable or not acceptable, or likely to be shot down 0:33:21.840 --> 0:33:27.520 in a public battlet or not. Um, I'm stumbling around us. 0:33:27.560 --> 0:33:29.040 But but there's like a sort of a thing like 0:33:29.040 --> 0:33:34.560 a traditional use. Okay, so in areas where people have 0:33:35.280 --> 0:33:41.480 traditionally haunted lions with dogs, I would tend to think 0:33:43.120 --> 0:33:45.160 and I think most people agree that you would continue 0:33:45.200 --> 0:33:48.240 doing what was traditional. So if you had an area 0:33:48.280 --> 0:33:51.720 like there's states where you've never been able to bait, 0:33:52.280 --> 0:33:54.880 to set out bait for black bears, Okay, you can't 0:33:54.920 --> 0:33:57.400 bait black bears Montana, for instance, It's been like that 0:33:57.480 --> 0:34:02.280 for a long time. Now. I'm not like uh pressing, 0:34:03.000 --> 0:34:06.640 you know, I'm not encouraging someone to legalize baiting bears 0:34:06.640 --> 0:34:10.640 in Montana because the way it was set, it was 0:34:10.680 --> 0:34:13.239 set from a wildlife management issue. It was set from 0:34:13.239 --> 0:34:15.720 a traditional used issue. And they have a system that works, 0:34:16.360 --> 0:34:20.240 you know. But it's like when you start taking away 0:34:20.280 --> 0:34:25.359 traditional use practices, that's more upsetting me, and that like 0:34:25.760 --> 0:34:30.400 makes me more suspicious than preventing new practices from entering 0:34:30.680 --> 0:34:36.040 the realm. That makes sense, And I think I think 0:34:36.040 --> 0:34:37.719 it's something that like comes up all time, like when 0:34:37.719 --> 0:34:40.160 when guys down South, like for me, Like I grew 0:34:40.200 --> 0:34:43.600 up in the Upper Midwest, no one hunts deer with dogs. 0:34:44.280 --> 0:34:46.480 If you went and said we're gonna start a new 0:34:46.600 --> 0:34:51.160 rule you can hunt near with dogs, people particularly deer hunters, 0:34:51.480 --> 0:34:56.160 would be up in arms. Okay, they'd be like burning 0:34:56.280 --> 0:35:00.000 buildings down over this. Meanwhile, you hunt deer with dogs 0:35:00.040 --> 0:35:04.120 in the southeast many states. It's just what they've done, 0:35:05.080 --> 0:35:08.280 you know, And you have to kind of respect traditional 0:35:08.400 --> 0:35:11.880 use practices, I think. And the thing with lions is 0:35:11.880 --> 0:35:15.920 because the way lions behave when they're active, how they travel, 0:35:16.320 --> 0:35:20.320 you just you can kill them with predator calls kind 0:35:20.320 --> 0:35:22.920 of now and then a guy will run into one 0:35:22.960 --> 0:35:25.800 and shoot it. But it's like you hunt lions with dogs. 0:35:26.840 --> 0:35:29.480 To stop dog hunting for lions, you're basically saying you 0:35:29.520 --> 0:35:33.080 can't hunt lions, correct, basically, And I know, like in 0:35:33.160 --> 0:35:35.399 South Dakota that guys call them in a little bit. 0:35:35.480 --> 0:35:39.000 You know. Well, we just got the data back for 0:35:39.040 --> 0:35:42.239 our two thousand fourteen harvests here, and I believe there 0:35:42.280 --> 0:35:44.200 was two hundred and these are round numbers, but tw 0:35:44.239 --> 0:35:49.000 hundred and seventy lions harvested, and at least two hundred 0:35:49.000 --> 0:35:51.320 and thirty of those were with the eight at hounds, 0:35:52.200 --> 0:35:54.680 you know, and and uh, I say to thirty, maybe 0:35:54.719 --> 0:35:58.600 it's just somewhere in there. But basically, you when you 0:35:58.719 --> 0:36:04.239 remove how hunting from the scope of wildlife management, lion 0:36:04.440 --> 0:36:07.400 hunting lions with hounds from the scope of wildlife management, 0:36:07.600 --> 0:36:11.120 you've effectively removed your ability to manage lions, whether it's 0:36:11.160 --> 0:36:14.440 to benefit a sheep or deer or any other pray species. 0:36:15.120 --> 0:36:20.000 So now California is a great example. Go to California 0:36:20.000 --> 0:36:22.600 and try and find a deer. Yeah, they thought they 0:36:22.640 --> 0:36:26.840 had a lion hunting problem, not only had a line problem. 0:36:26.880 --> 0:36:29.239 And and right now we're seeing a decline in the 0:36:29.280 --> 0:36:31.360 line numbers in the Western states, at least in the 0:36:31.400 --> 0:36:35.400 states I'm familiar with, which which are Utah, Nevada, New Mexico, 0:36:35.440 --> 0:36:39.480 and Arizona. Line numbers are far lower now than they 0:36:39.480 --> 0:36:42.440 were five years ago. And we've got you know, i'd 0:36:42.480 --> 0:36:44.719 hate to guess, I'd say that there's a third a 0:36:44.760 --> 0:36:47.359 half the lions that we had five to ten years ago. 0:36:47.760 --> 0:36:49.800 But it really doesn't have him to do with hunting pressure. 0:36:49.840 --> 0:36:51.919 It has more to do with a cyclic following prey 0:36:51.920 --> 0:36:56.600 basis and and everything cycles and all wildlife animal species do, 0:36:57.160 --> 0:36:59.040 but they're definitely down now. It's one of the things 0:36:59.120 --> 0:37:01.000 we've encountered, Like we were on that that's weird because 0:37:01.000 --> 0:37:04.200 they're having like an like outside of this area they're 0:37:04.239 --> 0:37:11.200 having they're experiencing an expansion of range, like expanding, expanding 0:37:11.200 --> 0:37:13.440 in the more urban areas, expanding in the states that 0:37:13.520 --> 0:37:16.440 you have traditionally not had them. And I would question 0:37:16.520 --> 0:37:20.799 too whether those states have or haven't had them. I 0:37:20.800 --> 0:37:23.560 mean they have everywhere has had them well, but has 0:37:23.600 --> 0:37:26.279 been of trail cameras has given us a lot more documentation. 0:37:26.320 --> 0:37:29.120 You know, there's always been claims of lions in Maine, 0:37:29.760 --> 0:37:33.160 and everybody thought, you know, somebody was just seeing things. 0:37:33.800 --> 0:37:36.359 But now with trail cameras, you know, it's obviously more 0:37:36.520 --> 0:37:41.080 much more documented situation. And and they are and I 0:37:41.120 --> 0:37:44.239 do believe they are expanding the range and very dynamic, 0:37:44.480 --> 0:37:47.840 very healthy population of lions the United States. And that 0:37:47.960 --> 0:37:53.239 expansion is a lot less if you take out young males. 0:37:53.239 --> 0:37:55.840 Like if you're in the drawing map of where females 0:37:55.880 --> 0:37:58.439 are showing up, that map is not nearly as big 0:37:58.480 --> 0:38:00.040 as where males are showing up. So a lot of 0:38:00.080 --> 0:38:02.080 times when you find these when these lines are coming 0:38:02.080 --> 0:38:05.920 out of the eastern US, and people used to say, like, oh, 0:38:05.960 --> 0:38:08.799 it's a runaway pat like there's a hell a lot 0:38:08.800 --> 0:38:14.200 of people of mountain lions. But now they're fine. You know, 0:38:14.360 --> 0:38:17.640 these are like these male mountainlins. They're traveling several states, 0:38:17.680 --> 0:38:21.120 over coming out of the Black Hills, you know, turning 0:38:21.200 --> 0:38:24.920 up in crazy places. Researchers termed those transient lines, and 0:38:24.920 --> 0:38:27.400 they're almost always males, and males tend to be the 0:38:27.440 --> 0:38:30.200 ones that get in the most trouble. A friend of 0:38:30.200 --> 0:38:33.279 mine that works for the government is I think it 0:38:33.360 --> 0:38:36.240 was five hundred lions were removed in a I forget 0:38:36.239 --> 0:38:39.200 how many year period of time, but the vast majority 0:38:39.239 --> 0:38:42.399 of them were males. And that's typically what you see. 0:38:42.440 --> 0:38:44.080 They're they're the ones that get in the most strokes. 0:38:44.120 --> 0:38:47.280 You treat more males and females. They're easier to treat, 0:38:47.719 --> 0:38:50.600 and I would say, yes we do. Why the easier 0:38:50.600 --> 0:38:55.760 to drink, you know, they leave more scent. They travel 0:38:55.840 --> 0:38:58.719 the country. The example I always used as a guy 0:38:58.800 --> 0:39:02.600 going into the store and buying something. He goes in 0:39:02.680 --> 0:39:04.319 and he gets what he wants and he comes back, 0:39:04.360 --> 0:39:07.399 he's gone. He hit straight lighted in straight light out. 0:39:07.960 --> 0:39:09.800 You send your girlfriend or your wife in there. She 0:39:09.920 --> 0:39:11.799 might be there an hour to do this, get the 0:39:11.840 --> 0:39:14.920 same thing, and wonder all over the damn store. That's 0:39:14.920 --> 0:39:17.880 how female lines are, so it makes much more challenging 0:39:17.920 --> 0:39:20.680 to trail. They leave less scent, so they you know, 0:39:20.719 --> 0:39:23.440 it's just the males are generally much like in the 0:39:23.440 --> 0:39:25.719 case of Chris's lion that day when some of the 0:39:25.760 --> 0:39:28.040 gun came right straight down that canyon for two or 0:39:28.120 --> 0:39:31.160 three miles, you know, And and when we were going 0:39:31.520 --> 0:39:34.800 backwards trying to find the dog, we saw every place 0:39:34.800 --> 0:39:37.239 that he scratched and every mark that he made along there. 