WEBVTT - Ep. 912: Clay’s Ozark Bear Camp | 12 in '26 0:00:11.920 --> 0:00:15.280 I'm in the Ozarks today and tomorrow is the opening 0:00:15.360 --> 0:00:18.800 day of the Arkansas Bear season. It's like a holiday 0:00:18.840 --> 0:00:22.200 to me. We're gonna be competing against the white oak 0:00:22.200 --> 0:00:26.400 acrens to kill these bears. But the day before season today, 0:00:26.800 --> 0:00:35.760 we're gonna be making molasses with my friend Willard Belines. Hey, everybody, 0:00:36.000 --> 0:00:39.559 my name's Klay nukemb And what you just watched was 0:00:39.600 --> 0:00:44.479 the intro to our newest film called Ozark Bear Camp 0:00:44.760 --> 0:00:48.000 with Klay Neukam. It's the latest and Meat Eaters twelve 0:00:48.040 --> 0:00:52.440 and twenty six series brought to you by Moultrie and Onyx, 0:00:53.080 --> 0:00:58.800 And that little intro kind of warms my heart. I 0:00:58.880 --> 0:01:03.360 love the landscape odds. Willard Vilnes is kind of a 0:01:03.440 --> 0:01:06.880 legend around here, and it was a good film. So 0:01:07.080 --> 0:01:11.880 on on what we're doing right here is our companion 0:01:12.040 --> 0:01:15.400 series podcast where we're gonna go behind the scenes, answer 0:01:15.480 --> 0:01:18.040 viewer questions and talk to you about a bunch of 0:01:18.080 --> 0:01:21.679 stuff that we weren't able to talk about in the episode. 0:01:21.840 --> 0:01:27.000 And in this film, we head to my Arkansas Bear 0:01:27.040 --> 0:01:30.679 camp with my family, friends and a bunch of other people, 0:01:31.120 --> 0:01:34.520 and well, I guess everybody's family and friends. There were 0:01:34.600 --> 0:01:38.320 no non laws. Just a few people that came that 0:01:39.080 --> 0:01:42.360 just like completely, you know, are not my friends. That's 0:01:42.400 --> 0:01:45.720 not true, But we're gonna talk about that on this podcast. 0:01:45.840 --> 0:01:52.600 I'm joined today by my producer, Hero Mustache, icon Fly 0:01:52.720 --> 0:01:57.160 Fishing Sage, and best friend a guy could ever ask for, 0:01:57.480 --> 0:01:59.280 Josh Landbridge, Spillmaker. 0:02:00.760 --> 0:02:02.840 Very kind of you to write that. Wow, that was Yeah, 0:02:02.880 --> 0:02:06.240 that was touching. Speaking of warm and heart. 0:02:06.320 --> 0:02:09.000 You were at you were beyond this film. I was 0:02:09.440 --> 0:02:12.240 you showed up a couple of times in the film. Ye, 0:02:12.720 --> 0:02:15.280 So well, let's we're excited. 0:02:15.280 --> 0:02:19.200 Man. This the the this film has tons of bear 0:02:19.280 --> 0:02:22.120 hunting in it. You know, it's it's kind of a. 0:02:22.000 --> 0:02:25.440 Iconic and a lot of bear hunt hunting exactly, not 0:02:25.560 --> 0:02:27.800 so not a lot of bear skinning or. 0:02:28.360 --> 0:02:31.639 Yeah, but the you know this, this region where we're 0:02:31.680 --> 0:02:34.640 hunting is kind of iconic for bear grease especially. You know, 0:02:34.720 --> 0:02:38.200 this would be kind of your home, you know, the 0:02:38.200 --> 0:02:40.600 the the Ozarks and the Washatas are kind of where 0:02:40.639 --> 0:02:44.920 you've cut your teeth hunting. And so, without further ado, 0:02:44.960 --> 0:02:48.280 we want to just dive right in. Like I said, 0:02:48.280 --> 0:02:51.000 there's lots of bear hunting in this film, but the 0:02:51.000 --> 0:02:54.880 film starts with a thing that happens to coincide with 0:02:54.919 --> 0:02:57.440 bear season, and that's the harvest of the sorghum. 