0:39:37.680 --> 0:39:39.200 And by the way, I'd say that they used their 0:39:39.239 --> 0:39:41.840 hind feet most of the time. It's just a nine feeahs, 0:39:41.880 --> 0:39:43.319 what I mean. Their thought has always been. But there's 0:39:43.320 --> 0:39:45.359 an awful lot of pictures on trail cameras. Now I'm 0:39:45.440 --> 0:39:49.560 using the hind feet, but and they used both, but 0:39:49.760 --> 0:39:52.080 sometimes they use their front feet. Two. You know, there's 0:39:52.120 --> 0:39:53.840 a story I know, I told you this in the 0:39:53.880 --> 0:40:04.719 past play where in the in Florida it was generally 0:40:04.800 --> 0:40:09.520 accepted that the Florida panther was gone. You know, there 0:40:09.600 --> 0:40:11.839 was rumors of sightings in the same way that now 0:40:12.040 --> 0:40:14.359 they could take some state like Missouri or something. We're 0:40:14.400 --> 0:40:16.480 like now and then a guy will see one. Everybody 0:40:16.480 --> 0:40:20.040 tells me he's crazy. Right, That was the situation in Florida. 0:40:20.080 --> 0:40:23.160 But there was some guys who just knew they were there. 0:40:24.040 --> 0:40:27.520 And there's a story where a guy in some someone 0:40:27.520 --> 0:40:29.520 in the early thirties, I think it was, he got 0:40:29.600 --> 0:40:33.600 in touch with some houndsman in Arizona and they came 0:40:33.600 --> 0:40:36.560 out and within a couple of weeks had killed seven 0:40:36.600 --> 0:40:41.520 lions in Florida, at which point we said, okay, we 0:40:41.680 --> 0:40:45.040 at the point and like the guy was just basically saying, 0:40:45.120 --> 0:40:49.160 stopped telling me there's no lions in Florida. And I 0:40:49.200 --> 0:40:51.040 don't remember who the line hunter was, but that could 0:40:51.040 --> 0:40:53.160 have been one of the Lee brothers or any number 0:40:53.200 --> 0:40:55.320 of you know, there was a lot of famous line hunters. 0:40:55.560 --> 0:40:57.560 I went and reread it because you had mentioned there 0:40:57.600 --> 0:41:00.319 was some famous lion guys. I went read he the name, 0:41:00.360 --> 0:41:02.440 the name of the guy that came well, a man 0:41:02.520 --> 0:41:05.320 out of Texas his name, And there's a whole family 0:41:05.360 --> 0:41:08.719 of the McBride's, and Roy McBride is the one that 0:41:09.160 --> 0:41:11.640 I believe that I don't remember where maybe out of 0:41:11.640 --> 0:41:15.840 Texas that they took lions back to Florida and infused 0:41:15.920 --> 0:41:18.840 him into that population and helped to help bring it 0:41:18.920 --> 0:41:22.000 back around and some fresh genetics in there, you know. 0:41:22.320 --> 0:41:25.000 But yeah, that's been a dynamic population down there now 0:41:25.040 --> 0:41:27.000 and it seems like they've got a very healthy population. 0:41:27.239 --> 0:41:29.239 It's doing better now. And it was a funny thing 0:41:29.280 --> 0:41:33.080 because when we talk about mountains, were talking about there's 0:41:33.120 --> 0:41:40.799 so many names, so mountain, lion, cougar, puma, puma, catamount 0:41:41.880 --> 0:41:43.680 when you don't hear it very often, I mean that 0:41:43.960 --> 0:41:48.920 was like a older term in the East primarily was catamount. Um, 0:41:48.960 --> 0:41:52.040 it's all the same thing. And so like again, like 0:41:52.080 --> 0:41:54.320 you go back to the time of European contact, these 0:41:54.320 --> 0:41:58.920 things were everywhere, right, you know, Yeah, there was no 0:41:59.239 --> 0:42:02.760 real division, so there was probably no genetic barrier. Really 0:42:03.080 --> 0:42:06.680 when you factored like how much they could travel, how 0:42:06.719 --> 0:42:10.120 many places, there were probably no genetic barrier between the 0:42:10.160 --> 0:42:13.520 ones in Florida and the ones in Washington State. There's 0:42:13.560 --> 0:42:17.239 a lions you know. Um, when the lion population in 0:42:17.280 --> 0:42:22.279 Florida got so low, people made an argument that, um, 0:42:22.320 --> 0:42:25.440 they were talking, they were talking like a subspecies, and 0:42:25.440 --> 0:42:29.280 it's just constant like in in biology, had this constant 0:42:29.280 --> 0:42:33.080 like lumping and splitting. But people were arguing that you 0:42:33.080 --> 0:42:37.520 had this like subspecies in Florida and it would damage 0:42:37.560 --> 0:42:40.920 it somehow to bring you know, blood in from somewhere else. 0:42:40.960 --> 0:42:44.720 But they did and and and you know, literally every 0:42:44.840 --> 0:42:48.239 mountain range can have its own subspecies if you get 0:42:48.239 --> 0:42:50.279 carried away just because the animals may or may not 0:42:50.360 --> 0:42:52.719 ever travel out of that and they have the same 0:42:52.800 --> 0:42:54.760 kind of thing. They called it the hum of puma 0:42:54.800 --> 0:42:56.880 here in Arizona, and you know, it was was a 0:42:56.920 --> 0:43:00.000 lion that was geographically isolated, just like the Florida pants. 0:43:00.280 --> 0:43:02.239 And at that point they will take on their own 0:43:02.239 --> 0:43:05.960 genetic characteristics, but they're still all mountain lines. Yeah, and 0:43:06.000 --> 0:43:09.240 those things in Florida we're having that they needed genetic 0:43:09.320 --> 0:43:11.880 diversity brought in so bad. They were like their tails 0:43:11.920 --> 0:43:16.080 are shaped wrong, and there's all kinds of problems. And 0:43:16.160 --> 0:43:17.520 it was a funny thing because like you look at 0:43:17.520 --> 0:43:20.480 people who argue in favor of the existence of bigfoot, 0:43:21.760 --> 0:43:24.279 okay that you've had, you know, like people say it 0:43:24.360 --> 0:43:26.640 was all these big foots in the up big foots 0:43:26.680 --> 0:43:29.279 of California and big foots in Washington big foots in Oregon. 0:43:29.280 --> 0:43:34.600 So you've got a sizeable population, you must, right, And 0:43:34.600 --> 0:43:38.480 they've been here continuously now since people would argue pre 0:43:40.000 --> 0:43:45.759 before the arrival of Native Americans across the barrin Land Bridge. Um, 0:43:45.920 --> 0:43:48.719 no one's hit one with a car yet, no one 0:43:48.760 --> 0:43:52.520 has a trail campot. Well, but in Florida, just like 0:43:52.560 --> 0:43:55.480 take just like the dead on the street thing. Okay, 0:43:55.520 --> 0:43:58.560 in Florida, at a point they were down to a 0:43:58.800 --> 0:44:03.720 known like forty seven or fifty mountain lions in Florida. 0:44:04.320 --> 0:44:07.680 And every year they're losing multiple cats to getting hit 0:44:08.400 --> 0:44:13.040 by cars. And this is in the Everglades, which is 0:44:13.040 --> 0:44:17.240 not a huge abundance of roads, And you've got fifty 0:44:17.239 --> 0:44:20.160 of a species and you're hitting several year with cars. 0:44:21.120 --> 0:44:23.720 That to me is the greatest argument against the existence 0:44:23.719 --> 0:44:27.480 of bigfoot. If you could be hitting like a significant 0:44:27.480 --> 0:44:29.600 percentage of mount lions of cars every year. But no 0:44:29.640 --> 0:44:32.080 one's running into one of these things, a real one. 0:44:32.160 --> 0:44:35.400 It's always like it's like a real dead one that 0:44:35.440 --> 0:44:39.600 we can just show around. I run into people occasionally 0:44:39.640 --> 0:44:42.799 that actually believe that there is you know what I mean. 0:44:42.880 --> 0:44:44.440 I have two of my life that I can think 0:44:44.440 --> 0:44:47.160 of that we're dead serious about it. And I in 0:44:47.239 --> 0:44:50.120 the general goes back to an experience they had out 0:44:50.120 --> 0:44:53.000 in the woods where they saw something that they thought 0:44:53.120 --> 0:44:57.239 was Bigfoot. But I spent thirty years of my life 0:44:57.320 --> 0:44:59.680 right into the state of Arizona staring at the ground. 0:45:00.480 --> 0:45:02.719 I've never seen anything that even came close to looking 0:45:02.800 --> 0:45:06.560 like big Foot this country. Yeah, well, I mean that's 0:45:06.600 --> 0:45:12.000 probably true. We have a lot of sightings here. Yeah. Um, 0:45:12.120 --> 0:45:17.239 what is some of the work you've done with going 0:45:17.280 --> 0:45:20.000 out with government people or biologists or whatever to like 0:45:20.080 --> 0:45:24.280 get lions. We all the bulk of it was probably 0:45:24.280 --> 0:45:27.520 the late eighties. I haven't done much in the last 0:45:27.560 --> 0:45:29.280 ten or fifteen years, but it would be the studies 0:45:29.320 --> 0:45:31.920 over by Wickenburg and over in that area in the 0:45:32.080 --> 0:45:35.560 in the desert country and uh from Wicky Up and 0:45:35.680 --> 0:45:38.839 all through the western portion of our state over there. Well, 0:45:38.880 --> 0:45:41.399 they do they hire you just to put lions into trees? Yeah, 0:45:41.440 --> 0:45:43.040 but there was It was hired in one case, and 0:45:43.040 --> 0:45:45.439 then the other is generally volunteering my time because it's 0:45:45.480 --> 0:45:47.600 all the Typically the biologists were friends of mine and 0:45:47.640 --> 0:45:51.560 people like that that that knew us. But you and 0:45:51.760 --> 0:45:53.799 in those in those places, you almost always put them 0:45:53.840 --> 0:45:55.880 up in a rock, you know, want to bluff, and 0:45:55.920 --> 0:45:58.000 they darted, put a collar on them, and then a 0:45:58.040 --> 0:45:59.400 lot of times we have to go back out and 0:45:59.480 --> 0:46:02.040 change called you know, and the back in those days, 0:46:02.080 --> 0:46:04.799 the telemetric systems weren't what they are today, and we 0:46:04.840 --> 0:46:07.279 certainly didn't have any satellite stuff, so it was all 0:46:07.320 --> 0:46:09.839 they would change them, which, you know, those lions get 0:46:09.880 --> 0:46:11.759 to be pretty savvy after you have to do that 0:46:11.800 --> 0:46:13.799 with him a couple of times, because like if a 0:46:13.840 --> 0:46:16.319 lion trees once and gets caught, he's less likely to 0:46:16.360 --> 0:46:18.800 tree again the second time. He darn's you're not gonna 0:46:18.800 --> 0:46:23.080 tree is easily typically uh particularly, I say that the 0:46:23.120 --> 0:46:26.239 females seemed to be worse than the males. But you know, 0:46:26.320 --> 0:46:30.879 Julie and I this year had a mail lion that well. 0:46:31.000 --> 0:46:33.440 We started the track in the morning at six or 0:46:33.480 --> 0:46:37.680 seven in the morning and went from Arizona to New 0:46:37.680 --> 0:46:41.440 Mexico eight miles as the crow flies air air miles 0:46:41.520 --> 0:46:44.400 eight miles, and at three o'clock in the afternoon, the 0:46:44.440 --> 0:46:47.920 lion was across the canyon from US actual Mile Creek 0:46:47.960 --> 0:46:50.880 Canyon drainage and we could see the lion. It was 0:46:50.960 --> 0:46:53.640 laying on the side of the rim looking back, watching 0:46:53.680 --> 0:46:56.400 the dogs come, and that turned into second pack of 0:46:56.440 --> 0:47:00.480 dogs in that process, so that lion wasn't gonna be coughed. 