0:02:58.680 --> 0:03:03.240 Yeah, this was really cool for me because the previous 0:03:03.360 --> 0:03:05.280 year was the first time that I would have made 0:03:05.360 --> 0:03:07.000 sorghum with Willard Blines and the. 0:03:07.000 --> 0:03:09.079 Whole you get into it. Let's actually watch a clip. 0:03:09.120 --> 0:03:12.560 We're gonna watch about a one about a one minute 0:03:12.560 --> 0:03:15.800 clip about the sorghum making. So my dad made Malaysious 0:03:15.800 --> 0:03:17.880 when I was a kid, so that's been about said 0:03:18.440 --> 0:03:19.280 some years ago. 0:03:19.720 --> 0:03:22.040 And then the lines when they came into this valley 0:03:22.919 --> 0:03:26.000 brought with them sorghum seed, and some of that same 0:03:26.120 --> 0:03:29.799 seed is the seed that you grow today, right, Yeah, 0:03:29.919 --> 0:03:32.920 just been handed down from generation to generation. So that 0:03:33.560 --> 0:03:36.720 mister Dole is putting in there and squeezing all that 0:03:36.880 --> 0:03:37.320 liquid o. 0:03:37.520 --> 0:03:39.080 Right, then you got to boil it down and it 0:03:39.080 --> 0:03:40.200 goes in from the lasius. 0:03:40.680 --> 0:03:44.800 The history is pretty remarkable, and in modern times, the 0:03:44.840 --> 0:03:48.600 timing of the sorghum harvest is coincided with bear season. 0:03:50.000 --> 0:03:52.440 When you're boiling something down like this, really you're just 0:03:52.600 --> 0:03:56.280 removing the water and just concentrating the sugar. I mean, 0:03:56.280 --> 0:04:12.320 that's really all it is. So with the molasses making 0:04:12.440 --> 0:04:15.760 finishing up, It's time to get down to brass tacks. 0:04:16.000 --> 0:04:19.080 We're hunting bears in less than twenty four hours, and 0:04:19.120 --> 0:04:22.880 we're gonna take today's skimmings to sweeten up my bait. Side. 0:04:24.800 --> 0:04:27.560 There you go. Just just a little clip, just a 0:04:27.600 --> 0:04:31.719 little clip from the sorghum making with it. 0:04:31.880 --> 0:04:34.960 Pretty It was pretty cool. The the year before was 0:04:35.000 --> 0:04:39.200 the first year that I'd ever made sorghum with Willard Villines, 0:04:39.720 --> 0:04:45.040 and it was it was right before bear season, and 0:04:45.160 --> 0:04:50.080 so I wanted to I'll tell you exactly what happened 0:04:50.600 --> 0:04:53.120 is the year before I was there with them, just 0:04:53.200 --> 0:04:55.600 a scene just like what you saw. And I made 0:04:55.640 --> 0:04:59.120 a little video on my phone, yep, And I put 0:04:59.120 --> 0:05:02.880 that video my Instagram and really didn't think that much 0:05:02.920 --> 0:05:06.120 about it. It was just a cool video showing the mule grasshopper, 0:05:06.720 --> 0:05:10.120 you know, you know, turning the mill. It showed the 0:05:10.160 --> 0:05:14.000 whole process in less than a minute. And that video 0:05:14.160 --> 0:05:20.000 got thirty million views on Instagram. Thirty point five million 0:05:20.080 --> 0:05:26.039 views on Instagram, and it just kind of cued me 0:05:26.160 --> 0:05:29.080 in that this is something that the world needs to 0:05:29.080 --> 0:05:31.560 see in more details. Right, This is a thirty second, 0:05:31.800 --> 0:05:36.640 maybe minute long clip, and so that's when I talked 0:05:36.680 --> 0:05:39.920 to Willard and said, hey, we're gonna bear hunt next 0:05:40.000 --> 0:05:43.560 year over here. Why and we're gonna have a crew here. 0:05:43.560 --> 0:05:47.080 Why don't we Why don't we film the full sequence 0:05:47.680 --> 0:05:50.160 of you making molasses? And I mean it was no 0:05:50.200 --> 0:05:52.160 sweat off his back. It's like, we're gonna be doing 0:05:52.200 --> 0:05:54.279 it anyway. It was a little bit of coordination with 0:05:54.440 --> 0:05:58.200 when to harvest the sorghum. 0:05:58.520 --> 0:06:00.520 Is that the is that like the optimal time? 0:06:01.640 --> 0:06:07.400 So yes, they it's they always harvest it in September 0:06:07.400 --> 0:06:10.480 and early October. Ok, So you couldn't you wouldn't have 0:06:10.520 --> 0:06:18.279 done it too much earlier. But but here anyway, mid 0:06:18.360 --> 0:06:20.320 to late September to early October. 