0:47:01.400 --> 0:47:04.080 And then we watched. We saw it twice that day. 0:47:04.360 --> 0:47:07.040 You never caught it, never caught it. In fact, the 0:47:07.080 --> 0:47:09.080 second time we saw it, I called a friend of 0:47:09.120 --> 0:47:11.799 mine that owned the ranch, and he came and got 0:47:11.840 --> 0:47:14.080 on the track with the lions and the dogs, and 0:47:14.960 --> 0:47:16.680 you know, we ended up getting caught up with him 0:47:16.680 --> 0:47:19.640 and getting the hound stopped. But that line, I doubt 0:47:19.640 --> 0:47:22.080 that that line will ever be caught by hounds. And 0:47:22.160 --> 0:47:24.759 it's obviously learned that that's a learn because he's just 0:47:24.880 --> 0:47:27.719 not going to go into a tree. And what they 0:47:27.800 --> 0:47:29.440 do is they get out in front of the dog. 0:47:29.480 --> 0:47:33.160 In that case, he would get about you might say 0:47:33.200 --> 0:47:36.880 it was a half mile. He started moving again, and 0:47:36.920 --> 0:47:40.399 they start trotting and for whatever reason. Typically it's there's 0:47:40.440 --> 0:47:43.399 a lot of different theories behind it. But a lion 0:47:43.520 --> 0:47:46.200 that is trotting or running is much harder for a 0:47:46.239 --> 0:47:50.120 dog to trail if the scent has landed on the ground, 0:47:50.280 --> 0:47:52.840 if the scent still floating in the air, and the 0:47:52.880 --> 0:47:54.759 hound can take it out of the air. It can 0:47:54.800 --> 0:47:57.360 really put some pressure on it on an animal, But 0:47:57.480 --> 0:48:00.600 as soon as that scentence in the air dissipate, it's 0:48:00.640 --> 0:48:02.480 the dog has to go back to smelling it on 0:48:02.520 --> 0:48:04.799 the ground. And now the scent and the spores that 0:48:04.880 --> 0:48:08.400 were very evenly laid because the lion was casually walking 0:48:08.800 --> 0:48:11.800 are now in bounded piles where it's landing, if it's jumping, 0:48:11.880 --> 0:48:15.080 or even when it's trotting, it's just dispersing those those 0:48:15.120 --> 0:48:17.200 cells elsewhere for it. So it makes it harder for 0:48:17.239 --> 0:48:20.160 me to trade it. Yea. And there again, that's when 0:48:20.239 --> 0:48:22.120 it comes into the case if the dogs are in 0:48:22.120 --> 0:48:24.560 good enough shape. I thought mine were in really good 0:48:24.560 --> 0:48:26.880 shape at that time, but they're there are guys that 0:48:27.040 --> 0:48:31.879 hunt that to do it professionally that their dogs might 0:48:31.880 --> 0:48:33.880 have been in better shape and put more pressure on 0:48:33.920 --> 0:48:37.560 that cap and made it climb a tree. But it 0:48:37.640 --> 0:48:40.799 was a long day. So when you saw that land 0:48:40.840 --> 0:48:42.600 across the cane, what you mean he just looked over there, 0:48:42.600 --> 0:48:45.400 he was, Julie saw and she's can't wanted me to 0:48:45.400 --> 0:48:47.000 shoot it, And of course I had a pistol and 0:48:47.040 --> 0:48:49.239 I told her, I said, I wasn't gonna be able 0:48:49.239 --> 0:48:51.560 to shoot it and she filmed. In the filmed it 0:48:51.560 --> 0:48:53.560 will be laying under the tree, and it did its 0:48:53.600 --> 0:48:55.839 mouth hanging wide open. It's like how many yards away 0:48:56.840 --> 0:48:59.759 d fifties, hundred seventy five. It's one of those. It's 0:48:59.760 --> 0:49:04.040 just you know, real abrupt, bluffy canyon. And then you 0:49:04.040 --> 0:49:06.359 saw him get back up and start going right as 0:49:07.440 --> 0:49:09.080 in the dog and it laid down under a big 0:49:09.080 --> 0:49:12.280 pine tree. Was interesting to watch this that the dogs. 0:49:12.360 --> 0:49:14.640 There was three dogs coming and we we knew, you know, 0:49:14.640 --> 0:49:16.640 they're all we knew which dogs they were. They were 0:49:16.640 --> 0:49:19.960 coming fast. When they got to the tree, they thought 0:49:20.000 --> 0:49:22.399 the lion had gone up the tree because the scent 0:49:22.520 --> 0:49:26.360 was so strong. So they fooled around there for another 0:49:26.480 --> 0:49:29.600 five minutes or so while the lions just getting farther 0:49:29.640 --> 0:49:33.239 ahead and going and going, and I'm sure it got 0:49:33.239 --> 0:49:35.640 ahead of and now the hounds never quit going, so 0:49:35.680 --> 0:49:37.279 that you know, the lions were doing this where it's 0:49:37.360 --> 0:49:39.520 running for a while and it'll go through a really 0:49:39.600 --> 0:49:43.400 rough spot and then take a break, and it just 0:49:43.480 --> 0:49:45.200 it was there are a lot smarter than people think 0:49:45.239 --> 0:49:48.560 they are. That's uh. You know, there's a lot of 0:49:48.560 --> 0:49:50.160 people that will make the case that a cat's i 0:49:50.280 --> 0:49:52.759 Q was greater than that of a dog. And I 0:49:52.800 --> 0:49:54.880 never really thought that most of my life, but you know, 0:49:54.920 --> 0:49:56.880 some of these experiences like that really makes you think 0:49:56.920 --> 0:50:01.880 about it. Yeah, have you encountered Uh well, let me 0:50:01.920 --> 0:50:03.480 let me go back to to the to the to 0:50:03.560 --> 0:50:06.239 the biology things. So you guys would go out and 0:50:06.320 --> 0:50:08.719 catch them with the collar on. Does that make it 0:50:08.800 --> 0:50:11.279 super easy to catch a line when you got a 0:50:11.280 --> 0:50:15.719 telemetry deal? Yes, typically when you do that, doesn't know 0:50:15.760 --> 0:50:20.640 where he is and when he's there, right. Uh, it's 0:50:20.680 --> 0:50:23.080 you know, half of the hunt is trying to locate 0:50:23.120 --> 0:50:25.719 a track a lot of times. And you know, once 0:50:25.760 --> 0:50:28.000 you locate the track, then you start trailing the line 0:50:28.080 --> 0:50:30.840 and we're you know, really when you have the collar 0:50:30.920 --> 0:50:32.720 on a line like that, you're going to a spot 0:50:32.760 --> 0:50:36.560 to to catch the line with you with fresh dogs, 0:50:36.600 --> 0:50:40.080 and so it's a lot different. So what happens between 0:50:40.239 --> 0:50:42.359 when you run the line and the line doesn't know 0:50:42.680 --> 0:50:46.040 you're after him, He's just going about his business. When 0:50:46.080 --> 0:50:50.080 you say jump a line, what do you like? What 0:50:50.200 --> 0:50:53.200 happens when they jump the lion? That just means the 0:50:53.239 --> 0:50:56.160 lion is now aware of dogs. That means we've come 0:50:56.200 --> 0:50:59.120 to the place. You know, the Lions, they travel a 0:50:59.160 --> 0:51:03.359 great deal or afternoon, late evening, and then again they 0:51:03.400 --> 0:51:06.040 travel some in the morning, but most of their traveling 0:51:06.120 --> 0:51:08.160 starts about three or four in the afternoon and then 0:51:08.280 --> 0:51:12.120 probably eight nine o'clock that you know they're they're either 0:51:12.239 --> 0:51:15.440 laying up somewhere. I know, I've learned a lot from 0:51:15.480 --> 0:51:19.040 people's trail camp photos. They just don't travel as much 0:51:19.040 --> 0:51:21.560 as I thought they'd traveled all night, and they don't. 0:51:21.640 --> 0:51:23.440 It seems like the sweet spot for them is that 0:51:23.640 --> 0:51:26.239 early evening stuff. So if you started to track the 0:51:26.440 --> 0:51:30.480 daylight hours, right, most through traveling is daylight hours, that 0:51:30.640 --> 0:51:33.640 gray light type stuff, and you're liable to see them 0:51:33.640 --> 0:51:39.880 at any time, but the the evening, early evening and 0:51:39.920 --> 0:51:42.560 in that, you know, eight nine o'clock seems to be 0:51:42.680 --> 0:51:45.000 the time that they do most of their hunt. So 0:51:45.080 --> 0:51:47.160 if you're picking up on one of those tracks, you're now, 0:51:47.400 --> 0:51:49.120 say you hit it at seven or eight o'clock in 0:51:49.160 --> 0:51:51.319 the morning, you're twelve hours behind this thing. So it's 0:51:51.320 --> 0:51:54.040 going to be a grind. And if it's a mail 0:51:54.440 --> 0:51:56.399 in the conditions are right