0:06:20.400 --> 0:06:24.440 You know, it seems like in the harvest and production 0:06:24.920 --> 0:06:28.080 of the sorgum with the volons, like not a lot 0:06:28.120 --> 0:06:31.040 has changed. Is there anything that has changed since they 0:06:31.080 --> 0:06:33.520 started doing that a couple of generations back? I mean 0:06:33.600 --> 0:06:35.440 the way obviously they weren't lifting it with a track. 0:06:35.560 --> 0:06:38.680 So if you go to the store and buy a 0:06:38.880 --> 0:06:43.720 jar of sorghum molasses, most likely that was made in 0:06:43.839 --> 0:06:49.760 a modern mill. You know, they weren't using a mule 0:06:49.839 --> 0:06:52.440 to turn it. It was an electric mill somehow that 0:06:52.560 --> 0:06:56.880 you know, presses down the canes and makes the juice. 0:06:57.920 --> 0:07:01.320 The way that they're doing it is identical to the 0:07:01.320 --> 0:07:05.080 way it would have been done hundred years ago because 0:07:05.080 --> 0:07:09.800 that that mill that he has, the press is has 0:07:09.840 --> 0:07:13.560 been in his family for many years. They actually have 0:07:14.400 --> 0:07:18.120 one of the other brothers. So what's cool about the Blinds. 0:07:18.400 --> 0:07:22.240 Willard Blinds is one of ten children. 0:07:22.560 --> 0:07:23.560 And how old is Willard? 0:07:23.760 --> 0:07:29.200 Willard's seventy eight, and I don't get me talking about 0:07:29.240 --> 0:07:31.480 where he's at, but I want to say he's somewhere 0:07:31.480 --> 0:07:36.440 in the middle. So he he has some brothers that 0:07:36.480 --> 0:07:41.960 were older, and one of the brothers has the original 0:07:42.000 --> 0:07:47.240 mill that his father had had used the sorghum press. 0:07:47.800 --> 0:07:49.400 Am I saying the right word for that? 0:07:49.680 --> 0:07:55.120 I think mill seems right? So, but but that that 0:07:55.200 --> 0:07:56.760 might be a class it might be a press mill. 0:07:56.800 --> 0:07:59.640 Seems like it would be grinding, right. Yeah. 0:08:00.320 --> 0:08:03.160 So yeah, the way they're doing it is just the same. 0:08:03.200 --> 0:08:05.760 And it's really pretty simple, you know when you the 0:08:05.800 --> 0:08:07.400 first time I was there, I was like, man, this 0:08:07.440 --> 0:08:10.880 is a complicated process with a lot of stages. You 0:08:10.960 --> 0:08:15.120 just press the canes, get get the juice out, and 0:08:15.120 --> 0:08:17.160 then you just heat it and remove the water. Like 0:08:17.200 --> 0:08:21.320 there's no recipe, right, there's no, there's not, Like, well, 0:08:21.920 --> 0:08:24.280 at this moment, you have to do this. However, that 0:08:24.360 --> 0:08:28.680 makes it sound simple. When that fire is burning, Willard 0:08:29.000 --> 0:08:32.680 and those guys are watching it like a hawk because 0:08:32.720 --> 0:08:33.440 you can ruin it. 0:08:33.440 --> 0:08:36.200 It seems like the critical things would be like timing 0:08:36.600 --> 0:08:39.240 when it's done, you know, keeping it moving and making 0:08:39.280 --> 0:08:42.199 sure that fire doesn't get too hot or too low exactly. 0:08:42.280 --> 0:08:47.839 And they can tell you the taste difference in where 0:08:47.960 --> 0:08:52.840 sorgum's grown, even in their county, Like Willard'll be like, now, 0:08:52.840 --> 0:08:55.880 this cane came from here, and it tastes a little 0:08:55.920 --> 0:08:58.400 bit sweeter than the cane that came from up on 0:08:58.440 --> 0:08:58.920 the mountain. 0:08:59.640 --> 0:09:02.280 So this is this something that happens regionally, Like are 0:09:02.320 --> 0:09:03.760 there other families in that area that. 0:09:03.760 --> 0:09:07.560 Are Yeah, I'd say there's quite a few that, not 0:09:07.679 --> 0:09:11.720 quite a few. There are others that make sorghum just 0:09:11.840 --> 0:09:13.600 this same way, not a lot. 0:09:13.679 --> 0:09:15.720 I wonder if they have like a sorghum off, like 0:09:15.760 --> 0:09:17.080 whoever makes the best sort. 0:09:17.240 --> 0:09:21.359 Oh, it would be contest, highly highly contested. 