like this time of year, 0:51:56.440 --> 0:51:58.319 those mails put off a lot more scent and the 0:51:58.320 --> 0:52:00.880 trailing conditions are a lot better than say if it 0:52:00.960 --> 0:52:06.520 was in September or in in October. But when you 0:52:06.520 --> 0:52:08.759 you'll you know, the dogs are barking and trailing, doing 0:52:08.800 --> 0:52:11.799 a hundred miles of what we did together. When they 0:52:11.800 --> 0:52:13.839 get to where that lion is laid up, that lion 0:52:14.000 --> 0:52:16.480 jumps and runs. Now that tracks very fresh, and a 0:52:16.520 --> 0:52:18.080 lot of times they're taking it out of the air. 0:52:18.920 --> 0:52:21.080 They'll be chasing that line and it just you can 0:52:21.120 --> 0:52:23.839 tell the dogs had jumped it. It just the intensity 0:52:24.000 --> 0:52:26.960 and the and their excitement and some dogs that may 0:52:26.960 --> 0:52:28.800 not have barked all day all of a sudden be 0:52:28.880 --> 0:52:31.200 joining in and that's when you know they've jumped the line. 0:52:31.200 --> 0:52:33.560 And that's that's when the race is on. And sometimes 0:52:33.640 --> 0:52:37.120 it'll just last at the bottom of the canyon. Uh, 0:52:37.160 --> 0:52:39.520 And then sometimes it may be a mile or but 0:52:39.600 --> 0:52:43.040 it generally is typically a normal lion, it would be 0:52:43.120 --> 0:52:44.880 over that's you know, you would expect to get it 0:52:44.960 --> 0:52:48.040 caught at that point. And when you when he's getting caught, 0:52:48.040 --> 0:52:53.680 what's he usually going into? Trees are rock piles in Arizona. 0:52:53.719 --> 0:52:57.600 We probably catch them them in the rocks. Do they 0:52:57.640 --> 0:53:00.799 go in the holes? Oh? Yeah, Mine all kinds of 0:53:01.120 --> 0:53:03.760 and it's I think that cats just wonder through their 0:53:03.840 --> 0:53:07.120 domain throughout time, because they seemed to find the craziest 0:53:07.160 --> 0:53:10.000 places to go get in, and they also seem to 0:53:10.000 --> 0:53:12.440 know how to get out of them. And we Dave 0:53:12.520 --> 0:53:14.799 Martin's lion, the fellow that puts the rim to rim 0:53:15.160 --> 0:53:19.359 On this year, the lion Joe Mitchell called and said, 0:53:19.440 --> 0:53:23.000 you know, we're coming your way. And anyhow, when they 0:53:23.040 --> 0:53:24.759 he actually saw the lion get up and go on 0:53:24.800 --> 0:53:28.160 the rock pile, he was above us. And we hiked 0:53:28.239 --> 0:53:30.120 up to where the rock pile was, and Dave and 0:53:30.200 --> 0:53:31.799 Joe were standing on one side of the rock pile, 0:53:31.800 --> 0:53:33.800 and I watched the lion come out the other side, 0:53:34.080 --> 0:53:36.720 and I say a rock pilot. It's probably a seventy 0:53:36.719 --> 0:53:41.000 five yard long pilot boulders and that lion had traveled 0:53:41.040 --> 0:53:44.400 through that maze of boulders and come out somehow on 0:53:44.480 --> 0:53:48.200 our side. And unfortunately for all of us that were 0:53:48.239 --> 0:53:51.480 hunting the lion, I had dogs with me and saw it, 0:53:51.920 --> 0:53:54.280 and then we got Joe's dogs over there and managed 0:53:54.280 --> 0:53:56.360 to get it in a tree. But you know that 0:53:56.480 --> 0:53:58.800 that lion, and that's how smart they are. The underground 0:53:58.880 --> 0:54:02.160 passing toway. Yeah, had an underground passageway and the lion 0:54:02.239 --> 0:54:05.640 had gotten away the week before doing something similar to that. Okay, 0:54:05.800 --> 0:54:07.720 you know, but they're they're cats. You know, they probably 0:54:07.760 --> 0:54:12.439 spend their lifetime prowling around that mountain, investigating all those 0:54:12.520 --> 0:54:14.960 nooks and cranny's and that kind of thing. I was hunting. 0:54:15.080 --> 0:54:17.640 How often kind of quick question, how often can you 0:54:17.719 --> 0:54:19.680 jump on like that and be on like a hot 0:54:19.760 --> 0:54:23.120 track where there where you're like the chases on, but 0:54:23.200 --> 0:54:27.240 then you don't get them treated. You know, it's happened 0:54:27.280 --> 0:54:29.360 once this year, you know, a out of a dozen 0:54:29.400 --> 0:54:34.640 lins haven't done Yeah, so it's uh it Typically when 0:54:34.680 --> 0:54:38.080 they jump a line, you should catch it, but you 0:54:38.200 --> 0:54:40.040 just never know. It's you know, that's kind of what 0:54:40.120 --> 0:54:42.239 makes it exciting now. And the lions are definitely this, 0:54:42.520 --> 0:54:46.640 you know, as the numbers of lions decrease, the lines 0:54:46.680 --> 0:54:51.600 that are in existence, or just smarter genetically, you know, 0:54:51.600 --> 0:54:54.319 whether it's a genetic thing or learned trait from having 0:54:54.360 --> 0:54:57.479 been hunted, or whatever it may be. They certainly seem 0:54:57.520 --> 0:54:59.840 to be jumping and running and they're evolving more and 0:55:00.080 --> 0:55:03.319 that sense. I recently, I have a dog out in 0:55:03.320 --> 0:55:06.239 the backyard. You haven't seen Steve that's a friend of 0:55:06.239 --> 0:55:08.279 mine out at Wisconsin helped me acquire and they call 0:55:08.360 --> 0:55:11.239 him Lurchers, but it's half border Collie and half Staghund 0:55:11.840 --> 0:55:14.280 and his only job is to handle those kinds of things. 0:55:15.160 --> 0:55:17.719 And he's just a physical specimen as far as an 0:55:17.760 --> 0:55:21.839 animal that's super high intelligence and unbelievable physical ability. And 0:55:21.840 --> 0:55:25.000 he just meant to handle a jump line, right, jump 0:55:25.080 --> 0:55:28.279 lines lines that that do things that the hounds. The 0:55:28.719 --> 0:55:31.040 hounds typically if one jumps and they're looking at it, 0:55:31.160 --> 0:55:34.719 that they handled that very well. But this dog would 0:55:34.760 --> 0:55:38.040 be more along the lines of with his intelligence and 0:55:38.040 --> 0:55:40.799 the fact that he isn't a trailhound. When he thinks 0:55:40.840 --> 0:55:42.520 we might be getting close to a place where we're 0:55:42.520 --> 0:55:45.319 gonna jump a lion, he gets out and he's he 0:55:45.400 --> 0:55:47.400 spends a lot of time doing things that the hounds 0:55:47.400 --> 0:55:49.239 aren't doing trying to get the jump on that line. 0:55:51.239 --> 0:55:53.520 He's kind of just kicks out the intensity just a 0:55:53.560 --> 0:55:56.680 little bit, and he doesn't even normally leave us until 0:55:56.719 --> 0:55:59.080 he thinks they might be getting close to catching it, 0:55:59.640 --> 0:56:02.360 and then all of a sudden he'll just disappear and 0:56:02.560 --> 0:56:04.520 and I don't know, I mean, I never been there 0:56:04.600 --> 0:56:06.440 right when it happens. But I feel like he has 0:56:06.480 --> 0:56:09.240 definitely helped. I know that he helps when they jump 0:56:09.360 --> 0:56:12.680 in the tree jump type stuff. He doesn't really do 0:56:12.719 --> 0:56:14.279 a lot of things like a hound does, but he 0:56:14.320 --> 0:56:16.759 never quits looking at him. And you know, when like 0:56:16.840 --> 0:56:19.799 that lion hits and he's only seen maybe ten or 0:56:19.800 --> 0:56:22.640 fifteen lions. Now, when that lion heads out to a 0:56:22.640 --> 0:56:24.040 tree limb, he looks like he's trying to catch a 0:56:24.080 --> 0:56:26.560 pop fly, you know. I mean he's right there trying 0:56:26.560 --> 0:56:29.080 you know it's gonna do. Yeah, and he's you know, 0:56:29.120 --> 0:56:32.719 he's anticipating it the whole way. Yeah. And your dogs 0:56:32.760 --> 0:56:34.680 might be oblivious to the fact that the lions leaving 0:56:34.719 --> 0:56:38.120 the tree. No, they some are, but most of them 0:56:38.200 --> 0:56:40.560 kind of get that. But they tend to be more reactive. 0:56:40.560 --> 0:56:42.640 In the border Collie in him is you can see 0:56:42.640 --> 0:56:46.880 the intelligence factor there. You know, you're talking about that 0:56:47.040 --> 0:56:50.240 lion going underground, you know and coming on. In our spot, 0:56:50.360 --> 0:56:55.080 we were hunting pigs, wild pigs in New Zealand with 0:56:55.200 --> 0:56:58.319 dogs and the guy had the GPS collars on the 0:56:58.360 --> 0:57:02.560 dogs and of a sudden his dogs just vanished off 0:57:02.600 --> 0:57:05.640 of his He's not getting on his unit. He's not 0:57:05.680 --> 0:57:09.840 getting their signal anymore, and we start going to drags 0:57:09.920 --> 0:57:12.920 we'd last heard him, and then now and then he'd 0:57:12.960 --> 0:57:15.600 be like it popped the dog and pop up. One 0:57:15.640 --> 0:57:16.960 of the dogs will be like, oh, there it is. 0:57:17.520 --> 0:57:19.960 But then it to go away. And it was because 0:57:19.960 --> 0:57:23.640 this pig had gone down into a tunnel. The dog 0:57:23.800 --> 0:57:26.600 went in and the yeah it wasn't getting satellite reception 0:57:26.600 --> 0:57:30.000 anymore on his collar. But then the pig went up 0:57:30.000 --> 0:57:35.080 getting stuck in the tunnel. So the dogs just down 0:57:35.120 --> 0:57:39.400 there holding on the pig's tail and no one's coming 0:57:39.400 --> 0:57:42.640 out of that hole. Wow. So we went up digging 0:57:42.640 --> 0:57:46.640 a shaft down to the pig and pulled up a 0:57:46.640 --> 0:57:50.320 dog still hanging off it on the other end. Like 0:57:50.320 --> 0:57:53.240 the dogs were just never going to give up, no 0:57:53.400 --> 0:57:56.680 they You know, that's a good that's generally your best dogs, 0:57:56.720 --> 0:57:58.360 you know, the ones that quit earlier and all that. 0:57:58.520 --> 0:58:00.560 Those are the ones that you probably wonder if you 0:58:00.560 --> 0:58:03.320 shouldn't find him a good home. But those that and 0:58:03.320 --> 0:58:05.480 and unfortunately those a lot of times you're the dogs 0:58:05.480 --> 0:58:08.800 that get killed because they jump off bluffs after their 0:58:08.840 --> 0:58:10.800 quarry or whatever it may be. But those are the 0:58:10.800 --> 0:58:16.360 good ones. It's kind of funny you talk about um. 0:58:16.400 --> 0:58:18.600 It's like we have such a weird relationship with dogs 0:58:18.600 --> 0:58:21.800 in this country where on some on some level, we 0:58:21.840 --> 0:58:25.920 want to bestow on them like human characteristics, you know, 0:58:26.520 --> 0:58:30.200 and that they have almost like human rights. But then 0:58:30.440 --> 0:58:32.240 how can you then tell the dog that he shouldn't 0:58:32.240 --> 0:58:36.640 want to hunt lions? Yeah? Do you know what I mean? Like, 0:58:37.000 --> 0:58:41.600 it's like an honest question I always think about, is um, 0:58:41.640 --> 0:58:44.880 if you really are like, let's say you're like adamant. 