0:09:21.440 --> 0:09:23.079 I wouldn't want to judge it. I wouldn't want to 0:09:23.160 --> 0:09:23.520 judge it. 0:09:23.600 --> 0:09:28.520 Yes, but if you haven't had sorghum, it's an interesting product. 0:09:28.760 --> 0:09:32.840 It's it's sweet. You could use it like syrup, yeah, 0:09:33.320 --> 0:09:36.280 but it's uh, it's kind of got. It's got a 0:09:36.360 --> 0:09:39.120 very unique taste that if you didn't grow up with it, 0:09:39.160 --> 0:09:41.440 you might be like, you know, it might kind of 0:09:41.480 --> 0:09:45.120 catch you off guard. I grew up eating sorghum glasses. 0:09:45.120 --> 0:09:48.520 My grandfather he treated it like it was like we 0:09:48.640 --> 0:09:51.240 got to go out and have ice cream. I mean 0:09:51.280 --> 0:09:54.360 it was like, hey, you want some sorghum, you know, 0:09:54.440 --> 0:09:56.720 I mean like it was really something special. And what 0:09:56.800 --> 0:09:59.200 he would do is he would pour. He would take 0:09:59.240 --> 0:10:01.360 a butter knife and pour it out of the jar, 0:10:01.600 --> 0:10:07.080 and he could very strategically. You know, it drips. It's 0:10:07.120 --> 0:10:11.240 like thicker than syrup. It's more like honey. It's it's 0:10:10.840 --> 0:10:14.400 like a thinner honey. And so when it's poured out, 0:10:14.720 --> 0:10:16.760 if you just tip the jar back up, it gets 0:10:16.840 --> 0:10:19.520 all over the side of the jar. And so at 0:10:19.760 --> 0:10:21.560 just the right time when you're tipping it back up, 0:10:21.640 --> 0:10:25.600 you zoom the knife across and keep the jar clean, 0:10:26.000 --> 0:10:29.120 and you'd have a little doll up about as big 0:10:29.120 --> 0:10:31.600 as a silver dollar, about a you know, less than 0:10:31.640 --> 0:10:34.679 a quarter inch high. Then he would take a piece 0:10:34.679 --> 0:10:37.400 of butter, a square of butter, and put it in 0:10:37.440 --> 0:10:40.480 there and mash it up with the sorghum and put 0:10:40.520 --> 0:10:42.760 that on biscuits. That's what he did, and it was 0:10:43.360 --> 0:10:46.880 hungry man back in the day before the commercialization of 0:10:47.280 --> 0:10:50.400 sugar and candy. And how much access that the everyday 0:10:50.400 --> 0:10:53.720 American has to sugar, which is bizarre, and you should 0:10:53.800 --> 0:10:56.840 be very concerned with how much sugar you eat. I mean, 0:10:57.320 --> 0:11:01.839 wildly bizarre that of the people watching this video. I mean, 0:11:02.120 --> 0:11:04.480 what are the statistics of how much sugar the average 0:11:04.480 --> 0:11:07.520 American me eats. I mean it's like like fifty pounds 0:11:07.559 --> 0:11:08.800 of sugar or something. 0:11:08.720 --> 0:11:12.760 Yeast at least if you drink so it's insane. You 0:11:12.800 --> 0:11:16.120 should be very very which camera does. You should be 0:11:16.320 --> 0:11:21.040 very concerned about this. But back in the day, to 0:11:21.160 --> 0:11:25.280 have sorghum, which was sweet, was like a treat. It's interesting, 0:11:25.360 --> 0:11:27.000 this olden sugar. 0:11:26.679 --> 0:11:29.960 In your every day in your everyday consumption. 