0:58:45.120 --> 0:58:49.120 You know you're vegan, right, do you think that wolves 0:58:49.160 --> 0:58:54.120 should stop killing the ones? That ever? Actually answered this 0:58:54.200 --> 0:58:55.720 question for me? But you know what I mean, It's like, 0:58:56.040 --> 0:58:57.840 who were we to tell the dog that he don't 0:58:57.840 --> 0:59:01.680 want to hunt that lion? Well, think about your animal rights. 0:59:01.760 --> 0:59:05.680 People are cat and dog lovers that have some form 0:59:05.720 --> 0:59:07.600 of an animal in their home, and if they let 0:59:07.600 --> 0:59:09.920 that animal be wild for one second, it would go 0:59:09.960 --> 0:59:13.880 back to going killing its own, particularly cat Like, you 0:59:13.880 --> 0:59:16.440 don't need to talk the dog into one to hunt lions. 0:59:17.240 --> 0:59:21.720 They get up in the No, that's I mean, And 0:59:21.760 --> 0:59:25.600 that's what really Probably the breeding of those dogs is 0:59:25.720 --> 0:59:30.120 the single most important part, is to breed that drive 0:59:30.120 --> 0:59:33.880 and desire and those those characteristics into them. I'm fortunate 0:59:33.960 --> 0:59:36.640 enough of a man here in Arizona that's hunted lions 0:59:36.680 --> 0:59:39.360 his entire life named Steve Smith, and a man that's 0:59:39.360 --> 0:59:42.440 mentored me, Jim Bueler out of Nevada. Those guys have 0:59:42.760 --> 0:59:46.200 the breeding that they've created. I've been the beneficiary of. 0:59:46.960 --> 0:59:49.600 And it's a game changer for you as a lion 0:59:49.680 --> 0:59:52.280 hunter to have those genetics that where that dog get 0:59:52.320 --> 0:59:55.240 you know, when it's the day it's born, it's it's 0:59:55.240 --> 0:59:57.600 almost as though they want to hunt lions. So you've 0:59:57.640 --> 1:00:00.360 got dogs that come from generations of do dogs have 1:00:00.560 --> 1:00:06.560 been selected like selectively bred Ford lion hunting decades? Thirty 1:00:06.640 --> 1:00:10.080 forty years? Did you were you on lines and all 1:00:10.160 --> 1:00:11.960 during the bounty days when you could get a bounty 1:00:12.000 --> 1:00:14.880 on lines? No, that was that was in the I 1:00:14.880 --> 1:00:19.120 think they late sixties. That one a wedding here. So 1:00:19.160 --> 1:00:20.919 if you refer to that at the time away ago 1:00:21.160 --> 1:00:23.960 when you just like back turn in the scalp on 1:00:24.000 --> 1:00:27.160 that line, right, and there was and there was guys 1:00:27.200 --> 1:00:30.120 that and we still to this day have government guys 1:00:30.160 --> 1:00:32.120 that are on payroll to do that. To protect the 1:00:32.200 --> 1:00:35.800 livestock industry, you know, some of these lions just they 1:00:35.800 --> 1:00:39.960 can wreck havoc uh in Nevada. I know Jim Deeler's 1:00:40.000 --> 1:00:45.240 dealt with as many as twenty and thirty sheep killed 1:00:45.240 --> 1:00:48.760 in one one evening, and there's numbers where they're much 1:00:48.800 --> 1:00:51.000 higher than that. But that's not a crazy thing to see. 1:00:51.800 --> 1:00:53.880 Julie and I showed up one time in the line 1:00:53.920 --> 1:00:57.040 had killed twelve sheet that day. Yeah, it just looks 1:00:57.040 --> 1:01:00.440 like a massacre. And I I'm not sure why they 1:01:00.440 --> 1:01:02.640 do it, you know they I think they just get 1:01:02.680 --> 1:01:05.440 to be like a large mount bass eat and chad, 1:01:05.600 --> 1:01:07.840 you know, I mean, they just get to kill them. 1:01:08.000 --> 1:01:10.040 Did the lion? Did you guys catch the line and 1:01:10.120 --> 1:01:12.240 killed all those sheep? We did? I remember when I 1:01:12.240 --> 1:01:14.080 was a kid, I used to read Tracker and Predator 1:01:14.160 --> 1:01:16.200 Caller magazine. I remember an article in there. It was 1:01:16.240 --> 1:01:19.720 called like the hundred thousand dollar lion, and it was 1:01:19.800 --> 1:01:23.760 because they had done a big horn sheep transplant and 1:01:23.800 --> 1:01:29.560 in a lion killed all the sheep they transported. You 1:01:29.600 --> 1:01:32.080 know that they've brought into this area. I feel like 1:01:32.120 --> 1:01:36.800 it was in Arizona. Well, there's been, of course, the 1:01:36.800 --> 1:01:39.040 the brilliance of our Game and Fish Department here to 1:01:39.080 --> 1:01:42.720 transplant sheep on a mountain called Lion Mountain. This is 1:01:42.760 --> 1:01:45.040 back in the days when they didn't acknowledge that lions 1:01:45.080 --> 1:01:47.440 had an effect on sheep, which in the last decade 1:01:47.480 --> 1:01:50.440 they have certainly come light years around on that. But 1:01:50.520 --> 1:01:55.280 even today we have the Derringers are just world class 1:01:55.320 --> 1:01:58.280 line hunters here in Arizona are working on the air 1:01:58.440 --> 1:02:01.440 Viper sheeper to preserve it. Another man, Jim Bedlin, has 1:02:01.480 --> 1:02:03.280 done a lot of work. Steve Smith done a lot 1:02:03.280 --> 1:02:06.000 of work and Unit twenty two here to bring that 1:02:06.120 --> 1:02:08.320 those sheet that Jay send to take pressure off of 1:02:08.760 --> 1:02:11.640 remove that remove as much pressure as they could. Typically 1:02:11.640 --> 1:02:13.560 they remove the females or what you need to get 1:02:13.560 --> 1:02:15.600 out of there to get a sheet population to come back. 1:02:16.000 --> 1:02:18.520 There's no girls. The boys don't show up for the party, 1:02:19.400 --> 1:02:21.040 and the and the females when they set up and 1:02:21.080 --> 1:02:24.560 teach those kittens to kill those sheep. They're just devastating. 1:02:25.240 --> 1:02:27.320 I know. The guys in Nevada, Jim Bueler and Casey 1:02:27.520 --> 1:02:29.520 Shields are both were just working on the salmon or 1:02:29.560 --> 1:02:33.680 ever on the rockies removing lions there this last week. 1:02:33.760 --> 1:02:36.200 So that's been for what kind of stuff. Their egg 1:02:36.280 --> 1:02:39.080 purposes or for wildlife purpose. The wildlife purpose, that's all 1:02:39.160 --> 1:02:42.320 wildlife stuff. That's one thing you really lose is well, 1:02:43.040 --> 1:02:46.320 it's very expensive to keep professional lions hunters in business, 1:02:46.440 --> 1:02:49.360 and we'll always have them as long as we have lines. 1:02:49.440 --> 1:02:53.200 I mean, California they banned sport sport hunting of lions, 1:02:53.240 --> 1:02:55.280 and I think they were killing three or four lions 1:02:55.280 --> 1:02:56.800 a year, and now they kill three or four iron 1:02:56.800 --> 1:02:58.680 and do the same thing, except we pay to do 1:02:59.240 --> 1:03:02.960 and is that right? Yeah, yeah, the harvest of lions 1:03:02.960 --> 1:03:05.960 has never gone down in California. Just illegal to do 1:03:06.000 --> 1:03:09.760 it from a sports standpoint now, but from the agriculture 1:03:09.760 --> 1:03:12.040 of standpoint, you know, you just if you're gonna have 1:03:12.480 --> 1:03:15.160 I'm gonna feed this nation, you have to keep predators 1:03:15.160 --> 1:03:19.120 from meeting the sheep and the cattle. Any idea what 1:03:19.200 --> 1:03:22.560 it costs you think to keep to kill three four 1:03:23.120 --> 1:03:25.760 lions in California? No, I mean, I don't know off 1:03:25.760 --> 1:03:27.280 top of my head, but it's you know, it's it's 1:03:27.280 --> 1:03:30.480 a government agency that's functioning, and you can imagine the 1:03:30.520 --> 1:03:32.520 expense of that. But we'd have them anyway. They deal 1:03:32.560 --> 1:03:34.560 with a lot of other things. They deal with everything 1:03:34.680 --> 1:03:38.880 from the you know, controlling the waterfowl around airports so 1:03:38.960 --> 1:03:41.520 we can take off a lander airplane. Yeah, you know, 1:03:42.040 --> 1:03:45.320 deer on the runways at the military bases. And you know, 1:03:45.520 --> 1:03:49.120 because something must have shifted in California though, because you 1:03:49.200 --> 1:03:52.600 hear about that that like that the number of cats 1:03:52.640 --> 1:03:56.800 their lions are removing through predator control. But then on 1:03:56.800 --> 1:03:58.720 the other hand, you hear so many stories about just 1:03:58.760 --> 1:04:02.480 like the shifting nature of the lion population in California 1:04:03.120 --> 1:04:05.800 and lions popping up in places they hadn't popped up 1:04:05.800 --> 1:04:09.360 in before, guys losing more livestock lines than the used dude, 1:04:09.360 --> 1:04:12.120 so something must be It must not be that they 1:04:12.120 --> 1:04:14.040 were going to kill x number and now they're killing 1:04:15.280 --> 1:04:18.680 the same number. Anyways, there you probably wouldn't have these issues. No, 1:04:18.880 --> 1:04:23.520 and it's always hard to track lion actual lion harvest numbers. 