0:11:29.679 --> 0:11:32.960 That's right, And it's it's kind of interesting because when 0:11:33.080 --> 0:11:35.920 I would do this same thing with my kids, Hey, 0:11:35.960 --> 0:11:38.760 you want some sorghum? I mean, I'm ashamed to say 0:11:38.800 --> 0:11:43.080 that they were kind of kind of unimpressed. You know, yeah, 0:11:43.600 --> 0:11:46.520 but kids these now, my kids don't eat that much 0:11:46.520 --> 0:11:50.840 sugar Bear Nukeum No, bar Nukem is like almost sugar free. 0:11:51.040 --> 0:11:51.520 Yeah. 0:11:51.600 --> 0:11:52.600 And he's also like a. 0:11:52.600 --> 0:11:54.960 Lean mean, he's like two percent body fat. 0:11:55.080 --> 0:11:58.640 Yeah. So no, that kind of stuff is really special 0:11:58.679 --> 0:12:00.400 to me to be able to document it. And what 0:12:00.720 --> 0:12:04.240 is most special, and this is what you get behind 0:12:04.280 --> 0:12:06.480 the scenes, is I wanted to do that for Willard 0:12:06.520 --> 0:12:10.839 and his family, right because Willard's his family's been doing this, 0:12:11.240 --> 0:12:14.480 and I mean, all they would have would just be 0:12:14.600 --> 0:12:17.839 some cell phone videos in modern times and then some 0:12:18.080 --> 0:12:22.920 just you know, a handful of photographs from years ago. 0:12:23.360 --> 0:12:26.080 And so it was pretty cool to have the mediator 0:12:26.200 --> 0:12:31.280 crew there to document it so well. And you know, 0:12:31.320 --> 0:12:33.400 it's about a ten minute clip, so it's not like 0:12:33.440 --> 0:12:34.439 it was exhaustive. 0:12:34.880 --> 0:12:38.920 So that, you know, a couple of questions. First, you 0:12:38.960 --> 0:12:41.080 know that same seed has been passed down for the 0:12:41.360 --> 0:12:46.760 through the generations. Why does that matter? Clay good Sorgum 0:12:47.120 --> 0:12:49.079 good Sorgum, No. 0:12:49.240 --> 0:12:52.320 It's just I think it's just a connection to the past. 0:12:52.480 --> 0:12:56.680 Like the human life is deceptive. It feels like people 0:12:56.720 --> 0:12:59.960 from the eighteen hundreds, third and fourth great grandfathers were 0:13:00.640 --> 0:13:04.840 a long ways away, but they really weren't. And you know, 0:13:05.080 --> 0:13:08.080 by Willard holding that seed and planting it in the 0:13:08.080 --> 0:13:11.839 ground and knowing that his ancestors, you know, you could 0:13:11.880 --> 0:13:13.960 track it back and grew that seed. I think it 0:13:14.000 --> 0:13:18.880 just connects you to the past and to the the 0:13:20.080 --> 0:13:25.040 just just the the heritage of the region, and it's 0:13:25.080 --> 0:13:28.400 it's just unique. I mean, there's there's nothing that I 0:13:28.440 --> 0:13:32.240 could that I have that I could touch that. I 0:13:32.240 --> 0:13:36.520 mean my great grandfather's shotgun, which I've got over there 0:13:36.760 --> 0:13:40.800 like very little. And you know, when you think about history, 0:13:40.800 --> 0:13:44.080 which I talk a lot about history, and you might 0:13:44.160 --> 0:13:47.400 think that I was hyper nostalgic in the way that 0:13:47.440 --> 0:13:50.640 I think about even my life, and I'm not sure 0:13:50.679 --> 0:13:54.000 that I am. Because the past is interesting. There's a 0:13:54.000 --> 0:13:56.720 lot of the past that we should forget and even 0:13:57.200 --> 0:14:00.000 reject and move past in our own personal lives and 0:14:00.800 --> 0:14:04.080 even in our family's history. Like but it's but the 0:14:04.200 --> 0:14:08.839 knowledge of some of this stuff is powerful. That's more 0:14:08.880 --> 0:14:13.640 a statement of like general understanding of like why the history, 0:14:14.480 --> 0:14:18.040 because I think there's there's probably a can be an 0:14:18.400 --> 0:14:22.800 unhealthy attachment to the past yeah, and this is not that. 0:14:22.880 --> 0:14:25.960 This is a celebration of heritage and a connection to 0:14:26.200 --> 0:14:29.440 a family legacy and uh and over in this part 0:14:29.440 --> 0:14:32.680 of the world, in Newton County and kind of the 0:14:32.720 --> 0:14:36.880 central Ozarks, the name Vlins. There are hundreds of Voliines 0:14:37.240 --> 0:14:41.120 because the guys that brought that sorghum seed. I want 0:14:41.160 --> 0:14:47.360 to say, Willard told me that Abraham Beliines had eighteen children. Wow, 0:14:47.880 --> 0:14:51.560 and they're all still over there and they're they're a 0:14:51.600 --> 0:14:54.800 wonderful family. There are a lot of lot I know, 0:14:54.840 --> 0:14:56.200 a lot of violins over there. 