1:04:23.560 --> 1:04:26.960 But one thing that when you are hunting a lion population, 1:04:28.040 --> 1:04:30.240 you know, it's especially even if guys are catching them 1:04:30.240 --> 1:04:32.160 and turn them loose. Those lions have a tendency to 1:04:32.200 --> 1:04:36.520 avoid people. And these big males christs was I mean, 1:04:36.600 --> 1:04:38.320 I think back to years was probably the worst, one 1:04:38.360 --> 1:04:40.520 of the worst I can remember. But we can't oneed 1:04:40.560 --> 1:04:43.000 in Mexico last year. That absolutely and I can tell 1:04:43.040 --> 1:04:45.040 when I come up to them whether they're going to 1:04:45.080 --> 1:04:46.960 be a problem or not. But some of those lions, 1:04:47.240 --> 1:04:49.880 they're king of the woods, those big males, they don't 1:04:49.920 --> 1:04:52.160 wonder if they can kill you. And and when you 1:04:52.160 --> 1:04:54.320 get a line like that wandering around in some place 1:04:54.400 --> 1:04:56.439 with children or people that are jogging and not paying 1:04:56.480 --> 1:04:59.080 attention if it decides to kill, I think the only 1:04:59.120 --> 1:05:01.840 reason they don't kill more people is at a their 1:05:01.920 --> 1:05:04.960 upright and they don't correlate that with their normal method 1:05:04.960 --> 1:05:08.320 of taking prey. And we probably taste bad, you know, 1:05:08.360 --> 1:05:10.160 I mean in comparison to say a deer or something 1:05:10.200 --> 1:05:13.360 they're accustomed to eating. But we've certainly lost people, I mean, 1:05:13.360 --> 1:05:15.240 and every year, you know, Colorado seems to be having 1:05:15.320 --> 1:05:19.600 more more interaction than anybody these days. The female joggers 1:05:20.120 --> 1:05:23.120 and an adult and then uh young kids. It seems 1:05:23.160 --> 1:05:26.000 like so it's like something, it is like there's some 1:05:26.080 --> 1:05:27.880 kind of like visual thing and often like the thing 1:05:27.880 --> 1:05:30.080 with like people running. Well, I think the reaction of 1:05:30.120 --> 1:05:33.120 those two types of people are where a man may 1:05:33.160 --> 1:05:36.200 stand this ground or at least not at least think 1:05:36.320 --> 1:05:39.480 not to just turn and run children. It's hard to 1:05:39.520 --> 1:05:42.800 convey that to them. You know, they're just probably they're 1:05:42.840 --> 1:05:45.560 scared and they're gonna run. And even if the cat wasn't, 1:05:45.600 --> 1:05:48.400 cats are very instinctive. If they're just like housecats. Lions 1:05:48.440 --> 1:05:51.640 are overgrown, great big version of a house cat, and 1:05:51.680 --> 1:05:54.880 if something runs from it, they just go into that 1:05:54.920 --> 1:05:59.160 predatory mode. Well, in fact, like how many lions there are, 1:05:59.360 --> 1:06:02.000 it's kind of shocking, and like how many there are, 1:06:02.360 --> 1:06:05.800 and that they have the capability to kill people, it's shocking. 1:06:05.960 --> 1:06:08.280 It just doesn't happen. It doesn't happen more. And I 1:06:08.360 --> 1:06:10.360 always tell people, you don't here in Arizona used to 1:06:10.400 --> 1:06:12.439 be typical for people to hunt a lifetime and see 1:06:12.520 --> 1:06:16.600 a lion. Now, with everybody doing so much more optics hunting, 1:06:16.600 --> 1:06:18.520 they tend to see a lot more with the optics 1:06:18.520 --> 1:06:20.880 than they used to. But I always told people, I said, 1:06:20.880 --> 1:06:23.680 we don't ever wonder if once has seen you. You know, 1:06:23.680 --> 1:06:25.880 I don't know how many times we've ridden by where 1:06:25.880 --> 1:06:28.960 a lion was laid up and come back the next 1:06:29.040 --> 1:06:31.280 day and trailed it, you know, and realized that some 1:06:31.440 --> 1:06:33.640 of the gun was right there and all that, you know, 1:06:34.120 --> 1:06:36.280 let us ride by and maybe it was a sleep, 1:06:36.320 --> 1:06:37.920 maybe it was watching us, who knows, but it was 1:06:37.920 --> 1:06:39.600 five hundred yards up on the side of the mountain 1:06:39.640 --> 1:06:43.360 the bluffs watching us. Probably have to digress a little bit, 1:06:43.400 --> 1:06:45.760 but just at the point you were talking about with 1:06:46.800 --> 1:06:50.760 lion harvest and lighton lion predation, employd pointing this out 1:06:50.800 --> 1:06:54.360 to me, and I think it's it's genius in the process. 1:06:54.440 --> 1:06:58.400 The thought process is that you know, we're controlling we're 1:06:58.480 --> 1:07:03.720 hunting lions, but we don't control coyotes near as well 1:07:03.760 --> 1:07:05.600 as we used to with the banning of trapping in 1:07:05.640 --> 1:07:08.960 most states and the banning of poison in all states. 1:07:08.960 --> 1:07:10.880 So a lion goes out and a lion kills a 1:07:10.960 --> 1:07:13.400 deer an average, it needs an average of one deer 1:07:13.400 --> 1:07:16.160 a week. A lion goes out and kills a deer, well, 1:07:16.200 --> 1:07:18.960 now kyle populations out of control. The kylotes come along 1:07:18.960 --> 1:07:21.720 and find the kill, eat it before the lion can 1:07:21.800 --> 1:07:24.560 even get a belly full. Practically. Now, all of a sudden, 1:07:24.560 --> 1:07:27.080 that lines back hunting again. You know, so instead of 1:07:27.120 --> 1:07:29.760 killing one deer a week, he's hope maybe killing two 1:07:29.880 --> 1:07:32.280 or three just to meet his needs, you know, you know, 1:07:32.320 --> 1:07:34.960 so it's you know, a state like California and we're 1:07:35.040 --> 1:07:37.320 killing you used to kill three hundred with sport with 1:07:37.320 --> 1:07:39.840 sport hunting. Now we're killing three hundred with government hunters. 1:07:40.440 --> 1:07:43.400 But I gotta believe if if we were controlling kyo populations, 1:07:43.600 --> 1:07:46.600 that three hundred would be was a lot more significant 1:07:46.680 --> 1:07:50.080 number back then than it is now. Yeah, because the 1:07:50.120 --> 1:07:52.840 coyotes are just basically forcing a deer hunt every the 1:07:52.960 --> 1:07:55.720 lion hunt. Interesting since we've had that conversation, I saw 1:07:55.720 --> 1:07:58.240 a studied the other day where they've documented that with 1:07:58.280 --> 1:08:03.360 the wolves, the same scenario they're getting. They're grizzly steal there, 1:08:03.400 --> 1:08:06.720 that the wolves steal the lion kills, woolf steel lion kills, 1:08:07.760 --> 1:08:11.080 and they pirate him. Which you know, there's a lot 1:08:11.160 --> 1:08:12.840 of things going on that are always hard. It's a 1:08:12.920 --> 1:08:15.200 very dynamic process when you try and figure out how 1:08:15.240 --> 1:08:19.120 lions engage the prey species, but there's always a lot 1:08:19.200 --> 1:08:21.519 of moving parts to it. To the coyote deal is 1:08:21.560 --> 1:08:25.160 a real significant problem here. They've taken some steps here 1:08:25.200 --> 1:08:28.240 to try and manage them in certain places, but it's 1:08:28.280 --> 1:08:31.280 it's definitely where our phone crop was really really getting 1:08:31.880 --> 1:08:35.360 hammered here. Losing them to that there was a video 1:08:35.439 --> 1:08:37.760 clip that came out of Washington where a deer had 1:08:38.000 --> 1:08:43.479 was wearing a collar camera and um, you're you're they 1:08:43.479 --> 1:08:45.599 have the footage from this where because he's like it's 1:08:45.600 --> 1:08:48.439 just like sort of it's sort of like the cameras 1:08:48.479 --> 1:08:50.920 hanging down where like the tags on a dog would 1:08:50.960 --> 1:08:55.080 hang down, and you can see the deer. He's just browsing. 1:08:56.439 --> 1:08:59.679 And when a lion comes and kills it. The lion 1:08:59.760 --> 1:09:04.759 comes directly on that thing, doesn't come from behind, doesn't 1:09:04.840 --> 1:09:07.040 jump from a tree. It's just all of a sudden, 1:09:07.040 --> 1:09:11.800 there's a lion running directly at this deer. Wow, and 1:09:11.840 --> 1:09:15.240 that deer's just dead in seconds. Oh, they're they're extremely 1:09:15.280 --> 1:09:18.479 effective killing. But he just came like just at it, 1:09:19.160 --> 1:09:22.920 you know. And typically I would say that they kind 1:09:22.920 --> 1:09:24.760 of ride up on him from behind and try and 1:09:25.160 --> 1:09:27.280 you think when you think that that behind, you do it. 1:09:27.360 --> 1:09:28.840 This guy this is like all of a sudden, there 1:09:28.840 --> 1:09:32.720 he is hit on his head and you got the 1:09:32.720 --> 1:09:36.040 feeling he'd done it before, you know. And you know, 1:09:36.120 --> 1:09:39.679 some of those big males and and any lion, their 1:09:39.800 --> 1:09:45.200 strength pound for pounds is just unbelievable to me. I mean, 1:09:45.240 --> 1:09:48.400 I've seen him flip dogs distances with I'm not even 1:09:48.400 --> 1:09:51.120 sure I saw quite how the dog got slung so far. 1:09:51.720 --> 1:09:54.479 And their strength is amazing. And to watch him leap 1:09:54.560 --> 1:09:57.160 up onto some bluffs since they just explode and fly 1:09:57.320 --> 1:09:59.880 through the air to they were just if you like 1:10:00.080 --> 1:10:02.760 for back to the housecat. You know, you watch a housecat, 1:10:03.000 --> 1:10:05.320 it's nothing for him to leap up on the side 1:10:05.320 --> 1:10:07.599 of the any piece of furniture or anything they decided 1:10:07.640 --> 1:10:10.600 to until those lions are just you know tenfold that. 1:10:11.240 --> 1:10:14.799 Have you ever been scratched by line the No, I haven't. 1:10:16.040 --> 1:10:20.800 The although Joe got bit two years ago and uh 1:10:21.000 --> 1:10:24.880 that was a complete fiasco. Or girls had shot the 1:10:24.920 --> 1:10:27.680 lion with the thirty eight special and it came out 1:10:27.720 --> 1:10:31.840 of the tree and the dogs were small, and it was, 1:10:32.080 --> 1:10:34.320 you know, kind of the normal problem with the lion. 1:10:35.040 --> 1:10:36.960 When Joe stepped in there to try and grab one 1:10:37.000 --> 1:10:39.120 of his dogs, the lion got ahold of his jeans 1:10:40.160 --> 1:10:43.479 and just I mean one just jerked on him a 1:10:43.520 --> 1:10:45.400 little bit and can jerked his leg out from under 1:10:45.479 --> 1:10:47.840 him and then just bid him in the right here 1:10:47.840 --> 1:10:50.320 in the calf and then proceeded to just claw its 1:10:50.360 --> 1:10:53.080 way up him. And that was and I had a 1:10:53.120 --> 1:10:56.680 pretty big oakland that I always get a stick when 1:10:56.760 --> 1:10:59.400 it when't we're about to shoot one. Anyhow, I went 1:10:59.439 --> 1:11:01.240 to hitting that thing. I couldn't get it off of him, 1:11:01.280 --> 1:11:03.559 but when I hit it, it it would quit going up him. 1:11:03.560 --> 1:11:07.040 Other than it was bidding, only bidding really hard the 1:11:07.120 --> 1:11:11.679 one time. And I remember the last time I swung 1:11:11.720 --> 1:11:13.960 at that thing. I remember thinking, if I missed this line, 1:11:14.000 --> 1:11:17.120 I'll break his femer in half. And uh, And I 1:11:17.200 --> 1:11:18.960 hit the line in the head and it turned around, 1:11:19.000 --> 1:11:21.960 came after me, and I had a pistol too, So 1:11:22.040 --> 1:11:23.760 it was, you know, kind of the end of the 1:11:23.800 --> 1:11:27.920 story there, but it was it was a painful experience 1:11:27.960 --> 1:11:30.519 for him. And we had punched moles and you have 1:11:30.640 --> 1:11:34.240 to do a bunch of stables shots like I ain't 1:11:34.240 --> 1:11:36.720 had shots for that. You've met Joe, so you can have. 1:11:37.000 --> 1:11:38.280 I mean, it was all we could do to get 1:11:38.320 --> 1:11:41.960 him to take some man about auto. He was kind 1:11:42.000 --> 1:11:43.360 of thought I was kind of a cool deal. He 1:11:43.479 --> 1:11:48.120 bleeding all over the place at That's really the only 1:11:48.160 --> 1:11:51.920 one where I've been involved in and somebody getting hurt. 1:11:52.760 --> 1:11:56.600 You know. The first line I ever saw I was 1:11:56.720 --> 1:12:02.879 coming back from trout fish on this lake and I'm driving. 1:12:04.160 --> 1:12:06.920 It's just after dark, and I'm driving, like I know 1:12:06.960 --> 1:12:10.240 where a roads cut into a steep hillside and also 1:12:10.280 --> 1:12:16.560 on all these white tails are like coming down the 1:12:16.640 --> 1:12:19.280 grade and just like a cloud of dust and kind 1:12:19.320 --> 1:12:22.960 of like plopping down into the road in front of me, 1:12:23.080 --> 1:12:25.559 but like they're spooked rather than being spooked from me, 1:12:26.400 --> 1:12:31.360 they're spooking from something almost like running into my into 1:12:31.479 --> 1:12:35.559 my my van and the headlights and all. And then 1:12:35.560 --> 1:12:37.880 but then the road was so sheer on the side 1:12:38.880 --> 1:12:42.200 that they sort of shuffle trying to stay on the 1:12:42.320 --> 1:12:46.240 road without going over the ledge. They sort of shuffle 1:12:46.280 --> 1:12:53.559 along like right alongside the door of the vehicle, And 1:12:54.000 --> 1:12:58.200 I rolled my window down and put it in reverse 1:12:58.280 --> 1:13:00.559 to turn the rear lights on. I'm trying to see 1:13:02.000 --> 1:13:05.840 what they're doing. And I roll the one down, put 1:13:05.840 --> 1:13:08.720 the backup lights on, and standing just feet off my 1:13:08.760 --> 1:13:12.040 bumpers a lion standing there, Like I have no idea 1:13:12.120 --> 1:13:15.479 what I drove into or what the situation was as 1:13:15.520 --> 1:13:17.439 I came around the corner. And I would like tried 1:13:17.479 --> 1:13:19.040 like the piece it together in my head. There's no 1:13:19.080 --> 1:13:22.560 way to explain like how everyone got in the position 1:13:22.640 --> 1:13:25.080 they were in when I hit him with those lights. 1:13:26.200 --> 1:13:28.519 He probably did a double take. Yeah, I was like, 1:13:28.560 --> 1:13:34.360 he's like, oh man, now what like there's a van here? Yeah, 1:13:34.640 --> 1:13:36.720 probably thinking thank God for that. It was just the 1:13:36.800 --> 1:13:39.360 weird It was the weirdest thing, man, just like standing 1:13:39.400 --> 1:13:43.360 there in the backups like, yeah, like he's trying to 1:13:43.479 --> 1:13:47.680 kill one around me. So, now, if you've been on 1:13:47.840 --> 1:13:52.439 you you on lines in Arizona in New Mexico, Now, 1:13:53.560 --> 1:13:56.720 what prevents you from his taking your lion hunting operation 1:13:58.280 --> 1:14:03.840 in in going to the next frontier of lion hunting. Well, 1:14:03.880 --> 1:14:05.800 I think we're probably in it here. I think there's 1:14:05.840 --> 1:14:11.120 probably more opportunity. Nothing prevents you from doing it. You 1:14:11.120 --> 1:14:13.720 can travel and go. But you think that, like but 1:14:14.320 --> 1:14:16.040 you feel like this is still like a good for 1:14:16.160 --> 1:14:19.320 now even it was like a good place to be 1:14:19.360 --> 1:14:24.200 a lion hunter. Yes, it's not nearly as as good 1:14:24.240 --> 1:14:28.880 as it was five years ago or even ten years ago. 1:14:29.520 --> 1:14:32.120 Somewhere in there we peeked out and it's been declining 1:14:32.160 --> 1:14:36.000 ever since. But it's, uh, it's one of the greatest 1:14:36.000 --> 1:14:38.519 places there is because here we you know it. It 1:14:38.640 --> 1:14:43.519 snows in the high country every year consistently, but there's 1:14:43.560 --> 1:14:47.080 always lots of wilderness areas and pockets that these lions 1:14:47.160 --> 1:14:50.400 can move out of that so you have a constant 1:14:52.200 --> 1:14:55.920 regeneration of most areas. And with that said, this year 1:14:56.000 --> 1:14:59.040 is the first time we've seen places where there's no 1:14:59.280 --> 1:15:02.280 lions in certain spots. And that's you know, concerning to 1:15:02.280 --> 1:15:04.640 everybody that likes to hunt lions here in Arizona right now, 1:15:04.680 --> 1:15:06.360 where do you attribute that too? I mean, in the 1:15:06.479 --> 1:15:08.200 last five years, is not like there's been like a 1:15:08.280 --> 1:15:14.280 great you know, influx of lion hunters. Well, there's been more. 1:15:14.840 --> 1:15:17.519 Is there a people have got you know, there's every 1:15:17.600 --> 1:15:19.599 day here's somebody that's a lion hunter that I've never 1:15:19.640 --> 1:15:23.559 met and never heard of, whereas years ago I kind 1:15:23.560 --> 1:15:27.400 of knew everybody that that did it very much. And 1:15:27.439 --> 1:15:29.800 the biggest thing that I think is a factor now 1:15:29.920 --> 1:15:34.360 is the mechanization. When people used to have to ride 1:15:34.400 --> 1:15:37.280 mules and that was the primary way to do it, 1:15:37.280 --> 1:15:40.200 it was limitedd is limiting, limiting in itself that just 1:15:40.280 --> 1:15:42.680 to have the livestocks, and not everybody did it. But 1:15:42.720 --> 1:15:44.479 now with the four wheelers, I see a lot of 1:15:44.479 --> 1:15:47.960 guys that wouldn't be affected normally that are very very 1:15:48.000 --> 1:15:50.559 effective because they'll drive on their fore wheelers. Still they 1:15:50.600 --> 1:15:52.439 find a track just like they were hunting in the snow, 1:15:53.080 --> 1:15:56.080 and then they'll track in the dust, right in the dust, 1:15:56.160 --> 1:15:59.479 and that and that seems to have really increase the 1:15:59.520 --> 1:16:02.559 harvest of lions. And with that said, our lion harvest 1:16:02.640 --> 1:16:07.240 has not changed significantly. The Arizona has harvested between two 1:16:07.280 --> 1:16:11.360 and three hundred lions for you know, well over a decade. 