0:14:56.360 --> 0:15:00.600 One last question, and it's kind of a philosophic question, 0:15:00.640 --> 0:15:05.240 would be, oh, another one, what what does Willard represent 0:15:05.280 --> 0:15:08.080 about the Ozarks that you wanted the viewers to appreciate 0:15:08.360 --> 0:15:11.360 m by starting? I mean, you started this film off 0:15:11.400 --> 0:15:14.040 with that. What what is what is it about him 0:15:14.080 --> 0:15:15.440 that you want to us see? 0:15:15.480 --> 0:15:22.720 He's just there are people that are he just has 0:15:22.760 --> 0:15:25.000 such a connection to the Ozarks. He's just a real 0:15:25.120 --> 0:15:29.160 deal Ozarky and like he's not trying to be anything. 0:15:29.720 --> 0:15:31.640 He just is what he is. 0:15:31.680 --> 0:15:34.000 He didn't put those overalls and had on because he 0:15:34.160 --> 0:15:35.680 was going to be on film. 0:15:35.960 --> 0:15:39.880 He may have just a little but but but he 0:15:39.960 --> 0:15:43.080 wears those all the time. I mean, you know, there's 0:15:43.120 --> 0:15:46.760 actually a part of history in all these places that 0:15:46.840 --> 0:15:51.320 we we reflect back to our past and are influenced 0:15:51.320 --> 0:15:54.480 by me wearing these overalls right here. I mean it's like, yeah, 0:15:54.520 --> 0:15:56.240 it's a it's a hat tip to the past, and 0:15:56.280 --> 0:15:59.240 I think people still do that today. But but Willard's 0:15:59.240 --> 0:16:01.280 the real deal. He's a he's a mule man, he's 0:16:01.280 --> 0:16:06.360 a hunter. He's just a well respected guy over there. 0:16:06.480 --> 0:16:10.160 Love it, they yeah, yeah, great guy. Okay, let's we 0:16:10.280 --> 0:16:12.400 got another another clip here. Let's go ahead and watch it. 0:16:16.000 --> 0:16:18.720 Bears right now are going into what they call hyperphagia, 0:16:19.160 --> 0:16:25.240 which is a physiological state of incredible increase in metabolism. 0:16:25.400 --> 0:16:30.160 So a bear fell off five to eight thousand calories 0:16:30.160 --> 0:16:32.640 a day in the fall, they can eat twenty thousand 0:16:32.640 --> 0:16:36.800 calories a day. So when you're baiting, you're capitalizing on 0:16:37.240 --> 0:16:44.239 a natural process inside of a bear. We're using pop tarts, 0:16:44.600 --> 0:16:49.400 corn sorghum, molasses, skimmons. We got in a little later 0:16:49.480 --> 0:16:53.640 than we wanted, so it was a quick drop over 0:16:53.680 --> 0:16:56.400 the bait. We filled up the bait barrels. The last 0:16:56.400 --> 0:16:58.520 thing we want to do is spook bears the night 0:16:58.560 --> 0:17:03.760 before the hunt. Everybody's here for the season opener and 0:17:03.800 --> 0:17:06.760 we're having a big time. Much of my hunting is 0:17:06.840 --> 0:17:11.280 primarily solo, but our bear camp is always full of people, 0:17:11.680 --> 0:17:15.040 and that's something that I love. I always got to 0:17:15.040 --> 0:17:17.960 give like the State of the Union, the State of 0:17:18.040 --> 0:17:22.879 the Bear Union. I have pretty good news. Like I 0:17:22.880 --> 0:17:29.760 would say that the bear the bear situation is average 0:17:29.800 --> 0:17:31.320 to slightly below average. 0:17:34.960 --> 0:17:38.439 So tell us, uh, tell us a little bit about 0:17:38.680 --> 0:17:41.640 you know, you typically have a bear camp every year. 0:17:42.560 --> 0:17:45.199 Tell us what made this bear camp different than than 0:17:45.240 --> 0:17:46.560 bear camps in the past. 0:17:47.400 --> 0:17:52.000 Well, it was fun to have Lake Pickle Jordan Bliss 0:17:52.119 --> 0:17:56.920 it there. They were both new bear hunters, had never 0:17:57.880 --> 0:18:00.720 bear hunted before, so it was cool to get to 0:18:00.760 --> 0:18:03.480 introduce them to it. We were actually in a new 0:18:03.520 --> 0:18:07.560 spot that I hadn't hunted for. We were in we 0:18:07.560 --> 0:18:12.600 were in a new spot and uhs and my buddy 0:18:13.119 --> 0:18:18.960 Justin House was there. James Lawrence came up, who's in? Yes? 0:18:20.000 --> 0:18:24.760 And uh there was another interesting guest at our bear 0:18:24.840 --> 0:18:28.720 camp this year. Ted Copple was there as in the 0:18:29.080 --> 0:18:33.680 as in the real Copple that interviewed Richard Nixon. Ted Copple. 0:18:34.520 --> 0:18:37.760 You actually see Ted Copple in the last clip of 0:18:37.800 --> 0:18:41.280 the film sitting by our fire. He's he's wearing all 0:18:41.320 --> 0:18:43.760 black and he's kind of sitting in the back and 0:18:43.800 --> 0:18:47.560 we're playing music and it's the lights are on and 0:18:48.240 --> 0:18:50.240 you actually can see Ted Copple. 0:18:50.200 --> 0:18:52.240 So he had come to do so. 0:18:52.680 --> 0:18:55.080 Yeah, what you wouldn't have known from watching the film 0:18:55.359 --> 0:19:00.200 is that CBS Good Morning, Sunday Morning, Sunday, CBS Sunday 0:19:01.280 --> 0:19:04.040 came to our bear camp and we're there for basically 0:19:04.119 --> 0:19:07.399 two of the five days. There were people there. I 0:19:07.400 --> 0:19:09.960 guess there were people there for parts of three of 0:19:10.119 --> 0:19:13.520 five days. They came in on the evening. Ted was 0:19:13.560 --> 0:19:16.520 there all day one of the days, but the guys 0:19:16.520 --> 0:19:19.080 were still there the next day for portion of the day, 0:19:19.119 --> 0:19:23.040 if I recall. Yeah, and they did a spot on 0:19:23.119 --> 0:19:28.600 CBS Sunday Morning, and so Ted interviewed many of us. 0:19:28.800 --> 0:19:32.800 We rendered bear fat. Aside from what you saw, we 0:19:32.840 --> 0:19:38.240 rendered bear fat for CBS Sunday Morning, and he just 0:19:38.280 --> 0:19:39.639 hung out with us. 0:19:41.320 --> 0:19:43.560 I have to say that compared to some of the 0:19:43.560 --> 0:19:45.840 bear camps of the past, which have been awesome, this 0:19:45.880 --> 0:19:47.080 one was a little boogie or two. 0:19:47.119 --> 0:19:49.119 We had a pretty stayed in a really nice cabin. 0:19:49.480 --> 0:19:50.560 We did that was unusual. 0:19:50.640 --> 0:19:51.320 It spoiled there. 0:19:51.359 --> 0:19:53.440 We kind of had to do that because we had 0:19:53.800 --> 0:19:57.560 so many people there and because we had Ted Coppola's 0:19:57.680 --> 0:20:03.680 crew coming and so so we on the Bear Grease 0:20:03.760 --> 0:20:07.840 podcast spoke about when Ted Copple came. He was he 0:20:08.000 --> 0:20:13.159 was a he's eighty five, eighty five years old, younger 0:20:13.200 --> 0:20:18.200 and you don't wreckon anybody. I would say thirty five 0:20:18.240 --> 0:20:20.359 and older would know who Ted Copple was. Was one 0:20:20.440 --> 0:20:24.080 of the most famous, well known faces in America for 0:20:24.240 --> 0:20:28.120 probably twenty five years as a as a broadcast anchor 0:20:28.200 --> 0:20:29.679 for CBS. 0:20:29.880 --> 0:20:30.280 Yeah. 0:20:30.680 --> 0:20:36.280 So yeah, back in the day, kids, there were when 0:20:36.480 --> 0:20:39.679 there was just television. That's you had television and books 0:20:39.680 --> 0:20:43.800 and radio. That's all. You had no cell phones. People 0:20:43.880 --> 0:20:45.200 watched television. 0:20:44.760 --> 0:20:46.760 And Ted Copple was a household name. 0:20:46.640 --> 0:20:48.439 And there were there would have been like three or 0:20:48.480 --> 0:20:53.520 four major networks, and the anchors for the nightly news 0:20:53.600 --> 0:20:58.200 on those those stations were as famous as the president. 0:20:59.560 --> 0:21:02.160 And so Ted Copple was one of those guys. 0:21:02.160 --> 0:21:04.480 He was on Nightline for years. 