1:16:12.479 --> 1:16:16.439 So something else is going on, that's yeah. And I'm 1:16:16.439 --> 1:16:18.240 not like like you're we're talking about her like something 1:16:18.280 --> 1:16:23.000 with like like the like a cycle with the with prey, 1:16:23.479 --> 1:16:25.160 you know, and our dear bird has been in a 1:16:25.240 --> 1:16:30.680 decline for a decade anyway, maybe two decades, and possibly 1:16:30.720 --> 1:16:33.200 everything is just reaching that point where the predators are 1:16:33.240 --> 1:16:38.080 following it. Um, it's just really hard to say. And 1:16:38.120 --> 1:16:40.000 this is, you know, the first time I've ever felt 1:16:40.040 --> 1:16:43.120 like our lion numbers were low and and it's and 1:16:43.160 --> 1:16:46.560 it's not I don't think that much. There's much that 1:16:46.880 --> 1:16:48.760 could be done to change it one way or the other, 1:16:48.760 --> 1:16:50.679 if you want to increase it or decrease it more. 1:16:51.240 --> 1:16:54.160 It's just a natural thing and a natural peaks and 1:16:54.240 --> 1:16:57.880 valleys of wildlife. What's the next favorite food after deer 1:16:58.160 --> 1:17:01.920 for amount lion not counting to nasty have a lina 1:17:02.000 --> 1:17:05.960 here it's number two. Yeah, um, it'd probably go deer. 1:17:06.040 --> 1:17:09.080 Calves have a lina. Uh you know in the spring 1:17:09.080 --> 1:17:11.200 around here they can just be deadly on the cat. 1:17:11.360 --> 1:17:13.360 When we were out, we found were one and killed 1:17:13.360 --> 1:17:16.719 a fox, well fox and the deer and didn't didn't 1:17:16.720 --> 1:17:18.880 found a dead deer. Yeah, didn't we find a calf 1:17:18.960 --> 1:17:22.080 killer one than old calf killed remember that, remember I 1:17:22.400 --> 1:17:24.599 want and just like ripped the fox up and that's 1:17:24.680 --> 1:17:27.680 kind of where you saw her. They've eating tortoises or turtles, right, 1:17:28.000 --> 1:17:33.280 turtles towards happened to be riding along with Matt Pearsh 1:17:33.439 --> 1:17:36.640 was conducting the study in in the hark harkwehlers and 1:17:36.720 --> 1:17:38.680 harko bars at the time. We were actually in the 1:17:38.680 --> 1:17:41.040 Walpie Mountains and rode up for a lion and killed 1:17:41.040 --> 1:17:44.120 a desert tortoise and actually left a scratch right there by. 1:17:44.160 --> 1:17:46.840 It broke the shell off of a bit, you know, 1:17:46.920 --> 1:17:48.719 down on the bust of the shell, and then probably 1:17:48.800 --> 1:17:51.360 jerked the turtle out through the hole and then actually 1:17:51.400 --> 1:17:53.880 scratched just like he killed a deer and left that 1:17:54.320 --> 1:17:58.519 and what was crazy was he pulled meat. It was 1:17:58.600 --> 1:18:01.360 just just a shell there. And Matt actually still I'm 1:18:01.360 --> 1:18:04.000 sure he still has the shell. What was interesting was 1:18:04.240 --> 1:18:07.320 we were writing that day discussing the fact that a biologist, 1:18:07.320 --> 1:18:09.920 a lady by the name of Jenny Cashman, had She 1:18:10.040 --> 1:18:11.720 was with the U of A at the time, and 1:18:11.800 --> 1:18:15.080 she had just finished doing the fecal elexantera. They collected 1:18:15.080 --> 1:18:17.679 a bunch of scots up and they were finding tortoise 1:18:18.280 --> 1:18:22.800 feed in there, okah and there. And Matt had asked 1:18:22.800 --> 1:18:24.559 me and said, do you think they eat us? They 1:18:24.600 --> 1:18:27.639 eat everything else? Like what all have you seen when 1:18:27.640 --> 1:18:29.719 you're tracking? And what all have you seen that they've killed. 1:18:32.560 --> 1:18:34.600 I can't think of anything that lives in Arizona that 1:18:34.640 --> 1:18:40.759 I haven't seen that they've killed, badgers, skunks, man, bears, eagles, 1:18:41.360 --> 1:18:46.840 they were cubs, you know, young bears, um elk, lots 1:18:46.840 --> 1:18:51.479 of sheep, mostly dear everything. I just cannot think of 1:18:51.520 --> 1:18:54.479 a species. Antelope. We had one. It was last year 1:18:54.520 --> 1:18:56.439 or the year before. I killed an antelope right up here. 1:18:56.640 --> 1:19:01.840 My sonset point and uh, they just they I think 1:19:01.840 --> 1:19:06.040 they can kill anything they want to. They just matter 1:19:06.080 --> 1:19:08.240 whether they decided to do it or not. He said, 1:19:08.240 --> 1:19:12.679 you have killed the eagles. Yep, and that was on 1:19:12.680 --> 1:19:15.559 one of their kills. Oh he came down was because 1:19:15.600 --> 1:19:17.800 onder like, wow, he caught what the eagles doing with 1:19:17.840 --> 1:19:20.360 the eagles is eating something? It was in me somehow 1:19:20.439 --> 1:19:23.080 the lion. Of course they birds, you know, cats catch 1:19:23.160 --> 1:19:26.840 birds all the time. I guess the line, you know, 1:19:26.840 --> 1:19:28.800 it was probably laying right there when that eagle was 1:19:28.920 --> 1:19:31.080 eating on it and just took him out too. Did 1:19:31.120 --> 1:19:33.439 he eat the eagles eat the breast out of it? 1:19:34.320 --> 1:19:38.680 Remember looking at that when we rode up, thinking that 1:19:39.120 --> 1:19:46.639 I didn't want to get any credit for that at all. Burrows, burrows, 1:19:46.680 --> 1:19:49.400 they eat the wild burrows. Yeah, you don't see that 1:19:49.479 --> 1:19:51.360 very often, but they'll kill these wild burrows once in 1:19:51.400 --> 1:19:55.760 a while. Yeah, not enough of them, but none of them. 1:19:56.120 --> 1:19:58.320 As we train lines to kill burrows, we can solve 1:19:58.360 --> 1:20:01.559 a lot of problems turn those loose. Yeah, man, that's 1:20:01.560 --> 1:20:04.800 the whole issue. For a future conversation that would be 1:20:05.120 --> 1:20:08.679 I would love to have that conversation on the borough 1:20:08.840 --> 1:20:11.800 just about yeah, let's do about it. We need to 1:20:11.960 --> 1:20:13.560 not have it when Julie's around. If we're going to 1:20:13.640 --> 1:20:18.160 transfer it to the wild horse population. I just refuse 1:20:19.160 --> 1:20:22.439 to like, like, I don't like the argument of people 1:20:22.439 --> 1:20:24.599 who say they should be treated like a native animal 1:20:25.600 --> 1:20:29.840 because like somehow doing like the EO scene, they were 1:20:29.960 --> 1:20:33.160 here and then you know, like millions of years ago 1:20:33.479 --> 1:20:37.360 or that that because the Spanish brought them here, they 1:20:37.360 --> 1:20:40.000 should be treated as a native species. The Spanish brought pigs. 1:20:40.640 --> 1:20:44.400 They're fairal livestock the end of the day, they're faral livestock. 1:20:44.479 --> 1:20:47.160 And these horse lovers can make all the arguments they 1:20:47.200 --> 1:20:50.479 want to about that, but they're non native species in 1:20:50.520 --> 1:20:52.960 a fair and fairal livestock. And how we have the 1:20:53.000 --> 1:20:56.200 Wild Horse and Burrow Act boggles my mind and it 1:20:56.360 --> 1:20:59.519 is a you know, it's devastating the habitat. That's what 1:20:59.560 --> 1:21:02.439 I would think. I was thinking anytime you have a 1:21:02.520 --> 1:21:10.599 conflict between firal livestock in native wildlife, that that it's 1:21:10.600 --> 1:21:15.800 just I can't believe there's even a debate about which 1:21:15.840 --> 1:21:18.680 is gonna who's gonna take precedence. And even if you 1:21:18.680 --> 1:21:21.120 took the wildlife out of the scope of the damage 1:21:21.160 --> 1:21:24.000 that can be done through the overgrazing, the same people 1:21:24.040 --> 1:21:26.639 that want to run every cow off the land think 1:21:26.640 --> 1:21:30.000 it's okay, let the burrows and the horses destroy it. 1:21:32.360 --> 1:21:37.280 Next time, ladies and gentlemen, the Mediator Podcast, we're gonna 1:21:37.320 --> 1:21:39.400 take on the issue of wild burrow. You guys call 1:21:39.479 --> 1:21:44.680 them burrows. That's what the wild horse. We have burrows 1:21:44.720 --> 1:21:47.760 here too. Donkeys like full on wild donkeys, yea. And 1:21:47.800 --> 1:21:49.720 they're probably worse than the worst. Oh, I didn't know 1:21:49.760 --> 1:21:54.920 about that. How many of them roam Arizona in the thousands. 1:21:56.800 --> 1:21:58.880 They're really bad and desert sheep country because they'll just 1:21:58.880 --> 1:22:01.720 get into a water hole and just own it. They 1:22:01.720 --> 1:22:04.240 won't let anything come and drink. Those just hang out 1:22:04.240 --> 1:22:07.200 there for days, anything that comes into it. When you 1:22:07.240 --> 1:22:09.640 said that, that that is automatically thought you meant like mustangs. 1:22:10.000 --> 1:22:13.400 We we we have more horses here now than we 1:22:13.439 --> 1:22:15.639 ever did due to the big fires that we had 1:22:16.000 --> 1:22:18.760 a lot of domestic horses got loose and a lot 1:22:19.000 --> 1:22:20.920 and then we had the economic downturn. A lot of 1:22:20.920 --> 1:22:24.479 people turned horses loose here, you know. But also the 1:22:24.640 --> 1:22:27.280 shut the one to shut down the horse slaughter facilities, 1:22:28.000 --> 1:22:30.080 you know, cause love I remember I was talking to 1:22:30.080 --> 1:22:33.559 a stock detective. I wrote a story about livestock thefts 1:22:33.560 --> 1:22:37.240 some years ago, and one of the stock detectives was 1:22:37.280 --> 1:22:42.800 saying that there used to be a horse theft problem 1:22:42.840 --> 1:22:45.800 and now we have the opposite problem where people are 1:22:45.800 --> 1:22:48.240 always waking up to find horses they do not want 1:22:49.960 --> 1:22:54.519 inside their fence for instead of trying to go get 1:22:54.520 --> 1:22:56.040 a horse, you'reways trying to go get rid of a 1:22:56.080 --> 1:22:59.600 horse place to put them. All right, thank you for 1:22:59.680 --> 1:23:04.880 tune in. We will solve the wild horse wild burrow 1:23:04.920 --> 1:23:07.760 dilemma next time on The Meat Eater podcast