0:21:04.440 --> 0:21:07.840 Yes, many years, and he was a delightful man. 0:21:07.960 --> 0:21:11.960 He was it honestly surprised me how endearing he I mean, 0:21:12.040 --> 0:21:14.240 just like personable. 0:21:13.760 --> 0:21:18.640 Humble, set with us and just talked. He singled out 0:21:19.600 --> 0:21:26.360 almost everyone in our camp and had fairly in depth conversations, 0:21:26.400 --> 0:21:29.760 personal conversation. When I realized what he was doing was 0:21:31.440 --> 0:21:34.880 Justin House, who can just kind of be a fly 0:21:35.000 --> 0:21:40.199 on the wall at times, was there and there was 0:21:40.240 --> 0:21:42.080 a little bit of a lult. We're in a big group. 0:21:42.520 --> 0:21:44.800 This is after he'd been there for hours, and he 0:21:45.400 --> 0:21:48.360 looked at Justin and he said, Justin, tell me what 0:21:48.400 --> 0:21:51.960 you do. And it was clear that he was trying 0:21:52.000 --> 0:21:56.400 to connect with everybody there. And you know, one time 0:21:56.400 --> 0:21:58.199 I came around a corner and he and Brent were 0:21:58.240 --> 0:22:01.359 sitting over in a chair, just chatting away, no telling 0:22:01.440 --> 0:22:02.320 what Brent was telling him. 0:22:02.359 --> 0:22:04.880 When you guys were out hunting one afternoon, he sat 0:22:04.920 --> 0:22:07.960 down with with your mom and dad and Misty and 0:22:08.000 --> 0:22:10.920 I and I think just the four of us and 0:22:11.040 --> 0:22:13.680 just for hour and a half and just let us 0:22:13.720 --> 0:22:17.120 ask him questions about his career and his family and yeah, 0:22:17.280 --> 0:22:21.320 just really neat. Yeah, what is it about bear Camp 0:22:21.400 --> 0:22:22.679 that means so much to you? 0:22:23.400 --> 0:22:25.680 So most of my hunting, I said it in there, 0:22:25.760 --> 0:22:27.879 most most of My hunting is solo. Like most of 0:22:27.880 --> 0:22:31.520 my hunting, I wake up here at my house and 0:22:31.560 --> 0:22:33.439 you know, go deer hunting or go bear hunting. Then 0:22:33.440 --> 0:22:36.160 maybe somebody comes with me, but you know, I'm driving 0:22:36.200 --> 0:22:39.080 there and hunting for a day or two and coming back. 0:22:40.480 --> 0:22:44.879 Other times I'm leaving on the bigger hunts. To me, 0:22:46.000 --> 0:22:49.639 my hunting and probably most people's hunting can be segregated 0:22:49.680 --> 0:22:52.440 into two things. You're local hunting, but then you're if 0:22:52.480 --> 0:22:54.879 you travel, if you're so fortunate to get to travel 0:22:54.920 --> 0:22:57.520 to hunt, and many people do make one big trip 0:22:57.600 --> 0:23:01.040 hunting trip somewhere, right, you know, you travel. So when 0:23:01.040 --> 0:23:05.440 I travel, I'm usually with people, but it's not home 0:23:05.520 --> 0:23:11.000 and it's not with family. Bear camp is very communal, 0:23:11.400 --> 0:23:19.160 very focused on the camp. Very we're not honestly, we're 0:23:19.160 --> 0:23:23.359 not hunting that hard in terms of hunting. The work 0:23:23.400 --> 0:23:25.800 that goes into it is more than I do for 0:23:25.920 --> 0:23:30.240 anything else that I do, and that's that's hard to 0:23:30.320 --> 0:23:33.600 describe for some people. I mean it just you know, 0:23:33.840 --> 0:23:38.480 the work that goes into baiting bears is the most 0:23:38.480 --> 0:23:40.320 work that I do. Yeah, Like when I go to 0:23:40.640 --> 0:23:44.119 Alaska next month, I'm just going to like show up 0:23:44.160 --> 0:23:46.960 and I've never been there, and all of my energy 0:23:47.000 --> 0:23:49.160 will be dedicated during the time I'm there and then 0:23:49.200 --> 0:23:52.360 I leave. You know this, this takes a whole bunch 0:23:52.400 --> 0:23:53.560 of effort to get there. 0:23:53.640 --> 0:23:55.480 I mean, for for a month ahead of time. 0:23:55.720 --> 0:24:00.440